Glia

By Relvin Gonzalez

Brian's sister just disappeared. He was never well to begin with.

 

New York City lawyer Brian Grant has everything he needs to be an upstanding member of society: a good job, an office with the view, and a fresh bottle of antipsychotics keeping him sane. He also has everything required to spiral into the abyss: childhood trauma, lifelong mental health issues, and a sister with her own diagnosis who has gone missing.

 

Brian, desperate to locate his sister, ceases taking his medication to get a glimpse into her mental state. Leaving life as he knows it behind, he leaps into the surreal unknown. In this mind-bending search for the truth, reality blends with insanity, interweaving the barriers between right and wrong.

 

If Brian doesn't find his sister soon, he is likely to become trapped in the maze of his mind, and he might be so deep that he won't even realize he wants out.

 

Glia is a novelette about perception. A nightmarish dive into relativity.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Relvin Gonzalez
• Release date: Apr 23, 2023
• ISBN: 9781964803043

Book preview

Glia

GLIA

RELVIN GONZALEZ

BIRTHMARK PUBLISHING

Copyright © 2023 by Relvin Gonzalez

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

CONTENTS

Introduction

Part I

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Part II

Chapter 3

Hefnd

Chapter 1

Afterword

About the Author

Also by Relvin Gonzalez

INTRODUCTION

glia

noun nonneuronal tissue in the nervous system that provides structural, nutritional, and other kinds of support to neurons. It may consist of very small cells (microglia) or relatively large ones (macroglia). The latter include astrocytes, ependymal cells, and the two types of cells that form the myelin sheath around axons: oligodendrocytes in the central nervous system and Schwann cells in the peripheral nervous system. Also called neuroglia. —glial adj.

gliosis

noun an excess of nonneuronal cells (glia) in a damaged area of the central nervous system. A particular type involving the proliferation of astrocytes is called astrocytosis, although the two terms sometimes are used interchangeably. Gliosis is a prominent feature of some neurological disturbances, including stroke.

According to APA Dictionary of Psychology - https://dictionary.apa.org

PART I

1

At a high rise in the heart of Manhattan, in a corner office overlooking the honks, lights, and pedestrians of the city, a man sat on a squishy pellicle suspension chair calculating the time it would take for his body to land on the ground if he were to lunge through the window. Brian Grant wished that the day was going better.

The constant beeps of phones and clacks of shoes on the epoxied floors outside buzzed away into the background. The noise kept zooming out until the phone in his office rang. When he saw the number, he almost didn’t press the blinking button on the receiver, but the fourth ring did it.

Oh Brian, it’s awful!

What’s going on, Mom?

Something’s happened! I know it!

I told you, Lynn sometimes doesn’t pick up the phone. I’m sure she’s fine. She’s probably traveling or out with friends.

No! You check up on your sister. You go right now!

Brian looked at the words twenty seconds in the middle of the page. He put a blue square around it and closed the notebook. Alright fine. I’ll go at lunchtime. Just try to relax, you’ll blow a vein or something. I’ll call you later.

After pressing the button on the receiver, he grabbed a bottle of pills from a desk drawer and rattled it. He pushed the cap and twisted it open. The yellow capsule slid to his hand as he tilted the bottle. Looking at it, he revered the power it held to both cure or destroy him, depending on its location. The pill went down the hatch and he washed it down with yesterday’s bottle of water, now warm from the sunlight hitting his office. He took the bottle of pills and left.

During lunch, he walked in the general direction of his sister’s one-bedroom apartment. She’s probably just fine, he thought, and stopped for a bite at Katz's Delicatessen.

Outside her building, he pressed on the buzzer next to 4B several times. No response. He recognized an old lady walking out, first with a youthful spring in her step, then slower when she saw him. It was her neighbor.

She went out, she said.

Did she say where?

She says nothing to me. She started coughing. It was a dry and lifeless cough which hurt Brian more than her.

Brian sat on the steps to the building entrance.

I wouldn’t if I were you. She took her luggage.

When was this?

Two days ago, maybe five. Hard to say at my age. Hard to say. I need to get some groceries. It’s too bad I don’t have a car. It sure would make things easier. The old lady waited for a few moments and walked down the steps, making a pause at each step, and then down the street with a hunched back while holding on to her hip, turning back every couple meters. Brian wondered where his sister could have gone since she was an introvert and didn’t really have too many friends. There were only two plausible places she could be, with her parents, or in the New York apartment Brian paid for her.

She’ll turn up, said the police officer, taking his statement. His uniform showed off the name