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I got back to my residence in a daze. I dumped my bag and coat in my room and marched down to Dan’s room. I found his door open, so I leaned against the doorframe.
“Ethan!” He exclaimed.
“Let’s get drunk.” I said.
***
It was a party. Dan rounded up as many of our friends as he could, as a last holiday bash before classes started in the new semester. A crew of us headed down to the school pub, and Dan taught me about alcohol.
“This is vodka.” He said, handing me a shooter glass filled with clear liquid. I sucked it back, trying to ignore the flavour.
“This is tequila.” He said after a few vodka shots. It was amber, and tasted nasty by comparison. I drank a few of those.
“This is gin.” He said, handing me a glass. It was like drinking liquid pinesap, and I coughed afterwards. I preferred the tequila.
I let some of the girls pull me to the dance floor in between drinks. I cavorted. I celebrated. I rollicked. It was fun to be around people, at least while I was drunk. I talked to everyone, laughing and smiling. This was a lot better than sitting around depressed.
I would retreat to the bathroom. I had myself convinced that frequent urination would keep my somewhat sober, so I drank water. I would stare into the mirror, trying to focus. To help, I’d perform math problems or think about things from science class. Lately, I’d been fascinated by relativity with Einstein, quantum mechanics and the Big Bang theory.
Sometime in the proceedings Jon and some of the other guys from the dorm joined us, having heard from Dan about the party. Jon offered some sage drinking advice.
“You need to eat sometimes, so your stomach isn’t empty. Take it slow, especially your first time. Pace yourself. And don’t follow liquor with beer, it’s a bad scene.” He said.
I don’t think he realized I’d been drinking for an hour already, and Dan had made sure I’d had a lot. I was profuse with thanks, however.
“You’re the best, Jonny! That is great advice. I mean, really great! You are a great friend!”
Considering that I didn’t really like Jon all that much, this was an odd speech. I tried to clear my blurry mind. I remember finishing a beer someone bought for me and putting it down on the table. As the bottom of the glass bottle clunked on the wood tabletop, everything went blank.
My vacation was miserable after that. I had to sleep sitting up, keeping my nose elevated. It was swathed in a bandage fitted to its shape. Daily I had to take it off, clean myself up of dried blood and mucous, and then apply a new bandage. I took Tylenol with codeine for the pain, which made me feel groggy. All I could eat was soup and crackers.
Because I had to sleep sitting up, it meant I hardly slept. I watched movies and tried to keep my mind active. Unfortunately, being up late at night, isolated from my family, gave me too much time to think. My thoughts turned toward my solitude and to missing Faith. I tortured myself with memories, and wishes. I missed church and most of the family Christmas festivities because I was too ill.
I wandered the house at night in the silence, feeling isolated. I would watch the snow fall through the windows, painting the world in white. Nights seemed almost mystical, the world washed over in blue and black silence. The worst part of being so alone was that I could not feel the need to care. I felt no anticipation for Christmas, none of the wonder at the holidays that had been taken for granted in years past.
I thought about how I hated school, and didn’t want to talk to my friends, about missing Faith, and basically just wallowed in misery and self-pity. I even took to writing more depressing poetry.
The Snowflake
A snowflake
Falls to earth
Unlike any of the others, yet exactly the same
Distinct, and individual descending to join the masses
Where it becomes impossible to distinguish one flake from another
There’s just a blurry white blob of snow on the ground
Not a group of separate snowflakes
And when the weather warms they melt together
Forming a rushing current that flows far and fast
The idea of “one snowflake” suddenly has no meaning
There is simply the flow of water running downhill
For water always runs downhill
Rushing until it hits rock bottom where it gathers and grows
Drowning the snowflakes and their individuality
Turning them into a pool of stagnant water
Part of a whole with no direction
And the pool keeps growing
Swallowing the snowflakes
Just to feed its growth.
Which meant that I was severely depressed by the time I had to return to school, an individual being swallowed by the institution.
I no longer had to wear bandages, but I had been told to avoid physical exertion for at least a month, or risk tearing the healing tissue open. I packed a duffel bag of clean clothes and my father drove me to the bus. I sagged against my seat and looked outside.
The world was covered in snow. Tree branches were laced with dangling icicles. I loved winter, the simple beauty of white blanketing the world, like a blank page before you draw or write. Like God erased the world and then in springtime brought everything back, a fresh start.
On the subway, I half dozed. These windows mostly showed just concrete walls and the occasional light. I felt closed in. Halfway through the ride I glanced over and saw a girl trying not to watch me. I realize that sounds odd, but that’s what she was doing. Trying not to get caught for having watched me when my attention was elsewhere.
I glanced at her out of the corner of my eye and tried not to be as obvious. She had long black hair and deep, dark eyes. There was a sparkle of mischief there. She had a white winter hat and thick white coat, and a red scarf. I had to struggle not to stare. She was beautiful.
I was hunkered into my seat wearing a navy Toronto Maple Leafs toque and a thick black coat that hung almost to my feet. I had a thick growth of beard, having shaven only for my surgery three weeks before. I felt like I must look like a vagrant. She looked like she just fell out of heaven.
Nevertheless, she stood in front of me as the doors opened for the next stop.
“You have the most beautiful eyes I’ve ever seen.” She said, and then stepped off the train. The doors closed.
I sat there flabbergasted.
When I was twelve I got hit in the face by a baseball. It hit dead centre of my nose. I had a tremendous headache but still managed to play the whole game. What no one realized, probably because I acted like I was healthy enough to play, was that it actually broke. I guess it must have been a pretty clean break, since I never developed black eyes or any of the usual signs. I hardly noticed a problem until I started developing massive sinus headaches. It turned out that I had deviated my septum, effectively blocking a nasal passage and preventing it from draining properly. And, just like when I was twelve and ignored pain to play baseball, I ignored the headaches for years.
By the time I was in university I had wised up a little, and seen a nose specialist about the headaches. He recommended surgery, and since it would take a few weeks to recover, I decided to wait until December when I was off school. So, the day after coming home, I went to the hospital.
I dressed in a gown, and followed a nurse to the operating room. There I lay down on a table while someone attached an IV to my hand. My doctor showed up sometime during these proceedings, wearing a mask and surgical gown.
“All right Ethan, we’re all set.” He said. “I need you to count backwards from one hundred for me.”
“Okay. One hundred, ninety-nine, ninety-eight…” I drifted off as the anaesthesia in the IV took effect. Everything just slipped into darkness.
I floated in a black oblivion for a long time. I felt like I was swimming at the bottom of the ocean, and started pushing up for the surface. I struggled, kicking upwards, sensing the light. I swam on, faster now, eager. For some reason, I was sure that I would see Faith on the other side. I could feel her somehow. I burst through the surface.
Opening my eyes, I smiled. Sunlight streamed in the nearby window. I was in a hospital bed, alone in recovery. I remembered going in for surgery. I shook my head. It was almost as if my mind had woken up before my body, and I had to swim back to consciousness. It bothered me that, cut off from the world, my only thought was of Faith.
Exams approached at the end of the semester before the holiday break. Everyone was studying and working hard. Except me, it all seemed to come easily to me. That was more a frustration than a load off my shoulders. I wanted a challenge. Going to the gym with Daniel was the closest thing, as I had never really tried to be physically fit before.
My exams passed by with little fanfare. Each one was similar to the others: I’d sit in a different room from our usual classroom, find a desk near the back, finish before anyone else and then wait for someone else to turn theirs in so I could give the teacher mine and leave. I waited to be second just so I wouldn’t appear too keen. But honestly, I was just bored.
Once my final exam was finished I jumped on a bus and headed for the subway. I didn’t say goodbye to anyone, and didn’t want to. I just wanted to get off campus. I took the Greyhound back home, sleeping on the way. I couldn’t shake my ongoing feeling of fatigue; it felt like it was in my bones. Whenever I woke up I would glance outside, and see only the world gone to grey: December was bleak without snow.
When I exited the bus terminal there was a definite chill in the air, promising winter’s approach. I put my hood up and shoved my hands in my jacket pockets, waiting for my ride. A moment later my uncle’s truck pulled up and I hopped inside.
“How was school? Learn anything?”
I shrugged. “That parents are shelling out five thousand dollars for their kids to get drunk and flunk out. Everything else I could learn myself with time and a well stocked library, save myself some money.”
He laughed, and we drove off.
Dan did his best to prove me wrong. Over the next few days he became attentive and considerate with Teri, where before he would ignore her while talking to other people even if she was sitting beside him. He bought her flowers, took her out on dates, and seemed to be as head over heels for her as she was for him.
When not with Teri, he sought me out. We went to the gym daily, and in residence played video games on his Nintendo 64 or rented movies. We watched the World Wrestling Federation every Monday and Thursday; one of Dan’s favourites, and it was becoming fun for me. He avoided his seedier friends, and I took it as a compliment that he wanted to be around my “good influence.”
After a few weeks the strike ended amicably, and we went back to class. Dan came to me for help with some of his classes, displaying a work ethic he had lacked all semester. This new leaf was certainly lasting a long time. I wondered if he had really changed.
Dan and I continued our gym routine even while studying for exams. One day we were coming back from the field house. It was at the bottom of a wooded hill, with the school buildings up top. A long stone staircase led from one to the other. Just walking up it could make you out of breath. Dan frequently pushed us to run up it. But today he was more ambitious.
“We’ve got to get really buff you know.” He said.
“I think you’re already there.” I said, noting our size differential. He had at least forty pounds on me.
“No, I mean we have to get jacked up. How else are we going to be wrestlers?”
“Yeah, right.”
“No, I’m serious. We’re the world’s best tag team, and one day we’ll dominate, just like Stone Cold!”
I laughed. Stone Cold Steve Austin was Dan’s favourite wrestler, a bald bad-ass. He outweighed me by about a hundred pounds.
“Come on, Ethan.” Dan grinned. His enthusiasm was infectious, I had to give him that. “We’re running up the hill. Only the weak take the stairs.”
“What?” I asked with a laugh. He turned off the path and started trying to run up the steep hill through the trees. Unbelievable. I laughed again and chased after him.
Our legs pumped us up the slope, and we had to use tree branches as handholds on some of the steeper places, but eventually we reached the top, breathing hard and laughing.
“That was awesome! We do that every day, from now on!” He grinned.
“Deal!” I chuckled.
It was crazy, but it was fun. And that was something I had lacked lately.
I slept badly. A knock on my door startled me once I did fall asleep. I rolled over and saw that my clock said noon. I rolled out of bed and pulled on some track pants before opening the door.
“Hey, Ethan.” Dan said, standing in the doorway.
“What’s up?” I asked, bleary and dishevelled.
“I didn’t wake you, did I?”
“Uh, not really. Just having a lazy day. It’s no problem.”
“Okay. Well, I don’t know how to say this, but, uh, I wanted to say thank you.”
“For what?” I raised a quizzical eyebrow.
“For kicking my ass all semester, telling me to treat Teri better. I was lying in bed yesterday, and I had like, an epiphany. I realized you were right, and she deserved better from me. I should be grateful for what I have, instead of being stupid. So I wanted to tell you. I’m going to turn over a new leaf.”
“Um, you’re welcome? I guess.” I didn’t know what to say. It was nice to hear that some of what I said got through to Dan.
“Well, I owe you one. You’re a great friend, Ethan. Nobody else would have the balls to keep disagreeing with me, and be right.” He grinned. “Want to head to the gym later?”
“Sure, give me a couple hours.”
“Catch you later.”
I closed my door and thought for a moment. Dan was being his usual charming self, and he was saying all the right things. But underlying that, I knew he hadn’t been alone last night. I hoped, I prayed, something last night had given him a change of heart and he realized screwing around behind Teri’s back wasn’t worthwhile. This wasn’t some magic epiphany, this was guilt.
I rode back to school wallowing in my gloom. I lurched along, a zombie looking for a brain, the ability to think clearly. But I was stuck in dark broodings. I sat at the very back of the city bus that led to the school, slumping against my seat. I felt lost. I sat, staring at my navy blue sneakers, noticing that the right one’s toe was wearing through.
And then God spoke to me on the bus.
This girl in a red coat came towards me from a seat further up the bus. A ray of sunlight came from behind my seat through the western window, and its radiance lit up her face.
“It suddenly came upon my heart that I should tell you, Jesus loves you. I’ll be praying for you tonight.” The girl smiled softly, and then got off the bus at the next stop.
I would never see her again, but her words somehow awakened me. I felt lighter, and when I got back to campus I found a tree to sit under while the sun went down and night approached.
Nightlight
Children fear the night.
The coming of darkness brings them visions of monsters.
Only when a nightlight watches over them can they sleep.
They do not trust the gloom and this is a mistake.
The night is trustworthy.
How many stolen kisses have the stars seen?
How many lovers walked under a benevolent moon?
The night will never tell.
The night hides the secrets the day reveals.
Only by the light of day can you tell the difference between rich and poor.
There is only one colour in the dark.
In the dark we all look the same.
The day separates everything and everyone.
It makes things distinct, contrasting light and dark.
The sun demands to be seen the moment it is in the sky.
It expects to be noticed, and in its light everything else is noticed too.
Nothing is safe in the light.
Everything is exposed, every strength and every flaw.
But the dark wraps us in a blanket, comforts and conceals.
It demands nothing, expects nothing, for it is nothing.
Darkness is not a thing, so it cannot be a thing to fear.
Darkness is the absence of light, and night is the absence of day.
Yet, what wonders revealed during absence?
The stars, the secrets, the loves that can only be seen at night!
I need no nightlight for protection,
The intrusion of brightness would chase away the wonder.
I sleep easier knowing that the darkness is there.
The twilight gloom protects all I love.
The night is trustworthy.
It guards my dreams and I tell it my secrets.
All the things hidden during the day,
The night knows and it will never tell.
I lay in the cool grass looking up at the stars, feeling the wind as it raced across the field, flicking over me. Off in the distance were the school buildings and the two dormitories, and trees on the edges of the field. But lying here, looking up at the sparkling black velvet night sky, it was easy to believe I was alone in the world. Out here I could breathe.
Everything that moves is vibrating, and vibration causes sound. Even stars have their own radio signals. Sometimes, alone in the night, I could believe I heard them singing. With the peace that came in solitude, sometimes I could find my own heart-song. The whole universe would have harmony, broken into discord only when other people arrived.
Sooner or later, however, I would have to go back inside. Once I had breathed in enough cool, soothing night air, once I had listened to my silent song long enough, I would return to the chaos of student life. I sat up in the grass, sliding my green hood off my head. I brushed grass off my jeans and stood, heading back towards my residence.
When I reached the glass doors leading into the lobby, I could see a few cars pulling up on the other side. The lobby had doors to either side of the building, the field on one and a road through campus on the other. From inside the lobby I could see Teri grabbing her bag from one of the cars. Apparently she had returned to school.
“Hey, Ethan!” She said cheerfully as she came into the building.
“Hi, Teri. Dan will be glad to have you back.”
“Have you seen him?”
“I think so, earlier. I could go tell him you’re back, if you want to drop your stuff in your room.”
“Thanks!” She smiled, and we headed upstairs. I went into the second floor house towards my room, and Dan’s, while Teri went up to her house on the third.
As I turned the corner of the hallway I saw Dan in the distance, talking to a girl in the corridor outside his room. I walked closer, as his room was at the far end. I couldn’t really see who she was. My room was in the middle of the hall, two doors down from the shared bathroom. By the time I reached my own door I knew that the girl he was with was Melody. They went into his room together and closed the door.
I walked down the hall slowly. I reached Dan’s door, and could see from the bottom that the lights were off inside. I knocked on Evan’s door instead.
“Hey, Ethan.” Evan said, opening the door. “What’s up?”
“Have you seen Dan lately? Teri just got back and asked me to see if he was around, but his door is closed and his lights are off.”
“He was here a little while ago.” Evan shrugged. “We were talking, and then I had a phone call. I guess he left during that. Maybe he went down to the common room?”
“I don’t think so. I passed it on my way down. He probably took the side stairs to see someone, or maybe he went outside.”
Teri was coming down the hallway. I felt my stomach lurch in my stomach.
“Hi, Evan!”
“Welcome back, Teri.” He smiled.
“Is Dan around?”
“We were just wondering that.” I said. “His door is closed, and lights are out. We thought maybe he stepped out.”
I didn’t know what else to say. Daniel was supposed to be my friend, and you’re supposed to show loyalty to friends. But I strongly suspected he was doing more with Melody than just talking, and that meant he wasn’t really worth sticking up for. But then, church taught that you’re supposed to forgive people and help them do the right thing. I couldn’t figure out my responsibility.
“Ethan, you okay?” Evan asked.
“Hmm? What’s that?”
“You seemed lost in the clouds for a second.” Teri giggled.
“Sorry.” I felt sheepish.
“I’m just going to check his room.” Teri said.
I felt my guts churn as she turned the handle on his door. It opened, and she peeked inside. Then she closed the door.
“I guess he’s still in the building. His door’s unlocked.” She grinned. “Maybe I can still surprise him. I’ll check with Jon. If he shows up here, let me know so I can drop in, okay?”
“No problem.” Evan agreed.
I nodded, trying to breathe again. Teri headed off down the hallway.
I wondered why I was trying to protect someone who was willing to hurt an innocent girl that only wanted to care about him. I wondered why I was a friend to such a jerk.
Tension hovered over the campus the next few days. Picketers approached any car that wanted to enter the grounds. Professors didn’t attend classes. Good students worried about the status of their year, while bad students partied and drank. I could feel the stress crawling through the residence hallways like a lurking monster. The only respite I found was to walk by myself through the grounds, or to go off campus.
Fortunately, our school was in one of Toronto’s nicest neighbourhoods. Off the Bridle Path, most homes were worth millions. There were trees everywhere. Our own campus had been a wealthy family’s estate, bequeathed to the university for educational purposes. The manor house, with its large rose garden, was now home to a student pub, art gallery and offices. I enjoyed the crisp autumn air and the firework display of the leaves on the many trees almost as much as I had hated going to class.
A lot of students were vacating the dorms to go home until the crisis was over. Those that could. Many lived in the residence because home was in another province or country. Teri had been gone most of the week, and as a consequence, Daniel was grouchy. As I came back from my walk, I spied him down the hall talking to a girl I recognized as Melody, one of his flings from earlier in the year. She was laughing at something he said, and then brushed her hand down his thick arm. I shook my head and went back to my room.
By Friday I barely remembered the week. I think that I spent most of it sleeping, catching up on the lack of rest from the past few months. The residence was eerily quiet, like a ghost town. I was bored stiff, having caught up on my readings and few assignments. Going home for the weekend to work seemed a welcome break; at least I would be doing something, instead of just wasting time.
My uncle drove up at the bus station. I noted his grim expression immediately upon entering the vehicle.
“What’s wrong?”
“I guess you don’t need to worry about going to church this week. It’s cordoned off for a police investigation. Someone set the church school on fire.” He sighed, his fingers tightening on the steering wheel.
“Who would do that?” I asked, my voice loud with outrage. I felt my heart squeeze in my chest. I put my hands on the dashboard for balance, trying to catch my breath. My uncle watched this in silence. I felt a roll of vertigo: a mixture of rage, frustration and nausea. When I came to my senses, he was watching me, quietly.
“There are times in our lives where everything changes.” He said unexpectedly. “Sometimes we lose ourselves in those changes. Sometimes we are tempted to become someone else. And sometimes we find parts of ourselves that we never knew existed and become more fully what God made us to be.”
He grew silent, and I realized that this was the longest speech I had ever heard him make. I thought about asking him what he meant, or why he was telling me this. Then I realized that part of what he was telling me was that I was responsible for figuring it out for myself.
I tried to shake myself out of my mood. Everyone has tough times, I told myself. Sometimes it just comes down to attitude. I tried to embrace the enthusiasm the others were showing for their night out. Maybe it would help?
I made jokes with the others on the subway ride that night, laughing with them. I pretended to surf against the movement of the train, not holding onto safety bars. I had dressed for the night out, wearing dark jeans and a stylish top, gelling my hair on Dan’s advice. I tried my best to seem like a happy university student out with his friends.
But, on the inside, I was dying. I knew it was a lie.
Teri was practically sitting in Dan’s lap the whole ride, making a big deal about his last minute appearance, as predicted. She held onto his arm as we entered the club, looking up at him with stars in her eyes.
The music was loud, and I didn’t know whether to call it dance music, house music, or something else. The walls gleamed with iridescent colours under the various lights. The crowd writhed and gyrated to the music, and the combined effect caused a sensory overload for me, making my senses swim. I felt hemmed in by the press of bodies, trapped…
I excused myself to the bathroom, refocusing myself in solitude and relative quiet. I returned to our table, and was subsequently dragged onto the dance floor by Mandy. Teri and Erin took their turns as well. Dan had come along, but refused to dance. He sat at our table drinking, and drinking in Teri’s attention as well. In between, I would return to the restroom, to restore my sanity. I hated the crowd.
Towards the end of the night, Daniel disappeared from our table. The girls scattered throughout the mob to find him. I checked at the bar, and then the hallway leading to the bathroom. After all, the girls couldn’t go in there. It was empty. Beside the restroom was a set of stairs, leading down. I assumed they led to storage rooms. I could hear voices, however, so I crept down the concrete steps.
I descended, and peeked around the corner of the wall. One of the storage rooms was open, and contained a small crowd. Daniel was there, speaking with a tall man in a dark coat. He had pale skin and sunken cheeks. They shook hands, and I thought I saw Daniel pass him some money. The man gave Dan something back, which he deftly palmed and hid in a pocket.
I backed up the stairs and stood against the bathroom door. When Dan came up the stairwell a moment later, it looked as if I had just exited.
“Hey, there you are! We’ve been looking for you.” I exclaimed, acting glad to see him.
“Everyone ready to go?”
“Yeah, the girls don’t want to miss the last subway.”
“No problem, I’m done here.”
Two subways and a bus ride later, we were walking back onto campus. Dan strode ahead, and Teri hurried to keep up. I hung back with Mandy and Erin and the rest of the returning crowd. I had my hands buried in my jacket pocket, my head down. I looked up at Dan and shook my head to see him on his cell phone, ignoring his girlfriend.
Dan’s friend Jon and some others met us at the res building. He kissed Teri on the cheek and then walked off with this new group. I imagined he would be sharing whatever was in his pocket as soon as we were out of sight.
Ever since my philosophy paper, I had loathed most of my classes even in the rare cases where I liked the professors. The only class I was remotely interested in was Creative Writing. For years I had been writing prose, and our professor was convinced that good writers pushed themselves to go places they had never been, so he was pushing me towards poetry. I don’t think any of mine was any good, but it somehow gave me a different way to look at my feelings, something I couldn’t talk about with my friends.
I remembered how amazing my summer with Faith had been, and how much I looked forward to university. The world had seemed full of opportunity, like there was adventure waiting around every corner. Now, my life was in ashes, with no Faith, no real friends, and the possibility of losing my school. So I wrote about how that felt.
The Remnant
I am the one who was left behind
I am the forgotten, the soulless
The pale shadow following a course
set by an intrepid trailblazer
Only, when I reached the place where
The path ends, I did not find his feet.
I found only the dust in the wind,
Ashes that signified his passing.
“Destiny” is a place you must go,
and when he got there the earth opened
up and swallowed him whole. Hungry,
The world feeds on the souls of heroes.
Leaving their shadows to remember.
I may be forgotten, the lost one,
But I will remember forever.
I am the remnant. That is my curse.
Later, several of us gathered in the common room, where others were already gossiping about the strike. Some people wondered if they should go home for the duration. Others argued against that, hoping the strike would be resolved within days. We had already paid our residence fees, so it wasn’t like they’d be kicking us out any time soon. A large number of people had ‘wait and see’ attitudes.
I sat in the corner of a couch, barely registering the ongoing debates. As usual, I was lost in my own disordered thoughts. I pulled down the sleeves of my black sweater so they covered my hands, a nervous habit from my childhood that was now resurfacing.
People filtered in and out of the room at frequent intervals, changing the flow of conversation. Everyone was gathering news, passing on rumours, and sharing their fears. The less scholarly of us were treating it like a holiday, planning parties and excursions.
Teri and her best friend Mandy were excited about something, but I had not been paying attention to what, exactly.
“So, Ethan, do you want to go too?” Teri asked.
I shook my head, trying to focus. “Sorry?”
“A bunch of us are going clubbing on Thursday. Do you want to come?” Mandy repeated for her, laughing.
“I guess. Sure.” I said. Anything to do was better than nothing. Alone, I just worried too much anyway.
Dan spoke up. “I frigging hate clubs. Have fun.”
“That’s fine.” Mandy shrugged. “You can have fun here by yourself.”
“You’re not coming?” Teri asked, concerned. “Do you want me to stay?”
“No, of course not. Go. Have a good time. It’s not like we have to do everything together.” Dan grinned. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll be fine by myself.”
“Yeah, you two can hang out together after. Let’s go shopping, pick some new outfits!” Mandy encouraged her friend.
“I… I guess.” Teri said, trying to read Dan. “Okay.”
The two girls hurried off while I turned to Dan.
“You’re seriously not coming?”
“Oh, I’m coming.” He grinned. “I’m just not going to tell her so. Not until the last moment.”
“I don’t get it.”
“This way I’m her hero for doing something I don’t want to. She’ll be thrilled. If I agreed all the time, she’d take it for granted.”
I rubbed my face. “Why is it that complicated? Why not just make her happy right away?”
“I’m not giving up everything I like just because she makes plans. And this way, I give her what she wants, she might give me something I want.” He winked.
I grimaced. It seemed manipulative. Maybe I just didn’t understand relationships. No wonder Faith and I broke up.
It was Thursday, and the week was a blur. I barely remembered going to class, but now it was dinner in the cafeteria. My friend Angelina was talking to me about our professor’s lecture like I had been there. I shook my head, trying to clear the fog.
I walked over to the pizza corner, trying to decide on toppings. I blanked; did I want plain cheese, pepperoni, or deluxe with mushrooms and peppers?
Angelina touched my shoulder and I almost screamed I was so startled. Usually I knew whenever someone was close. My friends often called me ‘bubble-boy’ because I’m so sensitive about personal space. Only a select number of people were ever able to hug me.
Angelina stared at me with eyes wide with concern.
“Ethan, I called your name three times. Didn’t you hear me?”
I shook my head. “I guess I’m just tired.”
“I’ll say. You’re never here.”
I grimaced. And wondered where I really was.
***
I could hardly stand by Saturday morning. My uncle pulled up to my parents’ farmhouse, but turned to me before I exited the truck.
“Are you doing okay?” He asked.
“I’m fine.”
“I don’t think so. You haven’t been to church.” He noted.
Despite working the late shift, my uncle never missed church. He was a deeply faithful man. He believed in hard work, and honesty. He spoke little, but was always there when needed. My lack of attendance at church automatically concerned him. I took it as a sign of respect for my ability to solve my own problems that he had waited almost three months before mentioning it.
“I’m just tired.” I told him.
He looked at me. It was a look that said he trusted me, and that he knew I’d figure out whatever was bothering me. Because it was a look that also said that he knew I wasn’t telling him everything.
“You’ll go when you’re ready.” He said finally.
I nodded and got out of the truck, wishing I had his faith.
***
By the time I got back to school, Evan had bad news.
“There’s a strike, starting tomorrow!”
“What?” I asked, incredulous. He had come to my room at the time I always got back. I was just taking off my jacket when he burst in.
“The teaching assistants are picketing tomorrow.” He said. “They’ve been talking about the contracts being up all semester. Part-time teachers, too. Haven’t you been paying attention?”
I shrugged, groggy from lack of sleep.
“Most of the profs won’t cross the picket line. Some will hold classes off campus, but our whole semester might be at risk!”
I stared at the floor in silence, holding very still. My fists clenched, and so did my jaw. My chest felt like it was being squeezed.
“Ethan? Are you okay?”
I snapped out of it and looked at him with the same flat effect I seemed to show everyone lately.
“I’m fine.” I said. I just worked all summer and all semester for nothing, is what I thought. Just been isolated from friends and family for no good reason.
I closed my eyes, letting the shower spill over my face and hair. I lost myself in the sound of rushing water, the feeling of the hot beads spilling over my skin. I tried to forget the world.
I dried off eventually, putting my boxers back on and then my bathrobe. Wearing flip-flops, I left the bathroom and walked down the hallway. I could see Daniel down the hall, talking to someone through an open doorway. As usual, he was wearing only a towel around his waist, displaying his big chest.
Seventy percent of our student population was female. Out of thirty people in our section on this floor, only five of the students were boys. That wasn’t one of their rooms.
I returned to my bedroom to dress, pulling on jeans and a sweater. I headed over to Evan’s room, which was beside Daniel’s. I figured he had finished his last class by now.
As expected, he was in and his door was open. This was a universal signal throughout the residence, telling everyone you welcomed visitors. I knocked on the doorframe anyway.
“Hey, Ethan! What’s up?” Evan grinned. He was just setting down his books.
“You busy?”
“Not really. Come on in.” He gestured to his chair. I took a seat.
“How was class?” I asked.
“Not bad. I hate that it’s so late in the afternoon. By the time it’s finished it’s dinnertime and dark, and no one pays attention for the last half of class.”
I nodded. “I’ll try and avoid evening classes, then.”
“You going home this weekend?” He asked. I nodded. “Maybe you should head over to church. I bet Reverend Craig would like to see you, and so would Farrah. I’m going home to play in the worship band on Sunday.”
“I’ll think about it.” I shrugged, not committing to anything.
“You haven’t been all semester.” Evan probed. “You love church!”
I shrugged again. “Try working until six in the morning and then going to church at ten-thirty and classes all week.”
But that wasn’t the real reason. How could I explain that, for me, church was about connecting with God in my innermost self, and I could only do that with trust. Now I felt so disconnected from everything that I lacked faith in myself, and couldn’t bear to enter God’s house. I knew God could see me anywhere, but I couldn’t go to a place of celebration and worship. In all honesty, I could see nothing to celebrate.
Dan was training me in the gym, getting me to go to the sports bar and meet people. Evan was teaching me guitar and engaging me in philosophical discussions. Both thought that they were bringing me out of my shell. Neither of them suspected how far inside it I was hiding. I had become a chameleon, blending in, acting the way they wanted me to act. I didn’t want them to know how badly I was hurting.
I had not told anyone about dating Faith that summer, or about losing her. Some things lie so close to the heart that you can’t share them.
I sat alone in my room, attempting to write an essay. In a single day, I might be too tired to remember to tie shoelaces, zip my fly, or shave, but somehow I still finished my school assignments. Often at the last minute, but still, I was getting excellent grades.
Now, sitting at the computer, I had a dizzy spell that made me sag back against the chair, my head rolling back so that I was staring at the ceiling before I regained enough control to right myself. I stumbled to my bed, and felt vertigo even while lying down. I couldn’t tell if my sleeping pattern was driving me to exhaustion, or if I was going insane.
I dropped by Daniel’s room after class. He was sitting at his desk, hitting keys on his laptop. Like all the single rooms in the dorm, his was sparsely furnished: one wall held the bed, the other the window, the third the desk, the fourth a dresser and the door. The walls were large bricks painted white. He had decorated his with psychedelic posters of mushrooms and dwarves that glowed under his black-light. He was bold enough to leave Playboy magazines out on the wide windowsill where anyone could see them.
“What’s up?” He asked, turning his head to look at me briefly before going back to his computer. He was downloading music again.
“I hate this place.” I grunted, sitting down on the edge of his bed.
“Dude, you need to relax. Get drunk, get laid, get high. Something. Life is too short to take it as seriously as you do.” He grinned, turning from the computer. “Want to go to the gym?”
“Sure. Why not?”
Dan had been dragging me to the field house, training me in the use of the equipment. He weighed over two hundred pounds and had this massive chest, and felt I should try harder. We jogged there in sports-pants and sweatshirts, then shucked the pants for the shorts underneath, and stowed the sweatshirts in lockers so we could head to the machines in our t-shirts. Dan was my spotter; encouraging me to do more, work harder. I don’t think I ever put in the effort I should have, though I was noticing a significant difference in my muscles as weeks went by.
I grunted through the last reps of my set and then set the bar into its socket. Daniel gave me a knowing wink.
“She’s a hottie, eh? I’d love to get my hands on that.” Dan gave the girl in question a smile, and she smiled back.
I glanced at the girl on the treadmill that he was indicating. I shrugged.
“Aren’t you dating Teri?”
“Yeah, so?”
“So show some commitment to your relationship. You complained all semester about being single, and now you’ve got a girlfriend. Show her some respect by not flirting with other people, and show yourself some respect by honouring your commitment.”
“Nice speech.” Dan grinned, never ruffled by other people’s opinions. “Want to grab some dinner in the sports bar?”
“Sure.” I stood, and headed for the change room. I met him upstairs in the bar, and we sat in a corner table. From there you could see three television screens of different games. Hockey was on, and so was basketball. The other station seemed to be a sports commentary show. I ignored all three.
Dan ordered a beer and a double-cheeseburger with fries. I got a clubhouse and onion rings. He winked at the waitress.
“Want something to drink?” He asked, as usual. I answered with my usual ‘no.’
“Seriously, you need to lighten up, Ethan.” He smiled. “Life is about the pursuit of pleasure. Sometimes it’s in beer, sometimes it’s in a hot girl’s ass while she’s wearing tight shorts. I can’t believe you’re turning twenty in three months and you’ve never even had a drink. Not everything is life and death.”
“I think it is.” I said, in between eating.
“Obviously!” Dan laughed.
“I don’t want to drink, not yet, anyway. I have other things to think about, and that’s my choice. Your choices are your choices. I wouldn’t care if you were just screwing around.” I told him. “That’s your business. You were doing it with Laurie, and Melody, and Rachel, up until two weeks ago. But now you chose to have a relationship, with a girl who worships the ground you walk on. Honour that choice, the one both of you made.”
“That’s not a bad point.” Dan said, saluting me with his beer bottle. “But it doesn’t hurt to look.”
He punctuated this point by grinning at a waitress as she passed.
“It does. Your thoughts are on someone else, instead of on Teri. And you don’t just look, you flirt.”
“It’s not like I’m cheating on her!” He laughed.
I wasn’t so sure.
I lived in a hazy, half-sleeping state for most of the week, my sleep cycle disrupted by midnight shifts on the weekends, occasional all-night essay writing binges, nights up talking to friends, days waking up early for classes. Some days I didn’t sleep, others I collapsed for twelve hours. Time had no meaning, there were only classes or appointments each day that were checkmarks on a schedule. I was acing most of my classes, from sheer intellectual ability. I certainly wasn’t trying hard. That was the joke.
I lost all respect for the educational system in my philosophy class. The professor handed back our mid-term exams, essays on various subjects that had been written in class a week or two before. I barely remembered it. I turned over the exam to see my mark. Staring back at me, it read “100 percent. Please see me after class.” I wondered what he wanted. Did he think I cheated? Was it possible to cheat on a philosophy exam?
I sat in my desk, my thoughts clicking around in my head like a field of crickets, relentlessly chirping. To block them out, I kept tapping my pen against my knee, concentrating on the beat and sensation. I tried to get a grip on my anxiety. What did he want? I couldn’t guess, and that uncertainty let my thoughts spin.
The professor wandered over once everyone else had left. I had stayed in my seat, waiting for the crowd to clear. This class was one I actually liked, somewhat. The students were idiots, but the professor knew his material and had a subtle sense of humour. Every day he would poke his head into class, seeming absent-minded, and ask if this was Philosophical Classics? We would agree, and he would wander over to the podium, make odd chitchat for a few minutes about his life, some strange observations, ask if anyone had seen any good movies. Some students wondered if he was senile. Then he would wade into the lecture, precise, detailed, picking up where we left off last week, and only I knew that he was playing a joke. He enjoyed being eccentric, and wanted to see how much we bought into it.
Now, he walked towards me, lanky, plodding, his face that of a friendly grandfather. He sat down in the desk next to me.
“Thanks for staying.”
“No problem, sir.” I said, always respectful.
“I wanted to talk to you about your grade.” He began, and I wondered if this would be the first time I am ever accused of cheating. I really had no idea why he wanted to talk to me. “It’s incredible. In thirty years of teaching, I have never given anyone that grade. So, I guess what I’m saying is… keep up the good work.”
He genuinely wants me to excel. He sees potential. I thank him quietly and go on about my day. It feels strange. On the one hand, I think I should feel honoured, to be the highlight of someone’s teaching career, to impress a brilliant man. But all I feel is the death of my interest in education. If no one else has ever earned the same level of achievement, then it says less about him as a teacher and more about me as a student. Many teachers in high school had told me that I was a shining moment in their career, a rare prodigy. Now, I felt more alone than ever. I had not struggled for any of it. It was easy. I began to believe one of two things must be true: either I was made for more than this, or the world was empty and offered me no hope.
I began to wonder what it felt like to lose your soul.
It was Friday. I waited at the subway station for the arrival of my train. I stood close to the edge, head down, staring at the yellow line. The point of no return that you weren’t supposed to cross. The toes of my shoes rested on the border between concrete and yellow paint. The train arrived from down the tunnel, a rush of thunder and wind. I raised my face, feeling the powerful gust of air blow through my hair. It made me think of flying. This was often the best part of my week.
I stepped aboard once it rolled to a stop and its doors opened, and sat down. The people on the train studiously ignored each other, reading newspapers or books or the advertisements along the ceiling. I watched them for a while, wondering why they lived like this, and then stared out the window, watching the flashing lights go by. As a child, I would only travel to the city once a year to see the museum. Back then I would imagine the train was a time machine, taking me through time and space. Now, I just lost myself in the rhythm of the tracks.
Eventually we reached my stop, and I took the stairs to the Greyhound terminal. I found a window seat on my bus, and stared out at the city. It was evening, dusk painted the streets in grey light. People and cars moved around in my window in a dreamy haze. The world fell into twilight as we left town, passing by other cities, fields, and forests. I would watch oncoming traffic, lost in the white blur of their headlights travelling through the darkness. Then I would watch red taillights receding into the distance. The world was a Monet painting of blurred colours and lights. I drifted, lost.
It was fully dark by the time I arrived at the station. My uncle was waiting in his beat-up old pickup truck. He leaned out the window.
“You ready to work?” He said in his gruff voice.
I grunted agreement, throwing my bag in the truck-bed and hauling myself into the cab. He drove off.
“How was school?” He asked, trying to be polite.
“Fine.” I answered, not caring. He stopped trying to make chitchat after that. It didn’t suit him or me.
He was wearing the same heavy denim coat he always wore in the autumn. His beard was going grey, but his hair was still brown. I looked more like his son than his nephew, with my beard. His was a personal choice. Mine was from being too tired to shave. I was tired all the time.
I worked all night in the meat plant, cleaning up blood and chunks from the machines. Midnight sanitation crew. I made every surface clean, the metal shiny. I liked it because I restored order. I liked it because I worked alone.
In the morning, half asleep on my feet, I gathered my coat around me. Dark, forest green corduroy that gave comfort from its weight. I was wearing my favourite sweatshirt underneath it, a lighter green hoodie. It was increasingly colder every morning. I stumbled to the truck. He shoved my shoulder good-naturedly to wake me once we pulled up to my parents’ house. I sat up, blinking, and exited the vehicle. Yawning, I waved as he drove off.
I made my way inside as silently as possible, and tumbled into bed. I would sleep most of the day, and then work again the next night. Sunday I would head back to school in time for classes on Monday. One of my sisters said I was never home. A friend at school recently complained that I was missing everything there. I began to wonder where I lived. Perhaps on the bus, watching taillights and dreaming.
The alarm clock announced that it was six in the morning with a jarring blare. My hand slowly lurched out from under the covers like a zombie stumbling out of its grave. I hit the snooze button on my third awkward attempt, rolling over with a groan. Fifteen minutes later I repeated the process. My covers were a bundled mess overtop my sleeping form, blocking out the world. Only the insistent alarm intruded, interrupting me in fifteen-minute intervals until, finally, I sat up. Rubbing my bearded face, groggy with sleep, I saw that it was eight o’clock. I ran my fingers through my unruly shoulder-length hair and rushed off.
I arrived in class barely in time for the professor to start at eight-thirty. My hair was still a little damp from my hurried shower. My clothes were a rumpled mess.
“Enjoy your morning jog?” My Romanian friend Mihnea asked, referring to my supposedly daily ritual.
I grunted in reply and opened my notebook.
***
I was a ghost in the shipwreck that was my life. I had died at the age of fourteen, left in the snow like a discarded toy. Rescued, resuscitated, I dreamed of my own death each night. For years I concentrated my attention on my friend Hope, thinking she had saved me. Believing that she loved me. I eventually outgrew that unhealthy fixation, in time to fall in love with Faith Sheridan, and hope for new meaning in my life. Losing her left me feeling hollow and purposeless. Adrift.
I sat in the back of my classrooms, enjoying a silent contempt of my peers. My teachers in high school had promised me that university was better, that people there were alive with intelligence, bereft of the need to form cliques and ostracize those who were different. I was promised professors who were masters of their craft. I was told that I would be challenged, my mind expanded, my potential would become realized. I smirked now, listening to students who used twelve-letter words out of context, attempting to sound smarter than they were. After class they would be preparing for their Friday night parties and drinking binges. Granted, I had a few professors who could amaze you with their knowledge, but most of them were pompous idiots. And certainly none of them were challenging me, not in first year. On the whole, they were boring.
So I sat in the back, turning invisible. Occasionally I would speak up, hearing some infantile comment from some would-be intellectual and condescending to explain to my peers some insight about Nietzsche or Aristotle that would otherwise have been beyond their grasp. I was this dark, brooding wunderkind that impressed professors with his youthful wisdom, intimidated his classmates, and surprised everyone with his rare breaks from silence. Most people on my floor in the student residence had been unaware that I lived there for the first several weeks. It was a shock to Daniel and Evan that they lived on the same floor as I did when we finally ran into each other. I had known for weeks and just never bothered to say hello. I had become so good at being silent, and unobtrusive, that most people didn’t see me even when I passed them in the halls.
I didn’t care. About anything. I saw no reason to. What use was any of it when I was alone?
My imagination is a monastery, and I am its monk
John Keats
I lay in the sand for an age, not caring that the sun blazed upon me mercilessly. I was devoid of thought, lost to myself. The world spun away from me and darkened. I learned something then, something that had not occurred to me in all my years in the desert. For the duration of this odyssey, I had not felt fear, nor despair. The depression that often gripped me in my youth had lifted. I had faced tremendously trying times, yet not once had I given up hope. Unconsciously, I had assumed that those days were over, that somehow negative emotions would no longer plague me. In fact, I had believed that my division had separated me into positive and negative poles, like a magnet. The beast, Donovan Reza, seemed to contain my darkest aspects, and I had taken for granted that I would never feel bad again.
Now I learned something. While I felt no fear, there was a terrible longing in my soul incapacitating me. Without Mara, I felt I could not move. I ached within, with all forward motion halting, all motivation evaporating. Like a compass that had lost its bearings, I had no sense of direction. As I lay on the burning sand, my thoughts turned upon this feeling.
It was familiar. You know that sense you have, when going out for the day or on a trip, that you’ve forgotten something? That indefinable tickle in the back of your head or your gut that says something is wrong? Whether it was your wallet or your keys, you know that something is missing, but you cannot place what. Not until you need it, or when you find it days later. I have felt that lack, every day of my waking life, save for my time with Mara: the sense of being incomplete, only on a far more intense and longer lasting level than the one for errant car keys.
My imagination in the form of a hawk had once cast me out into the wide world and the sword had taken me through time and space. Now my memory sent me away from this empty desert to a time that may have been just as empty, in its own way.
We travelled for a long time. Days, hours, years, none of those things mattered in this spiritual realm. I had already learned that journeys lasted as long as they were supposed to here, and that time was a tricky concept. I had already spent fourteen years in the desert, and it never seemed quite that long. I could not tell you how long we walked along that safe green sward, only that we slept when we had to, ate when we were hungry.
We walked in silence most of the time. I didn’t want to interrupt Mara’s thoughts, or interfere with her decision. Perhaps I was wasting the last few days we would be together, but at the same time I didn’t want to influence her. It was confusing for me, to feel this need for her, to want her with me, to choose me, to give my life meaning. But I also knew deep down that her happiness and well-being were even more important to me. I had to let her be free, to make the choice not for my sake but for her own.
I have never felt so torn. I loved her so much, and could not imagine losing her. But I also could not live with myself if I forced her to pick me, leaving her to wonder what her life might have been like if she hadn’t. The choice had to be hers. There were days in the desert where she would fly off to be alone, sometimes for hours, sometimes for what seemed like days.
Whenever I was alone I could not sleep, and hardly ate the food a silent Raphael brought to me. We did not speak, but I could see in his eyes that he felt as I did. Raphael was torn with wanting his daughter at his side, or letting her be free to make her own choice in a world that could be dark and dangerous.
It was odd, to communicate wordlessly this way. I think we respected each other, somehow coming to an understanding, but at the same time we both wanted opposing things. If he got what he wanted, I would lose her, and vice versa. We both understood what the other felt, and empathized, but could not speak of it to each other.
As Mara and I walked the green path, it began to grow wider. Eventually there were more flowers, and then trees. Soon there were entire forests and rivers, green growth all around us, the path widening to touch the horizons around us.
“What is this place?” I asked.
“We are in a place where faith is not dying, but living.” Mara said, pointing out what should have been obvious, given my previous experiences of the symbolic nature of this strange reality.
“Where in the world is there faith like this?” I asked. “I saw so much suffering, so much darkness…”
“Oh, I think you’ll recognize it when you see it.” Mara smiled. We walked a short distance, and she stood under a large tree. A tree I recognized.
We were standing in a field, green grass all around us, with hills and more trees in the distance. But the lone tree she stood under matched exactly my memory of a tree in our yard at the family farm, one that I had learned to climb on as a child visiting my grandfather, years before my parents had moved us into the house.
“Are we…?” I couldn’t say it.
“We’re standing where your home would be, if we were in your world.” Mara said, holding my hand. “Your town has kept their faith, all these years. Your sisters, your parents, neighbours, friends. Here is a place where God is still worshipped.”
She sounded proud: proud of them, proud of where I came from, proud that some humans could resist the dark times that had enveloped the world, I couldn’t tell. But I was proud of them too, of them for being who they were. And I was happy to be close to my family, if only in spirit.
“You’re going to have to make your choice soon, aren’t you?” I asked.
“Yes.” She replied.
I took her hands in mine, and fought back the tears I could feel welling up in my eyes. I looked up at her.
“Mara, I love you. I have never felt safer in my life, than with you. Or happier. There is no place I would rather be than with you. I have searched for you my whole life, dreamed of what you would be like. The reality is far better than anything I could have imagined.”
She kissed me gently, her way of saying thank you.
“I want you to choose whatever you think is best. But, Mara, I don’t want you to choose humanity because of me, if that’s what you’ll choose. I would want you to choose it for yourself. I don’t know what it would be like to be in Heaven, I’ve never been there. But it sounds like a place where you won’t be able to choose for yourself who you want to be.
“On Earth, as a human, it can be frightening and scary, but it is also a place where you can be free. If I understand anything about God, then the Lord gave human beings freedom to choose. Between good and evil, certainly. But also to choose what to have for lunch, how to dress, what to do for a living, how to have fun, who to be friends with. All day long you get to make choices about who you want to be. That much freedom can be confusing.
“But it can also be wonderful. Every day is a new choice, you get a new chance to be who you want. You’ve never had that choice, to figure out who you want to be. I think that if you choose humanity, it gives you the freedom to be who you want to be. If you become an angel, you’ll never have had those choices. And I won’t be with you in Heaven, if I understand anything about this choice. Humans and angels aren’t the same. But, if you choose to be human…” I paused, choking on the words, but needing to say them.
“If you choose to be human, I think you should go to Earth, by yourself, and figure out what it means to be Mara the woman. I don’t want to be away from you, but I don’t want to be someone else telling you who you are, either. I don’t want you to do this for me, I want you to do this for yourself. I want you to be free, to do whatever you want. If someday you chose me, that would be the greatest blessing God ever bestowed on me. But the only humanity you’ve seen is through my eyes, in my life… I want you to have the chance to have your life on your terms.”
Tears were flowing down my face, it was so hard to say all that. But I knew loving her meant leaving her free, in every way. Letting her go. Loving herself meant finding out who she was, who she wanted to be, and she had never had that opportunity in Heaven. It broke my heart, but I had to let her know that she came first, not my own selfish need to have her near me.
Mara’s soft hands rested on my cheeks. Softly, deftly, her thumbs wiped away my tears, and then she kissed my lips gently.
“Sometimes we think so much alike it’s scary.” She smiled. “For days I’ve been trying to figure out what it would be like to be human, because I don’t want to be an angel. I don’t want to belong with people who would never take me as I am. But if I became human, I wouldn’t know who I was, it would be so new. How could I expect you to ‘take me as I am’ when I didn’t know what that would mean?
“Being without you, figuring it out my own way for once, seemed the only answer. That’s the only way I would know if I could love myself, and then give myself to you. If that was even the right thing to do.
“But that was such a scary thought, and I didn’t know how to talk to you about it. But you know, you feel it too. It means that it’s the right thing, and that it will all be okay.”
She hugged me tight. I held her close, feeling our heartbeats in rhythm together, savouring the sensation of her warm body pressing to mine, feeling her breathe, smelling her hair. I squeezed tight, and then let her go.
“Now use your sword, Ethan. Let it show us the truth.”
I drew my blade, shining white, and held it out. She stepped forward, as strong and brave as always, even with tears in her eyes, and I pierced her with the blade. I moaned, tears streaming again, and the bright flash of light knocked me to the ground. There was a wind, but I could see nothing because of the light. I shaded my eyes, blinking, as the light began to dim. For a moment I saw a tear in reality, seeing my house beyond the tree, seeing a woman with wings growing shorter, her wings disappearing, and then as the window to the world closed I saw her turn and raise her hand in farewell…
When the light was gone, I was alone in the desert.
We walked for a long time in silence. I remembered what I was like when I was young: quiet and shy, afraid to speak to people. In high school and university I metamorphosed into a chatterbox who never shut up, with people I was friends with, anyway. But my time in the desert had shown me that my talkative behaviour was the same as my quiet childhood: in both cases I had been unsure around people. Silence protected me from having to trust them with my thoughts, and talking too much accomplished the same thing. So long as I was talking I would seem fine, seem engaged, but in reality I still felt out of place no matter who I was with.
But with Mara it was different. I didn’t feel the need to talk with her. I was happy just being quiet, sitting with her or walking, or listening when she wanted to talk. I felt at peace with her, like I belonged.
She looked like she was about to say something probably a half dozen times while we walked, but each time she stopped herself, as if uncertain about how to begin. Something was going on in that pretty head of hers, but I didn’t want to rush her about it. She would say what she needed to when she was ready. I was just glad to be with her.
We fell asleep on the path, Mara wrapping her wings around us as we nestled down on the grass. I held her hands in mine, kissed them gently, and settled in to sleep. I could feel her breathing, sense her heartbeat, and I knew she would be awake for a while after I went to sleep.
As a child I had learned something of a trick with my siblings, while holding them when they were babies. If I did my best to relax myself, changing my breathing, eventually calming my heartbeat, they often fell asleep even if they had been agitated before that. Now I concentrated on exuding that same calm atmosphere, hoping to help Mara sleep.
I know it put me to sleep, anyway. I don’t know if it helped her or not, but when I awoke in the morning she was asleep in any case. I gazed in adoration, memorizing her face. I had never felt so safe, or so lucky. She eventually awoke, those startling eyes meeting mine. She smiled.
“Good morning.” I said, and handed her a flower I had found on the path. She smelled it and smiled again, tucking it behind her ear.
“Thank you.” Mara said, and then kissed me. Her hand felt soft and warm on my cheek. When our kiss ended she spent a long moment staring into my eyes. I blushed a little, not used to this kind of scrutiny.
“I have something to tell you.” She began. I only nodded, giving her encouragement to continue. “Long before you were born God promised me that I had a soul-mate, someone who could make me whole. My father, yesterday, was saying that God wants me to know that time is coming. Because you are the one who makes my heart feel whole.”
I felt emotion surge through my body. Every nerve ending in my body seemed filled with light, no compliment could mean more to me than her words. I felt tears in my eyes and could not respond.
“God told me I would have to make a sacrifice, and my father said yesterday that I have to make a choice. I think that at the end of this path I have to choose between being an angel or being with you.” Mara said, tears in her eyes. “I can be wholly an angel, and be accepted by my family in Heaven. Or I can be wholly human and be with you.”
I felt a lump in my throat. I had lost her once, that summer where she had been Faith. I knew how much that had hurt then.
“Mara, I love you.” I said at last, finding my voice. “But I will never stand in the way of your dreams, your plans, your choices for your life. I want you to do what you feel you want the most. If you need time to make the choice, if you want space, I can understand that.”
She looked into the distance for a long time. I sat there, my heart beating rapidly, my chest locked up tight, not knowing if I should say more, or if I had said too much, questioning what I was to do. I loved her beyond words, wanted her with me, but knew that I could not say I loved her if I could not let her follow her own heart wherever it might lead. I wanted her to be free to be herself, not just who I wanted her to be.
“When I lived in Heaven, I felt like I didn’t belong. My father was very caring, and my Uncle Jeremiah did his best. Our friend Enoch was very kind. But most of my family, the other angels, didn’t care about me one way or the other. I know they talked about me behind my back, I know that they didn’t want me there. I never knew my mother, and never really had anyone to talk to about how I felt. I was always lonely, even when I was surrounded by angels, in the midst of Heaven.”
I listened, and my heart broke for her, the alienation she must have felt for countless years in that place among people who could not see her for who she was, how amazing Mara was. I was astonished that they were blind to how wonderful she was, the depth of her soul, her strength, her heart.
“I have learned a lot about humanity, from the Library and from watching your life.” Mara continued. “I know that there is cruelty, pain and suffering among your people. I also know that there is compassion and love. There is risk and danger, the possibility of sinning and damnation, the possibility of grace and redemption. So much confusion, so many choices, Heaven isn’t like that at all.”
She wiped tears from her eyes, sniffling. “No one in Heaven cries, either.” Mara tried to smile, and I laughed with her, sniffling back my own tears. I knew that this choice was difficult for her.
“If I become an angel, I’ll finally belong.” Mara said. “It will be my home, not just the place I live.” I nodded, understanding. “But if I become human, I become just as vulnerable as any other person, with all the chaos of that life… It’s frightening, in Heaven no one ever worries. But no one ever chooses either.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Angels and humans are not the same.” Mara said. “We’re like different species. Both are children of God, and there are similarities, it’s possible for us to interact… But aside from the superficial differences, the main difference between a human and an angel is that human beings have free will, and angels don’t. They never make a choice, ever. They do what they do because it is in their nature. I am the only angel who ever had to make a choice, because I’m half-human.”
“So if you choose to be an angel, that’s the last choice you’ll ever make for yourself?” I asked. Mara nodded solemnly. “But being human includes the risk of making wrong choices, or being vulnerable to the choices of others?”
“That’s right. As an angel I could never be harmed, never die.”
I closed my eyes, praying for strength.
“I think that you should give your choice a lot of thought.” I said. “We have until this path ends, after all. Who knows how long that will be? I also think that, no matter what you choose, I will support you and love you either way. I just want you to be happy.”
Mara smiled, and then flew off to get me breakfast. Meanwhile, I held myself and cried. I felt overwhelmed with emotion: I couldn’t believe that she had grown up in Heaven unloved by angels, I didn’t want her to leave me, but I also didn’t want to ever see her hurt… There was too much, all of it was confusing. I had spent my whole life waiting for her, and felt like I could not bear it if she left. But she had spent her whole life being unsure of who she was, what she was supposed to be. Her wholeness, her feelings, seemed more important than mine. I wanted Mara to be Mara, even if that meant she had to leave me.
Why does this keep happening? I looked around and saw the wilderness once again, endless miles of sand going on past the horizon. I stood up and dusted myself off. I was uncertain of what to do next: the last time I had been in this spiritual realm I had been near the mountains. Now I was once again in the middle of nowhere and I had no idea which direction to go.
I suppose I should have been frustrated. After all, I had intended to hunt Reza across the continent until I could end his sinister life. Now I had been prevented in my intention, removed from my own world once again. Yet I knew that these spiritual journeys had a purpose, and so I guessed that I was back in the desert for a reason. I stood still, trying to think if I had any clues as to direction. Where I was supposed to go from here?
I could see no landmarks. No rocks, not a single cactus, and there were no signs of mountains on the horizons in any direction. I could arbitrarily choose to go anywhere I wanted, or I could stay where I was. Remembering the best way to get found when you’re lost, I stood still and waited. The hot sun beat down on me, and sweat began trickling from my brow, but still I waited.
In retrospect, I suppose that I could have prayed. It had helped me before, after all. However, I reasoned that, if I was here for a reason, then that reason would be made apparent in time. I was not going to ask for help when I was not really in trouble, because the place I would call to for help had put me where I was already. Does that make sense? Heaven had put me here, so I was not going to ask Heaven why, I figured they would tell me when it was time. Otherwise, I was going to stay where I was.
It was rude. No matter that I didn’t feel any annoyed or angry emotions, I knew that they were moving me around like a pawn on a chessboard and I did not appreciate it. Standing still was my only means of expressing that I was an independent entity, capable of thinking for myself and refusing to be manipulated. I was a faithful servant of God, and was willing to be obedient to the Lord’s will, but I was not about to ask for Heaven’s help to get out of a situation Heaven caused. If they wanted me to be part of the plan, then they could tell me, I wasn’t going to ask.
My mother always said that I was a stubborn child, I would never just meekly do what I was told. I always asked why I had to do it. She learned early on to explain things to me, give me a reason, and then I would quite often accept her reasoning and do as she asked. I would never do anything I didn’t understand. I was too independent.
I remember my friend Angelina joking that I could never make it in the army, back at university. A friend of hers from the Royal Military College was visiting, and she remarked that I could never do that. I asked “Why?”
Her answer was “You always have to ask ‘why’ for everything!” She simulated a conversation between me and a drill sergeant (as Angelina was a drama major, play-acting featured in a lot of our conversations):
“Pitney, drop and give me fifty!”
“Why, sir?”
“Pitney, do twenty laps!”
“Why would I do that, sir?”
“Pitney, shoot the enemy!”
“Why would I shoot him sir? What did he ever do to me?”
She made me laugh, I have to admit it. I also have to admit that she hit the nail on the head: if things weren’t explained, I didn’t buy into them. I never responded to authority for authority’s sake. If someone had proven their leadership skills, earned my respect, had a good reason for what they were asking, then I would listen. But Heaven had interrupted my plan, one I thought was part of my overall purpose, and until someone told me why I was not going to budge an inch.
My mother once told me I couldn’t get up from the table until I ate everything on my plate. I sat there for several hours, just to prove a point. It may have been the most boring evening of my life. I could have ended my misery at any moment, but that was the point: What I did with my time was up to me, not to anyone else. Of course, proving that point left me tired and bored. I said I was stubborn, I didn’t say I was smart.
I wondered, however, if this time it would leave me starved, dehydrated, or worse. Could someone starve on a spiritual plane of reality? Did the usual rules still apply? I wished Mara were here. She would know. Plus, she had an uncanny talent for making me feel better.
I suddenly felt a tap on the back of my head, so I turned swiftly. There was no one there, so I immediately swerved back around to my original position, to see Mara, hovering upside down, her hair askew. She smiled warmly and kissed the tip of my nose.
“You’re awfully stubborn.” She laughed. “Staring eye contests, silent treatments, you just don’t give in easily.”
“And what you’re doing is physically impossible. Wings create lift, they don’t hover, especially upside down and without flapping.” I countered playfully.
“Physics don’t apply here, this plane has different rules.” Mara giggled, and tickled my armpits from her odd position. I laughed, and before I fell over I grabbed her by the forearms, pulling her down on top of me as I hit the sand. We squirmed and laughed as we tickled each other.
“Stop it before you make me pee!” She said through her laughter.
“Can angels pee?” I asked, and reached to tickle her some more to find out. Mara slapped my hands away with a giggle.
“Not most of them. I’m kinda unique.” She said. “And if you asked my uncle Raguel, he’d say I wasn’t very proper, either. Angels probably aren’t even supposed to say words like ‘pee’ I think.”
“Well, I’m ‘kinda’ glad you’re unique.” I smiled, kissing her softly. “I’d say that I missed you while I was on Earth, but I was pretty sure you were there helping me the whole time.”
“Well, I DID miss you.” She said emphatically. “Do you know what it’s like to wait your whole life to hold someone in your arms, and then all you can do is watch them? I missed touching you.” Mara ran her fingers through my beard and into my hair, wrapping her long legs around my waist and kissing me with meaning, showing me just how much she had missed me.
After a blissful eternity like that, I reluctantly broke the kiss and smiled. “Okay, I admit it, I missed you too. Being able to kiss you is a lot better than just thinking about you all the time.”
She moved to kiss me again and I heard a familiar polite cough. We turned to see her father standing there, his eyes slightly averted, waiting for us to make ourselves “appropriate.” We stood and I could see Mara’s cheeks flush while we brushed sand off our clothes.
“Hi Dad,” she said sheepishly.
“Hello, Mara, Ethan.” Raphael said warmly.
“Hello, sir.” I said, feeling like a teenager picking up someone’s daughter from their house. Then I remembered that he (or someone in Heaven, anyway) had lifted me out of my reality and my plans to this desert place.
“Why are we here?” I asked him, coming straight to the point. “I was kind of intent on a purpose.”
“I know, but there’s plenty of time for that later.” Raphael said.
“Later? Reza is a killer, and my visions showed me that he’s really a beast! I can’t just let that monster do his work out there in the world, wearing my face.” I argued.
“There are forces at work that you are not entirely aware of.” Raphael said, not unkindly. “It’s not as simple as it might seem to you. I know you want to stop him, and you will when it’s time. But you’re not ready yet. You just have to trust me on this one. Heaven has a purpose here, and when it’s time, I’ll be able to tell you about it.”
“So what do I do in the meantime? Wander through the desert some more?” I waved my hand at the empty wilderness.
“No. I have been empowered to make an offer.” Raphael said, his voice tinged with some unnameable emotion. I couldn’t figure it out, but there was something about this task that bothered him.
“You’re going to make me an offer? For what?” I asked.
“Not you. Mara.” Raphael locked eyes with his daughter. She had been standing beside me silently, letting us talk, and I appreciated her supportive presence. Now her demeanour visibly changed, as she stiffened as if with a sudden shock.
“Me?” She said, her voice filled with a mixture of curiosity, hope and fear. Her father’s jaw clenched. Mara’s hand slid into mine for comfort.
“God the Father has given me a message for you.” Raphael told her. “He says that your time to choose is coming. You can be whole.”
“Now?” Mara asked, and again there was mixed hope and fear.
“You have time to make up your mind. Follow the path, at its end you will have to make your choice.” Raphael finished speaking, and abruptly unfolded his wings and flew off faster than my eyes could follow.
Mara’s hand squeezed mine, and she looked at me with tears in her eyes. I said nothing, trusting that she would explain when she needed to. I only smiled and gently squeezed back.
We looked to the east and saw a green path, like the one Gwen and Genevieve had created that had led us to the mountains. I guessed that this one led back towards my childhood home, on the earthly plane anyway. For now it was just another faithful path for us to follow.
Ethan’s Note
Azazel. I don’t know why that name struck me when I watched “The Fallen,” but it has stayed with me. At first I wondered if it was just made up, but then I heard it again in Torah class. My professor talked about it being like an inversion of divinity in the wilderness, the direct opposite of God. One goat was given to the Lord, the other to this evil force.
The King James doesn’t even say Azazel, but then, it has a lot of inaccuracies to begin with. The scapegoat reference is because that’s what sacrificial goats were, that’s where the term comes from. They escape carrying the sins of the people. I did some research, however, and Azazel means more than just being separated for a sin offering.
Azazel wasn’t just made up for the film, it’s an actual demon in Jewish legends, according to an author named Ginzberg. I found his book on the Internet, after my prof talked about him. In some legends Azazel fights with an archangel and seems to be a leader among the demons. We’re talking pure evil here.
***
Gwen shivered. She tucked the note back inside Ethan’s Bible and replaced both translations back on the shelf.
“Ethan had some weird hobbies,” she said. “Why was he so interested in all of this stuff?”
“He believed in God,” Genevieve said. “Does believe, I mean. He wanted to know everything he could, that’s all.”
“I wonder why he left the note in the movie, and in the Bible,” Zoë said.
“Maybe so we’d find it.” Gwen postulated. “He did leave his journals for us. Maybe there’s something he wanted us to know, or something we’re supposed to figure out.” Gwen felt a shiver of excitement, for she loved mysteries. It was something she had in common with Ethan, apparently.
She turned back to the bookshelf, examining the other films she had never been able to see. “Have either of you ever watched ‘Seven,’ or ‘Fight Club?’”
“‘Seven’ is about a mass murderer, I think.” Zoë said. “He goes after people who have committed one of the Seven Deadly Sins, and makes the punishment fit the crime.”
“I remember it being pretty gory.” Genevieve added. “And Fight Club had a guy who gets involved in underground boxing, and other crimes, only to find out that the ringleader of it all is really him, the person he thought he was following was more like an imaginary friend.”
“That sounds so weird!” Gwen said.
“Well, it makes more sense if you see the movie. It’s like having split personalities, only thinking the other personality is a person you can talk to.” Evie told her. “You’re unaware that you’re alone.”
“I remember some psychology from university, the idea of a suppressed personality is in a lot of works. People tend to repress their darker urges, Jung talked about the ‘shadow’ in people’s lives.” Zoë added.
“That’s like the Dark Half, I told you Evie! Ethan is bizarrely interested in dual personalities, the dichotomy of being two people at once.” Gwen said. “That’s so strange: Ethan read stories and watched movies about people having two sides to themselves, and now Ethan has his own evil doppelganger.”
“What are you trying to say, Gwen?” Zoë asked her.
“I don’t know, I’m just noticing an odd coincidence maybe. It’s just that his life is imitating art, sort of. Like his childhood stories are being lived out.” Gwen scrunched her nose in thought, trying to process everything. “Evie, Hope once told me that you all played a Camelot game as children.”
“That was a very long time ago. I hardly remember it.” Genevieve said. “I’m surprised you remember Hope well enough to recall a conversation with her.”
“Yeah, well, I guess she left an impression. In the game, do you remember who played Guinivere?”
“I did. And Neal was Arthur.” Eve and Zoë were sitting on the bed, looking at her as she stood by the bookshelves. Gwen took a step closer.
“Who was Lancelot, Evie?”
“Alexander played him, why?” Genevieve stared at her sister with a perplexed expression. “What does that have to do with Ethan’s taste in movies?”
“Maybe everything. Did you ever watch ‘Excalibur,’ or read Le Mort d’Arthur?”
“I guess I watched it when Ethan and I were kids. I didn’t read a lot of the books he liked, though, and that one was really long.”
“What happened between Arthur, Guinivere and Lancelot, Eve? Do you remember?” Gwen said, and it seemed as if she was getting frustrated with her sister.
“The two men were in love with her, and fought over her. When Lancelot took her away, Arthur and his army went to war with him. So?”
“Evie, think about it!” Gwen was definitely frustrated now. “You were Guinivere!”
“Sure in the game…” Eve paused, and then a dawning comprehension lit up her face, as it did Zoë’s in the same moment. “It’s just like the story!”
“Arthur and Lancelot fighting over Guinivere, Neal and Alex trying to kill each other…” Zoë said, shivers running up her spine.
“But this is real life, not a storybook.” Eve insisted. “How could Ethan’s stories change real life? That’s crazy.”
“The whole world’s gone crazy, sis.” Gwen said. “The question is, why? Why is it happening? Why did your life follow the pattern of a book and a childhood game? Why does Ethan keep reappearing and disappearing, and why are there two of him? The question is why, and we don’t have enough answers.”
Next Chapter: Intermission
or, if you haven’t already, now might be a good time for reading The Companions
Their parents were surprised, to say the least. They hadn’t seen their children in seven years, but that didn’t stop them from welcoming home those they had considered lost. The reunion was quiet, the Pitney parents realizing that their daughters were exhausted from their long journey, but there was some thankful weeping and a lot of hugs. Zoë was put to bed immediately, while Gwen and Eve stayed up a little longer to talk with their mother and father. It wasn’t long, however, before they had to get some sleep.
Gwen woke up first of the three of them. She looked out the window of her bedroom and guessed that it must be mid-morning by the position of the sun. Without electricity her old digital clock did not work. The house was still. She guessed that her parents must have gone into town.
Gwendolyn found that her mother had thoughtfully put clothes out for her just outside the door. She was pleasantly surprised to recognize that the old jeans and sweater had belonged to Ethan. Though her parents had always found her habit of memorializing her brother odd, at least they were supportive, and at least they had remembered.
Gwen crept silently across the hall to Ethan’s old room, and slipped inside. It was still exactly as she remembered it, exactly as he had left it so many years before. It was so strange, to come home and find nothing different. She wondered why her parents refused to move on, and she also wanted to know why the area had been left untouched by the plagues and tribulations that affected the rest of the world.
She let her eyes slide over