Release

  As he said these words, he whispered under his breath, “The girl in the bubble has to come back.”

  Johannes stumbled along the grey, stony plains that led from the edge of the town towards the riverbanks, counting the umbrella-shaped thorn trees as he passed them by. He had assured Frederick that he was just taking a walk to clear his head, but he now wished he had taken the offer to ride home with him in the wagon.

  Everything hurt. His head was pounding, the beat as consistent and repetitive as Kagiso’s pan call for supper. His mouth felt as dry and parched as the heat-hazed horizon ahead of him. His stomach lurched in nauseating waves. Frederick was right. He really did need to stop drinking.

  It had been a year. A whole year since the day that he had finally kissed Elna, finally let his fear of making a genuine connection subside; the very same day that everything had changed.

  “Why can’t I stop thinking about it? I mean, who the hell was she? What was she?”

  It was not the first time he had asked himself this question. He was even starting to bore himself.

  He started to pick up his pace but then the unmistakable sound of an ox-wagon creaking across the trackless plain not far behind him made him stop. Turning around to check whose company he now shared on his path he waved when he saw a group of boys.

  “Hey Johannes, you talking to yerself again?”

  He managed a smile when he saw that it was Erasmus Jacobs who called out to him from the group that huddled together on the cart. He was a young, gregarious boy, who lived close by. The kind Johannes would have gladly socialised with not so long ago. But that was when he was still the old Johannes - the fun, sociable version of before.

  “Something like that. Where y’all heading to then?” he answered, careful to hide the evidence of his afternoon excess in his voice.

  “Just going down to the river to catch a breeze. It’s like an oven out here today. Do you want to join us? Heard you’re a pretty fine player of five stones. Fancy teaching us?”

  Johannes couldn’t help but laugh, much to Erasmus’ obvious confusion.

  How ironic! He thought. They were playing five stones together, just as he had with Elna, a year ago.

  “Ag, no thanks Erasmus. I should probably get back to the farm. Another time, hey?”

  He watched them tie up the wagon to a nearby fence and then run down towards the river ahead. Erasmus moved the ox into the shade and gave Johannes one last wave before running after his friends.

  I bet his mother is proud of him! A kind, considerate boy who looks after animals and invites his drunken neighbour to play five stones with him and his friends. Mrs Francis was wrong. My mother would have been more than worried if she had seen me like this. If she knew what I was capable of, she would have been heartbroken!

  Johannes shook his head to clear his thoughts. The sun must have gotten to his head as much as the alcohol had.

  He reached the clearing in the trees which led towards his house and then stopped in his tracks. He needed to have a word with himself. Kagiso had promised to make bobotie for supper, his favourite meal, and his stomach was rumbling with hunger, but he wasn’t sure the delicious mince dish was worth the fury he would face if he turned up in his current state.

  He pivoted around on his heel and headed back in the direction of the river, close to where he could hear Erasmus and his friends playing with the stones.

  As soon as he reached his favourite thorn tree, closest to the edge of the river, he slumped down the side of the bark, pulled on his brown felt hat so that it covered his eyes from the low-lying sun, and closed his eyes. Now he was here, he realised he was much too tired to join Erasmus and his friends with all their boundless energy.

  He needed to sleep, even if doing so meant enduring the memory of the last time he had seen Elna and the words that always tormented him before sleep would finally come.

  He drifted off into the first stages of slumber as their last conversation replayed itself in his tortured mind.

  “Why can’t you see what is in front of you Johannes? It’s like you’re always looking for something else, something sparklier than you already have. You even dropped that stone we found together. It could have been a diamond. I think it was a diamond and you just let it go. Like you let me go too!”

  “Elna! Do you not remember why I dropped the diamond…I mean the stone, or whatever it was? Do you not remember what we saw?”

  “We saw an illusion that’s all! It was just the sun and the heat playing tricks on us. But you have become obsessed by it. You kissed me, and then you just ignored me. You abandoned me because of some naked girl that you thought you had seen.”

  “No Elna! That’s not true. You saw her too. I know you did.”

  “I think you have actually gone mad Johannes. Your mother would be ashamed of the way you have treated me. Not to mention your dirty little secret!”

  Those were her last words to him. He heard her spit them at him as he fell asleep. The hatred in her words that always encouraged his fitful attempts to achieve some rest.

  “EUREKA!”

  Johannes jumped up at the sound of Erasmus’s excited scream in the distance. The boy was jumping in the air, the stones he had been playing with now discarded as he lifted a familiar looking stone up to the sunlight.

  “He found it!” Johannes croaked, as he sat up and wriggled into an upright position against the tree.

  It was a funny feeling, seeing Erasmus holding the same stone he and Elna had found together a year ago. It hurt and healed, all at once.

  So that was the way it was, a succession of things no more: his mother and father, both gone; Elna and what might have been; and now, a diamond that could have belonged to them too. What could be left for his journey to reveal? How many more mistakes could he make?

  He watched Erasmus and friends as they ran away from the river, no doubt to share their good fortune. Johannes was happy for him. He only hoped the boy would hold onto the treasure, and not let anyone else reap the rewards of his find.

  Settling himself into a comfortable position again, he smoothed his hands over the bark and dried grass that surrounded it.

  If this tree could talk!

  How many afternoons had he sat here, brooding about his losses to the barks and leaves? Had it absorbed his tears, like the roots that entwined underneath him, draining the moisture from sky to earth?

  There was something strangely comforting about the idea that his pain could provide some nourishment. That life continues and grows, even when others are taken away. His mother used to say that the roots of a tree were like a family’s bonds, each one intertwined with another, lending strength to the twists and turns of our individual journeys.

  What a lady, his mother had been. So many dreams yet to live out as a writer, a poet, a grand-mother. How could it be, that she was no more? There were so many possibilities she had wanted to explore. There were so many questions he had never had the chance to ask.

  Would you have understood? Would you have still loved me if you knew how I treated Elna. How I made her feel rejected so many times, just because I felt there was something more that I could find?

  He liked to think his mother would have held him close to her chest and whispered that, yes, she understood how love can find you in the most unexpected places. That our timing may not always suit our surroundings, but love knows no boundaries, and will always prevail.

  “What do you think tree?” he whispered.

  Foolish thoughts young man.

  It always seemed to whisper such admonishments to him. He imagined that it had an old, smoke-filled voice, this tree.

  “Elna was right! I really am…finally…going mad!” he said out-loud.

  His eyes felt drunk-heavy again, despite it being a good few hours since his last drink. All these memories, discoveries, revelations and resolutions had drained him.

  He closed his eyes, letting his need for sleep push him off into a fast-fall towards heavy slumber
. He had hardly reached it before the sound of breaking twigs and rapid, heavy breathing nearby, jolted him back to alertness. Something, an instinct, prevented him from opening his eyes. A voice, a sweet one, belonging to a girl, spoke nearby:

  “Did you…call my name? Was that you?”

  He knew it was a dream. It had to be. This voice was familiar. It was also wrong. She was not supposed to be here. You couldn’t really wish somebody, or something, back into your life. He wasn’t that deluded, was he?

  “Hello? Can you hear me? Understand me?”

  She was still here: the voice… the voice that sounded exactly like his mother, just higher pitched, and softer.

  Johannes gripped clumps of dried mud at the side of him, steeling himself to open his eyes and face whoever this talking vision was.

  He opened them. It wasn’t his mother; of course not.

  “You! You’re back? How…? How did you get here?”

  The girl from the pink bubble, she was here; real, solid, a body standing on these dry, muddy banks. She was beautiful. She was naked!

  Johannes jumped up. But it was too quick. He fell backwards, narrowly missing the trunk of the tree. Damn, useless, foolish tree! It should have broken his fall. Instead, he twisted awkwardly, landing on his side before bouncing off towards the water. He tried to grab a water branch that bridged between the bank and the river, but he was too weak for his mind and body to come together in any order.

  The girl – the naked girl – did not hesitate. She jumped in straight after him.

  Johannes couldn’t help himself. He laughed: big, loud, hacking laughs. This had to be the most bizarre dream he had ever had. The girl waded towards him, frowning. And that’s when he noticed her eyes, the flickering, pulsating lights. He stopped laughing. His mouth gaped wide open.

  “Who are you? What kind of dream is this?” he managed, pulling himself to a standing position, that water lapping at his waist.

  “I am not a dream. I am Tiegal…Tiegal Eureka. Was it you? The one who called out my name?”

  15. Mirror

  The mirror was positioned at just the right angle for him to catch a good eye of her as she dressed. He had not placed it in that way on purpose, but it was impossible not to notice how it reflected the shine of her body behind the dressing screen. Johannes tried to avert his eyes, but he couldn’t tear them away. Her body was a perfect hourglass in shape and her strange, amber-coloured skin glistened with an iridescent glow.

  His heart beat so fast he found it hard to breathe. And his mind raced with every possible scenario to explain how this could be happening.

  Who was she? And how did she get here?

  He caught her watching him and their eyes locked in the mirror. She flashed her eye-light at him in rapid flickers. The shock of it caused him to stumble back into the wooden frame of his parent’s bed that he now called his own.

  Determined to regain some composure, he seated himself on the edge of the mattress, mindful of the obvious tremor of his legs.

  “Why do you keep falling? Do I frighten you?” the girl called out to him. She walked around the screen and moved herself close to him. He coughed and averted his eyes to the floor, focusing on the edges of the long dark grey skirt she had chosen from the bundle he had given her to try on.

  He noted, with relief, that the skirt she had chosen to wear belonged to Annarita. Thank goodness she had not picked one that had belonged to his mother. That would have been too much! Still, he couldn’t help wishing she had also chosen a blouse to wear too. Anything to cover up the upper part of her body. As arousing as seeing her like this was, he knew his body would soon betray him, and make it obvious just how aroused he was. He lowered his eyes to the floor and crossed his fingers.

  “Do my eyes scare you?”

  He could sense her moving towards him and could hear how she was struggling to breathe properly, occasionally taking in big gulps of air as though she had been close to drowning and had only just reached the surface.

  Finally, he dared to raise his eyes a fraction higher, enough that he could see her folded arms parallel to his head. The thought of looking higher up was tempting, but also unnerving. He knew being so close to the dark red tight buds on her naked breasts would push him too far. Instead, he buried his hands underneath his bottom to restrain himself from making any inappropriate moves to touch her body.

  “No, I’m just…I’m not used to seeing girls in this way,” he stammered, focusing on the light brown hairs on her arms in front of him. She was so human and yet, so not.

  “Oh, my body? You do not like to see skin? Do I not look the same as the other females here?” she asked, stepping back from him.

  Not knowing how to answer such a bold question, he took a deep breath, and then sat up straight, forcing himself to really look at her.

  If he was going to survive any attempt to converse with her, without making a complete fool of himself, he needed to adjust to her extraordinary optics.

  As they looked at each other, he realised that she seemed uncertain where to place herself in the room. Her hands kept folding under her breasts and then falling to her side again. She appeared to be waiting for him to speak.

  Forcing himself to focus on her radiant eye-light, rather than the more tempting parts of her body, he quickly adapted to the strangeness of her eyes, noting that it was calming rather than threatening. Alluring rather than grotesque.

  Finally, she broke the silence. “Who is this Elna you are thinking of so much? Is she the girl I saw you with? The first time?” the girl asked.

  Unable to keep his eyes from darting to her breasts any longer he handed her his mother’s woollen kaross to cover herself with. And then instantly cringed as he watched how she leaned her face into the wool and breathed in its scent, wrapping it around her shoulders like a shawl. Even after all these years, it still contained the memory of his mother’s scent.

  Annoyed with his intrusive thoughts, he pushed it out of his mind, aware that it was her mention of Elna that was the true cause of his rapid heart rate.

  “How do you know her name? Elna?” he grunted, clenching his hands over the bed sheets at the side of him. It was close to a growl, a version of his voice that he did not even recognise. The girl must have sensed his unease as she backed away, hiding herself behind the dressing screen once more.

  “I can still see you, in the mirror,” he admitted.

  The girl looked at him through the reflection in the mirror.

  “I can hear you, in your mind,” she conceded.

  Before he had a chance to let this revelation sink in, the girl started to shake violently. Despite inwardly screaming at himself to ‘get off the damn bed,’ to catch her before she fell, or hurt herself, he found himself unable to move from his position.

  “What the…” he managed to squeak as he watched, in disbelief, as her

  skin visibly changed before him, rapidly transforming from her rich amber tone to the shocking colour of egg white.

  “Help me!” she trembled, pressing her fingers to the mirror as though reaching for him through her reflection.

  Her plea was enough to break his trance. He darted over to her, catching her in his arms, only just in time

  Johannes watched her chest heaving up and down as she slept on his bed. Her mouth was parted ever-so-slightly, and her nose flared with each sleepy inhale she took. She was, quite simply, breathtaking to behold. She was, also, an absolute enigma. Where on earth had she come from? In fact, was she even from this Earth? It made his head hurt just thinking about this possibility.

  You have finally gone crazy Johannes!

  Once again, Elna’s venomous words rang in his head.

  This is what happens when you do bad things. You lose your mind!

  Elna hadn’t actually said that part to him. He was sure of it. But it was all too easy to imagine she would say such things, if she were here, now, watching him curled up in a chair, waiting for this strange creature to emerge from
her deep slumber. Waiting for her to give him some answers. To explain how she had found herself, naked, on the section of the Orange River nearest to his house.

  But, then, what was it Kagiso always said to him? Be careful what you wish for! Well, hadn’t he wished for this? For this girl in the bubble to come back.

  All this time, he had been willing her to appear to him again, and yet now she was here, he was starting to wonder if Elna had been right. He was losing his mind.

  “Wake up! Please!”

  His spluttered out his words on instinct, not certain if he was begging for the ‘girl’ on his bed to wake up, or for himself!

  He pulled out his right foot from under his bottom, where he had been sitting on it for too long, massaged his toes to encourage the blood flow to return to them, and then finally gave into the temptation to touch her arm once again. As before, her skin felt searing hot to his touch. And he loved it. It was like a scorching heat that didn’t burn. A pain that didn’t hurt. If anything, he felt a burning need to hold on to her.

  This was not a dream. This was something extraordinary. She was extraordinary. The alluring diamond-shaped pupils that pulsated a magnificent light; her sensual body that radiated an alluring heat; and her chameleon skin, like none he had ever seen before. The skin tone that had already regained its glorious colour; a magnificent combination of soft peach, yellow, pink, and woody hues, that seemed to alternate preference for each tone every few minutes, as though designed to depict the various stages of an African sunset.

  He glanced around the room, silently thanking whatever part of his useless brain had finally triggered him into action so that he had caught her before she had smashed her head on any of the furniture in his overcrowded bedroom. He had been meaning to clear out some of the unnecessary side-boards and cupboards his father had made, and his mother had treasured, for a long time now.

  “I’m not letting you go! It’s a miracle you are here at all!” he whispered out loud, stroking her cheek with the back of his hand.