by Justin Kairo
What I remember about those years is spending much of my time alone. Sitting in my room by myself playing with the toys and games my parents gave me. Instead of giving me themselves. Whenever I went anywhere, I was usually by myself. I was not allowed to take a bus or a subway like other children. For me, there was a chauffeur and a limousine. I journeyed in luxury but always alone.
When my parents traveled, they didn’t tell me ahead of time. I knew they were leaving when I saw them in the hallway with their suitcases. Too late then for words. My eyes had already told me they were departing. I resented the suitcases. The silence more.
When my father and mother went to Reykjavik on business, it was their fourth trip in several months. During seven weeks, they had been home just one day. Less than a day. I had counted the minutes.
Sometimes I knew they were leaving before I saw the suitcases. I could feel this was a day for another trip when I woke up in the morning. Sensing it as if something in the air had pushed that knowledge into my head. Vibrations I picked up around me.
And I was always right. Those moments frightened me and I didn’t tell anyone about them. I had no idea then they were early signs of my powers
I’ve never forgotten the Reykjavik trip. “Justin,” my mother said to me standing in the hallway with her coat on. “We’re going to—”
“I know,” I said, interrupting her. “I know what you’re doing. It’s what you’re always doing. And I hate you for it—”
Before the words came out of my mouth, my mother’s hand was in the air and her flat open palm came down across my face. She had never struck me before. The sting of her fingers hurt more than the days of loneliness.
She pulled back away from me, frightened at what she had done. Confused by her own unusual behavior. Unable to speak.
I stared at her and I repeated the words that upset her so much. “I hate you.”
This time her manner changed. “You have a right to,” she said. “It must seem to you I’m always leaving you. I know that.”
Her words surprised me. It was the first time she had ever expressed anything resembling regret for all the occasions when she and my father had gone away and left me. I sensed this was an important moment for both of us. And I knew even then that the words I spoke on this day would follow me for the rest of my life.
“I wish I didn’t have to leave you so much,” she said. “I think we should spend more time together.”
“I would like to spend more time with you, Mother. We’ve never had a chance to get to know each other.” As I said the words, I felt older. I was no longer a baby. I was not reacting to her in a childish way.
“Maybe we will one of these days.” Her eyes looked sad. Mournful. Like she wanted things to be different but didn’t know how to make them that way.
“Let’s not wait, Mother. If we wait, then it will never happen. Take me with you on this trip. For once, take me along with you and father.”
“I can’t do that,” she said. “It’s not possible.”
“That’s not true. Give me one good reason why you can’t.”
“There are many good reasons, Justin. School is one of them. I can’t take you out of school.”
“Other children’s parents take them out of school. You can do the same thing.”
“There are other reasons, Justin. You’ll just have to believe me and try to understand.”
“There’s only one reason and we both know what it is. You don’t want me to come. You want to be alone with Father. You talk about our getting to know each other, but you don’t mean it.”
I looked into her eyes with such intensity that she looked away. I knew I was right even though she disagreed with me. Her silence confirmed my suspicions.
“It’s not true,” she said, but the way she said it made me more sure I was correct.
“I said something before that I didn’t mean. I said I hated you. I said it because I was hurt and angry. I didn’t mean it. But now I mean it. I hate you, Mother. I hate you, and I mean it very much.”
This time her hand did not come up to strike me. This time nothing happened. My words ended the conversation. She turned around and faced the door. She walked out the door without looking back at me. Without kissing me. Without saying good-bye. She walked out the door and left me alone again. Hating her.
I stood facing the closed door that she had just walked out of. She was no longer there but I talked to her. I spoke to her out loud and finished the conversation. I knew she was downstairs already, but I knew too that she would hear me.
“Don’t come back. You have left me alone for the last time. It is too late . . . too late.”
I said the words and I sensed a pure white flash that seemed to come from somewhere in the back of my brain. It was evening but for a moment I was sure the entire sky was light for just a fraction of a second. And then I became aware of a low, steady hum. It was deep and even and it did not stop but I was sure it was there and I was sure that nobody could hear that noise except for me. I was frightened. Something was wrong. Something had happened. Something was going to happen. And there was something I could do about it. Something I had to do. A way to help, to change things. To stop things before it was too late.
“Come back, Mother. You must return. You must come back to me.”
I was then overwhelmed by an incredible feeling of exhaustion. I felt that I had not slept for days and days, and that I must lie down right away and close my eyes and rest. I must relax and close my eyes and sleep for a long time until the exhaustion was gone.
I did not find out what happened until I woke up. They let me sleep and did not wake me up to tell me. My mother and father were driving to the airport in the limousine. They were driving down a one-way street and at the corner a truck came at them. A truck that was going very fast went out of control and turned into the one way street and hit the limousine and turned it into the gutter.
The truck crawled through the limousine and demolished it and it was a freak accident. But the strangest thing of all, and this is what the policemen said after they came to the scene of the accident; the strangest thing is that in all the time he had seen accidents and cars demolished and people hurt, he had never seen a limousine so totally destroyed as this one. It was so mashed and mangled that no passenger in this limousine could possibly have lived. And yet my mother and father who were sitting in the back seat were somehow almost unharmed. There were a few broken bones but nothing more serious than that.
Broken legs and arms meant they couldn’t leave me for a while. They couldn’t go on any trips. They had to stay at home until they were healed. They were going to be at home and they were going to stay with me. But it was too late.
Chapter 6
Lanny was the most important person in my childhood. Maybe even more important than anyone else in my life.
I have often wondered if without her I might not have become aware of my powers. I could have gone through life afraid of myself. Frightened of the many inexplicable phenomena taking place around me. Afraid and unable to harness my skills, crucial for everyone—not just warlocks. To be in control of oneself. In control of the world around us.
Lanny came to me when I was born. Sent to me, I realize now. It was intended that she look after me, something my parents didn’t know. They had no understanding of destiny. They went to an employment agency to hire a person who could look after my childhood needs when they were away on their trips. They hired a nanny and a housekeeper. They didn’t realize they had no choice. Lanny was sent by Merlin to watch over me.
During my earliest years there was nothing unusual about our relationship. Lanny was there to take care of me and, in ways I could not understand at the time, I took care of her too.
Her name was one I had given her. I was supposed to call her Nanny but as a child that was a word I could not pronounce. I tried to say Nanny and it came out Lanny. So I called her that. And so did my parents and everyone else who visited the hou
se. Lanny. A childish mispronunciation. But as I learned later, it was no accident.
• • •
There was one rule in the house that was not to be broken. Do not enter a room with a closed door without knocking first. It was a matter of courtesy. Respecting the privacy of others. No one ever walked into my room without knocking and it was expected that I would be as considerate as everyone else.
What is strange is that the doors in our house were always locked. If I had tried to enter a room without knocking, I would not have been able to. Lanny and my mother and my father always seemed to be doing private things behind closed doors and I would knock and they would open up for me but they always had to unlock it from the inside.
After my parents’ accident, I started experiencing dizzy spells. For a few moments, my head would spin and my vision would blur but then everything would return to normal. These episodes scared me but I didn’t tell anyone. I sensed the symptoms were connected to the car crash my parents survived and I knew it would be better not to mention them.
One evening, when I was ten years old, the dizziness was particularly severe and I called out to Lanny. I whispered her name three or four times. I spoke too softly for her to hear my words, but that was not important. She didn’t hear the sound of my words. Just the essence of my words. She knew that I wanted her and she came. I didn’t realize at the time that there was something unusual about this. It just happened that she could hear me in ways that no one else could.
On this one evening, I called out to Lanny but she didn’t hear me. I tried again and she still didn’t come. The dizziness made it difficult for me to stand up, but I walked to her room. I kept my hands against the wall as I walked to steady myself and remain upright. To keep from falling down. When I reached her room and I don’t know why—it was the first time—I turned the knob without knocking first. I turned the knob and the door opened.
I walked into her room. I did not see anything at first. But before my eyes could focus, I felt them burning. An incredibly sharp pain came from somewhere deep inside me and landed behind my eyes.
In the instant after I opened the door and before the scene in front of me had a chance to register on my brain, a yellow flash ripped apart the inside of my head. Then the pain and the dizziness left me and I stood at the door. I knew that I had to walk into the room and close the door behind me. I did. After the door was closed I stood there rigid. Watching. Stunned. Waiting. Understanding everything all at once. And also understanding nothing.
Lanny was sitting on the floor, a cloth circle beneath. Around her were strange objects I had never seen before. A sickle-shaped knife. A pair of swords. A black-hilted knife. Brass bowls. A crystal ball.
And Lanny. Naked. Sitting in the middle of the cloth circle without clothes. She was only skin and hair and I had never seen her naked before. Had never seen any woman naked. Not my mother. Not Lanny. Not anyone.
Lanny knew I was there. But she did not look up. She did not move. Her lips moved but no sounds came out. She was saying things but making no noise and only she could hear what she was saying. Except I could hear. Not the words, but they didn’t matter. I could hear their meaning. I could not understand. Not yet. But I could hear.
She was not talking to me. She was not talking to herself. I knew my coming into the room did not change what she did and said. She continued as if I had never entered. As if I wasn’t there. As if my presence did not make the slightest difference. And yet somehow I was part of it all.
In a strange way I was very much there. As if I had always been there. As if I belonged in the room. As if—and I didn’t understand this then but I could feel it—as if I were Lanny and Lanny were me and it was all the same and I would always be there the way I had always been there.
I sensed these things. I could not have put them into words. Not then. I understood but I could not have explained. I stood at the door. I said nothing. I waited. I should have been frightened. Lanny was different. Lanny who was a big part of my life. Lanny whom I could always depend upon. Lanny who never changed. Lanny who was always there. Not like my parents.
I should have been frightened. The person I depended upon for sameness gave sense to my life. but she was not the same anymore. Not the way I had always imagined her. The way that she always was. I should have been frightened. But I was not.
And her body should have made me feel something. The first naked woman I had ever seen and I should have felt excitement. Or fear. Or nausea. Or desire. Or temptation. Or guilt. But I felt none of those things. I felt as if it were perfectly natural to see her without any clothes. As if I had seen her that way many times before. As if I had seen many women many times in their nakedness.
I stood at the door. I waited. I did not wait for her to tell me what to do, although I knew that she might. It was possible she would tell me what to do, but I was not waiting for that. I was waiting until I knew what to do. I had no idea how I would know. It might be because she would tell me. But I was sure that I would know.
I stood there at the door and not one part of my body moved. I was stiff. My fingers were straight at my side. They did not bend. They could not bend. My body was stiff and erect and frozen and rigid and I could hear and see and smell and taste and feel like I never could before. With greater depth. With more intensity. As if I had entered a new dimension, climbed into the center of a cloud and discovered that in the very center there was no whiteness at all. No cloudness. Only clearness. The clarity of pure water but purer.
As if in that one moment I knew that sanity and insanity were the same. We are all one and we are all the same. And I knew what sanity and insanity tasted like. What IT tasted like. Since they are all the same.
I stood at the door and I could feel pieces of my body falling off like unused skin. I was losing unnecessary parts of myself and suddenly I knew exactly what was relevant for me. And what was irrelevant and unneeded.
The stiffness left and I trembled. My arms and my legs were shaking and I could barely stand. As if my entire body had entered the rhythm of crazy and body-jumping in a mind-flipping dance. All of a sudden I knew that my moving, twitching, bouncing, bobbing body was exactly the same as it had been a moment ago when I was stiff and rigid. The same because movement and the lack of movement are alike. Everything is always the same.
It seems astonishing to me now that I was ten years old and I knew all that. I could not have put my knowledge into words. But words do not matter. The reality is the perception. I was ten years old and I was a hundred and ten years old and I knew then as I had never known before. And I knew as I had always known that I was different and special and not like any other human being in the world, but at the same time I was like all of them.
I was ten years old and I perceived what some do not perceive in a lifetime. But I also knew that age does not matter. It’s just a convenient way of expressing a fact that does not matter. What matters is the moment of birth. For some people that moment comes when they emerge from the womb. For others, the moment of birth may come at the age of one hundred or twenty. And some people may never be born. Not in this life.
I was ten years old and suddenly I was born. I had lost my innocence and I had attained my innocence at the same time. I was no longer a virgin and suddenly unable to be anything ever except a virgin. I was ten and I was a hundred and ten and I was Lanny and I would never be the same. And I did not even know why. Not then.
“It is time,” Lanny said, speaking at last.
“Time?” I replied.
Chapter 7
Then the words spoke themselves, coming from someone who was me and not me. “I know it is time.”
“Then you know what you must do,” she said.
“I think I know. I know some of it.”
“Yes, you know some of it.”
“You know about the blackness and the yellow flash.”
“I think I know about that. I think I do.”
“You know,” she said.
I took off my socks. I put them inside my shoes. She touched my socks with the palm of her right hand. And then she stood up straight again.
I unbuttoned my shirt. First I unbuttoned the top button of my shirt. Then the bottom button of my shirt. Then the second from the top. The second from the bottom. The third from the top. I had never unbuttoned my shirt this way before. It was a strange way to unbutton a shirt. I had never seen anyone unbutton a shirt that way before. And yet it was the only way to unbutton a shirt. Then. At that moment. There was no alternative. No other way. One way was right.
I unbuttoned my shirt and took it off and laid it on top of the shoes and socks and Lanny touched the shirt. She bent down and touched the shirt and stood up straight again.
There was a zipper on my trousers. A zipper and three buttons. Of course there would be three. There had to be. That was the number. I unzipped my trousers and unbuttoned them, top button, bottom button, middle button. I unzipped and unbuttoned my trousers and lay them on my shirt and Lanny touched them.
Next came my undershirt. I do not know why but I lay down flat on my back to take off my undershirt. It was awkward that way. But it was the right way, and it was what I did. Then I stood up with my undershirt in my hand and I put it on top of the shoes and the socks and the shirt and the trousers. I stood straight now facing Lanny who was naked and I was wearing nothing but my underpants. I bent over and took off my underpants and this time I did not put them on the pile of clothes I had worn.