A light flurry of snow had started and miraculously with all the varied events of the morning, the day had just reached its peak. Nicolai emerged from the ground as Lazarus might have from his cave (only much less grateful to be alive) surprised by the light and disoriented, for before him lay a great wilderness that stretched from where he stood to beyond vision. A good place to get lost, which is exactly what I could use. It seemed appropriate to begin in this new chapter of self-awareness with a vast and unusual exploration, which began, as does Central Park, with a few meandering paths heading this way and that and following a busy thoroughfare. Almost immediately the walker is offered a choice to follow them to the right or left. Standing at the fork, you can see along the right path toward what appears to be a large bazaarpeople milling about and such. Nicolai chose to go left, following the trail which seemed to head into the thicket. Quite quickly this path leaves the road and brings its travelers to a pleasant little pond. Reaching this point and having not yet fully committed himself to the rest of the journey, he paused and sat in indecision; besides which the pond was most captivating. The water was dressed in the dead leaves of fall onto which the tiny snow-flakes parachuted, riding for a moment, white, winter fairies on early release, and then disappearing, leaving their mounts unburdened for the brief moment before one of their wet brethren took the steed in their stead. And of the silent, not-neighing water-horses? Like their equestrian equals they held up in their aquarian stable, unable to escape, barely able to shuffle amongst themselves, until the older, less-able ones were overcome and sank into that collective grave to be replaced by other dying, falling autumn leaves lazily dropping from one death into another life, in their turn to be ridden, abandoned, and buried; and Nicolai wondered if even below the brim of brine on that pond those leaves were greeted by sea-horses hungry for soft, chlorophyll-filled blankets to keep them warm in the wake of winter. When did the duties of life end if not in the grave? He looked at his watch in anticipation of that moment and found that it had stopped. So, that little bile-colored shack was after all the end of time, at least for me. For his watch read the exact moment of Rifka’s demise: a mocking reminder of his tangential guilt in the matter. Too much head stuff for one rest stop, he thought rising to move on, there are sure to be others and I must save some for then.
Unfortunately, only a hundred paces down, the path bisected a large recreational facility virtually swarming with nasty people. They all seemed dreadful to him in that large space, crawling about the cement and mossy boulders like maggots, clamoring to stuff themselves with dead animal fat smothered with mustard and rotted cabbage. The area was a large wound from which he hurried to escape. Under a bridge and over a hill he ran. Good Lord, it never ends. There were people everywhere. Choice now, left through a baseball diamond, right goes back to the road, but there it seems to swerve away again. He went that way, then down a little hill bringing him to a carousel, horses spinning madly to cheery melodies. He bent sick at a tree and one of them approached him so he ran off again around the carousel to the north, up a hill, and then down to a lake. The snow had worsened and was coming down in heavy drifts. What’s this, frozen already? Recent weather had been cold, but not enough to freeze this very large lake. No matter, the storm had driven away most of the people and he could breath again. He sauntered comfortably now down the path, enjoying the space. He saw some benches over a bridge to the east and headed for them, but they were further off than he thought; eventually however he arrived in the small area. It was not really an area exactly, the path simply widened slightly to make room for two flanking benches. A young man sat on the bench to his right with a large pad on his lap; he was sketching. Nicolai stopped and turned around to look back along his hurried passage. As an experiment, he closed his eyes and in his head pictured himself walking back again, through the play area and to the pond, he again saw the snowflakes dropping and the leaves milling; oddly though, whenin his head nowhe tried to about face and return, he could notthat mental exercise was resistant to his will. He tried again, nope, no doing. Oh well, he thought opening his eyes, abandoning that fancy, foolish little exercise anyway, and turned his attention to the artist. The man was dressed for the cold. Did I miss some widely rumored winter weather forecast?
Nicolai lit a cigarette and moved in closer to get a better look at the pad on his lap and the young man either didn’t notice or mind; nor did he notice or mind that as each flake of snow landed on his work and melted it blotted and smeared the ink upon the paper.
In addition to this peculiarity, the artist glanced up occasionally ahead of him as though he were sketching an actual scene, but for all Nicolai could tell the sketch was of a stony clearing, a collection of several knolls from which jutted mostly unnatural looking stones at severe angles andhe followed the man’s glance hereahead of him lay only the opposing bench and beyond that the frozen lake. Just as Nicolai noticed this, the man acknowledged his presence with a silent nod and then turned his attention again to his drawing to make a few touches. Concluding these he lifted the pad and showed it to Nicolai who politely nodded in return. Having done this, he then looked off in the direction in which the artist had been staring and turned back with a shrug. Surprised by this gesture the young man looked again at his drawing and then into the distance and was quickly satisfied he’d done well. To prove so he pointed his index finger forward inviting Nicolai to go and see for himself; and in the spirit of adventurewhich, he reminded himself, was what brought him herehe did.
There wasn’t much land between there and the lake shore, but it was deceptively concealed and after stepping through the wall of trees his foot crashed through a thin layer of ice and sank a few inches into the muddy soil. Recoiling quickly, he backed up and reported such to the artist whose only response was another commanding finger. Nicolai went back, cautiously this time, and found the ice strong enough to bear his weight, though not without a few moans and burdensome crackles. As he progressed, these became less frequent; the snow however did not. The buildings once outlining a neat perimeter to his present world were not now visible in the distance. What am I doing treading such thin ice on but an artist’s whim? He walked on and the crunch-crunch of the accumulating snow beneath his feat pleased him.
In the distance, he noticed that other living souls were braving the ice, walking slowly, sadly, heads downcast, some in groups, toward a small gathering on top of an approaching hill (on the ice?). Feeling that he should join these people, that it was this toward which the artist pointed, he began to climb the hill. It was slippery at first, that great slope of ice, and he fell several times, hands plunging through the snow, cracking the ice beneath, and into the freezing water. These he placed in warm pockets and continued. It became easier as he neared the top. Sprouting grass there made him realize that he was on an island. The gatherers were...well, gathering only twenty feet or so in front of him and others toiled with the icy hill beside him. One of the pilgrims, for he could describe them no other way, was quite large and his weight getting the best of the ice upon which he stood, dragged him down into the lake. He disappeared for a moment, but then with great force shot up from the water and gripping a large stone used it to leverage himself back onto the island. Nicolai realized then that what he had thought were tree stumps were actually rocks and looking back he now noticed that they littered the field, visible now only because the snow had slowed. All of the people, except for himself, had now arrived so he hurried to the perimeter of the gathering.
From where he stood he could not see what was going on at the center. He could tell that someone there was speaking, but not loudly enough to be heard from Nicolai’s position. The scene held a tinge of familiarity for him, but having never been in the park before and still unable to make out what exactly all the fuss was about, he could not ascertain exactly why. An air of grief prevented him from edging his way through the throng, which left him only the option of circling the group in hopes of better position; n
one could be had. Having stopped this foolishness with the aid of a few angry glances, he strained to listen to the speaker whose voice at times rose to an audible level. A few words overheard in this manner led him to believe that the ceremony? was in Greek; alpha and omega he was sure of and then perhaps beta? Could this be some oddly timed gathering of Grecian illiterates learning the fundamentals of their alphabet? The snow started again and the people began to slowly disband. It was a real blizzard this time and its fury scattered them as surely as Nicolai’s thoughts. In the confusion he lost his opportunity to observe what doings did at the epicenter of the gathering. He was lost now and could not even see the scarred hillside from where he was, nor even his hand in front of his face (no nor nothing else neither). In the tenseness of the moment his left leg began to atrophy again, but the bitter cold somehow prevented a full decay. Leg then in tow, he chose to stumble blindly on in his current direction and so quickly did the storm once again stop that he was physically shocked to be again face-to-face with the artist, still sitting on his bench, still sketching, now though on a second page, the first tucked neatly under the pad. His leg suddenly came back to him forgetting its former tenseness and he comfortably sat on the bench next to the man. Nicolai observed the newly begun sketch and although none of the detail was filled in, a rough outline showed the image to be a proper representation of the lake as it now (and before) appeared, flat and without any islands or stones. Even the ice was breaking up now as the temperature noticeably returned to normal (lows to the mid-forties with a chance of snow flurries in the afternoon); the artist however still paid him no mind.
It was not so much the oddity of the event that bothered him, rather that, though a part of it, he could not discover what it was all about. They all gathered with a purpose which he was not allowed to share, although in some sense now he felt as if he’d been a part of it, had known what was going on, had even had some special connection to the matter and been more closely a party to it than any of them. Hoping that the artist would again flip up his first drawing to check some smudgeand perhaps give Nicolai a hint as to its subjecthe sat and watched him draw. The artist’s attention was now being given to a small area on the right edge of the paper where his lake met his land. He was sketching there three figures in an embrace. One was a tall, thin fellow, the other two an unimposing couple; the tall man was in all black and the artist gave him a large rottweiler on a leash, and a collar identifying him as a man of the cloth. Sure enough when Nicolai looked up they were there, clasping hands, bidding each other good-day. As the couple walked past, he noticed that the woman was grieving. The priest headed off north along the path and as they all disappeared from sight, the artist changed their drawn forms into bending trees; the dog into a stake, supporting with its chain a tall, thin weeping willow.
Hearing a few of the priest’s parting remarks, Nicolai immediately recognized his voice as the barely audible one from the island and wishing to have a few words with him abandoned the artist for same. Something about the priest though made him as unapproachable as he was barely audible. Perhaps it was the manner in which he kept ultimate control of the large dog which continually tried to gain supremacy; Nicolai did not know, but no matter, he was unapproachable, so for the time being he simply followed at a modest distance. He was able to maintain such modesty because the priest’s black outfit made him, in its contrast with the snow, visible from a long way off. The dog stopped occasionally to tinkle, but aside from these unplanned and quite momentary pauses they headed apace, the troop of them, through the woods. Strangely, the mass accumulation of snow which Nicolai suffered through in the southern half of the park dissipated as they moved, until passing a creak just beyond the lake there was little sign of frozenness and the ground seemed affected only by the flurries which came before. The paths, except for this one, were barren and at one point Nicolai had some difficulty remaining hidden. They were climbing up a particularly twisty path leading up to and across a narrow stone bridge. As the bridge is approached, however, the person upon it has a clear view of the path for some ways back. Hence, when the priest arrived on the bridge his dog took an opportunity to spray and he one to take in the surroundings. Nicolai therefore had to quickly duck into the woods in order to avoid discovery. This successfully done and pursuit quickly resumed, a curious thing happened: for Nicolai, who had believed himself to be following a simple man of the cloth, realized that he was mistaken. Himself arriving on the bridge and the man stepping off, he noticed, now that snow was not present to offer a contrast, that the man was not robed in black, but in white from head to toe; and that the alleged canine was actually a short man (still held on a leash) with an obvious spinal deformity (which of course did not excuse his rather and frequent public urinations). He absolutely was not going to approach the man now, though he did still follow. Curious trick of the eyes that, he thought; I suppose I am still not fully recovered. Having cleared that bridge of polarization, the men’s pace quickened and suddenly they were upon a large castle. No more castles in my life, please! And the unanswered prayers amount.
They approached from the rearas all good sneaks willand Nicolai stopped as the man ducked through a small door, his (Nicolai’s) only thought being: I hope that vile creature is housebroken. Any fear he’d had of old castles and dark stairwells and creaking doors and the like were left far behind on an Eastern European steppe, so giving the pair enough time to get ahead of him, he entered.
Nicolai expected to go up into the structure, perhaps finding the two engaged in some naughty no-no in a high tower chamber, instead the door opened on a stairway leading downwards. It was not long before it ended however and presented a long, ill-lit hallway leading to darkness. No sign of the two ahead, so he went on knowing that they could have only gone the one direction. The end of the hall abruptly curved right, leading him into a downward spiral staircase which by his best count made seven revolutions before opening into another passage.
This hall was lit even worse than the last, but on the plus side it was much shortermaybe half the lengthand offered at its end a choice, another silent hall led back and away exactly opposite the page from this one, exactly opposite that is if the entire level were folded along the third, the smudged ink from the first creating the slope of the second. This at any rate is how Nicolai envisioned it: as a folded page and he a slithering book-bug. Not wishing to fall too far behind however he took his chances with the long, third hall and felt that if anywhere the title of this book should be found along its spine. That way, however, proved to be not as long as promised, for quickly he came upon another small door.
This creaked (naturally) as he opened it, revealing another long passage. It was dark here too and each side of the hall was lined with more small doors, all locked. About halfway down, the hall split into three separate passages. One continued in the present direction, and the other two broke off at 45 degree angles from the main, one heading to his left and back, the other to his right and away. To these latter two he initially paid no heed, deciding instead to follow the usually reliable rule of inertiaand because he thought he saw some movement at the end of the present hall. Alas though, its terminating door was locked. Turning back, he tried the other hall leading away from where he began, at its end was another staircase. Tired of these and hoping to delve no farther into the bowels of this fortress he again turned back trying the third and last passage, but that one simply ended in a stone wall and so the stairs it was for him.
These proved more promising, for although plunging him deep into the Earth, as they did so more and more light creeped in. I am getting close I think now, he thought then. The stairs ended without warning in a very, painfully bright room two levels high. It was circular in shape, except on the far left side, which, while still completing the circle, was flat and extended in a straight line beyond the area in both directions. The whole place was a bustle of activity and in the center of it all stood the tall man handing the leash of the desp
icable one to another similarly dressed (in white) man who took him away. The first then, being handed a notebook, began to circle the perimeter of the room, stopping briefly at each doorfor it was lined as was the previous level with several small, closed portalswhere he would make some notes and then proceed to the next. On the upper level, which was really just a series of crisscrossing catwalks, Nicolai could see that a similar man did the same. Unlike the complex through which he’d just traveled, this area was bright and sanitary; even as he thought this, a man crossed the room with a mop and a bucket of disinfectant. That was the last thing he saw before feeling a nasty prick in the buttocks and falling into darkness.
Nicolai awoke in bed and heard snoring, but looking up he saw the smooth white ceiling to which he was accustomed. I am home; the snoring continued. This fact, however, did not disturb him, for he had heard tale of a strange state of existence which was located between dreams and waking and assumed himself to be just coming from it. I am in my bed, he thought, that is real; there is my ceiling, and the snoring, the noise, that is a figment, a dream; my visual cortex has awakened and my aural functions have not. He’d seen this described on a not unusually uninteresting BBC documentary. This he decided to accept, but not explore. I am home, he thought, and this thought mollified him. Then he began to smell something, something odd and strong and fecal. This odor was followed in his brain, but preceded in time, by a loud toot as if from a trumpet. But of course, he thought, this is nothing for there quite clearly is my ceiling and it was toward this now that he directed all of his attention; it was exact down to the crackshe counted them to add fact to fancy. Then his bed shook as though someone (or thing!) were climbing upon it. Hello, white ceiling, I see you are still there. Of this he was less sure as his other senses were mounting against him. You see, Mr. Brain, you’ve got it all wrong. We should start with some multisensory illusions and then progress into a representational picture of reality. Like the artist in the park, we should “come into our senses” and not stray from them. In this gradual manner the sounds in the room began to encroach upon his sanity until there were three distinguishable noises each taking its turn in the patter of an annoyingly rhythmic waltz: a toot first with accompanying stink, next a little chitch-chitch as if someone were scraping, and then a snore. Toot, chitch, snore; toot, chitch, snore.
I Thought My Uncle Was A Vampire, But He Was Just A Creep Page 9