Brightfellow

by Rikki Ducornet

  “I’ll replace the pillows,” Charter begins, but Billy stops him, says:

  “You have better things to do with your insignificant allowance than provide me with pillows!”

  When the mornings are lazy, the coffee thoughtfully prepared, the conversation cheerful and already leaning into dinner, one’s shirts pulled hot from the dryer, the refrigerator ample with orange juice and cottage cheese—well then the days are effortless, effortless the hours, and Charter begins to let go, to take things as they come, to take things in. He dares believe there is a place for him. He dares believe he is not so strange after all.

  A merry band of men in overalls undo the damage to Billy’s living room. Windows are washed, sheets changed. The lawn has never been greener. The lilac never more fragrant. Billy and Charter go into town to hunt down sofa pillows. There is a lunch in a gracious white inn with a view of the water. Roast-chicken sandwiches made with thick house mayonnaise and pickles.

  “Billy!” Charter begins, “This sandwich is—”

  “Isn’t it! Charter, dear boy! Isn’t it!”

  The two take their ease, companionable, happy. For the first time Billy speaks of his teaching, his passion for the French poets: the cell of myself fills with wonder . . . the whitewashed walls of my secret . . .

  “What is his secret?” Charter wonders aloud.

  “He’s speaking of the deeper self, I think. The one we embodied when we were little children. When we could reinvent the world undisturbed.”

  “For days at a time,” Charter whispers. “As outside the snow falls hour after hour.”

  “Yes. That is it. Exactly . . . I had a student once,” Billy says, “who translated Jouve brilliantly. He died the night he graduated, stupidly, in the river—although he knew how to swim. The entire campus mourned for months.”

  On the way home, Charter dwells on the loss of the young man. The faculty and students mourning together as one moves him deeply. And he feels the familiar pang of loss, feels the old longing to have lived in this place as those students did, the place he had abused—yes, this is the word that comes to him—and is abusing still. He fears it is because he is twisted, he is strange. Sitting in the comfort of the car, the windows open to the day’s benevolence, Charter feels the full force of this chronic strangeness once again.

  After they return, Charter spends what remains of the afternoon wandering the campus he knows so well, yet not at all. He recalls the many times he has sat on the grass in the sweet nights of Indian summer once classes had begun, listening to chamber music spelling the air around the chapel, or the sound of someone playing a horn, a piano, in the little music studio tucked away in a grove of pines. Such things he recalls . . .

  In all those years he only once dared step into a classroom. When the professor asked his name he fled. And once he dared creep into the theater, crouched in the wings, watching the rehearsal of a play. He recalls now the pain of that moment, a feeling of such isolation it had been almost untenable. Fearful of discovery, he had remained frozen in the shadows for hours, so crushed by the weight of his own singularity he could barely stand after everyone was gone. He had unfolded his limbs like a crushed Jack rising from a rusty box. Making a terrible joke at his own expense, he had sputtered between his teeth: Screek! Screek!

  Now, approaching the Circle, he thinks: I must find a way to be—to be what? True to life. Real. Why was it so hard? It was impossible. Insurmountable. He was an impostor through and through, a coward and a liar. He was one hell of an evasive, secretive, spooky sonofabitch!

  In the early light of evening, the campus is resplendent. Somehow unfathomable, so much grander than his own aspirations. Aspirations? Has he aspirations? He who is living such a small life, something cramped and reduced (how is this possible?) despite the promise this place provides him to live out a wealth of dreams? Yet here he is, as always, on the perimeter of that promise, soaking up a lonely man’s many kindnesses, embroiled in the frustrations of the soused faculty wives and their brats—but no! It is not as simple as that! Because . . .

  Watching Asthma. Those transcendent moments when everything dissolves and something epic takes over, something coherent, a thing that again and again surpasses itself. The moments surpassing themselves—as once, when he was a tiny child, his father had opened his little valise and one by one taken out the packages of seeds and taught him the names of things.

  Much later, long after Billy has gone to sleep, Charter once more dozes off on the screen porch. He awakens to the sound of Dr. Ash wandering and is afraid that if she ever wandered away and was forever lost, the Circle would be intolerably still. As she passes in the shadows not far from him, he understands that all it would take is a few small steps from the porch to the yard to find her. And so he does this, he takes those steps, and as soon as he does, Dr. Ash stops her pacing and stands perfectly still. And he finds that he is holding her, that she is holding him. They cling to one another for dear life. Silently, she begins to cry, her tears spilling from her eyes like rain. The front of his shirt is wet where her face presses against his chest.

  After a time she lets her arms fall, and stepping back, her hair clouding her face, smiles at him. It is a moonless night but the sky has a glow. He sees this smile of hers and returns it. Thank you, she says, turning away, waving once with a sweet, small gesture of her hand. Off she glides; he hears her enter her dark house, sees her move through the house as she illuminates it room by room; he stands there alone taking this in, strangely moved, a profusion of blue shadows and lustrous scents pressing around him.

  Dr. Ash is beautiful. But Charter is desireless; desire is a thing unknown to him. In some vague way he thinks the best lives are somehow disembodied, suspended . . . not bruised by imperious need or weakened by the renouncements of day-to-day living. Perhaps Dr. Ash shares this idealism. Maybe idealism is the place from which she stands, scorched and lonely. Not without desire, clearly—Beloved, she had said the other night, my dearest heart. But her desire has become idealized—or so he imagines—a perfect thing, perhaps too perfect to endure. (Of course he knows nothing of what she has endured. He does not know, cannot know, that she was speaking of a child.)

  The world is a riddle, quarreled and tormented. It is threaded through with darkness, or, worse, its fabric is dark through and through. Rarely does a bright thread work its way into the weave.

  He retires early. He takes the coin out from under his pillow and gazes at it for a long time. It is an unsettling thing, as old as time, he thinks. Yes. It’s like holding a small slice of time between his fingers. Made of copper yet with the weight of lead. Its unsettling little figure is familiar; looking at it now he feels an old malaise. And then he recalls a drawing of Vanderloon’s that had served as a frontispiece for Rules of Rage, his most disquieting book. A book so disquieting Charter had never managed to finish it.

  He decides he must rid himself of the coin at once. He pulls on some clothes and slips into the night, walking in the deepest shadows until he reaches the woods beyond the library, and there, finding two good stones, hammers the coin between them, smashing it to bits. After, he returns to Billy’s and sleeps, but the little coin continues to exert some influence, or so he fears, and he thinks he must undo this nefarious influence by taking something of Asthma’s—an animal from her tabletop town. He will replace the coin with one of the many creatures she rules over with such devotion. He begins to watch her house differently, like a man in a fairy tale whose life depends upon a treasure he knows is just within reach. But the weather turns—thunder and all the rest—and everyone is caught in place. Asthma in her room, Blackie at her typewriter, and Blackie’s Rod glued to his stamp collection.

  He is weary. He has been watching for too long and has torn open a can of worms. He is fractured and leeched. Because today, as he stands in the shadows, the ornithologist’s binoculars burning his eyes, he sees Pea Pod and Asthma at play—an enigmatic game that involves scolding and finger wagging; it involv
es shouting. Something savage is unfolding, savage and absurd. It is as if Blackie and Goldie are straddling the rafters and tugging at their offspring’s strings.

  The game intensifies and accelerates. The girls are shouting with such force their voices carry across the Circle and into the woods. He sees Pea Pod raise her fist in the air, throw herself at Asthma, and pummel her heart. He sees Asthma slap Pea Pod across the face with such force Pea Pod stumbles and falls, vanishing as if swallowed by the floor—only to rise again and fly at Asthma and, like a wild thing released from its cage, bite her arm.

  Charter turns away. Repulsed and despairing, he falls to his knees, his hands held to his ringing ears. When an instant among the many rises above all the rest to seize the mind, what are the consequences? He shivers. He has seen something primal, grotesque. He has seen two little girls transformed into harpies before his eyes.

  Or maybe not. Maybe he is overly sensitive. Overly concerned. Perhaps little girls, just like little boys, inflict these punishments on one another thoughtlessly, in the spirit of play, with no ill intention. In childhood he was never in a scuffle; he would watch other boys bewildered, their passions inscrutable, given to an animal impulse. Like the hissing of kittens. After all, he knows his Asthma. Knows her tender ways. Knows her sweetness, the innocence with which she took his hand, whispered in his ear . . .

  It’s Sunday. Billy and Charter relax with bowls of café au lait and the Ohneka Tribune. The calm is breached by shouting: a child howls, then another. The scene that haunts him infects another hour. Muzzle her! Goldie screams. Pea Pod! Little thief! Billy leaps from the sofa and closes the windows. “It never stops!” Billy mutters, “I think it’s getting worse.” Moments later the doorbell rings. Charter goes to the door. A small, intense woman gazes up at him with impatience.

  “I’m Santa,” the woman says, and then trots in to greet Billy. Dr. Santa Fofana, anthropologist, now retired. Back for the weekend for the sake of nostalgia, something like that.

  “Divorce suits you, Billy!” she cries. “You’ve never looked better!”

  “It’s Charter here,” Billy says. “He has lifted my spirits immeasurably. Come to us from Australia. On a Fulbright. A fan of Loon’s.”

  “Loon!” she erupts with laughter.

  Charter feels trapped. How does he justify the harebrained project Billy has so eagerly embraced? Needlessly he explains his Fulbright is singular.

  “Good for you,” Santa says, “to have been singled out. Loon!” She laughs disdainfully. This burns him. When Billy goes off to fetch more coffee, Santa makes herself at home among the new cushions. Charter feels compelled to say more.

  “There are a few of these, uh, singular grants, ah! Sponsored, I should say, by a family foundation—”

  “Is that so?” Santa digs into her purse for a cigarette that Charter is quick to light with the gleaming and somewhat ridiculous lighter Billy keeps on the cocktail table.

  “Nadine . . .,” Charter begins. “Nadine Hettering.”

  “Who?” Santa frowns at him. “Who’s this?”

  “The Nadine . . . the Nadine Lark Hettering Family Trust.”

  “What of it?”

  “Sponsored—”

  “Oh. The Fulbright! Loon! The Eternal lasts only as long as its aspirations.” She snorts.

  “He’s much admired in Australia,” Charter says defensively. “Because of his interest, you know, in obscure islands . . .”

  “The obscurer the better!” Santa says. Billy hands her a cup of coffee.

  “It’s fascinating, Santa,” Billy says. “Charter lived among the Mannja Fnadr.”

  “The Mannja Fnadr. Er . . . never heard of them.”

  “Tell her about the Mannja Fnadr, Charter! Tell her about Noola!”

  “God. Where is this place?” asks Santa. Billy scurries for the atlas, calling out as he does:

  “Sing her the song! There’s a song!” Billy cries. “Charter knows it!” Charter does all he can to escape, but cannot. He has barely a notion of what he had improvised a week earlier over a supper of shad roe. He is sinking into a nightmare and desperately attempts to come up with something not too ridiculous.

  “Rapa ta runula,” he begins in a strangled voice, “Ru nulu oho oho.” Santa asks what it means.

  “Here we stand naked in the breeze—” Charter says.

  “Indeed we do,” says Santa.

  “The Noola is the tree; its leaves, the bird; its beak . . .”

  “Hm,” Santa exhales. “Where did you say this island is? Any connection to Easter Island? Loon was so taken with Easter Island.”

  “It is actually quite far from Easter Island,” Charter says desperately.

  “Well, what isn’t?” Santa fixes Charter with two very bright brown eyes.

  Charter opens the atlas and points to a spot that is barely there.

  “Ah,” says Santa. “Rurutu. Its scorpions and its bird gods. Rurutu. A wonderful name, isn’t it? It rolls of the tongue like a spoonful of oil. Rurutu! Noola! I want to go to Rurutu,” Santa says savagely, “and rub myself down with Noola.”

  Billy has brought in more coffee and a plate of scones.

  “What do they eat on Rurutu?” Santa asks, tearing into one. “Still baking, Billy! Thank god!”

  “Ah, well . . . the children—” Charter manages.

  “The dear little ones. So cute the little ones. So sad they grow up into cannibals. One wonders why.”

  “They’re not cannibals!” Billy interjects. “Charter says—”

  “The hell they’re not.”

  “They. Uh!” Charter thinks his entire upper body is blushing. “They would bring me eggs in little baskets of their making, green leaves and grasses . . . you know. All woven together.”

  “Oh, I don’t know, Charter. Which is why I asked.”

  “Little blue eggs, rather like quail eggs. I don’t recall the names of the birds that lay them. They bake them on coals—”

  “Perhaps they were the eggs of the Lulu bird. And the women. Are they perhaps all named Lulu, too, on Rurutu? The men called Roo? I bet my life they all go barefoot, except in the places where the thorny Noola grows.”

  “The Noola has no thorns,” Charter tells her.

  “Why not?” Santa asks. “Why not give the Noola thorns?” She smiles companionably as she says this.

  Billy, wonderfully amused, chuckles, says:

  “The world is a dream, after all! Why not invent all our islands!”

  “Oh, but we do!” says Santa. “Here’s to the Noola and egg eaters of Rurutu, their Lulus and their Randy Roos, too!” She raises what remains of her scone.

  “When the islanders have a feast,” Billy says gaily, “they slap their bellies like drums.”

  “Of course they do!” Santa cries. “And I bet they whack the Lulus’ bottoms with a nice fat Noola spoon.” And then, thank heaven, she stops; Santa and Billy get into recollections of the old days, the people come and gone. When she leaves at last, she says to Charter at the door:

  “Next time, Charter, dear, we will have to play cards. I do love to gamble, as I dare say you do, too. We will play Jack of Spades—do you know the game? I do! I know the game.” She beams with evident malevolence. “It’s a great game for those who know how to bluff.” Off she goes into an afternoon as rich in the songs of insects and birds as any island paradise.

  Charter is so undone he manages to drop any number of things on his way to the kitchen—coffee spoons, an empty dish. But Billy, always in good spirits it seems, does not mind and says only: “I have never seen Santa so playful, so animated! I had no idea she was such a tease. You’ve charmed her, Charter! I’ve not played Jack of Spades; you will have to clue me in!” And on and on—Charter, suddenly overcome, runs to the sink and vomits violently onto the small stack of dishes and cups. When he is done Billy gently mops his face and neck with a damp hand towel and insists he lie down. He walks Charter up the stairs, gently patting his back all the way, and helps h
im into bed. As Charter lies there in a panic, Billy arrives with a glass of ginger ale and sets it fizzing companionably beside him.

  Almost at once Charter falls into a deep sleep. He sleeps until the middle of the night, when he is awakened by a nightmare.

  He is walking on an island of black lava no larger than the Circle, surrounded by an ocean the color of ink. And Santa is walking beside him, saying:

  “You see, there was nothing to your story. Nothing at all. You are naked, young man. As naked as an orange skinned within an inch of its life.”

  Charter lies awake in the lifting dark of early morning, touching his body, prodding his flesh. Slender still, he can feel the start of a belly beneath his hand. His skin is pale, his hair pale, not quite red; freckles are scattered across his nose and cheeks. What little is visible of his beard appears almost white.

  As the minutes pass his anxiety increases. He is a lonely child again, his is that foolish name: Stub. The name of a candle burned down to the last inches.

  The day his mother left, his father took a hammer to the radio. It was as if he were murdering it. He carried it out back and hurled it to the ground. It bounced. He struck it until it was annihilated. He left the pieces where they lay, so that the backyard became a place neither of them ever wanted to go. The little vegetable garden was abandoned and the flower beds overtaken with brambles. The grass grew, the weeds; soon the sumac took over. The front yard was abandoned and in no time became overloaded with junk. The house was also the place where his father kept the things he thought one day he could make over and sell. Broken toilets, sinks, iron bedposts, and such. He bought a rusted-out truck and used it to haul away whatever people no longer wanted. Stub felt lost submerged in all that broken stuff. He knew that he, too, was not wanted. If it had not been for Axel, the library, the campus, and the woods he thinks he would have fallen to pieces. Like he is now. There is a thread of darkness, a soiled thread, that runs through everything. He is weary and afraid. He lies alone in a borrowed room, adrift. Outside, the world starts up again, but he is somehow excluded from its cohesion. The sound of birds calling up the sun begins.