She walked away without saying a word.
Shira sat down at her desk and began her workday. She was writing a personal column about the daily hardships she experienced—how unglamorous they were compared to the life she aspired to.
“We expect to reach places, fulfill great causes, fulfill dreams, and we feel at times that our lives are pointless or uninteresting until we do these things. We keep forgetting that even when we reach our goals in life, we will fall into one routine or another there too, and it will be challenging. If we don’t learn to enjoy life now, it will be even harder to enjoy it later. Because there will be a gap between the extreme of success and the other extreme of a dull and worn-out routine, the best time to bring on change is now,” she concluded. She felt a little joy in her heart. She glanced at Ben. He was still lying motionless on the mattress.
She turned on some music on her computer—an upbeat, cheerful song collection. Her movements were just as bouncy and joyful. She hopped to the storage room and took out a bucket, mop, broom, rags, and other cleaning supplies. She filled the bucket with tap water from the kitchenette, dancing to the beat of the music. A wonderful feeling took over her as she started cleaning and tidying up. Shira pranced and sang to herself the lyrics she remembered, a little out of tune but enjoying every moment of it. Every so often, she peeked at Ben’s lifeless figure laying on the mattress. The music didn’t seem to motivate him or touch him in any way.
Three hours later, she had managed to scrub and tidy the studio and the bathroom and run one load of laundry. Shira smiled and felt accomplished. She arranged the cleaning supplies back in the storage area and went to take a shower. When she was done, she went over to Ben. She took him to relieve himself and returned him to the mattress.
She felt great. She prepared a meal and spoiled herself with a sweet dessert. She glanced at the mattress in the corner and then went into the living room to eat and watch a good movie.
It was late in the evening when, tired, she returned to the studio.
She went over to Ben and sat down in front of him.
“Ben?” Shira asked quietly.
No response.
“I’m going to remove the gag now, and we’ll take a shower.”
He didn’t move.
She gently removed the mouthpiece. He moved his jaw slightly as he walked like a lifeless ghost toward the bathroom. She helped him relieve himself and washed him as she had on the previous days. This time, the scene resembled washing a girl’s doll, only human sized. She toyed with the idea of selling dolls that size, both male and female, in toy shops.
She finished washing and tending to Ben, who was very passive, and led him back to his mattress.
“Tomorrow we’ll eat breakfast together,” she said.
DAY 5
Ben woke up to the sound of Shira cooking.
“Hey, you woke up. I’ll be right with you,” she said. The metal spatula in her hand kept making noise as it hit the pan.
A few moments later, she washed her hands and walked over to him. “Let’s go to the bathroom.”
Once more, she helped him get up and shuffle to the bathroom. Her hands were wet and smelled of onion. After freshening him up, she sat him down at the table. She prepared eggs over sautéed tomato and peppers, pear and apple salad on a bed of fresh baby leaves, and strawberries and cream for dessert.
“Here, taste it,” she said, and then blew on the bite she prepared to cool it.
Ben sat silently. He chewed and swallowed without moving. But his stomach told a different tale, a tale of joy and pleasure accompanied by gratitude and respect for the elaborate meal Shira had prepared.
“Did you like it?” she asked after they finished eating the strawberry dessert.
No response.
“I saved these strawberries in the freezer for a special occasion. It’s not the season, and I wanted to cheer you up a little.”
He looked lifeless.
“I know what will improve your mood,” she said after giving it some thought. “Tomorrow, if all goes well, I’ll release your legs and we can start a regular routine!”
His face remained blank.
“Would you like me to remove the leg cuffs?”
He nodded unexcitedly.
“Great, then tomorrow it is! Would you like me to read you something I wrote last night?”
Silence.
She sighed. She got up, took all the dishes to the sink, and washed them. When she finished, she took Ben back to his corner.
Lunch went by uneventfully and ended on the same estranged note. Shira didn’t go to great lengths to prepare lunch and settled for a simple spaghetti bolognese.
“We don’t really know each other.” She tried to start a conversation after they had finished eating. “I mean, I know you, but you don’t know much about me,” she corrected herself. “Would you like me to tell you a bit about myself?”
He didn’t respond.
“All right. I’ll take you back to your corner then.” She was finding it hard to maintain the upbeat mood she felt before.
She took him back to his corner.
Ben immediately lay down on the mattress like a dead man and didn’t move.
The hours went by and evening came. After a light dinner consisting of toast, butter, cheese, and jam, she tried to coax him into conversation again. But he didn’t cooperate and was once again returned to his corner for the night.
DAY 6
The next morning, Shira woke Ben up early.
“Good morning! Today we’re starting our daily routine. It will do you good, you’ll see!”
He sat up slowly.
“First off, I shall keep my promise and remove your leg cuffs.”
She opened the bindings and removed the socks and the bandages. The wounds were nearly healed.
“Look! How great. The ointment I applied to your sores really helped,” she said, giving it little thought, since he couldn’t see. “Come, let’s freshen up a bit.” She led him to the bathroom.
This time he didn’t shuffle since his legs were free to move about with no limitations.
When he was all freshened up, she sat him in the center of the studio. She hooked the long chain from near his mattress to his collar. “Now, sit cross-legged and we’ll begin a half hour of meditation.”
He sat down and didn’t move. Shira played some relaxing, new-age music and sat down opposite him.
“Let’s imagine we have an energy generator in our bodies; it’s slowly starting to turn and work. We inhale pure, white energy into our bodies…pure, clear energy of light. This light slowly fills us… It has pure and clear energy that washes away and heals any pain or discomfort. Our bodies fill with one great light, powerful and radiant…” Shira said slowly, pausing many times in between sentences.
“This energy can be larger than the size of our bodies, shaped like a great big sphere that can even occupy the entire studio space. Now, imagine you, as a sphere of energy, starting to move anywhere you want—it can be a real place or somewhere in your imagination—and you can do anything you want there.”
At this point she stopped talking and let the music take over.
After a long pause, when the music finally faded and the studio became quiet again, she said, “Take a deep breath, and slowly come back into the room. Let the big sphere of light return to your body, to the studio, and slowly sit down on the floor with you. I will count to ten, and when I reach ten, you will be back. One… two… three… four… five… six… seven… eight… nine… ten. That’s it. The meditation is over. How do you feel?”
Ben didn’t respond.
“It’s okay if you don’t relate at first; you can just listen.”
He didn’t seem to be listening.
“Okay then.” She let out a small sigh. “Let’s go eat something, shall
we?”
It was clear to her that Ben was having a hard time getting used to his new state. Shira had tried to help him get settled slowly. She hoped that as time went by, he would adjust. For now, he seemed to be outright resistant.
After breakfast, Shira told Ben, “From now until lunch, it’s your personal time for introspection. After eating well, you can use this time to think calmly with no outside pressure. Think about why you’re here, look inward, and let yourself rest.” She took him to his spot and went about her business.
At lunchtime, she went over to him. “How fun, the sun is out! I think we’ll eat lunch in the garden; what do you say?”
Silence.
“We’ll get you out of this mood eventually. You’ll see,” she said, optimistic as ever. She connected the walking chain to the collar and led him a few times around the garden. “Crisp air, eh? Real clean… And the sun above us is warm and pleasant.”
She sat him down by the table in the garden and hooked him to the chain that was there. “Wait here until the food is ready.”
He stayed seated on the wooden bench under a wide umbrella. After some time, she returned to the garden with lunch. They ate and she enjoyed being in the moment. The sun gave her a sense of triumph that encouraged her to stick to her method and beliefs. A new, fresh hope arose in her that everything would fall into place. Shira didn’t want to tell this to Ben, but he was a real challenge. None of the other caretakers would agree to take on the job of treating him.
“Now I’ll take you back to your corner for some more introspection time.”
In the evening, after the shower, they sat down to eat in the studio. At the end of the meal, she said, “Now, after dinner, when the day is almost over, is when I would be happy to talk to you and share things with you that you may find interesting… But I won’t force you to listen to me. Would you like to listen?” She waited for a response, even the slightest one.
As usual, he didn’t respond.
“Back to your spot, I take it?” Shira asked in a slightly despairing tone. She got up from her chair to collect the dishes.
Ben shook his head. He was back to being present in his imprisoned body, and he was beginning to feel bored in his spot. Any change in his passive state on the mattress would have interested him by now, even Shira’s annoying voice.
“Great!” She sat back down on the chair. “I really want us to talk—or at least, you know, for you to respond to what I say. It’s important for me to feel that you’re listening.”
He exhaled irritably. He didn’t want to make her happy, but it seemed that making her unhappy was a rather difficult task, so perhaps he should stop trying. The woman got excited over every little thing; he would have to stop breathing for her to have any unhappy emotion.
“Would you like me to tell you a little about myself?” she asked.
He nodded.
“Where do I start? Hmm… I already told you that I was a registered nurse for four years at a hospital. I was looking to change careers. It’s not that I don’t like treating sick or wounded people. I like to feel that I’m truly helping and giving of myself, but in many cases, people turn into bloodsucking leeches. The person closest to them suffers all the negative energy, and I decided I wasn’t going to be anybody’s punching bag anymore.
“It’s funny—I didn’t think I could remain a caretaker; I thought I would have to change to an entirely different profession. Luckily, this job found me by coincidence.” She giggled.
He feigned indifference.
“I suppose this story doesn’t really interest you… Let’s see what else I can say about myself. I’m divorced, no kids… I have a brother and a mother who live far from here.
“While job hunting, I started writing columns for a few websites, and just recently, I’ve started writing a book!” Her voice rose with excitement. “Do you want to know what the book is about?”
Ben didn’t respond.
“The book is about a man who likes to climb mountains. One day, he discovers that there’s a really high mountain he hasn’t climbed yet—it’s kind of a fable or an allegory, but the moral of the story is very simple!” She examined him to see if he showed interest. But he hardly moved.
“The moral of the story is that you have to enjoy the journey, the present, and what there is right now. You probably think there’s nothing to it…but it’s going to be fabulous!”
He wasn’t thinking of anything.
Shira got up from the table, collected the dishes, and took Ben to sleep in his spot.
DAY 7
They continued their routine the following day.
Ben was terribly bored in the hours between each meal. He couldn’t do anything. He remained passive and mute, but his mind awoke and became lucid.
Up until that moment, his mind would not cooperate with him as far as logical, linear thinking. But now he was trying to analyze the situation he was in and fit the details into a structured and familiar pattern. He was missing some information, and many troubling questions came to mind. The past month seemed to him like a trickery of some sort.
One particular question burned in his mind: Who actually ordered this treatment for him?
Everyone likes me, he thought. Except maybe Don. He’s probably not a member of my fan club. He chuckled to himself. But there’s no way he hates me that much.
Ben tried again and again to recall the events of the day leading up to his arrival at Shira’s. He had a hard time remembering that night, and his train of thought kept hitting dead ends. He remembered sitting down on her couch before he sipped the wine. They were having some strange conversation. Wait! She spoke about him—she definitely said something about Don. Yes! Was that redheaded loser responsible for bringing me here? He fumed.
The thought of that hotel boy planning such a crazy, extreme manipulation seemed unrealistic to him. But what if he did manage to pull this off? It can’t be. But she did mention him. He recalled his encounter with Don and the day he sent him for two weeks on the farm.
He also began to conjure up the images of the newspaper headlines that dealt with the story. Could it be Don? he wondered. But he soon gave up the idea, simply because he met the man after he had met Shira. They were having lunch at the hotel when he showed up.
Thoughts were swarming in his mind again, blurry, yet monotonous.
But wait. Another coherent thought came to him. What if someone planned the fiasco with Don? What if it was a provocation? What if Don was also a mole who deliberately annoyed him just to get him into this mess? But what mole would want to go through the suffering he had inflicted? He ruled out that idea too.
Thinking about this was beyond his strength. He reverted to an inert state, physically and mentally. He withdrew into himself.
In the evening, Shira sat down to eat with him, then struck up a conversation again. “Tonight we’ll talk a little about you,” she said when they were done eating. She got up and came back with her laptop. “Let’s look you up online,” she said excitedly. “I opted not to run any search on you before we began treatment but rather get to know you in person, face to face.
“Wow, there are lots of results here,” she said after a few quick clicks on the keyboard. “The first link features your highly mentioned breakup from La Belle Michelle… Not interesting.” She continued searching. “Oh, here’s one with some basic facts. It says here you’re twenty-nine… So your thirtieth birthday is coming up! How great, we can celebrate here,” she said happily. “I’m thirty-two, by the way, going on thirty-three. Okay, what else does it say? Let’s see… Here it says you completed your business and economics studies with honors from an Ivy League university—well done!
“Then you changed careers to advertising and started working for your father in his prestigious, top ad agency. Hmmm. You have a brother named Joe. He founded a highly successful business in Europe
for media and cellular communications. Europe? Why did he go there of all places?”
Ben shrugged. He didn’t want to get into that topic.
“Okay, you were elected two years in a row as the most eligible bachelor… Well, no wonder. You’re a very attractive man!” She flattered him.
He wasn’t impressed by her compliment.
“Hmmm…here’s a link worth mentioning. It says here that when you turned sixteen, your birthday present was a trip to Japan, where you studied aikido for more than a year.” She sounded intrigued. “Is that true?”
He nodded slightly. He was pleased with the way the media twisted reality for a change. It was not a “present” in the pure sense of the word.
“I’ll look up aikido.” A quick search yielded the definition. “Loosely translated, aikido is a way of harmonizing with energy. Interesting.” She chatted to herself. “It’s not just a martial art, but also a peaceful way of life. The aim is to resolve conflicts without causing damage to the aggressor. Fascinating!”
She went on reading. “The aikidoka aspires to unify with the aggressor’s movement and divert his power to merge with his movement and lead him with no resistance. Therefore, the technique ultimately ends with throwing and pinning the aggressor to the floor.”
He wasn’t interested—he knew all of it. Nothing she said was new to him.
“The founder of aikido summed up its essence in one sentence. ‘It is the way for the individual’s body and spirit to develop to promote a better society for all.’ He also summed up the goal of the art by saying, ‘True victory is victory over oneself; therefore, victory over another person is meaningless. The aikidoka must conquer his own negative traits: the fears, hurdles, and limitations within himself.’ Wow. Inspiring,” she said enthusiastically.
Ben rolled his eyes under his blindfold in silent protest.
The Light Between The Shadows Page 9