by John Hunt
“Dionysus.”
“What?”
“Dionysus. The Greek god of theatre. And of ritual madness. And of religious ecstasy. And of, by the way, wine.”
“That was meant to be him?”
Heb shrugged his shoulders. “I thought you’d be good at charades.”
Looking for some form of protection, Phen wrapped the lead around his arm.
“He’s also the guardian of those who don’t belong to conventional society. The outsiders. He symbolises the chaotic, the dangerous and the unexpected. The stuff that escapes human reason and can only be attributed to the unforeseeable action of the gods.”
As Heb leaned forward to retrieve his hat, a still-stunned Phen checked the contours of his back. He was looking for something that might be folded tight against his skin. He wondered if Heb’s spine didn’t supply the rod from which two white feathered kites might hang.
Everything looked normal, though he couldn’t be sure. The tie-dyed top was fairly tight. A psychedelic circle exploded out in a volcano of colour. Purples, reds and yellows radiated outwards and oozed down towards Heb’s waist.
“New shirt?”
“Yes. Was a kaftan. Cheerfully hallucinogenic. I decided to cut it in half and make it a top. Offsets the pinstripe suit pants.” He rolled the sleeves up to the tops of his shoulders. “And it can be worn in a number of different ways.”
Trying hard to recover, Phen nodded politely and attempted to clear his head. He’d hoped for more than a believable act of madness and a diamond on a chin. Could that winged being be the same as this man in half a kaftan? He turned to face him again. And there, drawn with dark ink on the ball of his shoulder, like an ancient map, he saw it.
“Tattoo?”
The head half turned towards him.
“Haven’t seen it before.”
“It’s from a time long, long ago.”
“Spiral?”
The question was rewarded by Heb turning to face him directly. The face, for once clean-shaven and smooth, allowed the diamond even more prominence as it two-toned in black and grey. He pushed his hat so far back against the hedge of hair, the brim pointed to the sky.
“Is it spiralling up or down?”
“Don’t know.”
“Exactly.”
“Exactly?”
“We’re all orbiting. But in which direction?”
Heb closed his eyes and allowed the sun to hit his face. Phen noticed a hole in his left earlobe. Judging by the circumference, whatever had been in there before was large.
“I’ve worked it out.”
It was Phen’s second blurt. He’d spilled the beans. The cat didn’t have his tongue; he’d let it out the bag. He was anxious and relieved at the same time. He needed this man-angel to understand that he, Phen, was different now. That he was part of a deeper knowledge.
“I said, I’ve worked it out.” He slowly repeated the sentence, trying to give it a pointed direction.
Heb didn’t react one way or the other.
“Heb Thirteen Two. Hebrews chapter thirteen, verse two. Be not forgetful to entertain strangers; for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.”
“I said you’d work it out. You’re smart. Well done. Gold star.”
Phen had been expecting more, much more. The man he’d just accused of being an angel didn’t even open his eyes. The polished, tanned face and heaving chest stayed oblivious. Catherine wheels of colour expanded and contracted at an even pace. To relax his eyes from the kaleidoscope, he moved back to the dark blue of the tattoo. It was stationary yet whirled at the same time. It reminded him of the snake’s eyes in The Jungle Book. If he looked at it for long enough, would he be hypnotised like Mowgli? The even sweep of the continuous curve pulled him closer and closer. The entire universe sat on his shoulder.
“Cut away a nautilus shell and it’s there,” said Heb, still with closed eyes. “You see it in the whorls of a sunflower head. Stare up at the galaxy and that spiral stares back at you … Dab-a-dab-a-doo, yes sir, right back at you.” Heb was starting to sing, “No need to be blue, yabba, yabba, yabba, do! ’Cause you’re in that spiral too!” He stopped clicking his fingers and opened his eyes.
“Right!” Heb pulled his sleeves down and suddenly stood up. He then tried to touch his toes and missed by six inches. This was followed by a few half-hearted star jumps. Every time his arms windmilled up, a flash of only moderately firm midriff showed. The push-ups were even less impressive. After the first two his knees stayed on the ground as he battled to lift his shoulders off the grass. He then rolled onto his back and attempted to cycle in the air. His dirty tennis shoes pawed at the blue sky, battling to find traction.
Pal returned to check on his master. It was a brief visit. One pat on his head and he was gone again. Heb used the interruption to bring his gymnastics display to a close. He lay like a starfish on the ground before slowly getting to his knees and finally standing up. He bowed, acknowledging this physical crescendo, did two laps of honour around the bench, then used the kaftan top to dab at his non-existent perspiration.
“Nervous about the play?” he asked.
“A little. I don’t want people to make fun of me. Everyone knows I’m a tree because I don’t speak properly.”
“Lots of other people don’t have speaking parts?”
“Not because they can’t talk normally.”
“Everyone dances around you? The actors all act around you? You stand in the middle of the stage?”
“Yes.”
“Even their dreams dream around you?”
“Yes.”
“So, you are either a poor little mute tree, or the centre of the spiral. Everything spins out from you. Your choice.”
Phen felt a growing frustration. He didn’t know exactly what he’d expected. He had hoped it would involve some mystical angel–boy camaraderie. At least a manly arm around the shoulder, like a captain acknowledging you’ve just scored the winning run. Instead he felt blocked, boxed in. Outmanoeuvred. He was being asked the questions and he thought it should be the other way around. Angels weren’t meant to be cornered into revealing the universe. He was looking for sacred light and heavenly music and secret doors into other worlds. Dab-a-dab-a-do wasn’t cutting it.
“You appear confused.”
Phen didn’t know how to reply. He looked down at the Catholic cathedral, more distant yet still huge, and then at the roller-skating waitresses of the roadhouse. He’d accept assistance from anywhere.
“You must know things that normal people don’t. Special stuff. Wisdom … understanding … only you …” He ran out of words.
Heb placed a profound look across his face and slowly ran both hands through his hair. There seemed to be some ceremony involved, the momentary untangling of the mass of curls also serving to straighten his thinking. “Ankles and elbows,” he said. “Very few people appreciate them. Little bony pieces no one pays any attention to.” Heb demonstrated by first pulling up his trousers and then his kaftan sleeves. “But wait until they stop working. Suddenly they’re not just jagged bits of joinery. Can’t cruise like a cushioned Homo sapien any more. Can’t get food or drink into your mouth. And you can forget tennis entirely. Holy commandment number eleven: honour thy ankles and thy elbows.”
15
Epiphany
/e-pif’a-ni/ noun
Mairead said the rain was very unseasonal. Which is what she said whenever it rained. Scotland had four proper seasons; you knew where you stood. In Johannesburg the weather was all over the place. Ill-disciplined and unexpected, the rain hit the lounge windows and furrowed down to the red-polished sill. From there it channelled between the grooves of the tilting stone and poured into the garden. Already the palm was surrounded in a circle of water. She parted the net curtains and tugged at the handle of the closed window, trying to seal some invisible gap.
“Look at it! It’s coming in sideways now!”
This was clearly no way for rain to be
have. She checked the other closed windows and moved the potpourri from the Grundig although it was in no danger of getting wet. Next she prodded the towel that was lying snake-like at the bottom of the balcony door. She hid her annoyance that it was still dry by complaining that it would soon be sopping. Mairead then questioned the state of the world which allowed a half-inch gap between door and floor to be acceptable. Craftsmanship was dying, pride in your work was seen as an old-fashioned concept. No one wanted to be an apprentice any more, it took too much time. Everyone was in a rush. It didn’t matter where you were going to as long as you got there quickly.
“You don’t have a spring,” she said to no one in particular. “Winter stops and summer barges in. Same with autumn; blink and it’s gone. Not that it’s a proper winter, anyway. No snow. Well, once in a blue moon. Then everyone runs outside like crazed banshees.”
Phen sat at the dining-room table, pretending to do his homework. He’d noticed his grandmother talking more and more, even when there was no one there to chat to. This dialogue with herself seemed to be when she was at her happiest. Phen never interrupted; he knew about other worlds and how you could be in two places at the same time. It was a rare connection he had with her. A bond he could never acknowledge, but one of the few things he understood. It made him feel strangely reassured as he watched his own life mend a little then fall apart once more. He spiralled into the centre only to be pulled out again. He had no idea whether he was spinning up or down and no control of its direction anyway.
Even his school lunch wasn’t under his jurisdiction any more. He’d been very happy with the thick slices of Bovril and cheese he’d begun to make himself. Now Mairead insisted on skinny egg-and-lettuce sandwiches. “More protein, the lettuce is just for show.” He hated eggs. He hated lettuce.
He was also no longer allowed free access to his father’s bedroom. “Maybe later, not now,” was all his mother would say as the door closed behind her. Forced grins split sad faces horribly from side to side.
The only time he was free to make his own plans was when he was out with Pal. This meant walking as fast as he could, without actually running, straight to the park. He no longer pretended he was doing something else while he looked for Heb. The man in the fedora was mostly found at the far end of the green strip on a bench between the young willow tree and the almost completed waterfall. He was usually asleep, sunbathing or reading whatever newspaper or magazine he could find. On his “intellectual days” he’d play chess against himself. He kept the pieces and fold-up board in a toffee tin. “Damn, I’m good,” he’d say. “Never lost a game yet.” Occasionally his head would be perfectly still as his eyes scanned way beyond the horizon line. At these times Phen would slow his approach, sensing something private and personal was in progress. He’d sit quietly next to him and follow his gaze. Sitting without speaking was becoming his favourite form of communication.
However, for all this comfort and easy camaraderie, Heb’s puzzle was far from completed. The more Phen saw of him, the more he felt he knew only his outer edges. He knew what he was, yet that had proved, surprisingly, not to be the full answer. He hadn’t thought there would be more to know about a man who glowed at night and had wings. He had presumed this knowledge would unlock all the necessary questions. Finding an angel in your local park seemed like the end of the story. This was not proving to be the case. Surely he knew he’d been seen? Didn’t divine messengers know everything? Was God’s envoy keeping quiet because he didn’t like being spied on?
Paul had seen a burning bush on his way to Damascus and everything had changed. A light had flashed around him and he’d fallen to the ground. A voice had spoken to him. Most importantly, afterwards he’d known exactly what to do. He was a changed man. Phen had a picture of him in his Bible. His eyes were suddenly filled with a steely blue. His wavy hair turned white with a wide middle parting like the Red Sea, going left and right. His skin pushed back as he felt the G-forces of the Lord. His legs transformed to a polished marble by the furnace of the sacred fire. Nothing like this had happened to Phen. His balls hadn’t even dropped.
The problem was that a question to Heb, no matter how directly it was asked, always just produced another question. The school play was a case in point. Heb told him to stop worrying, that he would have an “okay evening”. When Phen asked how he knew it would be okay, Heb asked if he was a well-rehearsed tree or not.
Phen almost hoped for some catastrophe just to prove him wrong. Wrapped in his green baize and planks, he’d tried to watch the audience with one eye through the hole in his trunk. The only truly unexpected moment was the arrival of a huge rock pigeon. It flew in through the top window of the hall, cooed twice as if to announce its arrival, then made itself comfortable on the rafters. Mrs Smit stood on a chair and shook a broom at it. The younger children in the hall, thinking she was part of the play, clapped politely and waved at her. The pigeon was unperturbed. It spread its wings and began to preen. The lights dimmed, and Miss Delmont strode to the centre of the stage. She was dressed as some form of mythical forest creature and it was clear her costume had not passed through the school’s sewing class.
Phen noticed the headmaster, who was sitting in the front row, suddenly sit bolt upright and scrunch his programme into a tight ball. From behind, the tasselled brown moccasins launched a pair of green tights that sucked at her body. These, in turn, gave way to a smooth-fitting white blouse which highlighted the thick curls of her red hair. At its apex this fiery auburn was crowned by a pair of antlers that waved to the audience as she turned her head. What Phen wasn’t aware of at the time, and what he heard again and again afterwards, was that as she pranced in the spotlight, her nipples stood out “like cherries on a cupcake”.
This moment of potential scandal was quickly subdued when it became evident that, as the narrator, much of her time would be spent in the darkness of the wings. Margaret Wallace stole the show, leading other female cast members to spread the rumour she’d had her hair professionally done. Besides Mustardseed flying into an unsighted Bottom, forcing his left donkey ear to point south, all went pretty much to plan. The Leb couldn’t resist doing his Elvis swivel whenever he was on stage. This led to good-natured laughter and therefore escaped sanction. Kobus Visser received an extra round of applause for enchanting the forest with a goblin’s-hat-rugby-scrum-cap and a crutch. His broken leg made him the only other cast member who could not take a bow. Phen shook his branches, not that anyone noticed. He was standing right at the back with the entire ensemble in front of him.
He’d tried to imagine himself at the centre of some magical spiral rather than just a tree in the background. Sometimes it worked. He was inside himself and inside the play. And everything did spin around him. If the performance had an epicentre, he was surely it. Did it matter that no one could actually see him? Somewhere near the middle, while Puck was placing the flower’s juice on Lysander’s eyes, he went back to his father’s bedroom. He saw him lying at peace, fast asleep. This time, though, he pushed the hair away from his father’s forehead and gently brushed it back.
By the time Mr Swindon announced “the tree feller is here” and the planks lay on the stage in neat piles, the hall was almost empty. The pigeon sat plump and fast asleep up in the roof while down below Hettie Hattingh’s family took pictures of her. The flash exploded off the wooden board behind her, turning the gold lettering of past headmasters silver. Her father asked her not to pose so much and she asked what the point was then. She’d taken some of the flowers from her hair and placed them sideways in her mouth. When Phen walked past, he nodded at her mother’s greeting. “He was the tree,” was all Hettie said.
The children were invited for tea afterwards although this really meant Lecol orange squash in a paper cup at their own table. They were allowed to mix with their parents only once the teachers had made sure the adults were sufficiently refreshed. The scones and koeksusters were not for juvenile mouths until Mr Kock said so. Once this happened, Ph
en was not fast enough. Carlos de Sousa, however, pulled a plaited piece of dough from his pocket and offered him a piece. A Wicks bubblegum wrapper and a piece of fingernail had to be removed before he placed it in his mouth.
“Now the hungry lion roars, and the wolf behowls the moon.” The Portuguese Puck punched him on the shoulder and headed for the exit. For the rest of the term Carlos would say that line over and over. Whether he passed biology, scored a goal, or saw a pretty girl, lions and wolves would be involved.
From what Phen could gather it had been a fairly successful night. Miss Delmont was much in demand although she now wore a small waist-high riding jacket over her blouse. Her horns were gone, yet she still looked like some bewitched and beautiful creature of the woodlands. She seemed ready to join in the hunt for the fox or, if needed, become the prey itself. With her cup sliding dangerously across her saucer she explained that a story didn’t have to be linear. The atmospherics of the telling was often as important as the tale itself. We had to be authentic to the author’s ambience as much as to his play. The men were enraptured; the women drifted off.
Mr Kock thanked Miss Delmont and simultaneously suggested something more South African for next time. Once more he mentioned his preference for the Battle of Blood River. “Four hundred and seventy Voortrekkers held twenty thousand Zulu at bay,” he reminded her. “We could build a laager right across the stage. The girls could make themselves kappies. You know, bonnets.” He used his hands as blinkers down the side of his head in case she didn’t quite get it. “And inter alia the boys, they love a little action, guns, spears and boot polish.” His fingers circled his cheeks as he pretended to blacken them.
In the car park Phen heard Philip Denton’s older brother say Miss Delmont looked like Bambi with tits. It sounded more like a compliment than an insult. Phen waited at the gate hoping to walk home with Jimmy. Once the last car had gone he realised he must’ve missed him and turned to go. He was halfway across the road when a rusted Anglia drove through the side entrance from the fields and hooted at him. It was only when the window was wound down that Mr Swindon’s face became recognisable beneath his gnawed-at straw hat.