The Book: A Novel Calling

by Leo Nation

  Winds of Change are blowing

  In a new song: “Everyone Can Win!”

  You … are Woman!

  I am a new love song.

  You … are Love.

  I am your Celebration!

  I drop to my knees laughing. She wraps the warmth of her hands on my cheeks and looks at me with starlight in her eyes. She hugs me tight. We kiss and I feel at home as I thrill to the sound of her laugh. I get excited by a sexy idea: as she places a tender kiss on my brow, I think, Oh, my God! We’re going to make it.

  I think of an old crooner singing an old song. I sing the words to her: “All the way….”

  Woman chuckles as we lie back in the shade of the great live oak tree. We are like a pair of cosmic soul mates, all the way back home again. The appreciation we give and receive elevates us both.

  Our love is true delight.

  ∞ 32 ∞

  “Now that was great!” I say, still basking in a glow of supreme being. Woman laughs as she eyes a big white cloud above her toes. Two pelicans cut across the world like animated sunlight.

  “The world moved,” she says.

  “I was thinking we were the world.”

  “No, I mean it did. The world did move.”

  Distracted by the honey color in her hair, I behold her beauty as in a trance.

  “Everything … has changed!” she persists.

  “I saw a kaleidoscope in my head,” I say, “turning and shifting, changing colors and patterns: I felt connected to the universe.”

  Woman props herself on an elbow and she laughs as she looks out to sea, “Love is good.”

  I almost blush as I brush a few grains of sand from her shoulder and say, “Lucky we.”

  “This place is different now,” Woman insists. “Look over there, at that. Have you seen it before? It wasn’t there. We were on a hill in the shade of a big oak tree. Where is it? Now, we’re lying here on a beach—where did this ocean come from?”

  “That is the question,” I answer.

  “Have you thought about it?”

  “Not until now, I’m trying not to. My mind is still wrapped around you.”

  “Look around and see this,” she says.

  I wonder how far the pelicans had to travel to get here. How did a tropical ocean move in here?

  “It is incredible,” I say.

  A pair of seagulls flies over and a sandpiper struts on delicate legs, poking its beak into the sand just in front of us.

  It stops and looks as if it knows.

  “I love the way they walk,” Woman says.

  A fine inner glow is still toasting my emotions. I don’t want to let go. I enjoy lingering in pleasure, but it is clear that her primary desire is to talk things out.

  “I’m glad the world didn’t change until after we got together,” I say.

  Woman merely smiles with a sweet glow.

  “I mean, anything else would have been a terrible distraction.” Remembering many foiling frustrations I laugh.

  Woman’s warm lips touch my ear lobe. She whispers “We are not alone,” and I receive a sweet, hot shiver.

  “Is that right?” I say, with a smile.

  “We came down a long hill on a bike like a rocket soaring into a green valley. I didn’t see any water, did you?”

  “No, there wasn’t any.”

  “So? How could this happen?”

  “You got me.”

  Woman sits up straight and wraps her arms around her knees; she rests her chin on her forearm and studies the ocean.

  “I don’t understand this, but I do think we earned it,” I say. “We deserve it. I accept all this because I want to enjoy it and be happy.”

  “Don’t you want to know why the world just changed?” she asks.

  “Of course I do, but … maybe we did the right thing at the right time.”

  “Could that do it?”

  “Sure, why not?”

  “You believe that?”

  “It’s all I got.”

  “Why aren’t you curious about this?”

  “Usually I would be, but look out there!”

  A row of waves rolls onto the beach looking like liquid perfection. I am still beaming from the afterglow of real love. I take a breath of happiness. “I have to say, nothing can bother me right now.”

  “So gazing at pelicans is enough?”

  “After what just happened?” I laugh, “How could I want more? I am delighted and satisfied with existence exactly as is. It’s enough. I like it. Joy is the end of all sorrows.”

  “But still, it is odd.”

  “Very strange, I do agree.”

  “You think we did this?”

  “It is possible.”

  “How?”

  “Right thing, right time, right place.”

  “You are guessing now.”

  “Call it intuition.”

  She laughs, “I think we found a new level.”

  “Obviously,” I reply.

  “We made love—and the world changed.”

  “Post hoc ergo prompter hoc,” I reply. “We did, and it did … that’s right.”

  “Be serious.”

  “I am. I don’t know how not to enjoy this.”

  “Don’t you want to understand?”

  “Not in this particular delightful moment.”

  “But you always have an opinion.”

  “My opinion right now is to savor this a little longer. Not a lot. Just enough.”

  Woman grins at me, her teeth white in the sunlight, and she says, “Tell me when a thought comes to you.”

  Soaking up a brilliant world around us, I lay my cheek on her shoulder. Ignoring a desire to please her in all things, I take a minute for me.

  “…Woman.”

  “Yes.”

  “Sometimes, when the world aligns just the right way, and things happen as they should, with everything at its best, life connects with something mystical and magical.”

  “Are you trying to avoid the question?”

  “Not at all. Can you explain the universe? I accept the astounding mystery with pleasure. Don’t you? This is an exquisitely beautiful world. I don’t want to miss it by trying to figure it out. What we see right here and now is perfect as it is. Let’s stay open to it and take what we get.”

  “The tree is not here,” she laughs.

  “I accept that. The action under it still is.”

  Woman laughs and shakes my shoulder. “I will accept that.”

  I put my arm around her, and we sit gazing at the surprising sea. “I love the universe,” I tell her. “I love the world. I don’t know how we did this, but if I had to guess I’d say we created a turning.”

  “What is a turning?”

  “I read about it somewhere. It’s like when all horizontal lines suddenly shift to vertical, and new things become possible.”

  “You think we created that?”

  “I think it is possible.”

  I turn my hand and tiny bits of sand fall to a little mound near my ankle. I scoop up another handful of warm sand and pour more on top.

  “Life is amazing,” I say.

  “I think we moved up,” Woman repeats, “and we are not alone.”

  I laugh.

  Maybe she’s right.

  I watch little eddies of surf foaming into smooth wet sand, and I open up to the beauty all around us. I take a deep breath. Maybe we have reached a new level.

  “This is something big,” Woman says.

  “Possible,” I repeat.

  “You don’t sound excited.”

  “I’ll be with you in a minute.”

  Like a pair of peas in a pod of goodness, we face a sublime sea. Sitting in a pleasant breeze and absorbing exquisite beauty, I know that life is good. I am aware of existence as a conscious privilege, and I can’t help wondering how long it took the world to create a miracle like Woman.

  “Love is all of it,” I say.

  “You said that,” she laughs.<
br />
  “I can’t explain it. I feel it. I know it. Love is all of it. Compassion is a universal function.”

  I stand up brushing sand away.

  Woman takes my hand and pulls herself up. She bends and sweeps sand off the back of her legs. Now she looks up and smiles. “Do you remember the first thing you ever said to me?

  “Of course I do.”

  “Say it again.”

  “You were the last thing I expected to see.”

  “Not that, right after that.”

  “Well, then I told you I had something very important to say and I didn’t know what it was.”

  “You were nervous.”

  “Quite queasy, indeed I was. I had never felt so many emotions and so much pressure. My feelings were so strong I was worn out. All I could do was wait for what was coming. I knew I would recognize it when it showed up.”

  “I saw your plight,” Woman laughs.

  “I had to wait for what felt like betrothal.”

  “You looked numb.”

  “Then it came to me. I knew what to say. I told you almost as fast as I found the words. I didn’t know what they meant but I did know they were true. I had to say them, to tell you: We share the same being.”

  “That’s right,” she says.

  “They were true then and they are true now.” I look up at the sky. “I have no doubt. Love is all of it.”

  “Do you think we did this?” Woman asks, looking around. “Did we change the world?”

  “I think we did.”

  ∞ 33 ∞

  After a long and tender kiss, I take Woman’s hand to my lips. I glance over her shoulder to the point of our little cove.

  “Hey!” I say.

  “What?”

  “Holy Hell!” I blurt.

  Sitting on a high bluff like an astronomy observatory at the far end of the cove, a golden pot overlooks the sea.

  “That wasn’t there before,” I say.

  “It’s a mystery,” Woman laughs.

  “What could be in there?”

  “Want to find out?”

  “Let’s go!”

  We dash across mounds of dry sand as if driven by an invisible force of supreme power. Racing up the belly of a big sand dune, Woman stops and stands perfectly still. Her face framed by golden flowing hair, she observes our destination.

  Now she sets forth in naked splendor.

  Golden Pot Number Three!

  On the side of the great vessel a wrought iron staircase rises about three-quarters of the way to the top, where a platform stands at a door set in smooth convex gold.

  “Wow!” I say, still naked on the run.

  “We’re on our way,” she laughs.

  “It’s bigger than the others!” I cry.

  The attraction pulls me like an invisible force of nature. I feel like a honeybee dragged to a rose by its antennae. I have to get there, and be there—no matter what. I hear a voice in my head repeat: Be there now … Be there now … Be there now!”

  I dash to the metal stairway and bolt up taking two stairs at a time. Standing on the landing I grab hold of a nautical disc in the center of the great door. I turn hard to the left. It doesn’t rotate. I try with more force but it stays put. I throw my whole body into the process with no luck. Woman stands beside me now; we take hold of the circular shape and turn it together.

  This time it gives a little bit, and inside the door sounds of precise craftsmanship indicate quality. Precision seems to be tumbling into all the right places: clink, clink, and clink.

  Like a Swiss bank vault the door swings open. Woman steps through and I follow her. I look down and see a beach from inside the pot.

  “Wow, what a vision!”

  “How can this be?” asks Woman.

  “You’re right. Where are the walls?”

  “Surprise!” she replies.

  “It’s impossible!”

  On the other side of a stone wall only about knee-high we see daylight beyond a circular veranda. The space around us is wide open. Ocean breezes waft through the place. Nothing around us obstructs our view of the world outside.

  A vast patchwork of green fields and mixed colors of harvested wheat, yellow and light brown, seems to go on forever. All the plots of land teem with abundant crops. The rich lands extend to a distant range of blue mountains.

  Despite this incredible vision from inside a solid object, I enjoy a profound sense of coastal relaxation.

  I turn to my left and I see the back of a big man with tangled long hair. At a computer, and facing an interior wall, he looks like Beethoven playing a keyboard.

  He is so engaged he hasn’t noticed Woman and me standing close by. He hulks over the keys as if he expects birth at any moment. He hesitates, types something, stops and waits, mulls things over in his mind, and types a new entry.

  Behind his computer a sign on the wall contains a single word.

  Small e and capital Q.

  In blood red:

  eQuality!

  This rawboned giant of a man in a brown sports jacket with worn-out leather elbows, and trousers of navy blue, is still captivated by his work. I can see the side of his face, which is long and lean and strong, with prominent cheekbones. His wrists are thick, and his knuckles big-boned. The blood vessels around his hands bulge like night crawlers on a Mississippi shore after a good rain.

  I like this guy. Without any reason I just like him. I don’t know why. I’m sold. Whatever he wants I’m for it. I don’t have a reason in the world, and it simply doesn’t matter. From me this guy gets whatever he wants. I’m okay with that.

  The big man stretches reaching for a page emerging from his printer; he catches a glimpse of us.

  “Ah, good,” he says. “I’m glad you are here.”

  He drops a printed page onto a stack of white paper and Woman says, “You knew we were coming?”

  “Indeed, I have been waiting for you.”

  “Oy!” I groan. “How does that work?”

  “You will see,” he laughs. His oversized voice reverberates in my chest. “I know where you have been and I know where you are going.”

  His presence is huge, so impressive the whole space seems full of his being.

  “Are you a writer?” Woman asks.

  “I am an Author. There is a difference.”

  “What is it?”

  “Writers can write anything. They know the craft. They have a talent for it. Ask them to write a speech and you’ll get a good one; request an essay on any subject, and they produce good work. A writer knows the skills of his trade. An author, however, is one who has encountered something he must write, whether he likes it or not, whether he knows the craft or not. He is simply driven because the impulse is too strong to resist. He must do it. That is me. I am the Author.”

  “Sounds mysterious.” I glance at Woman.

  “It is difficult,” he says, “but it feels right.”

  He waves his arm over a thick stack of paper and laughs. Woman says, “Those pages next to you, are they it?”

  “A first draft,” he replies.

  “Are you going to finish it?” I ask.

  “Beyond a doubt,” he laughs, “as soon as I know what it wants from me. I don’t know exactly what it is, but I shall recognize it on arrival.”

  “That sounds strange,” Woman says. “How did you know we were coming?”

  “I am the Author.”

  “Oh,” I say, pretending to understand.

  “We should discuss what you two have got yourselves into,” he says.

  “I don’t like the sound of that,” I say, giving Woman a sidelong glance.

  “You have a very big job to do,” he says, “an important role in something new.”

  Woman’s eyes open with interest.

  “Your primary task,” the Author adds, “is to find each other.”

  “We just did that,” I say proudly.

  “When you leave here, you won’t know you ever met. Thus, your challen
ge: find each other.”

  “She’s here now.”

  “You will not remember this. When you wake up in another place she will not be near. You must find her.”

  “What a bum deal!”

  “We already have each other,” Woman says. “We like it this way.”

  “I know.”

  “So?” I ask, “Why screw things up?”

  “Just find each other.”

  “We’re not lost,” I insist.

  “This journey is mandatory,” he says.

  “I don’t understand that.”

  “You will understand the moment you find each other. Take my word for it,” he laughs. “It will be worth your trouble. I tell you this now because, even though you will forget, the knowledge will remain somewhere deep and guide you to each other. Trust that you can find each other as you enter the quest. That is the game you are destined to play.”

  “Can you believe this?” I ask Woman.

  “No—and yes,” she replies.

  “Find a way to be human,” the Author says. “Make a difference. By doing your best you will make it easier for others to know that love is real. The challenge is quite simple. Find each other.”

  “That sounds easy,” Woman says.

  “On the contrary. Simple, not easy.”

  “It doesn’t sound simple to me,” I complain.

  “Some things are worth striving for,” says the Author. “This is one of those things, a task worth doing, whatever it takes.”

  “But, if we don’t remember, how can we?”

  “That is the rub,” he says. “It is a challenge. Listen closely to your longing. You can find your way to each other.”

  I look through the veranda and see the white beach through a wall that isn’t there. Everything outside appears open and free. Why should we get stuck with an impossible problem like this? I don’t want to lose Woman now or ever—or forget I ever knew her. That’s crazy.

  And yet, as bizarre as it seems to me, I realize I’m okay with whatever this man wants.

  “Okay,” I say. “I’ll do it.”

  “I knew you would,” he laughs. “Now consider this: Love is a universal principle. The only way you can understand it is by creating it. You must take it from the realm of ideas and thoughts and create an actual context. I mean transform the value into a space you live in.”