Amberville

by Tim Davys

  Eric tried to interrupt, tried to correct him, but to no avail.

  After ten minutes Eric rose from the chair, held his paws over his head, and admitted defeat. This didn’t get Snake to quit talking. Eric backed slowly out of the small office cubicle. Harried by complicated sentence constructions filled with ironic poison arrows, the bear hurried along the dark-blue corridor back out into reality.

  He needed a new strategy.

  Snake Marek was an animal with a calling.

  Even at a very young age Snake’s brain could be compared to a generator working dangerously near the limits of its operating capacity. Apart from a few hours of quiet at night, it glowed, sparked, and hummed from early dawn until long after sundown. When Marek reached his teens, his need to communicate all of these thoughts, ideas, feelings, melodies, and visions was as physically tangible as his need for food and sleep. The surrounding world must find out. The surrounding world must hear, observe, and confirm.

  So thought the young Snake.

  He wrote poems that he hid in his desk drawer, because he knew that posterity would one day discover them there. He wrote editorials for the school newspaper under a pseudonym, but signed his arts columns with his own name. He started a pop band as a twelve-year-old, and compelled some schoolmates who were several years older to accompany him when he performed his profound lyrics. His first exhibition as an artist took place two days after his sixteenth birthday. What he exhibited were predominantly charcoal drawings; the forests around the city were his still life.

  Snake Marek’s artistic production knew no limits. From his thirteenth to his eighteenth year he poured forth no less than seventeen collections of poetry and five novels. In addition he made daily contributions to the newspaper. To begin with, he wrote in Amberville’s school newspaper, but later he did double duty as a reporter for The Daily News as well. During the same period he wrote more than a hundred songs, none with fewer than four verses, and produced twice that number of paintings, if you only counted oils and watercolors. Thanks to his manic disposition, Snake Marek managed to suffer, ponder, and produce in a feverish, un-ceasing cycle. He, however, didn’t have time to notice the surrounding world’s complete lack of interest in him.

  The summer he turned eighteen everything fell apart. Burning yourself out was of course a kind of merit badge for a hard-pressed artist, and therefore he felt rather satisfied with the entire course of the illness.

  The triggering factor was his fourth art exhibition, which, exactly like the earlier ones, was met with haughty silence. This was the final drop that caused the goblet to overflow. Two days after the exhibition Snake Marek made a large pyre on the street outside his entryway. All the handwritten poems and manuscripts of novels, all the demo tapes and paintings, framed or not, soon formed a neat pile on the sidewalk, albeit considerably smaller than Snake had wished for and imagined. Before anyone was able to stop him he lit it, and when the flames were leaping high the neighbors called the police. Sirens were soon heard at a distance, and Snake—who hadn’t foreseen this—went into a panic. He fled from the scene, and ended up—after a cold night in a foul-smelling trash room—at Casino Monokowski.

  The years he then spent along with Eric, Tom-Tom, and the others, Snake chose to conceal deep down in the archives of his memory when he took over the position as administrative assistant at the Environmental Ministry.

  For Snake Marek had a Plan.

  During his time at Casino Monokowski his artistic endeavors weren’t given up, but the surrounding world was no longer allowed to share in the development that Snake Marek underwent as a poet, prose writer, musician, and artist. The insight had smoldered the whole time in his subconscious. His talent was depicting Reality. Cut the symbolism, skip the subtexts, and weed severely in the poetry. He would become a Realist.

  And the time at Casino Monokowski gave him, if nothing else, stories enough to tell for the rest of his life.

  So with great and somewhat unexpected patience he set to work. Day after day, well-formulated and then corrected and edited manuscript pages were added to the others; notes were joined with care to notes; colors blended with a careful, sensitive brush, without anyone on the job knowing of it. It didn’t go quickly, it was an artist’s life as far from the romantic myths of impassioned creation as you could go. Nonetheless, Snake Marek found a deep satisfaction in his methodical mission. By day he lived like a normal office rat at the ministry, evenings and nights and dawns he returned to being an all-around artist in the small apartment he’d purchased on Knaackstrasse in northwest Lanceheim.

  Even if Snake Marek began his career in the public sector in the Environmental Ministry, from the first he already had his sights set on the Ministry of Culture. And when the possibility of changing departments arose, he seized the opportunity. So many signs, he felt, indicated that the grandiose—not to say fantastic—Plan he had put together in orgasmic haze was completely plausible.

  For three long years he was forced to carry out idiotic office tasks at Culture before the next move became possible. But only a few days after he had taken the position at the Office of Grants, the years of waiting proved to have been worth the trouble.

  He became one of five processing assistants to the department’s then boss. Snake was responsible for poetry and related cultural manifestations, that is to say sung, improvised, and dramatic poetry, and no one questioned the proposals for nominations that he sifted out from the applications. As long as there were candidates to give grants to, everyone seemed to be in a good mood.

  But in the energy that he showed, Snake was alone in the Office of Grants. The other administrative assistants were older culture workers who capped unsuccessful careers with jobs in the department, and in that respect Snake stood out as an obvious candidate when, a few years later, a successor to the boss’s position was discussed. No one put as much effort into preparatory work as he did, no one showed as much interest in the individuals behind the applications as he.

  One fine spring day a little less than five years after Snake Marek had changed departments, he was named head of the Office of Grants in the Ministry of Culture, and the distinction was celebrated at a run-down tavern right next to the office in east Lanceheim. Snake was a happy, contented, newly named boss; it was striking with what ease he took on his new role. In his imagination he’d had it for a long time.

  His first decision was to refrain from replacing himself with a new administrative assistant. When another one of the assistants took retirement six months later, this position as well remained unfilled. Snake himself took on these duties. In the ministry this unwillingness to recruit personnel was seen as positive. Reality beset the Ministry of Culture’s finances, and having a manager who was not too refined to do some of the heavy work was unusual.

  Four years after Snake Marek had become head of the Office of Grants, only he and a secretary were still working in the department. During the same period the combined appropriations for grants had been reduced by a six-figure amount. Snake had made himself known as a reflective authority, cautious with the taxpayers’ money.

  All, of course, in accord with The Plan.

  Only extremely deserving poets, prose writers, musicians, and artists were awarded grants nowadays. The ones whom the reviewers in the daily papers scarcely dared judge. The ones who were introverted and self-referential and impossible to have in a furnished room. Snake knew their secrets. They were all drug-abusers, psychopaths, and obsessive-compulsives.

  And this, all while Snake Marek’s own artistic production of easily accessible books, songs, and paintings simply grew and grew at home in his dark apartment.

  It had been a long time since a young, promising novelist had the economic opportunity to grow into a great body of work. No popular poetry was being created, because the poets were forced to work as dishwashers and language teachers and were completely spent in the evenings when they came home. The authorities seemed only to encourage navel-gazing and experimentatio
n, and soon there was nothing else.

  But all this would be transformed.

  Soon the city’s yearning cultural consumers would have their fill of Snake Marek’s collected works. In one stroke he would then become the leader in every art form.

  It was therefore not strange that Snake Marek reacted coldly to Eric Bear’s proposal of a leave of absence; Marek had things to do.

  In the afternoon after Eric Bear had met Snake at the Office of Grants, the bear went straight to his childhood home on Hillville Road. As always in the middle of the day the house on the peaceful light-flame-yellow street was empty. Father was at school, Mother was at the ministry.

  In the secretaire in his parents’ joint office on the second floor, Rhinoceros Edda kept everything she needed to carry on her correspondence. Among other things, official Environmental Ministry stationery, watermarked with her own monogram. Eric Bear used this paper to write—in Rhinoceros Edda’s name—a brief message, addressed to Snake Marek.

  At the Environmental Ministry, wrote Eric, a document was circulating at the present time that dealt with gambling and alcohol abuse. In one of the addenda, which discussed the problem from a historical perspective, Snake Marek was mentioned. It would be unfortunate, wrote Eric, if Snake’s past were to make his political future impossible. If Snake took an immediate leave of absence, then Rhinoceros Edda would see to it that the document in its present form would not be distributed.

  Edda was doing this for the sake of her cub, wrote Eric, because she knew that Eric needed Snake’s immediate assistance.

  After that, Eric signed with his mother’s signature, which he’d learned to copy in his early teens, and sent the letter by courier to the Office of Grants. It would reach Snake Marek before the end of the business day.

  TEDDY BEAR, 1

  In a way my twin brother Eric and I are married to the same she.

  But she doesn’t know it.

  It’s a complicated situation.

  But love is a world unto itself.

  The crooked path that led me to love: How did it happen? Emma Rabbit was an angel, I an ordinary bear. She both was and is worthy of someone better. And yet she chose me. The ways of love are unfathomable.

  Love is lethal for a bear who has consecrated his life to goodness. Love is the victory of feeling over reason. Is that why my thoughts become cloudy when I think about Emma and what led up to our wedding?

  Is Emma good? Could I be married to someone who isn’t good? Could I be married to someone who doesn’t strive for the same goodness as I myself do?

  I’m no missionary. I’m no hypocrite, either. But I was in love with Emma even before I met her. Paradoxically enough, the fact that Eric had my job at the advertising agency Wolle & Wolle made the decision easier.

  Emma Rabbit was the most beautiful bride I’d ever seen.

  Around her head, where the fur was combed so it looked like the softest lamb’s wool, rested a garland of fresh dandelion leaves and pink roses. I had braided the garland for her that same morning, according to tradition. A sheer bridal veil of silk brocade fell across her slender back and drew attention to her sweet face where her nose glistened moistly and her cheeks were glowing with expectation, anxiety, and happiness. But it was her gaze that bewitched me. The solitude in her large peppercorn eyes that had enticed me to tenderness and affection was temporarily gone, replaced by conviction.

  She was strong and beautiful.

  Emma was standing in one of the narthexes of the church along with her mother. Her mother was nervous. I had never met her. Or perhaps I had met her. She was not angry, only worried about all the hundreds of details that might go wrong. She was worried about whether her cub had chosen the right mate or not. I’m not criticizing her. I was not an unequivocal match. Despite my successful parents, I probably made an unstable impression at times.

  Outside the narthex Emma’s girlfriends stood waiting. They spoke loudly and shrilly with one another. They were nervous, too.

  Neither the nervousness of her mother or her girlfriends could, however, compare to Emma Rabbit’s own. She had awakened with a lurch when the half-moon was still high in the sky. She sat up in bed and called out, “The ring!” with such panic that I threw off the blanket and leapt up.

  “The ring? Is it gone?”

  The ring was in secure keeping in the blue case that I had set on the nightstand. Yet Emma did not go back to sleep. Her anxiety kept us awake until dawn. Then we fell asleep for a few hours until it was time for me to go gather flowers for the garland.

  They grew in the flowerbeds outside Lakestead House.

  “You’re completely sure now, aren’t you?” asked Emma.

  She was waiting for me in the corridor. She was driving her wagon.

  I went up and looked her deep in the eyes. I nodded.

  “I’m sure,” I answered without the least hint of doubt.

  “Why?”

  There was anxiety in her eyes and her nostrils flared involuntarily. A moment later they narrowed again.

  “Because I love you,” I replied.

  “But you were so hesitant,” she said, exactly as I knew she would, “you were occupied with your evil and good. You said that making promises you know you can’t keep is lying. And the more you cared about someone, the bigger the lie. You said that marriage was the worst kind of lie. Because even if you wanted to be faithful…even if you wanted to love for your whole life…even if you wanted…”

  “Darling,” I interrupted, “I know what I said.”

  “Even if you wanted all that…” Emma continued without paying attention to my objection. “You said that the rest of your life was too long a time to foresee. You said that things always happen that you can’t control. You said that, knowing all that with certainty, an animal with good intentions, an animal with a thoroughly good heart, ought never to get married.”

  “Dear,” I interrupted a second time, “I know that I…”

  “But everything you said,” said Emma, looking at me at the same time as her nose carried out the same sort of unregulated expansions and contractions as before, “doesn’t that mean anything anymore?”

  I sighed and tried to calm her.

  I didn’t want to take back what I’d said.

  I couldn’t take it back; I stood by every word.

  But to profess my love to her, to describe her as I saw her, with her secure self-confidence, her creative talent, and last but not least her remarkable beauty, wouldn’t be telling lies.

  “Many struggle their whole lives to find the empathy which is completely natural for you,” I said. “It makes you sensitive and strong. If you find yourself in a difficult situation some day, your empathy will help you through the sorrow.”

  “What difficult situation?” asked Emma.

  “I mean,” I replied, reining in my irritation so that it was impossible to hear, “that you can rely on yourself, darling. You don’t need me, or anyone else, either. You are your own happiness. If you can’t see that yourself, which in a way is part of your charm, you’re going to find out what I mean the day you need to.”

  I don’t know if she understood what I was saying.

  She leaned forward and hugged me hard. When at last she released her hold, I went down the stairs and gathered my flowers.

  I hadn’t lied.

  I hadn’t held back the truth.

  Yet it was with a heavy heart that I cut pink roses from the bushes growing in the backyard.

  A good bear.

  That’s what I want to be.

  That’s not a humble desire.

  In the afternoons, after reading and before I go down to dinner, I sit in the armchair and think about everything that separates good from evil. Some days I sit for a quarter of an hour. Other days I don’t get out of there for two or three hours. They are punctual at Lakestead House, and it’s unfortunate when this drags on.

  Evil is a serious subject. Many have immersed themselves in it. Yet one of the greatest p
roblems is the definition itself.

  Being a good bear demands that you know what evil looks like.

  I know what evil looks like.

  My forty-eighth summer of life is approaching. It is not without experience that I look back on my life. I don’t want to call it a happy life. It was never a question of making a happy life for myself. But I feel satisfied; there is a certain calm. It occurred to me yesterday. Few grains of sand from the past chafed in my soul as I walked along the shore in the pouring rain of the Afternoon Weather.

  Involuntarily my mood darkened.

  And in my armchair before dinner, my childhood was waiting for me.

  The day my twin brother and I were delivered to our parents I already knew everything about a mother’s and a father’s love for their cubs. I knew that my brother would come to experience that kind of love. And I knew that I wouldn’t. It was not an insight expressed in words; I was two days old. And yet the certainty of it was in my heart. It marked my upbringing. I loved Mother and Father. They loved me back. But never like they loved Eric.

  Never.

  We came direct from the factory, a troupe of parentless cubs being driven out to their future homes by the Deliverymen in their green Volga pickup. Stuffed animals out taking a walk that morning stopped to look at the truck. The males clasped their females closer to them. The females tipped their heads to one side and smiled tenderly.

  I can imagine how it was.

  I myself have been walking on a sidewalk like that and seen the green pickup driving by. A truckbed full of cubs who will long for love their whole lives. A longing that is going to lead them astray, and destroy them.

  Almost nothing is more difficult than keeping the longing for love free from demands.

  It is a struggle.

  I struggle every day.

  Mother liked to say that the Saturday when Eric and I came to flame-yellow Hillville Road, nature appeared in sparkling garb. The sky was light blue and the pleasantly warm sun put the cascades of red, yellow, and green foliage in light and shadow by turns.