Montag stepped into the room. It was only in this quiet darkness, this gaping void of memories, where he could still feel the phantom of the mask that once gripped his face. That fiery grin, those fiery eyes and fiery sparks – all swallowed up in the inky black of time. Gone. Over. Done.
Without turning on the light – its brightness always blinded his eyes for a few seconds – he crossed the length of the room in three strides and crouched down in front of a chest. Hands reached out, undid the latch, swung the lid open on silent hinges. He knew what items laid at the bottom without having to see them; how many times had he opened up this same chest, brought back the past, reminded himself of the world's mistakes? A book at the furthest corner, a dried yellow flower tucked between the pages and pages of typewritten words. A tiny corked bottle on the opposite side, filled to the brim with a mixture of sweat, tears, dust and ashes: remnants of a society where he'd once belonged. At the center, folded neatly, was what Montag saw in his mind as he listened to the silence around him. Hands reached in, came back out, bundles of cloth held tightly.
Slow, deliberate, he brought the clothes to his face and breathed in deep. Kerosene. The familiar smell, once comforting, once a drug, had returned back to its true form: Nauseating and repulsive. Life-taking.
Mildred. Finally, after all those years they'd spent together, him at the firehouse and her in the parlor, he'd finally remembered where they'd met. We met in Chicago. Mildred was walking on the sidewalk at night – a moonlit one. When she turned her head to look at me, the moon turned her skin white. We talked, then a few months later I asked her to marry me. Why, at that time she'd been so inquisitive! So daring and alive! Eager to try new things, even the seashells and parlor walls, eager for adventure... Almost like–
Clarisse. He tried to remember the last conversation they'd ever had, before she'd disappeared. What had it been about? Something to do with salamanders. Or was it lizards in general? Montag traced his fingers over the scaly pattern on the worn out fabric in his hand, shivering slightly when they brushed against two small beads, cold and lifeless. Yes, it had been about salamanders. She'd asked why the firefighters had chosen a salamander as their emblem. And he had answered… what had he answered? The harder he struggled to recall, the further it slipped from his mind's grasp. It was like trying to retrieve a ball out of a lake. The more you paddled at the water, trying to draw it towards you, the more ripples would be formed, pushing it away even more.
He squatted in the shadows, silently attempting to retrieve the words that had fallen from his lips, once upon a time. What did I say? In the dark he could see the pale porcelain face with the glittering violet eyes, could feel his mouth forming a series of shapes he'd forgotten. And all of a sudden, it became so imperative for Montag to bring back to mind his own answer, so important not to forget any second of his old life, that he jumped up in a frenzy.
Clothes in hand, he bounded through the doorway, down the hall so fast that each window became a blur, wrenched open the door and stumbled onto the porch. Clarisse. My uncle says there used to be front porches… they didn't want people sitting like that doing nothing, rocking, talking; that was the wrong kind of social life. Oh, Clarisse! There are porches here. Your uncle was right. You were right. The books were right.
Rip. Off came one sleeve. Tear. There went the other. Slash. Slit. Pull. A clean split went down the back of the coat, separating the three gold-threaded numbers, the temperature of hell. Yank, claw, shred, reduce to rags.
Burn.
Montag thrust one hand into his pocket, rummaging, searching, digging through the buildup of ancient memories. Fingers brushed against something – recoiled. Tentatively, they went back to investigate closer; the smooth slender surface and the rough nub at the end were strange yet familiar to his fingertips, like a sober man being handed a bottle of whiskey for the first time in many years. In the scarlet sun's retreating rays, he brought the match up to eye-level, marveling at the amount of chaos a single flame could start, marveling at its transforming, destructive powers, marveling and wondering at the promise he'd made to himself so long ago: I will not burn again.
He could feel the longing in his gut, the simple and undemanding art of striking a head lovingly, perfectly, against the box surface and seeing it give birth to a newborn flare, the joy of seeing that flare enter the world. The desire-filled yearning – that repulsed even him – had been an unquenchable thirst in his mouth for more than a year now; almost twelve months since Clarisse had been whisked away, three-hundred sixty-five days from the day Millie had left him, a year since he'd allowed himself to be tempted again by the pleasure of burning.
Rags in his right hand, the tiny stick of dynamite in his left, Montag placed the match in a crease at the top of the shredded pile. He wrapped the sides around and around it, layer by layer, so that bit by bit he felt the oxygen-deprived flames in his chest once again become smothered, suspended at the heart of a sphere of new resolve. He knew what to do now.
Place one foot in front of the other, then place the other one in front of that one. Slightly awkward at first, then becoming more comfortable, he began a slow jog to the back of the house, which turned into a sprint. Into the woods he ran, the trees leaning towards him with their outstretched branches and the moon drawing their shadows across the uneven ground in a frozen cacophony of figures.
Montag ran without pause, the bundle tucked beneath his arm, and for a passing moment he saw himself as he was now; a fleeing man – but instead of a forest landscape, he darted under the harsh glare of streetlights, to the dreadful symphony of helicopter blades slicing through the air and a robotic abomination ready to pounce on him at every corner. For a few seconds, he once more felt the rabbit's fear when being pursued by the fox. At one terrible moment he even thought he could sense the sharp pinprick of a needle at the side of his leg; then the red fog lifted, and he was no longer Montag the Refugee or Montag the Burner of Books. He was the Holy Bible, Matthew Arnold, Lois Lowry and John Steinbeck. He was Montag the Treasurer of Books. Montag the Survivor.
How long he stalked through the night, he didn't know. When he finally burst through the other side however, his panting gasps echoed across the gurgling river, the grassy plain and the vast emptiness. Montag went as close to the bank as he could without falling over, to stare into the swirling liquid obsidian depths.
Have you ever noticed how funny it is, that you can never step into the same river twice? At that time, Montag hadn't understood Clarisse's question. Yes you can, he'd argued. Just go in, walk out then go back in again.
His friend had shaken her head, laughing. Oh, no! Maybe you could step into the same spot, but the river you were in before will have already rushed on somewhere else to some new place, wouldn't it? And at every second, you would be in a new river, because the water is always moving around you, always moving and never stopping… Never mind; you don't get my logic, do you?
Yes, he thought he did now. Change – that was the force propelling the world forward. An endless river of life stretching from the east to the west, flowing regardless of the people immersed up to their chins within the waters. No beginning, no ending, just an eternal current that sucked in everything near it.
And with change, whispered a tiny moth voice in Montag's head, can come great gain as well as loss. We who think we can retain all the knowledge of the world within a single mind are fools; that is the role which books play. Unlike books though, our minds may never be burned unto our dying day… and while we might not remember all events of the past, they will always be there at the bottom, waiting to be brought back up again. Such is the way of the world, Montag.
The no-longer-fire man brought the pile of rags out from under his arm, holding them straight above the busy torrent. He watched them half float, half tumble through the air to be immediately swept away in the open arms of the river. Two meters, five meters, eight meters downstream the clothes were dragged, until they sank below the enigmatic, sparkling surface. Montag shielded his eyes as the first rays of dawn made their entrance upon the horizon.