FL E U R
de
L I S
- Dim Aldebaran -
II. La M A L É D I C T I O N de la F L E U R
It was an awkward way to live, without the memories, but Trouble managed. They all did, in the end. Besides, it suited him: he had always been an awkward boy before that first rush of the hunt.
The confident, the arrogant—? They never quite mastered voluntary ignorance. Perhaps that was why they had the money, the fame, the glory; but he didn't want those things, no, not anymore, so perhaps that was why he went to the café alone, why he bought his women at the corner and forgot them after.
But he could live with himself—
—others could not.
They were still friends, of course—there had been no blame game, no lackluster life lessons. Every once in a while, though—they'd ask, in that foolish little way of theirs, half-ashamed, like a child, asking for a shoe to be tied for them after they had tripped and cried.
They'd ask; he'd answer.
He came for tea on a secondhand request. He sat on a stained sofa; she curled up in an understuffed plaid armchair, which was tattered as if a cat had frequented the place but had died some years ago. The lights were dimmed for an intimate air, though he knew it was really to save a few on the electric bill.
They chatted, passing control of the conversation like a hot potato, back and forth between each other. She didn't know he was a cheater in the game, didn't know he liked to play pretend: she was too busy adjusting that mask of hers, the starry smile and bright eyes, overdone like a geisha.
He looked at her lips and thought of sin—
—and then at her eyes and thought of salvation.
The pierce of the kettle's whistle broke the moment; she passed the potato to him and left, leaving it to sear his hands with such obtuseness.
Curious, he moved to her chair. A permanent depression had indented the seat for her derrière. How often did she curl here, how often did she cry, clutching that worn blue duvet?
By the seat was a lamp; a fine chain dangled from it, gilded paint curling off it like wisps of baby hair. He pulled on it: on, off; light, dark; day, night; dream, nightmare. It got old pretty fast, so he picked the paint off the lamp base like an old scab; it peeled off, like the rind of an old orange.
stifled sobs from the kitchen, muffled with a dishrag.
—next to the lamp, like a bad neighbor, a picture and its frame, a picture of her and the blue-eyed boy, together, laughing/learning; tepid teaching on her part, but neither cared, just elementary lessons on life and love.
the sobs slowed; there was a rustle of cloth as she wiped her face clean of such heresies.
She had taught the boy to be real—
—she had not forgotten him.
He flipped the picture down, giving the blue-eyed boy a fine view of the plastic table.
She came in; margaritas. They toasted with a cheap plastic clink.
"To life," she says—
—"To memories," he responds.
She froze, halfway through setting the picture upright.
"So now you know," he said—and left.
Encounter at the door: she held it shut, preventing escape to more decadent climes. "You're supposed to help me!"—trembling tone and tears.
"Help yourself," he replied, and left unhindered.
III. Le L I S d'Î L E
She left the underground: they all knew where she had gone.
Her way was made clear to her— midnight escapes, Foaly had said, aboveground permit in hand, sleepovers, teenage trysts, or perhaps escape alone suffices—
It wouldn't be reason enough for the boy in the picture: he would need to rationalize it to himself, wouldn't he? He would need reasons, rational reasons, a why for every what.
She cited vengeance. Other causes were too noble for the broken.
She walked the long hallway to the pods, alone but for her thoughts, and though she drowned she drowned in that which welcomed her: thoughts of darkness, thoughts of death, thoughts that filled the chamber like water into a sinking ship.
It would be a long walk, perhaps: but wasn't it always?
Perhaps not: perhaps some paths were through those fabled fields of gold, or the road less traveled, or a yellow-brick road.
But perhaps so.