He was careful, meticulous even, placing down the drop cloth on the floor in the sunroom, straightening the edges, palming out the wrinkles, paying close attention to the corners of the room where the fabric was starting to wriggle away, exposing a splinter of floorboard. He certainly didn’t want to have to make any more work for himself than was absolutely necessary. No drips, no mess, no additional work. Smart man. Meticulous man. Fascinating man.
I watched him from the other side of the room, leaning back into the elegant red wingback velvet covered chair, this chair, the one which in 18 months time will hold our awkwardly propped up newborn son, windy smile destroying us and remaking us, propelling us into an unknown future, together. I watched how he moved with effortless ease, stroking, padding, pulling, smoothing. I watched his body move gracefully through the space as he assembled the assorted paraphernalia needed to paint this one wall. Paint, roller, tray. This one wall that looked out to the west, across the tops of crammed in houses+, trees like broccoli poking up above red rooflines, the scorching afternoon sun sending the wise into a Sunday slumber, blinds down, water glasses full, music soft, and sand brushed mostly from feet.
He has everything he needs now in front of him. The can of paint promising transformation, paint roller the handle of which was flecked with a rainbow of colors, and paint tray. Paint, roller, tray. He’s ready. Am I?
Paint, roller, tray. Faint, holler, stray. Taint, collar, fray. I played with these words in my head, making up rhymes, nonsense songs, all to the beat of Baaba Maal whose music filled our world those days. And I watched him, my eyes drinking him in. I was being carried off on some cloud that I was marveling at, that I was scared of, that I wanted to resist and yet was powerless to refuse. I was drifting, floating, pinching myself to double check reality, smiling each time I landed.
He leaves the room for a few minutes and returns with a screwdriver, kissing me en route back to the paint can, our eyes locked for a fleet. I feel a jolt of energy course through me, weakened yet fantastically alive beneath his touch, in his gaze. He twists the screwdriver under the lip of the paint can and pries the lid open. Orange. Orange? A color that will later cause some controversy much deeper into our relationship. Ochre he corrects me.
The next hour, or dreamy two or three are spent marveling at his exertion. It’s hot and getting hotter in this glass baked sun drenched room. His naked back speckled with beads of sweat, spider streams that etching out the landscape of his back. I was still learning about his body, how it moves, how it responds, how it dances, how it listens and answers me, how it makes love to me. His scent becoming more familiar to me every night we spend together, the noises he makes as he sleeps, when he wakes, all becoming gently encoded in me. He discarded his sarong when he started painting, and now his white underpants are patterned with orange - sorry - ochre stripes. He stretches and swoops, dips and dives, reaches and rolls. The wall comes alive beneath his touch, just like me. The color expands its reach across the wall, streaks of lime in the paint give it texture, movement, depth. It’s exhilarating to witness this transformation at his hands. Marvelous to see it blossom so quickly under his gardeners hands, a joy to experience how it starts to pulse a rosy hue as the sun starts to sink and settle itself behind the now red ochre roofline, and a wonder to begin to see the genius in this man.
And so why do i never let him paint anything orange? Was it because of the orange outdoor wall he teamed with a green flowerbed walll, and it was truly hideous and i had to live with it for waaay too long? Is it because I want to keep safe the memory of that first orange - sorry - ochre wall, a direct path back to what it felt to come alive at his touch in those very early days. Or maybe I should just let him paint orange wherever he wants
Oh how she loves it here, here where everything is familiar. It’s what she’s used to, comfortable with, it’s where she can inhabit a world shaped to her size, where harbingers of practically no surprises dwell, where she can revel in tightly bounded pleasures all on her own terms, where expectations are slashed to a manageable edible digestible size. This, the daily rhythm of a safe life is an easy track for her to align to: ask no questions, keep your head down, one step at a time, ruffle no feathers, just get on with it.
These are her mantras, these are her crutches, these weak platitudes her only hope of survival in a world that whirls and swirls around her, a world that threatens to suck her up into its vortex, crushing her as completely as a tiny black peppercorn cracked in this unwelcome mill of life, a world that looms as a shadow over her shoulder, around the next corner, under her desk, behind the curtain. It has its own rhythm, and it’s radically different to hers. Hers is measured, controlled, serious and weighty; outside her feels overbloomed, full of restless dramatic emotions too swollen to swallow. Her Brahms to the world’s Wagner.
And yet, and yet she knows she has to leave. She can’t stay still like this, can’t stay hidden, can’t keep running away on the same spot: destination - Nowhere Any Time Soon. Sweet though the familiarity might be, she’s starting to become aware of a taste in her mouth that is both acrid and appealing all at the same time. She’s starting to hear traffic beckoning her through the sweet dawdling birdsong that has rooted her.
The structures she’s relied upon to keep her safe are starting to wobble, starting to creak, starting to reveal their transient fickle nature. Structures she’d never really questioned, never really tested, never fully laid her hands upon, neither a firm shake nor even a gentle jiggle, just to make sure. She never made sure, she just assumed, gave her power over to, expected they’d maintain, always be strong, could always be counted upon. But not now.
Her eyes are being pried open and try as she might she can’t keep them shut, the color wants to flood in, wants to engulf her, wants to wake her up and thump at her heart and invite her in this moment of now to breathe, to take just one deep long languorous breath, inhaling the possibility of a life reimagined, exhaling the life gone by; inhaling a world that brings vitality, exhaling the one she’s now dead to. One breath followed by another, and another and another.
Time fleets by, time slows down, time envelopes her, time elevates her. With every breath she’s feeling lighter, there’s freshness, and yes there’s fear. But this time the fear doesn’t shock, cripple or break her. She leans into it and lets it feed her courage. She repaints the landscape of her life, and this time she allows other hands to guide her brushstrokes, new energies which expand her world and offer gifts undreamed of, unimaginable even in that old small space she inhabited. Now she can turn cartwheels and somersaults in the vastness of her new deserved treasure filled life.
Gilarcha’s neck is being stretched, slowly their head being tipped from one side to the other, its elegant length being swooped around in semi-circles. They feel the resistance, the tightness, the deep deep slumber still trapped inside. Then they feel the fingers which start to pad in and around crevices, kinks and knots; gently, slowly, cautiously lifting their head up, a slight pull and a gentle twist before placing it down again with the care you’d afford a new born.
Not my fingers, not my hands.
Gilarcha is neither man nor woman; neither beast nor human. Gilarcha is our future. Gilarcha is divine. Gilarcha holds the secret to our survival. Gilarcha must be saved.
There’s a dull droning humming starting to fill the air around them. It’s a horrible sound, one that portends doom, death, the end. How can this be?
Make it stop. Make them stop.
The fingers keep padding at Gilarcha, now starting to move down their body. As they land on different places it’s as though Gilarcha realizes their existence for the first time. Shoulders, chest, tail, wings, legs, fingers, toes. Jolts of life sparkle into their body.
I can’t see, I want to see, where am I?
Gilarcha has been laying in this cave for longer than anyone can remember. They’ve been protected by enchantments and goblins; folklore and fairies. Children of this country are told stories of Gilarcha’s strength, their powers, the hope which they have all absorbed into their very being from generation to generation. As their world crumbles around them and good men die horrible senseless deaths, the story of Gilarcha, the promise, the weighty expectation they hold for Gilarcha has kept this people fighting, kept them believing, kept them hoping that one day Gilarcha will return and save them.
Pulsating moans becoming more rhythmic, undulating hums carrying wisps of life. The sound is shifting, taking on a new shape, new energy, maybe the start of something? How can this be?
Don’t stop. Keep going. Am I where I think I am?
Pad, pad, pad go the fingers. Darkness starting to lift. No sight yet. Gilarcha tries to open their eyes but they are weighted, bound, unable to make out anything other than a cloudy dreamy haze. Fingers moving across their head moving quickly, moving slowly. Their body now being pummeled and beaten and pushed and pulled, stretched and contracted, stroked and scratched.
Moans and hums transforming into song, a sweet stretching aching song of redemption, of hope released by a thousand voices that reverberates and echoes around the rocks, bouncing off each surface, the beauty of which brings tears into their eyes.
I’m here, I’m alive. How long have I been here? It must be close to a thousand years.
Tears well up, tears trickle down, tears puddle under their neck. Tears bring light, tears bring color, tears bring shadows, tears bring sight. And then finally tears bring back memory. And with that memory comes sorrow, the memory of their people being banished to this land, the memory of the wars that ripped all decency from their hearts, the memory of a people hardened and turned cynical towards the world. The memory of a sacrifice that had to be made, of a deal turned bad, of a hope gone wrong.
Silence now. Just a feint shuffling, rustling, whispering. Soft breathing, expectant breathing, nervous breathing. Gilarcha’s eyes are adjusting to the cave, to the moving shadows on the walls, the plumes of light, the multiple faces peering at them.
So now it’s my turn, my time. I am whole again and I must save them. Good Lord I really thought they would have figured it out by now. Ah well, here we go….
