29-1 2023-11-05

One foggy night, a strange man appeared in town. I watched him drawing water from the well. He looked nothing like anybody I had ever seen before. The texture of his irises lured me into unknown depths.

"Good morning."

"Morning."

"I don't think we've met before."

"No, probably not."

"What's your name?"

"I don't need one."

"You're not from around here are you?"

"I guess not."

"Where are you from?"

"I don't remember."

"Okay mystery man."

"Wait, I remember now. Would you like to hear about it?"

He produced a stringed instrument I had never seen before.

"Sure."

He looked at something far away just over my shoulder. I followed his gaze across endless sand. I don't think I had ever heard greater silence than this. I tried to follow his footsteps across the crest of a towering dune, but they would fill up again too quickly and look just as they had looked before. I tried desperately to catch up to him, fading into a thickening gold veil of windswept sand, but the sand sank quick beneath my feet as he disappeared so effortlessly, replaced only by faint music. So entranced by the nectary notes of a timbre and rhythm I had never heard before, I walked on and on and on. When at last I caught up with him atop the tallest dune in the horizon, we sat down, I watched his fingers play over eleven strings that seemed to vanish as they were struck. For an eternity, I listened to these most beautiful sounds next to silence. Watched the sun set over the borderless desert, how the sky played across a dimming spectrum of colours I had never seen before.

I didn't realize I had fallen asleep until I woke up. On the rocky shore of a raging river, the man was kneeling next to me, arranging pieces of wood. I felt a sudden chill, slowly replaced by the warmth of a fire.

"Is this where you're actually from?"

"Yes, it is, I finally remember."

"What was it like?"

"Listen."

And I heard the oaks whisper as they swayed. I did not hear the evergreens silently sway, but there were so many more of them than I had ever seen before. I heard the campfire crackle, the river rumble. I heard my breath freeze as I asked him.

"But what about your family?"

He looked straight at me.

"Where are you from? Your friends, your lovers? Everyone you've ever known and forgotten, remembered and tried to forget. Where are you really from?"

"Listen."

I kept quiet at that point, but only because I didn't want to admit to him that I wasn't hearing it. In my wordlessness, the river carried my gaze downstream to a dazzling double summit crowned with glaciers. Timidly, the sun nestled itself between the two summits and gradually disappeared.

"That's beautiful and all. But aren't you just running away? You can't keep putting up these pretty defences and pretend it doesn't bother you. One day, it might all come back to bite you. You can't keep living in denial."

He smiled at me, either mockingly or sympathetically, and opened his mouth to speak.

"And don't you tell me to 'listen' one more time."

"I wasn't."

"Sure, then what were you going to say?"

"That you're right. I can't run away, put up defences, lie to myself that I'm happy. What I wish you could see, though, is that that's not what I'm doing. What I wish you could see is to unsee all that. You keep asking me what I'm hiding when I'm already showing you everything. Please don't assume other people are as conceited and constructed as yourself. I could sit here and spend all day and night, and then a few more after that, telling you the story of how I got here, sitting next to this river talking to you. It might take me years, decades even. I'd put you in my shoes and you'd take every step, wipe every tear, get fucked and fuck over every soul I wish so dearly I could have treated differently. God, I could show you everything, down to every shimmering star that doesn't give a damn. Sometimes I think that's all I've ever wanted, is to share all of this with someone. I'm sure it would make a great story. A real great story."

He turned away for a second so I couldn't see his face, then looked back at the fire.

"But hey, let's save that for another time. I'm sure your story is better than mine anyways."

I waited for him to catch his breath, then watched him close his eyes and stay very still.

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be."

I watched him breathe slowly a while longer before he opened his eyes again and spoke.

"Thank you."

"What for?"

"For listening."

Somewhere an owl called. A deer leapt over a fern. I listened to the moonlight shatter over the jagged current.

"What about you, where are you from?"

"I'll tell you another time."

He sighed.

"When it's warmer."

He smiled at this. And we watched the campfire burn out, how the embers smouldered far longer than the fire burned. After that, we listened a while more to the moonlit rapids and ever-swaying trees.

"I can't sleep."

"Neither can I."

"Wanna play a game?"

"Sure."

"Alfa."

"Bravo."

"Um, camel?"

"It's a name."

"Katherine."

"That starts with a K."

"No, I said Catherine."

"Well you're wrong anyways."

"Oh, Charlie."

"Yes, then back to Greek."

"Delta. And then epsilon?"

"No. What do you tell a cave?"

"Echo."

This went on for a while, I don't even remember whether we finished the game or not, but eventually I got tired and asked him again.

"Okay, for real this time, where did you actually come from?"

He laughed and leapt into the river.

I waited a while for him to come back, but when I looked again at where he dove into the water, I could see that it was far deeper than I had thought possible. I shook my head and jumped in after him. Down, down, down, I went, deeper into pitch blackness and liquid silence.

"Hey, river! Where did he go?"

"..."

"Ah, I see."

And I went and checked but he wasn't there.

"He's not there."

"...."

So I went there too. I stayed there for a long time. Alas, I could not find him.

"Okay river, thanks for trying to help, I have to go back now. Goodbye."

"."

I took one last look at the deep blue blackness down there, how mesmerizingly tranquil, so deafeningly still. I don't think I have ever heard greater silence than this. I promised to return but the refracted shards of the moon above beckoned me back to shore.

It was the dead of night when I climbed out of the well. There was nobody around. I was awfully thirsty, so I dropped a pail and heard it splash a long way down. I hauled it back up full of water. When I had my drink, I looked back down the well.

"Echo!"

"Listen."