Uncovered {Lyndis, Open}
Jan 11, 2018 18:08:15 GMT -5
Post by Deleted on Jan 11, 2018 18:08:15 GMT -5
Vasco Izar
I like to think that the snow hides away the seeds that will blossom in the spring to come.
Little pieces of what was left behind were scattered in these fields. Some flowers, some crops, bits and pieces we’ll have pluck in the first blossom. Little memories idling in the corners of fields for those patient enough to discover. We’re taught to clear it all out from one year to the next, to make way to treat the soil and turn it over for new life. But—I like to save the little flowers that grow, and press them between pages of old books, just to show that there’s more that grows in these old fields than what we’ve been told to.
It’s never too many. Maybe a tulip or an odd bulb, sometimes violets, and once a rose. That was the year after Raquel was born. I still have the little flower, totally dessicated by now, tucked in between yellowed pages like some sort of relic. I could’ve given her the flower when she left—I should’ve, I think. It’s a hard memory on a cold day like this, when, after clearing the fields and my aching bones tell my body to quit. My mind’s alive though, turning over the thought of finding a rose bulb this morning, peeking out through the dirt.
There’s a fracturing, I think. The name Izar had a heft but we’ve had holes poked into us, cuts sliced in and pieces taken out. We’re a patchwork of what’s left, carrying on like the winter won’t us apart. Some still have that bitter fire. Sampson, who wanted to go to the capitol to spit in their faces, until I convinced him not to. Well—I asked him, on Salome’s sake, and Raquel’s, as a father—don’t go making pain where you can stay and mend. He’s not usually one to listen, but maybe the cold and age has a way of dulling fires in our bellies. Haven’t seen him since that day, but he didn’t board the train like I thought he would.
He told me about this place, on the edge of the Izar land and close to the wall. He said that there was an old rainwater pipe that went underground, across the line where the wall is, and came out the other side. He’d gone through, once. The winter that he came down with the flu; when he wasn’t seen for months and we thought he’d gone and died. Back then I thought he might’ve actually gone and done it. Bakar had a tell when you would ask him, and he’d try to lie it away. The little wrinkles that formed under his eyes, the twist of his cheeks. It left me thinking he’d gone under, gotten out, seen another world.
But then he’d come back, flames and brimstone, like the outside world had tarnished whatever piece of his heart had been gold.
On a winter night, when your brain is turning and your body aching, you think about anything to distract from the cold. And all I could think about was this shaft, the hole that had led from one world to another. And so I was walking to the edge of the world, because if I went home it would be time to watch little Yanamari (and truth be told, I needed more time) waiting to come upon something special in the dark. I walked the length of the fence toward the little hill that stuck up out of the field. It has a little metal lever, you might have to dig for it. But if you twist it three or four times, you’ll hear the lock come free.
I should’ve turned back. My hands were chilled now, and the stars were coming out overhead. But I walked a pace around the hill, nudging my foot at indentations. I wondered if Sampson would come up behind and laugh, thinking he’d play the best joke of all on me. But the second time around my foot knocked something with a clang. I kneeled. I started to dig, slowly at first, until I was pulling away dirt between my fingers. The handle was rusted but started to turn. There was a click, click, click. I turned with all the strength I could muster. Click, click, click. And again, until the earth along one patch of grass pulled away, and a circular black shape formed.
I stared down into this abyss in wonder.
