Alexander I

Alex looked at his watch. It was getting late; the sun was just disappearing behind a horizon he refused to look at any longer. Others were just beginning their period of activity, but darkness for him was a time of fearful, anxious rest.

"I've got to sleep," he mumbled softly, wondering if the dry feeling in his throat would cease after he brushed his teeth. Pulling his jacket a little closer (not because it was cold, but out of habit), he shuffled toward his flat. Pebbles clicked under heel. He thought about kicking them, perhaps even picking one up and tossing it in the direction of the pond he would pass at the end of the trail, but he was tired and apathy brings a strange comfort to the anxious. He craned his neck, more to stretch it than to look at anything in particular, and was surprised to see that the stars were actually visible. The stars. Groaning he remembered with embarrassment his old immature fascination with the sky. "Rubbish," he growled, "elusive treasures twinkling from on high like celestial fools." He kicked hard at a pebble only to stub his toe, "of course nature will take its own side."

***

Once an old memory has been pricked awake, the mind can be hard pressed to change the subject. It is as if the subconscious activity has increased to such a degree that it drowns out actual reality and reigns, either bringing comfort or despair. It occurred to Alex as he walked that the stars and the pebble had ganged up on him. He kept remembering his old fascinations and loves, the hundreds of hours spent in delighting in something he now could barely stomach.

The wind was blowing softly now and as the evening air blew through his hair he cursed it for its dark freshness. The stars were the problem. They were too alive, too bright, too unchanging, too inaccessible. Alex hated them for being everything that he wasn't, everything that he felt he could never be. His rich knowledge of constellations and nebulas had never faltered, but now the resplendent truths that had slaked his thirst seemed to have turned into a sort of brackish salt water. The stars hadn't changed, he had.

***

With a start Alex lowered his head and stared hard at the ground. The wind had died down and the distinct clicking of the pebbles had become more muted. The sun had disappeared--everything was back to normal, he could finally shut the stars out all together and get on with what really mattered to him now. The factory had a problem. The rest of the journey home would be spent as it should be: thinking how the problem would be solved. Alex was a superb manager; he knew how to quell minor problems before they got too big. He was recognized, and if he only knew, feared, for this very thing. The very first part of Monday would be spent talking with the problem. "Nip it in the bud," he said out loud as he unlocked his flat. "No agitators under my watch." Pushing the door closed he threw his jacket onto the sofa and wandered into the bathroom. Alex gargled his customary half glass of salt water, brushed his teeth, and then crawled into bed grumbling. His throat was still dry.

II.

"That really was an excellent shot my dear, but I do think you've under estimated me a bit."

"Is that so? I do believe you'll have to prove it."

"Naturally, watch closely so you don't miss a thing."

"Watching."

I don't remember what I said after that, but I made the shot (perhaps I was so excited the rest of our conversation was a blur?). Mark was quite good at darts--but I had been practicing; I usually got home a half hour or so before him from work, and after putting on the water for dinner (or starting the oven, depending on what we were having) I usually spent a few minutes in the study. Of course, my "training" would come to good use in our next contest. He usually won--with a good natured smile of course--but I wanted to surprise him; give him the beautiful unexpected gift of defeat.

***

I'll never forget the day I met Mark. It was at the movie theatre, which is sort of odd I suppose. I was going through one of those phases; the phase of the moment was an anti-movie phase. In retrospect maybe I'd say that one of the key factors of anti-movie phasation (is that a word?) was my attention span, but at the time my abstention from cinema was for a purely philosophical reason--a reason that is still valid. But of course the predominant reason that ruled at the time is not the only factor; isn't that how all absolutes tend to break down, the admission of more data? But I digress. My biggest problem with entertainment in general (particularly cinematic entertainment) was (is) that it presents a world generally null and void of consequences. It is a world built around an ideal. And lots of the time there is nothing wrong with conveying ideals, but the ideal of no consequences is a corrupt ideal--it is patently false; the message of "freedom from consequences" is so attractive, so innocently seductive (or not so innocently), that it can't help but to woe the observer (any genuine participant quickly realizes that there really are consequences) to thinking, and then acting, as if there really weren't any consequences. The thing about movies and other forms of entertainment is the fact that most of the time they exercise their charm on observers. The static voyeur: perfect target of the false ideal, all too easily manipulated into believing that there are no consequences.

***

There are many rooms in my house, or home, as my wife prefers to call it. Some of them are loud because they are constantly occupied by loud people. The neighbor's children playing with the cat, my friends laughing too hard at an old joke, the television blaring over the ambient roar of the dishwasher in the next room over. I feel sorry for the walls sometimes in knowing that they cannot escape. They must stand there stolidly and take in every sonic nuance; plaster eavesdroppers in eternal bondage. Of course it's not a wholly tortuous occupation. Sounds can be heavenly just as they can be terrible (and sometimes they can be both). Generations of laughter lie buried in those walls; passionate whispers of love and devotion have helped those rooms age gracefully; exposure to soft, anxious prayers in the middle of the night makes the gentle corners reverberate with a spiritual glow that seems most evident just before dawn, before the pans start rattling in the kitchen.