Unreal Cities

BY AMELIE ANDRÉZEL

[dr1nk1ngm3rcury-deactivated2013]

[aoibhincollins]

W

Photo adapted by smokeandsong.  Original here.

[aoibhincollins]

11

“That night,” W began, “The judge went to visit the teacher.”

Tom sat expectantly on an overturned cabbage crate.  Evie slumped against the wall, trying to ignore the pain in her arm.

“But he never,” W continued, leaning forward, “Intended to bring a gift.  And he certainly didn’t stop beneath any olive tree.  That is to say, there was no olive tree to stop beneath.”

Tom looked puzzled.

“Of course at some point,” W said, “There’d been a tree.  The landlord had plucked a sprig from it and he’d put it at the teacher’s feet.  That much is true.  But the timing is wrong, not to mention the place.  The landlord’s tree was a world away: in a different garden, casting the shadows of a different moon.”

“The storytellers uprooted this tree,” W lamented, “And transplanted it where it didn’t belong.  Why?  For symmetry.  We can all agree that the night in our story was one of great and peculiar magic.  But it was also lopsided.  Good magic always is.”

Evie had been afraid of this.

“There's nothing circular about a miracle,” W added confidently, tapping her pen on the arm of the couch.  “Anyone who tells you different is a fool.”   

Aïsa frowned, but said nothing.

“Now,” W continued, “If you can trust a bard to do anything, it’s to smooth out the rough bits.  You see,” she explained, “A tale goes down easier without any lumps.  Audiences prefer their stories ready to eat: vacuum-sealed and over-sweet—like Ash’s kimchi.”

“You leave my cooking out of this,” Ash said.

W shrugged.

“So the storytellers kidnapped the tree,” she said, “As a way to explain strange circumstances.”

“What strange circumstances?” Tom asked.

“Three men went into a tent,” W said simply.  “Three men came out.”

“That’s not strange,” Tom objected, “It’s just boring.”

“Is it?” W asked.

“Nothing changes,” Tom said.

“Everything changes,” W insisted.  “And therein lies the magic.”  

[aoibhincollins]

10

This time, it was Tom who interrupted.

“Who was the woman by the creek?” he asked.

Aïsa fished another piece of grime from Evie’s wound.  “Who indeed?” she repeated.

Evie frowned, and not just from the pain.

“A woman;” she said, “An apparition; A figment of the landlord’s imagination—I don’t know.”

It wasn’t exactly a lie.

“You have your suspicions,” Ash said, increasing the pressure to the bullet wound.

Yes, Evie thought, but they all did.  Except maybe W, and she wasn’t telling.

“All in good time,” Aïsa clucked, patting Evie’s knee.  The overhead lights flickered and the ceiling shook as a bomb detonated down the street.  Evie had been so distracted, she’d practically forgotten the air raid.

“No sign of letting up soon,” Ash sighed.

“Oh?” Evie asked.  Predictions weren’t usually Ash’s style.

“You don’t need a weatherman,” Ash observed, “To know which way the wind blows.”  Before Evie could press her further, Aïsa doused her arm with a fresh glug of iodine.  She cried out in pain. 

Damn Aïsa, Evie thought—even if she were only trying to help.

“Who told you the story, anyway?” Tom asked, going back to his original question.

“My boss,” Evie said.  That was the truth.

“Maybe he knows,” Tom said, “Or she?”

“Yes.”

Nobody spoke.

“Well,” Tom asked impatiently, “What happens next?”

“The parable of the judge,” Evie said.

“Let me guess,” Tom said.  “He stops beneath the olive tree, right?”

“Right,” said Evie. 

“Wrong,” said W.

Tom waited.

“Well?” he said, “Which is it?”

“Of course he stops,” Evie said.  “He has to stop, or the story doesn’t make sense.”

W sighed.

“There’s your problem,” she said.  “You go around expecting these things to make sense.”

“It wouldn’t be much of a parable,” Evie argued, biting her lip as Aïsa’s tongs dug deeper, “Without a moral to the story.  Not that we’ll ever find out.  Not at this rate.”

“You’re the one slowing us down,” W said.  “You and your creative additions.”

“Fine,” Evie said angrily.  “You tell it, then.”

“I thought you’d never ask,” W said.

[aoibhincollins]

9

“Stop messing around and tell the story,” W complained from her place on the couch.  “And this time, we could do without the embellishment.”  Her fingers never stopped flying across the sketchbook.

“I'm telling this parable,” Evie said bitterly, “The way it was told to me.”  She tried not to squirm as Aïsa plunged the tongs back into her arm.  “If you have a problem with that,” Evie snapped, “I suggest you tell it yourself.”

“It’d be more accurate,” W said.

Tom laughed.

“The way you talk,” he said to W, “You make it sound like you were there when it happened.  Like it happened in the first place.”

Evie and Ash shared a glance.  Ash raised her eyebrows.

“You’ll be more succinct this time around,” Aïsa told Evie, adding her perspective to the conversation.  “Won’t you, dear?”

Evie couldn’t tell if it was a request or a proclamation.  Not that it mattered much, in the end.  She sighed.

“Yes,” she said.  “More whiskey, Tom,” she added, wincing.

Tom handed her the bottle. 

“Where was I?” she asked.

“The landlord,” the Sisters said in unison.

“Ah, yes,” Evie said.  “The landlord.”  

“The next to come to the teacher’s tent was the landlord,” she began again.  “Like the prince before him,” she said, “His attention was caught by the sight of the olive tree, whispering softly in the moonlight.”

“Boring!” W quipped.

“Oh for heaven’s sake!” Ash interjected.  “Be quiet and let her tell her story.”

Evie nodded.

“The landlord rested against the sturdy trunk,” she said.  “How old this tree is! he thought to himself.  In the days before he had begun to serve under the teacher, there had been a similar tree on the edge of his property.  It had been gnarled and ancient, with broad boughs and a mass of great roots that spread out like fingers in the fertile soil.”

“Get on with it,” W moaned.

“One winter,” Evie continued, “A merchant from another town came offering a very fair price on grain to sow for the next season’s harvest.  The landlord saw the opportunity for profit, so he bought all the seed in the merchant’s wagon, leaving none for the other farmers.  To accommodate the great volume of seed, the landlord instructed his tenants to plough the western-most corner of his lands, which had lain fallow for many seasons.”

“The tenants were pleased by the prospect of the extra land, and they did as their master bid them.  On the second day of ploughing, the landlord walked down the western field to oversee the progress.  All was very much to his satisfaction, except for the long swath of ground by the creek that grew as wild as before.  The landlord called the eldest ploughman from the field to demand an explanation.”

“The roots of the olive tree grow under that ground, your lordship, the ploughman had explained.  To till the land there, we would need to chop it down.”

“Then chop it down! the landlord insisted.  Make way for the grain.”

“The ploughman had protested.  In spring, his children played beneath the tree and climbed high in its branches.  On hot summer nights, the women hung laundry from its boughs and waded in the creek as the wind blew it dry.  He took his lunch among its roots, as his father had done before him and his grandfather before that.  He would not chop it down.”

“This made the landlord very angry, but the tenants were all in agreement.  None of them would chop it down.  The following night, the landlord took his axe to the western fields, determined to fell it himself.  He swung and he hacked.  The sound of the blade on the wood reverberated in the empty night.  Roosting birds took flight and the small creatures of the hedges lay quiet.  The landlord rested for a while against the handle of the axe, watching the moonlight on the muted spring landscape.  As he waited, a tall young woman emerged from the forest on the opposite side of the creek.  She was slender and exceptionally pale, as if she herself were made of moonbeams.  She looked at the landlord, and his axe, and the great gouge in the olive tree.  She stood at the edge of the water but she did not cross.  At first, the landlord believed her a dream.  Then, the mysterious woman spoke.”

“Will you cut down this tree? she asked, gesturing toward the old olive.  Her arms were lithe and swayed in the air.  In the moonlight, the impression of her body was like a trunk; her limbs like fine silver branches.”

“I will cut it down, the landlord replied, To plant grain, which will grow at great profit.  This land, which I have let lie fallow too many long years, shall at last be plentiful.  My tenants and I will feast for many seasons on the bounty of this fallen tree.”

“The tall woman shrugged.  You must do as you please, she told him.  Your land will do the same.”

“The landlord went back to his chopping.  The tall women turned and walked sadly back into the forest.  The next morning, the olive lay on its side across the wild ground.  The woman was never heard from again.”

“The tenants were saddened by the loss of their tree, but the work of ploughing and planting the new land soon pushed all other concerns from their minds.  Come harvest in the fall, the wheat sold at great profit.  The landlord declared a festival.  He invited the tenants to the hall of his fine house for a celebratory feast.  Come feast time, the landlord went down into his kitchens to oversee the preparations.  Many savory loaves of freshly baked bread cooled upon the racks.  The landlord wished to taste the product of his fine grain, so he called for a cup of wine and a bowl of oil in which to sop his warm bread.  The servants said they could bring him the wine but regretted there was no oil.  This season, there had been no olives to press.  The landlord replied that there must be oil for the feast, and so it was brought in from a neighboring village at great expense.  Still, it was little compared to the profit of the grain, and the landlord was pleased by the fruits of his endeavors.”

“This prosperity continued for several years,” Evie remarked, “Until one spring, when heavy snowfall in the mountains brought high water to the valley.  The creek at the western edge of the landlord’s property swelled well beyond its banks.  Without the roots of the olive tree to hold it in place, the fertile soil and the grain that grew in it were swept away on the muddy tide.  Come summer, the field lay fallow once more.  Those western fields, where the grain once had grown and the olive tree before it, were fit now only for crows, who nested in the reeds which grew up from the mud.”

“Standing outside of his master’s tent, the landlord at last understood the significance of his actions.  The olive tree had grown into the land.  Its boughs had been wide and its roots had been long.  He had been a fool to think he would profit from its destruction.  The landlord put his hand upon the trunk.  My master the teacher, he said to himself, is like this olive tree.  When he dies, what roots will anchor me from flood?  What branches will shade me from sun?”

“The landlord’s eyes filled with tears.  He plucked a sprig from the lowest bough of the tree and he held it close to his heart.  He ran into his master’s tent.  Forever after, he pledged, I shall plant grain only in sturdy earth, held fast by the joining of many hands.  Never again, he wept, shall I be a toppler of trees, but a vision of light in the darkness, generous and strong.  I will support my brothers in times of trial and need, he told the teacher--even as you have supported me.  He lay the sprig of olive at the teacher’s feet.  Let this bough be the symbol of my promise, he concluded.”    

“The teacher was deeply moved by the words of the landlord.   Thank you, my son, he said kindly.  What a beautiful gift.  Come close, and you shall have the key to what you seek.  Then the teacher pulled the landlord to him and whispered a single word in his ear.  The landlord's tears vanished.  He began to shout and sing.  He danced from the tent, greeting the starry sky with a soaring in his heart.”

[aoibhincollins]

8

"Word went out across the land," Evie began, picking up where she had left off with the tale of the three apostles, "That the teacher had fallen ill."  There was no need to backtrack for the Sisters.  In her own way, each of them would have already pieced together the details.  

"The apostles lingered at his bedside," Evie continued, "From sun up to sun down, tending to his every need."

"On the seventh day of their vigil," she recalled, "The teacher grew pale and his breathing shallow.  The thought of his death sat heavily in the apostles’ hearts, for they had loved him well.  They lay awake beneath the midnight sky, pondering the mysteries of birth, re-birth, and death.  Maddened by grief, they came, one-by-one, to beg the teacher for wisdom.”

“You’re telling it wrong,” W interrupted, putting down her pen.  “That’s not how it happened.”

Evie gritted her teeth.  The fine line between story and history, she thought: blurred again.  Her shoulder was killing her.

“She’ll get it right,” Aïsa assured her younger sister, poking the tongs about in Evie’s wound.

W scowled.  “She was wrong,” the fire-haired teenager repeated.

“But she will be right,” Aïsa said.

“And at the moment,” Ash observed, “She’s bleeding on the floor.”  Sure enough, there were dark spots on the tiles below the make-shift operating table. 

Aïsa sighed.  Ash got a mop.  Evie closed her eyes and went back to the story.

“First came the prince,” she said.  “It was a cool and starry night, soothed by a breeze from the nearby mountains.  The sound of the wind through the silvery leaves of an old olive tree reminded the prince of the place in his father’s gardens where first he had heard the teacher preach.  The old man had recited one of the prince’s favorite parables, a story of two young lovers—Duke Harin and the nymph Anjana—whose rebellion against fate sowed the seeds of their downfall.  The prince had been so moved by the teacher’s rendition of the tale that he had sworn himself to the holy orders then and there, renouncing his title and the rights of his birth.” 

 “The prince entered his master’s tent,” Evie continued, “Touched by the night and the memory of happier times, weighed down by the sadness of his own heart.  He knelt humbly at his master’s bedside and began to sing.  He sang the song of Harin and Anjana, his voice as pure as moonlight and as serene as poppy fields.  He sang of the snow-capped mountains where the young Duke went falconing.  He sang of the injury to the nobleman’s bird, and how the Duke became separated from the hunting party.  In plaintive tones, he recounted that first fated moment when the Duke hid in the meadow, watching the beautiful nymph take down her hair to bathe.” 

“As the Moon climbed higher overhead, the prince sang of how Harin pledged to win her for the King, his uncle.  He sang of an old, blind woman and the prophecy she gave the Duke.  She warned of a forbidden passion between Harin and the nymph.  Hearing of the sorrow their love would bring, the Duke commissioned a love potion for Anjana and the King, to be administered on their wedding night.  With the sweetness of a nightingale, the prince described the pact between Anjana and the Duke.  He sang of how the young people swore to deny the dishonorable prophecy, raising their glasses in victory over fate.  His voice trembled as he described their joyful libations.  In that terrible moment when Anjana and Harin mistakenly shared the vial containing the bridal potion, the prince sang as though his voice were a knife, forged to cut the night with the tragedy of their fate.”

“When the lovers were discovered where they trysted by the sea, the prince’s hands began to shake.  He was weeping.  He knew not if he wept for the doomed pair or some other, unknown, reason.  Perhaps he wept for his beloved teacher—so close to death—or perhaps he wept for the folly of his own excesses.  Whatever the reason, his face was as wet and salty as if he had been standing beside the nymph herself, trembling in the waves before the ruthless soldiers.  When the last, lamented note of the prince’s song dissipated into the night, the teacher raised his hands in a sign of holy peace.”

“Thank you, my son, the teacher said, weeping himself.  What a beautiful gift.  Come close, and you shall have the key to what you seek.  The prince leaned in.  The teacher whispered a single word into his ready ear.  The prince's eyes glazed in peaceful ecstasy.  He was like unto a saint, body pressed in prayer high above some holy altar.  He kissed the teacher's hand and left his master's tent with a soaring in his heart.”

Evie cried out, breaking the spell.  Aïsa held a bloody lump of metal between the tips of her tongs. 

“One down,” she said triumphantly.

“Twenty-three to go,” Ash mumbled darkly, daubing at the wound with a roll of cotton cloth.

Evie gestured for another drink of the whiskey.  Tom smiled faintly, trying to pretend he knew what was going on.  Evie sighed.  She’d made a real mess of things.  Ash was right about that much. 

Then again, she reminded herself, it was hardly in Ash’s nature to be wrong.  

[aoibhincollins]

7

Aïsa’s lips stretched slowly into a frown.

“That needs seeing to,” she said seriously, pointing to the wound in Evie’s shoulder.

“It’s nothing,” Evie assured her.  “Don’t trouble yourself on my account.”

“There’s a piece of mortar grit lodged above the bone,” Ash said, leaning against the doorway.  No one had heard her come in.  “And seventeen dirty threads in the folds of the muscle,” she continued, “Not to mention whatever the smoke deposited while you were playing the hero.  You’ll let us trouble ourselves—or you’ll get an infection.”

Evie made no reply.

“Give us a hand, won’t you dear?” Aïsa asked, turning to Tom.  He did as he was told, pushing aside a pile of papers on the largest desk to make room for Evie.  Aïsa swiveled the light above the desk to shine directly on the patient.

“Off with your shirt,” she said to Evie.  “I can’t see anything like this.”

Evie grumbled.  Aïsa was making a fuss.

“Now, dear,” Aïsa commanded.  “You are bleeding on my invoices.”

Evie pulled her shirt over her left shoulder, but got it stuck around the injured arm.  Tom reached in and slid the bloody shirt the rest of the way off, revealing an inscription on the upper part of Evie’s arm.  In plain print were tattooed the words:

           Jerusalem

                                     Athens

      Alexandria

                                 Vienna

                   London

                     Unreal.

  “What’s that?” Tom asked, setting down the shirt.

“Ah, that old thing,” Aïsa said, glancing down at it.  “You never did know when to leave well enough alone, did you?” she asked Evie.

Evie snorted.

Aïsa gestured to a bottle of whiskey on one of the shelves.  “Give her some of that,” she said to Tom.

Tom gave Evie the bottle.  She took a long swig and set it down hard on the desk.  She clamped her fingers into a fist.

“Hold her hand,” Ash instructed, coming over to the operating arena.  All the exhaustion had vanished from her voice.  Tom put his hand on Evie’s, though she would not unclench her fingers.

Aïsa plunged a pair of sterilized tongs into the wound on Evie’s shoulder.  Evie grimaced.

“Another drink,” she said.

Tom brought the bottle back to Evie’s lips and tipped it slowly.  When she had drunk her fill, he set it back on the table.

Across the room, W spoke without warning.  She had looked up from her notebook.  Her eyes were like obsidian: shining, dark, and jagged.  “You were telling a story,” she said.

No one responded.

“Aoibhin,” W repeated, “You were telling a story, about keys.”

Evie ground her teeth as Aïsa searched for the grit at the top of the wound.  Ash stroked Evie’s good arm patiently.

“Tell us the story,” Ash said gently.  “Tell it to pass the time.  It will ease the pain, a little.”

Evie bit down on the back of her teeth.  A story might pass the time—she doubted it would help much with the pain.  

[aoibhincollins]

6

Tom and Evie ferried the unfortunate residents of 422 Cardinal Street across the road by the orange light of the fires licking through the bombed-out landscape of their neighborhood.  In four trips, each of the fifty-odd refugees made it safely to the basement stockroom and temporary shelter of The Three Sisters’ noodles take-away and chip shop.

On the first crossing, Evie had groped in the half-light for the familiar feel of a delivery buzzer through the bars of the security gate.  The restaurant would have been closed since curfew, hours ago now.  If no one came to the door, they’d be stranded in the street, with the fire and the bombs.

Come on, Aïsa, Evie thought as her finger found the buzzer: Don’t fail me now.

Before Evie even let up the button, the shop lights came on and the gate groaned into motion.  An old woman appeared in the doorway, her curly grey locks tied back in a cheap hairnet.

“You’re late,” she said reprovingly.  Her lips were pursed but her pale eyes twinkled.

“It seems we’re having a bit of weather,” Evie replied, clutching her bloody arm with her good hand. “Would you mind if I keep my new friends dry in your basement until it all blows over?”

The old woman shook with booming laughter. 

“Come in,” she said, making way for the refugees.

By the time the door had swung closed behind the last of the stranded neighbors, Aïsa had launched a professional-grade disaster-relief station in the restaurant basement.  In every corner of the crowded stockroom, children sat on empty vegetable crates or slept fitfully against fifty kilo bags of white sushi rice.  Freshly laundered aprons hung around their shivering shoulders like shock blankets.  Adults sipped mugs of green tea or slurped from a pot of porridge simmering on a camping stove at the center of the room.  A red and gold calendar from the Year of the Boar had been pinned to a shelf and was serving as a kind of impromptu triage board.

Aïsa ushered Evie and Tom through the melee toward the manager’s office near the back stairs.  At the first aid station, a slender woman with walnut-colored skin and a mass of beautiful, black curls looked up from the bandage she was applying to hassle Evie as she passed.

“Fancy seeing you here,” she said.  “Looks like you got yourself into a real mess this time.”

“I aim to please, Ash,” Evie said with a lackluster smile.

“You certainly do,” the woman called Ash replied, her voice strained.  She gave Tom a tired nod.  Aïsa ushered them into the office.

The Three Sisters’ office was more cramped than the stockroom, if that were possible.  The floor and shelves were piled high with jars of sesame oil and chili paste, bundles of unopened napkins, empty take-away boxes, and soup lids.  Purchase orders and hand-written recipes lay in stacks on the largest of the three desks, near the back of which sat a dusty electric typewriter and an industrial-sized bottle of antacids.  A very dated orange couch had been wedged between a pair of overflowing filing cabinets on the far wall, on which lounged a girl in her late teens, her flaming hair only a shade or two lighter than the furniture.  She clutched a pocket-sized notebook, branded cover to cover in elaborate doodles.  She did not look up as they entered the room, but scribbled and scrawled as if their very lives depended on it.

“That’s W,” Aïsa said to Tom, pointing at the girl.  She nodded but did not raise her eyes.  The old woman shook her head.  “You already met Ash,” she continued, “And I’m Aïsa, the eldest of the Three Sisters.”

Tom looked puzzled. 

“You don’t look much like sisters,” he said.

“Heavens, no!” Aïsa exclaimed.  “But five out of seven customers prefers a family restaurant,” she added with a wink.  “If it’s sisters they want, it’s sisters they’ll get.”

She laughed again and Tom smiled uneasily.

Oh lord, Evie thought: We’re in real trouble now.       

[aoibhincollins]

5

“How did we get here from Parson Street?” Tom asked, looking very serious.

“Like I said,” Evie repeated, “I’m not telling.”

Tom turned the paperclip over in his hand.

“It’s a key,” he said, “But it looks like a paperclip.”

“It is a paperclip,” Evie replied.

“Like a lock pick?” Tom asked.

“No,” Evie reiterated, “Like a key.”

“But not a paperclip?”

“A key and a paperclip,” Evie said.

“How can a key be a paperclip?” Tom wondered.  “Isn’t it one or the other?”

“What do you think?” Evie asked.

“A key,” Tom decided.  “I think it’s a key.”

“Have you ever heard the story of the three apostles?” Evie asked, putting the kettle on the stove to boil another pot of tea.

“No,” Tom said.  “What does that have to do with a paperclip?”

“If you listen,” Evie said impatiently, “You might find out.”

Tom was quiet.

“A long, long time ago,” Evie began, “When the land was greener and the world less solid, there were three apostles who prayed and studied with a holy teacher in the farthest east.”

“Each of the apostles,” she said, sitting back down across the table from Tom, “Left a life of great comfort to serve in poverty under the teacher.  The eldest apostle had been a landlord.  He’d held dominion over forest and field, with the people to toil at his command and the fruits of the land to swell his coffers.  The second apostle had been a powerful judge, presiding over important cases in the capitol city, dispensing pardon and punishment as he had seen fit.  The youngest of the three apostles had been a prince, the son of a mighty king.  He had the face of an angel, the mind of a dreamer, and a passion for pleasure that could not be quenched.”

Evie paused.   Far away, in the dark above the city, she thought she recognized the sound of an engine boring through the night.

“Did you hear that?” she asked.

Tom shook his head.  He had not.

Evie sighed.  She was tired; she must have been hearing things.  “Now, there came a time,” she continued, “When the teacher fell ill, and word spread among his followers that any day might bring his death.  Being chief among the disciples, the three apostles made great haste to their master’s bedside.”

Evie paused.

“Are you sure you didn’t hear anything?” she asked again. 

Before Tom could respond, a bright flash illuminated the kitchen.  Immediately, they dropped flat to the floor, tucking their heads in their hands.  A hot blast blew in the kitchen window.  The walls of the building swayed and the floor shook as the air-raid sirens began their high-pitched whine.

“Too late, as usual,” Evie muttered as she picked herself up from the floor, shaking the glass from her shoulders.  “Are you alright?”

“No harm done,” Tom answered.

“The stairwell to the shelter is down the hall to the left,” Evie explained over her shoulder.  She was already headed for the door.

Tom nodded as another detonation rocked the building.  They made their way briskly toward the stairs.  When the door opened, they emerged into chaos.  People were packed three and four deep against the railing, shouting and pushing in a state of panic.

“What’s going on?” Tom asked.

Evie cursed under her breath. 

“The shelter must be closed,” she shouted to Tom above the roar of the crowd.  “The landlord is careless.  He locks the basement and forgets to leave the key.”

“Does that happen often?” Tom asked, horrified.

Evie just shrugged.  Together, they began to push their way through the crowd toward the basement and the cause of the hysteria.  As they wound their way down the central stairwell, bombs continued to fall very close to the building, shaking the stairs and knocking out the lights.  They staggered a few steps in darkness before the emergency generator came on.  Everywhere around them, parents and children were shoving and shouting, everyone fighting to make it to the basement.  But Tom was a sturdy man to match his height.  Together he and Evie slogged through the masses until, at last, they reached the bottom floor.  As they had expected, the shelter was locked.  A stocky man with long hair and glasses pounded angrily on the door.

“Open up!” he shouted, thumping his fists against the metal.

“We’re full!” replied a muffled voice from inside the shelter.

“Like hell you are!” bellowed the long-haired man.  “Half the building is out here!”

  Tom pushed to the front of the crowd.  “What’s going on?” he asked.

“That bastard locked the shelter from inside,” the long-haired man explained, “And left us out here to die!”

He shook the handle of the door with venom.  Another blast rocked the building and dust from the ceiling rained down on their heads.

“We’re full!” the landlord repeated from the other side of the door.

“Yeah, of loot!” the long-haired man shouted.  “He’s been hoarding metal,” he said for the whole building to hear: “Now the shelter’s so full of it, there’s no room for our children!”

Tom walked over to the door.

“People out here could be hurt if you don’t open the door,” he said, loudly but calmly, to the man inside the shelter.  No reply came from the other side.

“I said,” Tom repeated, his voice louder this time, “That people out here will be hurt badly if you don’t open this door!  You don’t want that, do you?”  

Again there was no response.  The mass of humanity behind Tom and Evie began to push harder toward the door.  The building shook.  Somewhere upstairs, a frightened child started to wail.  Something changed in Tom’s face, a nearly imperceptible flicker around his eyes.  With a twitch and a rustle, he sprang into action, kicking the center of the door with such force that it rattled on its hinges.  Evie knew he had no chance of breaking the barrier; it was designed to withstand an explosion that could bring down the building.  But in the confusion, the landlord seemed to have forgotten.  He panicked.  The door swung open.  The landlord emerged, wielding a small handgun which he fired into the crowd.

Pandemonium broke out.  Those who had been pushing down the stairs suddenly turned and began climbing up, away from the bullets.  The desperate people on the upper floors continued to press down, catching the few in the middle who had not yet decided which direction to flee.  The landlord fired again and again: into the ceiling, into the crowd.  Evie staggered backward as a stray bullet grazed the top of her right shoulder.  She cried in pain.  Blood began to seep through her sweater, sticky and warm to the touch.  In a single, fluid motion, Tom grabbed the landlord at the wrist and thigh and pushed him against the wall.  The gun fell from his hand.  Evie snatched the weapon from the floor as quickly as she could with her wounded arm.  The gunman wrenched free his other arm and managed to land an elbow to Tom’s nose before the bigger man had him pinned again.  Tom kneed the landlord hard in the stomach.  As he folded from the blow, Tom finished the job with a hard right to the left side of the landlord’s face.  He slumped to the ground.

With her good arm, Evie pried open the shelter door.  Terrified neighbors immediately scurried in.  After only a few people had squeezed inside, someone called out:

“There’s no more room!  It’s full of junk in here!”

Evie looked at Tom.  Her arm was throbbing with pain and, more worryingly, dark blood. 

“There’s no time to move it out,” she said, referring to the metal in the shelter.  “And nowhere to put it, even if there were.”

“We can’t stay here,” Tom replied.  The building shook again.  “I have no intention of being buried alive.”

“Or worse,” Evie said, shaking her head.  She had been trying not to think of what would happen if a fire started in the building. 

“Besides,” Tom said, looking at the blood darkening Evie’s sleeve, “That looks like it needs attention.”

Evie scowled.

“I know a place,” she said, brushing aside his concern, “Down the block and across the street.  If we can make it there, we’d be safe until the raid was over.”

“Will it fit everyone?” Tom asked.

“Everyone?” Evie asked.

“All these people,” Tom said.  “I’m not leaving them behind.”

“Are you crazy?” Evie asked.

“I’ve been responsible for too many bad things in life,” Tom said bluntly.  “There isn’t room for any more on my conscience.”

Evie sighed.

“Alright,” she said grudgingly.  “What about him?” she added, pointing to the landlord lying unconscious on the floor.

A dark smile spread across Tom’s lips. 

“He looks pretty comfortable right where he is,” the former wolf said.  “It would be a shame to disturb him.”   

[thereisthisgap]

[aoibhincollins]

by thereisthisgap

[Source images here, here, here, and here]

[aoibhincollins]

4

"I take it," Evie said, drinking from her tea at last, "That Tom Long is not your real name."

"No," Tom said.

He offered no further explanation, and Evie was happy not to pry.

"When the bus takes you home in the morning," she asked instead, "Will you go on hunting?"

"Yes."

Evie nodded.  Between the wolves and the riots and the secret police, there were ways enough to die on the street.  At the very least, she told herself, a man had a right to choose which one he'd face when the time came.  It was not her place to dissuade him.  And anyway, she wouldn't want to.

Instead, she got up from the table and pulled open the drawer beside the sink.  Tapping blindly at the underside, she removed its false bottom with a single loud pop and extracted a slender, rectangular tin from the hidden compartment.

Sitting back down at the table, she took the lid from the tin and began to methodically remove its contents.  Tom watched with intense curiosity.  A strange collection of odds and ends emerged from the box.  There were five short pieces of twine--each of a different color--, a large brass button, two tarnished bottle caps, a broken telephone card, a set of empty biros, a paperclip bent into prongs like open scissor blades, and a lone red earring of a tiny lacquer bird.

Evie spread the tokens across the table.  She studied them without a word, running her fingers thoughtfully over their contours, pausing over one or the other before settling, at last, on the paperclip.  She hefted it gently in her upturned hand, as if to be completely certain, and offered it to Tom.

"Take it," she said. 

Tom frowned.

"What is it?" he asked.  

"A gift," Evie told him.

"What kind of gift?" he pressed her.  He took it from her and held it up to the light.

"Consider it a good luck charm," Evie said.

"Does it work?" 

"I guess you'll find out," Evie said.  Tom scowled.

"It's a key," she said impatiently.  "Do you want it or not?"

"What does it open?" Tom asked.

"Not what," Evie explained, "But when, and where, and for what purpose."

"I don't understand," Tom said.

"No," Evie agreed, closing the lid on the tin once more, "I don't expect you do."

[aoibhincollins]

3

Evie's eyes were burning with sleep but she fought to keep them open.  The tall man, who was called Tom Long, was drinking a cup of coffee at the corner table in the cramped kitchen.  She sat across from him, running her finger along the rim of a mug of tea with lemon but drinking nothing.

"So I went away," Tom was saying, "For a long time.  More than long enough for them to think I was dead.  Among wolves, death is the natural explanation for absence. Even of just a few days."

Evie nodded.

"Where did you go?" she asked.  

"Away," Tom said again.  "West across the ocean.  South.  Taking rides from strangers in whichever direction they were headed.  Eventually, I found my way back here."

Despite herself, Evie was beginning to sympathize with him.  A man didn't just walk away from the wolves.  He certainly didn't walk back again.  She found herself studying his face.  He was young, for all his adventures, with a pleasant set of furrows running from the corners of his eyes and a steady-looking chin.  All in all, though, his features were unremarkable.  Evie supposed that much was a streak of good fortune for a man whose survival had depended on his ability to lose himself in a crowd.  Yes, he was very generic-looking.  He could have almost been one of the boys she had been at school with, but she knew that was not possible.

Aoibhin Collins was much older than she looked.

Not biblically old, or cosmically old.  Nothing as serious as that.  She would not live forever, as far as she knew, but she had already lived longer than many people with heads of gray hair, longer even than some with no hair at all.  Yet to see her, she could have been Mr. Long's contemporary, a woman in her early thirties.  

I had expected to be old by now, she thought with a sigh.  But that was not to be. 

[aoibhincollins]

2

"You are not a wolf," the tall man said, sitting on the Murphy bed and clutching his stomach where Evie had elbowed him.

"Neither are you," Evie observed.

They eyed one another suspiciously.

"Do you have a name?" the tall man asked at length.

"Aoibhin Collins," Evie said stiffly.

"Well, Yvonne Collins," he continued, "Would you mind telling me what the hell just happened?"

"Ee-vuhn," Evie corrected, sounding it out for him.

"What?" the tall man asked.

Evie shook her head.

"I'm sorry for kidnapping you," she said.  "But it was better than the alternative.  And I'll give you bus fare home in the morning."

"I am not staying the night here," the tall man said.

"Would you prefer to get pinched again by the wardens?" Evie asked.  The tall man looked sheepish.  "Then you'll stay here," she concluded with finality.

"Where is here, anyway?" the tall man asked.

"A safe house," Evie said.

"Where is the safe house?" he prodded, moving gingerly from the bed to the window.  He pushed aside the blackout curtain and studied the skyline before letting the drapes fall back in place.

"Cardinal Street," Evie admitted.

"Cardinal Street?" the tall man repeated in disbelief.  "That's miles from where we were."

"So it is."

"Look," the tall man said, getting agitated, "Are you gonna tell me what happened or not?  I think I have a right to know."

Of course you don't, Evie thought.  What a ridiculous thing to say. 

"You should get some sleep," she said instead.

"Only if you tell me what's going on," the tall man bargained.

"I had a job to do," Evie said, "And you got in the way--that's what's going on.  Now I am trying to do you a favor and you won't leave well enough alone, so it seems to me you have a taste for trouble.  What were you doing out after curfew in the middle of wolf territory in the first place?"

"If I tell," the tall man asked, "Will you tell?"

This was absurd.

"No," Evie said.

"I was hunting wolves," the tall man said anyway.

"I am not going to tell you," Evie repeated.

"Don't you want to know why?" the tall man asked.

"No," Evie said.  She wanted to go to sleep.

"They turned some kids in my flats," the tall man continued, sitting back down on the bed.  His face got hard and blank.  "Nice kids.  A few weeks later, two of them are dead.  Another is in jail--they say for life.  I don't know.  What I do know is, I've had enough."

Evie thought back to the look in his eyes on Parson Street, same as the one he was wearing now.

"Well, you seem to know your way around the neighborhood," she said carefully.  "Or at least around a fight, which is as good as the same thing."

"I was a wolf myself, once," the tall man said.  He shrugged.  "Some things never leave you."

[aoibhincollins]

1

The Parson Street wolves weren’t much like the others, Evie reminded herself as she rounded the corner into the dark alleyway.  The night was cold and clear.  Blackout curtains were drawn in the apartments above, and only the moon bled a little light on the pavement.  It kept watch carelessly overhead, overtly following her movements, tumbling across the sky like a clumsy policeman.   A glance at her watch confirmed it was a half-hour past curfew, but the district wardens were the least of her concerns.  Not with a door to open.  Not with the wolves between her and the door.

Keeping close to the wall, Evie walked silently to the other end of the alley.  Parson Street lay beyond, open as a field.  By day, it was a grey stretch of nothing connecting two equally dismal blocks of council estates.  The signs above the shops, now dark for the blackout, advertised what you might expect: a corner market, a bookmaker’s, an electronics emporium.  A 24-hour counseling service with a red “To Let” sign in the window.  Only by night came the transformation.   By night, this was a hunting ground.

The wolves who worked the transit station by the bridge wore cheap leather jackets.  They had studs in their eyebrows and they cut their hair close to their heads in slashes, like scratch marks.  To stand out.  The wolves who worked the bridge wanted to be noticed.  They liked you to see them coming, because what they liked most of all was your fear.  Evie felt in her pocket for the knife she carried there.  Bridge wolves were easy that way. 

The Parson Street wolves were a different breed.  They wore t-shirts and dirty sneakers and every manner of urban camouflage.  Their hair was short or it was long; they wore hats or no hats or sometimes a scarf, like everybody else.  They blended in.  In their territory, everybody was a wolf, or nobody was.  At the very least, everybody was a suspect.  And that was what they liked most of all: your suspicion.  To them, it was a game, played out of boredom; the sport was in your reaction.                

As she waited in the darkness, mapping a mental route to the blue bins on the opposite side of the road, two young men came up the center of Parson Street.  They were laughing loudly and stumbling a little, as if drunk.  Ideally, their drunkenness would be an assurance that these were not wolves.  But the wolves would know that.  Your confidence would intoxicate them.  That alone would get them pissed.  Alternatively, it would be helpful to think that their brazenness—shouting arm-in-arm in the street after dark—was a sure sign these must be wolves.  This, too, would be false logic.  Wolves needed civilians in their territory, or any man out at night would be a wolf as certainly as if he wore a stud in his eyebrow.  So they welcomed a few outsiders in, like minnows to the jaws of sharks, picking clean the remnants of flesh between razor teeth, engaging in dark symbiosis.

The moon was creeping higher in the sky.  Evie did not need to look back at her watch to know the window during which the door could be opened was rapidly closing.  The young men were very close to her now, so that she could make out their eyes in the dim light.  She was studied at making these kinds of distinctions, she reminded herself, but this did not change the fact that tonight she was running late, or that the blackout seemed blacker than usual.  It did not change the fact that she had no time to decide.  In that moment of action, when the muscles in her limbs sprung into motion of their own accord, it seemed to Evie that it had been a lifetime since she had visited Parson Street.  Surely, though, that must have been an exaggeration.

She pushed out into the street and three things happened almost instantly.  First, the taller of the young men swiveled expertly to face her, his glazed eyes suddenly bright and gleaming with intelligence.  Second, a warden came around the corner from the adjacent block.  Third, he began to blast his whistle and run in the direction of the lawbreakers loitering in the dark street.  These things pressed home three related truths in Evie’s mind, sounding off in order of importance.  One: any moment, the door would be gone.  Two: she would not be strong enough to take the tall wolf in a fight.  Three: she had no intention of spending an evening at His Majesty’s pleasure.  So she acted on instinct.  She opted for surprise.

Evie made a beeline for the tall wolf, grabbing his arm with a look of intense concern.

“Where have you been?” she chided loudly, pulling him in the direction of the blue bins while he was caught off his guard.

“Sorry officer,” she shouted over her shoulder.  “I know not to be out so late, but I was worried about my brother.”

She elbowed the wolf hard in the stomach from an angle the warden couldn’t see through their heavy coats.  The wolf doubled over.  Evie pulled him closer, pretending to steady his drunken stumbling.

“We’re headed straight home,” she assured the dumbfounded officer.  The second wolf had taken advantage of the confusion to make his getaway. 

“No need to worry about us!” Evie added, practically dragging the wolf around the blue bins.  The warden would never believe it, but she didn’t need him to believe it.  She only needed a little time.  Leaning the wolf against the wall, she felt around for the tingling nearness of the door.  Good.  It would still open.  At last, Evie let a smile form across her lips.  If only she could see the look on the warden’s face when he rounded the bins, ready for an arrest, to find the alley deserted.  Like the curfew breakers had been figments of his imagination.  Evie laughed and opened the door.