I had somewhere to be and something to do, and yet here I was stranded in a non-descript white landscape.
I was shambling in confusion trying to find a foothold, but despite my best efforts I quickly found myself crawling. I dug my fingers and toes into the white nothing and I couldn’t make any sense of it; things like coarse and fine, hard and soft, many or one seemed to have no significance here. Consequently, I couldn’t tell if I was crawling over sand, through grass, or on a road. However, as I had something to do and somewhere to be I couldn’t allow myself to be bothered with the minutia.
After some time a splash of colour became visible in the horizon and that encouraged me to pick up the pace. If there were others there, perhaps they could help me remember where I had to go, and what I had to do. And so I crawled, I crawled, and I crawled until I arrived there. What I saw first was a magnificent gate larger than any I’d ever seen before, with a giant plaque atop it that read “Reichstadt Eichel.” If I had to hazard a guess, I’d imagine that’s what this place was called.
This must’ve been some sort of holiday for them, as even outside the gates I could hear an ensemble of musicians performing and the citizens stomping and dancing along in unison. Fascinated by the sound I squeezed through the gate to take a closer look, and look I did indeed. The citizenry was composite of all sorts of beautiful people with the attributes and accessories of different animals, so many that I couldn’t possibly hope to enumerate them all:
(Why) there were dogs, cats, lizards, and rabbits, (and) there were frogs, bats, wizards, and faggots!
Serpentine majesty, wide-crested Avian fashion, double-breasted!
Were I to ask, surely they’d have it The place I seek, surely they’d know it!
Squirrels, rats, this place was infested foxes and coons, their funds invested
[Continue later]
I suddenly realised that I must’ve taken the transition from white-nothing to cobblestone for granted, but it was a very welcome one. The streets were wide and lined with stalls and storefronts offering refreshments and knick-knacks in which the citizenry seemed to take great pride. In fact, the streets were so wide that it seemed irrational. There was room to dance, to drink, to walk, to sell and to trade, yet carriages were also able to proceed without impediment. Fascinating.
I continued down the irrationally wide street towards the source of the music, 3 girls standing on a platform in the centre of a roundabout posing and swaying fashionably like some monument of independence as their instruments seemed to play themselves. This phantom ensemble seemed to command a great fandom, the crowd was inconsolably hyped up and even I found myself swaying along to the rhythm of their tune.
The beautiful sights, the wond’rous sounds, the delicious smells, it all seemed to have an abrasive effect on me, and eventually I found myself speaking aloud:
“How could there be a place as happy as this?”
One of the citizens heard this and then approached me in a hurry. A handsome boy about half my height in a collared dress, he put his hands on my shoulders (standing on his toes) and looked into my eyes. This was not an ordinary look. Where I come from men typically regard each other one of two ways, with callous indifference or absolute contempt; but his regard was neither of those things, it was concern, empathy and tenderness. Why would such a beautiful boy, a stranger, look at me with such tenderness? I returned his gaze, enraptured by his: pretty orange eyes, ringéd sclera, vertical slit pupils dilated with passion, long green hair draped over his ruff which seemed to suggest something like a neck frill. Oh beautiful dragon, what will you say to me?
Finally he spoke:
“Have you ever had a dream and struggled to recall the details? What once was such a beautiful story filled with nuance gives way to a brief synopsis until ultimately that synopsis births generic vagueries, and then it finally becomes nothing, relegated to oblivion. So too are we, the subjects of the Acorn Prince. When Prince Rupert awakes, we’ll all return to nothing, never to be remembered. To that end, everyone here is committed to living their lives to the fullest and making the most of every day.”
Something about his words must’ve resonated with me, because I felt a deep pain in my heart, the first thing I’d felt since I found myself here. I winced at the pain and shifted my weight forward, putting my hands on the boy’s shoulder in turn.
I replied to him:
“I have, and I fear that my life is no different from such a dream. Except in the dream I come from none have looked at me so tenderly as you have. I have somewhere to go and something to do, but I cannot remember where or what. I crawled through a sparse nothingness before I suddenly found myself here. Can you tell me where to go?”
As I spoke I realised that I did in fact have some memory of what I sought, and it was the rings in his eyes that reminded me. I believe I lied and there was in fact another who looked at me as he had.
I don’t know if it was what I said or my painéd expression, but his response was to shrink with sadness. Him breaking eye contact was more painful in that moment than the thought of him disappearing. I quickly moved my hands from atop his shoulders to beneathe them and gently squeezed his ribs to say:
“Please don’t look away from me.”
He complied, and looked back up at me unable to hide the tears beginning to form in his eyes. He said something in response
”…”
I couldn’t make out what he said (i hear the bells) and that greatly distressed me, so I asked him to repeat himself
”…”
Watching his lips move and being completely unable to figure out their intended meaning further upset me (I HEAR THE BELLS).
Words be damned, I was running out of time and I hadn’t the presence of mind to even think. I knelt and pulled the boy as close to me as I possibly could. I squeezed him so hard I could feel his cartilage popping, then I relaxed my grip and switched to pulling on the frills of his dress.
“Damned bells, I don’t want to go back! i hear the bells i hear the bells i hear the bells I HEAR THE BELLS!”
He rubbed the top of my head to little effect, I was shaking with anger and confusion.
Then as suddenly as it’d appeared to me, everything was gone. I gasped for air as I came to, greeted by the light of the Summer evening sky and vespers being chanted at the basilica.
I remembered where I was going and what I was doing. I was a teacher and I had to go meet my class. But before that, I committed the young man I held to writing, he would not be relegated to vagueries or oblivion, he would be remembered.