Diego Sieiro

Lucinda

 

 

Sunny days felt overcast. Rainy days saw the peal of water muted by ears that no longer listened. Derek cared no more for the shine of rainbows or the flight of ponies under the stars. Lucinda was dead. The accursed consumption had taken her.

 

Brief smiles abducted his face when he recalled the glow of her laughter. Her happiness at the garden had withered with abandonment. The walls still echoed her giggles, and for half a heartbeat, the grief slumbered.

 

Sadness awakens harshly, and the little solace that memory brings, reality shatters. A widower for almost a year, Derek could swear to have not slept over an hour since.  Truth was that he passed out at the oddest of places; on the floor, whilst sitting and at times even leaning against the walls. Slept never found him at bed. For hundreds of days her scent creased their sheets; lingering on air that he no longer dared to breathe.

 

Hapless were his evenings, spent trying to remember what they were calling their future children. Disease took her at the start of a troubled pregnancy.  The names picked on the first month of the joyous news were gone with her.

 

Friends continued to try to heighten his spirits, yet he refused them shortly upon arrival. Even closest acquaintances were swiftly asked to leave, so Derek could go on walking unperturbed the forests in his state. The walks for him lasted minutes, yet for the world they were hours. Darkness oft found him in wander of unkempt gardens and stoic trees.

 

One night as he was dreaming by their favourite tree, under the leaves that saw their first kiss, a soft flutter of wings woke him. Owls and their hoots had been ignored at length. Their soundless flight disregarded as rocks seemed worthier of unending stares. That evening his eyes went along the bird’s flight, until it landed noiseless on a branch. Beneath that limb of wood, a church stood.

 

For a moment he saw the family crypt where she rested. His sight entrapped upon the white marble of the columns; sticks of stone holding masterfully chiselled angels and gargoyles: The ghastly figures sculpted long ago into solemn grief and hushed sighs to watch over generations of his ancestors. Unperturbed they stood as Derek called her name, yelling at walls of fabulous stone. They replied only in silences, stolen by hoots of invisible birds.

 

In a sorrowful heartbeat, the structure morphed. Derek stared at the crypt that traded wailings for cricket chirpings, and found it changed. It was smaller. No longer gleaming in the dark but shadowed in derelict. Dark moss covered its sides as an army of weeds danced to the wind on its flanks.

 

“Come wither Derek, come within to be reborn”.

 

Derek’s right eyebrow rose in amusement. After a moment of contemplation, the deep voice from under the earth was ignored. The grieving man took the path home, firm in the resolution of drinking two bottles of wine.

 

“Soon we shall talk of your grief; soon we shall see your joy grow anew”.

 

Derek grinned, spirits these days were busybodies, sticking their noses in businesses not their own. If the prospect of wine had not been so alluring, he might have shouted a curse back. Harsh tones might enlighten those voices to the fact that he had long given up on listening to advice. The blandishment of wine enhanced stupor mitigated the umbrage. Politely he strode away, whistling an unfamiliar tune.

 

Derek uncorked a pair of very fine vintages. In fast tasteless guzzling were the refined bottles consumed. Suppressing a belch, he clumsily took to the armchair, where the dizziness turned into slumber.

 

Pine needles waved at him, as dusk eased. The tiny green soldiers signalled secrets Derek yearned to comprehend. As he struggled to decipher the mysterious dance, time—fleeting as of late—became sluggish. Amongst circling spirals of greenery, his soul faded.

 

Derek looked through dry eyes. A mighty headache diffused the shape of a dusty table leg. His gaze failed to decipher the rings on the wood; arranged as letters from a language unknown. Exhausted from straining his sight, he muttered her name and went back to sleep.

 

Notes from a harp echoed as dark gave way to grey; unvented dusk intruded via the gap left by an askew curtain. Derek cursed the whims of the sun, turning his back on the weak rays.

 

“Awaken. Under snow you have slumbered, the spring of the soul is upon you. Awaken”.

 

Derek promptly revived. Unable to leave the comfort of the floor, his vision fixated on the moist stains traversing the once exquisitely painted ceiling. From the many frescoes above, his eyes lingered on the depiction of an angel landing upon a rock. A scarlet robe hovered over the armoured soldier of destiny. Brown curls cascaded upwards forming a magnificent mane. The left hand of the warrior graciously hovered in counterbalance to the right one, which unsheathed a sword.  Worn sandals landed on rock, booming like the cries of a thousand ravens.

 

Around such brilliance, moisture clouded perfect knees and soiled mighty wings. Under a headline of tragedy, the messenger fell to dried dirt arrows. His calm countenance transfixed into shards of agony.

 

Upon the left hand a stain amassed in the shape of a rose. Its petals silencing the whisper of beauty, as thorns paused the clangour of the crash. A rose made of filth, a nonsense that two blinks did not wash away.

 

“Awaken.”

 

For an instant Derek gawked at the rose. Then, overpowering dizziness and numbness, he regained verticality. An aftertaste of sorrow was overhauled by a tang of solitude. Oblivious to grieving, hunger echoed a protest. Disregarding strange mutterings around him, Derek made his way to the kitchens.

 

The scent of forest after rain overpowered that of stale bread under rotten cheese. Derek oft found his senses faltering after intoxication. Considering all the oddities around him to be the product of alcoholic fumes, he started on his usual meal.  The first bite had the flavour of moist earth and soaked leaves. Parsimoniously he consumed the garden scented meal, enjoying every single morsel. Satisfied as he had not been in months, rest found him sitting by the table.

 

As the moon danced with unwilling clouds, Derek awoke. A lush world of rivers and rocks greeted him. Weeds and bushes waved messages in hushed tones, from the inside of dusty ovens. Derek struggled to recall if he had been drinking over dinner. As he reached the conclusion that he had not, he made the promise to destroy the remainder of the case. It clearly had gone awry.

 

Bats stopped mid-air, changing course with leathery wings as Derek gazed from below a tree branch. As the kitchens had no trees within, he assumed himself to have fainted. Rotten cheese had that effect at times. Knowing himself in one of his recurrent nightmares, the small building yonder failed to startle him. It looked as if erupted from the earth, in the stead of having been carved by men. The empty bell tower tolled a beckoning, in notes resembling the sound of wind on barley.

 

Unwilling to offend the haunted construction, Derek walked towards it. He paused ever so briefly before crossing the pine-branch crowned arched doors. The interior gloom was diminished by moonlight. A column stood in the middle of the enclosed space, holding the low vault. A few paces behind the central pillar, stood a granite altar.

 

“Cry over the stone table, to have your cravings sated.”

 

Derek was accustomed to ignoring anything he was told. On this occasion, he obliged. It struck him as utterly rude to bypass the commands given by a breathing building.

 

Derek circumspectly advanced. By the pillar he paused to search for his conversational partner. Atop the column he discovered a carved face. For a second the masonry eyes gleamed. A closer look revealed them to be unmovable rock.

 

Derek averted his eyes in disappointment, pinning his sight on unkempt shoes. Perhaps the stone man was offended by his dirty loafers.

 

“My house is a field. Bring unto me the muds of wandering.”

 

The human feet left the soil in a startled prance, regaining ground with the buttocks. From his mushy grass seat Derek glanced upwards.  The marble mouth now grinned, revealing daisies and lilies. In front of his eyes a carved beard softened into roots and stems. The long hair solid an instant ago, waived strands of grass and vines as sturdy eyes blossomed summer flowers. Finally polished Stalwart skin flowed into a river held in place by wooden cheeks and chin.

 

“Confer with me about your winter-long spell.”

 

Derek shook his head in denial.

 

“You have not forgotten, like trees cannot forget. Your soul was planted within stone, a year ago.”

 

Through incoming tears, Derek anew nodded in denial.

 

“Be silent then, but dwell upon this: what was sown with love shall rise. Do not reap, but water that which has grown into life again.”

 

Overpowering shaking knees, Derek found his footing. Guided by his heart, he walked towards the altar, to shed tear upon rock.

 

In silence he bent over the slab. Watery his eyes were, yet no tears fell. Disillusion was once more wrapped in stone. A sigh then escaped him, to crash against the petrous table. Finger tips clenched on rugged rock shook as granite gave way to leaves, stems and petals. Basalt folded into timber, exhaling scents of berries and nuts.

 

“Your kiss was wind instead of rain, yet the rock never forgot what it was to be alive.”

 

“Enter the dome of branches and lily pads. Saunter towards what you seek and could not find.”

 

Derek went past the lush altar, and stepped through a gap in the wall. Under a tunnel of greenery he advanced, his heart beating sap instead of blood.

 

A wall of daisies stood at the end of the path. Carefully Derek pushed through caressing petals to emerge from the hull of a tree. A few paces ahead laid a forest opening, at the centre of it, shrubbery beckoned.

As he reached the overgrowth, Derek noticed that amongst its foliage a purple rose shone.

 

Tears fell upon it, caressing its finesse, making it move in gracious bursts.

 

“Lucinda”.

 

 

 

Diego Sieiro has written comics, short stories and fragments of books in Mexico, Spain, the U.S. of A. and Ireland. Poems he writes whenever Calliope tugs at his ears. Currently he is working on a science fiction thriller, because not mixing genres is boring. His first comic book, “Perfume for the widow” will see the light in 2015. He happily lives with his lovely partner in Dublin, where every time she forces him to cook they both end up with food poisoning.