Brightfellow

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THE LINOLEUM SWELLS WITH STORIES. As he plays, darkness rises from the floor and slowly claims the room. Outside, a heavy rain falls and then it ends. Outside, the world spins, and he is the only one alone.

He cautiously steps from one island to the next. Cautiously! His feet are bare and small. Sometimes he considers them with curiosity. He doesn’t know he’s beautiful. He doesn’t know he’s lonely and that his fear is not of his making, that it will haunt him for the rest of his life. It will impede him years from now — twist and turn him just as an incessant wind twists and turns a tree — just as it will in unexpected ways nourish him. Yes: it will both nourish and impede him. And this is a terrible thing. How can he undo such a tangle?

The damage, already there, is subtle. As is its progress. It reaches for the future like smoke. The world bends beneath the weight of such malfeasance. There is a smell to it, a flavor and a mood, a familiar weather. Although he is six, only — six! — he is accustomed to it. It is the atmosphere that sustains his tirelessly imagining mind. Oh! How tirelessly he dreams! He cannot know it, but already he yearns to live richly. That is to say deeply and with excitement. He is thirsty but it does not occur to him to drink.

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