The Peacock 357

 She doesn't seem to notice my approach, not at first anyway.  Then she looks up, and for a second a shadow flickers over her face, as though she is a bit cross that her privacy has been violated, perhaps more than a bit , then quickly shoves it under a cheery and welcoming smile.  

"Well, hello, Christopher.  Do sit down, please." She gestures to the other bench. "Isn't this a lovely little grotto?

"If you can call it that."

"Well, perhaps not exactly a grotto, but I am sure that you know what I mean.  And that magnolia is simply enchanting.  Here it isn't yet the middle of May and already it is beginning to bloom.  For a southern magnolia, very early, and most unusual, I would say."

"What book are you reading?"

"Wuthering Heights.  I just adore the Bronte sisters.  And how about you?  How ARE you getting along?"

I understand what she is getting at.  "I am feeling a lot better now.  Thanks for asking."

"Think nothing of it dear.  We were, I was, so frightfully worried about you the other night, but you really seem to have come around.  You said you had amnesia when you came here?  How very frightening that must have been for you."

"My father's death must have left an impact.  And other matters as well.  How are you doing?"

"I'm muddling through as usual."  She puts the book face down beside her and rubs her eyes with the knuckles of her right hand.  She still hasn't put the rings back on.

The Peacock 356

 This is all too much for me and now I have to get away.  Yes, to the gardens for a solitary walk, but even farther beyond.  I have my car back and I just might succumb to temptation and leave this place.  I have never in my life had three days so completely immersed in the lives of other people.   Now I seem to have moved from the land of the dead to the living.  I have no idea when I'm returning to work.  I am returning, I am sure of that.  I have long known that my vocation is with the dying. This is going to be a very hard place to leave.  Carl and I have bonded, brothers, more than brothers. And the others also beguile me.  Aaron says he is an author and that he is writing us.  Somehow that doesn't strike me as altogether implausible, and I seem to be looking into his world as much as he is looking into mine.  How else could I explain being able to see his apartment in my mind, with those beautiful coloured cushions and the teal and golden Indian bedspread? I am living in a dreamscape, and perhaps I am waiting to wake up.  My sense of reality has always been, at best, fragile, and I do fear another episode.  At least I have my memory back.  

I even could end up living here.  Carl seems to expect it.  And I could do a lot worse.  I might even sublet my place to Erik when he comes and just stay here.  But I also want to spend time with Erik.  It's been ten years.  Sarah seems interesting.  I want to ask her more about her travels, especially her time in Australia  And to get to know the other two women she came here with.  And George and Jeff, a couple.  Why should I find that surprising?

I do want to return to the diner.  Maybe even tonight for coffee house, but I think we have already things here that need to be attended to.  And I want to hang out with Carl again tonight, read some more of Kenny's diary.

It is nice having time alone here, and too late, because there, on one of the benches by the magnolia is Carol reading a book....

The Peacock 355

 Guilty as charged", says Carl smiling.

"We cut him off on his fifth glass of ale", says Aaron.  Then we waited around for an hour and something for him to sobre up a bit.  That's why we're so late getting back."

"Just as well", says Melissa.  "That was one of their sticking points about forming with us a united household.  They think our ways to be a little bit too fancy free for their digestion."

"Prissy little prigs", says Carl.  "But evidently, they are not entirely unanimous."

"George and Jeff say they've both had their bellyful.  And this is another reason the others have shown resistance, "says Melissa.  "They want to live with us as a couple.  Apparently, a few months ago they snuck off to Mission where they were married by the justice of the peace.  They are also hoping that we as a community will bless their union."

"I don't see why not", says Carl.  "Easier to do that than to wait for the others to get over their homophobia."

Melissa picks up one of the two family photos.  "So, anyway, when should we go out to the cabin?"

"Tomorrow sometime?" says Carl.

"Should we come with you?" says Aaron.

""I would like that very much", says Carl.  "Mel?"

"I don't see why not.  After breakfast?"

"Sounds like a plan", says Carl.

The Peacock 354

 "For example", continues Aaron, "A few years ago a I had a dream about a doctor in Mexico.  I knew nothing about her, at the time, but I was in this dream visiting a clinic in the desert in rural Mexico.  I think in the Sonora dessert.  She was wearing a white lab coat, looked exhausted.  An older woman, around my age, I'd say.  And we were conversing in Spanish.  It was suggested I should return at around three thirty in the afternoon  Then it was just around eleven-thirty.  She told me her name.  It was Juanita Jiménez.  So, the next day, I looked her up on the internet.  In less than five minutes, there she was on YouTube, giving an address about care delivery in the city of Aguascalientes in Mexico.  Same woman, same face, same voice, same accent of Spanish."

"She also happens to be my aunt", says I.  "My mother's sister.  That is truly amazing."

"Are you in touch with her?" asks Aaron.

"We haven't communicated in a few years.  But, now I think I should reopen the channels with her."

"That is truly amazing", says Carl.

"But not at all surprising" says Melissa.   "By the way, Carl, what's this I heard about you getting drunk today?  I can still smell it on you."

The Peacock 353

 "As I explained to you back in the diner, I have a rather curious relationship straddling both our worlds."

"Huh?" says Melissa.

"Aaron says he is writing a book about us."

"You don't say."

"It's a little more complicated than that, Melissa", says Aaron.  "I am actually writing all of you, right now, while seated in front of my laptop in my apartment."

"We're all a product of your imagination.  Uh-huh, yes, I see."

"Well, then don't believe me."

"Look, Aaron, after nine years of living here, off and on, you might say that right now there is a flock of bright green pigs flying towards the moon, and I would still believe you.  This place is cursed.  Or enchanted, or pick a word, but, no, this is not at all a surprise to me.  Nothing surprises me any more.  Nothing."  She pulls off her eyeglasses, as though she wants to see better, or perhaps, not liking what she is seeing, to somehow blur her vision.

I am sure now that I either dreamed of your father, and that encounter wiht him at my dad's, or somehow just thought it up without really thinking.  I do have dreams like that sometimes..."

The Peacock 352

 "We have to go to the cabin", Carl says.

"Who do you think that was?" I ask.

"I think that was all we saw of him. Mel?"

"I don't remember anything else."

"Dad used to disappear for up to four or five days at a time."

"Do you think he was staying in the cabin?"

"I don't know", says Carl.

"You know", says Melissa, "He really was acting strange the last few years."

"Was he still drinking?" asks Aaron.

"That's right, you knew our dad".,

"I thought I knew him."

"What do you mean?" says Melissa.

"I think I might have seen him in a dream, and then just assumed that was him."

"But surely you recognize him in the photo"; says Carl.  "Aaron, is there a story there?"

The Peacock 351

 "You never told me anything", Melissa says to Carl.

"I wasn't sure what to say.  And I didn't want to worry you.  And then, after he did the deed, you and I were so caught up in our immediate survival that I must have pushed it to the back of my mind."

"Wait a minute", she says.  "I have also seen this guy.  I'm sure of it.  It must have been earlier that day.  I was out way in the back, looking for birds, and there was a raven I was trying to follow through the trees.  I was really fascinated by ravens, and sometimes heard them talking among themselves, like humans, with their own kind of language.  Seriously, it does happen."

"I believe you" Aaron says.  "I also heard a family group of ravens once having a conversation in a tree in Cathedral Grove on Vancouver Island.  It was quite incredible."

"Where were you, exactly?" says Carl.

"I was at the edge of the property, near the entrance to that path that Dad ordered us to stay away from.I stopped just short of the entrance to the trail, when I saw this man approach me from the trail.  He looked like he was heading towards the house.  I at first tried to hide, but he already saw me.  And in those days, when the Asperger's was still pretty bad, I was simply too painfully shy to want to start a conversation, especially with some strange man appearing out of nowhere.  But he was a short, slim man, about dad's age or a bit older.  He simply just stared, or glared right at me, like his eyes were boring into me.  He held me in his gaze and said "Hello.".  I said nothing, but yes, he did have an accent.  I am going to see your father he said.  Is he at the house?  I said nothing, but then noticed a little deer trail so I ran away on it."