Chapter 5 #4
It took me time to open my eyes the next morning.
I felt a dull sense of emptiness that rapidly intensified, and after a few seconds, I realized I was ravenous.
I imagined slices of bread swimming in butter and the oatmeal I had to make for Lily.
Then, I realized Lily wasn’t home, and the habitual vigilance faded.
I tracked the sun’s rays and, in the morning light, envisioned the figures of Jean and Thibaut, the way they’d been sitting when I came across them over the ridge, writing songs and smoking from that clay pot.
For a moment, I imagined them in the yard of my old high school, cutting gym class (twang, twang, the strings sounded in my head).
I got dressed and went to fix myself some coffee.
Halimi was stretched across the couch, buried under the weekend newspapers.
He lifted his head when I came in and narrowed his eyes.
I turned the kettle on, poked around in the fridge (I pulled out smoked salmon and vegetables, as well as butter), and when I caught sight of Halimi’s smiling face, I gave him a wink.
“Cool, cool,” Halimi said, leaning back.
“You had me a little worried back there. What happened?” I sliced a loaf of bread, considered his question, and finally said, “Something … entirely out of the ordinary.” I started to say something else but stopped.
“Have you eaten? Do you want something to eat?” I asked him.
I cut vegetables, arranged the cutlery, and made coffee.
Halimi joined me at the table. “Coffee?” I asked.
We ate and drank, chewing hard and gulping deeply. He tried not to say anything but finally gave up and looked me in the face. “Aren’t you going to tell me what happened?”
I giggled with embarrassment. “No, it’s just …
just so crazy,” I said quickly. “I had a trip that I went back to the Crusader days.” Halimi’s eyebrows rose in surprise.
“I saw the fortress and the village and the swamps and everything,” I continued in a rush.
“Did you know that mushrooms can do stuff like that?” I asked him.
“I thought that only happened with cacti.”
Halimi chuckled and repeated, “‘cacti.’” But I could tell he was piecing it all together. “I also went back in time in my dream. I think I went to that Neolithic village buried under the sea … and the very fact that I fell asleep …” He rubbed his forehead.
I asked him to tell me more about his dream—and he tried—but when he began describing the receding tide, he was actually telling me about the people in tattered furs, and when he tried to describe the spring in the middle of the village, he suddenly began wondering aloud about the pitcher a priestess was holding, and how she had poured a brown-red liquid over his head.
As I half-listened, my thoughts returned to the sandstone ridge and the buildings I had seen there.
“Anyway, there’s still a bit left. Do you want another round of ’shrooms?” Halimi asked in his mischievous voice, which didn’t contradict the questions.
“No, no. Not yet,” I trembled. “I thought I’d flipped, honestly, it was so … real.” I stroked the coin that hung around my neck. It had returned to its worn and lackluster state.
We called Simone after that, who said everything was merveilleux—Lily was having the time of her life. She was hanging out with Richard while Simone sunbathed and read. She promised they’d be back that evening, but late.
Halimi suggested we take a walk to the sea.
I almost turned him down—I’d already found a comfortable position from which to stare at the ceiling and chew things over—but Halimi insisted.
“Come on, let’s get some fresh air,” he said.
“I’m going anyway, but it’ll be more fun with you.
” I dragged myself off the couch, stretched extravagantly, and slipped into my flip-flops. Everything suddenly felt so sweet.
When we reached the shore, we sat down and watched the high waves breaking in front of us.
The sun burned a few inches above the sea, and I yielded to those final moments of warmth down to the smallest molecule in my body.
I sighed in pure delight, and Halimi beamed with pleasure.
He smoked his Camels, and I rolled myself a cigarette. We drank a bottle of Coke together.
Everything was so normal. I stared at the little that was left of the fortress, expecting to feel anxious or alarmed, but the ruins were just ruins.
Through the fence, I saw a military vehicle driving through the base behind the fortress.
Halimi was in a rare, contemplative silence.
He stared out at the sea almost bashfully.
“I can’t get that priestess from the dream out of my head,” he said.
He never remembered his dreams and never talked about them.
But there was more. “She was naked,” he continued, furrows deepening across his wide forehead.
“I think she was pouring blood over me. I don’t know if it was the blood of an animal or a human. ” He shivered.
“Weird,” I said, almost whispering. Halimi’s words ignited an array of visuals inside my head: Jean, lighting the clump of dry weeds with a graceful motion; Thibaut, eyes closed, plucking his lute and humming to himself; the curls of smoke rising up from the hamlet.
I glanced behind me, but my eyes met only the familiar landscape—salt pools; roads; construction sites that had unearthed white dust, biting into the earth and sandstone; and clusters of middle-class houses in the nearby neighborhood.
I walked into the sea; Halimi finished his cigarette and joined me. We stood there, not talking, his arm resting on my shoulder, my arm curled around his back, the waves breaking against our ankles.