Three Tales

I have been an avid reader for a little over six decades now, and for the vast majority of those years I have been waiting to discover that certain book which each serious bibliophile longs to find. It is the book which will resonate to such a strong degree that the need to seek out anything else will no longer be of such a nagging concern. A book, to get to the very heart of the matter, that might justify some small part of our existences. I am one of those fortunate enough to have found such a book. It sits alone on a bookshelf in my humble garrett. I found the volume in a secondhand bookstore which I have haunted weekly for the better part of my reading life. Believe it or not, the book literally fell upon my head, dropping unexpectedly from an upper shelf as I browsed. Thankfully, it is a fairly slim volume, a novella really, so no lasting injury was sustained. After the stars had cleared, I bent to retrieve the book. Something about its overall construction and design appealed to me. Nostalgia, perhaps, which I could not at that moment firmly place. It seemed, as I read its first few pages, like a book that I might have written in a dream. I felt almost faint with a joy entirely new to me. I opened it to check the price, but more importantly to ascertain the date when the volume had been purchased by the bookseller. Imagine my surprise at finding out that it had been hibernating in its high perch for over thirty years. Had it really been waiting this long to find me, or I it? It seemed too fanciful a notion, but then again the coverage of dust proved the passage of time all too well. It seemed impossible that I had not once come across the book, considering the amount of general browsing I have done over the years. Perhaps, as overly sentimental as it sounds, we were waiting for the right time to find each other. That night, after reading the book twice, I became fixated on locating its author. The odyssey I finally embarked upon took nearly a full year to complete, and my hiring of a detective significantly drained my retirement savings. But the journey was well worth its hefty price tag, for it led me to the last thing I expected to find: a brother. And not only a brother, but an identical twin who, as it turns out, also had no knowledge of our being separated at birth. We are currently collaborating on a book, a memoir of our dual lives. It is certain, in this day and age, to become a bestseller.

One of the secret pleasures in my life is taking a long walk through the lush countryside that surrounds our absurdly compact city. Such an excursion, I have found, is the very antithesis of my routine day job. I sit at a small rectangular desk for approximately eight hours a day, proofreading documents related to my profession, the business of which I would rather not discuss. Instead, I shall describe the walk which forever changed my life. The evening in question, occurring three nights ago, was like most others: quiet, still, contemplative. I took my usual route, heading in a southerly direction until all traces of the city were gone. I must have been two miles out when the meteorite struck, knocking me senseless. (At the time I did not realize that the assault was cosmic in nature). When I finally regained my senses, I assumed myself the victim of an attack by rural hooligans. I soon discovered, though, that nothing whatsoever was missing from my person. I continued my walk, oddly energized with each succeeding step. Indeed, I experienced a new sort of euphoria, an elation that became almost unbearable by the time I reentered the city. I crawled into my garret and quickly fell into a stupor which lasted two days. Luckily, it was the weekend and I had no commitments. If you think this unexpected slumber surprised such a habitual creature as myself, imagine my astonishment when I stepped up to the bathroom mirror and discovered that a meteorite, no larger than a horse nut, had, by some strange means, lodged itself into my forehead. Truth be told, it resembled an intricate third eye. Touching it sent a shiver through my bones, and I found myself staring at it for hours on end. Lately, I have taken to wearing a beret at work, at least until my hair grows out a bit more. My superiors don’t seem to mind, they are merely thrilled by my increased productivity. And this goes hand in hand with my newfound and overwhelming desire to create. There are so many words, ideas, concepts spinning through the constellation which now exists in my mind. Strange how one’s orbit can so suddenly shift when the fantastic comes into play.

The fumigators arrived early this morning. I wasn’t about to take any chances and so waited anxiously at the front door. Three men stood before me, immaculately dressed and wearing the sinister stove top hats of their station. I had never witnessed the fumigators in such close proximity before. Usually, if my timing was right, I would catch a glimpse of them through my second story window as they traversed the city in the early morning hours. From such a distance they looked more like monoliths than men. So, you can well imagine the nervous state that I worked myself into. Indeed, not only did I fumble with the door in my attempt to let the threesome in, but also stumbled on the stairs as we ascended to the floor in question. The fumigators spoke not a word, they were men of duty and nothing more. In fact, a rumor had spread a number of years ago that to attain the rank of fumigator required the removal of the initiate’s voice-box. Each man, I now noticed, wore an elegant scarf that covered the whole of his neck. When we arrived at the room, the fumigators requested that I remain in the hallway. This was not suggested to me in words, so much as an outthrust arm forceful enough to send me into the opposite wall. The tenant who had up until recently lived in the room never struck me as the writerly type, and how he had snuck in all that paper and those books over the years is beyond me. I had imagined him to be a clerk of some sort. He had kept his secret well hidden and always paid his rent on time. A quiet young man who, as it turns out, had much to say. A man who had divided himself in two, who imagined his secret self unseen. But someone had been paying attention. By the time the official call came through, my tenant was long gone, ripped from his abode by a faction of the monarchy no one in this city ever feels comfortable discussing. While my view of the fumigation was mostly obscured, I did eventually smell the clinical odor drifting from the room. It was a bit like rotten eggs, which seemed appropriate given the situation. Soon this room would be cleared of its rottenness, all evidence of the false clerk disintegrated. Only then could I install a new tenant, whom I would keep a better eye on this go round. I would also make certain that my own secret room, filled as it is with books and writings, remains secure. The days until my own fumigation, it seems to me, are numbered.