New Year’s at Jackie’s
Part 2
by F. Jammes


Dear ____,

Very often, at night, I cried. Can you blame me? I know it’s pathetic…I was all alone.

My eyes were puffy and red; in hotel-beds I tossed and turned and woke with sore eyes and the tangled sheets imprinted on my skin.

My skin was sickly, my cheeks and lips bluish.

From the cold. I didn’t always sleep in hotels. Usually if I’d had a not too bad day I would go a little ways into the woods and find someplace dry. I couldn’t bear to be around people sometimes. Or if I’d had a very bad day. Then I didn’t care whether it was dry or not, I almost didn’t notice.

Walking, I lost a little weight. I also didn’t eat much, of course. The walking between towns became very dear to me. I would go slowly then, unless I forgot myself. The beauty of nature would impress me deeply, it would take my mind away for awhile from the past.

Sometimes I would wake up during the night and not remember why I was sad. Or in the morning, or when I had been daydreaming. I felt almost refreshed then. But soon I remembered.

Is it less powerful than it used to be? Less visceral? I still remember, but it seems far away, a little tinny. There were very dark times, but it seems they are past. The trauma must consume itself in the end, leaving just a husk.

If I’m empty, let me fill me up.

As long as Giygas was there, I felt a connection with him, and, through him, I felt connected to the entire world. I believed in this and lived for this, and it guided my steps. The words that I spoke were spoken half by it, and half addressed to it. When Giygas was dispersed, I lost this connection. I was alone. Or I realized that I had been all along.

You know what it is to feel linked to something. You know better than I do, in every sense. You embraced the world, and it enveloped you and filled you, and still does, ever renewing. You do not know what I know, then: what it is to be consumed instead of filled. What it is to cling to the void and discover at last that you can only suffocate in it, exhausted, with gnawing hunger and gnashing of teeth.

Perhaps you also cannot know, then, the awe and relief that I feel now, slowly returning to life. Neither of us can know what it is to be the other, yet both, it seems, are good, very good. Though we cannot know, not exactly, there are connections possible between us. You rescued me, and now I am discovering what you have always known. In return, I can give you something: I can tell you, don’t take it for granted.

So, now the world is made safe. I came upon a mushroom almost as big as me, and though its stalk looked strangely like two long legs crossed in the act of walking, it was not moving. It grew under the trees at the side of the path, peaceful, bobbing gently when a crow perched on its brim to watch me pass by with intelligent eyes. I saw, in town, the people shopping, playing, going to work, all admiring the autumnal tranquility that never seems to leave their community. The homeless and the policemen, the drunkards and the dogs in the yards were intent on their own business. You have seen this, remember, walking her home. Normalcy and order where there had been uncertainty, danger.

I passed through the town lost in thought, and through the cave feeling a little claustrophobic, but then I emerged into the valley. Have you been back here? People come here from the towns on either side to walk and picnic and tryst; there isn’t any metal glinting in midair, the trees no longer defend their territory. They share it, abiding in their great strength. The brook runs along just as it always has. I fish sometimes; more often I listen to it and think.

I’m staying these days at the cabin where you first met her face to face. I don’t intend to stay here long; I know other people might like to use it…I had a nightmare about Jackie’s, so I don’t think I’m ready just yet to be back among people. My resolution this year is nothing more than to decide whether that is what I want at all. But you, what do you want in the year to come? Are you content with towns free from sinister sounds, with flat, placid geographies and without new challenges? There is Giygas, there is always that last obstacle—but maybe you can only pray so many times before it becomes rote? I tell you, don’t take it for granted, that fine romp home, but who am I to say, really? Maybe to me tranquility is beautiful, but who am I? Not even a monster, just a disgusting little boy. My tranquility is your boredom…Or do you see it? Do you look at houses and front yards and backyards, at streets and schools and stores, at the undeveloped lots and the run-down lots, do you look at them and see…Well, if you do, you don't need me to remind you. Okay, I’m going to go now. I’m a coward.

Have a Happy New Year,

Pokey