I pull the card from deck. I don’t draw it as I did the others. This time, I search for it, flip the deck over and paw through it to find what I’m looking for. The cards stick together, refusing to give their secrets away so easily. This is not a deck of playing cards: it is something more. Something to make the wielder look inward. But though the deck puts up resistance, it still allows itself to be manipulated.
The card I’m looking for calls to me quietly, asking to be next. When I finally pull it free from the deck, I see her face. She is among my favorite; one I always saw myself in the most. The White Tiger sitting in stillness, absorbing the world around her and seeing beyond it.
“It’s been a long time.” I hear a voice whisper beside me. The voice is so quiet its like a barely audible buzzing. But the words. The words, the stories we have shared with another scream out to be heard. I turn to look at The Fool and am glad to see her face as obscure as ever. He hasn’t changed. Still standing upside down with his twin tailcoat and top hat. She tip’s her hat to me graciously when I look at him and gives a little wonderful bow with his hand at his stomach.
“Far too long.” I tell him, as the world around me fades away but not before dragging a part of my world into the darkness I once found myself in.
“I even get my own binder now do I?” She asks me with her toothy, Cheshire grin. The binder in question floats up between us. Is it now in his control? In mine? The questions which come to my mind feel welcome. Feel comfortable. Familiar.
“Are you sure that’s a good thing?” He asks me, flipping through the pages with apathy on his face.
“I’m glad to be back.” I answer. She throws the binder aside, it floats off into the distance but it’s still there. Floating off to the side. The presence of the binder refuses to be forgotten.
“But you left.” It’s a straight face he carries. There’s some anger in it. Some disappointment. “Well of course there is.” He says. Reading my mind once again. I forgot how wonderful it was. She sighs. “You left. And we never even finished our stories. You show back up after all this time and expect things to be the same?”
Ten months. It’s only been ten months and yet it feels like it’s been so long. Feels like its been years and years.
“Because it has been for some of us.”
The stories I print and read through fill me with emotions I’d forgotten I had only ten short months ago.
“For you.”
They remind me of the stories I’ve told. Remind me of the stories I have yet to see. When my eyes look back up into the darkness, I see the twinkling lights through the darkness. See the strings and film reels descending towards me.
“You needed this once before. Are you sure you still need it?” The Fool asks me. The smile on his lips still hasn’t returned. Hasn’t turned Cheshire. I know I do. The pain isn’t as great as it once was. The turmoil less loud. The stories don’t beg to be told as frequently as before. But that’s also why I need it. To remember who I am. To remember what I want. To remember what I need.
And in that instant, The Fool’s smile turns Cheshire. My world flips so he is standing on his feet and I am upside down.
“Then I believe this.” He hands me a string. “Is yours.”
I read through the stories again. Since writing them, I don’t think I’ve ever stopped to re-read them. I’ve never edited them or felt the power in their words. I was too busy. I never finished the project; I lost interest half-way through. And so, the pages lay there, untouched, unedited, unheard by anyone. Until today.
I was just looking for something to read while I ate. Words from a book I didn’t care about getting dirty. The problem was I cared about all my books. Not a single one of my books had a cracked spine. I’d read them all of course but I’d been careful when I did. I held those words in my hand gingerly, respecting the medium which bond them together. Instead, I decided to read words of a printed page. Discardable. Meaningless. Simple.
They were anything but.
I could feel my eyes tearing at words. Words that talked about a path into darkness and light. I recognize something in those words. I recognize the truth of them in my own life. It makes me wonder which path I’m on now. A path out of the darkness? Into the darkness? Out of the light? Or into it? Sometimes, I can’t help but wonder if there’s even a difference between them all. The path is just a path, ever onwards. And those words too, the ones I’ve just said, remind me of yet another story. The story of someone wandering the forest. The story of someone who forgot what it was like to be on the path forever onward. Forgetting what it was like to stop.
Take a moment.
Breathe.
Is that what I’ve done now? Forgotten? Is that why these stories hold such power over me? Because in the short time between when I wrote those stories and when I was reminded of them, I’d already forgotten the message I once knew?
There are times reading these stories I feel ready to cry. I don’t just feel a single tear developing in my eyes then. I feel it all. Feel my breathing start to quicken. Feel the lump in my throat. Feel my vision starting to blur. But I don’t cry. Even as I read about the fears I will one day have when my daughter comes along, I don’t cry. I don’t know what it is within me that stops me. It isn’t anything as noble as strength or overcoming those fears. It’s something more stubborn. Something more engrained. Whenever the tears come, whenever they might finally fall and the emotions within me finally released, I start to gag.
And it stops the tears. As if the mere thought of crying were so disgusting to me, I would rather throw up. But as I read through those pages, feel the emotions that went into writing those pages, feel the emotions welling up inside me, I wish they would come out. Wish they would flow freely from my eyes in a way I can no longer remember doing. Instead, I keep reading.
“Getting specific now, aren’t we?” The Fool asks me. I’m still holding the shard of glass in my hands, still watching it play it but there’s something different about it. Something familiar.
“What’s wrong with that?” I ask her. I feel as if I can almost make out the face now, I don’t just know him from the stories, I know him.
“Perhaps because I don’t just see myself in him.” We say out loud. I’ve surprised her. I feel it in her beside me.
“Perhaps because you are him.” She says to me, taking a step back. Taking a step away from me. I can feel it now, the story in the glass twisting as my mind twists. Changing as the story in my mind changes. My brow creases, furrows as I try to recall the true story. The origin of the story. But.
“But it’s not what matters.” The Fool says to me. Walking backward. Taking more and more steps away from me. Because what matters is what the story does for me. She wants to say. But she isn’t just stepping away from me anymore. Her back is turned to me. I can’t find the words to say to stop her. I still want her. Need her. The glass floats away from my hands as I chase after her into the darkness.
I reach out my hands to grasp at her but the strings, the reels get in my way. I can barely see him now. A silhouette somewhere in the darkness. Looking down, I see the reflection of the world above. I see the twinkling lights overhead, see them connect to the strings and reels below. Before I can even pull on one, my mind is consumed by the story.
At other times, when I read through the stories, I can’t help but laugh. I laugh at the connections I’ve made. The parts of the story that make it truly mine. The song sticks out like a sore thumb. A Japanese song with translated lyrics. I struggle at first to recall where its from but when it comes to me, I can’t stop laughing. Can’t stop myself from pounding my fist into the table at how amusing I find it.
It’s a beautiful story. Even as it talks about the death I hope to one day have, the legacy I hope to one day leave, I love every bit of it. I’m reminded of the things I want to leave behind. I’m reminded of the things I still hold onto. Reminded of things I should stop holding onto. But I know, there is a part of me that will never let it go. These are things that define me. Things I can forgive but can never forget.
It’s what all these stories are really. Parts of me I’ve put down into writing. Memorialized in a way only I can do. In comparison to my other pieces, these are lacking. The writing is simplistic. The descriptions are non-existent. The length is half of what it should be. But in reading them apart from the time when I’ve written them, I realize that’s not what this story is about. Those are not the things these stories need to be. These stories needing to be only one thing: personal. Stories about my desires. About my fears. My needs.
I shudder at the thought of one day sharing this with others. Of sharing this with the inspiration from whom these stories are written. In that moment, I understand that too is one of the fears. The fear of having them truly understand me. The fear of having my beliefs shattered against the rock of their beliefs. I smile. Yet another echo from a story already written.
I don’t know what the future of these stories hold. I only know they need to be written. Need to be finished. Even if they remain in a binder, locked away for years, never to be read by anyone ever again, they will still be there. Still ready to remind me of who I was. What I wanted. What I feared. What I needed.
Normally she would say something now. Whisper in my ear to remind me there are two parts to this story. But she’s gone. The Fool is still no where to be seen.
“Really now?” I ask myself.
“I’m nowhere to be seen?” I ask myself. My smile turning Cheshire.
“Thought you’d gotten rid of me, did you?” She says to me. I smile with relief.
“I did.” I answer honestly. I feel her pull away from me. See her in her twin tailcoat and top hat. She looks above, sees the twinkling lights, the stories above. I follow her gaze and am glad to see only darkness.
“You’ll see it all one day.” He says to me. There’s a real happiness in her voice as she looks up. The boredom and sadness she once had gone like a flash.
“But if I do, you’ll disappear.” I say sadly. She turns to look at me and I see, for the first time, my own face reflected in hers.
“It’s amazing. The things we forget sometimes.” She has a baton in her hands now. One he extends to me. Or rather points at me. Somehow, I know I should take it. Hold onto it like I held onto those shards of glass. So, I do.
I wonder one day whether those stories will be a source of inspiration or despair. If the dreams I one day had will remind me of the crushing reality I face today. And I realize, perhaps that is why I’m here to begin with. Because the reality standing before me is not the reality I used to hope for. The job I find myself in, the financial difficulties I face, the loneliness within me, were never supposed to be a part of I was. Of who I am.
As my fingers hit the keys, I understand these stories are a way to escape. A way to flee into a future that doesn’t yet exist because in those worlds, in those futures, I have the power-- No. Because in those stories I have the power to be who I want to be. To be what I need to be. To fulfill the desires I have. To conquer the fears plaguing me.
But that’s all they are. Stories of what could be. Stories of what never was. And as much as those stories may hurt me. As much as they may force me to confront these truths I could never speak, I need them. I need the stories. I need the art. The voices. Because they are all a part of who I am too.
I’m no longer holding onto his baton and I feel myself falling backwards. As if the world has flipped, I keep falling and falling. Until I’m not. My back is steady against something soft and I’m staring up into the darkness once again.
“You’ll always be here. Always be a part of me.” I state. But its also a question. A desire.
“Is that what you believe?” She asks me. Gentle and kind. Soft. She’s laying down beside me now, starring up at the beautiful lights above.
“I think so.” I admit. She might not always be the Fool. Sometimes she might be more. Sometimes he might be less.
“Harsh.” He says to me. We smile.
“I like this version.” I say. “I like the Fool.” Because I see myself in it.
“You see yourself in all of us.” They answer. They stand, half a deck of cards in their hand. They flick their wrist and fan out of the cards. “Ten cards left.”