Everything Graham had
told Peggy Lee about his life at headquarters had been true, but he knew it was
not the entire truth. Not anymore. Despite
his efforts to avoid them, his doubts – about the facilities, his position, his
life – were quickly ballooning out of control.
And now, Peggy Lee’s questions – her simple presence – had scratched an
itch that he had been ignoring since he had received the Minster’s confidential
memo.
Didn’t he deserve a
life better than this? He could leave. He could use his savings and travel the world
– with the singular goal of enjoying every last minute he had left on the
planet. Colonel Graham Snow’s Bacchanalian
phase . . . filled with real rather than virtual pleasures. He dreamt of stretching out on the bank of a faraway
river, someplace like the ol’ Missouri of his childhood, gentle sunlight warming
his face. He dreamt of sitting down to a
table covered with every indulgence still available – lobster from the Alaskan
shellfish farms and prime rib from the Siberian cattle herds. He dreamt of holding Peggy Lee’s hand, a
quiet dinner with her – red wine, cheese – alone and in love.
He needed to
escape, but he did not know how. He
wanted to forget the dehydration and hunger that lay just over the horizon . .
. and the final die-off for which he would feel, at some level, responsible. But then he knew he could never abandon his
post. Or could he? Was he going to die out there? Was it inevitable? Or could he find some way to be with Peggy
Lee, to build something new somewhere far away?
Crossing his arms
and examining the creamy smudge of the Milky Way, Graham wondered if Peggy Lee had a
similar effect on everyone she met. Did
she walk through the world changing people’s lives forever in just an hour or
two? He couldn’t remember the last
time he had spoken to so openly to anyone.
Maybe never. More than just
beautiful, she was powerful . . . maybe to the point of being dangerous, at least to
Graham’s equanimity. He decided that it
was time to get her to her room. He
already knew that he was falling for her. If he didn’t pull himself together, he would surely make
a fool of himself.
“Shall we go to
bed?” he said, snapping himself too quickly out of out of his reverie.
“Why, Graham, how
absolutely forward of you! Do you offer
such services to all of your visitors, or am I special?” Peggy Lee laughed and
gave him a nudge.
“You know what I
meant. May I escort you to your
room?” Why did he keep saying these
ridiculous things to her? But she seemed
to see his social clumsiness as amusing, perhaps even endearing. Unbelievable.
“That’d be great. And, may I say, I had a lovely evening.”
Graham shut down
the winds, turned off the stars, and walked Peggy Lee back up the bleak,
florescent-lit stairs to the main floor.
This time the elevator was waiting.
They ascended silently to Floor 5.
Down a maze of dim hallways, he led her to her room.
At the door,
Graham gave Peggy Lee a pass card that had been pre-programmed for her room and
showed her how to use the scanner. There
were more high-tech locks these days – iris scans and fingerprint
identification pads – but he had never seen a need to spend the money for an upgrade. The old pass cards worked just fine. When the door clicked open, Peggy Lee said
softly, “Thank you Graham. A demain.”
Graham took her
hand and gave it a squeeze. He wanted to
raise it to his lips, but he was not gallant like the knights of long ago. “I will be back to collect you for breakfast
at 0700 hours. We have a big day of
sightseeing tomorrow. I hope that I have
not kept you up too late. Get some
sleep.”
“I will,” Peggy
Lee said. She closed the door
quietly. Graham stood still for just a
moment. He breathed in the last of her lingering
scent – it was lemons. It
reminded him of his mother’s kitchen in the summer. Then, he turned and walked down the hallway,
feeling exhausted, confused . . . and aching with hope, fear, and desire.
##
That night, Graham
dreamt that he was wrapped up like a baby in an old-fashioned, wicker basket. He was his adult self, but wrapped up snug
like an infant. Invisible fingers lifted
him from a flowered meadow and placed him gently into a brook deep in the
woods. The basket floated easily on the
surface. He pulled an arm free from the
swaddling blankets and dipped his hand into the clear, cold water. He then licked up the honeyed droplets as
they ran down his forearm.
As the brook
merged with other streams, other baskets joined him. By the time the many streams had become one
thick, wide river, Graham could see thousands of baskets bobbing along. They covered the entire surface of river from
bank to bank. A warm, comforting breeze
blew upriver, soothing the travelers as they flowed through a wide, unpopulated
valley. Eventually, they fell asleep,
cooed by the natural flow of the river and shushing sounds of the wind. They floated together, quietly asleep, a
peaceful flotilla of slumbering humans.
Still in his
dream, Graham awoke to the roar of a waterfall.
He could see a massive cloud of mist rising in the near-distance, beyond
the drop-off. All of his cohorts awoke
as well. Graham looked for fear in their
eyes as they coursed inevitably towards the falls. They all smiled reassuringly. Graham searched his own feelings. He was not panicked. He was not fearful. He was ready.
The baskets in front of Graham began to disappear one-by-one over the
edge. When it was his turn, he felt
exhilaration. As he fell, the basket and
the swaddling blanket disappeared. He
was naked with all of the other strange looking, naked people – old and young
and all different races, free-falling in slow-motion through the mist. As the bottom of the falls approached, Graham
felt his body disintegrate, becoming millions of fine water droplets. In the final moment, he felt a part of him
surging deep into the pit of the waterfall, and then into the dark, cool
commotion of the rushing waters downstream.
Another part of him became mist, billowing in a perfect arc up towards
the mighty sun.
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