The Day My Dream Died

65 - I'm Nameless Neradre

— 65 —

I'm Nameless Neradre

//\\

Wandering deeper into Loh Corone, Lise allows disorientation. The buildings aren't as similar to one another as those in Kellean are—which are uniform by design. Shades of clay ranging from a ruddy orange-pink, to sun-bleached yellow, to deep brown. The structures themselves tend to be rectangular prisms, cubes, right angles. They rarely connect evenly, like crates of mismatched sizes stacked sloppy. She passes building after building, noting their distinctions but not bothering to remember them beyond what light they shed on the building next.

She gives all those she sees a wide berth, fearing a stray bump would make of her a street fixture. Around fruit-sellers, woven baskets seeping old juice; past travelers trading spices and foreign herbs, who are hushed when not in barter. Watching a boy approach a fruit-seller, proffering a pair of dull gray metal wedges. The seller takes them and gives the boy three of the thick-shelled fruit which he promptly places into his waxed satchel. The practice perplexes her but she moves on without question.

"Hey, Lise! Is that you?" Just as she comes round the wind of the road, a strange man is waving to her with an expression that registers recognition. "It has been so long! Where have you been? I was worried you were trapped in there!"

Lise wracks her brain, trying to place this man anywhere in her memories. He is tall (though he still needs to look up to meet her eyes). A coppery complexion sets his slightly-bulging green eyes bright and clear. His teeth are clean—a disarming smile dimpling his cheeks. She struggles to recall him, thinking he looks the type who likes to be remembered. She just hopes he isn't the type who hates to be forgotten.

"Ah..." She hesitates, futile in knowing what to say. "Sorry, I went home before daybreak, actually, and I've just arrived here in the last couple hours."

He grins, "Yeah, you seem to be a bit, er... traveled." His apparent familiarity is somehow as comforting as it is unnerving.

"Yes..." She glances down at her ill-fitting clothes, mud-crust where they aren't burnt or otherwise compromised. "It wasn't the easiest on me but it could have been worse." I was only around for about half the journey here and others got it harder.

"You heard about The Dwelling already...? Well, obviously or you'd not be in Loh, would you." He smacks his forehead, chuckling, "I'm dumb. Anyway, hey, if you haven't a place to stay yet we've a decent little spot not far from here. Get you cleaned and rested." He points a thumb over his shoulder.

"That... That would be nice, thank you."

"Of course!" He broadens his smile, gesturing for her to follow. "What brought you back? It wasn't the fiends, was it? But no, there's no way you would have heard and been able to get here so quickly. Hey, are you alright? You're walking some kind of strange."

She pauses. "...A lot has happened to and around me since I left. Opis Luma had an outbreak. I don't know how many others made it out. My walking strange could be attributed to having dislocated my knee or the chest wound I'm still nursing."

He whistles, "Wild... Well, it's good the apartments aren't far then, isn't it?"

He isn't exaggerating—they halt before a broad building only a street over. A ramshackle stack of three, it towers a third taller than the surrounding structures and is thrice as crusty. Of deep brown clay, it has the unfortunate appearance of a particularly prodigious pile left by a beast bigger than she can imagine exists.

"I know, I know. It's on the dingy side. We didn't have many options on short notice, and Student Denoda offered to take us in," He says for excuse, though Lise didn't need one.

"Student Denoda? The same who only held a class every three weeks?"

"Yes, that one." He smiles, chagrinned. "I know, but it's not as bad as you might think. Here, I'll just show you into the bath so you can wash away your travels." Leading her through the front door, she catches just a glimpse of an open room beyond the foyer which has a variety of opulent—if mismatched—seats, then loses sight of it as they turn left into a hallway. "Third-to-last door on the right."

"Thank you. Before that, you wouldn't happen to know where I could get a change of clothes? I had some in my room in The Dwelling, but..."

"Yeah, I'll find something and leave it for you. Probably going to be gone by the time you're done, but don't worry—I'll let everyone know you're here."

Lise stokes the small stove—bringing the water to boil, she dumps it into the half-full tub. And repeats the process until she is satisfied it has warmed enough to offset the night's chill. For the first in however many cycles, she strips her crusty matted clothing. It clings to her skin in the creases of her arms and legs, her armpits and between her legs is worse. It smells deathly fetid.

The repulsion she feels diminishes when she steps into the warm bath, but returns by the time she's finished scrubbing. Stinking brown, she drains the tub and begins to refill it. Her second bath is more pleasant—if also more painful, as she tends to her chest and makes some attempts to untangle her matted hair. She has an easier time with her chest; several knots remain stubborn and she has to stop lest she break the strands which have gone brittle. Her mother would weep to see the state of her hair.

Lise stands before the tall bronze mirror a moment, dripping wet and bare, and as she looks on her body she feels herself split. As one part despairs at her atrophying muscles, the off-kilter tilt of her posture, the hunch as she cradles her chest (I appear as a creature), the length of her arms and legs, gone willowy in the worst way (I'm become a disfigured cripple, the horror I am), another part of her recedes deeper into her, and feels as if she stands alone in the back of her mind, in utter blackness, emptiness, broken only by the two openings through which beams of light land upon her naked and ashamed figure. And as she turns away from the mirror and comes back together, she feels a deepening unease; a dread hanging rootless over her.

I can't continue like this, she finally acknowledges. Then, Yet I continue like this. The fool I am. I say I cannot continue like this and yet I allow it to persist, this cycle, by fear or negligence or forgetfulness—I don't know. I can't continue like this nor can I face the monster in the mirror. So... What? Suicide? Better than this slow self-destruction, sure. She sits naked in the cold emptiness of the tub, elbows on her knees, head in her hands. Porcelain echoes her sobs hollow. Fuck me. I feel so fucking broken. I feel irreparable. Irredeemable... What do I do? What can I do? The fool I am. The cripple I am become. What can I do? I don't want to continue like this, but what else can I do?

Pain creeps up to her chest, tender, a helpful distraction. It feeds on her despair. She cradles it. This pain is the more pleasant.

She shakes her head. No. I've had enough of distraction. Enough. I'll face myself. I'll get out of this tub and turn back to the mirror. I'll turn to the mirror and face myself until I see myself in the mirror. She sits silent in the tub. Easy to approach the abstract; to approach reality is difficult. Why is this so hard? Why do I despair so much for my maiming? I wasn't ever going to be beautiful anyway. Is this some twisted vanity I can't shake?

If I can't feel well about what I see, can't love my new reality, I must at least cease avoiding it. She rises, slow, careful to keep her chest cradled close. Again, she stands before the mirror and faces herself. Too much my father in my face, too strong a jaw, too low my cheekbones. My limbs are wiry and gnarled with scarring. Most what I had of my mother I hacked away long ago. These breasts too small, these nipples too large. This violent silver-blue between, leaving my left breast deformed, the skin around the scars too taut. My belly a shining sheet of smooth tissue, where has my naval gone? What gazing is this then? She snorts. Listen to how I think of me. Too this, too that. What a disservice I do myself, allowing these features value. Still, I wish I was another way. Seli got all of mother's beauty—father would say. What consolation I have, perhaps, is only that she gave me her eyes.

When Lise turns from the mirror, she fears it less. But that is as much as she accomplished. It's enough for now just to acquaint with myself. I needn't love at first sight.