Marooned

It was Duílio who opened the Mithraeum doors this time. A place where I had never seen him enter, as well as master Danilo. Andrés walked in first, followed by me, master Danilo and the other five kids. Duílio then closed the vault doors; at least that was the way I felt that hermetically shut environment of the Mithraeum.

The Mithraeum was very different from the last time we all got together here for the ceremony. The bays for the bulls had disappeared together with them after the ceremony. It was also my first time here after that ghastly night.

Down there, we sat down on the temple's grandstands and were silent for some minutes. Weird flashbacks arose all the time on my mind. As though something in that night tried to make its way back to my memory.

The two hurt by yesterday's fight — Andrés and Renan — took seat before anyone else. They'd refuse to sit down at each other's side. Guilherme, Anderson and Adriano occupied different places on the grandstands lest they got caught in a new row of the two mini-warriors. Then master Danilo, Duílio and I sat down too. The kids looked at us in suspense, waiting for what would follow next.

I started by saying I had called that meeting uniting the two Chambers of Taurinos' Ancient Society: the Inner and the Outer Chambers, because there were members of the two Chambers involved in the story. Although master Danilo belonged in the Inner Chamber he was not directly involved in the story. However I made a point of his attending the meeting. He had opened my eyes to so many issues, even suffering from the same unconsciousness as I was, feeling the ambient this way and that, trying to find the missing pieces to this puzzle Taurinos' history was and still is since its inception. From the beginning, my only guiding light in this weird tunnel came from the heat of his cups of coffee.

All heard me in silence; even Andrés' debased look sustained its interest. He could foresee the worst waiting for himself, but tried hard not to let it show, it seemed.

"What we heard and learned yesterday morning is no secret to anyone anymore. It's no more secret even for the townspeople who came to the farm Taurinos in full force and got the news. Even those who did not come learned everything from those who did. Now I know I'm in hospital and that I can decide to go back to my normal life if only I want to. If any day of my life could one day be considered normal."

Dead silence around me. All seemed to make a point of understanding clearly what I said. Not a single speck of sound was heard in that murky and weird catacomb the Mithraeum was and will always be.

"I see that I have created a past history for this town. I have created a past, a present but a future that is shrouded in uncertainty, together with all of you. I have always defended the idea that there's hardly anyone needing a psychiatrist, but people who create, in the world of the ideas, things that end up becoming as real as anything else in the material world. Even a car was one day nothing more than an idea on someone's mind. But a force comes that turns this simple idea into something we can touch and measure, something that can influence us in our everyday lives. As the car I have just spoken about, that can shorten distances between places and people who love one another and that, in the specific case of an ambulance, can make a difference between someone's life or death."

I turned my eyes to Adriano. He no longer seemed confused. After yesterday he seemed even more conscious of everything than myself. Andrés stared at me in a crescendo of expectation.

"Now I understand that Adriano saw everything that Andrés saw upon being created. Adriano only saw things happen long after that. Andrés saw everything happen at the moment it did, that's the great difference. When Duílio and Aparecida helped me with my suitcases to the car, they couldn't see the ambulance by my house, they didn't see me be carried to hospital by Meire, the officers and paramedics. When Meire, the officers and paramedics put me in the ambulance, they couldn't see Duílio and Aparecida helping me with my suitcases to the car. Because they were obviously in different plans of existence. Only Andrés, without ever leaving Taurinos, could see the two things happening simultaneously. He could see the two plans co-existing in perfect harmony at that exact moment in my life. Taurinos and everything that thrives in town were created at the moment I got in a coma. Andrés was probably created instants earlier."

"You should've created me before", cut Renan, protesting lively, drawing the looks (between curious and furious) of the Conselheiros, "why would you have created that prick before…"

"Renan, please!" Guilherme wanted to punch his younger brother, but he was way out of reach at the moment. I asked them to be silent and asked Duílio how he had found me. He told me he had found my professional card with my phone number by his computer. Told him I never used a professional card with my phone number anywhere. I had never operated this way.

"The card was probably created and printed by Andrés, no?", I looked at the lad that raised his eyes from the glasses to stare at me.

"It was. I found you on the internet, together with your blog… I searched the online directory of Santos, where it was a piece of cake to find your name. There aren't many Grisams in Santos, you know…"

"You started to act weird, fought Renan at school, began to get weirder and weirder until your father was forced to look for the professional help of a psychologist. Casually your father found the card next to the PC becase you had left it there so Duílio could find it "casually"."

"I did see he came up to me with a very strange story to start that fight at school. Now I can see what it really was." Renan was astonished, gazing infuriated at Andrés.

Duílio, at master Danilo's side, heard it all in disbelief, infuriated for being completely fooled by a twelve-year-old. Anderson, Guilherme and Bruno looked like they understood less and less as they learned more and more. They looked at me dumbfounded. However, from the three of them, Bruno was the one who mostly had the appearance of not conforming to the way he had come into existence. Yes. It was not only confusing for me. It was confusing for them too. They're human beings with their own desires, aspirations, ideals, dreams. How could I ever get stuck to this? Wouldn't it be, for my consolation, a dream within another dream within another dream within another dream like in the short stories by Jorge Luis Borges?

"How you calculated the time for your father to call me and arrange the appointment with me is something that can only be explained by the way time passes in a dream. But you did manage to achieve a perfect synchronization, you really did it in that moment. As with the bulls on the truck. Did you treat them so they would die exactly as we crossed the city limits that day in late February?"

Andrés sniffed, looked at the others before answering me.

"You killed them. I made you kill them because I convinced you that it was true. Because it was true, but it would take them 40 days or so to die. You wouldn't stay there for that long waiting to see if it was true."

"What a great son of a bitch!", Guilherme whistled, admired with his friend's cold-bloodedness. Marooned at the highest portion of the grandstands, Andrés gnashed his teeth nervously when he heard Guilherme speak. Adriano start moving toward him, "swear at my mom again and I'll shut down this meeting and you too." I held Adriano back as Duílio already got ready to intervene, while master Danilo only shook his head and looked upwards in dismay. Told him that was just an expression, that Guilherme didn't mean it literally. Asked them to be quiet for the whole of the talk and limited his speeches to questions and nothing else. I decided to tell Guilherme off myself before the Conselheiros swore to kill him.

"Guilherme, one more force of expression and you'll have a serious talk with me, no longer with the Conselheiros, right?"

The lad cringed in fear of the repercussion his spontaneity had brought to him, mumbled a frightened "you got it" to me. Renan was all glee, "that serves you right, always cutting me down 'cause of the things I do and say…" Renan was always that spontaneous and would have me laughing weren't it for the hardest days I have been going through in my life.

"Andrés only didn't expect the fact that Adriano could see things that way too. He couldn't see the Master Plan, it's true, but could see his things as well as Andrés. He tried to bully Adriano at Horns Falls when it was plain for him to see it was happening. When he heard Adriano was telling stories about their grandfather, the first sensitive point, since Andrés was his own grandfather. One among Those Who Have Returned."

Andrés started gnashing his teeth again, but kept silent. From way over here, I could see the slow movements of his mouth, his teeth calmly and coldly sandpapering one another. I had to be all cautious with him. As if he were made of glass. He has all accumulated inside himself, all I have created. If — and it's a great big if — I have really created this all myself. What if I had created Andrés and he then created the town? I don't know what difference it'd make in light of everything I know now and what I'm at the mercy of. But I decided to test him anyway.

"Andrés, I want you make a pledge."

He was scared, as if he could foresee what was to follow, "What pledge? No…", he tried to say, but I reminded him he was not in position to refuse the pledge. Or was he? How much more, knowing the Master Plan as he did, would he still have to hide? Or have we managed to empty his ocean of infinite secrets?

"What pledge?", he shrugged, tired of the questioning.

To determine what value could this procedures today — that reminded me of the Spanish Inquisition and made me cringe — have on hearts and minds here in Taurinos was pretty hard, it seemed. Until what point did I really have to comply with these medieval procedures in this secret society? Secret? Did anybody mention a secret?

"Swear you'll only answer with the truth from this point on."

He had a nervous seizure of laughter.

"You mean that everything I have said so far might be lies?"

"It would strike me as funny from a chap that doesn't like to be called a liar." I said, causing the first moment of relaxation of the meeting to happen. Even Andrés let out a hearty episode of laughter eventually.

"I swear", and he showed his empty hands to us, probably symbolizing he had nothing else to hide. I found that gesture elegant, one of the most interesting gestures I have seen him perform, for the absolute spontaneity it meant to me.

"Was it me who created Taurinos? Or was it you?" I was ready to ask the question, what didn't mean I was ready to hear the answer. But it would come, I was sure of that. And it did come in the end.

"What difference does it make?", and he had a genuinely curious expression, as though he really wanted an answer for his question; it seemed to be no commonplace.

"I don't really see much difference in the current state of mind and situation I am. But I really want to know."

"So I'll you I've got the Master Plan on my mind since I came into existence and there's no such thing as creating Taurinos. It came into existence as I came into existence. The seed of everyhing is the Master Plan and it was the first thing that existed on your mind, then I came into existence and the Master Plan and my mind were one thing only on your mind and this is how everything came into existence. Taurinos exists outside me the same way as it exists inside. I know everything that happens in town, and I know what has passed too. I only cannot see forward. I don't even see well without my glasses. Could it be symbolic?"

The was a big hush. Only everyone's heavy breathing was heard in the silence of the catacomb. The exhausting fans were strangely silent, but did play their role well.

"I do think Andrés was fighting for the city. For himself too, of course, but he was fighting for the city.", said Anderson in defense of his friend.

"Bullshit! He tricked us all! He hid everything from us that are his own people! This fella has to die, dude!", Renan looked at the top of the grandstands and for the first time I could see the hate in his eyes. Not even in yesterday's fight, when they grappled, punched and kicked each other like men possessed could I see a look like that. A calm and deep look of hate that froze anybody's blood in the veins, "I told you I was going to destroy you and there you have it!"

"Destroy me, go ahead", Andrés gnashed his teeth calmly as calmly he spoke, "and you'll destroy yourself together with me."

"Is it true, Miss Grisam?", Renan seemed startled.

"I do believe he's telling us the truth, Renan."

"I know the talk you had with Miss Grisam when you said you were going to destroy me. If you're really smart, you won't even think of trying, dude. Not even Miss Grisam, that was the origin of everything, has the Master Plan on her mind. I do."

It would be hard to forget Renan's desolate air upon hearing that. I liked Andrés, wished him peace and temperance yet it was amazingly complicated that the foundation of everything was a possession of him alone and no one else's.

"Course, Miss Grisam can decide to put an end to all this by going back into her physical body and waking up from that coma. I can't and don't want to stop her. I'm throwing the towel. Miss Grisam, I'm going to tell you something: go back to your normal life in Santos. Only be sure you're destroying a whole community. I'd really like to see how you'd lay your head on your pillow every night without remembering you destroyed us. We did not intend it to happen. Not even you know how it happened, but it did. Remember we want to live. Remember that the more alive you are, the deader we are. The deader you are the more alive we are. And if you want to get rid of your body, you'll come to live here with us forever. No one else will die and even those who did while you were here will rise again. This is the Immortality master Danilo was speaking about yesterday."

"No one else is going to grow older? Is this what you mean?", I asked to make sure that was what he really meant.

"This is exactly what I mean."

"Does it mean I'm going to be fourteen for good?", asked Anderson calmly.

Andrés spun his neck until his eyes met his friend's.

"Yep." he simply said.

A new pause, this one heavier and more ominous than the others, until I broke the spell of silence, "is this the promised Immortality, master Danilo? Stagnation?", I asked, not disguising a tear thar rolled down my face.

"It seems that's it, "sá" Stella…", master Danilo had a desolated air when he said that. I turned to the others, dumbfounded.

"Is this the life you want to live? A life of stagnation? Of dullness?"

I looked at all those present. It was unbelievable. There was no sound other than my voice. I didn't want to believe what I had just heard. That Andrés had done it all, that people were waiting for me since the dawn of mankind to turn their lives into a stagnated lake? A pool of still water?

"Well, it's better than not existing at all", said Renan timidly, afraid of being reproached again.

"Is Renan the only one here with a tongue? Or does he speak for everyone in town?"

"He speaks for everyone of us, you can be sure of it, Miss Grisam", said the voice on top of the grandstands.

"But he doesn't speak for me", said Bruno all of a sudden, drawing everyone's eyes on to himself, "I don't know if I want to live like this. I don't know if this is life at all. I'm going to wait until Miss Grisam makes her decision and depending on hers, I'll make mine."

"What do you mean, you'll make yours, dude?" Adriano was as astonished as I was. He looked at Bruno, at the others and finally at me. We foresaw the same, but there was not much we could do at that moment. He'd only make his move if I made mine, so we would have time enough to act. The others seemed not to understand what was going on inside Bruno's mind, except for me, Adriano and the Conselheiro cadet, the Grand Master of all of this madness. I changed subjects, not knowing what do of that conversation at all. Also because I had to clarify something that intrigued me from the start.

"What about the ceremony? Was it the reason why you could do things on the arena that would otherwise be physically impossible?"

"Yep, it was the reason why we — you included — could do things on the arena that would otherwise be physically impossible." and he started laughing.

My vision was blurred, all of a sudden. I turned my eyes to the arena and walked until I got there, followed by eyes that had the appearance of people looking at an extraterrestrial coming out of their flying saucer. Opening the small gate, I entered the arena for the first time since the ceremony. And a plethora of memories from that night invaded me. I saw the bull that had killed Arthur. I saw him come up over me and all that happened that night on that arena came washing over me in a single jet of power, uncontrolable, without law or order. I saw the appalling process of dismemberment of the animal done by myself, all that had terrified and stunned me in the others on that night I ended up doing even worse. A vision blurred with the blood of the agonizing animal, whose petrifying moos were enough to break anybody's heart. The voice of all of the bulls in the world, the ones which died in the truck all letting out a hellish and neverending moo that plagued my mind and deafened my ears.

I opened my eyes. There was more light through my eyes than the environment in the Mithraeum could offer. I was not in the Mithraeum any longer. I was in my bed on the farm Taurinos. I had Aparecida coming to bring me tea. She laid the cup on the night stand while helping me to sit on the bed, "look, drink some tea I made with melissa and chamomile; you'll feel better, I swear."

"Want to sedate me, Aparecida?" I tried smilinng relaxed and she returned the smile, a smile she could not fake.

Outside, the sound of the radio in someone's car. I asked Aparecida who it was and she told me it was one of the townspeople. Settled on the farm Taurinos' yard as in a campsite, they wouldn't leave the farm until I reached the Great Decision. It was a beautiful yet brooding song I had heard before, from an early Depeche Mode:

"Working week's come to its end
Party time is here again
Everyone can come if they want to
If you want to be with me
If you want to be with me
You can come with me if you want to

Exercise your basic right
We could build a building site
From the bricks of shame is built the hope
If you want to be with me
If you want to be with me
Even though you may still not want to

Let tomorrow and today
Bring a life of ecstasy
Wipe away your tears of confusion
If you want to be with me
If you want to be with me
You can come with me if you want to
Even though you may still not want to"

If You Want, written by Depeche Mode.

Advent | Toothpuller day

Radio Universal: The Day Of Creation