The Gray House

by Mariam Petrosyan

  “Do they give Wolf the same thing?”

  “They give everyone the same thing. Unless they’re on a special meal plan.”

  “Can I go see him?”

  “That’s a question for the head of the department, not me.”

  “They’re going to tell him I’m perverted. And that I have no shame. They’re going to tell everyone, to make them think I’m disgusting.”

  Elk was picking up and replacing the cutlery on the tray.

  “Elk, listen,” Grasshopper said, trying to catch his eye. “Is Wolf not long for this world too?”

  Elk’s face went red in splotches, and his eyes flashed angrily.

  “That’s ridiculous! Who told you that?”

  “Why wouldn’t they let him go, then?”

  “He’s undergoing treatment.”

  “This place is very bad for him,” Grasshopper said. “He can’t stay here any longer.”

  Elk was staring out the window. He looked worn out. His face was lined heavily, especially around the mouth. For the first time ever, Grasshopper wondered how old Elk was. He thought that Elk was probably much older than Grasshopper’s mom. And that the gray hairs on his head outnumbered the not-gray ones. And that his face looked even older when he was upset. Grasshopper had never thought about these things before.

  “I talked to the department head. Wolf will be discharged soon. They’re not keeping him here for their own amusement, you know. You should be old enough to understand this.”

  “I do understand,” Grasshopper said. “So can I see him?”

  Elk gave him a strange look.

  “You can,” he said. “On one condition.”

  Grasshopper squeaked excitedly, but Elk raised his hand.

  “Wait. I said on one condition. You’ll be transferred to his room, and you’ll stay together until you’re both discharged, but only if you can make him do everything the doctors say. No running, no pillow fights, no games except those they allow. Are you up to it?”

  Grasshopper frowned.

  “Maybe,” he said evasively.

  “Forget it, then. Not good enough.”

  Grasshopper thought about this. Would he be able to make Wolf do something Wolf didn’t want to do? Or not do something? It was hard to imagine. Wolf didn’t listen to anybody, so why would he want to listen to Grasshopper? But then, he’d cried that night, cried because he wanted more than anything to get out of there. He just didn’t believe he could anymore.

  “I agree,” Grasshopper said and shifted under the covers. “But you have to give me your word, Elk. Swear that they’re going to let him out.”

  “I swear,” Elk said.

  “Let’s go, then!” Grasshopper sprang up and started jumping excitedly on the bed. “Quick, before he dies there all alone!”

  “Wait,” Elk said and grabbed Grasshopper’s ankle. Grasshopper crashed back down on the pillow. “We’ll have to wait for the doctor and the nurse.”

  “Listen, Elk, are they ever going to discharge Death? And Ginger, she’s this girl here, is she long for this world? What about this senior, White, did you know him?”

  Grasshopper was getting a sizable escort. Doctor Jan was carrying his things, the nurse had the linens, and Elk took the books. The doctor and Elk talked on the way, but Nurse Agatha was keeping silent, and her pursed lips were informing Grasshopper that she no longer expected much of him, wherever he might be transferred. Grasshopper was trying to slow himself down.

  “Well, then,” the doctor said as he stopped and bent down. He was tall, taller even than Elk. “Changed your mind yet?”

  Grasshopper shook his head.

  “All right.”

  The bars on the windows were the first thing he noticed. They were white, and they protruded into the room, checkered boxes encasing the windows that blocked the view. Multicolored Winnie-the-Poohs and Mickeys frolicked on the walls. Wolf was lying on the floor, facing the wall, his pajamas pulled around his head. He did not turn around when he heard the door or their voices, and Grasshopper didn’t want to call to him. The nurse made the bed, shaking her head and muttering under her breath. Doctor and Elk went to the window. Grasshopper’s stuff went on the nightstand, his books on the floor. The nurse busied herself with the bed for far longer than necessary. Wolf hadn’t stirred. Doctor Jan and Elk were talking in whispers about something unrelated.

  On his way out, Jan pulled Grasshopper’s ear affectionately and said, “Courage.”

  It was as if they were leaving him alone in a cage with a real wolf.

  Finally they all left. The lock clicked shut and all was silent.

  Grasshopper looked at Wolf. He felt uneasy.

  I don’t know him. I really don’t know him at all. He may well not be glad to see me. Maybe I should have stayed in my own room and gone with Ginger to visit Death every night.

  He looked at the jumping Mickeys again. Some morbid joker had provided them with sharp fangs.

  Grasshopper sat down next to Wolf and said softly, “Hey. Hey, vampire . . .”

  SPHINX

  VISITING THE SEPULCHER

  I am looking into the eyes of my own reflection. Intently, without blinking, until my eyes start tearing up. Sometimes I am able to achieve the sense of complete detachment, sometimes not. It’s either a decent way of calming your nerves or a waste of time, depending on your inner state when approaching the mirror and the lessons you carry away from it.

  The mirror is a mocker. Purveyor of nasty practical jokes unfathomable to us, since our time runs faster. Much faster than is required to fully appreciate its sense of humor. But I do remember. I, who used to look into the eyes of a bullied squirt, whispering, “I want to be like Skull,” now meet the gaze of someone who looks much more like a skull than the eponymous character. To compound the joke, I am now the sole possessor of the trinket that was responsible for his nick. I can appreciate the humor born behind the looking glass because I know what I know, but I doubt many would wish to pay for that knowledge by spending countless hours talking to mirrors.

  I know an achingly beautiful man who runs from mirrors like they were a plague.

  I know a girl who has an entire set of mirrors around her neck. She looks into them more often than she looks around, so the world for her exists in little upside-down fragments.

  I know a blind person who sometimes freezes watchfully in front of his reflection.

  And I remember a hamster attacking its own reflection with the fury of a berserker.

  So don’t tell me there isn’t magic hidden in mirrors. It is there, even when you’re dead tired and not good for anything.

  I stop detaching and catch the eyes of my reflection.

  “Jeez,” I say. “What a monstrosity . . . At least put some clothes on, my friend.”

  The monstrosity, naked, covered in scratches, eyes crazed with insomnia, looks back reproachfully. He’s got a Band-Aid over his right eyebrow, his left ear sticks out, flashing red, and dried-up blood covers his busted lip.

  Chastised by the mute reproach, I turn away.

  “All right. Sorry. You’re perfect. Just a bit out of sorts is all.”

  I wiggle the bath towel from the hook onto my back and smooth it out over my shoulders with my teeth. Now draped in the fluffy white toga, I can emerge from the bathroom.

  “There are people who live their lives as if running some kind of experiment,” Sightless One said about the recent events. Beats me why this desire to experiment takes over so many at once. With no breaks in between. Noble, then Black, and finally me. There’s a certain logic to it. Is this the way flu epidemics start? This virus of aggression and apprehension flies from one person to another, multiplying unstoppably. A dark period in the life of the pack, and one hard to snap out of.

  I freeze, close my eyes, and try to identify it, this abomination that managed to sneak in from who knows where. To know its smell, corner it, return it back to where it belongs. But I feel nothing, apart from the two sleepless nights p
ressing down on my eyelids. Well, that and the smell of someone’s socks, apparently buried in the pile of boots and sneakers. The shoe cemetery needs to be dealt with at some point, before we start getting mice addicted to the toxic vapors.

  I open the door. The room is empty and quiet, which makes it seem smaller than it is, even though it should be the other way around. But this is not how it works here. Considering that Humpback always brings trees with him wherever he goes; that Alexander is shadowed by an invisible choir belting out the “Lacrimosa”; that Noble is always in his ivy-walled castle and only puts down the drawbridge when he feels like it, while Jackal is capable of spawning another half-dozen of himself at any moment; and that it’s a blessing that at least Lary is not dragging the corridors inside when he walks in the door, and Tubby only does his magic when cooped up in his pen . . . Considering all that, it’s not surprising that our room, overflowing with all those different worlds, would seem smaller now than when we’re all in it.

  I sit on the bed. I’m hungry, but I need sleep even more. I rest my forehead against the bars and switch off for a while. Until there’s a quiet rapping on the door and the swish of rubber tires.

  It’s Smoker.

  He’s glowing, renewed after visiting the Cage. He’s a nice guy, he doesn’t bring anything here except himself. And his nightmarish questions.

  I give him a one-eyed birdlike look. The other eye can’t see from behind the hanging strip of Band-Aid.

  “Hi!” he exclaims, but darkens immediately. “What happened here?”

  I feel pangs of guilt. Those who are returned from the Cages should be met jubilantly. This is how it goes, ever since the times when nobody went there of their own accord. And I’m a tired scarecrow right now, incapable of performing the requisite rituals.

  “Had a disagreement with Black. How are you doing? Everything all right?”

  Plump, rose-cheeked Smoker, with those shiny bangs all the way down to his eyebrows. He passed the test of the Cage. Of course he’s all right, I can see it clearly, but I have to ask to make sure. Cages are not good places. Not the worst in the House, but still pretty bad. I’m glad Smoker didn’t have a reason to find that out. Even though being glad about it is not a good idea.

  “Everything’s great,” he confirms. “It’s like I’ve been reborn! All thanks to Jackal.”

  “I’m happy you feel that way.”

  He wheels next to the bed and looks at me probingly.

  “Why did you fight with Black?”

  Meaning: how on Earth have you and Black managed to have a fight. Even though my expertise in that area is an undiscovered country for him, he finds it easier to imagine me fighting as compared to stolid, emotionless Black, which is the way he sees him. Also, he’s deathly afraid of hearing something along the lines of “You know, kid, we just had a certain difference of opinion” as the beginning and end of conversation. He’s afraid because that’s exactly the kind of explanation he usually gets, and it makes him depressed. It interferes with his need to feel grown up. He has all the reasons to be afraid right now. The temptation to get rid of him with a pair of meaningless sentences is overwhelming. The explanations will only invite more questions, and then eventually I will run out of answers. But Smoker is impossible to get rid of. He opens his palm and all of himself is right there on it, and he just hands that to you. You can’t throw away this naked soul, pretending like you don’t understand what it is you’ve been offered and why. That’s where his power comes from, out of this devastating openness. I’ve never met anyone like that before. I sigh and silently bid good-bye to the idea of getting some rest before the pack is back.

  “You see . . . Noble decided to try Moon River. The effect of this stuff on the human consciousness is unpredictable to the extreme. Some just feel sick. Others start behaving strangely. There are those who experience absolute bliss. Which doesn’t look nice on the outside. I knew a guy who after a dose of River started talking in iambic pentameter. And then there was one who completely forgot how to talk . . .”

  Smoker’s attention is so rapt that I’m barely in time to stop myself from expounding on all side effects of River I’ve had the opportunity to learn about.

  “You get the idea. Drinking it makes you a human guinea pig.”

  He nods. “I understand. It’s a drug. So what happened to Noble?”

  I shoot a quick look to the wrinkled covers in the corner of the bed. The place where the dragon was sitting. Frozen. Lifeless.

  “He went stiff. Turned to stone. Wouldn’t respond to anything. That’s not a particularly bad reaction, by the way. The important thing in those circumstances is to stand back and not interfere. Except someone needs to be nearby. Just in case.”

  Smoker sighs with relief. He wasn’t here to look into the wide-open eyes of the live statue for five hours straight. Or to hear Lary’s whining and Jackal’s prophesies. There is nothing scary for him in what I’m saying.

  I am trying to stick the damned Band-Aid back in its place by rubbing it against the bars of the headboard, but no such luck. Breakfast will be over soon. Time to wrap up the story.

  “Black volunteered to stay with Noble over lunch. When we returned, Noble wasn’t here. This moron hauled him over to the Sepulcher. I’ve no idea if he lugged him all the way there himself or asked Spiders for help. But it doesn’t matter, really. That’s about it.”

  Just as I expected, this is clearly far from “it” for Smoker. He looks so shocked that I begin to suspect that something must have filtered through from my side, something bad. I felt like I was talking without bringing any emotions into this, and anyway I am already far removed from the way I was yesterday, but some feelings are very hard to hold inside, they find a way out. My dislike of Black is one of those. As is his dislike of me, naturally. Smoker doesn’t need to be burdened with this, but I might be too late, at least on my own account. He’s already caught some of it.

  “I think”—Smoker’s eyes flee, hiding behind the lashes—“maybe he thought that would be for the best? Maybe he was afraid for Noble and decided that he’d better make sure. In the hospital wing they know how to take care of people after . . . after things like that.”

  “Of course. They know a lot of things there. And Black wanted what was best. And what’s best, in his opinion, is that we get rid of Noble. He’s much too unstable.”

  “That’s a strange way of putting it, Sphinx . . . It’s not like they’d eat him alive there.”

  That’s the most unbearable feature of all newbies. They constantly need obvious things explained to them. I feel like an idiot doing that. Especially when I’m wrapped in a wet towel. But I am also firmly against avoiding it, since sooner or later we always run into problems stemming from things left unsaid. From one of us being misunderstood.

  “The medical records kept in the Sepulcher,” I forge on bravely, “have these stickers on them. Yellow ones, blue ones, and red ones. They are also put in the personal files. I’m not going to talk about yellow and blue right now, but one red stripe means that you are antisocial and unbalanced. Two, you have suicidal tendencies and require a psychologist. Three, you have a psychiatric disorder and require inpatient treatment, which the House is not capable of providing.”

  Smoker frowns, trying to remember if he saw any stripes in his personal file. I want to laugh, although heaven knows there’s nothing funny about this.

  “One,” I say. “You’ve been thrown out of your group, that’s a sure way to get it. But everyone has one, so don’t worry. Here only Tubby managed to avoid it.”

  “And Noble has . . .”

  “Three. And I’m afraid that, barring a miracle, someone is going to finally notice them this time.”

  “Does it mean he has schizophrenia, then?”

  I take a huge breath, but then the strengthening roar and clatter of an avalanche rolling down the hallway reaches my ears and all the nasty words stay where they were. Smoker also hears the sound of the imminent arrival of th
e well fed.

  “Oops. I guess I better go someplace,” he says. “While there isn’t anyone there.”

  He manages to sneak out just as the avalanche reaches our door. Jackal, riding his Mustang, is the first to burst in. Yogurt mustache, a pack of sandwiches under his arm.

  “Why, hello, Sphinx! Doing a one-man strip show? Could have waited for your friends!”

  Humpback shoves him aside, places a packet of juice on the nightstand, and goes on to take Nanette out for feeding.

  “Yummy sandwiches, look!” Tabaqui tempts me. “I can even put some sauce on top.”

  Alexander, a bunch of clothes in his hands, pushes his way through.

  “This is cheese and this is cream cheese,” Tabaqui persists. “All lovingly made by these very hands!”

  “Smoker’s back. Why don’t you ask him if he’s hungry?”

  With a triumphant yell, Tabaqui backs out of the door and, by the sound of it, proceeds to break down the door to the bathroom.

  “Smoker! Light of my life! Are you in there? Talk to me!”

  Alexander finishes buttoning my shirt.

  “Are you going to go see Noble?” he asks.

  Sure. That’s about the last thing I need right now. Go to Noble and explain to him the circumstances leading to his current whereabouts.

  “Leave me alone,” I snap. “Can’t you see I’m not in a condition to drag myself over there?”

  He just holds the jeans for me. He doesn’t argue, he doesn’t question me, and this makes me that much more miserable.

  Jackal, the sunny go-getter with the yogurt mustache, the exuberant noisemaker, is back. Along with Smoker, who’s chewing on a sandwich from that packet, and Humpback, who slaps Smoker’s back excitedly, preventing him from enjoying his food with a barrage of questions about his time in quarantine.

  “How’s the Cage? Is the blasted thing still standing?”

  Smoker nods. “Of course it is. Still there. What could possibly happen to it?”

  I observe the lightning-fast disappearance of the sandwiches and swallow hard.

  “You’re so thin,” Lary observes with concern. “Was it hard for you over there?”