The Gray House

by Mariam Petrosyan

  Noble scratches forlornly at the blanket with his finger. His soul clearly hungers for the dialogue with the deaf-and-mute Twentiers.

  “Tried it every which way for them,” Lary mumbles. “Bring this in, take that out . . .”

  Enter the dragon, quietly and unassumingly. No eyes of flame, no burbling as it came, none of that. Tiptoes in, keeping close to the wall like the least mouse in the whole world. And he comes bearing us a huge egg. Must be a tribute, for all the tumult he made us undergo. Passes it on to me and holes up in his bed.

  I unwrap the egg-shaped pack. It contains unevenly cut slices of cabbage pie.

  “Cool! Is that from the wake?”

  Alexander startles.

  “Relax,” I say to him. “It was really fun, actually. Look at Noble. He tumbled down from his crutches and is drinking himself silly now, under the guise of his disability. If you hadn’t provided him with an excuse he’d be ashamed. So, breathe easier.”

  “I’m not drinking,” Noble counters. “It’s medicine.”

  “My point exactly.”

  Alexander is still miserable and concealed. Horrible thing, moral scruples.

  “So it was Alexander who did it, then?” Lary says hopefully, clutching the can of tea leaves to his chest. His lips move with a newfound purpose. “Threw the bomb, or whatever it was back there in the Coffeepot.”

  “No,” I say. “He didn’t throw anything. All he did was try to fly away.”

  The wind howls between the double panes. Ginger dons blue glasses.

  “The weather’s changing,” she says.

  The wind moans and bangs at the windows for the rest of the day. I change cold packs at regular intervals and generally take care of my lump. Sphinx’s eyelashes are gone and his cheeks are seared, so he’s walking around slathered with burn cream. The overall impression is unusually bright. Noble continues his journey into the bottle. The girls have left, to protect Needle and her wedding dress from the evil eyes of malicious loiterers.

  Instead of them we receive a visit from Black. He’s exchanging banter with Smoker about their favorite painters. Even without listening closely, it’s obvious that this topic is a struggle for Black. He’s suffering, but soldiering on. Must be imagining that as soon as he’s out the door we’d all fall apart, done in by assorted vicious ailments. Or, conversely, worrying about Smoker’s psychological state in our continued presence.

  Blind is doing his best to play Alexander’s replacement. The water boils over, the cold packs get lost, and when he does find them they’ve been thoroughly trampled—by him. When he tries to repair Mustang his finger gets caught in the works, and I end up lovingly tucked in with Tubby’s much-pissed-on blankie. To quote Sphinx, “Where would we be without you?”

  I’m the only one to drive out to dinner, after Smoker’s feeble protestations that he’s going to join me.

  The Coffeepot is still besieged by the curious throngs. I stop by to listen to the scuttlebutt and find out that apparently Alexander doused himself with kerosene, protesting the graduation, lit himself, and jumped out of the window. I liked it better when it was a bomb.

  At the doors to the canteen, Monkey catches up with me.

  “Hey! Did you know Lary went into the Outsides with the Flyers? Said he needed something out there urgently.”

  The frightening news makes me put on the brakes. Lary in the Outsides! Apocalypse! He’s going to get whacked before he goes around the nearest corner. Or lost, admiring his own shadow. And if he manages to return, he’d be covered in Syndrome from head to toe.

  I say to Monkey, “Sure. Of course we know. Thanks.”

  And drive on.

  In the canteen, under probing stares, I prepare mounds and mounds of sandwiches that I need to bring back. I spread this and that, shake some salt on them, and fold the pieces together. Continuously fretting about that idiot Lary. In a leather getup like his, an inhabitant of the Outsides is supposed to roar past on a Harley, not perambulate with his mouth agape. As he is, Lary would provoke an irresistible desire to beat him up in any sane male under the age of forty. And I’d just bet that the whole risky business is about something like a ghastly-colored tie for the wedding.

  Smoker arrives, towing Tubby after him. I am busy for a while spooning oatmeal into Tubby’s mouth, and then it’s suddenly the end of dinner. I leave Tubby unfilled and try to satiate myself with whatever I can before it’s all carted away. I can feel for Blind, in a way. It’s hard being Alexander if you’ve never been him before. Tubby blinks pathetically over his bib, opening and closing the empty mouth in hopeless expectation of more food. I slap the fork down and inquire of Smoker if his vacation is quite over while I’m struggling here with pangs of both hunger and guilt, and if it is, would he be so kind as to maybe help me out? Smoker doesn’t argue, to my surprise, and takes Tubby’s spoon. His style of feeding is exceedingly slow. The oatmeal is delivered in minuscule portions, but it is at least something, and I can return to unhurried mastication.

  One by one the entire canteen crew assembles around us. Hovering and throwing meaningful glances in the direction of the clock. I shove the sandwiches into the bag, pat Tubby, filled to the brim with the oatmeal he hasn’t swallowed yet, say “Step on it!” to Smoker, and make a dash for the exit. I am probably the least stable when there is an increasing number of unseen watch dials crowding around.

  When we arrive at the door Smoker hesitates, as if undecided whether he wants to enter or not. I can see he’s not really thrilled about it, but on the other hand it’s not like he has any choice.

  He puts his hand on the knob and says, looking away, “You know, I’ve been there too. In the Coffeepot, with you. It was the first time I’ve actually seen something extraordinary happen, instead of listening to you tell a story.”

  “Oh. So, how was it?” I say, intrigued. “Are you still bored?”

  “No.” He lowers his eyelashes, so it’s impossible to tell what his eyes reflect now. “Not anymore. But tell me this. What I saw . . . Did it really happen?”

  “That depends on what you saw.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it. For some reason. I haven’t figured it out for myself yet.”

  I sigh.

  “None of us wants to talk about it. I thought that’s what was driving you nuts.”

  “No,” he says, sounding surprised. “Quite the contrary. I’d be mad if you started debating it. I think. I’m not sure. But even you haven’t said anything.”

  “And good for me,” I say. “Alexander wishes to sink through the floor as it is.”

  Smoker nods and opens the door.

  Sometimes I get this curious impression that he’s one of us. Rarely, though.

  I wonder what would you do if your roommate, bedmate, tablemate, and mate of every other kind suddenly woke you up in the middle of the night with a hoarse cry of “There you are! Finally I’ve found you!”

  In the Outsides it’s customary to call for paramedics in cases like that, but we’re not in the Outsides, so I speedily crawl away from him, put a pillow between us, and start deliberating whether it’s time to cry “Help!” yet or if it could wait for a little while longer.

  “I found you,” Noble insists, tugging at the pillow. “You’re not going to wiggle out this time. I know who you are.”

  He looks like he’s totally round the bend.

  I tell him that I had no intention of wiggling, and that luckily for both of us I also happen to know who I am.

  “And now that we’ve established who both of us are, and know everything about each other that’s possible to know, what say you we get some sleep? It’s dark. Everyone’s sleeping. Look. So, hush-a-bye . . .”

  “I want to go back,” Noble says. “Back here, but earlier, and I want everything to be different. I mean, the same, but with me in it.”

  “And it is very stupid of you.”

  “I’ve made my choice.”

  Amazing how they all consider these words to be a f
inal argument. Like it’s a spell against which I’m helpless. I’d have laughed if I didn’t want to cry.

  “Think,” I say with a sigh. “Think carefully, and come another time.”

  His fingers clamp on my wrist with such force that I’m afraid it’ll break.

  “No! Please!” he says. “I might not find you another time. Even once was hard enough.”

  The guy’s crazy, I tell you.

  “Hold it!” I say. “Wake up, baby. I’m here all day, every day. There’s no need to go searching.”

  I push the pillow aside, sit up, and give him a slight fillip on the bridge of his nose between the eyebrows. Very lightly, in fact I barely touch him, but Noble reels back as if I whacked him with one of the weights from Mustang’s footboard, and almost falls on his back. He closes his eyes. Opens them. Stares at me like he’s never seen me before.

  “Damn you,” he says. “You hurt me.”

  “And you woke me up. Now we’re even, and can go back to sleep satisfied. Sweet dreams.”

  I fluff the pillow and close my eyes, painfully aware that peaceful sleep is not likely in the cards.

  And I’m right. Noble doesn’t back down.

  “You are him,” he says. “You can’t fool me.”

  I sit up again.

  “Of course I can fool you. Easily. Anytime I want.”

  The lights of the two tiny wall lamps make his eyes look like black vortices. Windows into a bottomless blackness.

  “You can’t do this. I found you. I asked you. You must help me now.”

  What wonderful arrogance!

  For the next half hour I am busy assembling everything that’s necessary into the spare backpack.

  Then we crawl. Slowly, because of the need for stealth. Finally we’re in the anteroom, wheelchairs and flashlights at the ready. I free Mustang of the weights, to save on clang and clatter. I don’t have the master backpack with me, so there’s no chance of it overturning. I’m not sleepy anymore. I’m alert and perky, and wouldn’t say no to a nice snack, because the first thing that catches up with me when I’m perky is hunger, with everything else switching on later.

  Noble is quiet and exceedingly polite. Very helpful and not at all annoying. And good on him, because I’m not in the mood for explanations.

  The journey is short, since our destination is the classroom. A midnight visit to the beloved collection, you might say. Once inside I open the spare backpack and take out the three items I’m going to require. The chain with watch gears hanging off it. Those that live in old watches, not the modern ones with batteries inside. It goes over the neck. Also I hold a notepad in my hands and a pencil in my teeth. Now I’m ready.

  Noble gnaws at his fingernails, studying the collection with a haunted look on his face, like it was me luring him out here and not the other way around. Fingers the strap with rat skulls that I have hanging on the birdcage, takes it off, and turns it this way and that.

  “A delicate specimen,” I warn him, extracting the pencil from my mouth. “Possibly a hex. I wouldn’t touch it if I were you.”

  He hangs the skulls back. With a fleeting smile that immediately trips my hunting instincts.

  “All right, what is it? What did you just understand about them? I saw it, ’fess up!”

  Noble shrugs. Leans to the side, fishes the wide-brimmed black hat out of the pile of no one’s things, and winds the strap around its crown. The skulls line up in a circle. Noble clicks the copper buckles that obviously were designed to be latched to this very hat and carefully places it on the seat of the chair with the stuffed crow.

  There is nothing left for me to do but to gasp slowly.

  What’s been simply a hat has now become the most meaningful item in the entire collection.

  “Wow! Thank you,” I say. “You know, I had this impression for a moment that you were going to put it on.”

  Noble looks at me blankly.

  “It’s not my hat,” he says after a long silence.

  I look at the hat. Then at him.

  “Of course not,” I say.

  Then open up the notepad and clear my throat.

  “So. You have made your stupid choice and you don’t want to think it over.”

  He nods.

  “You are aware that your memory is a part of you? And not an insignificant part. Those who return could become somebody quite different from who they were before. And not experience some of the things they have experienced on the previous loop. Which would make the next loop itself different as well.”

  “I know,” Noble says. “You’re wasting your time. I will not reconsider.”

  “You are of the Forest,” I say. “It’s in your blood. You shall not find rest until you join with it.”

  “I know,” he says. “But she is not there.”

  “Your love has consumed you. And the first thing it devours is reason, mind you. Speaking of love . . . Are you sure that when you become a different you, you’ll still love the same person that you love today? Absolutely sure?”

  “Of course.”

  And he smiles. The smile of a maniac. Or of someone in love. Which is the same thing, come to think of it. His love has eaten him alive, stripped him to the bones, and still he smiles at me. This smile overpowers all. To hell with tradition, with the rituals, and everything else, including the questionnaire. I’ve never neglected to go through it before. Ten questions must be asked and answered, and I’ve asked them of everyone, but Noble will get not a single question more. He is the Little Mermaid who came to exchange her tail for the useless legs, and gave up her voice too, and if the Sea Witch asked her for something else, anything else, she would’ve given it to her as well. Lovers and maniacs are all the same, they rush in where anyone else would fear to tread, and arguing with them is a fool’s errand.

  He has no idea what it is he’s just asked for. That’s his problem. He believes that his love is so strong that it’ll catch up with him on every loop. Let him believe. Who am I to tell him otherwise?

  “All right,” I say. “You have convinced me.”

  I unclasp one gear from the chain and place it into his open palm.

  He looks at me “fuzzy,” then takes my hand and kisses it. And this, horrible as it is, transforms me into Master of Time for a moment. Standing at death’s door, standing there for so long now that it’s become something of a habit, because the he-me is ridiculously old. It’s impossible to live for that long, only to exist. And I hate doing that, which is why the damn old man is so inaccessible—he’s almost always in hibernation that’s stretched into eternity. A curt nod—he doesn’t waste time on words, a nod is usually more attention than we allow ourselves to bestow on anyone—and I return into the dear old precious adorable sweetie me, who’s unable to hide a disgusting giggle.

  Noble staggers like I’ve just slapped him.

  “Come on,” I say. “No reason to be embarrassed. I promise not to remind you of what we did tonight. At least not too often.”

  SPHINX

  Sphinx dreams of the House breaking out in cracks, raining down pieces, bigger and bigger, until they’re the size of entire rooms. The fragments disappear together with people, cats, the writing on the walls, the fire extinguishers, the commodes, and the clandestine hotplates. He knows that many share these dreams with him now. It’s not hard to figure out who. They sleep in their clothes with bulging backpacks for pillows, and they try not to enter empty rooms and not to walk around the House alone.

  Which is why, when Sphinx wakes up and discovers the fat cables woven into the bars on the window, with their ends extending in both directions, to the windows of the Third on the right and of the Sixth on the left, he’s not surprised. It just means that someone’s dream mirrored his own. He reverentially studies the knots, as big as his fist, and tries to decide if this can be considered a sign of full-blown panic or if it is still at the level of fear. Alexander is watching the tents of the shaved heads from behind Sphinx’s back and thinking about somet
hing sad.

  He’s no longer as white as the day before. He has on Humpback’s old hoodie, striped gray and orange, with the hood over his head. A sort of compromise between his usual curtain of hair and yesterday’s opened face.

  “This is the first time I’ve looked at them.” He addresses Sphinx, who’s sitting on the windowsill.

  “I know,” Sphinx says without turning around. “You have been avoiding windows ever since they came. Afraid?”

  “No. Their presence changes me, that’s all.”

  Sphinx turns around, trying to catch Alexander’s eyes.

  “It sure does,” he says. “Radically so.”

  Alexander smiles a haunted smile.

  It is hot and stuffy in the dorm. The day is cloudy, and the sky has a curiously yellowish tint. The color of a desert waiting for the coming sandstorm. Sphinx leans his head against the bars. There’s only a solitary figure on a camp stool down by the tents, with a hood drawn tightly.

  Mermaid stumbles around the room, in the dusk that filters through the curtains, collecting her clothes. From the chairs, from the bedsteads. The clothes and the six bells. She clutches them in one hand and climbs up on the table. It is going to take her no less than an hour to brush her hair and braid the bells into it, even though she never takes out all of them at once, only six out of the dozen. Ensconced on the bed, head in hands, Smoker is staring at her. The pack likes to watch Mermaid brush her hair. This spectacle never gets old for them.

  Down in the yard it’s windy, but not a bit less hot than inside the House. Sphinx sits on the stump in the middle of the parched lawn and looks at the tents. After a visit from Shark, its inhabitants moved back. Not much, just several feet. It still allows them to congregate by the fence and even hang on it, holding on to the wire mesh. And it still allows them to try and attract the attention of anyone who steps out of the House, imploring them to arrange a meeting with the Angel, who “dwells here among you, we know . . .”