H(A)PPY

by Nicola Barker

  What should I do?

  Reject the resonance? But it was fully embedded – vibrating off the new clamps, flying back and forth between them at an inconceivable speed.

  I was helpless! I did not know if there was anything I could do . . . even if I felt the . . . felt the . . . the desire.

  I closed my eyes. It was here I saw ****, standing in front of me.

  ‘I gave you another chance,’ he hissed, ‘and this is how you choose to repay my generosity? With a destructive resonance?’

  ‘Everything is shaking itself apart!’ I gasped.

  ‘You created the tuning fork!’ he yelled. ‘This is your doing!’

  ‘The tuning fork is in my heart!’ I exclaimed. ‘There was nothing vindictive in it! You sent me to the Kora Group. You told me about The Cathedral. You said there was another star – a sister star that oscillated! You created the neural pathways! This is not my fault!’

  Kite was not listening. He could not hear me. He was trying to find some measure of stability within my mind, because there was oscillation, and the equations were trying to force their way between my eyelids. They were trying to prise them open.

  **** pointed to his own Sensor, which was working, behind him, but oscillating:

  **** shrieked.

  I opened my eyes and then quickly closed them. The room was collapsing. The world was in free-fall. I could not stop the resonance. It had synchronised the two parts of my brain. I was destroying everything. I closed my eyes again. My head was full of equations, scoring off each other, bouncing off each other, generating each other, devouring each other, forming into spirals and stars and patterns. Where could I go? Where was my refuge? Not in The System. I had declared war on The System! I had declared war on The Young! Or at least the narrative – with all its words and words and words and words and words and words . . .

  I started to cry. Everything was lost. And then, out of the chaos I suddenly heard a . . . did I? Could I? Yes. Yes. I heard a waltz. But far away, hidden deep within the blare, the cacophony. It was lost in the margins. On the edge of the page. And it was her tune. It was her tune. So I focused all my energy upon it: one two three, one two three, one two three . . . Everything I had, I focused upon it. And in that instant, without any jarring or confusion, in a billion tiny calculations, in the infinite squiggle of a bottomless cauldron of seething black ants, I suddenly built it (it built itself). I saw it forming – arching up with a terrifying grandeur and solidity out of all of the quaking and the chaos and the confusion. I built it! We built it – she built it with me, surely? Because there it stood:

  Our hope. Our shelter. Our refuge.

  Towering above us.

  Dark. Ancient. Remorseless.

  Terrifying:

  The Cathedral.

  It’s so quiet – so very still. I can hear my own breath. Everything (all that heady, violent, ecstatic reverberation – and even the sweet, lilting waltz that somehow contrived to bring me here) is obliterated by the giant, dark walls. Perhaps it is the architecture? Perhaps the huge arches within the main body of the building suck all the vibrations upwards and trap them in the rafters?

  I glance around. Am I alone? For some reason I peer behind me, towards the entrance, squinting in the half-light. I am standing in the foyer. There is someone by the door – remember? The person by the door? The huge, oak door, which is half ajar? But they cannot come in. They are unable to enter. I look down at myself, and am shocked to see that I am very young – small – eight, nine years of age, and my belly is massively distended. I place my child’s hands upon my belly, almost in wonder, and it throbs under my touch. Everything throbs. Am I truly nothing more than a million shuddering after-shocks?

  The resonances start to bubble up. But I am strong. I turn away. I turn away from them. The Young – The System – have taught me this, at least.

  Turn away! Turn away, Mira A!

  I quickly pivot and peer towards the door again. I feel a strong urge to go and see who is standing in the shadows there. I sniff the air. I sense danger – darkness. I smell – musk. Yes. I smell – dirt. I smell – corruption. I smell – life. I smell – death. Yes. Death.

  I know that aroma so well. It is familiar. Is it . . . is it him? The Stranger? The Intermediary? My heart flutters.

  The organ starts to play Bach. I pronounce the name with ease. Bach. No numbers in this black Cathedral – because this is my narrative – no masonry, no bricks, no judgement, just sound. Just words.

  The piece being performed is The Well-Tempered Clavier. It is beautiful, but lonely. I glance towards my Sensor. My Sensor tells me that this piece of music has been composed with Equal Tuning. It is therefore irrational – discordant. Compromised. But then it flashes up another message:

  THERE IS NO CONSPIRACY ! NO CONSPIRACY OF TUNING AND SOUND! THIS IS MERELY A NARRATIVE – YOUR NARRATIVE. THIS IS JUST CIRCULAR LOGIC. AND IT IS IRRATIONAL!

  I scowl and quickly walk forward – as if to escape my Sensor (which I have constructed, surely, along with The Cathedral? This is my architecture, my story, after all). I move swiftly past the rear pews, and suddenly I feel myself losing balance. I have stepped on to something – a marble – a small, round stone? I begin to fall backwards and lunge for the nearest pew to try and save myself, but before I land and crash I am grabbed by a man and firmly righted. He is on his knees beside me, intent on picking up the stones. One hundred stones. He is wearing a beautiful dress suit. His hair is fragrantly oiled. His shoes . . . as he crawls about, they squeak.

  It is him, surely? This is his Cathedral, his composition (and the Bach his inspiration, was it not? Its ringing tones? Its tempered harmony? Its austere, sombre authority?).

  He gently releases me and then immediately returns to his former task –

  TERRIBLE DISCIPLINE!

  without even a word, a nod.

  (‘Beloved brother, I have promised Don Luis, before I leave for Paraguay, to give him a pig so his wife, Dona Guillermina, who is very good at preparing pork chorizo sausages . . . ’ my Sensor whispers.)

  I glance behind him and there I see his other self – his native self – with his wide, indigenous lip, his bare chest, his warpaint, his feathers, his beloved guitar with its metal strings.

  ‘Whose Cathedral is this – mine or yours?’ I enquire of the kneeling man (all those tiny stitches on his upper lip, and, on closer inspection, his cheeks so sallow, his eyes so bloodshot).

  THIS IS ONLY NARRATIVE! my Sensor flashes. SIMPLY NARRATIVE! NOTHING MORE. THERE IS NOTHING COHERENT HERE, ONLY A SERIES OF SENTENCES CONNECTED BY GRAMMAR. YOU ARE SELECTING CHARACTERS FROM A STORY THAT YOU CONSTRUCTED YOURSELF FROM RANDOM COMPONENTS. THERE IS NO HOPE BEYOND THE SYSTEM. THERE IS NO TRUTH BEYOND THE SYSTEM. KNOW THIS!

  I scowl and turn again to the native – the performer – the patriot – the humiliation – the farce. Which of these two should I address? I wonder. Which do I prefer? Both are unreal. Both have been so carefully, so painstakingly constructed. Can these two – so different: the one so civilised, so polite, so careful; the other so fearless and ridiculous and romantic – be merely one entity? Is that feasible? How might I conceivably hope to address them when I am not even able to unite them successfully within my own consciousness?

  The native Barrios sits down on a pew and begins to play. The kneeling Barrios covers his ears.

  WHERE IS THE TRUTH? a familiar voice whispers. LOST SOMEWHERE BETWEEN THE POSITIVE AND THE NEGATIVE POLES? BOUNCING HELPLESSLY BACK AND FORTH BETWEEN TWO OPPOSITES?

  Something kicks in my belly.

  I cannot answer this question, so I peer deeper into the body of The Cathedral. I am looking for comfort. I am looking for the praying people – the kneelers – the ones I’d seen previously, in other dreams. A narrative that demands less of me, perhaps. A narrative of family. And . . . ah yes, there they are. I hurry towards them. Four figures. Two young girls – my sisters, slightly older than me – and another woman (the instinctive warmth in my he
art tells me that she is my mother). I note (with some dismay) that she is wearing prison overalls. And sitting just along from her, a short distance away? The Grandmother I saw previously, weeping in the hospital. I walk towards them, clutching at my belly, calling out. They all turn. They see me. I notice that they are surrounded by boulders, by stones. Dozens of large stones. Hundreds of large stones. Their hands and their clothes are covered in dust. They look hot – exhausted. They cover their faces when they see me. They lean forward. They start to wail and to ululate. They are fearful. They are plaintive. They are ashamed.

  ‘The date of the festival is December 8th, which is, of course, the feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin . . . ’

  my Sensor grumbles, hoarsely,

  ‘ . . . and for weeks beforehand the “promeseros” – or those persons who for various reasons have made vows to pay tribute to the Virgin of Caacupé – start from all parts of the Paraguayan Republic on foot, on horseback or in bullock-carts . . . and pay substantial tribute to the image of the Virgin as a kind of thank offering for being relieved of their troubles. Even the very poorest of the poor – those who can offer no tribute in money in fulfilment of their vows – will actually carry for many miles a huge stone balanced on their head. And outside the church at Caacupé, which I will show you presently, there are many piles of these extraordinary tokens, some of which weigh as much as thirty pounds . . . ’

  ‘AFTER FIVE OR SIX DAYS, HE BEGAN DRINKING A LITTLE HONEY, DILUTED WITH WATER . . . ’

  my Sensor quickly runs on,

  ‘WACHUGI, THE MOTHER OF HIS VICTIM, WAS THE ONE WHO PREPARED IT AND BROUGHT IT TO HIM. SHE TOOK CARE OF HER DAUGHTER’S KILLER AS IF HE WERE HER OWN CHILD, AS THOUGH IN HER EYES JAKUGI NOW HAD TO TAKE THE PLACE OF THE GIRL HE HAD ROBBED HER OF. THIS IS THE WAY IT IS AMONG THE ATCHEI. A MAN KILLS A CHILD OUT OF REVENGE: HE IMMEDIATELY STEPS IN TO FILL THE VOID HE HAS CREATED, HE BECOMES THE MOTHER’S CHAVE AND FROM NOW ON CALLS HER CHUPI-AREGI, MY GODMOTHER. THIS IS WHY SHE FEEDS HIM . . . WAS THIS ASKING TOO MUCH OF THE MOTHER? IT WAS THE ATCHEI’S RULE. BEYOND THE STRANGE BONDS THAT FORM BETWEEN THE EXECUTIONER AND HIS VICTIM AND CREATE A SECRET SPACE IN WHICH THEY ARE RECONCILED, THERE IS A GUARANTEE IN THE TRIBE THAT THERE WILL BE NO HOSTILITY IN THE TRIBE BETWEEN FAMILIES ASSOCIATED WITH THE SAME MISFORTUNE . . . ’

  I am lost for a moment, deep in thought, considering these words – confused by them, perplexed by them – when suddenly I hear a quick movement behind me, beyond the music. I turn and see – to my intense dismay – that it is **** – it is Kite – I can say it now, without fear or anxiety, because this is my narrative. And he is advancing upon me, at speed, down the aisle. His tail flies behind him, with its many bows. ‘I indulged you,’ he yells, ‘I showed you nothing but tolerance and kindness, and this is how you repay me? By declaring war on The Young? By building this Cathedral? This giant, swarming edifice of contradictory words and empty echoes and meaningless equations?’

  HE MEANS TO HARM YOU! Mira B whispers. HE IS THE FLAW. HE WANTS TO DESTROY YOU. HE MEANS TO STOP THE SACRIFICE. YOU MUST RUN! YOU MUST SAVE YOURSELF! YOU MUST ESCAPE HIM!

  ‘Where will I go?’ I gasp. ‘I am only small, and my belly is heavy. What is this weight I am carrying?’ I demand. ‘What is this weight? What shall I call it?’

  Sin!

  the organ suddenly blasts –

  Sin! Sin! Sin! Sin!

  FOLLOW! FOLLOW! Mira B calls. She disappears into the gloom. I glance behind me. Kite is approaching. His face is distending. His face is breaking up – as if all the vibration beyond the thick walls of The Cathedral is gradually shaking him into a million tiny fragments.

  I follow Mira B along the aisle, past the altar, into the Sacristy, through a succession of dark corridors, until finally we reach the base of a small stairwell. I am out of breath. Mira B climbs the stairs ahead of me.

  FOLLOW! FOLLOW! she yells.

  I wonder, momentarily, why Mira B’s voice has become so much smaller. And all the other voices around me – even that of my Sensor, which is now my voice, is it not? But still, still, I follow her.

  The stairwell is small and cramped, and the weight of my belly makes climbing difficult. I twist and I turn and as I ascend I feel the stone walls closing in upon me. But I cannot go back. Kite is following. Kite is behind me. An angry, buzzing swarm of recriminations – a million symbols and numbers and letters hotly pursuing me. At one point – when I stagger on the stairs and rest against the wall for a second – his anger suddenly coheres into a black syringe and its needle injects me. His poison – his remedy – his antidote says:

  ‘The mistake you have made, Mira A, is to think that The Cathedral will set you free! But faith is simply another kind of prison. And from now on your every thought, your every movement, your every impulse, your every yearning, your every word will be subject to an infinitely more savage and restrictive form of censorship than anything The System could ever have dreamed up. Because the censor will be YOU! And the ultimate payoff will not be hopefulness or purity or unity but SIN, but damnation! You have built a new prison for yourself, Mira A! And its culmination is pain! Is death!!!’

  I continue to climb. Kite’s words are an epidural. They have numbed me. And the walls are getting closer. I can barely squeeze my way past them now. They are soft. They are fleshy. And they throb. They contract and then release me. It is hard to breathe here. But still I inch my way forward. I inch my way upward. Where is my sister star? Has she been born ahead of me? Or is she here, in my mouth, preparing herself to draw her first breath, to utter her first wail?

  The Cathedral labours to give me birth. For a while I am stuck. Will they pull me out with forceps? There is a moment of terrible uncertainty, and then the walls are ripped open and I am plucked out, gasping. I weigh three pounds. I am tiny and naked and innocent. I am unwanted. I am impossible. I am unnatural. I am shameful. I am perfect. I am flawed. Around me the air reverberates with otherworldly howls.

  This is the Bell-tower. And I am Mira A. I look down at myself to confirm this fact, then gaze across at the giant bell that shares the tower with me. I am standing on a small platform, a couple of feet of scaffolding. I kneel and then inch my way forward and gaze down from this great height to see The Cathedral far down below me, full of infinite versions of myself. Earlier incarnations. My ancestors. This great assembly – the culmination of one, dreadful violation, one awful mistake. They are all singing, in unison:

  SOMEONE IS MISSING, Mira B yells.

  ‘Where are you?’ I ask, squinting, my eyes scanning the only section of the crowd currently visible to me. Is Mira B down there, hidden among them?

  OUR FATHER. THE ONE WHO VIOLATED OUR MOTHER. THE ONE WHO DENIED US. HE IS OUTSIDE THE CATHEDRAL. HE CANNOT ENTER – Mira B bellows.

  ‘I don’t understand you,’ I murmur, still searching for her – for myself – among the mass of people lying far down below.

  ‘Since colonial times, state and community existed as parallel entities that rarely overlapped,’ my Stream coughs. ‘One was Spanish-oriented and scripted towards the literate world, the other was Guaraní and directed inward as part of Paraguay’s oral heritage . . . for Guaraní had no words to express key political concepts like “parliament” or “representative democracy” . . . ’

  I can’t really comprehend this, at first. I start to re-read it.

  STOP CREATING DIFFERENT NARRATIVES! Mira B howls. STOP TURNING AWAY, MIRA A! FACE UP TO THIS! ELIMINATE THE FLAW! FORGIVE! PERFECT US! BRING HIM INTO THE CATHEDRAL.

  ‘NO ONE HAS SHOWN DEFINITIVELY THAT THE COSMOVISION OF AN ARCHAIC SOCIETY IS BETTER OR WORSE THAN THAT OF A MODERN SOCIETY. IT IS JUST DIFFERENT . . . ’ my Stream shudders.

  ‘I don’t think I fully understand what is being asked of me,’ I murmur.

  Mira B tries to speak, to answer, but her voice is now infinitesimal. I wonder whether this is because she is too far away from me (obliterated by song), or whether I have made her far away because I do
not want to hear her. I draw still closer to the edge of the scaffolding and peer down into the crowds below. It is then that I see the tail – the string and the bows – dangling beside me, into the air, into the drop: Kite! He has made it up the staircase! He is birthed! He is here! But he is simply a Kite now. Merely his logo. And even that – as I watch it, horrified – is shuddering itself into nothing. I wonder why I have allowed him to persist. Because this is my narrative, is it not? I have created The Cathedral – the congregation – the songs – the tower – the bell. Who might have created this place if not me? And just as I am pondering this, the tail – Kite’s tail – wraps itself, quickly, ruthlessly, around my wrist and jerks me forward, yanking me, toppling me, into thin air.

  I snatch for the wooden boards that had supported me previously. I grab at them with one hand, then with the other. I swing there, panting, legs kicking into nothing. I peer up at the giant bell. Etched into its huge, brass side is

  8Hz.

  I marvel at this as I dangle there.

  Will I fall?

  I do not want to fall.

  But my arms quickly grow tired.

  I close my eyes.

  Will I pray?

  ‘Shall I help you?’ a deep voice asks.

  I open my eyes and glance up (although I do not need to look, because I can smell him. I know who he is. Life. Death. Famine. Hunger).

  ‘Shall I help you?’ he repeats, smiling, and before I can answer, he places a boot – a filthy, leather boot crudely fashioned from wood and rank animal skins – upon the fingers of my one hand. I gasp. I feel

  PAIN!!!

  He gently applies his full weight to this foot – to my fingers. I sense the bones in my fingers bend, then snap –

  PAIN!!!

  I try to shift my other hand – to protect the first – but this hand he quickly traps under his second boot, and presses down hard upon it.

  ‘I am holding you,’ he says tenderly. ‘You will not fall.’

  ‘I don’t . . . I can’t . . . ’