162
The huge celestial clock appears yet again and plays with time.
It seems the atoms have aligned in my favour: the external circumstances are such that tomorrow I will be able to host Julija according to protocol! Her visit will last around eighteen hours. In view of my excitement, do you think Julija will convene an urgent session in Lake Redoubt to try and prove my guilt? Will the Keeper trail me when I walk through the gates with a cheery face?
Julija: “For how much longer do I have to endure this obvious mockery?!”
My expression may at this very moment indeed indicate cheerfulness, there is, however, a hint of uneasiness emanating from my eyes.
Me: “Julija, this is our tomb. I know how you don’t want me, don’t want us to be confined to a small grave, therefore I am in the process of tying our memory to Lake Redoubt and your story. This place will be our after-life. I will not let you fade away. Listen to me! Our spiritual tomb will be better than that family’s tomb.
…
I’m being disrespectful? I don’t think so!”
163
The four spear carriers, tilted at the forty-five degrees, stand motionless as if on a chess-board – each of them in his own corner, two pairs facing each other.
“Don’t coddle her!” Julija shouts when she sees the Keeper hiding behind my back. “She does not need to be exposed to your wrath,” I calmly reply, “Face me, and me alone! I forbid you to hurt her without my authorization.”
Julija: “Why do you keep summoning me if you don’t intend to fulfil your obligation?”
Me: “The device has been assembled.”
Julija: “Don’t mock me, you … you … deceiver!!!” She wavers for a while, looking left and right, and continues: “Do you know what her pseudonym, her nom de plume, is, has always been? Lisica. Gdč. Lisica. Ha-ha, what a silly woman! And you expect me to trust a fox?”
She moves from one golem to another, asking, “Would you trust a fox? Would you trust a fox? … Would YOU trust a fox? Would YOU trust a fox?!”
Me: “… I need my sun. It’s not my fault the catastrophe of the year of two thousand and fourteen failed to materialize. That is all.”
164
A cold morning. The grey cloud-blanket deprived me of its golden hour. Today, everything is dull. No star rays. Just the sorrowful, serene sky. No need to take the umbrella with me if I go out. Two months ago, I was imagining the peasants would ridicule my umbrella, my protection against the sun, if they saw me on the road when I fancied a stroll.
165
Indeed. The procession is leaving the Redoubt. The lake is wide, so we take the boat. It is awfully slow. Tensions are rising. My right hand tries to calm the Keeper down.
A falchion-carrying golem jumps out of the ferry – unnaturally to the fleshy eye – and says in an impossibly unhuman voice, “Everyone. Step out of the vessel.” We reached the shore without incident. I immediately cover my mouth with my right hand and start whispering something; it’s as if I’m delicately laughing.
Julija: “Don’t let that bitch confine me to her house again!”
In the countryside house:
Julija! Once again, we are reunited! You were wrong last month! Ha-ha-ha … HA-HA-HA-HA-HA!!!
Julija moves swiftly towards me: “You will pay for the harm you are causing me!”
Calm down!
Julija grabs my neck with both of her hands: “Shut up! Shut up! SHUT UP!!!”
…
In the evening:
Julija: “Tell me a story.”
Well … there is nothing sweet to tell: the midnight forest: it was freezing, the path was obstructed by thick, icy branches. I eventually found a clearing. I stared into the sky. I went home. Nothing poetic, nothing sad. Yes! Yes! Yes! I was possessed by the midnight! I was wandering in the woods, the frozen woods … That happened in the year of two thousand and thirteen. Now it is twenty twenty five.