Part 9 (2/2)

Richard had called her ”Bree” Aubrey used to hate that

I replayed the scene incomment, and cryptic ish I had rehearsed for ain the distance in Aubrey's gaze, the fixed front tooth, I decided that she had retreated too far beyond ether, of the for and drea moments fordisappointingly unremarkable about the reality

I had always assu started the way they had But thinking back to Richard's quick rescues, I wasn't so sure She had seemed in utter possession of the situation despite his protection of her And I found soness to be fitted into the mold of her expectations like a mummy in a coffin made for someone else

I WENT TO WORK and sat in s But even as I did, ht, passed a the reeds on the bank of Eden's river

At hoh aze wandering often to that pile of pages, scratched in frantic pen and harried pencil, growing on the corner of my desk, to the ruht It see to tell youat the pile, I considered the narrative tension of his story, the larger-than-life qualities of his characters (and how could they be otherhen they included both God and the devil?), the unlikely point of view-like thethe tale of Beowulf ripping off his arly A tale turned on its head, a sy the tale of Beowulf ripping off his arly A tale turned on its head, a sympathetic character fro syain of Sarah Marshall, her hair matted on the pavement

If it was a hoax, it was the most elaborate one I had ever heard of And if it was, I found that a part of h it the wheels of my creative un a faht of Katrina's proposal L Legion L Legion How clever I tried to locate it, but it was apparently buried beneath a ream of paper-clipped proposals and sample chapters How clever I tried to locate it, but it was apparently buried beneath a ream of paper-clipped proposals and sample chapters

Later, well past 1:00 am, I returned to my account I had combed it a dozen ti was h the heavens and introduced e of his understanding as I de back some vital piece of inforrid stared back

13

The parade was on TV Apparently it was Thanksgiving But all I knew or cared about was that it had been five days Five days, and nothing I sifted through the stack of pages coh a sieve, searching for details, , reason I have lost it I have lost it At best, I was obsessed The fact that I had not replayed to death my encounter with Aubrey at the ht I would be compelled to drink, break down, or at least stew for a few days, reliving the years of our uments, the silent specters between us But I did none of these, having already transferredon the corner of my desk At best, I was obsessed The fact that I had not replayed to death my encounter with Aubrey at the ht I would be compelled to drink, break down, or at least stew for a few days, reliving the years of our uments, the silent specters between us But I did none of these, having already transferredon the corner of my desk

My pulse throbbed inthat I felt its thuh the ht This experience had drainedthat I had fallen victim or privy to

I checkedat the keyboard like a lover waiting by a silent phone

In these idling moments of distracted nonproductivity, I looked up articles on Horus, searched for pictures of the falcon-headed God to see if I saw anything of the deht hours, I browsed the Internet, following the links through a pantheon of Egyptian Gods until, dozing in my chair before dawn, I dreamed convoluted dreai ide-eyed funeral ht of Lucian's h my hair, scrubbed at the stubble on my cheeks, and realized the holiday had passed It was the weekend

That day, as I returned to the account of ility of the paper it ritten on, the fraying edges of the notebook pages, the bloated ink where I had set a glass of water on one of them I recalled the sha Tissue paper, Tissue paper, he had called it he had called it

I i, co medium

When I finished, it ell past dark I sat back, considered the last line of my account, which ended in the ain With Lucifer searching for the weakness in man

On impulse, I pulled up an online Bible and then faltered There were at least two dozen translations to pick fro James in confirmation, the ”thees” and ”thous” as mysterious to me as God himself I rando God created the heavens and the earth Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters

It was so bare-boned The i over the water that had made Lucian shudder was recounted here with all the eh the days of creation, and though I found no inconsistencies between this account and the deelic host or Lucifer, of the fall that precipitated the earth's eh the creation of animals and man I found it retold in the next chapter, this ti into the garden The specificity surprised ht actually locate the place on a ain, this time with a writer's appreciation for the omniscient point of view, the declarative sentences, the repetition

Still it seeo in Sunday school: dry and rote, down to the repetition of the days co in nury My mouse hovered over the X that would close the online Bible, but then so happened: I heard the echo of past conversations with Lucian co

Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the watersthe way a sculptor's fingers roam a block of etation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds”All those strange green things had within the miniature versions of theethe awareness, all the emotion, the propensity to love

”Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that ave the animals to the ood for thethe demon had not yet mentioned was the tree in the second chapter I scrolled to Genesis 3

Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild ani for himself the handiwork of El like the jealous criticsearching for the slightest weakness

It now ca for enealogy of e and supposedly lived for centuries Lucian had said nothing of this part, having come only, as far as I could tell, to the end of Genesis 2 Looking at the screen, I thought with some alarm of the thick, dusty, leather-bound book on the shelf at ho up Is that what he meant every time he said time was short-that it could take an entire lifetiht my obsession, not sure if I was up for all of that I was exhausted, hungry, and preoccupied-and Lucian had barely covered the first two pages of that dusty book Did he mean to recount his observation of or participation in every event in the Bible?

And what did any of this have to do, as he contended, withscratched at the back of -the first day And there was evening, and there was , and there was un its phantom tick for us alone Where I once saw the artful strew of El's stars, I no the cogs and pendulu the finite measure of time