TCOTNK 7 Easy Things First
TCOTNK 7 Easy Things First
He made notes. And read it three times from cover to cover. When the last candle died, he sat for over an hour in the dark, staring.
Easy things first
James and Michelangelo had spent the whole day in an internet cafe, a shared hub with high-speed access, busy spreading press releases, calls to action in volunteering networks and in-person pitches among their contacts to ask them to spend a few hours doing the same. Creating momentum. Imagery of the paintwork, and the dragon gate sketches. Pictures of the girls dressing up. The potential of the empty terrain. The first tent. A narrative of new beginnings. A Renaissance of the dark ages. Placing the imagination in a leading position. The challenge to let go of the clatter of arms. To abandon the battle fields and find new ways to move, to shape.
Tuesday morning brought, besides two hiking brothers, a tent builder looking like he worked himself to death, a renovated city bus housing a very hairy pizza baker, a chef, bald and bold, and a couple of full-time travellers.
The I-speak ritual was moved to before breakfast. The chef turned out to be a budding dictator and the two activities were linked. No circle, no porridge. Mornings there wasn’t much more than white sugar and oatmeal those first days. The evening meal alternated between red macaroni and white macaroni. Both with a sprinkle of decorative cheese.
The festival had lost its audience through a change of direction by Joe. The old team had resigned a week before Scarlotte arrived. Why? Who knows? Incomprehension? Fear of the unknown? Distrust?
Scarlotte didn’t know but suspected there was more to it.
Still, they did well. On Friday thirty recruits stood chained as one. The atmosphere moved from snug to noisy. The kitchen tent was erected and functioning. A small settlement grew near the forest edge. A hefty workshop tent got equipped. Reclaimed car batteries and third hand solar panels were hooked up. A few containers with remnant building materials were dropped. Three electric golf carts were donated, of which only one was still functioning, and the other two were merged into a thing that drove but had no name. They got a geriatric bulldozer on loan from a farmer nearby.
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In less than a fortnight things had shifted considerably. Three times a week they did a round, visiting the local bakers and supermarkets to pick up past-sell-by-date foodstuffs. Scarlotte was slicing vegetables, standing at a pallet-table under a party tent together with seven other kitchen apprentices, busy talking while murdering outdated greens. The smell of mango, pineapple, carrots and root celery embraced them all. The young woman next to Scarlotte stripped and diced onions and seemed the only one unaffected by the teargas oozing from her station. She was furious after a turbulent night with her guy. People called her Tay Rah, because no one could remember or pronounce her actual name.
“He thinks he owns me,” she whispered to Scarlotte. Her sharp knife decapitated a golden onion. Then pulled the skin rigorously.
“He sleeps in same tent. No right, come to that.”
Scarlotte followed - a bit worried - the chopping of her neighbour who, after each sentence, tried to wipe an annoying lock of hair to the side. With her knife hand. And she stood very close. Tay Rah spiced up her discomfort with considerable gestures. Scarlotte could hear the sound effects fit for augmenting the scene. Swoosh, sjinngg. But the actress was skilled, despite her angry monologue. The large bowl of chopped onions was filled with a mount. Her ten-kilo net was empty. Scarlotte’s celeriac cubes churned out a sort of demolition waste. Ten tubers to tend to. Yes, she liked alliterating for the rhythms and patterns they held.
“And I am having my period.”
Still waving the now jobless knife.
“Balder has no idea of cycling.”
She carved up the air.
“The only cycle he knows is the four minute lap. Up, down, up down and finish, boooring.”
The blade followed the dance, bang, up, down, up, down and then bored its point into her board accompanied by a viking screech that interrupted all activity for half a mile around.
“Wooaaahh! I’m done! Anyone care to dance?”
Scarlotte glanced at Pedr who idled around the mostly-female cutting station.
“Wanna take over?”
She gave him her knife and ran after Tay Ray, who was on her way to the camping site, barefoot. The woman’s stride showed no trace of periodic moodiness. Only femininity. The orange summer dress was proudly riding her hips, her shoulders soft and low. While walking she tied a long red scarf round her head. Scarlotte caught up with her and her face lit up.
“Char!”, she said cheerfully, “great, I hadn’t found motivation on my own to go practicing,” and opened her arms for a long embrace.
Tay Rah’s sleeping quarters were a gipsy tent. A frenzy of colorful patterned fabrics and pillows. Blackened torches lined the entrance, and inside the cloth cave, above a round copper table, hung a wire chandelier with purple drip candles. The remaining space was all bed.
She dug up a stool and ordered Scarlotte to sit. Skull inspection. After much consideration Tay Rah took a nosedive in a steamer trunk. Scarlotte wondered what truck this woman had come here with. Her settlement was decorated. Abundantly. Four times over. Softly humming she plowed through the contents of the chest. Then chose what she had pulled out first and used that to wrap Scarlotte’s scalp in a way that made her hair look like the eruption plume of a volcano. A silkscented stroke smelling so spicy she suspected some strange secret strings connecting it to beeswax, curry powder, black tea and sex. Ivory coloured.
“Not sure,” Tay Rah said.
Then they grabbed a couple of hula hoops and left holding hands. “We go to the high field, there is sunshine,” said Tay Rah.
Scarlotte carried the brightly coloured hoops and looked at the grey skies.
The long grass up there had a dance floor. A worn-out piece of vinyl with a wood print.
“I ovulate at full moon,” she said, drying the dew with a wet towel under one foot.
“You watch your cycle?”, she asked while warming up her hoops.
Scarlotte was fascinated, having hardly heard the question. Her eyes following the movements. She tried to mimic what didn’t look too complicated. But when Tay Rah suspended six rings independently, round both her arms, middle and an extended leg, Scarlotte forgot her own strenuous wiggling. Her hoop fell to the ground and she sat down, jaw dropped. The sun broke through the clouds, igniting the reflective striping. A haze of colors blending with the orange fire of her wide wavy dress. Warm tones of skin showing and hiding. A tiny collision broke the spell and the pattern collapsed. The woman laughed, rolling her eyes over her clumsiness and removed her dress over her head in one swoop .
“It looks good, but is a bloody pain in the ash.”
Getting a good grade for English class shouldn’t be a problem, Scarlotte thought. Without the dress, in her shiny yoga-onesie she looked even better. All the curves you could wish for were present.
With her widest smile Scarlotte asked, “can I learn what you did just now?”
At the end of that day her wrists, arms, hips, ribs, shins and several parts she couldn’t name were bruised. Not a problem because tomorrow her limbs would fall off anyway. Tay Rah hadn’t even started the actual hula hoop lessons yet. First Scarlotte needed to get acquainted with the rings themselves.
“Easy things first,” she’d said with a wink and a mean smile.
Michelangelo was running errands with James so she had a lot of time the first days. Despite the frustrations, she was hooked. Each day there were a few others interested to have a go at the morning session. Scarlotte was a total fanatic though. Her teacher loved it.
“You are a natural, Char!”, she would say and then she’d raise the bar again. After a week she could entertain three rings, but adding a fourth seemed impossible.
She tried to share her time. Equally often it was her prodding Michelangelo at six in the morning as it was the other way around. Then they ran the five hundred metres to the riverside: through a patch of forest right behind the camper, over a crooked metal fence, down the slope of the outer river bank, through the field with the high weeds, where they had carved a nice winding path by now to the spot among the reeds where the shore was sandy. The beach, as they called it, was a stretch of three meters but unobserved and their secret for now. As long as they took the plunge before dawn it would remain their little kingdom. The ice-cold water set the tone for active days. And especially then, the unusual couple felt completely at ease.
Of course Michelangelo looked at the beautiful young body at the peak of her radiance, and fantasised about more than the innocent waterplay, and surely Scarlotte was curious about the adult male with all his mysterious mechanics. She didn’t have brothers, and was raised without a dad. Still, it never came to sex. They held each other warm. They came close. Sometimes very close. Often their bouncing chi was buzzing but each stayed on their side of the thin line.
After the plunge, most mornings she helped out in the kitchen. Cleaning the big percolator and filling it, not drinking the coffee herself, however. Cutting veggies, measuring oatmeal, replacing gas bottles, and joining the smokers on the pallet-mountain behind the double pavilion tent. She never smoked herself though. Then getting on the same page with Joe right before the circle. She contributed something every day. Most often spontaneous. Something she wished to be taken care of. It worked.
During breakfast she wandered, spooning her bowl of porridge and fruit. Hugging, admiring, attentive. New people wondered why they hadn’t come sooner.
Then the most relaxing part of her mornings: the outdoor workshop of her favourite artist. Michelangelo was the most tranquil of all, despite his expanding project. He delegated diligently and experimented with cardboard, tubing and moving parts. He was reading a lot, filling notebooks with the contents of his mind and heart. He sketched Scarlotte regularly. He mended his clothing with needle and thread. Collected a small hill of secondhand materials. During the tail end of the evenings, they conversed. Real exchanges. Often something Scarlotte had never spent a thought on before. And she shared her feelings. A deep river flowing through her days and nights.
'Can I read this book of yours?’ Michelangelo asked. He pointed at her half emptied shopping bags in the corner.
“I don’t have any...,” she started, “oh, yes that one.”
She held the picture book he handed to her, and looked at it as if for the first time.
“Funny,” she said, and gave it back without opening it. “It’s also about knights and stuff. Got it from my grandmother.”
The rest of the evening he was reading the children’s book. Scarlotte fell asleep on the couch next to him. He made notes. And read it three times from cover to cover. When the last candle died, he sat for over an hour in the dark, staring.
Afternoons belonged to dancing with the hoops. Often they ended up at Rose’s caravan. From a piece of old cloth (a gift from the tent guy) she had stitched a canopy. Greenwood stalks and fluorescent paracord held things up. Underneath, a full sewing lab. On a chipboard and pallet floor, cutting tables, sewing machines, mannequins and clothing racks huddled together. Second skins was a hive for creators, a source for fantasies, a local cafe for colorful birds (the other volunteers referred to it as the chicken coop). Rose was contagious. A magnet for the right people and the right stuff. Being efficient online she manifested everything needed with her phone, often brought to her doorstep for free. And regularly these contributors left with a bought item from her studio and a ticket for the festival. Weapons were made there, out of foam and old fishing rods; shields out of inner tubes; leather accessories out of thrown away couches; body armor from detergent bottles. Hoodies, pouches, belts and bags. Scarlotte finished her red dress at the dressmakers’ hub. Better and faster than she ever would have managed on her own. Naturally followed by a plan for the next outfit. She collected fabrics and spent days designing. Something fitting for the dragon gate. A real second skin it should be. It remained elusive. Getting from something she saw in her mind's eye to something you could actually wear was not simple at all.
She only left reluctantly for dinner, even though it was always served way too late. When the truck rim bell was rung (by some overworked kitchen dude with a wrench wearing ear protection) and the dissonant sound blared like an end-of-the-world-alarm, each and all volunteers obeyed and streamed in from every corner to the waiting line leading into the striped tent, where it was buzzing with excitement and expectations. The group was getting too big for the venue.
Josh was behind Scarlotte in the line. He was staring at her open-mouthed. He never talked much. Was on his phone a lot. He was the limit case of shy.
“O hi, all good Josh?”
He turned a glowing ember.
“What have you been up to today, huh?” She added a wide smile.
He looked startled.
“Huh, why? What did you hear?”
“At ease, comrade, I was just curious about what project you worked on today. All else is none of my business. You may proceed as you wish.”
“Oh, okay, that's good.”
A tiny hint of a smile appeared. Scarlotte suddenly saw a surprisingly sharp sparkle in his eyes.
“Thank you,” he said softly.
The line was splitting as it led to both serving counters. Scarlotte held up her chinese bowl with the blue dragon on the side to receive her splosh of veggie curry. She had confiscated the porcelain jewel from the communal pile of crockery. When she turned around Josh was gone. She kept an eye out for him but the shy boy had vanished. Now I still don’t know what team he is in, she thought. In fact she was a bit worried about the strange conversation.
In passing their table, the toilet-builders caught her like a trout. Always lively in that corner. They fantasized over steak and fried anythings, and complained they were losing a kilo a day on the obligatory ‘health’ grub. Vegetarian curry in twenty-seven variations came down to just a different order of putting in the same plant material and pretending it was something new. With vegetables alone one couldn’t fabricate a solid compost loo. And porridge gave people soft shit that lacked the complex aroma of the solid carnivore poop. These huntarians threatened to go on hunger strike if their meal was not once a week gratinised with an inch of melted golden cheese. Cows, not goats. While talking loudly, they did however consume every last trace of the vegan stew at high speed, including an expanding circle of neighboring dishes.
Rose became a hooper too. In a relaxed, fun way. The total opposite of her dark mirror friend. She accomplished through sheer luck things way too hard for someone not practising that hard. And she considered falling hoops hilarious.
Scarlotte, Rose and Tay Rah spent a lot of time together in different teams. They painted signage, pruned overgrown pathways, dug trenches for the infinite grid of water pipes, cooked porridge at five in the morning in Mussolini’s kitchen, had deep discussions at the central hearth as fire keepers and the three of them regularly hauled food-waste from the local shops. They were great at getting more than was bargained for.
Tay Rah had a truck license. Even though nobody had checked how valid her claim was, she drove the large forester’s pickup with confidence. First the bakers, four of them, then gathering stuff from the list at the hardware store, they received five boxes with plates, cups and mugs from the community thrift store, were gifted eight bicycles in return for a proper cuddle and illegally ate the single over-date apple pie with too much spray-can cream. They enjoyed it on the roof of the truck cabin with cooler- chocolate milk and the view from the river bank across from the bustling town quay and its Saturday market. Their laughter drowned out the noise from across the river. It was the first warm day and the sun was preparing to settle for the evening. They had lined the uneven roof with reclaimed garden-furniture cushions, legs dangling over the edge against the windscreen.
“I want sex,” Rose said with a sleepy yawn.
“Me too,” Scarlotte replied languid, “but I’m too lazy.”
“I am okay,” said Tay Rah. “For now,” she added.
Pondering with infectious chuckles, time trickled down to a deeper layer.
“Tonight’s a full moon,” Tay remarked, suddenly sitting upright. “Let’s do a ceremony.”
“To get huge orgasms?”, Rose asked hopefully with eyes closed.
“No! Well, yeah maybe, but that’s not the point.”
“But what else is there?” Rose asked, perplexed.
“Ow, shut up! I mean it, this is important.”
Tay Rah was already climbing down.
“Come off, we’re heading back. Our veggies are wilting.”
Rose moaned like a spoiled princess and looked at Scarlotte with her tongue drooping. Then glanced at her lap. “No they’re not!”, she said.
The evening meal was noisy. The group had grown to more than a hundred, but who was counting? The builders were especially loud. Mostly men. Around the fire a lot of people sat on cushions leaning into one another, recovering from a long day and a big meal. Most had eaten too much of the spuds-with-mushrooms dish. Slathered in coconut cream with a hundred cloves of garlic. Then the baby bath filled with fruit salad for dessert went in for the kill. Mussolini was suspected of putting in some secret ingredient. People were licking their plates until nothing was left but a bulging heap of noisy humans.
The spring evenings were still chilly. With the setting of the sun the temperature dropped. The central fire in the striped tent was the place to seek warmth.
“I am dying,” said Rose. Scarlotte didn’t respond.
“My lover has to do the active bit. I can only lie down,” she continued while stroking the long hair of Ionathan, who didn’t hear her. He was playing guitar and awfully gay. She sank backwards landing her head on Scarlotte’s belly, who moaned irritated. She sat right back up.
“Hey, what’s bugging you?”
“Don’t know, I don’t feel too good.”
Next to her Troll responded. A big woman who was feeding her six-year-old son mashed banana.
“What is the matter then, sweetie?”
“She’s trying to wriggle her way out of tonight’s orgy,” said Rose.
“I am still a virgin,” said Scarlotte.
“Cool,” said the boy named Josh, who was listening in. He was nodding like an oil rig. Until Rose stuffed the remainder of the kids' banana in his mouth.
“Ksssht,” she said, “this is for vaginas only.”
James hollered from the other side of the circle.
“What’s wrong with your vaginas?”
Josh was nodding and chewing.
There was a moment of near silence before the volume in the tent doubled.
Tay Rah stood up. In some inimitable way she silenced the room without doing much more than just standing there. On a chair, slowly moving her hips.
Josh, his full mouth open, had turned into stone staring at the spectacle. In the buzzing silence only the fire dared sputter a crackle or two.
“I don’t know,” she started, a prison’s search light peeking around, “what rumors are circulating...” In the twilight tent the glow of flames licked the faces captivated by her voice, ”but the full moon ceremony,” she paused to postpone the inevitable, “is women only. Anyone without a vah-gi-nah will be cooked and eaten. Am I clear?”
Josh was blue in the face by now, forgetting to breathe. Joe raised and said, “Biute, that’s sorted then,” and tried to ride the wave of the occasion with some household announcements. They drowned painfully one by one in the ensuing flood.
Scarlotte left the tent, followed by Michelangelo.
“If you want me to cover for you tonight,” he proposed, walking beside her. She smiled faintly.
“I’m okay,” she said, “it’s been a long day. Can I sleep in the high bed for a few hours?”
“Sure,” he said, holding the door for her, “until I have my midnight shapeshifting.”
She climbed the worn down steps. Turned before entering and gave him a kiss on his receding hairline. He closed the door behind her and just stood there in the fading light.
In the circus tent Tay Rah was under siege by the remaining women. Troll managed a vagina-lacking babysitter. Girls who knew informed the other conspirators. And the men hung around crestfallen. Until James suggested they rattle up some ritual of their own. The dudes recaptured the striped headquarters and drove out the lasses. The ladies agreed to this on one condition: clearing the tables, doing the dishes and cleaning the kitchen. An ultra-clean tent at the end of the night.
The settlement prepared. Tay Rah disappeared into her cloth cave. Rose sold three dresses on the spot. A couple of girlfriends was busy braiding, fluffing and backcombing and had a waiting line the length of a high-end catwalk. In a cauldron, a few gallons of chai syrup was boiling down to perfection. The smell of ginger, anise and cinnamon merged with perfumes, incense and excitement while the twilight deepened to an orange rarely seen, casting a magic sauce that lacquered every single thing. They had to hurry. A beach cart was secretly and mysteriously laden with necessities because the destination was unknown. Tay Rah would lead them.
In the last graying daylight they went on their way. Twenty seven adult women. Elated like a class of seven-year-olds. And so thunderously loud that Rose had to intervene at the top of her lungs.
“Will you hysteric bunch of pigeonholes now shut the fuck up? Please, shush! They can hear us for miles around. If the neighbours complain, there will be no festival, no dancing, no getting laid, no knights to get out of their shining armor. So, keep it down!”
That helped.
A bit.
Tay Rah was proudly watching the procession of radiant women until she had a sudden scare.
“Where is Char?”, she uttered, “we can’t do this without her.”
Two minutes later Tay was in the military camper of Michelangelo. Scarlotte was very sleepy and yawning incessantly while leaning over the side of the high bed.
“Why not?”, she echoed back to Tay who was plucking the leeks on the overcrowded kitchen counter.
“Well, I somehow know this is for you. Is that weird?”
Scarlotte shook her head. Showed a sour smile.
“No, it’s sweet,” she said and started climbing out of the nest.
“Give me a minute.”
“A red dress?”, asked Tay, giving her a strange look. Estimating. Thinking.
“You’re not by any chance,” she asked, and the tone of her voice changed, “menstruating just now?”
“No,” said Scarlotte, “not yet.”
Tay Rah’s eyes got big.
“If you start bleeding,” she said excited, “right at the start of the full moon, that is very special. Then it will be a red moon ritual. Holy fuck, skip the plan. I have to prepare something.”
She ran back to the group waiting and explained where to set up, and gave instructions to gather wood for a big fire.
“Hurry,” she said, “everyone must help.”
Scarlotte caught up with the group short after. Bringing a warm blanket and a pillow to sit on. Close to a fire, she would hold out.
Darkness fell quickly. Roaming the forest the women gathered a good amount of firewood. In the center of a field beside the river, protected by trees on three sides, they lit the fire. Bright yellow tongues leapt over the dry fuel and up toward a darkening blue at the very moment the moon rose between the trees.
“Look,” said someone, and there it was. Rapidly rising, a pale red planet, sharp and clear. The dawn of the nightlight. Grand and unapproachably close. A bigger ball than anything Scarlotte had seen before. You could see it move, sliding through the silhouetted branches. It was as if lighting the fire had brought out this unusual moon. The veil of the day withdrew to make room for the endless depth of the night. Light not only makes visible, the opaque blue only becomes clear because of the darkness. The space above their heads was so big, the Earth so small, the moon a crystal bulb lit from the inside. Shrinking slowly, shifting from reddish gold to a silvery blue. The soil beneath their feet turned. Floating on a calm sea. Nobody spoke. Because the day is for the small, and the night rises above the details.
One of the women started to sing, her voice a bit thin and shaky, but it fitted the moment. Somebody reached for the hand of another, and she felt for the next. A circle formed, unplanned. Then they were silent, each with their own thoughts. With no one consciously noticing, synchronized breathing took over. Just for a round or two. But it was enough to start the tonic. The deep tone was ready to release what would follow.
Someone farted.
“Sorry,” she giggled, “It’s the garlic potatoes.”
The surface tension rippled and relaxed, creating even more space.
They unloaded the cart. There was hot tea. Music was made. Sore muscles were massaged and kneaded. Some fire staring. Chocolate shared. Knitting. Over-the-shoulder inspection of the dark forest seam and the fake parquet floor rolled out.
Scarlotte had been alert for a while. And when they laid the dark square between her and the fire, her vague suspicions took root. Rose set up a plump portable speaker and inserted her memory stick in the device, making sure her suggestive move was seen. Oriental drums.
Troll drew attention. Her primordial body was hung with strings of beads and covered in thin veils. Her belly dance was enticing. Full of beauty. Lighter than air she moved and was all waves. It surprised Scarlotte, gave her a longing to join in. Making her feet itch.
Before the howling cheers faded the next song began. She felt a surge traveling through the group. Something flammable was thrown on the fire and it suddenly roared. Several meters high it reached for the dark heavens. The women were pushed back by the heat. Making room for the appearance that warped the air. Her burning hoops formed a wild aura. A layer of patterns and fiery lines that couldn’t be traced back to any possible movements. Naturally this was Tay Rah. Naturally she wore white during the full moon. And oh so naturally she was a fire dancer. How could she be anything else? Something fell in place inside Scarlotte and she rose to her feet, howled like a wolf finding her pack. She just couldn’t stay still. Because the fire of the dancer that she knew and didn’t know spread to her. Her body was swept along. The red dress dictated what could be done to circle the spiraling flames. The tide of the music took her out to the open. Surely urged by the women around her but more by what happened inside. The spark, the little glowing ball in her chest had suddenly become a firestorm, a vortex of flames. A dragon propelled her.
Scarlotte stopped moving, panting, enchanted by her fellow dancer. Tay threw several of her rings high up in the air, one after the other. Three, five. They kept going up. And coming down. The small torches attached to the rings purred when she caught the last one and took her bows.
Scarlotte felt it leak out. She was menstruating.
It was different than normal. This wasn’t a punishment. Not a curse. Her gaze crossed Tay Rah’s who was still gasping from her performance. They were both crying. Feeling the same emotion streaming through their bodies. Tay Rah lowered her eyes. Dropped to her knees a little, a bow that didn’t just accept the applause but showed a deep respect toward Scarlotte. Bowing for a queen. And Scarlotte accepted with a nod. She let in the next song and started moving slowly.
Later she had no clear memory of what had happened. None of the women present would forget. It was pure enchantment. An incantation initiating a pulse that would keep on going for a long, long time. Of course there are no beginnings. Only slow changes. But something opened. Something was begotten. A fertilization took place. And from there on the dividing cells would keep multiplying until fully grown, until it would be time for this to be born.
Maybe that was why, during Scarlotte’s red dance, the men joined the ritual that was self-guiding. That evolved as it had to evolve. And they were received without friction. The new attendees were impressed, felt humble, guests of something beyond them. Gradually they mixed and were swept along until the contrast dissolved. In the morning, what remained of the fire were sweltering coals and a layer of ashes.