TCOTNK Season 4.7
TCOTNK Season 4.7
The bond between Yeshe and Thalia is getting deeper
New to TCOTNK? Reading along is free…. discover the slow joys of a weekly serial and enter The Castle Of The Naked Knights. A whole other world is waiting for you. Go to the INDEX for the introduction and links to all episodes
back to chapter 4.6 (last weeks episode)
Chapter 9
Day two at the studio. Early morning sunshine on a slightly sloping field that had been an orchard once. A stone’s throw from the buildings. They sat on a large play-mat in the grass among a few leftover fruittrees. The carpet had a complicated street map sewn onto it. Kay, his snout purple from the plate of blackberries he munched while doing a two-finger neighbourhood walk around the block. Integrating the adult size obstacles camping on his playground. Everyone present was in their own bubble. Enjoying the buzz of insect filled silence. Jonnes was humming, leafing through a decades old music magazine.
Thalia savoured the last of her oatmeal, her free hand caressing the tall ripe stalks and yellow tansy beside her, like you would the fur of a large sleeping pet. She gave Yeshe a glazed look and then lay back with her arms outstretched in the bed of creakingly dry wildflowers while filling her blouse-covered chest to a burst with summer scented air. Only to let the tension seep out in a sigh. Yeshe smiled at her, licked her spoon and noticed Jonnes’ eyebrows had crept up to beyond his receding hairline. He looked uncertainly at Es. Then down to his yet untouched bowl of pinkish oatmeal. Putting down the magazine and lifting his bowl he slurped a dripping spoonful into his fish-miming mouth. His eyes rolled back in ecstasy. Then he fell over in a gurgling slow motion, trying to imitate Thalia. It looked like the death scene of a triple shot soldier, gurgling purple blood. Kay imitated him and also went belly up, sputtering, blackberry juice running down his neck.
“Jonnes!”
Es indignantly poked the big dead clown in his globe-sized belly.
“That's no example! Behave yourself!”
Thalia lifted her head. Then onto her elbows. She looked serious.
"Whose phone is ringing?"
Yeshe just had her mouth full. Trying not to choke on a laugh. She listened until it sounded again. Nobody claimed it. Shit it was hers. Normally she had it on silent, or switched off. She never got incoming calls.
"Are you going to get that, or what?"
Yeshe flew up. Yes, she did. If someone called her secret number, something was going on. She swallowed the too large mouthful of sweet porridge and got moving.
The phone was on Daardaar’s kitchen counter. Still on the charger. Unknown number. She took a breath, pressed connect and held it to her ear. The woman at the other end started talking without introduction.
“He is here.”
Sapi!
“Or to put it more accurately; she is here!”
Sapi chuckled happily.
“I woke up early, as I do, because sleeping is a waste of the morning. Thus I climbed up the rock behind our camping spot to greet the sun.”
Wow, the woman is ninety, Yeshe thought.
“…and while I was just standing there musing a bit about the artist, the state of world and all that jazz, a little moped whined its way through the morning mist. Well, actually there wasn't any mist but it sounds more picturesque. You get the image. Beautiful black dress, dark stockings, breasts positioned way too high and a clean-shaven head. So I think, who is that guy, but actually I already knew. He is here, has checked in at Orph and is now sleeping in that colourful petite caravan across the exact same field as our private jet has picked to land. The flower girl hosting the newly arrived woe-man, has this big childhood textile dreamscape displayed around her nest. A thousand handstitched dresses the like I hadn't seen in a long while. So take it easy. We'll keep a close eye on the girls. It's a lot of fun here for now. Greetings to the muse, the widow and her new one, dear. And hug the barrel for me, will you?”
And she was gone. Sapi had disconnected. Ended the call as she’d started it.
Thalia appeared in the doorway, trying to read Yeshe.
“What was that? Some marketeer monologue?”
She sounded suspicious, worried. Yeshe wanted to reassure her about Michael. But first she had to process what she had heard herself.
“No, my mum. Concerned. As always.”
Thalia smiled wryly. Her attention waned. Yeshe could sense how her new friend still was somewhat shaken by the dream trip. Probably unsure whether it was a good or a bad experience.
"Thalia, was this your first time?"
The young woman pinched her nose, thinking back to previous times.
“No, I sometimes go batshit insane a night from the misery pushed through the letterbox.” A finger-gun triggered an illustrative brain blow. A matching face completed the image.
“It's like print advertising you didn't ask for. It's nothing, but you have to get through it page by page. But today was different. It was...”
She puffed out her cheeks and stepped outside. Yeshe went after her as she walked towards the studio. Suddenly, just before she'd step through the doorway, Thalia turned to Yeshe. Looking all radiant and intense. The young woman had managed to transform the boring uniform of the boat crew into a buttoned-up blouse and a tight short skirt and made it work for her. Yeshe felt a sting of jealousy.
“I didn't realize I already cared so much about that guy. And those books of his. Have you read them?”
Yeshe shook her head.
“Only skimmed through.”
She thought about the night of the arson. How she first had tried to choose, like an overwrought chicken, what to save and what not. Working through the collection by the light of her phone, realising more and more that she simply had to take everything. How could she leave any of that treasure behind and let it be destroyed?
Thalia pressed her knuckles into her eye sockets and meandered blindly onto the studio floor. Talking as she walked.
“Those notebooks are a whirlwind no a hurricane of ideas and I would buy the whole lot in a heartbeat if I came across them in an antique store but then they would be unaffordable as they are mystical works and a sort of codexes of his inner world or maybe angelic grimoires that supply sources of endless inspiration like sketch journals of a world where I would like to stay and want to live from now on as it is just like that book he's so obsessed with the castle of the naked knights what a title that is and I can just imagine those cute wiggly dicks that big disappointment are not shown in the drawings by the way and oh I could imagine wonderful music underscoring those stripped-down horse riders and I couldn't help picturing Michael among them cause he was a such great lover you know the sort you hope for able to give himself completely which still gives me shivers when I think about that collision and I miss having him near because to me he simply is one of those naked nobles so I imagined us as a couple fooling around at that festival for which I had borrowed a tent that you could describe as a medieval coloured larp thingy with battlements and flags hand stitched on the corners and us setting up camp and you know what I now think?”
She gasped for breath.
“Silly me, is what I think. Since the dream I feel like someone has dumped sixteen jam-packed shipping containers in my cramped inner courtyard and I can no longer move a finger in that godly mess."
Thalia plopped down deflated on the sofa and handed Yeshe a thick red book. Slightly larger than the others.
“You should look through this one. Then you get how I feel.”
Yeshe accepted the journal but her mind was still on the call. Something was nagging at her.