Invitation

[FindingJonah]

It wasn’t easy to see. He hadn’t been expecting anything, so he could have passed along the hall all day and never seen it.

It was the colour that caught his eye.

The vividity.

In the two tone normal, a white envelope would have been virtually invisible, or easily dismissible, but there poking slightly through the letter box, was a royal blue triangle. It seemed so out of place and yet bizarrely, he felt it had always been there..

He delicately fished the envelope out of the letter box, holding his breath, like a young lover retracting a hand from the Bocca della verita.

Vividity was important, colour was essential and he was fearful that some unseen force would allow him to just touch the blue before it was pulled sharply away.

The devil at the heart of this monochrome system thwarted him at every turn.

Mostly he let it win, in the past he had watched as his colours faded, his gold had drabbed to grey, purple had darkened to jet black and now the others all whitened day by day.

He occasionally fought, sometimes ferociously but the enemy was relentless and it was easier to medicate down the discomfort in his skin.

 

He cursed the devil and his conspiracy. He damned the numbing, dulling agents for his mouth and his eyes. He wondered if he had any fight left in him.

He ran cynical eyes over the envelope and felt relief that it was intended for him.

He knew this for certain as his true name (a name he had never heard spoke. A name he had never seen written down. A name he had never known. But yet a name he instinctively knew was his) was printed on the outside. As he opened it, the relief gave way to a flood of anxiety as he realised that his true name meant this was no mere invitation but instead was an vocation.

A calling. 

The time and location stood out in bold calligraphy upon a firm card embossed along the edges. It was, at once, every time and he supposed,  any date and yet it was clear to him that it was imminent. It was now. He looked at the calendar and the clock.

If he started to leave now he might just make it.

 

But… 

Leaving meant the trunk. He couldn’t go and let it stay. What if someone came while he was gone and just opened it? He was tethered as if it was a poisonous umbilical cord. He lovehated the trunk.

Girding his mind, he decided it must come. He didn’t expect to return so he ran to the yard and threw open double doors of the stone shed. There looming in the darkness, stood the hulking monster of his trunk.

He had dragged this behemoth across time zones and borders, possibly across dimensions. He staggered at the sheer size of it.

Every time he happened upon it he was shocked at how swollen and unmanageable it had grown in the interim.

He ran his fingers slowly over the top edge and played with the idea of opening it.

Maybe to sort it out or cull the contents somewhat.

But that would take time, and tears and he had this appointment. If he opened the trunk, time would disappear. He would get lost in its gravity.

He pulled at the handle but the trunk refused to budge. He rounded the great casket and leant his back against its rear, raising his legs against the wall. He straightened his legs and heaved.

Nothing.

He drew a breath and redoubled his effort, straining at the limit of his physicality he felt the great casket refuse to budge, almost pressing back against him in fierce mutiny. 

“if you give up now” a thought offered “The trunk will always win”

And with that he whispered the name, of the one who called him and summoned all his strength. All of it, his physical strength, his physical substance, his hate, his love. 

His dreams.

He felt them well in his extremities and he gathered them together into his solar plexus and forced it all down through his thighs to the soles of his feet.

And pushed.

And the trunk wouldn’t move. It wouldn't move. It  couldn’t move. It shouldn’t move.

Until it did move, until it suddenly gave an inch.

He felt joy and relieve wash over him. An inch was as good as a mile, he had temporarily defeated the hated sarcophagus. Joy dissolved as the realisation struck him that he would never move it again.

At some point, soon, he would have to empty it and face the pandora.

But not now surely.

Now that he had broken the trunks inertia, it slid across the ground surprisingly well. It was awkward and unwieldy, and it undoubtedly slowed him down. But it moved!

For now.

 

He dragged it out the narrow gates and made his way to the address on the invite.

It wasn’t far and he kept his head down until he came upon the great house. He looked upon it with recognition despite the certainty that he had never seen this house before. 

At least not with these eyes.

The noise of the traffic muted as he walked through the great white and iridescent gates.

Immediately he was struck by warmth as the light hit him, the sun felt alien on his skin and he noted with surprise that the garden was in late spring or early summer.

“Despite the fact” he thought darkly “that it is always winter.”

His negative thoughts were chased away by the colour in the garden and the sight of birds and insects fizzing around the blooming bushes and plants. This was no place to think of winter.

The trunk glided across the gravel drive. A happy looking gardener, pottering about in the flower beds, gestured to him a cheery greeting. He responded with a wave and saw that the smile on the gardeners face widened.

The drive ended at great columned portico, a spot had been cleared for his trunk and so he carefully wheeled it in to place.

He walked up to the door and was tempted to look in the panelled windows but somehow he knew the inside of this house as well as he knew his own name. A lump formed in his throat and his eyes warmed and moistened as a chill ran through him. 

It was home.

He took the great brass door knocker with a whispered prayer. But a sudden overwhelming feeling of inadequacy washed over him and he suddenly wanted to be anywhere but here right now. He had no right to be here. He wanted to take the trunk and run and hide. He wanted to drag it to the deepest darkest cave and empty it. Burn everything he could find in it. He would maybe come back some day when the trunk was smaller and no one could see how he had wasted his time. This was home. They would look inside, they would see, they would know…. and he couldn’t face that. 

But as he softly tried to replace the knocker it fell on the brass plate with the softest of soft clicks. He had requested entry.

A pause. A breath. The door opened.

And the world became forgiveness.