No Reason
The weather is tremendous. A cottage squats alone in a field, its warmly glowing windows isolated testaments of life in the dark night. Great yellow-blue flashes illuminate the surrounding valley; the terrible explosions that follow seem capable of trembling the cottage’s foundation to ash. Rain punishes the slate roof, and pours to the ground in intermittent clumps. A fire burns inside. The flames bewitch, diverting attention from the storm. The cottage has one small bedroom and the front room, where the fireplace is, where the guests are. They are seven in all, seated whimsically around the room: reclining in opulent leather chairs, lying prone on bearskin, seated smoking by a small occasional table in the corner.
Portentous clouds had hung low for days prior, breaking wide earlier in the evening. The lords and ladies came seeking both shelter and company. Electricity having surrendered to the storm, the front room is lit, in addition to the fire, by an intricate golden candelabrum and wall sconces. Some of the guests play card games. Ladies exchange community gossip while the gentlemen talk farming and politics. A grandfather clock by the front door pierces the social graces-midnight. With the six guests now keenly aware of the looming morning, the card games and conversations grow labored, weighed heavy by dullness and vapidity.
Until now, the party’s host has been smoking cigarettes in the rear of the room, watching. Sensing growing malaise among his guests, he rises intently. The man’s eyes and moustache swallow the rest of his face. He wears the moustache thick, curled into great circles at its limits; above it, his sharp eyes are brown, shrewd, and weathered. The cottage is a retreat for the wealthy man, a clever hobby he bought after his third divorce. The other six in the room watch as he skillfully wields the poker at the fireplace; the shifting logs cough out great clouds of sparks and embers. He feeds the flames fresh wood from a pile neatly stacked on the hearth.
The host sits cross-legged in front of the fire. Devious shadows dance among the guests’ faces. His form is black, his face silhouetted against the revived flames. He smoothes his moustache with one hand while the other swiftly retrieves a single cigarette from behind his ear. Without looking, he reaches back to light the cigarette on glowing red brass just within the fireplace. The group becomes impatient, expectant. The host appears pained, undecided. His eyes focused on his lap, great billows of smoke rise from his mouth and dissipate to either side of his face.
The host quietly watches his guests: they gather close, leaning in. He begins: “It was not long ago-perhaps a month, perhaps a week-that a good friend recounted to me a tale. I cannot say exactly when, for the events of the narrative have since consumed wholly my waking and slumbering thoughts. I shall tell it exactly as I heard it, which, the friend assured me, was exactly as he heard it-directly from the mouth of the man who is at the center of our story.” The ladies are visibly hesitant, seeking consolation in others’ faces, unsure whether they wish to surrender their days and nights to the forthcoming account. But like the storm that brewed for days before breaking, their host’s intention now seems menacingly inescapable. Like they had done in the face of the storm, the guests gather closer, the gentlemen and ladies who are in relationships embrace, while the others prepare alone, finding spare blankets into which they might vanish.
“Our hero is a man in his late twenties. He is a good man, as worthy in spirit and action as the ugliness of our modern times allows. His apartment is humble, its walls decorated with proof of his social consciousness, his avowed pacifism-civic indictments and anti-war sentiments. The man, whom we will henceforth call Eric, struggled for the majority of his life with addiction, his passion and fervor often dematerializing in a cloud of illicit smoke and devilish brews. But a couple of years prior to the events central to our tale, Eric was able to free himself of those constraints. He began expressing himself obsessively through paint and literature. Eric also began working at a local methadone clinic very much in need of his talent and zeal; he meant to give back to the community from which he came.
“Now, Eric worked queer hours at the clinic: 5am to 1pm. He often arrived home in the afternoon anticipating a short slumber before continuing with the remainder of his day. The heart of our story finds Eric returning home from work at just such an early hour. It is a brisk day in early Autumn. The bite of a new Fall conflicts with the waning summer months. The sun shines brightly on his city block. Eric parks his car on a corner close to his apartment building. He wants to briefly enjoy the fading warmth of the season before continuing up to his waiting bed. Eric steps out of the driver’s seat and lights a cigarette. He reflects on another early, distressing day at the methadone clinic.
“Having scarcely enough time to enjoy the first puff of smoke, and before he has even a moment to retrieve his briefcase from the car’s backseat, two men are upon him. They are well-built and clean-shaven, dressed unremarkably-t-shirts and jeans. One of the men wields a handgun that he trains on the ground in front of Eric’s feet. Their speech and tone are quick and pointed. They call Eric, ‘Harry.’ The men tell ‘Harry’ to take it easy and stay calm. Eric is blank. His mind feels vacant, completely erased. He is no longer standing next to his car, about to retrieve his briefcase, with a cigarette dangling impotently from his mouth. Despite the speed with which the men approach, his senses and reactions seem to stretch slowly until they collapse.
“The men grab Eric roughly by the wrists. The cigarette falls. Eric feels himself wrench free. He hears himself cry out. He watches one of his fists cut slowly through the air, a punch thrown underwater. One of the men falls backward, blood erupting from his nose suddenly and with surprising velocity. Eric is bemused by the sight. The other man is around his waist struggling, Eric thinks, quite clumsily. Eric repeatedly drives his knee into this man’s face.
“Eric is immediately aware of many voices shouting. Voices to his right and left, from above and below. Thousands of voices, it seems. And they are all upon him at once, the voices becoming grunts, the grunts becoming carnal and crimson. Eric‘s vision becomes a camera’s viewfinder: tunneled, shaking, and unfocused. The viewfinder is aimed at the man bent and still bleeding from the nose and then it is violently thrown upward, toward the sky. The once brilliant day that straddled two seasons is now flat and unremarkable, white in its nothingness. The camera swings to the ground, a two-dimensional image of the sidewalk and the grass shouldered up to it. It zooms immediately close to the ground. Eric feels the thousands of voices heap one on top of the other. They thicken into one voice frozen in terror-muscular and bestial. Eric realizes the sound is his scream. Boots and fists unapologetically pummel his sides. An open palm grinds Eric’s face into the dirt.
“Men that seem to have materialized out of the ether pull Eric’s body to its feet. One man, stout and older, gums a fat, extinguished cigar. Another wears a Kevlar vest and a golden oval on his belt. Eric is aware that he is handcuffed. Two of the men lead him to a tinted Jeep. The door slams somewhere in his head, reverberating between his ears. Eric is silent, numb, empty. The man with the bloody nose sits in the front seat. Tissue extends from one of his nostrils. He violently barks into a walkie-talkie. Eric glances around the interior of the truck. Leather-bound notebooks litter the seats. They are all embossed with the letters DEA.
“The man with the bloody nose turns back to Eric and explains the situation in broad strokes. He explains about the stakeout and the undercover agents. He gestures toward the corner where Eric parked his car, and he taps the face of his watch. The man’s meaning is simple: wrong place at the wrong time. Another man opens the door beside Eric. He works the handcuffs free and, with sheets of Kleenex and disinfectant soap, begins to clean our hero’s open wounds. More men, including the man still gumming the unlit cigar, approach the open door, hastily showering Eric with essentially genuine apologies. And then, like a flock of birds swiftly changing course, the men return to their respective vehicles and speed away, in pursuit of the true target. The man with the bloody nose turns toward Eric and extends his hand. Despite his vacant perspective, our hero recognizes that while there is much left unsaid here, the handshake and the other man’s eyes convey a shared, if broken understanding, a deep regret.
“Eric melts off the seat and down onto the asphalt of his city block. The man leaves in the Jeep. Aside from lifting a hand to shade the sun, our hero stands motionless. He allows the details to reemerge-the leaves, the rocks, the mud-those things that had been scared off during the chaos. Eric notes that the details are not as vibrant as they were, but he attributes it to his being still in shock. The briefcase is still in his car, his half-smoked cigarette still on the sidewalk beside. Eric gathers these and walks toward his apartment building.”
With this, the host tilts a tumbler upward, letting the last of the single-malt scotch run over the rocks and down his throat. Wind carries the rain sideways now, lashing the windows with staccato irregularity. While the host recounted the tale, the flames have withdrawn considerably, cowering behind logs. The guests, who have been sitting forward, slowly sink into more casual poses. Couples whisper back and forth. One of the ladies prods the host, insisting that his story, while certainly fantastic, does not qualify as macabre. The host takes his time; he lights another cigarette in the fire, tosses the first drag back to the air, and deeply inhales his second pull. The smoke rises off of his head, backlit by the flames behind. He looks at the lady who impatient awaits a response. He pulls the cigarette from his lips and holds it in front of him, examining, studying. “Miss,” he begins, still focused on the tobacco smoke, admiring the careless odyssey of smoke furls, “our story, like our hero’s experience, has only begun.”
“Following the incident, time crawls for our hero.” The host continues, “Eric becomes aware of new physical aches, discovering a new one daily. His ribs are badly bruised, possibly fractured in places. There is a deep gash behind his left ear that he takes great care to wash and redress every morning. The skin around his right eye is serrated; this, also, he properly nurses. In time, the most worrisome of his injuries heal. And though his skin’s new deep reds and purples betray internal bleeding, Eric knows his body is not permanently injured.
“The federal agents are deep undercover. Eric realizes that a chance encounter with them is not likely. They are shadows, ghosts that exist only in files, and even then, only as aliases. Besides, Eric doubts if he would recognize them, their faces smudged and blurred during the incident’s frenzy of movement. Our hero never discovers the outcome of the sting; he will never know whether the agents accosted ‘Harry’ the way they accosted him. In truth, Eric accepts that when the last agent, the one with the bloodied nose, sped away, it was left to him to reconcile the events.
“As I, Eric was raised Catholic. We Catholics revere the power of language, its potential to destroy and rebuild. Eric often sits in the confession box and imagines the telling of sins as a spiritual flushing. He visualizes miniscule imps and knaves clinging to the roof and sides of his mouth. They are washed loose, pulled under by a swift undertow of words, carried from his head along with full sentences, and left behind on the church floor. So, in trying to restore some measure of harmony to his life, Eric began recounting the story to all who would listen. He told co-workers at the methadone clinic. He told men with whom he showered at the gym. He told the clerk who sells him cigarettes. One day, he told a young woman whom he did not know at all. Eventually, he told the gentleman who, in turn, told me. Eric called his parents, ex-lovers, friends. All of them seemed incensed, demanding justice on his behalf. But he knew that justice is not something that may be taken from one and redistributed to another, like welfare. Eric understands that justice resides in the heart; he must make a personal reckoning.
“Our hero takes a week away from the methadone clinic. He writes and ruminates quietly. Steeping tea leaves in boiling water and leaning over the vapors, Eric repeatedly returns to the scene, trying to recall faces, movements, words spoken and words cried. Much was lost in the bedlam, but he remembers growing physically, his chest and arms expanding. Eric shudders to remember the growth, muscle seeming to replace emotion and spirit. He decides that it is not the absorbed blows that shake him; he remains whole, survived to consider the event. And it is not the quickening of fate, the way that life may change course suddenly, throwing its occupants chaotically against its walls-burning plans that had been painstakingly written. Nay, Eric senses that a far more menacing weight drags him low.
“During the week, Eric rarely leaves his apartment-as I mentioned earlier, it is a space draped in posters, collages, and pictures displaying specific beliefs and ideals. Our hero has cultivated these morals as finely as manicured bonsai trees, neatly trimmed and aesthetically pleasing. He is well versed in the philosophical lineage from Tolstoy to Emerson to Thoreau, culminating in Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. Pacifism, our hero concedes, is indeed a severe and unyielding burden. Eric cannot understand his reactions that day; he is unable to reason his own violence into nihility.
“Something within our hero was beaten to death. In its place, another was raised, molded from his broken ribs. Eric cannot shake the feeling of being watched, shadowed, and worse, inhabited. As the days draw slowly forth, the presence strips Eric naked, revealing a cryptic darkness. The decorations in his apartment, like their underlying worldview, dematerialize into nothingness. Eric can no longer look in mirrors with aplomb, fearing the appearance of a grisly face, severed between the eyes, split through the nose and mouth, exposing tendons and ligaments stretched to tearing. He reckons that the violent encounter unsheathed this sadistic, feral quintessence that he longed to bury beneath that pile of posters, collages, and pictures. In time, Eric shall come to understand the superfluous mechanics of society-everyday intimacies and social graces-as constructing a tightly woven leash always tensed, liable to sever and release our more nefarious halves.”
The fire behind the host is reduced to a warm glow emanating from deep within the canopy of wood. His eyes and moustache consuming his face, the host sits back and carefully watches the guests. They wait for more, but he knows there is no more. One gentleman walks to a window. The first suggestions of dawn: birds’ early morning calls, animals peeking through the brush, an opulent blanket of soft purple-gray light. Evidenced by the silence in the cottage, the storm passed some time ago. But the gentleman at the window announces the fact triumphantly, as if only to hear the sound of his voice, to be certain it retains its usual tone and eloquence. The host remains cross-legged on the edge of the hearth. He watches the guests rise slowly, silently. They extend arms and legs, roll necks, stretching away the languor of the night. The gentlemen tip caps, the ladies politely curtsy, and all extend salutations and thanks to their host. He lights another cigarette and says nothing, still watching. Those of the guests that are in relationships leave together. The rest slowly file out one behind the other. The host rises finally and goes to the window. He watches the guests’ shrinking backs. They are bankers and agents and lawyers and doctors. It is a new day and he knows that they have occupations and relationships and reputations to maintain.
