Bound & Bound – the Curse and the Captives – - 8. Chapter 8: On the Balcony

Chapter 8: On the Balcony

Sometimes I feel like a motherless child; the words to that old folk song drift across my mind. A long ways from home; my father had a record of Paul Robeson singing that, and he liked to slip into my room after the nanny had settled me in bed and sit with me. He'd stroke my hair, croon that song and others, and say "Don't worry, son. Things will be all right." And I suppose he'd stay there until I was asleep, for I never saw him leave.

I sit in my car in a sort of shellshock, thinking distracting thoughts about time and destiny, and about how the feel of my father's hand on my forehead was able to soothe my cares as easily as listening to an old record.

Now, what I feel is cold and alone. The car's engine is off; the wipers stand still but at a rakish angle. All around me is quiet, and the rain striking the windshield gathers into fat drops as softy as a remembered melody. But from there they linger in painful suspension before beginning to slide down the angled surface. They fall slowly at first, sometimes moving imperceptibly like the smooth running second hand of a grandfatherly watch, but then all of a sudden, unseen forces grab ahold and send them along to their destiny. On the way down they become caught on the miniscule defects of the glass, which are beyond my power of sight to tell, and get split in two. From there any number of other forces interact, pulling them down, tearing them apart, until the number of divisions that the hidden powers work on them is phenomenal.

I haven't left yet. Instead, I glance at The Seeing Fox across the street through my wet windscreen, and feel pulled in two just like the fucking raindrops. Only my hidden defects are time and the debate of whether I should surrender to external circumstances.

There is movement over there. The shop door flutters opens for a moment, and that older guy – Lupasc's brother – comes out.

Cockily, he kicks one foot behind him, leans on the wall next to the shop's windows, and lights up. I realize he's under the awning, so I guess it's plausible that he's just come out front to smoke his ciggie.

I know that looking at this man is just another form of distraction, but visual stimulus is almost always easier to process than sightless thoughts trapped in one's head. I sigh. One part of me wants to run. To put the key in the ignition, pull away and forget about this whole grotesque experience. The other half of me is trying to force down a rising dread that following the advice I've been given is the only way forward. And yet, following that advice will be tantamount to me caving in to the pressures of ill fortune.

I glance over to my 'distraction' for some relief. I notice he's wearing fancy European jeans that have all sorts of seams and pockets in unexpected places. His expensive looking button-down shirt is like the kind I've seen designed by Robert Graham: interesting fabric patterns, similar to an urban Hawaiian vibe, sewed into conservative dress shirts. The one this guy is wearing now is sort of white in the background with a couple broad sweeps of very faint blue and rust; overlaying the top of everything are these angled tops of buildings. The pediments jut this way and that and look like a frozen representation of the 'Jazz Age.' As with his mother's fashion tastes, I can identify his designer proclivities to the exact designer, thanks to my ex-gigolo 'uncles' who wear Paul Smith and Versace like they have something to prove on the money-equals-taste front

Funny, I didn't quite notice his clothes when I was almost face to face with him – all expensive and tacky as they are – but, I guess I had other things on my mind. All at once I remember the moment he bent down to hoist up his little brother, and he was in a tee-shirt. He must have slipped this bit of finery on before he came out here. But for whom did he do it..?

Oh man, I don’t know what I'm doing! I grip the steering wheel in sham pretence that I should be on my way, and yet, I don't move. Holding the wheel tight makes me think that sometimes we must hold onto what we can, that and the notion that fate can be so like one's father. My dad never hugged me after I was twelve years old. Men of his generation did not embrace other 'men,' even if it happened to be his scared little boy of a son.

Sometimes I feel like a motherless child. Whatever he did he did on his own terms and I just had to follow along.

The guy across the street lifts his right hand to draw the lit cigarette to his mouth. His fingers are banded with broad silver rings, and then his lips part to receive the butt.

This guy looks arrogant. The scowling muscles needed for him to smoke only highlight his naturally handsome look of disdain for all he surveys.

Enough of distractions; I can't keep looking at him as a means to avoid making a decision.

Sometimes I feel like I'm almost gone; I never knew my mother, and never felt like I needed one because I had my dad. A long ways from home; I never knew any embrace but my father's, and those dried up just when I wanted them the most. So, in my mind, I guess I will just let it happen, and accept once and for all that nauseating feeling of surrendering to my father's fucking control again. And yet in me is a strong desire to find the explanation for these strange happenings that started like a rain falling from a blue sky. I don’t want to be angry, but how can I not feel stymied and saddened? I do not want to rip this car apart in a rage, but fuck – why do I always have to be the dutiful son? That man, even from beyond the grave and plausibly removed from the influences of time and place, still has the power to run my life in the way he chooses, and I must surrender to it. The universe will sweep along with Time's slow-grinding second hand in the lead, and immutably it's only how I will react to its more hidden knowledge that's bound to make a difference. I can panic, I can foment anxiety into a passion of bitterness and denial, or – I can work to amend my sorry lot in life. Those are the choices my father left me to 'deal with,' so how can I not feel trapped in the embrace of my fate?

Maybe his voice is telling me right now "Don't worry, son. Things will be all right," but it's very hard for me to perceive him through the soft sound of the rain on the windshield, and the burning feel of the teardrops being pulled down my cheeks.

˚˚˚˚˚

Here it is, two weeks after the 'reading,' and the back of this Bucharest taxi is not only cramped, but it smells like the tailpipe empties right under my seat.

I crack the window and let the dark night's air seep in. It’s mildly better than breathing some communist-era cab's diesel exhaust directly.

The lights roll by off to the side of this traffic artery that knits the airport to the city centre, and I think how my life has sunk to resemble a bad movie premise – in Romania to hound a family curse, because some Gypsy palm-reader told me I had to track it down.

Instantly, the knot in my stomach tells me my cynical attitude has gone too far.

This is all very real; I have to look into this, end the paranormal crap happening to me, or as the cliché has it, die trying.

I reach in and pull my father's letter out of my inner blazer pocket.

Without extracting it from the envelope, I review the points from within. Don’t tell Ronald; okay, odd, but I left Canada without him knowing it, even doing the sunglass-wearing drugdealer-thing and buying my tickets at the airport with cash. I told him was going camping for a few months and leaving my cell phone behind, but in reality I upgraded my service to 'International.' Secondly, beware the spider's web; okay, no idea on that one. And lastly, he told me to seek further information under the sign of The Seeing Fox. How did he know I would even find it? Did he plan for that somehow, did I just luck into it, or was there another path that I was supposed to take and missed completely?

Then of course, there's the matter of the coin. I reach up and rub it through the fabric of my shirt. The metal presses against my skin, and I feel that 'a curse' makes odd sense in a way, especially if I consider all the bad history of misfortune the males of my family have been through.

Uncle Ernie lost an eye in that freak boating accident; cousin Jack committed suicide after his wife was found murdered; Granddad Stefan lost a foot when the chauffeur ran the '39 Packard over him on the croquet lawn – don't ask. The death, maimage and general misery just seems to go on and on. It also seems inevitable that I will suffer from it too, just when and how remains the only mystery.

I press the coin deeply into my chest, and wonder that since it's just me now, if I really have that much to live for. I also wonder how this coin is supposed to protect me.

The cabdriver reaches back and over his head. He turns on the interior light.

"Where to again, please?"

"Hold on."

I put the letter back into its place and pull out my phone. I could see the dark and surly cabdriver with his three-day-old stubble eyeing me coldly in the rearview mirror.

Luckily, I still had my destination book-marked.

"Studio Vogue Victoriei."

"Where; where?"

"It's on…" Oops, looking at it, I… "On Strada Sfinţii Apostolii." Well for sure I butchered that, and I have no idea how to pronounce 'ţ' – so I add, "Behind Constitutional Plaza, beside the river – "

"I know, I know," the man announces in a rather annoyed tone and switches off the light with a vengeance.

I sigh and glance back to my lit screen. And then I crack a wicked smile, remembering that when I found this B&B online, it promised a stay in 'Genuine Communist-Era Luxury.'

Time will tell, but I have my doubts – needless to say.

˚˚˚˚˚

A 'bellboy,' old enough to have 'voted' in the Communist era, plops my bag by the door next to my en suite bath, and I quickly tip him.

After closing the door on him on his way out, I turn around and am pleasantly surprised. Pleasantly amazed, really.

The room is very large, about ten by ten metres, and it has high ceilings, which have to be at least five metres up there. On the other side of the chamber from where I stand, four full-height French doors are open to a continuous balcony; here, three floors above the park-like street in front of the building, a warm and fairly fresh breeze rustles the light and gauzy columnar fabric of curtains. On the wall to my right, a four-poster bed with the same diaphanous drapes is centered against the wall between the windows and me. On the wall to my left is a marble fireplace, before which sits a generous seating area comprised of elegant sofas and upholstered armchairs.

The walls are in shades of ivory and pale grey, and pertly delineated into tall, graceful panels. These are done in raised plaster mouldings that look as sharp as paper, and cove details step up like the inside of a wedding cake to the ceiling. Suspended from the centre of which is a massive crystal chandelier, also of the wedding cake variety, but here done in upside-down hanging prisms the size and shape of plastic water bottles. They too lightly move and make some deep-toned crystalline music for me in the summer breeze.

Who knew that the 1960's Communist elite of this country wanted to live like Hollywood starlets from the 30's, but now I know.

As I step towards the terrace, I think to myself that Mommy Dearest herself would not be out of place in a gossamer dressing gown floating though this place with a glass of bourbon in her hand.

I step through one of the French doors and out onto the balcony. This building has unbroken iron-railed terraces running the entire length of this floor, as well as the floors above and below me.

I look up into the Bucharest sky for a moon, but do not see one. I feel tired, so as I lean on the handrail I resolve to have a quick shower and hit the 'Genuine Communist Era' hay.

˚˚˚˚˚

It feels good to be clean.

I come out of the bath and switch off the light in that room.

The lamps around the bedroom are dim; the chandelier is off, and the various floor and table lamps scattered here and there provide a soft calmness. There is also a lamp by the bed, so I switch that one on.

I walk around the room wearing only a white bath towel around my waist – only that and the gold chain and coin around my neck. I go to my suitcase and pull out a fresh tee-shirt and a pair of boxers to wear for bed. I slip my shorts on, toss the towel aside, and then decide the weather is warm enough to sleep shirtless.

As I pull back the sheets, I remember something, so I go to my jacket, which is tossed over an armchair, and pull out my father's letter along with my phone. Before I settle in, I take a turn around the room switching off all the lights; the one on my bedside tale is now the only one illuminated.

I walk back toward the inviting comfort of the sheets, and place both letter and phone on the nightstand. I position the phone on top so I can grab it and see the time in the middle of the night.

As I slide into bed and let some drowsy peace wash over me, I hope I have a dreamless sleep, but I'm not too sure about that.

I switch off the light and close my eyes with a sigh.

˚˚˚˚˚

I do dream, but of what I cannot remember; all that I know is I have been asleep for hours and hours.

And then, there is a sound in the room.

I awake with a deep intake of air, but hold it as I decide to listen.

There's nothing to discern, either sound-wise or seeing as motion, but I know I am not alone. So I roll halfway over and reach for my phone.

It's not there. I pat and feel around in the dark and find nothing on top of the bedside table.

What was that? A creak..?

I sit up in bed so I can lean over the edge of the mattress, and push my palm flat against the floor. I press and lift and pat trying to suppress the growing panic that is rising like a poisonous lump in my throat.

The side edge of my right hand rubs up against something. I fumble with it, and my phone clacks a moment on the hardwood floor before I can latch onto it securely.

There is more noise; anxious, screeching sounds from within the room, and the chandelier suddenly chimes in a guttural way to let me know some air has been excited within the chamber. My phone comes to me with the screen lit up bright and blinding. I aim it to my bedside table. The letter is gone!

I rip off the sheets covering my torso and legs and jump out of bed.

My bare feet land hard on the floor and make a resonating thump.

As if in response, a shadow moves between me and the fluttering ruffles of the curtains by the French doors. It dashes out onto the balcony with more chimes overhead from the chandelier.

I take off after it, and my feet on the parquet pick up speed quickly. So quick in fact, that I slide flat-footed across it to stop myself from tripping at the edge of the marble threshold. I immediately keep my upper body momentum going and stumble out into the night. I look left. Nothing. I glance right. A lump of some form as dark and indistinct as charcoal leaps off of the balcony by grabbing onto the massive round of drainpipe coming down from the roof.

This thing – this human-sized and human-shaped thing – descends the drain with faintly squeaking sounds.

I run to the spot where it had been, feeling the rough surface of the textured ceramic tiles bite the soles of my running feet.

As I get to the position, I half-hoist myself over the chunky railing and see the shadow carefully climbing down the metal conduit.

All of sudden, hands – which are in full colour and in vivid animation – reach out and latch onto the dark thing. In half a moment, they haul the dusky figure onto the balcony one level below me.

What sounds like a scuffle, and perhaps like those same hands I saw are subduing with blows, rings out in a muffled but frightening way. There are some faintly vocalized grunts too, grunts of dull pain.

"Hello?" I call down.

There is silence now.

I grab onto the iron handrail with both hands and lean myself out. My head goes below the level of my shoulders – my feet feel levitated and light, as if they are going to lift off of the balcony floor at any second. An instant lightheadedness also assails me, and somewhere in the back of my head a thought that this not something a 'cursed' person should tempt fate with. I might quickly wind up as a nasty stain on the Romanian sidewalk three stories below. And yet, I stretch and strain to see onto the balcony below, but cannot make out anything.

Oddly, there are no more sounds of strife either.

I slowly right my upper torso and experience the sudden headache of the blood exiting my head in a rush; this happens as tiny and confused thoughts fight their way to run back into me at the same time. I wonder, what’s just happened? And worst yet, what can I possibly do about it?

All at once, the summer Bucharest night chills me from tip of head to bottom of toes clenching onto the icy balcony floor tiles. I pull up my phone screen, for the whole time, the dumb devise has been clenched in my sweating palm. I rub the surface lightly and the screen pops up; it's two forty-five in the morning. Fuck.

I stagger a bit towards the door leading back inside. My legs feel like lead as the adrenaline abandons me all at once.

Stubbing my toe slightly as I step over the stone threshold from the balcony, I don’t feel it very much. It's not a pressing concern while my brain is reeling as it is.

I walk to the centre of the room like a zombie. What should I do? I do not want to lose my father's letter; it's his last contact with me.

My mind calls to me as if from a dream: I'll run after 'him' – the shadow, whatever he or it is. I’ll go down to the second floor, that's what I'll do.

But first, I need to put on my jeans!

I run around a second, realizing I never bothered to switch on the lights.

'Where are my jeans!' I think.

Then I nearly stumble completely over one of the upholstered lounge chairs. In an inspired flash, I remember my pants are there. I sit hurriedly and shove in legs two at a time.

I stand, and half hop to the room door pulling up my denim and 'latching' them via the copper rivet closure at the waist.

I freeze dead.

What was that?

There was a noise, this time coming from the other side of the room door.

Slowly and scared, I creep up to it. Ever since I was a kid and forced to watch a film on 'Surviving a Hotel Fire,' I've had an inordinate fear of burning up wherever I've stayed. So laying my hands on the door makes me paranoid that I might expect the surface to be scorching hot; I brace myself and slowly lean in. My eye nears the pinhole of light coming through the peephole.

I see…I see, nothing.

I scan to the left by shifting my whole body and turning to look out with my left eye. Nothing. I turn back and look to the right with my right eye. I strain and stare, but see nothing.

While I am touching the door – and fearing the unknown in a barely suppressed silence that I might actually see something at any moment, something monstrous – there is an odd sound.

It comes into my head mainly as a feeling through my fingertips, but also as a muffled sensation of friction to my ears.

I stand up straight. I glance down. And there between my two feet is my father's letter. In a shuttering moment of relief I realize that strange sound was of it being slid under the door.

I bend to scoop it up like a precious foundling, and do so with an almost overwhelming feeling of gratitude. But, who has done this? Who's done any of this crap?

I reach out and unlock the door with a single motion. I tear the portal open and light comes to blind me from the hall.

Blinking, I step out into it and look up and down. I also listen.

No one is there. There is not a sound to be heard.

After a long moment of confused hesitation, I decide to go back in and lock up.

I clutch the letter to my bare chest, feel it momentarily tangle with the gold coin, and then stride with driving purpose to shove aside the flimsy curtains and latch each French door closed.

As I do this one by one, I let my mind ponder that the analogy of that empty hall just outside this room is a perfect one. Out there, all is as quiet as death, and just as disconcerting and mysterious.