Berit Ellingsen - Not Dark Yet

“This is where we measure the owls’ hearing during the sound experiments,” Kaye said.

He nodded at Kaye through the window.

“Listen to this,” Kaye said. The assistant professor pressed one of the keyboards and a note played in the blue room. It sounded like the dull, amelodic tone of a hearing test. The silence that followed was thick and muted, nothing like the spacious, open quiet of the mountains. There was another note, longer and more high-pitched this time. Kaye pointed into the soundproofed room.

He turned to find out where the tone was coming from, somewhere in the corner to the left of the door. He went over to it and looked back at Kaye.

Kaye nodded and smiled, then played another sound, a deep one, which hummed right at the edge of his hearing.

He moved to the wall that emitted the tone.

The assistant professor grinned at him through the one-way mirror. “You’re a good owl.”

He smiled back.

“What do you think?” Kaye said, standing in the doorway. “Is the room too small for photographing the birds?”

He shook his head. “Should fit perfectly for a camera on a tripod,” he said.

“Excellent!” Kaye said. “Then we’re all set. Can we start tomorrow afternoon?”

“Yes,” he said. “When?”

“Six,” Kaye said. “Unless that’s too late for you?”

“No, it’s fine.”

“I’ll meet you at the door downstairs,” Kaye said. “The foyer should be open until eight. If it’s locked, just phone me.”

He nodded.

The assistant professor went back to the recording room. “It’s rather late. Do you need a ride home?” Kaye said while switching the monitors and the lights off.

“Thanks, that would be nice,” he said.

They exited the soundproof space and returned to the cloakroom.

“If you wish to be absolutely certain of not bringing any mouse allergens home, take a shower and wash your hair once you get there,” Kaye said, peeling the green coverall off and putting on the brown fleece sweater again.

He nodded. “I’ll probably go swimming.”

“In the sea, at this hour?”

“No, there’s a pool in the building.”

“Really?” Kaye said. “And it’s actually being used?”

“Mostly by me,” he said. “I rarely see anyone else there.”

“What a luxury,” Kaye said.

He nodded.

They both exited, the door sighed shut and the lock whirred into place. The ventilation hummed. The hallway was dark, lit only by the green shine from an emergency sign at the end. When Kaye started down the corridor, the ceiling lamps flickered to life.

“Not many people up here,” he said.

“No, not at this time in the evening,” Kaye said. “Probably only a graduate student or two, doing overnight experiments.”

They continued down to the fifth floor hallway and caught the elevator to the first floor. In the small mirrored space he leaned against the wall and avoided Kaye’s eyes, listening instead to the whirring of the elevator as it moved through the shaft until it slowed, bounced, and the worn doors rattled open. The foyer of The Institute for Biological Sciences was empty. The rectangular, rust-colored tiles on the floor dulled the light from the fluorescent lamps in the lowered ceiling that stretched from the elevators to the front door of the building. The rear wall faced an overgrown park and consisted of glass set in enormous rectangular wooden frames. In the space between the concrete front and side walls, and the glass-and-wood back, several suspended ramps rose toward the second and third floors. The panorama wall and ramps made the foyer look grand, but with the night pressing against the glass the space seemed dark despite the plentiful illumination. Their footfalls on the tiles were hushed and dry. The foyer was so beautiful he hoped he would never have to see it in full daylight.

Outside it was humid and foggy, on the verge of drizzle.

“My car’s right over there,” Kaye said and nodded at a modest vehicle further down the street. Except for the campus structures at the end, the thoroughfare was dominated by old yet well-kept tenement buildings which boasted elaborate casement windows, verandas with carved banisters, and tall finials at the gables. Kaye’s car was cramped and old and smelled of gasoline and rain gear. The dashboard held a compact disc player and several unlabeled discs cluttered the small compartment beneath it. In the back seat unidentifiable clothing and a plastic bag lay rumpled.

“Please excuse the mess,” Kaye said, got in on the driver’s side, and pulled the seatbelt on.

“Where do you live?” Kaye asked.

“In the towers by the marsh.”

“No wonder there’s a pool in the building. All right, should be a quick drive.”

“Where do you live?” he ventured.

“In the old part of the city, just south of the campus,” Kaye said.

“Are you certain you don’t mind driving so far out of your way?”

“It’s not that far,” Kaye said, smiling. “And at this time of night there’s no traffic.”

They drove in silence. The assistant professor seemed to have other things on his mind, and he felt no need to break the quiet. The sodium glow from the street lamps washed over the windshield in a regular, uninterrupted rhythm. Leaning into the headrest, he almost fell asleep, and only returned to attentiveness when the dry sound of the blinkers signaled that they were about to leave the motorway and enter the street toward the towers.

“These are some buildings,” Kaye said, glancing up at the five nineteen-story structures that rose above them. “I remember when all this was wetland. My father used to hunt in the area. He once shot an owl and had it stuffed. I grew up with the poor thing on the mantel.”

He smiled. “Is that a good memory or a bad one?”

Kaye laughed. “Bad, mostly, since the bird was dead. Which tower do you live in?”

“The second one.”

Kaye stopped by the glass entrance to the second of the six-sided towers. “Do you want me to pick you up tomorrow?” the assistant professor said.

He shook his head. “Thanks, but no need. The trains from here go to the university.”

“All right,” Kaye said. “Have a good night and see you tomorrow.”

“See you,” he said, ignoring the sudden impulse to pull Kaye very close to inhale his breath and fragrance and ask him upstairs. Instead, he closed the car door quietly and continued to the gleaming entrance. He didn’t look back, but followed Kaye’s car as it came into sight and vanished down the slope to the motorway.

He didn’t go swimming as he thought he would. Feeling unexpectedly tired, he took a quick shower to wash the scent of the owl room off, and went to bed. As soon as he lay still beneath the soft duvet, his two eastern-bred cats snuggled close, while their warmth and purring accompanied him to sleep. His dreams were filled with owls, but they were unable to fly, and ran across a dark forest floor on bare human feet.

HE CARRIED THE TRIPOD AND CAMERA BAG TO the fifth floor, and from there followed a windowed hallway to the staircase that led to the top level. That high up the night and the mist, which had been constant the whole spring and summer, cloaked the view of the park below. The formlessness that filled the glass was how he imagined being blind must feel. Not a complete darkness, but the absence of visual cues, a non-seeing. It made him want to turn toward the wall behind him instead, whose textures looked like clouds ought to, full of whorls and shapes and imaginary patterns.

Kaye arrived, smiling, carrying two paper cups with cardboard lids.