Jonathan Carroll - Voice of our Shadow

"Joe?" India called from the bed and, a snake to the charmer's pipe, I turned.

She was facing me now, the light unnaturally bright over her naked form. She reached behind her head and, in a quick ripping motion, tore her hair and face away.

Ross.

Where the strength came from I don't know, but I sprang from my squat and, shoving Bobby aside, ran out of the apartment.

I was going so fast I slipped on the first steps and almost fell, but I grabbed the metal banister and righted myself. Out of the door to the street. Move, run; go, run.

What do I do? Where do I go? Bobby, Ross, Paul, India. My feet slapped those names at me as I ran nowhere, anywhere. Away. As fast as I'd ever run in my life. Move! A car honked, and I brushed its cold metal with my hand. A dog screamed because I kicked it running by. The owner's outraged cry. Another car horn. Where was I going? Ross. He'd done it.

Karen! Get to Karen! The idea lit my mind. A gift from God. Get to Karen! Get to New York. Run and hide, and go to Karen, where there was love and truth and light. Karen. She would save me. I looked fearfully over my shoulder for the first time to see if they were following me. They weren't. Why? Why weren't they there? It didn't matter. I thanked God for that, thanked him for Karen. I ran and prayed and saw it all — the whole Ross game. Saw it all with such perfect clarity that it was all I could do to keep myself upright. I wanted to lie down in the street and die. But there was Karen. She was sanctuary.

Things became clearer. I knew I was near an overhead station stop, and the train went near the Hilton Hotel. I could go to the Hilton and take a bus from there to the airport. Still running, I felt my back pocket to see if my wallet was there with all my money and credit cards. It was. Hilton, bus to the airport, first plane — any plane — out of Vienna, and then a connection from wherever to New York. To Karen.

Heaving for breath, I got to the station and once again took stairs two at a time.

No one was on the platform. I cursed because that probably meant a train had recently come and gone. I clenched and unclenched my fists at no trains, Ross, life. Ross was India. I had fallen in love with, made love to. . my brother. How brilliant. Utterly fucking brilliant.

I paced up and down the platform, straining my eyes down the tracks, trying to will a train to appear. Then I looked behind me at the steps to see if anyone was coming. No one. Why? When that question began to frighten me, the thin line of a train light showed down the track. I was saved. As it grew larger, I heard someone coming up the stairs. The steps were slow and heavy, tired. The light loomed larger; the steps kept coming. The train snaked noisily into the station and stopped. The steps did too. The two cars in front of me were completely empty. I reached for the door and was about to pull it open when she spoke.

"Joseph?"

I turned; Karen was there. My Karen.

"Play with Little Boy!"

Ross.

Formori, Greece

There are one hundred people on this island. Tourists never come, because it is an ugly, rocky place and not what one has in mind when one thinks of Greece. Its closest neighbor is Crete, but that is seventeen hours away over the sea. With the exception of a supply boat that comes about every two weeks, we rarely see others. That is fine.

My house is stone and simple. Two hundred feet away is the water. I have a wooden bench by the door and I sit on it for hours. It is pleasant. I pay well, so they bring me lamb and fish to cook at the end of each day. Kalamaria, sometimes even great red lobsters big enough for three people. I sit outside when the weather is good, but fall is coming and there are many storms. They are brutal and endless. It doesn't matter. If it rains, I light a fire inside my house and cook and eat and listen to the rain and the wind. My house, my bench, the wind, the rain, the sea. I can trust them. I can trust nothing else.