Gregory Roberts - The Mountain Shadow

‘Listen, Rannveig, you know, there’s a river you have to cross, on the way back to the main road. I’ll prepare a plate for you, and you can leave it by the river, if you like. Did your boyfriend have a sweet tooth?’

‘He did.’

‘Good. There’s plenty of sweets prepared for tonight. Maybe your boyfriend will be so happy he’ll move on, and leave you alone.’

‘Thank you. I’ll definitely try it.’

‘It’s gonna be okay,’ I said. ‘It gets easier.’

‘Do you meditate?’

‘Only when I’m writing. Why?’

‘I’ve been thinking I should start meditating or something,’ she said absently, then quickly found my eyes again. ‘What do you think of him?’

‘Vinson?’

‘Yes, Stuart. I don’t have a brother or father here to ask about him. What do you think of him?’

I looked at Vinson, stacking the last of the pots and dishes on the shelves, and wiping down the long stainless steel sinks.

‘I like him,’ I said. ‘And I’m absolutely sure he’s nuts about you. If you’re not his soul mate, Rannveig, you should break it to him. Soon. This is it, for him.’

‘Do you ever get depressed? Stuart told me some things about you. About your life. Do you ever get days when you think of suicide?’

‘Never in captivity, and one way or another, most of my life has been spent in captivity.’

‘Seriously. Do you ever have days when you simply want it to end? All of it, at once?’

‘Look, suicide and I are nodding acquaintances. But I’m more your till-the-last-dying-breath kind of guy.’

‘But life can be so shit, sometimes,’ she said, looking at me again.

‘It’s all good, even the bad stuff. It’s all blood, flowing through the heart, and wonderful minutes, of wonderful things. I’m a writer. I have to believe in the power of love. Suicide isn’t an option.’

‘Not for you.’

‘And not for you. If you’re thinking about it, you can also put some thought into the fact that you don’t have the right to take your own life. Nobody does.’

‘Why not?’ Rannveig like the runway asked, her eyes wide, innocent of the cruel, broken question she’d just asked.

‘Think of it this way, Rannveig, does a deranged person have the right to kill a stranger?’

‘No.’

‘No. And when suicide is in your head, you’re the deranged person, and you’re also the stranger, in danger of the harm you might do to yourself. No matter how bad things get, you don’t have the right to kill the stranger that you might become, for a while, in your own life. The rest of your life would tell you, at that point, it’s not an option.’

‘But you don’t get the blues, ever?’ she asked.

She was so earnest that I wanted to put my arm around her.

‘Of course. Everybody does. But you’re young, and your life is so rich. It’s a hoard of minutes. We don’t have the right to destroy them, or even waste them, as I’m doing. We only have the right to experience them. So, get that crap out of your head. Not an option, okay? And don’t stress. It’ll pass. Vinson’s a good guy. He’ll wait as long as it takes for you to make up your mind, and get your feelings right, whichever way they fall. Everything will pass. Get up and fight.’

‘You’re right, I know, but sometimes the cloud takes a long time to clear the sun.’

‘You’re a very nice, very serious girl, who went through the same burning door that I did. It knocked you around, like it did me. You’re doing fine. You’re doing great. Look at me. I was running around town getting kicked by the cops. You’re so much healthier than when I saw you last time. Talk to Idriss before you leave. He’s pretty cool.’

‘You are a criminal,’ she said flatly.

It was a statement.

‘Ah… sure.’

‘Can a woman who is not a criminal, love a criminal? Have you seen this?’

I had, but not often.

‘Ah… sure.’

She looked doubtful, but I didn’t want to convince her.

‘You’re gonna have to talk to Vinson, about crime and punishment,’ I said. ‘It’s none of my business, how another man makes his money on the street.’

‘Do you know that Stuart killed someone?’

‘You know,’ I said, looking up at the small groups of people talking and doing chores on the mesa, ‘if we’re gonna talk about Vinson, we should invite Vinson.’

‘Not now,’ she said softly. ‘Not yet.’

I stood, and she stood with me.

‘Do you wish,’ she said falteringly, ‘do you constantly wish that you had done something else?’

‘It’s just regret,’ I said.

‘Regret,’ she repeated absently.

‘You know how they have proof of life , in a kidnapping?’

‘Not really.’

‘When someone’s kidnapped, the negotiator wants proof that the kidnapped person is still alive. A phone call, or film. Proof of life.’

‘Okay.’

‘Regret is just proof of soul, Rannveig. If you didn’t feel it, you wouldn’t be the nice person you are, and Vinson wouldn’t be deranged about you. It’s a good thing. And it’s a better thing when it fades, which it will, soon enough.’

We walked back toward the centre of the mesa. Vinson joined us, a smile like an empty beach on his face.

‘I’m going to talk to Idriss now, Stuart,’ Rannveig said, walking past him. ‘Please collect me after twenty minutes.’

‘Okay, babe,’ he said, grinning after her, his eyes following her like puppies.

‘What brings you to the mountain, Vinson?’

‘It was Rannveig’s idea. She was talking to Karla. That Karla’s something, isn’t she? I don’t understand half of what she says.’

‘You’re doin’ okay with half. She’s the quickest draw I ever saw.’

‘How did you meet her?’

‘She saved my life,’ I said. ‘Listen, they’ve just started the main fire. We can sit there, while Rannveig talks to Idriss. Sound like a plan?’

‘You bet.’

Most of the students on the mountain were involved in cooking, or preparing devotional idols for prayers. I asked one of them to prepare the plate of sweets for Rannveig’s persevering ghost, and to leave it with Silvano.

There was no-one sitting by the fire. Vinson and I sat on box crates, looking through the flames at the flame of Vinson’s heart, twenty metres away with Idriss, and beyond sound.

‘You know, Lin,’ he said, turning to me, ‘I wanted to come, anyway. I wanted to tell you how sorry I am for your loss. Lisa was a fine girl.’

‘Thanks, Vinson. You were at the service Karla organised. This is the first chance I’ve had to tell you, I appreciate it.’

‘It was nothing. We were honoured to attend, man.’

‘How’s Rannveig doing?’

‘Well,’ he said, scratching at his short beard, and stretching his mouth into a struggle with words.

He sighed, and let his hands fall to his thighs.

‘She’s hurt. She’s really hurt. I think, sometimes, that maybe I should get some professional help, a grief counsellor, but then, like, I always come back to the fact that nobody will ever care about her as much as I do.’

‘Except for Rannveig herself.’

‘Yeah, of course, kinda, when she’s better.’

‘Now, actually.’

‘But, like, she’s not a hundred per cent yet, man.’

‘She has to be her own principal caregiver, Vinson, just like you are for Vinson, see? Cut her as much slack as she needs. Let her explore.’

‘Explore?’

‘Whatever she wants to do, or try, support her in it. Just give her time, and space. If she’s yours, sooner or later she’ll come to know it.’

Advice, from a man who wasn’t with the only woman he ever loved, because he couldn’t reach out from a shadow of the lost. Who the hell was I to give advice?