The Mountain Stream
The trail wound down to the bottom of the gorge and without a second thought I walked straight into the stream that snaked across the bottom. The girls squealed in excitement when they saw the water but had second thoughts about stripping down and diving in as C.G., and the hulking, brooding man-child he was baby-sitting, broke from the cover of the trees. Instead, they walked along the bank until they found a good place to sit and dangle their feet. They are Patience and Faith, not Wanton and Lurid. I quite like them.
I call them my Lotus Eaters because of their endless ease and because they've never shared a bad thought between them. They've followed me around for most of my life, making repeated attempts to steal me away from the others and they sometimes wake me in the middle of the night to talk to me about the way I behave. They are as good as it gets. They show me the world as I would like it to be, but I'm a suspicious sort and they get frustrated with my negativity. And with Pan.
I saw them tense as Pan strode by. He makes no pretense about what he'd like to do to each one of them.
They are all with me now. They are my advisers, my mentors and my agents provocateurs. They are a motley collection of random thoughts and, at the same time, an organised team of interpreters.
There was a time when they were completely unaware of each other. It was in a time of complete disorder and confusion that I assembled them and brokered a truce. I asked them to come together for the purpose of finding someone I lost many years ago. I brought them together to track him through time and space, memory and forgetfulness, suffering, torment and grief. He's been missing for some time and I need him now, more than ever.
Ikkyu squatted at the edge of the stream and siphoned water for his kettle. As he set about building a small fire, I was, once more, impressed with the economy of his movements. He does everything with purpose and his temper is serene even in the face of danger. His musings are always concise and to the point and he never lets the boisterous attitudes of his forced compatriots interrupt the smooth flow of his thoughts.
"What is this place?" he said to me as he set the kettle in the flames.
"This is where I last saw him. Maybe twenty-five years ago?" I looked at the girls, and they nodded. They were here, too, although it wasn't me they were shadowing at the time. They followed me home that night, abandoning their post, thinking that I needed them more than the man who brought me here.
"And the one we're looking for?" Ikkyu watched me wince at the memory.
"This was the last place I saw him. I was hoping to find a clue or something." I looked around, not knowing how to begin to search.
I turned at the sounds of a scuffle and saw C.G. duck a swing from the animal he was shepherd to. This where he was born. He sprang into being at the edge of this stream, fully formed and raging. I couldn't control him then either. The flush of memory had provoked a fit of anger and C.G. was losing control of his charge. I watched impassively, as the Doctor tried in vain to soothe the beast, but the words he whispered into his ear had little effect and it wasn't until Pan held out something to him, that the child quieted and became subdued. I couldn't see what it was that the god had produced and so I stood to get a better view. The billowing form of the child began to deflate somewhat as he was held in check, mesmerized by a small mirror that he grasped in his massive fists. Pan turned to me then, and said, "You're an idiot. Get off your ass and get that old man moving or there's going to be trouble. This quack," he pointed to C.G., "doesn't know shit. Bringing us here was a foolish idea."
I looked at the Doctor and he was nodding his head.
"I'm sorry," he said, "I thought it might be helpful, but I didn't anticipate this reaction."
They all stood, staring at me, waiting for me to make a decision, and I looked from face to face.
The girls were frightened and fidgeted, holding hands and leaning on each other for support. The Doctor sat on his haunches, breathing heavily from the exertion of trying to control my rage. Pan stood in the middle of the stream, his hands on his hips and with a look of disgust on his face. Even the two headed dog was quiet, both heads avoiding my eyes.
From behind me, I heard Ikkyu clear his throat.
"Well," he said calmly, "I've finished my tea. We can go now." and he stood up, packing away the kettle.
I was sixteen the last time I was here and it looks exactly as I remember it. The stream that starts somewhere in the mountains above me, wanders down the valley and underneath the thick forest that covers both banks. It is beautiful. We camped here, after a long day of paddling. I was exhausted.
In the middle of the night, I woke to the sounds of some animal prowling around just outside the door of the tent and I sat up, trying to separate the sounds of the night from the chattering in my head.
The girls found me then, and soothed my fears, pushing me towards sleep and when I woke up all was quiet. I could sense him, then. The brutish beast that had been born by the coals of a fire left untended. He was awake, too, and I felt a terrifying realization grow inside me as I discovered that with the arrival of this beast, something else had left me. I'm still looking for him.
The connection I had, for so long unrecognized, to the world around me was shattered and in the aftermath I was disconsolate; the only comfort I felt coming from Patience and Faith, who upon discovering me in that fragile state, held me and wiped the tears away, telling me that I could survive this, that I would survive this. I did, barely. But it marked a new passage in my life, a new method to be learned. Without trust, my psyche splintered into pieces and the disparate aspects, previously held together by a common goal, came to me, one by one, to demand a reckoning.
They needed an answer. I thought this might be a good place to start.
