HAYNTA-10
Nolk returned about five days after classes resumed. Why he had been gone, he never said, and I didn’t ask. My communication with him was limited to occasional lunch-time reveries in the walnut grove. Otherwise, I never saw him; I never sought him out in the Nonagon. I was too busy with Little Bolo, helping her with her studies, and in my primary duty of protecting her from the unforgiving world. I still carried a flame for him, more than ever, in fact, but I didn’t pine for him, I didn’t think about him all the time; and my time with him was sweet, and stress-free. I just enjoyed his company those few mid-day moments I got to be with him. We no longer reviewed my studies, either, but just talked, the topics of our conversation ranging from anything to everything to nothing. We often talked about Little Bolo—or I did, and he listened, putting in a spare comment every now and then.
For Little Bolo was something to be talked about. In her presence, not precisely magic, but a twinkle, a sparkle—a twarkle—bubbled and flashed from the folds and creases of the air, ran in all directions like liquid rainbows, and blossomed into invisible but somehow palpable clusters of brilliant flowers; and in her wake, a certain glow lingered. It wasn’t something you could put a finger on, exactly; I say a glow: there seemed a lightness about things in that wake of her passage, the world seemed at once much bigger and yet as if it recognized you, and deemed you important.
Her appearance and her manner, common yet bright, intimate yet mysterious, accentuated this twarkle of her presence. She had a kitten-like quality about her, or elf-like. An elf-kitten she was, or another, unique, fairy creature. She—and this as much as anything revealed the almost-foreigner level unfamiliarity she had with the ways of her fellows—had a habit of what seemed to me to be examining the wind. Her head tilted this way or that (like a kitten, or, I imagined, an elf), she would gaze about in absolute wonder as her hands and fingers traced and caressed unseen presences in the air, as if she were reading a large, invisible book, doing an enormous connect the dots puzzle, or feeling an unseen object as a blind person might investigate a face. I decided that she wasn’t in truth examining the wind, but rather the buildings, the statues and other structures of the grounds, the trees, the flowers, the students—all the things that everyone else would find mundane—and that her different-colored, green vs. brown, eyes misdirected my perception of her gaze to seem not to be focused on any one thing.
This seeing of things that weren’t there, or the illusion, at least, that she was seeing things that weren’t there, which accentuated the twarkle of her presence, was itself accentuated by the fact that occasionally when I, or someone else for that matter, said something to her, she would do her finger-tracing thing in the air before responding, the only difference in these cases from when she was examining her surroundings, being that the tracing was limited to the space right in front of her eyes. I would say something to her, such as, “It’s going to be a hot one, today,” and she would look as if what I’d said was incomprehensible; then she would do her “spellwork,” as I took to calling it, and comprehension would dawn in her eyes, and she would respond.
“What are you doing?” I asked her, finally, one day as she painted what seemed a wild scene in the air.
“Translating,” she said, as matter-of-fact as if I’d asked her the time. While her reactions to responses to her questions were usually delighted smiles, gay laughs, or looks of wonder, her responses to questions put to her were most often serious and sincere, without a trace of affectation.
“Translating. What does that mean?”
“I forgot to look at the shadows, and…and, hear them, too. Sometimes I do that, forget, I mean, if the, the landscape is unfamiliar and there’s a lot to look at—and hear. And here, everything’s so big!”
That didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me, but I didn’t want to hurt her feelings by saying so, and I didn’t know her well enough yet to pry, so I let it pass. Yet, I didn’t want her to do too much of this “translating” in front of others, for fear she would be made fun of, or if she happened to do it in front of teachers or administrators, be forced to undergo psychiatric examination.
“You probably shouldn’t do it in front of other people.”
She laughed her little fair laugh, and said, “But then I wouldn’t be able to respond to them with proper words!”
I laughed at her odd, archaic phrasing, and told her, “Well, most people will repeat themselves if you don’t respond to them promptly.”
“But why?”
“Why what? Why will they repeat themselves?”
“Why make them repeat themselves.”
I didn’t want to tell her that by being herself, she might subject herself to ridicule, so I just said, somewhat lamely, “Let’s just keep it between us for the time being.”
With a disapproving, but loving, look, she exclaimed, “You’re just like Mom!”
She refrained, however, at least in my presence, from doing her “translating” in front of other people. Yet, I was worried. I couldn’t be with her always, in her first-year classes, for example, and in any case I didn’t want to become a stifling presence to her. These mannerisms, not to mention her archaic boys’ clothing and the way she looked deep into your eyes when you were talking with her, I thought would get her into trouble sooner or later. But, everyone seemed to like her, those who noticed her: most people at Clarks Hill, students and teachers alike, lived in their own little worlds, and weren’t going to notice one first-year student, even if she was a little eccentric. As long as she followed my directives for unnoticeable-ness, she would be okay.
It was about a half-month into the year, maybe a little more, when things began to change—when the chain of events that led to me being known as her familiar began. It started early one evening as we strolled to the library to complete the day’s studies. I preferred to go to the library via the outside grounds than to enter through the Nonagon, because usually it was less crowded outside, but today we were a little late, and the nightly gathering on the Offices/Library’s immaculate lawn had already begun. As we sidled through the crowd, Little Bolo’s attention was caught by Kjandolg Wayland, a veritable celebrity among his fellows because of his good looks and guitar skills. He was sitting on a flower pot with a group of students around him, mainly girls but a few boys, too, strumming, indeed, a guitar in his usual garish red blouse and singing bawdy songs to the laughter and applause of all.
The day was warm, and well-nigh sweaty; dew was already forming on the grass, which was as lush as it ever got, nurtured by the unseasonable warmth and the early autumn rains of Clarks Hill. The ground was damp and soft, the sky the deep blue of evening, laced with red-tinged clouds. It was, in short, a perfect night for music—but not, in my opinion, of the sort Kjandolg Wayland would provide, or to be enjoyed with the sort of individuals who would gather around him: smug, self-satisfied people, who would think nothing of impressing each other by making the fool of an ignorant backwoods girl.
“It’s music!” she said, transfixed, as if this were the first time she’d ever seen or heard instruments being played, and with that, took a bee-line straight towards Kjandolg and his circle of revelers, ambling along in the quick free weightless way she had of moving.
Grabbing her by the elbow, and attempting to steer her gently from her course, I said, “I believe it’s study-time, Miss Bolo. Maybe if they’re still going at it when we’re finished, we can stop by for a few minutes.” I said this knowing full well that they would have dispersed by the time we returned from the library.
Giggling as if she thought I were joking, she slid, fairy-like from my grasp, and said, “Haynta! Let’s watch. It’ll be fun.”
I told her, in as commanding a voice as I could muster, which wasn’t very commanding, “As your tutor, I insist you come to the library,” but she just kept going, and I had no choice but to follow.
Finding the area in front of Kjandolg choked with people, she plopped down in the grass sort of diagonally behind him. From that vantage point, we could see his hands and instrument, and long black hair, but only the profile of his red, handsome, smirking face.
He was playing a jangly, wordless tune that filled the body with a happy, robust, energy, and suddenly, as Little Bolo watched him with tilted head I thought, well, maybe this isn’t so bad. His playing was infectious, and enjoyable. It was quite enjoyable, in fact, just to sit there listening to it and relaxing in the pleasant evening air, and everybody was so focused on Kjandolg, they probably wouldn’t notice me or Bolo. The mandolin and ngala, which were leaning against Kjandolg’s flower pot, I noticed only as background details in the rich colorful painting suggested by this little gathering—of Kjandolg in his loose-fitting fiery red blouse strumming happily upon his conical green flower pot, surrounded by the adoring upturned faces of his fellow students seated on the lush green grass touched by the redness of the setting sun, themselves dressed in bright reds and blues and oranges and purples—until Bolo leaned forward and grabbed the ngala.
“What are you do…? Bolo!” I hissed, and pointed emphatically at the flower pot, a gesture intended to compel her to return the instrument to its place, but which she responded to with decided confusion. She seemed utterly incognizant of my alarm. I began to give voice to my concerns, but by then, the music had stopped, and alerted by the shifting attention of his listeners, Kjandolg had turned his pretty face upon us.
If he was surprised, he hid it well. A smile spread slowly across his face—a sly, dangerous smile, I thought—and he asked, “You play?”
Little Bolo shook her head, then said, “I plucked on my mom’s mandolin a few times.”
“Here’s a mandolin,” he said, offering her the one that had been leaning against his flower pot alongside the ngala, “Want to try it?” Oh boy, I thought, here it comes. He’s setting her up to get mocked and laughed at by the crowd, while he comes across as magnanimous. I plucked at the sleeve of her yellow shirt, and said, “Come on Bolo, let’s…” but she looked at me, askance, with her brown eye with what I came to know as her “brown-eye look,” and which I already knew meant “I’m going to do what I’m going to do, so accept it,” so I nodded and sat back and began making plans about how I was going to comfort her after the humiliation.
“I’ll try this one,” she said, indicating the ngala. She seemed fascinated by its long neck.
He chewed on his lower lip for a moment, as if trying to decide whether making a spectacle of her was worth the risk of damage to his instrument, then said, “It’s difficult to play.”
She said, “Okay,” and then plucked a few strings. Hideous, discordant sounds rose, incongruous, into the peaceful evening. She plucked a few more, and again, a sound to strafe the eardrums issued from the long black instrument in her hands. I looked at the half-circle of people around us, which was growing, but while many of the students there looked puzzled, or confused, none seemed inclined to laugh at her, as yet.
“Yeah,” he said, nodding and stretching the skin on his chin by widening his bottom lip, “It’s a difficult instrument to play, and sounds really bad when…”
“You play something!” she said, pointing at his guitar, “a couple bars!”
He regarded her with something between impatience and curiosity, but then complied, strumming out the first few notes of the famous (and simple-to-play), “Lords of Sa.” (It was late Sa at the time.)
She watched him like an iguana, following his hands, the strings of the guitar, and his face with acute, minute precision; and when he finished, she played the same notes on the ngala, messing up only a couple of times.
The astonishment that came into his face then made my concern for her and my discomfort about being near the center of attention almost worth it. He played, then, a series of notes a little more intricate, though still, I thought, pretty simple, and again she duplicated his notes, this time without missing a single one.
“Hey that’s pretty good!” he said, and then played something still a little more complex, which again she duplicated. The crowd was now looking on with surprise as well as delight, if for no other reason than this was something to tell their friends not present about, later.
Now, he played something that, I thought, definitely took some skill, an intricate and fast-paced, rolling cross-section of a jig; but again, she copied his notes with near-perfect precision. Before she had finished her turn, he played something else. She duplicated it; and on and on they went, soon, she no longer copying his notes but playing ones that were complementary to his, the comparatively low sound of the guitar and the high sweet sound of the ngala weaving together like the stripes of a star-filled night in a fast but gentle song.
And Kjandolg loved it. He even yelled out, “Yeah!” with his final notes. I suppose he’d been waiting for somebody to play with. And the crowd ate it up: Some looked amazed, some looked delighted, some had gotten up and started dancing, and all were grinning; and they cheered and applauded after Kjandolg brought the jig to its end with his shout.
“Where’d you learn to play like that?” I asked Bolo later. I was pretty sure that ngalas were not cheap, and I didn’t imagine Bolo’s parents had ever had enough money to purchase one, however much they loved her. “Man you should have seen their faces!”
“Here.” As usual, she was serious and matter-of-fact in replying to my question.
“Here what?”
“Here. I learned how to play here.”
“That’s impossible. I’ve been with you every day you’ve been here, and you’ve never taken lessons. I don’t even think they teach music, here. And anyway, it would take at least a couple of years to get that good.”
“Today.”
“You’re saying that you learned to play today? You’ve never played a ngala before today? Have you played other instruments?”
“Well, my mother had an old mandolin that she played when I was little; but she sold it a few years ago. I told her not to, but she did. I always loved watching her play it.”
“Hey little miss, I think you’re incapable of telling a lie,” (which she was), “but in the reality I know, disregarding Infin Gorilla’s opinion, or is it Jumpere, that you probably have studied ngala playing for years in some reality or another, nobody could learn how to play a fairly complicated song on any instrument, let alone a ngala, in one day, or just by watching her mother play a mandolin. So something doesn’t add up here.”
I thought I saw a tear welling up in her green eye, so I backed off. “You know, whatever. It was great. Wonderful; it was beautiful.”
“No, it’s okay, Haynta,” she assured me, patting my arm with her bright smile that lit up the world, “I saw it.”
“Saw it? Saw what?”
“The music.”
My heart raced, because what she said was impossible yet rang true. “What do you mean, you saw the music?”
“Well, that’s not really the right word, but it’s the closest our language comes. It’s not really seeing as you would think of it, it’s none of the five senses, but all of them, as well as intuition, and the senses of direction, location, and time, it’s experiencing the whole of things, or much closer to the true, the whole, of things than we can with our senses—what I call our shadow senses. I’m sorry I haven’t told you about this before; you’re my friend.”
“It’s okay, I, you know…What? Could you start over?”
And that’s when she told me about the patterns.