Stories

Going to Fade

When work is done, while the sunlight still shines down on us we scurry like cockroaches on the streets, skittering feet and nervous glances taking us from work to grocer, from grocer to home as quickly as we may. A brief, stiff nod is as much conversation as allowed when two people pass by. There's no time for hello. By dark, everyone is behind doors, locks, walls. Those left outside are easy prey for the night vanishings. We all this learned years ago.

Life lessons, I called them. Full of don't.

Don't ask questions. That one starts at school, as early as that. Questioning only leads to more work, to making things harder. Sometimes, it makes things harder for everyone, which leads to resentment and being ganged up on later. Just keep your eyes open and your mouth shut.

Don't be different. It doesn't matter how little you say. If you look different, walk funny, have bright hair or clothing, have an expression on your face it's all the same as speaking up, asking questions.

Don't be out alone. If you can, walk in a group, the larger the better. If you're a woman, have men in the group too. Spend as little time alone as possible when outside the safety of work. If trouble comes, scatter and get home as quickly as you can. As long as they chase someone else, you'll be fine.

Stick up for no one. No matter how right they may be, how unjust their treatment, how much you like them there's nothing more foolish than rising to someone else's defense. We each have enough trouble on our own. Why borrow more from others?

Don't be outside after dark, no matter how many you're with. It's not safe. People vanish, no sound, no trace.

These are the rules we live by. They keep us safe day to day, and keep our contentment uninterrupted. I tried as hard as I could to learn these lessons, to follow the rules and keep myself safe. The first one was always the hardest, but it was the last one I finally broke. Just like they always said, it changed my life, and killed my contentment.

And so, here I stand in the last afternoon hour in an abandoned old house. The windows are covered in boards, a few stray beams of sunlight forcing their way through the cracks. Those will have to be covered up before dark, before candles and people make this place noicable. There's black cloth in the corner to hang over the boards. It's about time for them to begin coming now, as they have for a few years.

It's almost time to call them home, and bid them come safely. We've lost too many to the night vanishings lately... and the vanishings come earlier all the time.

When the sunlight is too bright just take a nap.
Banish out the day and sleep away the hours until twilight
Then scurry softly to evade the trap.
They're stalking you and watching every street for them as are fools enough

To wander as the light falls down.
When night falls it's always "the wrong side of town"
So come you and gather but don't be found
Or we're all going to fade.

When it's time to rise for work just rub your eyes.
So long as you do all they ask of you, it's the next best thing to being invisible.
Tired droning fits with our disguise.
Just hold on to the memory of your evening company indivisible.

Gathering as the light falls down
When night falls it's always "the wrong side of town"
So come you and gather but don't be found
Or we're all going to fade
To fade away like so many before
In silence, gently forgot
Torn by trying and crying for war
Remember the fates of those who fought

For glory and for history and greed.
The gory truth is we're all proof the mouse lives longer than the lion
In silence and with subtlety and speed
Forget your mind by day and hide away while you keep your eye on

The sky until the light falls down
When night falls it's always "the wrong side of town"
So come you and gather but don't be found
Or we're all going to fade

Candle

I remember the first time one of us vanished. He was beside me, standing against one of the windows. I think it was Rebecca, but it might have been Tevi. One went right after the other, two nights running, and we almost stopped this gathering. He was the one who convinced me to keep it going.

"You want to let them win, to let all of these people who've started to break out of their stale lives see that you're giving in? Feh." The disgust in his voice was more than I could take. That night, we discussed safety, warnings, patterns, and recruitment. That night marked the beginning of safety for us. It was nearly a year before one of us vanished again, caught after staying too late talking to me, and missing work.

It was Him.

"You stayed late to tell me you loved me for one more goodnight kiss, and then you were gone." The thought fills my mind so often these days, as Outside, the vanishings worsen. I don't go out anymore. People bring me news and food and the things a person needs, and fresh candles. Candles are... like life after a while. Light doesn't move, light isn't gentle. Light is harsh and cleansing and judging. Candles aren't.

We've all been judged enough.

It's time to light them. Every time I do, I think of Him. They were his idea. "Let me show you darkness, and softest light" he would say, lighting the first one while we waited for the others

First there was darkness
And I was still
A single heartbeat
keeping time
I wasn't frightened
I was just alone
All of the shadows here
Were mine

The night like blankets
Tangled at my feet
Keeping me steady
Keeping still
But somehow, restless thoughts
Still tugged at me
And made me spill

Was it you who sang so fiercely
That you bathed my soul in flames
Held fast my heart of shadows
And bid me stay,
And bid me stay?

It was like slipping
In and out of dreams
The sudden shadows
On the wall
Danced with the flicker
Of one candle flame
So strong, so small

Was it you who sang so fiercely
That you bathed my soul in flames
Held fast my heart of shadows
And bid me stay,
And bid me stay?

And laughter soft as velvet came to cover me
And I was more than shadow, I was lover I was love
Oh laughter soft as velvet came to cover me
And I was more than shadow, I was lover I was love...

First there was darkness
and I was still
The blankets wound
Around my head
I wasn't frightened
I was just alone
In my own bed

Was it you who sang so fiercely
That you bathed my soul in flames
Held fast my heart of shadows
And bid me stay,
And bid me stay?

Whispering Hour

meet each evening, though most can't come every time. There's a feeling you get, when you've been tagged for watching. Sometimes if you're lucky you get a breath of warning, a false word from the friend or family member picked for the honor. Sometimes you don't, and that nagging little feeling saves you.

If not, you Vanish.

I've seen Vanished people come back. We all have. They're gone for a few months, maybe a year, then all of a sudden they're at home and work like nothing's happened. Their families all pretend that nothing's changed, and sometimes their friends will too. There's a difference in them all though. Any small hint of rebellion is gone, and they're remarkably happy, and usually... they're set to watch someone else.

None of our Vanished have come back, that I've heard of. I wonder why, and I wonder why the Powers haven't come to find us. Maybe they didn't bother to ask questions, or more likely, they're just waiting for the right time. So we gather nightly, a few more each week, rotating people in and out, and like religions of old we have our rituals. They're comforting, and sometimes beautiful. Living this quiet rebellion, I think we probably need as much of both those things as we can get.

And so each night begins with a song. Once a person's been here a few times, the song seems to relax them, and after a while most sing along. Music in our normal lives isn't like that. There are no words, and the sound of a roomfull of people all singing (some badly) would be considered far beneath the ears of any decent folk. Music is beauty, perfect, serene, and sterile. No false note, no sharp tang to tone... ours though, ours is rough.

And it is addictive. So we sing together, to start off each evening.

Light the candles… close the curtains.
Daylight is finally done.
Turn your back on, the bloodied skyline.
Night will overcome.
Have we forgotten
After years of paying dues, and paying bills
How quickly we waste away the time we kill
So sit where you will
The Whispering Hour's begun.
The Whispering Hour's be… la la la.

Have you been struck by, true vocation
Or have you left passion behind
How far have you gone, for salvation
Sacrificed your mind?
Speak your stories
Your worries will wait for a little while
And there's more to your life than a painted smile
So lay it aside
The Whispering Hour's begun
The Whispering Hour's be… la la la

Give up your sighs.
Open your minds and close your eyes.
Oh who can see to judge underneath the shaded sky?

Music it draws us, like lost souls to fire.
Mixing the humble and proud.
Twilight is license to conspire
To live your dreams out loud
Have we forgotten,
After years of paying bills and paying dues
We can spit out that bitter pill, and we can choose
There's no time to lose.
The Whispering Hour's begun
The whispering Hour's be… la la la

Answer Me

People call me a lot of things I don't agree with.

Revolutionary
Visionary
Leader

I'm not those things. I'm Vespers, a woman who saw things in the right way at the right time. I was maybe fourteen when my father vanished, and almost fifteen when he came home again. My witty, sometimes merry and sometimes caustic hero had been turned into a bland, smiling man. It was only two weeks before he'd warned me to stay in line more, and only five weeks before my mother was vanished herself.

She never came back.

I didn't hate him then, nor do I now, but I knew he was the one who'd made it happen. I knew he would do the same to me, and think he was doing me a kindness. Everyone knows at least one returnee. No one who ever questions Anything really trusts them. So I made my way through the rest of school, surviving by being only slightly rebellious, not enough to find real trouble. Keep your head down. That's what they say and it really can work. I wanted nothing more than to be done with school and find work so that I could move out and live in a place where my thoughts were my own…

Yes, I know, but I was younger then. Young people are optimists.

I learned quickly that adults had just as little freedom, maybe even less. The small hints of rebellion school had ignored were Not Tolerated at the workplace. I walked into my small cubicle and made my way through a pile of paper, then walked out. That was all I was to do. It was easy, and mindless, and left me far too free to daydream. I escaped trouble by the skin of my teeth more than once, barely biting back the "wrong thing" about to be said.

One night, I wasted too much time trying to explain my way out of a few hasty words. By the time I left work it was already twilight. It would be full dark before my feet carried me home. I hurried, almost running, but running makes them come faster, it's said. Being out after dark brings them. Running brings them. I was lost either way.

Then I saw the strangest thing, a soft light unlike any other in the world, which flickered and moved a bit. I stopped, held still by the light as it grew closer. I wondered if this was what it was like to Vanish, and then… I saw the hand holding the light, the face behind it, and I fell in love.

"Quick, before they see you" came the urgent whisper and he took my hand in his free one and half dragged me from the street into a tiny cell of a room, filled brimming with three other people. We squeezed in and I heard a woman's voice ask "Another one?" She meant me, and my rescuer nodded.

And that's how I met them, the ones who asked things, the ones who spoke and thought. It turned out one of them knew me, from work. She and I had never spoken, and never did during daylight. Eventually, we found the house I write in now, and our numbers grew accordingly. The others… the ones who were here before me all are gone, dead of one of the hundred wasting diseases come through lately, or vanished. I lead by virtue of surviving, I suppose. I survive by no virtue at all.

All I ever wanted was a life of quiet thought. Here I am, sitting on top of a boiling pot of revolution, trying to keep the heat up and the lid on at the same time. Here I am.

It's not my habit, no it's not my way
To be standing up here, wishing I had nothing to say.
I sing for beauty, and I sing for peace
But sometimes my inner revolution needs its release.
I try to let it go and sit back down
But my thoughts are driving, nowhere to turn around
Driving toward chaos, and driving toward night
And hope's so far away now it's drifting way out of sight

Answer me, will you answer me.
Is there some way of all of this that I can't see?
Are we free to love? Is it in me to love,
Or will I live my life in terms of me and enemies?

We talk a good talk about bringing them down
But their eyes are everywhere so we're all looking around.
Are we afraid or is it just good sense
To leave the governing to the people in the government?
I'm not political, I never have been
I just want freedom to love for me and all of my friends.
Love conquers chaos and love conquers night,
But love's so far away now it's drifting way out of sight.

Answer me, will you answer me.
Is there some way of all of this that I can't see?
Are we free to love? Is it in me to love,
Or will I live my life in terms of me and enemies

I don't know what the revolution's for
But the need's inside me, waiting to roar
Is it just being young, or long overdue
And can I trust these words with you?

I won't lie to you I won't lie back down
It's been so long since my mind had such a good look around.
Looking for a fight, or wrongs I can right
I wish I knew if I was looking out of justice or spite.
A rebel with no cause, just too damn many words
Too late to be quiet. I think somebody heard
Through the noise of the chaos, the quiet of night
And all my safe and silent days are drifting way out of sight

Answer me, will you answer me.
Is there some way of all of this that I can't see?
Are we free to love? Is it in me to love,
Or will I live my life in terms of me and enemies

Answer me, will you answer me.
Is there some way of all of this that I can't see?
Are we free to love? Is it in me to love,
Or will I live my life in terms of me and enemies

Alleluia

There aren't many people who come every night. Caution, or hesitation... people come once and change their minds, or are Vanished, or just can't stand the risk. There are a few though, and one of them I call the flower woman. She's seventy if she's a day, and where most of us wear the sober colors of the outside world, she wears things with flowers printed on them, things of soft color, or bright. You would think she would stand out among us. Instead, she sits in the back of the room, a soft whisper of color. Quiet, she almost never speaks, and never sings beyond the welcome song. It would be enough to make you think her a spy for Them, if it weren't for her eyes.

When I am old, if I don't Vanish first I want to have eyes like that, gentled by sadness, and fierce. She's been alive since the beginning of our time, since the first cleaning time when the Vanishings were high. She remembers things I can't even imagine.

And tonight, as I finish my singing, she stands up.

I think it surprises all of us, the movement and shift of color, the soft clearing of a throat, a mellow, sweet voice says softly "I should tell you why I'm here" comes her voice, turning the heads of everyone in the small room. "I should tell you what I remember, what I loved, and what I feel."

After a pause she finishes. "I may well Vanish tonight. My grandson's noticed me sighing. I should tell you."

There's a time soft pair of mittens underneath my bed.
They still smell a bit like woodsmoke and like wool.
I put them on sometimes to cover up my aging hands
And to shiver sweet, remember what it was like being cold.

Smoke stained clouds hang heavy in the hazy sky.
Drizzle rain makes rivers till the streets bake dry
On the wall beside my bed there's a picture of the ocean,
But my rivers never make it there.

Alleluia to the maker of my television set
Oh the stories of a simple life play on without an end.
We can make our cities of glass and fire. We can fabricate contentment.
So we softly say amen.

And the carpet here is soft as moss between my toes
All cooled by an air conditioned breeze
Instead of shadows. We've done away with all of those.
Isn't the world so much more pleasant now that everyone can see?

Smoke stained clouds hang heavy in the hazy sky.
Drizzle rain makes rivers, which the soil drinks dry.
The movie that I watched last night takes place inside a forest.
But the trees here only grow in squares.

Alleluia to the maker of my television set
Oh the stories of a simple life play on without an end.
We can make our cities of glass and fire. We can fabricate contentment.
So we softly say amen.

Alleluia, alleluia

Smoke stained clouds hang heavy in the hazy sky.
Drizzle rain makes rivers till the streets bake dry
On the wall beside my bed there's a picture of the ocean,
But my rivers never make it there.

Alleluia to the maker of my television set
Oh the stories of a simple life play on without an end.
We can make our cities of glass and fire. We can fabricate contentment.
So we softly say amen.

Amen.