Chapter 9 - Day 5 (the boy and the beast within)

The boy, so far, has avoided the plague that has beset our dwelling. The sounds of coughing echo in a terrible litany; the timbres phasing in and out with each repeated phrase, like some distorted Reich-ian motet to God’s glory. The percussive rasp, the glottal stop, the muted whimpers and exasperated gasps, like a band of splintered oboe reeds accompanied by a chorus of the infirm.

I’m not sure how or why the boy has been spared. Perhaps it is his close proximity to the earth’s iron and nickel core. I have witnessed first-hand how his short stature allows him to dispel the laws of gravity—climbing tall structures with mighty aplomb, appearing on the tops of kitchen cabinets without even so much as a ladder in sight. Is it this rejection of physical laws that causes the virus to be repelled?

I stare for a long time at my young charge. He vexes me. There is something so familiar about him. The way he squints his face. The way he furrows his brow. The way he tracks the dust particles dancing wildly as the late winter sun streams through an open sliver from the drawn shades of his bedroom window. Their patterns illustrating perfectly not only the beauty of entropy and the fragility of our aleatoric existences, but also the seeds of our primal motivation to make order where there is none.

I pondered for a moment. Should I just get the Swiffer®? But my years of monastic devotion to the cerebral plane of existence granted me a reprieve, once again, from the toils of physical labor. Summoning Milton, my answer came to me in an instant. “For what can war, but endless war, still breed?”

The boy came closer and looked into my eyes; and I into his. I looked. Unblinking. And to my amazement, I saw something reflected in his green flecked irises.

It was me.

[30 second pause]

The catharsis was overwhelming. My heart leaped inside my shell. I turned, exasperated and exhilarated and found whatever objects were in my reach. I found an old spoon, with a slight film of encrusted banana yoghurt. I held it up to his eyes, and what did I see? The reflection of an old spoon, with a slight film of encrusted banana yoghurt. I picked up a handful of mismatched, half chewed cardboard puzzle pieces and brought them into his gaze. And there they were, reflected, as if being shown to us from the other side of a looking glass. It went on for countless hours. I tried everything: mismatched socks, abandoned marker caps, pieces of broken crayons. I cannot describe my utter glee. How many clergymen, yogis, ayatollahs, prophets, and philosophers had sat and pondered, praying, searching for reflection? And here it was; In the eyes of a child.

I waved goodbye, as he removed his earthly vestments, and mounted his steed, riding off on the back of a wild and hairy beast into the never land of tomorrow.

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