Down the Barn

I’ve done a lot of procrastinating today. I threw out things in the trash, did the dishes, took my roommate’s Erik’s cat out for a walk, turned people down on dating apps. And even then, there were still 4 hours before Erik and his new girlfriend Tara can come over. She headhunted me, asked me for my resume. And now I’m waiting whether or not my badly written resume was good enough for her companies.

But four hours flew by, and I heard them at the door.

“Good news, Mauro.” I never figured Tara to get to the point but there she was. “They liked your resume.”

“That’s a surprise,” I responded.

“Hi, I’m home too,” Erik butted in.

“Don’t worry, this won’t take too long,” she reassured Erik. “So anyway, they need you to do this IQ assessment.”

“That’s demoralizing.”

“I’ll pretend I didn’t hear you put yourself down,” she quickly quipped.

I set up my laptop since she told me that the test was obviously online. It was one of those word association tests. Maybe the point was to see how quick I responded, or to see if my responses were office friendly, which I know I’ll have a problem with.

“Compensation,” the screen flashed.

“Money.” Damn. ‘Fair’ would have been a good answer too.

“Regret.”

“Rue,” I typed back. Madonna.

“Barn.”

I saw that word and it felt like time stopped.

“Are you ok,” Tara asked, her words like a muffled echo.

My sister Anisa was the birdwatcher in the family. I’d remember when I would go for my own walks and I’d see a black bird with a red stripe, or maybe yellow. She would know what specie it was. She would point our birds, cardinals, blue jays, birds that sports teams either get their names from or not, whenever we’d go for outdoor workouts, whenever we’d plan not to cancel on each other.

Last summer, August exactly, was when she, I, and her boyfriend Bruno would go on hikes every week. Drive up to a trail that she looked up online probably.

During the last Sunday of August, we went somewhere a little west, where the wooded trail ended to make way for a clearing. I can still remember the crunch I can hear when I would step on grass that hasn’t been kissed by rain. Anisa spotted a falcon perched up on a tree. She told us to be careful not to startle it. She wanted to take a picture and I did too. A little bit away from those trees was a barn.

“This is private property,” I said with a little apprehension.

I didn’t want to prove myself right, but I was. I heard something cut through air and Anisa went down. The next was Bruno. I wish it shot me first because now I’d have to run and my running days were over. I tried anyway but it didn’t work, and I felt something on my back that brought me down.

…

I tried sleeping but I couldn’t. After tossing in bed, I just gave up, which is probably a bad idea for someone who has to work early in a few hours. I watched a movie or finished one anyway. The cat was scratching through the door. I was waiting for him to get in. Maybe it was nothing, or something else harmless.

I turned on my light and saw a spider’s web. A fly flew in. Half the time, when I clean my apartment, I don’t clean the spiderwebs and this is why. They have a purpose, no matter how dirty and scary they might be.

Seeing the spider took me back to the barn. I expected to be tied up but Anisa, Bruno, and I were just sitting there, as if we were voluntary visitors to a person we’ve never met. Nothing was on my mind, not the job I used to have that I had to go to the day after.

“You’re probably thinking about taking a picture of me, but you won’t,” a deep voice said from a corner in the barn. Female, but deep. She was speaking to Anisa, who was catatonic through all of this Maybe it was shock. Had her senses kicked in, she wouldn’t be sitting on the floor next to pigs. She and Bruno were clean freaks. I would have been the only person who didn’t mind sitting down here.

“Even if you will,” the voice continued, “the moment you leave you’ll look at my picture and think ‘Why did I take a picture of a spider’ and delete the picture. You’d rather keep the ones showing trees and more trees and maybe a few that you took of my friend here.” The spider nudged her head to the left to where the falcon was, sitting stoically on one of the old barn’s beams. “Call me Charlotte. Weeks here last for days in the outside world. You will forget all of this.”

“Why are we here,” Anisa finally asked, those four words sounding groggy.

“You took an adventure, and I am here to give you some rest.”

Bruno, suddenly, started curling up and crying. The pigs didn’t react.

“He’ll be ok I promise you that,” Charlotte reassured us.

“I don’t believe you.”

“That’s really impolite. I’d punish you or make you leave but I’m too good of a host to do that.”

“You still didn’t… I was going to repeat my question but then I’d probably get a vague answer again.” Holy shit she’s going to piss the spider off.

And that’s all I remembered before snapping back into the present. I went out to go to the bathroom and came back. I swear to God I cleaned this floor yesterday, but I felt little dirt pebbles, like bugs under my feet. It never ends, it reproduces whatever it is, giving reminders even if I’m already far away and what’s past is past. It just digs on your skin, piece by piece.

…

I began a Facebook messenger chat with Anisa.

Me: Sorry I can’t make it. Too wiped after work. Tuesday?

Anisa: No problem. Let’s try next weekend.

Me: Ok.

Anisa: Enjoy your weekend.

Me: :)

Anisa: Can’t wait. Our vacation in two weeks can’t be sooner. It’s been a while since we left the city.

Me: Speaking of, do you remember anything that happened when we went on that trip last summer?

Anisa: No, I don’t know what you’re talking about.

Me: Ok.

She’s normally the caller out of the two of us. There’s a part of me that was happy that she didn’t call, because she would have busted me in that the reason I didn’t want to go is because Erik poured me a glass of rose after work. Can’t drink and work out at the same time. Not anymore. But I also wanted her to call. I couldn’t gauge her response when she said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” It feels like she’s avoiding the topic, just by the words. I just let it go though, I didn’t wanna fight.

My memory’s just as hazy. It’s not as breezy as it is now but it wasn’t as hot, I don’t remember. There was a lot more light coming through though, as if the second level had enough windows sawed out. Or maybe the door was open, and we still didn’t leave.

I’m not really wiped, of course, just scared of what my body will do if I do anything heavier than sitting on the couch and waiting for the roommates to make food plans. It’s been a while since I had a short day at my new job, when I could turn on a movie and relax. And of course the movie I chose was about people during a hotter summer and doing nothing. A luxury.

My roommate’s cat is sitting on top of an ottoman, ignoring me. She’s not like those animals last summer, who were more hands on. I don’t even remember if we ate, but Bruno got his energy back. I could hear the river nearby, as if it was close to the barn, rumbling.

I fed the cat. It was the only way to get it to pay attention to me. I always expect him to speak like the animals from last summer, but he never does.

“You can leave, but only for a day, come back before nightfall, you’d be smart enough to do so,” the spider said, and we followed.

Instead of dried grass and hay we walked out onto a field of sunflowers. Some of the animals followed us, as if they wanted to play. And we did. Just running around like kids. Further out were flowers with more different colors. I picked a pink one and smelled it, and a pig followed me.

“That flower is pinker than my skin!”

And just like that, the sun started to set, and we knew what to do.

…

Insomnia is a problem tonight. I’m a little bit hungry and thirsty. The little bit of room temperature beer that Erik poured me didn’t do the trick. Why would it? Not a lot of energy but I’m not tired.

There’s a machine that’s whirring outside but I can’t tell what it is. It’s kind of like the sounds near the barn.

I slept on the second level. They let us humans up there. I looked out the window.

“It’s a farm, what do you expect? The work never stops,” the spider whispered. “They’ll never touch us though, don’t worry.”

…

The curtains I have feel heavier than they are. There’s a part of me that wanted to open them but what will that do? It will only show the same view that I never look at.

I don’t remember how we got out of there. It was an afternoon as dark as this one. The spider told us to go to sleep, so we did. Anisa and Bruno was on the ground level with the pigs, cleaner than they were days before. I was on the second level. I had no idea why I got that privilege; it didn’t feel like one.

They told us to go to sleep and we did. A second later we woke up standing outside the bard. Way outside, next to the tree where the falcon was perched. We all walked back to the proper trail.

“Are you guys ok,” I asked both. They said yes as if nothing happened.

The dark and hot day turned milder and sunny. A breeze hits the trees next to my balcony. My TV on a state between on and off, showing pictures of the animals. Yes I did take pictures of some of them, but they look normal, even though I don’t know what that word means anymore.