MEIKA I

There is such beauty in the search for a greater reality. After nearly five years my work produces results. I know this because they send her.

She is introduced by silence. No words from Mother and Father. (Which is no introduction at all.) Months since they last spoke to me. They could only criticise or complain. But they cannot do this here. They might be noticed. Even if only by me. All this time of secrets has passed. They can’t confide in anyone, not even me. Maybe they think I will forget everything. Stop my work and join their conspiracy. They wanted me to come out once. That time is long gone. Too many absent seconds passed. Long afraid that I won’t leave my room. Their greatest fear now is that I will. This makes her arrival very puzzling. Surely they can’t have approached her? But she couldn’t find me on her own. Unless the neighbours know. But they can’t. I would have heard their thoughts. I read the clean thoughts of my parents. Baby-changing tables laid bare. The smell of liquid soap and detergent. There is nothing. Perhaps they have stopped thinking about everything. Not just me.

She is different. She wears pink and white striped socks. They are puffy like a schoolgirl’s. She has small feet. She must have poor balance. She skips down the hall. She steps on two of the footprints. She doesn’t seem to care. A musical knock radiates cute through the wood. I despise her instantly.
“Masa-kun!”
“Masa-kun!”
“Masa-kun!”
“Masa-kun!”
Voice somewhere between a squeak and a squelch. It bounces while it lingers. Echoes around my walls. Ichi, ni, san, yon. The tetra forest absorbs it. Groups of four are never good luck. Doesn’t she know anything?

“Masa-kun!”

I reach for the hammer. Ready to crush her multi-coloured toes. One more time; just once more. I calculate who this faceless figure is. What she says in her rubber bubble voice. I know who she is. I have seen the newsgroup stories. My world has one link to hers. The glowing screen full of faces unseen. She is here to stop my work. She must be from Newstart. It fought every obstacle just to exist. Only then could it begin its work. Helping people who don’t want to be helped. Getting no help from anyone else. Hard to fight a problem that doesn’t exist. Evidence of a problem proves a fault. A fault demands that responsibility be claimed. Public claims lead to public shame. No-one is ready for that. Better to keep the monsters locked away. Hidden within the home, that private prison. Four walls and familiar sounds. The smells you grew up with. The feeling you can’t forget.

I know their brief, know their time frame. If I resist her for eighteen months. If I can. If I am strong enough. I will be free forever. After that she must leave. Must trampoline away into anywhere but outside here. Finally, I will have peace. I don’t know how many have held out. Eighteen months doesn’t seem so long. I have been here three times that already. But Mother and Father gave up after days. Imprisoned in their resignation. They were amateurs at best. Two broken toes and their fight vanished. So did their son.

She is not the one I expected. Maybe I haven’t been here long enough. Not to deserve a true opponent. She sounds new. Must be. Is. She should be middle-aged and sour-faced. Definitely world-weary but with a good heart. She should be the teacher; social worker; parent. You see them in American movies. The ones who use tough love to save. She should wear a jersey or a cardigan. They make you feel at ease that way. She should have labourer’s hands. Five-fingered mementoes of a difficult but rewarding life. She should not be attractive at all. Not even remotely. Isolated young men have very vivid imaginations. I thought about her breasts first. Flat or round. Hanging or squashed across her chest. Just another way to tempt me out. No curiosity can overcome my reasons for staying. Breasts are not a sign of society learning. More the roots of problems, reasons for yearning. This is why breasts are over the heart. No man can ever see what you really think. Two many distractions in the way. Who chooses to look into the heart? To look down a sewer in open fields? No-one visits zoos to see vets.

I stand up as quietly as I can. She cannot know I can hear her. Let her think I am sleeping, dying, dead. I don’t need to be saved. There is silence through the door. I have not heard her move. She must be standing outside. Waiting for a grunt, word, or escaping breath. We do not have a relationship. She will get none of these. I concentrate on her thoughts. There is nothing. I focus my mind. Willing the receptors to find every scrap. Collect the information she is emitting.