I need a haircut. Only now do I come to think of it. I'm not sure of how much time has passed since I began staring at the dusty, abandoned spiderweb that lingers in an almost unapproachable corner of my room. I've tried to clean it off several times in the past, but for some reason, I never really intend to do so in the first place. I'm actually quite fond of it. At the same I feel ashamed at the thought of someone walking into my room, crossing his arms behind his back, with a grim gesture on his face, to squint up the cracks in the walls right into my filthy spiderweb. Still, I remember that's impossible. There is no person in this world who may feel the curiosity to ponder on the exact nature and contents of my room. I'm not quite sure if I should feel comforted over this.
I've lived alone in this room for such a long period of time my memories have become mere pencil drawings, weary and faded sketches of shapes I no longer recognize; they have become pages of an orphaned book transcribed with symbols of lost meaning. I am not an amnesiac. I know who I am and where I was born; I remember the house in which I spent my childhood and could even describe what my father was wearing on the evening of my ninth birthday; I remember moonlit nights of wandering the streets of the city with the heat of early manhood at heart and have no doubts as to why I isolated myself in this hot and humid corner of the country. Nevertheless, every single thing about my past tastes like a lie to me, everything down to the day I arrived to this room under the stairway. All the memories I hold seem irrationally foreign to me, distant and devoid of any value I could relate to; they seem lurid and inconsequential like, may I say? Dreams.
Today is a windy day; the large curtain that acts as a door for my room blows back and forth like an enormous, dusty lung. My bed remains with its covers stretched across its corners yet disturbed by the weight of my sitting body. I've turned on the fan up to its maximum level but it hardly helps at all; I can feel my nose dripping with sweat. My hands appear to take a life of their own when I'm not paying attention to them as I suddenly recognize the smooth texture of the metal headboard behind me. They now climb up and down the headboard's decorative patterns while I imagine walking blindly through a small area of an alien territory. I playfully fancy the idea of exploring it beyond my arms' length like one would in wakeful little dream, in a resting stroll! I rest and yet I'm not sure if I could explain what exactly it is I'm resting from. My hands now walk up my neck to my head. Here, I would not be able to see anything even if I wanted to. I encounter small crevices across this phrenological landscape and gather the sands leftover from my swim in the sea yesterday. My hair could use another shower, and a haircut. It may now be too late for the latter.
This weariness that I feel is no better reflected than in my thirst, work last night was particularly strenuous. I open the refrigerator and suddenly remember I didn't buy that gallon of milk after all. All comes to mind again. I hope I can forget today's incident soon, or a the very least, to take the image of those giant eyes away from my mind.
It is expected that accidents may occur in this line of work from time to time, but not once in all my time carrying this duty did I ever imagine the misfortune of finding myself in a situation like that of this morning.
I walked to the grocery store out of routine more than anything else. Such visits help me cope with my painfully tedious mornings. Besides, there is always something missing at home. Many times in the past I have craved a certain fruit late at night. I once looked desperately through the kitchen fruit bowl for just one grape in between oranges, bananas, pears, plums... All good fruit but not quite being the one fruit a whispering, yet assertive voice in the back of my head demanded. And so I like to have as many different types of fruit at home as possible.
This morning, the fruit in need was strawberries. I took my time picking twenty strawberries, one by one with great attention to detail, patiently analyzing each fruit in search of flaws and deformities as if I was a man with more time in his hands than all the immortal trees that thrive in secluded, overlooked areas of the world through long, indistinguishable ages. My mind certainly wanders performing such actions.
Then it occurred. A little girl's voice rose above the morning noise of faceless costumers, I could almost feel her pointing finger piercing my back. “It's him, Mommy! It's him! The man with the big spoon!” I couldn't believe it, or rather didn't want to believe it. I had certainly made a mistake, but what were the chances of it coming back to haunt me the next day? How small is the world? Then I saw her eyes again, her enormous, pitch-black eyes. And just like the first time, I felt as if something inside of me had been exposed, as if a fragile and unknown organ had been sucked out of me with its nerve endings still attached, feeling the wind and the light of day rushing against it, trembling and turning pale as my tormentor refused to cut it off once and for all.
If I had carried out my work faster, this may have never happened. Her dream was a day in the playground at a park. Many children played and ran around, their faces were very well detailed for a six-year old girl's imagination. The day was bright, maybe too bright. There was a pink slide in the corner of the playground that was unusually long, in fact it drifted off beyond my sight. That seemed like a nice lead. I followed it across the park as it went up and down the hills until it reached a big lake in the distance. I don't go to many parks, but that park was definitely no memory of any place around here. Just as I thought, she stood at the end of the giant slide near the water. She was facing the lake as she played with what seemed to be some kind of sand, pouring it from one hand to the other with an almost mechanical precision. Not one grain of sand seemed to fall out of place even though a wind blew steering the maddened waves crashing at her feet.
I stood a few steps away from her. I normally stand directly behind my victim but the slide was on the way and stepping on it would have definitely made my presence known. Everything was set in an instant and I was ready to carry forth what seemed to be an easy and uncommon assignment. She stood within a bubble. Even her long, black hair lay untouched and unaware of the rampant, and erratic movements of the universe. I restrained myself from enviously whispering a word of advice as I raised my scythe.
Just then, she turned around.
I finally understood the one rule that applies to my job. It is a simple rule: Never let the dreamer look at you in the eyes. I had always wondered what was the purpose in that. No matter how shocking a dream may be, it remains a dream. Finding someone in real life whom you previously met in a dream can't be much of a shock anyway. But the truth is the rule doesn't exist to protect the person having the dream as much as it does to protect the one who ends it. It wouldn't surprise me if they told me eyelids exist for a similar reason. Her eyes were neither asleep or awake; they were dark and empty, and inspired within me a dread not unlike the one a child may feel in a room in the middle of the night, the primal anxiety caused by things one can't even imagine. I was a child right then, a child with a fishing rod pressured into disturbing the waters of sleep. It was really only a matter of time before something bit. I stood barefoot upon the rocky shore with my catch before me. Her fish eyes looked looked in every direction simultaneously, but they seemed to look at me with a particular expression. This great, ancient fish lay away from the water in infernal impatience, questioning me disdainfully. A mere child had dragged it away from the depths, no fisherman but a child that didn't have the courage to finish what he started. Look at him! He trembles just at the thought of touching the fish! He will neither return it to the water nor pierce the catch-rope through its jaw. He will remain in this shore forevermore, and the snails will gnaw at his flesh slowly until he disappears.
My scythe lay on the ground, drenched in blue as everything dissolved. If only I could have ended it all at the grocery store the same way I ended her dream... ¨It's him, Mommy! The man with the big spoon! ¨ She kept repeating the same thing over and over again. I couldn't take it anymore, so I left the store feeling a strange sense of shame. But what did she mean by spoon? She must have seen it that way. Her parents kept laughing at their cute, little inside-joke. She must have told them. A man with a giant spoon, that really does sound like a ridiculous idea.
I close the refrigerator door, some water should be more than enough. My hands keep going through my hair, I think I'll take that shower. I walk back into my room and pick up my towel hanging in my closet, it's still wet. I keep thinking of a spoon, but why? My scythe lays wrapped in bag underneath my bed, it's been there since the day it was given to me. I've never felt the need to look at it. The bag holds a different shape than what I remembered. Suddenly, I can't picture in my mind how my scythe actually looks. How can I be troubled by this? How little do I know? I have nothing to lose by opening the bag.
If only I could laugh... It is a spoon!
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