Read The house at the edge of time Page 6


  It follows me without contradicting. My enterprise in the abandoned house has made me earn points in classification. We follow a shortcut that cuts in two the green of the country among the valleys, while I enjoy me my moment. In distance I already see the house-train. I am very satisfied of my choice. It is an astute and fast road. I don't understand because grandmother doesn't want that I/you/he/she pass of here.

  We are almost on the platform when the bike skids on something of smooth and muddy. I try to pedal, but the wheel is as inserted. I put down an earth foot and lunge up to half calf. Mud. I rotate the head. Lawrence is of me behind in the same condition. We wag there in the mud, to work, we push the bikes out of the slush. We reach the house-train with the legs marroncine and the wheels that don't turn anymore.

  Grandmother looks us arrive shaking plain the head. Lawrence directly spins in his/her wagon and grandmother he doesn't remind me that you/he/she had already told me not to take that road; it doesn't need to add other to make me feel a small child that as it stirs it makes pies. With patience, it starts cleaning the rays of the wheels. I would want to tell her of the man that resembled to an Ugly Dream, but I am not able because I should also admit that I/you/they have been in the abandoned house and you/they have told them me thousand times not to go us for that history of the tiles that you/they fall you above the head.

  Demetrio passes of there with a sneer that twists his lips. Its outline remembers that the man that we have seen on the bank of the abandoned house, but I doesn't say anything. He looks at grandmother that makes up for to my trouble. You informs. Does grandmother tell him, have you seen? It is what happens when one wants to make things that cannot be done.

  Demetrio shakes the head. Stubborn, this ragazzina. Too much. It resembles really to him. When it puts on in head a thing. then he turns verse of me, it laughs with the red gigantic eyes of blood. It says:

  "You like to do to iron arm with the world, eh? You pretend to win, straight. But you must be careful, sooner or later the world will do you her to pay."

  16

  In the afloat house

  In the afloat house, grandfather has built a hot-air balloon. Not a true hot-air balloon. A hot-air balloon-kite.

  For now thing is not understood well it is, but grandfather has explained that when the wind will blow it will inflate his belly as a ball and then it will have the correct form. To make me see steals us inside strong and for an instant the paper opens as a corolla of flower. I laugh and grandfather enjoys my smile without adding nothing. It brings her home to make her/it see. All the passengers of the house-train applaud. Mother places a kiss on his cheek, light as a wing of butterfly. Only grandmother looks at him/it and shakes the head. It keeps on shaving potatoes speaking alone. Stuff from crazy persons, to build kites in a place where it never blows the wind.

  17

  Charles says that perhaps this place

  Charles says that perhaps this place is not good for the wind, but it is good to turn on the thoughts. It says really this way, that the thoughts ignite. As the light bulbs. To turn on a light bulb in a room it he/she takes the dark and this silence, here, for the thoughts, some works as the dark for the light bulb. To one it comes him spontaneous to turn on.

  I take a seat me of side to him. There is so much silence that I feel the noise of the fire of his/her cigarette, when it inhales. We look far, the Great River that loosens him toward the delta and it opens the liquid fingers toward the sea.

  The oblique sun makes to shine the water. Here life flows, it doesn't fry. It is always Charles that tells him/it. Of fry they are only here there the crescentines. You makes economy of the time, from these parts, a lot of respect is had for the hours. And the hours, in change, they become more generous and they flow to the rallentatore.

  To me it is all right. I also tell him/it Charles, that suits me. This way I can have more time to train me and to be ready when the trip of the future will arrive.

  "You cannot be never ready for the future" it shakes the head Charles, while it is blowing away the smoke of the cigarette "because you see, the future, doesn't technically exist. It is to tell her/it all, not even the present.

  I shell the eyes. Does he/she take me around?

  It smiles.

  "You have ever felt to speak of Henri Bergson?"

  I shake the head, this Signor Bersòn I don't have him really ever felt. But you/he/she had to be one smart, from what Charles tells me. It was one who the books wrote on the future, but not as those that the horoscopes compile even if in reality they don't know how to make the forecasts as the shepherdesses that are firm on the shelf of grandmother without ever changing color. The Signor Bersòn, of time, it intended seriously and it said this way, that "the pure present is the elusive progress of the past that makes taking on the future."

  I am not sure to have understood well.

  "It is simple. It is some as with the crescentines" continuous Charles "that once you throw in the hot oil.

  At that time mother passes in bicycle and smiles. He loses the thread.

  "The crescentines" I say, to bring him in mouth the end of the discourse.

  Already, the crescentines. And the Signor Bersòn, also.

  Mother gets further, pedaling the lifts him some in air the skirt. Charles coughs, as if the you/he/she had gone on the wrong side a thought. I beat a hand behind his back, among the shoulder blades. The thought has gone down now for the correct verse, but the same doesn't end to tell me the history.

  18

  It has happened again this morning

  It has happened again this morning. But more serious than the usual one.

  This time is touched to the staircase. I was about to go down to have breakfast, I have still been on the first step half dormant and instead of the usual wood there was a hole. The stair was sunk down, who knows where and who knows because. Done it is that the void had left.

  I have called grandmother from the staircases. I have wakened up all those that you/they still slept. If this time they say that it is normal administration, I have thought, I escape of house. I swear.

  In reality grandmother he is some frightened for the history of the orphan staircase of the step. But it is not so much the lacking stair that worries her/it. You don't think, as me, that there is something of suspect in a step that decides to sink and in the rest of the things that up to yesterday they are behaved as tame animals and then, of point in white, they decide to do for their account. No, she doesn't see in common us nothing among the staircase and the vase of tulips that it makes harakiri or the coffeepot that it bleeds. What has frightened her is the fact that I could fall in the hole. I feel her that it tells the history to Charles. To the neighbors. To his/her sisters in visit.

  "You/he/she must be him disconnected this morning, after we have gone down to have breakfast. We were down all except the child. If it is aware of it her. If I think that you/he/she could fall, to leave us a leg, an arm and who knows thing other.

  No, I say: the adults think that noialtri we are stupid. To fall in the hole? But if I am the only one that if is aware of it! They have probably passed there above without not even seeing him/it.

  "But you are not you of it aware? Have not you felt any noise?Charles " asks, the neighbors and the sisters of grandmother ask.

  But the adults don't see and they never feel anything.

  "The child" grandmother repeats, squadernandosi the hands on does her/it "if you/he/she is aware of it her. Do you imagine him/it to you? And you/he/she could fall, to break a leg, an arm and who knows thing other.

  Luckily mother has returned today in the city to pay the bills of the light and to make a lot of other things that I don't remember me. There is not however, otherwise you/he/she would also have suffocated me her with his/her anxiety.

  A friend of grandmother that mends the things has come. In reality it is one that has down a shop in country where he/she sells some everything, toys, pens, pencils, paper, stuff for th
e house, but to lost time it also repairs the things of the others. You/he/she has trafficked the whole morning without combining nothing, then you/he/she has said that it went to call his/her child that it understood more of it.

  For the whole day you/they have not made me climb alone, because they were afraid that I/you fell in the hole that I was the only one to have seen. If I wanted to go than above, I had to call one of the great ones that it accompanied me. I don't understand because at times they say that I am already great and others, instead, that am still small. Meanwhile I don't understand as one can be great one day and small the day later I/you had even eaten the mushroom of Alice. And then, in the change, because I must always put again us? For example, because I am already enough great to wash the dishes, but I am not him/it enough to know what the mother policemen want? Also yesterday their car has stamped on the gravel of the avenue. You/they have delivered her some papers, that she has inserted in the usual yellow envelope. When I try to touch the matter, grandmother ago the catacomb. It puts on to fumble with ladles and knives, it says that I must not hinder me any things of the great ones, because they are too much great for me. I could stumble there above and to fall.

  "Who doesn't run away from the abyss, the abyss if he/she picks him/it up.

  Me grandmother's proverbs some times really I don't understand them. However toward evening the history of the staircase started to become boring. To the five grandmother you/he/she has given a dreadful push with the elbow against the handrail while it was helping me to climb. To the seven grandfather you/he/she has risked to slip, you/he/she has beaten the rotula against the wall and the skin you/he/she has become him all viola. Grandmother has given me a plastic pouch full of ice to be put above his knee and then has begun to say that it is always the usual one, that cannot be trusted him. They have started discussing, mother is also inserted, of return from his/her bills. I have also had the right to his/her ration of worries, doubled by the distance. I have asked if I could restart to go than above alone. Mother has done a whole matter of it, you/he/she has said she doesn't speak. You/they have discussed for mezz'ora, but at the end you/he/she has said of yes. You always do this way. Dad said that you/he/she was an experienced in to dramatize everything in to complicate the things. It said that he/she worked secretly for the CAS, the office Complication Simple Business.

  This evening I have the right to a kiss and the I turn up some sheets. I have the right to the attentions of everybody, considering that according to them I have risked seriously to fall in the hole of the staircase. I also have the right not to be stung by the mosquitos and to make some beautiful dream, believes. Domattina, before still that you wake up me, the friend of grandmother and his/her child will systematize the staircase. You/they have promised him.

  After mother has gone out, dò a last glance around I examine the territory of the dark to verify me, that every thing is to its place, that is not any other besides me and to my shade in the room. It is to the hole of the lock, that keeps on spying us both in silence.

  I close the eyes.

  Good night, world. Who knows if for a night I can trust you. Who knows as you will be tomorrow. Who knows if everybody the steps will be indeed to their place to my awakening. The odor of mother, that you/he/she has remained in the air breathe. Who knows if he/she works indeed for the CAS. And if instead he/she worked for the CIA? The CIA, certain. This would explain all that coming and going of yellow envelopes; there could be inside of the reserved information. Reserved. I slip in the drowsiness, where I meet mother dressed by secret agent with the overcoat and the newspaper. Those of the CIA must have knows that it knows Lieutenant Christopher Columbus strategy.

  Who knows that odor has the woman with which alive now dad. Who knows as it is, I think, while I am being about to put to sleep seriously me. You/he/she must be one who he/she works for the KGB, sure. Or perhaps for the SAC, the office Simplification Complex Business.

  I fall asleep me dreaming a staircase to pegs that it departs from the windowsill of my window. I begin to climb. I climb and I climb, but he never arrives from any part. They miss some steps. Above of I don't see anything. Only clouds and nothing. I stay me. I look down. In low there is Charles of shoulders that holds for hand Lawrence. When they turn him to greet me, Charles it is not Charles anymore. It has does her/it of dad. And also Lawrence doesn't seem Lawrence. I almost seem. me. Feeling to see out myself from, but one myself different. One myself that I have never seen. I decide to go down. I call dad but him him you/he/she is already getting further, greeting with the hand. I shout him to wait. I go down more in hurry, but they miss some steps. More I draw near me, more they miss some steps. It is this way.

  More I draw near me, more they miss some steps.

  19

  Charles has sat next to the house-train

  Charles has sat next to the house-train, a book in hand. It seems a traveller that waits for the whistle of the departure, the suitcase misses only him. To think well of us, Charles almost always holds a book. I am sure that he/she catches the train to read a book instead of taking a book to read in train. Ours, is however a train that never departs.

  Lawrence and I play to A, two, three. adorns with stars! in the courtyard. But Lawrence cheats. It says that you/he/she has not stirred, but it has the cunning calves that tremble still. If it is even that pigrona of Pralina aware of it, always busy to sleep. To the third time I grow weary me, I declare that I don't play anymore and I take a seat me to cross braccia on the platform of the house together with Charles. I look what he/she reads. He realizes, and pretending of nothing gives me the open book.

  It is the history of one that looked a lot at the stars and that you/he/she was perhaps fallen in love of a certain Silvia, but it is not well clear if this Silvia existed really.

  Charles asks if I have ever read that history, that is all writing with some short sentences that return back to every line and therefore you/he/she is a poetry. I do of no with the head. He/she asks me what we read to school. I tell him that a book we have that calls anthology and that anybody doesn't like it, because the histories are all reported ones to pezzettini, and if it likes one you never succeed in knowing of it how it will go to end.

  Charles smiles, you/he/she says that anthology comes from the Greek word anthos, that means "flower." There that book is a harvest of flowers, for that there are not all the histories from the beginning at the end, they put only us the flowers, that are the most beautiful parts. I make a grimace. I tell Charles that to me it doesn't interest to read only the flowers, I want to take me the whole history, with the weeds and the thorns and the whole rest.

  He smiles for the second time, he/she asks me if to school we have ever read a whole book, from the beginning at the end. I think it some. We have a book that the teachers call "of fiction" and that he/she speaks of a certain wall that is fallen in the capital of Germany that is Berlin, but that up to a year ago it was another city that I don't remember me as it calls. The book I remember him/it instead to me, it calls Wall on the heart. Charles asks if I like. I shake the head. He/she asks me if I have ever read the poetries of that gentleman that it looked a lot at the stars. I make sign of no and he responds that then I can hold the book. Was not you/he/she reading him/it him? It smiles for the third time, it says that he has already read him and it is correct that I pick him/it up.

  In the time of the siesta I climb me on the bed to castle together with the book that Charles has given me. I look him/it before and back before opening him/it. Before you/he/she is written Works there. There is back a portrait. It is a gentleman with the sweet look and some undecided, strangled by a blue jacket all stiff, with the starched white collar and a black cravattino. It seems really that he doesn't like that suits, that suffocate us inside. Its eyes shout "freed me!".

  I read some and I understand better this gentleman strangled by the blue jacket. It was a so good that was enough for him to lean out to the window to make two chatters with the stars of t
he Orsa. So good that was enough him to sit behind a hedge to sail in the sea of the endless one. It was one whom seemed that he liked on Saturdays in the villages, but then he discovered that he didn't like at all because they didn't keep the promises. It was one that to see had him/it the hump and the occhialinis, but under to that disguise it was an adventurer that had traveled for all the countries of the human mind and also more in there.

  I get up me from the bed together with the book. I look out of the window, I also see me gardens and greens sod, but for the stars it is soon still. I will look again at this night.

  I go out with the images of the gentleman with the blue jacket engraved in the mind. Lawrence asks me to play to hide-and-seek. I say of yes mechanically. From great I will be as that gentleman, I think, while Lawrence hides. I will have stars with which to speak from the window and a hump for disguise. I finish counting. I begin to look for Lawrence, but I am so busy to think about the sentences of the gentleman with the blue jacket that he slinks away behind me in hurry and it immediately says:

  "Den for me!"

  To say, to do, to kiss, letter, will. Lawrence, that doesn't know yet that from great I will become Giacomo Leopardi, it chooses the penitence to make me do. Who knows because it has a weak for the number three. Yesterday you/he/she has made me kiss for earth. Twice, because the first one had not seen well. Today he/she wanted to make me kiss a certain frog that has captured down to the river and that it holds imprisoned in a pillbox of cardboard with some holes to make her/it breathe. At all we are in one of those fables that grandfather tells, that then the frog becomes all of a sudden prince. Then he/she kisses a fish-cat. I have shaken the head.

  "Then you go to kiss the gypsy that walks down to head."

  I have pushed the eyes after the train of the house, after the garden, up to the trailers. Mujo there was not.

  "There is not" I have said. And I have been sorry some.

  20

  One could think that