sanama

In the distance Geno saw a silhouette walking down the deserted street. They moved with a purpose, with steps measured and deliberate.  The clothes they wore were like a badge of honor from a lost war. As they drew closer, it became clear that they were reciting something under their breath, their words flowing like the #2CFA1F river next to Geno.

The figure stopped in front of a crumbling building and looked up at the sky. Their voice filled the air with decaying verses about the losses they had experienced, and the vita, which had let them thrive like the tobacco fields, that were wasted and burnt to the ground because someone thought the land needed to be saved from monoculture.

As the recitation was over, Geno offered the figure a copper coin and one of the last mint drops. The figure turned their back on Geno, disappeared. Their words lingered like a metallic nausea, a sole proof of their existence. Geno crossed the street, entering into the insurance building. 

”Fellow G. Haptic, please reveal yourself.” Geno promised themselves not to get startled by the manner they were treated by the servants. As they sat down in front of the desk on the opposite side of the servant, Geno couldn’t help staring at the #7A1F3D Calathea, which they thought was planted in a pot way too large for its size. For them it seemed, that for the three times they had been coming there, the pot for that tiny plant has gotten bigger and bigger. The servant observed Geno caringly.

”Fellow G. Haptic, what lies so heavy on your mind, what makes your eyes hazy, what your mind thunder?”

”The letters just won’t end, recently the company empoyees came over and handed me a pile. Personally.”

”Yes my dear, the style in them certainly has matured.”

”I mean, that’s not the problem. The problem —”

Geno got distracted by the sudden crescendo of screeching chairs in the large room. Usually they had been taking care of such matters right after the sun coming out in order to avoid sudden changes in social situations. Now they saw the masses rushing out, however without a hint of horror on their face. Before they could realize it, Geno got dragged out of their chair by the #F2ECD2 collar of their shirt. 

An unexpected feeling of anger mixed with a surprising anxiety of getting hit by a bullet train from behind, although one hadn’t yet come up with any justification for all the duration spent waking up in the midst of anthropocene. ”Your hands better not leave any stains on my shirt. This is the only 244 GSM shirt I own and since it’s impossible to grow cotton here, I don’t see myself getting a new one in the near future.” The expression on the face of the newly found acquaintance didn’t change, yet Geno noticed, that the pace of their steps changed from 84 BPM to 88 BPM.

The large crowd packed itself inside of an area, that was according to Geno about 148 meters long and 59 meters wide. The formation lasted about the duration of 2,5 average Üekersleed state weather reports, if the municipal of Cravento wasn’t counted in. Geno had never been in Cravento and wasn’t able to form an image of its inhabitants, since the vehicles of public transportation driving to that area would always leave and return without passengers.

As the partial solar eclipse began to clear, the crowd slowly started moving along the borders of sun and shadow. Geno kept thinking about how from the revenue’s point of view, living according to the solar movements would be a waste of labour time. In their previous life they would join in demonstrations and strikes demanding a change to the system but during the countless drunk nights they spent imagining another form for a society, their utopies would never reach anywhere near to Üekersleed’s reality.

The servant of the company approached Geno attempting to get their attention with a long stare directed on Geno’s neck. ”Fellow G. Haptic! The collected works of our company will soon be brought to your abode. Think of them— as recipes for the summer, as nothing more than a dish of ceviche on a sultry afternoon in July.” Geno walked after the crowd ignoring the outside, in a haze, reminding someone, who had begun to loop one moment of their life.

A vehicle sliding in the dark like it would have found an exit from a game, directionless. ”For now it’s just vast space. No more distances.”

Too much water, Geno thought. The plant had got too much water. Now the pot covered about one sixth of the servant’s desk. Geno asked themself, why do they always get served by the same person, even though the hall had 41 other workers. 

”Ah, dear fellow G.Haptic! The collections, right?”

”I don’t like ceviche. Fish eat credit cards. Now can you—”

”A remembrance from the past, how would these days of sorrow seem without a portion of nostalgia?”

For a short while, Geno got drifted away to an era, where they used to walk to the lake with their grandfather, taking the withered row boat one constantly needed to empty from water, only to return with a bucket of a few crucian carps, misfits in any recipe. Geno was confused of the contrast between the clarity of the past and the distant present.

”How difficult can it be to organize a health insurance for oneself?” 

The duration of the gatherings had gotten from 2,5 weather reports to 3,2 weather reports, a remnant of changing seasons on Earth. During the gatherings Geno would seek to move as close to the borders as possible in order to examine, what was found outside of them. #000000. Or #FFFFFFF, it didn’t matter. Geno had begun to present gaps in their short term memory, the colors losing their relation to each other. 

For the sake of routine, Geno kept going back to the insurance company. The pot had gotten so huge, that the servant had to move their computer to the floor. Piles of documents remained under the pot because it was too heavy to be moved. Perhaps the servant didn’t have a name. Geno listened to the servant in fragments, drifting between their monologue and their grandfather’s lectures of walnut trees.  Breaking a walnut was an impossible task for Geno, for walnuts never broke evenly and nothing ever broke evenly and every evolution had an abrupt end to it.

”—in March 1883, the final quagga in the zoo and the world, ceased to breathe.”

”—in whispered whispers, tradition commands the walnut tree’s beating, limbs lashed, shedding decayed embrace, urging new growth to bloom.”

The alienation from any stream of events in Geno’s head. Unbreathable fog. A little moment lasted forever and the linear thoughts kept fading away. During those 29 or 43 years they had never had an insurance covering their life. 

Geno was surrounded by a crowd as they came to. The smarting pain in their lower back indicated, that they were dragged on the ground to the gathering. What the crowd feared the most, was leaving someone behind. Geno had forgotten the color code of their shirt. ”How much do these frames actually matter to me?” Geno asked themself. Still dizzy, they stood up and walked outside of the formation as the eyes of the crowd followed them. 

The light of Üekersleed, far and close. Odd nostalgic sentimentality of never being able to return. “Metal creaks,  distant flowers, sitting bones decay. The taste of salt, smell of gasoline, laughter, plastic, tears. Everything is here and nothing at all. A shadow of a shadow, fish, whisper of a whisper, echo of an echo. The world flickers, witness to its fading. A strange kind of beauty, painful, exquisite. Lost in it, drowning. Cannot turn away.”