ladyfirestarter (
ladyfirestarter) wrote2007-03-07 11:42 am
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
(no subject)
March 7, 2007
11:42am
Almost everyone thought the woman and the girl were mother and daughter.
For the second time in a week, Charlie stands looking at the little sculpture of the turtle at Dag Hammarskjold Plaza. This time she has company.
The note is gone, Charlie notices absently, but some wag has pasted a series of stickers along the length of the nearby walk, in the style of the old Burma Shave ads: SEE THE TURTLE / OF ENORMOUS GIRTH / ON HIS SHELL / HE HOLDS THE EARTH.
"It's from a book," is all she says to Bev's quizzical glance at her when she smiles at the rhyme.
11:42am
For the second time in a week, Charlie stands looking at the little sculpture of the turtle at Dag Hammarskjold Plaza. This time she has company.
The note is gone, Charlie notices absently, but some wag has pasted a series of stickers along the length of the nearby walk, in the style of the old Burma Shave ads: SEE THE TURTLE / OF ENORMOUS GIRTH / ON HIS SHELL / HE HOLDS THE EARTH.
"It's from a book," is all she says to Bev's quizzical glance at her when she smiles at the rhyme.
no subject
--only what comes out of her mouth is, "The Turtle couldn't help us."
She stands there for a moment, and then, just as unexpectedly, bursts into tears.
no subject
Charlie reaches out, puts her arms around the girl's shaking shoulders.
no subject
In the end, she gives up and just leans against Charlie, one hand covering her face.
no subject
Her hand moves in a soothing circle on Bev's back. After a moment, she steers her gently towards the nearby park bench.
"It's all right, Bev."
no subject
Bev's more under control now, though her shoulders still shake occasionally.
"How many more things like that are out there? And--that thing I just said about the turtle--I don't even know where it came from, really, but I think I know what it means. It means we have to face them alone, doesn't it?"
no subject
"But we weren't alone."
She squeezes Bev's shoulder.
"We were together."
no subject
"It still almost got us."
With the rush of adrenaline faded, the fact that they got it instead seems less of a comfort than it did in the room.
no subject
"Probably would have gotten me, if I'd tried to tackle it alone."
no subject
"I--I guess I'm glad I was there, then."
no subject
A short silence. The breeze picks up -- it's ridiculously warm for this time of year, a false early spring that'll be covered in snow again before the month is out.
"Little less glad about what helping me might have taken out of you."
no subject
"And...is wasn't your fault I was there."
no subject
She meets Bev's eyes directly. "But that was pretty hellish, and I don't think any of us are okay yet."
no subject
no subject
"Some time, and maybe some help. That's why we're here."
no subject
"Yeah? What's here?"
no subject
She sits forward, preparatory to standing up. "Need another minute, or are you okay for now?"
no subject
"I'm okay."
no subject
"See the TURTLE of enormous girth," she quotes softly;
"On his shell he holds the Earth.
His thought is slow but always kind;
He holds us all within his mind.
On his back all vows are made;
He sees the truth but mayn't aid.
He loves the land and loves the sea,
And even loves a child like me."
A pause, and she holds out her hand to Bev.
no subject
(he sees the truth but mayn't aid)
When she puts her hand in Charlie's, her expression is thoughtful.
"That's...you said it was from a book?"
no subject
no subject
no subject
"That does sound a lot like the turtle in the rhyme, doesn't it? Things echo, sometimes."
Charlie reaches to open the door, and holds it open.
no subject
Bev steps inside, and--
Oh.
She's been inside places that felt wrong before. Fundamentally wrong in ways she couldn't explain, but couldn't help feeling.
She's never been in any place that had an equally deep, unexplainable sense of rightness.
Until now.
no subject
Sun pours through the high windows, filling the lobby with delicately slanting light. The floor is tiled in pink marble, everywhere except at the very center.
A square of plain earth, surrounded by velvet ropes strung between chrome stands. A few dwarf palm trees, and some ferns ...
And in the middle, by itself, the rose.
no subject
And for a moment, that's all.
no subject
She doesn't speak for a long moment, and when she does, her voice is hushed.
"This is--"
(everything)
"--a lot more than just a rose, isn't it?"
no subject
Charlie stands as she did the day before yesterday, one hand lightly closed on the velvet rope, the other still holding Bev's.
A condition of complete simplicity
(Costing not less than everything)
"Everything," she says, her voice as hushed as the girl's.
And all shall be well and
All manner of thing shall be well
The singing rises around them, welcoming, comforting, affirming, exulting; it is the song of the world, of all worlds, the song of life aware of itself and rejoicing in the awareness.
When the tongues of flame are in-folded
Into the crowned knot of fire
I exist, it says. I am what I am.
And the fire and the rose are one.
"It's everything."
no subject
GIVEN BY THE TET CORPORATION, IN HONOR OF EDWARD CANTOR DEAN AND JOHN 'JAKE CHAMBERS. GOOD OVER EVIL, THIS IS EVER THE WILL OF GOD.
One of the names catches at her memory, but she can't place it--and in the presence of the Rose, she's not inclined to puzzle over it, not inclined to do much besides stand here and drink in the sound of the song.
Her vision is blurry with tears again, but tears of a very different kind--and then she shuts her eyes, and it doesn't matter.
"Thank you," she whispers, and isn't sure if it's to Charlie or the Rose itself, or both.