The Provenance of Monsters Read online

  Chapter 2 – Nourishments…

  Bora moved through the crowded carnival grounds like a snake.

  The boy who stood in line to ride the twirling cups little felt Bora as the ancient man brushed against his back. The girl who clutched her animal-bent balloons didn’t hear Bora as that old man stepped beside her. The young men gathered in the beer garden never noticed the alien, old man who crossed their drinking grounds, and the women who perused the offerings of carnival glass never saw Bora’s reflection in any pitcher or cup. Bora moved so quietly. His form was so slim, and the carousel’s organ played such music to conceal his sound.

  A different nation tempered Bora, and the death so prevalent in that land had turned Bora serpentine.

  Bora had hoped, after so much time, that his heart would’ve at least numbed, if it had not healed, following the passage of so much time. But his heart had done neither. His heart ached further each day, as did the joints within his legs and hips, as did that ruinous molar that screamed such pain in the back of his mouth. They were likely all long dead, yet the faces of those soldiers who marched into his village and murdered his first life remained clear in his memory. The sounds of so much crying and begging never went silent. Bora still saw the colorful ribbons pinned upon the soldiers’ chests, and his feet still felt the wet mud that oozed between his toes as those rifles marched his village into the jungle. He heard the exploding gunfire whenever he closed his eyes, and his old body still shuddered whenever he tried to stand still, as if he time and again relieved the impact of his father, mother and siblings’ bodies falling upon him. The horrors of that night when his first life was murdered never left him, and the pain never left his heart.

  Bora remembered how the dead covered him as the bullets from those soldiers’ rifles somehow missed his muscle and bone. Hundreds of his killed neighbors – poor farmers, or butchers, or the old men who taught children how to plant, or the old women who helped mothers birth their babies – buried Bora’s body, so that their blood stung in his eyes and soured in his mouth. The bodies swallowed him, so that the soldiers couldn’t hear him sob as they prodded the fallen corpses with the hot barrels of their rifles to find what survivors required another bullet to finish the execution of a village the new state believed had been too loyal to the old state. Bora remembered how he had wanted to close his eyes and die. He hadn’t wanted to leave his father, and he couldn’t then imagine living in a world without his mother’s laughter. Bora thought he might only close his eyes and wait to journey into whatever darkness his neighbors already travelled.

  Yet a strange melody of chimes penetrated that body pile to dance in Bora’s ears. He thought of frozen bells, and he crawled out from beneath the dead to investigate the song. An ashen unicorn stood ahead of him. The creature lowered its neck, and Bora saw that its horn was broken, so that a haggard knob was all that rose from the unicorn’s forehead. The unicorn stomped a hoof, and Bora followed it into the thickening jungle, fearful that his next step might toss him into a patrol of soldiers. The trees Bora entered were tighter than any he ever traversed, and he labored to keep the unicorn’s trail. Tendrils and roots clutched at his legs. Tentacles of branches scraped at his face. Shadows were plentiful, and they took ghastly shapes that shook Bora with fear. A low growling noise rumbled from the earth and rose up his feet in each silent beat of that chiming melody. He could no longer tell one direction from another, knew no sense of direction, or of where he was headed. But he pressed forward, his courage each time buoyed by the unicorn, which always waited for Bora to reassemble his bravery before plunging deeper into the trees.

  The unicorn led him into a clearing, and the creature didn’t retreat when Bora extended his hand to stroke the unicorn’s thick mane. Bora felt a warm nose against his face, and the unicorn gently pushed his gaze upon the clearing’s ground. The trees moaned and swayed. The shadows shifted. Roots extended from the surrounding trees and snaked into the center of the clearing like tentacles, twisting together into several sets of hands whose fingers locked tightly together. The unicorn neighed and stomped a hoof, and the risen, root fingers opened to reveal a glowing orb nestled in the center of a wide palm.

  The tentacles slithered around Bora’s feet as he stepped to that knotted, open hand to peer more closely into the illuminated orb. Contained within a swirling, pink fluid, two sets of tiny eyes peered back at him. Two embryos swirled within that bauble’s soup, and Bora turned his confused face back to the unicorn. That creature reared upon its rear legs and shrilled, and somehow, Bora understood that magnificent beast as if the magical creature had spoken the language of his tongue. In a flash, the unicorn told Bora the nature of those young creatures floating within the fluid, that one might break from that egg to grow into a unicorn more magnificent than the one Bora followed, a unicorn whose mane was not yet soiled gray, whose horn would grow whole. In a flash, that unicorn told Bora that the other creature would feed upon fear and hate, so that the hunger of its tentacles multiplied until the beast consumed the world. In a flash, the unicorn told Bora that neither embryo could exist without the other, and that the world of woman and man would decide which creature within that orb would thrive, and which would wither.

  “Ah, poor luck there, Champ! You nearly had it with that last throw! But don’t stop now! Don’t stop when you’re just starting to get the feel of the toss! Put another dollar or two down on the counter, and I’m sure you’ll get that prize after only a few more tries!”

  The vendor’s cry pulled Bora from his trance, and the old man quietly worked his way through the line gathered at the Flukey-Ball game in time to see a young boy dressed in a sleeveless t-shirt and ragged blue jeans slap another five dollar bill upon the vendor’s counter in exchange for five more plastic, wiffle balls. The game’s goal seemed simple – bounce a plastic ball off a slanted board to land it within a wicker basket. A successful toss earned a contestant a blue ticket, and a dozen blue tickets were enough to claim small, stuffed zebras and bears that often impressed young ladies. Most of the boys, however, competed for larger prizes that demanded further tickets: two-piece pool cues, switchblade knives and glimmering whiskey flasks.

  Bora took a keen interest in the conduct of each of the carnival’s games, and Mr. Finnegan relied on him to insure all those contests were fairly conducted. During Bora’s first season at the carnival, that creature in the house of horrors swelled terribly in size after feeding on all the frustration and anger those contestants felt at the gaming tents. Veteran vendors conducted those games during Bora’s first season with Mr. Finnegan, and they practiced all the proven tricks to take dollars from the players while rarely rewarding blue tickets. They bent the barrels to the air rifles so that even the deadliest marksman had little chance to cut the red star out of the piece of paper hanging at the end of the target range. The vendors secretly set a heavy milk bottle in the middle of the others, so that the strongest throws failed to topple every bottle. The vendors welded an extra sixteenth of an inch to the rims of their milk cans, so that the balls danced and bounced upon the cans while so rarely falling within. Mr. Finnegan’s carnival once gave the public far fewer toy giraffes, but Mr. Finnegan couldn’t afford to keep so many cheats when that creature swelled so quickly within his wagon of horrors.

  The tattooed man working the Flukey-Ball game spotted Bora when he appeared at the front of his line of contestants, and he pushed the five dollar bill back towards the boy.

  “You know, champ, sometimes a person’s luck can just turn sour, and there’s nothing anyone can do but take a bit of a break until that cold streak passes. Now that I consider it, I think that maybe your luck’s just turned a little bad here. Maybe you should try a different game, or maybe you should buy some of those red ride tickets so that you can ride the Ferris wheel.”

  Bora pressed the voice box to his throat, and he took the crowd’s attention when his strange accent mumbled through the speaker.

  “Let it play.”

 
; The vendor frowned. “Look, Bora, I don’t want to take advantage of anybody.”

  “Let it play.” Bora’s words crackled out of the box.

  That creature kept in the house of horrors swelled so massive during Bora’s first season at the carnival that Mr. Finnegan agreed to take measures to limit the frustration players felt at the game counters, lest all that anger continue to float into that wagon and add still more mass to the creature moaning inside those walls. Mr. Finnegan fired all the old carnival hands. He removed all the old vendors, whose years on the carnival circuit made them experts on the art of removing young hands from cold cash. Mr. Finnegan replaced his crew with inexperienced hands, hoping he might limit how much frustration floated to that wagon of horrors. Mr. Finnegan hoped that inexperienced vendors would encourage fair play, and Mr. Finnegan cared little how his toy budget ballooned.

  And Mr. Finnegan made Bora his watchdog, trusting his foreign friend to make sure the games played true. Bora was keen, and he learned through observation all the tricks that might me plied to those games of chance. Bora didn’t hesitate to cut any offending vendor his or her last paycheck before leaving the culprit in whatever rural and barren town that carnival had that week called home.

  The Flukey-Ball vendor forced himself to smile. “I’ll tell you what, sport. What would you think if I just gave you a few more balls, free of charge, just for a little more luck? I think I might like to honor the dedication you’ve shown my game tonight.”

  Bora again mumbled through his voice box. “Let it play.”

  Bora’s small, dark eyes didn’t flinch when the vendor shot him an angry glare. Bora carefully considered the game counter. There were not enough cheap, transistor radio key fobs or rubber lizards. The vendor was likely selling his prizes on the side, likely proffering them to the crowds who assembled to watch the county parades that often introduced Mr. Finnegan’s carnival to town. Bora doubted the vendor could’ve harvested much profit through the sale of such cheap souvenirs, certainly not enough reward to justify the dishonesty that would float to that monster kept within that house or horrors. Bora wondered how much new growth that vendor’s scheming would supply to that moaning creature of tentacles and tendrils.

  Bora tensed and watched the game progress. The boy had the right idea. He leaned as far forward as could beyond the counter, and he tossed each ball with a high arc that hit the bottom of the board to improve the chances of that plastic ball settling in the waiting basket. Yet the boy’s luck remained cruel, and each of his first three tosses bounced out of the basket.

  “Wait.” Bora returned the voice box to this throat before the boy had the time to make another toss. “Give him your ball.”

  The vendor rolled his eyes. “Look, Bora, my ball ain’t no different than any of the others.”

  Bora shook his head. “Your ball.”

  Bora doubted anyone in the crowd noticed how that vendor always kept one ball back from all others he handed to his game’s participants. The vendor always made sure to toss that special ball whenever he displayed how easily a player might claim a prize. The vendor’s ball looked no different than the rest, and that boy likely failed to feel how that ball was heavier than the others he had previously cast when the vendor supplied him with that ball before held back.

  Bora nodded when the boy sheepishly glanced at him. “Throw.”

  The crowd applauded when the boy’s next toss proved successful, and Bora gave the vendor credit for clapping his hands together as loudly as anyone else. The vendor’s game was ruined. Everyone would demand to throw that heavier ball, and the vendor would quickly run out of prizes. Bora smiled when the boy chose a plastic seahorse as his prize. He was glad that he intervened. The joy that boy felt would help Marcia’s unicorn, and that joy would force the monster to wither. Bora wasn’t sure he would inform Mr. Finnegan of that vendor’s transgression when he walked away from the game counter. He didn’t know if he could afford the resentment that vendor would surely feed to the monster upon learning that Mr. Finnegan was letting go of his employment. Bora worried that wagon would soon break if the monster fed on much more disappointment. He was in no mood to punish. He preferred to give the joy that boy felt over his win the chance to spread about the fairgrounds.

  Bora continued to drift through the crowd. Much of the Mr. Finnegan’s fairground magic faded in his eyes, but Bora still grinned whenever he approached the carousel’s wooden menagerie. He still paused to listen to the organ music. The lights that twinkled on each animal’s pole still captivated him. The color always whirled in his vision and gave Bora hope that a unicorn might grow instead of a monster. The carousel’s wooden animals always suggested to Bora that it wasn’t so strange to believe in beasts such as unicorns.

  It cost Bora his youth, and the strongest years of his manhood. The endeavor repeatedly placed him in peril, and Bora so often felt that his fate – and the fate of those creatures he carried back from the jungle the night his village was murdered – relied on whim. And somehow, he made it out of that jungle and crossed an ocean to arrive in America, that land of waving grains and majestic mountains. He believed something guided and delivered him, something that prevented those bullets from the soldiers’ rifles from striking him, something that chose him to be the custodian of the monster and the unicorn. He believed that something preserved him, even after the doctors cut the tumor from his throat after so many cartons of cigarettes. Something pushed him ahead, though Bora was tired of nights slept in the scant luxury of ships’ holds and carnival wagons.

  Bora believed in a guiding hand, but he still held doubts that the world would nurture a majestic unicorn. He survived such dangers to arrive in the great America, that nation that knew such comforts. Bora could think of no better land where a unicorn might feel the happiness and peace it required in order to grow into the magical creature capable of healing his heart. Where could jealously thrive in such a kingdom of plenty? How could hatred grow among a people born to such fortune? How could despair clutch to the hearts of a land filled with motor vehicles and brick homes? Bora had believed the unicorn would thrive in such a rich country. He had believed that the monster would shrivel.

  Yet Bora found the opposite to be true. It was the monster, and not the unicorn, that so rapidly swelled in that country of plenty.

  Bora tensed as he neared the food tents located in the center of the fairgrounds. The sound of discontent echoed above the carousel’s organ.

  “You can’t be serious! Five dollars for a slice of lemon thrown on top a plastic cup of ice? It’s outright theft!”

  “I want a funnel cake.”

  “You didn’t eat your meal, Trent. You just can’t eat funnel cakes all day.”

  “All of you are lucky to have anything. The cost of this carnival will bankrupt us if it stays for another week.

  “Don’t play that card, Dan. Don’t take it out on the kids.”

  “I just want ice cream, daddy. I don’t need any of the rides. I only want ice cream.”

  “We all want something, Eve.”

  “Come on. The carnival only comes once a year. The kids deserve it.”

  “Since when do any of us get what we deserve?”

  Bora flinched at the snarl in the father’s voice. Bora knew that monster caged within that wagon of horrors would hear that snarl no matter how loudly the carnival organ played, and Bora knew the monster would grow because of it. That beast was a magnet for every ill thought. That beast required so little effort to thrive. It fed so freely on the hurt, no matter how Bora did his best to seal each of the wagon’s windows and doors. Bora winced as he saw that father tighten his hand into a fist. The father wouldn’t need to lift that hand. The father’s body language was enough to pulsate tension into that monster’s maw. There was always so much food for the monster, and always so little for the unicorn.

  Bora lifted his voice box again to his throat, and the movement attracted the food vendor’s attention. “Free ticket. Charge Finneg
an.”

  The food vendor nodded and hustled back into his wagon to fill paper plates and plastic cups with the family’s order.

  The father peeked timidly at Bora. “Thank you, but I’ve never felt comfortable taking charity.”

  Bora smiled. “You’ve won a prize.”

  The mother tugged at her husband’s arm. “Please, Dan. Just accept it. The children deserve it.”

  “So I’ve won something?” The father asked Bora.

  “A lucky game,” Bora winked.

  The father thus accepted Bora’s gift with little hurt delivered to his pride. Bora thought pride came so easily to the people of that rich country. What did that people truly know of power and suffering? Who among them had been buried beneath the bodies of family? What did any of them know of shame? What did they know of fear? Bora took a breath and chased the negativity from his mind. He couldn’t linger on his resentments, and risk further feeding that monster with any spiteful words that might escape his mouth. The funnel cakes and ice cream arrived quickly, and the children laughed to receive them. Their mother’s eyes sparkled. Even their father smiled. Bora would stop every ride and silence all the music if he had the authority to do so, if clearing the air might help that family’s happiness reach the little horse that Mr. Finnegan’s daughter, Marcia, tried so hard to nourish. The monster grew so large, and the unicorn remained so small.

  Bora ordered several bags of caramel popcorn and a pair of sticks topped with blooms of purple and pink cotton candy. He ordered the largest cup of fizzing soda the vendor offered, and waited for several funnel cakes to sizzle in the fragrant oil. The vendor carefully placed it all into a large tray for Bora, who then made his way towards that tent where Marcia kept her small unicorn, hoping all the while that he would hear far more joy than sorrow during the remainder of that carnival night.

  Long ago, Bora believed merriment would bathe a sparkling carnival found in such a prosperous country. But after several seasons with Mr. Finnegan, Bora learned that even a carnival had very little to feed a unicorn.

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