Meteora

Whoever loses has to kiss the sandaled ikon of Byzantine Christ in the dungeon below the Holy Monastery of Great Meteoron atop the great cliff pillar Platys Lithos at Meteora. Losing means tapping out. This is a game we play at the Friends Select School for Young Children where I am a student and sometimes I feel as though I am one of my own instructors even!

The school is a big brown barn with a belltower that gongs and a rooster on top that twirls. Today our dinner is noodle soup. For dessert we receive our school portraits which has decisively impacted our game insofar as not finishing it goes.

What happened was this:

We, the student body, decided to never speak again. At first, our families thought it was some kind of prank. They voiced their various displeasures with our instructors/aids for not having nipped it in the bud. Primary care docs assured our families that nothing in the bloodwork signaled distress, and social workers grilled our parents about the usual concerns such as beatings/abuse. But we were so determined that legitimate concern developed and specialists convened. We stumped renowned pediatricians; child psychiatrists came and went. Researchers took great pains to rule out any sort of covert bullying or threat of interscholastic violence, and they asked us about trauma and conspiracy but we shook our heads in our baby blue scrubs as wires taped to our skulls transferred thought into big beepers. We all had loving homes and we’d return to them so long as we didn’t fail—except for Diontae my best friend who was the real reason for our vow.

My father grasped my shoulders and shook me like a maraca. “What’s in the box?” he screamed. That’s a game we used to play, where there’s a wooden box with a goofball mystery object inside. We shake the box and get 3 guesses but even if you lose there’s no consequence like having to go to Meteora. My mother tearfully directed my brother Jimmy to partition my xbox as if that would do fricking anything. It was a Saturday morning. I signed some paperwork in our breakfast nook. So did the other students in theirs. When the school week started, all of us entered the school and we haven’t been allowed to leave ever since.

*****

Me and Diontae like throwing woodchips at each other in the head. Occasionally this is really bad, but mostly we are switching sports. Like I am bowling woodchips at Diontae and he is javelining woodchips into my eyes and face. Diontae lives across the hall next to Lonnie and Angel. Mark lives to my right, Alberta once lived to my left and Mark used to bunk with Noah. Noah had two moms. But Noah stubbed his toe and uttered ow plus tears. We quietly determined that crying isn’t speaking but ow is words so Noah is on his way to Meteora.

The instructors/aids found out from our parents what we like to eat and fed us the opposite. What’s reverse mashed potato? I wondered. Turns out to be instant polenta. Diontae likes green grapes but he got raw beets. Mark’s tray is covered in rosemary crackers I’d sample in a heartbeat, Lonnie gets century eggs instead of omelets, and for Angel they’d been wheeling in camembert. Obviously, we had different lifestyles before the silence we’d still been trying to shake. But we won’t budge after a few lousy bites. Diontae is much better than me at group cohesion. I keep to myself, mostly, but make sure that the group abides by the rules of the vow which is 1. keep shut and 2. this is for Diontae. The first rule is much more difficult because it required diligence that once practiced became the primary modality governing our love for Diontae, which goes without saying. Put simply, we must protect him whilst lateral sclerosis turns his Auntie to stone/kills her. Diontae has east-facing windows through which he sees that the Atlantic and the Mediterranean are the only bodies between us and Meteora.

I’ll admit to something terrible that nearly happened. Even thinking about it now jolts me and Diontae out of respective daydreamings. One of the instructors/aids had fallen into despair because of the way me and Diontae weren’t listening to her aid/instruction regarding our woodchips. Like an insane maniac she tried to scoop up all our woodchips and drop them into this giga-dumpster with a thick metal slab for a lid. She somehow managed to fill the dumpster almost halfway up, enough to erase our supply on the playground. So me and Diontae rounded up our peers and we all shimmied up the lid of the dumpster to put a stop to this madness. This went bad because four children had never climbed the dumpster before. The instructor/aid had her curly noggin tucked inside, neck at the rim, as the four-inch metal lid with serrated rusty teeth began to fall. Well. The dumpster smashed shut louder than heavy metal rockers! She hyperextended one knee and sprained the other because the four of us jumped/tackled her but at least we didn’t behead her!

Given the circumstances, we decided that monosyllabic screams of warning/terror aren’t words.

After the incident, the instructors/aids locked us in our rooms, so we’ve been on hunger strike for many days. I’m not sure what day yesterday was, but a phantasmagoria of vines and thorns chased me about the room and the instructors/aids never showed. Our rooms are whoppers because they used to be whole classrooms. Each has its own bathroom with a little toilet readymade for us young children. If an instructor/aid sat on the toilet they would be the Colossus of Rhodes.

It was a hard day. Our bodies were one step closer toward total emptiness, nothing in and nothing out except for throw up but no crapping. Today is better. Mark and Lonnie and Angel spend their time wailing and sobbing, which I prefer to rule breaking. Despite their eyes crying for help all I do is point at Diontae and they buck up, filling out their scrubs not with full bellies but courage and resolve. There had been other children unable to comprehend the enormity of our task. Our school hasn’t been for friends in many generations.

Diontae never cries. He just breathes condensation onto the single glass pane of his door and draws hearts to replace those that evaporate. One of the things I love about Diontae is how he always thinks about others, first. He's selfless as the first quiet climber of Meteora. In return, our silence is a favor which sacrifices certain comforts for our greater purpose of providing Diontae the sacred gift of time which I intend he uses to stay with me forever.

Before we go to sleep, someone offers trays of warm bread and noodle soup through the slot that had been cut out of our doors. Thank the lord it’s not a more substantial dish like salmon steak or I’d feel fat enough to sink through the earth and mantle. One time our birthday pizza was so hot that Diontae ate the crust before the molten cheese. The instructors/aids turned the hallway lights off before they abandoned us but even if our doors unlocked none of us can reach the light switch. Through the glass we see nothing but a lone light ripple through the darkness like that of the angler fish. And we are photosynthesizing algae starving in the trench.

*****

We’d discovered Meteora by/on accident. Another thing I love about Diontae is his affinity for discovery. He’d been shopping with his Auntie who’d given him a final opportunity to select anything he wanted at Borders Books. He gathered a bunch of books with eye-catching covers and closed his eyes to shuffle and ended up with 400 Recipes to Live Forever. He brought the book to school and together we found recipes for glass noodle salads and tzatziki, empanadas and slaw. We saw pictures of Asia and the Adriatic and the flora of the Andes. In the background of a recipe for traditional pine nut pies stood Meteora. Meteora is many monasteries on pillars of rock that erupt from a sunbaked valley as did we from our mothers. Monks maintain the monasteries as tourists trample them back down to Earth. You can still make out scorch marks in the kitchen of the Holy Monastery of Great Meteoron where wordless bread was baked in silent prayer.

“Meteora never appeared in ancient mythologies” summarized Diontae from the blurb attached to Meteora and the pies. “It wasn’t until the dark ages that Christian ascetics ascended the stone pillars to contemplate their unity with God atop one of the most desolate and extreme geographical formations found in the natural world.”

*****

Weighed down by broth and unable to sleep on account of indigestion, I await morning like our crate-trained sheepdog Croissant awaits our return during holidays when we drive to the center of New Jersey for dry ham and kartofflelkloesse. Heat lightning flashes throughout the hallway outside our doors which is strange because it is winter and they turned off the radiators. Lately Diontae has been rubbing his hands together in the frame of his windowpane to remind us of body warmth, sometimes in slow motion because he is probably tired from the starvation. My belly is warm from the soup and although I’d normally disapprove of the breaking of hunger strike that afternoon I’d gone to itch my nose and punched myself in the face because my hand cramped into a fist, feeling something like Diontae’s Auntie regarding rapid degeneration of motor control.

The lightning flashes twenty-four times counterclockwise. There isn’t any rain and the thunder is just a single snap. Light brightens my room which is empty except for me. It used to feature desks and chairs and clocks and posters of Benjamin Franklin. As to whether Meteora features a clocktower I will admit to not knowing but the recipe for pine nut pies stated 15-20 minutes at 400 degrees.

What are you so afraid of, I ask myself. Supposedly we’re frightened of many things. Before our vow, the instructors/aids had us play a game called What Are You So Afraid Of where we wrote down our greatest fear on an index card and shuffled them in a salad bowl and selected one at random to read aloud. “Scary monsters,” I began, followed by the squeaks of my classmates. “Grease fires, gastrointestinal distress, weekend hospice, overdosings, strange bruises, bed bugs, pox blankets, crimes of passion, frayed rope, shootings at Fresh Grocer, zombified savannah animals chasing you into your respective hospital ward of birth.” I won’t share which was my answer because it was a lie. Obviously, my greatest fear is the loss of Diontae which at once seems impossible and entirely plausible should our class succumb to rule breaking, hence the safety scissored stabbing of the instructor/aid who raised her voice at me.

Diontae was the reason poor Alberta was able to head to Meteora after she’d misunderstood how far away and how high up the monasteries really are. Before the vow, me and Diontae explained Meteora in words because it would’ve taken too long in crayon given our handwriting is a load of fricking ass. Alberta climbed up the lattice/belltower of our school and tripped on the metal rooster when the wind spun it round. With a not insignificant dent in her shin Alberta hugged herself to the pinnacle of our school, steadfast in her commitment to our vow despite the sniffles. Imagine my surprise when Diontae called up to her, “It’s okay, Alberta, you go on and climb down now.” We would’ve gasped had gasps of surprise been permissible. Down she came, bleeding and trembling, however I would describe her countenance as shellshocked á la war which concerned us more.

The instructors/aids whisked away Alberta—to Meteora we presumed—and I just stood there shaking my head in Diontae’s general direction as the sirens spun red. “You idiot,” I’d wanted to shout. I would never shout at Diontae in real life, but there’s plenty of room for that in your own head when that’s the only place to talk! This was the infancy of our vow, and rather than make an example of my best friend in the whole world, I grappled up the playground’s plastic climbing boulder with paper and crayons, drawing a blue baseball plus a red/yellow mockup of Meteora equals strike 1. Gathered below me, the children understood that I bend the rules for Diontae only. They understood extra when I started writing them letters like If you squeal, Diontae will be sent to the mill and I will send you to the mill if you say literally anything and Be careful or I poison your pets. These were the last words I shared with my peers before the instructors/aids removed all writing implements from the premises. We were taught the Pledge of Allegiance in American Sign Language but not the alphabet. There are no mirrors.

My stomach hurts. I scream a war cry against the lightning which focuses all its attention upon me and my room. My cot, fingernail fragments, scrubs and crumbs are all I possess. Flashes strike like the strobes that land my epileptic brother Jimmy on his butt, foaming on the floor of his classroom from the grapefruit our grandmother included in our lunches without thinking. It’s yet another incursion, a representation of our vow made by authorities who want to mock our silence/brightness—who want Diontae seen, found, taken from me. I scream until the lightning jangles the keys and opens my door, affording me an opportunity to charge the hallway and save my friend from those who will bundle him with all the other voiceless children in society according to pamphlets provided by the Christian Confederation for Orphan Espousal we received in the mail after news spread of Diontae’s Auntie’s ossification.

I weave between thick limbs, shaping my scream into an utterance of hatred as flurries of lightning illuminate the little twitching faces of Mark and Lonnie and Angel through their windows. They pound on their doors with shouts of ah aye ee oh oo. Even the ghost of Alberta gapes. But Diontae, I realize after a ducking a swipe, isn’t in his room, his door ajar.

I trip and my face lands into something lukewarm and wet. The hallway lights turn on. Atop the shoulder of a camera-wielding Kevlar colossus he perches, munching a baby carrot. No one has eaten their soup except for me and Diontae. Then my best friend unholsters his lightning and shoots me in the head.

*****

Before I tell what happens next, I want to be clear that I am Diontae’s friend but Diontae is my hero. Me and Diontae took speech class together. His r’s were better than mine when we allowed ourselves to pronounce them. We read through another book Diontae likes, one that I showed him. It was called Greek Mythology and it said that “when the great heroes return home, they find that chaos has followed from the battle fields abroad.” So maybe the heroes should’ve had the guts to vanquish the enemy or move to another neighborhood. But Diontae could move houses and the chaos would follow still, I had been thinking critically. Chaos is when a black & white baseball disease turns your Auntie turns to stone and your new caretaker/guardian wouldn’t know you like she did, or I do. Chaos, rather, finds naught in a hiding place situated between surface and sky, where the world spins but you don’t. God ignores the rules, so the game can keep going. And then they made a cookbook out of it.

*****

The basement is red, and ever since my paintings have been, too. We used to make art down in the basement before privileges were revoked on account of our vow. Last time we were down there, Diontae and I baked twin guppies in the kiln.

In the middle of the room is a table with trays of water, smelly like my great uncle with kidney disease when he leaves the bathroom. There are flashes of lightning in miniature, like us children. My limbs are bound. I’m not alone. In the back corner of the room, barely visible even during the flashes of lightning is the Kevlar colossus glowering. And there’s something in my mouth.

Diontae is the operator. He withdraws paper from a light-gargling machine and with tongs dips the paper into each tray, then tacks it to the wall. He no longer wears his scrubs, instead a blue apron, but I know underneath is a t-shirt called iPood with a picture of man listening to music on the toilet. We’d asked for matching shirts at the beach.

“You’re a good friend,” says Diontae without looking at me. He studies the piece of paper on the wall like an asymmetrical mole on a plane of skin. Our dog has a fatty tumor the size of a honeydew. My parents sat me and my brother Jimmy down and told us that she has cancer but not the type that kills but what will kill her is being weighed down by all these fatty tumors.

My mouth is corked.

“Time for show & tell.” Diontae peels the paper off the wall and sticks it in front of my face. A terrible photograph glistens. It depicts Mark, huddled in his room with a wet crotch, in tears and hair unkempt, skin yellow and sagging. Mark is supposed to be fat. He was the fattest kid I’d ever seen.

“Do you know who this is?” Diontae asks me.

I nod my head, yes.

Diontae shows me more pictures. Lonnie looks like a bird who molted obligatorily. Angel looks dead. Diontae lugs the trays before me and allows me to see our own portraits materialize on the page. I’m unrecognizable, my face and arms a blur behind my scrubs. Diontae, however, is beautiful. His picture is crisp, as is his slight smile. Even in redlight, his brown eyes shine with kindness and clairvoyance. They soothe me like I’m a baby in his arms.

Diontae returns the trays and tucks the photographs into his pocket. “Do you realize the pain you’ve produced in my name?” he asks.

I shake my head no.

“You little shit,” mutters the Kevlar Colossus, who sounds exactly like Ms. Trisha, the instructor/aid I stabbed. “Will you stop torturing the poor boy?” she’d screamed at me after we nearly beheaded her. “Can’t you see it’s a difficult time for him?” Diontae stood between us at the water fountain, smiling while washing woodchips out of his eyes.

Diontae smiles as wide as possible. He’s lost four teeth. “I wrote you this letter so long ago,” he whispers into my ear, chubby cheeks jiggling breakfast gelatin. “I wasn’t sure I had the strength to let you read it.”

Diontae tucks the letter beneath the neckline of my scrubs. For the first time in my life, I recoil from his touch which is strange because normally his touch radiates through my waters of uncertainty like a sunbeam instinct. And I guess what’s taken me a long time to realize is that sometimes you make more friends when you just keep shut. For example, Diontae’s Auntie was a lot nicer to me when her limbs were seaweed but could still give me slow compliments, her voice skipping sounds as she said: “Terry, take good care of your friends.”

“I hope you read my letter,” says Diontae. “Our friends are in the hospital.”

All I want is the opportunity to speak.

“It’s time to go home, now.”

The linoleum floor shakes as The Kevlar Colossus/Ms. Trisha thuds forward and unfastens my arms. I rise into Diontae’s embrace, tighter than the belt binding my ankles. “See you, friend,” he murmurs. Drool spills from the edges of my mouth. I can’t say anything. But I hug Diontae back as I reach into his pocket and grasp a stack of photographs.

*****

I am a child with a lot to say, and the most important thing is to hold onto your friends, especially when he routinely betrays your trust/game and collaborates with the aids/authorities. You can just as easily remember what he was like in the good times before you failed to protect him from disasters encroaching, which is why I spend my time painting versions of his photograph that I stole from the Friends Select School for Young Children. Sometimes I even kiss them.

Don’t be afraid to hide/disappear. You can even hide in your own house while your parents torture you with enrichment. I departed my life. The new game is: how many times can I paint my friend until I am found/die. Shake me 3 times and out would topple 3 paintings of my friend Diontae. Sometimes I dream of Diontae dressed for show & tell. He gifts me bifteki and tzatziki and Chalkidiki olives. But if Diontae starts to speak it turns into nightmare.

Dear Terry, said the letter I destroyed,

You’re my best friend and I love you a lot. If you were drowning in the Mariana Trench, I would dive into the ocean until my vision went black and my lungs filled with saltwater. After that, I would drag you back to shore and breathe air into you. I haven’t known that many people which makes me love you more because you chose me. But school is over. Auntie needs me and we’ve been in class for so long that I am unsure if she’s okay. I wish I could tell you what kind of sounds her machine made but I think they’d have counted as talking and I know I’ve been on thin ice with you. I guess if I was born 100 years ago, I would’ve found the cookbook to make food that makes a life long living.

Anyways, I don’t know what’s going to happen when I go home but I have decided to stop playing our game. And I think, in addition to me, you should too.

With Love/goodbye,

Diontae

Goodbye.

And if you hear them beyond the walls calling your name, the dog sniffing out your whereabouts, you just keep quiet and relax, as having memorized the reference photograph, you prepare your friend’s canvassed head for a painted crown of sun.

Edgar Degas, Young Spartan Girls Challenging Boys. (1860)
Art Institute of Chicago

Byzantine Mosaic of Children Seated on a Dromedary. (6th century CE)
Great Palace Mosaic Museum, Istanbul, Turkey