The Fireplace - Chapter 5

As winter started to rip away, as spring ripened to summer slowly, their crops grew and then harvested, and until the next Christmas, when flurrying and drifting snow came, Fern stayed within the sanctuary of the SNC. He no longer hurried into the city for opportunities to make money, hugged his alcohol, and curled up miserably in his small bed. He had accepted his place, had become accustomed to it, and had been even glad to be living in the scrap houses of society. Fern was very glad that he could now concentrate on writing poetry and making literature however he wanted.

Throughout the seasons, the Saturday Sharings had enabled him to become familiar with most of the creators in the SNC.

But there was one point he still felt unfulfilled on.

As he had not expected much when he had first arrived at the café, he felt very fulfilled as it exceeded his meagre expectations. However, as his understanding and connections with the people in the café extended, as he got to know everyone’s loves and their preferences, he thought something was missing. It is well said that a man without expectations is the happiest of all because once there is expectation, disappointment follows closely after. After reading an old volume of Sherlock Holmes that was supposedly an anniversary version and a few translated oriental philosophic texts, he realised what was wrong.

There was an Oriental word that roughly translated to “friends of the neck” – it was when one could trust another with their neck. At first, he had thought this rather too philosophical and ridiculous – surely, there could be more poetic renditions of the word “neck”. “Heart”, “soul”, “dreams” – weren’t those better?

But he changed his mind. He didn’t remember where he had heard the phrase – he didn’t remember if it was in the original book, but it didn’t seem like something Sir Arthur Conan Doyle would write in the Victorian Era, “If Watson does kill me one day, it must be because I did something wrong.”

“Friends of the neck” – so solidly down-to-earth and physical – a person who you could entrust your whole body to, and who would treat you exactly how you would want to. No compromises, no fights – no love, nothing beyond the communication of brain and heart.

Yes, he wanted a confidante. Not just a confidante – a person who he could call a soulmate, but that word was so unattractively cliché that he tried to avoid it. “Twin-flame” sounded way too flourishing, and “consort” was too insinuated with royalty. What he wanted was a “beloved”, a “dear”, a “heartmate”, a legal “paramour”, but all this without romantic love. He wanted to have a friend who he could tell anything and give everything to. He wanted a friend where they’d be so close as to pass the boundaries of friendship but remain where they were both comfortable and caring. He wanted someone who he could entrust his neck to, wanted someone who would forever be standing behind him and in front of him like a mother or father, but without the paternity.

And throughout the days in the SNC, he tried to connect with the others in the café. He had at first tried to become more familiar with Florence, as his age was closer to his than the others in the Poets (except for Sage, perhaps, but the mute man was nothing close to a poet, Fern supposed) and he wanted to know about the youth’s mysteriousness. Secretly, he admitted that the frown of Hamlet on Florence’s brow attracted him to the extent that he would’ve wanted to act out a reliving of the play within the company. This had been in the beginning of January; he had then proposed a corner for dramatists in the café and a corner was taken out of all the sections to create a small stage upon which some would go and put on short plays at the beginning of every sharing. He never stepped onto that stage, of course; speaking and acting terrified him to the point he felt physically faint.

But Fern was disappointed in his discoveries. Florence was indeed a Hamlet through and through; perhaps too through and through, and this sort of Hamlet, this Thomas Chatterton, this great rendition of Holmes in his darkest, was not someone like Fern could deal with. It took a supporting Horatio or a calm and willingly stooping Watson to interact with success.

Sometimes, Florence was cool, collected and calm, speaking with the most earnest reason and the clearest of expression. Other times, he was like Chopin’s Etude 10, unstoppable, enraged and somewhat mad, ranting and raving irate drivel in quiet tones about how he wished certain things were different, how he wished he would be successful in his endeavours, how he wanted better.

These episodes frightened Fern as he had never been the best at emotional matters. He was always afraid he would say something false and uncalculated and would cumulate Florence’s anger instead of taming it. After a particularly bad fit with alcohol involved, Fern distanced himself minutely from the leader of the poets.

Fern did not give up; nobody should give up anything in the growth and temperament of April. He tried to sidle up to Venice in partial hopes he would be taught some music, as well as a friend, but Venice seemed strangely unwell, almost in the same way as Florence. If Florence was Hamlet, then Venice was Nietzsche in the middle of a bout of depression. He was Hemingway in the middle of the ocean. He was Van Gogh staring at his bloody ear. There was something dreadfully dead around the youth like there was a black hole in the middle of his chest – he was only twenty-four, but his eyes and his face were that of a moribund man. Fern was afraid of that. He wasn’t afraid in the way he had been afraid with Florence, but he feared the shattering of Venice’s bare life force in a single touch. He was afraid the thin frame under the black clothes would snap in the middle from a slight wind. He was afraid the black figure draped across the piano bench and the sofa would not sit up one day.

He broke himself away from the silent black clump of Venice’s body in the middle of June, feeling slightly like a football that had been kicked around and around. He didn’t like that.

But he had to admit Venice was the right person to have a conversation with. This was not said in the sense that they would have long, intellectual back-and-forths because every topic Fern brought up would be closed with a conclusive remark and a wave of the hand on Venice’s part. “Right” was said in the sense that Venice had more reason than Fern had thought; he was able to brutally take out the underlying statement from every affair.

One day in late May, Fern had shared with Venice the first question the poets had discussed – writing about oneself. Venice had come to the same conclusion as Clover, but much more sharply and even somewhat condescendingly, “The only reason you would write about your suffering is for pity. The only reason you would write about your happiness is because you are not happy. The only reason you would not write about yourself is because you are satisfied by yourself.”

Fern had thought about this long and hard until he concluded that Venice was right.

On another occasion, Fern had been in quite a dreadful mood, and had told Venice, half in hope, half in mockery, about his failure of a quest for a “friend of the neck.” That time, Venice had been surprisingly gentle with his words.

“You think you love everyone and no one, both because you have never felt what love is. Your soul is free from such a bond. It is perhaps for the better although you do not see it. It is not your fault but was some oversight of God.”

Fern was comforted by his softness but not of what his words implied. Was he flawed enough so that he would never feel love, romantic or otherwise? It was the first time he had touched alcohol after coming to the SNC that night. After he woke up with a splitting headache the next morning, slightly brokenhearted as if he had lost a lover he never had, he gave up his goal – at least for a while. Nobody can be perfectly fitting to his taste, he thought, might as well give it a rest as he concentrated on his poetry.

And in the heat of June to August, he dwelt upon his poetry, writing verse after verse, rhyme after rhyme, line after line – but he thought there was something missing.

He thought there was something missing.