Le chateau de vent

I watched her struggle with it from a distance. She was chocking, I couldn't help. Paralysed. Arms holding me back, anxious to catch me. And she took it in, gulps of it, big chunks of love. Of live bait. "The inadequacy of not being able to show love immobilizes me" I told her. I carry stones in my chest. How can I run? How can I swim? How can I fly? How can I give you what you want? Break the mirror and walk through

We walk into the lobby, a big room bathing in red velvet, mirrors curly gold frames and lots of glittering crystal. Thick carpets cover the parquetted floors, the astracan wool moving under my footsteps as if it is alive and ready to engulf the whole room. Three strategically positioned chandeliers illuminate the bloodcoloured half moon shapes of antique seats. The walls are covered with paintings darkenend by smoke and dust. "Sit down, please" says the voice from the darkest end of the room. "I'm sure you would like to know why you are here." I can see smoke curling up form behind a velvet chair,its back turned towards me. Virginie moves to what seems to be bar. An exquisite art nouveau counter ornamented with big lillies finely shaped in wood and colored glass. Behind it rows of strangely shaped bottles and decanters. "What was all the hocus pocus up there in the hallway?" I ask, a little bit vexed. "And you seem to know all about me? Well ...

I glance to my right and distinguish a faint light, about 10 steps from where I'm standing. "Go on," my guide urges me. Two very strange-looking ligthbulbs throw long shadows and bizarre shapes onto the walls and corner. I can see a shadow emerging from the dark corner: an ancient wooden cabinet decorated with more encarvings. My feet are heavy, tired, hesitating. Instinctively my hand touches the heavy cold watch in my left pocket. Smooth silver, oval shaped and fitting precisely into my palm. As I run my fingertips slowly over the engraved initials on the back, suddenly the cabinet comes into focus. In a spilt second I can see every detail: the structure of the wood, the leathery, parchment walls behind it covered with drawings of human shapes, the wood carvings consisting entirely of human an animal bodies, turning, whriting, torsing, entagled. I can see thousands of different creatures. It' s horrifying, I have to avert my eyes. Quickly I open a drawer of the ca...

Her mother? I am baffled. I think I can barely distinguish a slender shape moving towards me. Or maybe it is what is left of my failing intuition that leads me to believe she is a tall and elegant woman. "Enchantée" she says. It feels as if a cloud passes through the hallway. Obscuring every shade, movement or colour. Her voice is breathy, soft but supple, like a singer’s. Instinctively I put out my hand and feel a soft palm and slender fingers pressing mine. She is wearing silk gloves. "I’m sorry," she continues, "but I have a problem with light." She has a peculiar Parisian accent not resembling any I know and speaks slowly, stressing every syllable. "Let us move forward into the lobby." she pauses, breathes, but then decisively continues."But first I must ask you to leave your watch at the hallstand at your right." I am seized by a feeling of general uneasiness. My watch is not a common article of use you find in the shops. I...

Here I am in a dark house I never imagined to exist. I have to admit I miscalculated. This lady wasn't talking about an ordinary disappearing act. She isn't interested in a tarot reading or a symbolic tale to help her believe in the significance of her life, after life or love relationship. I look at her and feel a slight tension building up. What if she's really older than me. But masked and mastering secrets of life I haven't found out about yet. I see her face in profile. She's very beautiful, ancient. Her ears are covered with silver earrings and milk white moonstones. Her pitch-black hair is held together by a very old ebony comb decorated with strange undistinguishable signs. Maybe I have been still for too long, not to have seen this coming. A sound is approaching. Rhythmic. A hollow thump followed by sharp clicks. It must be the gatekeeper. No one on earth would keep a door like this unguarded. "C'est toi, Virginie?" a sharp, breathy vo...

She takes me through an endless maze of little streets. We pass art deco signs of trades and crafts long extinct: silversmiths, a doll maker, manufacturers of enammel chamber pots, a freak show, a hat maker, rosary manufacturers, a bailiff's office consisting entirely of mirrors. And suddenly the sweet scent of tobacco in my nostrills when we pass a wholesale cigar seller. I'm never really lost in the city. My orientation is usually very precise. I rely on my instincts. But this time, all I feel is her hand pressing into my arm, pulling me ahead, further and further away from anything recognizable. Merde. There's no one on the street here. Not one car. In the distance I seem to hear the faint sound of horse hooves on cobble stones. It will probably be the absynth pulling a joke on my imagination. She walks fast, way too fast for a lady with varicose veins and a heart that's reluctantly pulsing an exaggerated amount of blood around. "Nearly there" she says...

Maybe she's been reading too much Paul Auster lately, I wonder. "Listen," I say looking at her firmly "people go missing because they're dead, murdered or in an accident or they fall off a cliff. Just be realistic. It's a question of coincidence. You disappear because you've misspelled a streetname and get lost and run into the wrong person, or trip over a treebranch near a dangerous river." Silence. Then she moves, getting up from her chair. "Rubbish" she says, she spits it at me like a cat with a bad temper. "I thought you would be able to think beyond the daily pattern. I hoped you would use your imagination to teach me something. But ... you're just like the rest of them." She's up and going, grabbing her coat, ready to turn her back at me. "Wait,"I say, "Excuse me. I'm not what you think. I don't have the key to the next dimension. I'm bad with places and humans. Smells and sounds is...