Short Story: The Man From Cassiopeia

Short Story: The Man From Cassiopeia

I was standing up on a sort of internal veranda, leaning over the banister which separated me from the noisy melee of people on the level, three feet below me. I liked doing that, being able to see over people's heads, watch them going about their fun, intermingling, yet somehow shut off from each other with shallow laughs and even shallower words, every one a cliché; the timeless clichés which get you accepted as 'one of them', whatever that may mean.

In a way I suppose I was one of them. I knew the way to talk with them, spout all those banalities which kept them comfortably in their fantasies, but I was always studying reactions; string-pulling you could call it, and none of them came out of their cocoons to see what I saw as I stood watching. Coming through the big rotating doors I saw every-day-faces lose the blanched, "What a day!" look, and crease up into the relieved smile of, "Now I'm all right; I'm with friends..."

Were they? I often overheard remarks which said otherwise, but there, with a bit of booze inside you it was okay, who cares, there's safety in numbers...

Then she glided gently through those doors and transfixed me. Seemingly unaware of my intense gaze she stepped to one side and stood stroking the amazing looking ornament which adorned most of her right forearm. She was so orientally beautiful, her eyes so large and deeply, deeply brown, I knew I was in love on the instant; now there's a cliché for you. This, however, was not what made my breath catch in my throat, it was the extraordinary contrast between her lovely bronzed skin, and her pure white hair...

Truly, from her white eye-lashes to her flowing mane of what appeared to drift around her shoulders like finest silk, her hair was brilliantly, shiningly white. "You don't belong here..." I muttered to myself, "...you need to leave before they corrupt you."

She turned and looked straight at me then, shyly and searchingly, as though not sure of her welcome, and I smiled reassuringly as I at last got my legs to shift themselves the few paces to the stairs, and I descended to push my way through the oblivious throng to her side. Unbelievably no-one else seemed to have noticed her. How could they not? She shone like a beacon, and I reached her side without incident.

"I'm Matt," I introduced myself, trying hard not to stare.

"I know..." she whispered, and her voice murmured through my mind like a dream, "...why did you say I don't belong here?"

You could say I was stunned, shocked, gobsmacked, all of the above, but speechless was the one which counted. I mean what can you say when someone has obviously done the impossible? Words don't suffice.

"I'm Shwee..." she frowned and ran her fingers over her arm ornament, "...sorry, Sheneetah, I came to find you, Matt."

"Who is that Matt?" a loud unnecessary voice suddenly piped up. "You gonna introduce your sexy friend then? What's your name chick?"

I shuddered. The last thing she needed was Gordon's smarmy innuendos to start sullying her perfection. "She's my sister!" I said slowly, with a dangerous gleam in my eye, and stared him down.

"Whoah! No need to get shirty there man! Why have we never seen her before then?" Gordon continued uneasily, a few too many drinks dulling him to the inadvisability of pursuing the subject.

"Does she look like she belongs amongst crap like you?" I hissed dangerously, my face inches from his. All I wanted was to know why this complete stranger knew me, and had come for me, and my anger was more from the frustration of being prevented from finding out, I glanced at Sheneetah.

Something in my head seemed to soothe me as I caught the slight amusement on her face, and suddenly it didn't matter any more that more and more voices were bombarding me from the room, inside my head it was calm, and we smiled back at the crowd as we made our way out through the swing doors.

No-one actually followed us, although a few came out to stand by the doors, drinks in hand, making silly comments. My heart pounded a little faster with something akin to anticipation.

When finally we were beyond their reach, I glanced at her again, only now beginning to take in the detail of the sari-like drape she was wearing. It seemed familiar somehow, 'Like a roman toga..." her voice supplied for me, only she hadn't spoken; I was looking at her, and her lips never moved.

"What's going on?" I said a little too loudly.

"Matt, you have a family."

Well now I knew that wasn't true. The orphanage said all my family had got washed away in the flood, when I was only two years old. They tried to find aunts and uncles, anyone who might be remotely connected. I grew up with no-one but the Authorities to call my family... all my foster parents, and there were many, gave up on me, and by the time I was ten I was hardened to the constant rejections. I had no family and I wanted no-one...

She was smiling at the ground in front of us as we walked past a few dwindling pedestrians, stepped around the rubbish of the day, and into the subdued cool of the park, where the lights withdrew their garishness, and I had learned to come to terms with my life a long time ago.

"Come and meet them..." she invited, and I stopped dead.

"Well, thanks for that!" I said sarcastically, "But I know this life, and I'm not about to have it mucked up by any interfering busy-bodies!" and I turned on my heel and left her there.

She didn't call me back, she didn't even use her mind-words on me, she just stood there in the darkness and let me go. I could see her paleness in the distance as I marched back to my 'party'.

I'm really not sure what motivated me. You could say it was fear of the unknown. Maybe it was the deep down disgust of what I had become, and not wanting her to be corrupted by it. Having got her away from the seamy pettiness of this life I was so familiar with, I simply wanted her to return whence she came, and continue to be an apparition of purity in my mind.

I stood some distance from the swing-doors and stroked my chin. At twenty-four I was now a confident night-club owner. Not particularly attractive, but never short of the company of some female or other. I knew they and their cronies were my satellites because I had money. I indulged myself at every turn, knowing it was shallow and meaningless, and as such safe. No-one can break a heart that never lets anyone in, and I was fair and generous, so no need to fear enemies; - I was happy... wasn't I?

Sheneetah had got under my skin. I started to question stupid things like how did I know how to spell her name? It was easy to know where I'd seen togas before, people were always dressing up like Romans for one party or another, so why did that make me feel uneasy? I stared at my own bronzed features in the mirror, and studied my profile. I realised that the brown eyes looking back at me were unusually large, and I remembered plucking my eyebrows and eyelashes very thoroughly when I was barely fourteen, because I realised they were what had made me the butt of people's nastiness. Sheneetah brought those long forgotten memories back, and I realised suddenly that there was more I had forgotten, but I didn't know what.

For the first time since earning my place in this society, through mostly foul means, I began to question whether I was as contented with it as I thought I was. I'd known nothing of love. I thought I didn't want to, but now I had a pure and enchanting image in my head, and I knew I loved her; loved her enough not to want to risk her being spoiled. I went back into my den of iniquity, and mingled with my patrons, but now I knew I was only pretending, and I knew things would have to change.

--------

"I've decided to make you my over all Manager, Benji." I spoke to my first in command the following day, "Call a meeting before we open this evening, say 18.00 hours? That should give us half an hour before we have to start lining-up for the evening." I sat in my office with a cup of coffee between my hands, and watched the cleaners from my aerial roost.

"You taking a holiday?" Benji asked incredulously. In all his years of being my best friend he'd never known me take any time off, and I had to admit I hadn't actually thought of it that way, but yes, perhaps that's just what I was about to do. I smiled at him in a non-committal way, "Right, your wish is my..."

"Benji!"

"Sorry," and he backed out.

"I don't like myself," I muttered into my mug.

"You're better than this..." It was her voice.

"No, I'm not, but I'm going to try..." I pulled myself up abruptly. "...good grief! I'm going mad! Talking to voices in my head!"

I have to admit to being pretty unnerved by what I was experiencing, and I was still suppressing what a part of me had always known; I didn't belong here either, and tonight I was taking the first step towards learning where I really did belong; it was far from easy to be jolted out of my cosy little niche like this, but I never was a coward.

I doubt many of my cronies bothered to question Benji that much, as they went through their normal banalities, and faded into yet another night in the club, but Benji wondered, he was just too polite to do more than raise his eyebrows at me. I think he understood.

-------

Sitting in the park, dusk falling; along with a few premature leaves, I felt the strangest quiver of anticipation. I knew what was coming. I just didn't know why, why now?

There were four of them when I saw her again, hair at varying degrees of fawn through cream to her glistening whiteness. She came and held out her hand without a word. Her arm ornament seemed to dig into her of its own accord, and the five of us lifted free of the ground. I was surprised that none of the people strolling nearby appeared aware of us, I mean five people drifting up through the trees is hardly your every day occurrence is it?

"We're invisible to them," Sheneeta explained, "You disappeared as you walked into the park, you always have..."

Well, perhaps it was time to stop being surprised by anything, so I shrugged and decided to keep my thoughts to myself.

"Very wise," she agreed, and I looked sarcastic, whereupon the others laughed.

"This is Shenth, your brother,"

"I'm twenty seven," he added.

"Eesheedah your sister..."

"I'm nine!" she interposed excitedly, "And I've been longing to meet you!"

"This is your Father..."

"Matt," he said gently, "you were born Gatheerah," he looked as though he would reach a hand to touch my hair. I think a part of me wanted him to, but my years of conditioning made me flinch inwardly, and he respected it.

"You are my mother," I'm not sure where it came from, but I said it before I really knew it, and my unspoken question was being answered as we finally emerged into a glowing space of such opulence and loveliness I felt my heart swell in acknowledgement. "I think I've died and gone to heaven!" I exclaimed.

"By Earthly standards," my mother smiled, "but no, you're not dead, we're just sorry we couldn't come back for you sooner."

"The flood, when you were lost to us, destroyed our vessel, and an other vessel saved us," my father continued. "We had to leave without you, but we always vowed we would return when our fortunes were restored, and in the meantime we have added little Eesheedah here to our number."

It was too much to take in. I found myself shaking, and my mother sat me on a couch whilst my sister fetched a tumbler of liquid. It tasted a bit like water, and was certainly very calming, but I found it bland compared to the stuff I normally imbibed.

"You've grown up without any of the privileges which were your birthright, son," my father said. "We can see that you have done well for yourself here, but we knew you had to be given a choice, and we felt this was the best way to offer it, on neutral ground. Come and see what your planet is like, then you can return if you wish."

--------

I'm still here on Earth. It's what I grew up with you see, so it's me, but the legacy I was given that night, and the next ten or eleven days, has stood me in good stead. I'm married now, to a curly-haired imp of a woman.

I learned love in its purest form as I walked among my people. That's the legacy I brought back and have passed on to my children, that even if it hurts, it's still worth allowing into your life... only I really couldn't stomach any more of that sickly sweet niceness... the world of my ethereal family doesn't understand strife, and I might enjoy that as a holiday, but give me a good argument to spice things up any day!