A Sensual Novel. THE ROAD
The Road opens my first novel, a sensuous romance, fluid and sensual, published in 2017 as Traveling True. This alluring road, which is real and as fascinating in reality, leads you into the story, and Mim, the young protagonist, into the mysterious realm of adulthood.
THE ROAD
An archway rises ahead, and they glide into an unearthly world, a lullaby ride on a bluish serpent’s lustrous back, among secret whisperings from the surrounding vegetation. The high canopy shields them inside an endless corridor.
“Let’s pull over,” Mim says.
“No, I know the perfect spot.”
“Here!”
Not yet, babe, wait and you’ll see, Anton may think, pulling his chin to his chest.
Fantastic woods cover hills on either side of the roadway. Frames succeed one another in a hypnotizing carousel: majestic trees, dominant, close-cropped carpets of grasses, a naked hill, and again dormant populations of shrubbery. Primeval fern colonies ennoble static shadows in the forest. In silence, archaic mountains witness their passage.
Pity sweeps over Mim—hey, ancient fellows, I adore your bald bluntness. To her jocund amazement, the venerable guardians rejuvenate in succession, raw greens glittering on their weary shoulders. Marveling at this spectacular gallery, Mim feels blessed.
Road pit stop in wonderland
But where shall they stop and which frame distort with their mobile outlines?
“Here!”
After seconds’ further rolling, Anton pulls up. “Yes. You like it?” He shuts off the engine and turns to Mim, beaming, waiting for her reaction, as he has brought her to wonderland.
They both inhale the realm’s pristine essence. Mim would dart away to inspect thickets, then tiptoe to that clump of trees to discover what they hide behind. So she leaves on an impulse, runs among plants, as wet as they felt from a distance. Anton calls after her. They will lunch near a milestone.
The girl unwraps the grub, gets clumsy, eager to meet his tough expectations. But they swallow down, are hungry. Anton’s observant eye gives her a rest.
Now and then a car whirs past. Mim’s cached ego blares out her happiness—hey people, I am with him. Yes, they are camped together at the foot of this dear milestone.
Mim packs things back, hurries, yet take care, girl, Anton is watching you. Done, the pit stop is over and they resume their ride. It’s boiling hot inside the car, and he starts off.
One last ride
The car draws up. This time, not at their milestone. Mim had been praying he would stop there, with the innermost powers she summoned, her despairing love, and their spot shrieked out to them. But Anton did not push the brakes. Somber, unperturbed, he squashed the yell from the woods.
He pulled up much farther away. The place is as enchanting, but poisonous liquor drips in her heart. Their two companions are beaming; they are together. Anton and Mim, not. He patches jokes, but words and gestures come out artless and awkward, because imposed boundaries imprison the artist. Oh, Mim would break Anton free, since no boundaries used to be.
The party set off again, with Mim in the front seat near Anton and the enamored youths in the rear. Anton and his younger friends prank to kill stiffness. This time genuine laughter strikes her ears, and though the wheeze is worth a faint spill, Mim cannot unclasp her gloom.
Crude road
Crude, their last ride advances, and at the road’s end, nothing but darkness awaits Mim. A lurid hole gapes wide, wider and chasmic, for her soul to agonize inside, wounded and dumb, with no glint of light to send her grief worldwide. All Mim knows is dizziness. And her poor soul lost, a cub in the wilderness, doomed to languish with grief in the hole forever.
The sun is sinking, and fields of flowers swivel amber heads after it. Life is happening somewhere in the skyline, wonderful living, Mim breathes in … Deep down a bubble bursts open splashing her unaware with an insolent fragrance, yes, life. Let her dive for life, since limpid waters are easy.
Muted Mim starts in place. Yes, better take the plunge. But no, not while Anton is here. Grim, his lips taste bitter, smack sour, stay clenched. They played a kissing flower once. Oh, why has his flower vanished? Poor wretched girl gone mad … No one but Mim ever knew Anton’s flower.
Road slide
The car gulping the asphalt’s dark-ash gray sweeps her senses away, and she yields to the road’s slide, flaccid, eardrums throbbing, her memory whizzing and swaying to the cadence of the elegant swan-swings on which her mother pushed her as a child. Mim’s stomach thins to a thread, a wisp of thread melting away. Her wanderings, Mim’s teenage wanderings’ trailing bouquet …
When she sulked, she ambled lonely on streets, and her parents did not object. She came back spellbound by the suite of tableaux: houses, people whispering outside gates at sundown, hushed streets, her gliding along fairy-tale infinite halls, and no pain. Now though, a vast canvas sewn of sorrow, sewn tight, has caught Mim inside. A gigantic balloon filled with her grief.
Ragged doll on the road’s asphalt
No exit. Strip of asphalt, where to? Let disaster befall, planet tip, ground crack, let them hit something and not know, let someone hear the wretched cub in Mim’s chest.
Nervous spasms convulse her brain’s commands to each body fiber, yet her entire construction stays stock-still. Now, the ultimate act—jump! What if she yanked the door handle and flung herself out?
The car skids onward neighing, a bitten mare, then comes to a stuck halt. Horns, brakes, a ragged doll thrown away, the other three running. The girl covers her eyes; the boy stares, perplexed. Anton: Let someone call for an ambulance, let someone do something for God’s sake! His nostrils sniffle in vile spasms and frightening shadows pump at angles of jawbones.
Impaled
Mim finds herself irradiated by the foul frown Anton cast over her this morning—her pupils in his pupils, at last. Pity you never look into my eyes. That’s bad, Mim. Oh, has she not tried? Mim dared not, feared her enchanted pupils might give her away. Anton several times caught her. You’re sneaking glimpses—what are you hiding? Come on, tell me. Childish embarrassment would rush screaming to her cheeks, while Mim asked herself how real her guilt was.
Oh, Anton’s merciless stare—Mim lies impaled onto its ray. She had been waiting for him, shrouded in a splendor of light. Dressed in a white gown and brimming with shame, she waited. Yes, ashamed at his imminent appearance, when his frame loomed in a slit between tower blocks, then out in sunlight’s flood. The sick moment Anton clapped eyes on her, the sun went down. A cruel shadow descended from eyes to mouth on his countenance. The skies grew dirty, hanging in rags.
Putrid deluge
A putrid deluge rushes over, leveling memories into a stench. Boundless beaches splashing aromas into the sun, lips drying into perfumed vapors, breezes stealing through silvery shrubs to caress her cheeks. A mammoth tide paralyzes her existence into a foul-tasting gelatin. Why Mim, of the planet’s humans? Whence this unearthly torrent against life?
The noxious lymph has filled each chamber, poison, spit it out. A last spasm squats her memory and the flux of remembrances gushes out of Mim, toxic and stinking. Let someone throw her away, please.
The stench also gushes through Anton’s nostrils and mouth and glassy eyes, transfixed. He mumbles something, is scolding her. Yes, Mim has misbehaved again.
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