"The Darkest Room, the Highest Tower"

a short, short story

The Darkest Room, the Highest Tower

 

            She stood by the door in the dark, looking into the room.  Light from the parking lot and emergency room reached the window, making it glow a pale blue.  His silhouette was an even lighter outline reflected in the glass.  From where she stood, details did not exist.  There was only a silhouette.

            For six months, Lynn had changed and cleaned him, adjusted the drip of the fluids that moved in and out of him, cleaned the thin plastic tubes that brought life into his body.  The bruises on his face had healed and the cuts had left no permanent mark, except for the one jagged scar that ran from the top of his skull to his right temple, a white streak of lightning in his black hair.  Doctor Lipton checked him rarely now, and even the attending physicians had lost interest.  He would never wake up.  He would continue to waste, grow thinner, fade away.   

            In the dark, none of that mattered.  Lynn saw him as she had seen him when he first arrived.  She had seen past the damage then and couldn’t remember it now.  In the dark there was only his silhouette.

            Lynn entered the room and went about her work, cleaning and changing, preserving life.  She noticed her reflection in the mirror and looked up.  There they were, two white silhouettes, floating in a private world beyond the glass.  She kept her eyes on the image as she reached down in the dark and held his hand.

 

 

            He wiped sweat from his forehead and ran a hand through his dark, disheveled hair.  He beheld his work.

            In front of him was a castle.  It rose gently at first, then more sharply as it reached up into the sky.  It wound upward in a series of platforms, turrets, and towers.  To one side was a cliff plunging down to the sea.  Surrounding the castle on every other side were hills that became steeper as they rose, like the castle itself.  He looked toward the horizon and saw the pale blue and white silhouette of other hills.  Lightning pulsed above them.

He swept his eyes from the base of the castle to the top of the highest tower.  Then, he began to climb and the sky grew darker. 

            The work became finer as he climbed the winding stair, and he relived the slow progression, the methodical improvements in his ability to reshape his world.  With time, the stone had yielded to his will and his hands.  He could remember nothing before the building.  And always, he had been alone.

            Round and round, he ascended the stair, moving in and out of a stone labyrinth.  He climbed until the world below disappeared on all sides.  The light was almost gone, but it did not matter that he could no longer see.  He walked with certainty, knowing the stone in each step as he knew the parts of his own body.

            Then, at last, he reached the top of the highest tower and opened the door to the final room.  It was as dark as the sky above.  He crossed the threshold with his arm stretched out before him.  He felt a small, warm hand close around his own.  Then, the castle collapsed and crumbled around him.

           

 

            She stayed longer than necessary, cleaning the room with an attention to detail that ensured she would be alone.  Now it was empty, save for her and a freshly made bed.

            The sound of alarms and the rush of bodies that had flooded her senses were gone.  She felt the usual calm that came to her in this room.

            At the outer limit of her vision, she could see the shape of a familiar silhouette hovering in the glass.  She looked down at her hand, remembering the last of the warmth that had fled from his body and into hers. 

            She pulled closed the curtains, and the room was dark.