The Antarctic Dream

To Kevin (Sylver) Smith & Robbie James Hand

One

August 2nd.

It has been assumed that Davy Chronicles is dead. Joe Riley moves warily through the underbrush, fighting the dead tangles of blown up trees. He wants his friend back. There are spaces along the jeep ruts where soldiers are lying shocked from the night’s raid. Joe thinks briefly of London, of his wife Muriel as she stands on her weak balcony musing the disarray of her world, as she sees its finite edges press between the reddening sky and dark ocean. She is like a beautiful alien configuring the foreign tapestry below. Gunshots crackle a mile to his right. He meets the shore and traces his way to the spot where he saw five bullet holes go through Davy, putting him into the water with a dull splash.

There is no blood or disturbance. The ocean has locked Davy away.

Not even Joe Riley knew what happened exactly that night seven weeks ago. When he got home from the war he puzzled over it, prayed to God about it, asked himself what precisely he would tell the wife and son…..he knocked on the Chronicles’ door after weeks of conviction and stepped back, chilled by the sudden wind and confused as to how it was snowing so hard in October.

“London,” he muttered. The house was adjoined with a dozen others on that block, but was painted orange, contrasting with the white of the other villas so it stood out like a sunset in a pool of milk. All the windows were dark and the indoors seemed lifeless. For several seconds there was no answer. The sound of cars crunching over ice mediated the silence but didn’t make anything less uncomfortable. Just as Joe approached to knock again, the door inched open and the downcast eyes of a young woman peeked out; the eyes were large and blue and beautiful, just what her husband had loved about her.

“Hello Joe,” she murmured, opening the door farther so she was in sight. “Come in please. I wasn’t aware it was this cold.” Joe thanked her and gently eased past her. The moment she shut the door she asked him, “I suppose you’re here to talk about Davy.” Joe was in the process of removing his coat and studying the condition of the parlor. Nothing was organized like it used to be. Books lay disheveled on top of writing desks and even a couple of lamps were overturned from their nightstands as if someone had angrily stampeded through the room.

“I thought it was time I give you my side of the story, Phoebe,” Joe said. Phoebe was facing him, though the room was so dim he couldn’t discern her face except for the shadows beneath her eyes and chin.

“Please sit down. Sylver is still at school and will be for some time.”

“Does he play sports?”

“Just football.”

“Oh, yes, of course.” It wasn’t a relevant question.

Phoebe walked through the parlor and seated herself at the coffee table, where she flicked on the one lamp that was visibly upright and nervously joined her hands together on her lap. Joe slowly followed, noticing the circles half mooning under her eyes and how shallowly her chest rose and fell. The only ordinary thing about her was her thick brown braid collecting itself above her right shoulder. A golden ringlet, which she had owned since a child, sat delicately on the top of her head. Joe quietly took his seat beside her and thought about pursuing one of her hands, but warned himself, and instead began speaking softly about what had happened seven weeks ago. “It seems like it’s been years, somehow, since it happened. I remember the day I got home, you were waiting for him, and I had to tell you.”

“Yes,” she said in the same murmur. “He was killed in action and the body wasn’t found because it  sunk in the ocean. What else can there be to know?”

“I haven’t yet found the words to say this,” he continued, only slightly daunted by her response.

“I just thought it was time I added something I saw.” Phoebe looked up and gripped him with an eager, nearly hungry stare.

“I saw him fall into the lagoon, yes.” Now he was sweating, conscious of her scrutiny. “But there’s something else. They clearly shot him, I won’t deny it. I was twenty feet to his left and saw him keel. But the next morning, after we scoped the place for survivors, I visited the lagoon alone. In the distance I saw a sailboat. It had a tall, thin sail shining really brightly, though as I recall the day was cloudy. There was someone on it, and the person was waving at me.”

Phoebe’s stare had turned blank.

“I don’t want to give you false hopes, honestly,” Joe continued. “But something tells me it was Davy on that sailboat. There was just something other-worldly about it, and I haven’t shrugged off the feeling of seeing it.”

Phoebe rose to her feet and accidentally toppled her chair. Joe had nothing else in mind to say. His speech had been precisely recited. Now he would have to arrange his words by ear, according to how Phoebe received him.

She moved to the window in the parlor, picking up a dormant cup of tea on a low bookshelf under the sill. She sipped the remaining substance and then quietly remarked, “You had dedication to come over today, Joe.”

“I don’t mind the snow.”

“Oh, no Londoner should mind snow. That’s not what I meant.” Joe grew nervous and didn’t let the silence prolong itself. “Can you tell me what you do mean, Phoebe?”

“Just this. I have always loved you and your family, and I know you mean the best for me and Sylver, giving me a glimpse of hope, whether real or…...ethereal. But Davy still isn’t here, and the army says he isn’t out there either. Joe, he isn’t coming back.”

Joe blinked, then swept his spectacles away from his eyes with a helpless sigh. She undeniably made sense, and he felt himself an idiot for not suspecting this type of reply from her. She had hopes enough in love and romance, but none of them escaped her boundaries. She flew as far as the facts.

Sensing he had solved nothing, Joe quickly stood up, paused in an effort to establish a benediction, and said, “I perfectly understand, Phoebe. Forgive me for being so foolish. I know that until he’s back there is no satisfaction for anyone. I miss him, too, you know. It made me feel better thinking he might still be alive. I know it can’t be the same for you.”

“Give my love to Muriel,” Phoebe succinctly replied. “Thank you again for coming.”

“Yes, of course. She would be delighted to join you for tea sometime.” Phoebe was quiet. “You used to do that before the war.”

“Before the war,” she said in a voice that rent open all she had said so kindly beforehand. With that Joe softly opened the door and filed out into the snowfall, which had already thickened and now blanketed the avenue. The cars only crept now, their tires leaving creamy indentions lined with the brine of the slush. He searched the windows of the house and discovered them to all be empty, even the one Phoebe had just stood in. She had left her cup in the center of the sill, as if asking the outside world to fill it up again. Joe couldn’t help but pause in his steps and look the house over once more. The orange paint on the walls was flaking and cradled pockets of snow so at a broad spectrum it looked speckled, dripping with white until meshing together with the fingery drifts rising up at the foundation. He was bitten by its loneliness.

“Mr Riley?” He shook his head and turned. Sylver appeared carrying a rubber football under one arm and a couple of schoolbooks under the other. He was thin, rather pale, with shaggy brown hair that curled behind one ear. Though he fought the image, Joe saw Davy’s impenetrable eyes in Sylver’s. His own name being addressed to him almost mutated into a voice twenty-five years older. He shivered, recovered, and then smiled, receiving the boy with an embrace and then inquiring about football. Sylver offered a minimal reply about being picked last for the team, and then coyly opened up one of the books after Joe ranted a little about the shortcomings of the public school system.

“What book is that?” Joe asked after a length of silence. Sylver checked the front and reported: “History of England.”

“Very fascinating.”

“I suppose it is. I’m looking for my bookmark though.”

“Ah. Did you make it yourself?”

“No sir.”

“I was just asking because I know how fond you are of drawing things. Doodling, I suppose it is.”

Sylver paged through the volume and finally unearthed the bookmark. He handed it to Joe, saying, “My dad and I used to go, when he was alive.”

It was a flyer advertising the premier of a new polar bear at the London Zoo. Joe spent a long while studying the photograph of the bear, wondering how any living thing could be so enormous and yet still be confined. It was a good picture. The polar bear was standing upright next to a human silhouette to measure comparison. According to the caption, the beast towered at an astonishing ten feet, so huge that scientists predicted it weighed more than thirty St. Bernards.

“Premier November the 7th!” Joe mused, returning the flyer to Sylver. “Would you like me to take you to see it?”

Sylver seemed surprised. He took the flyer back with hesitation, nodding with a half endorsed smile suggesting he had almost forgotten how to be happy.

Joe placed a hand on the boy’s shoulder, and said, “November 7th...let’s see that’s a Saturday, right? I’ll be here. Say ten a.m.?”

“Okay. Do you think it would be a good idea to invite Mother?”

“She may like that.”

“She used to come with us.”

“I remember. We all made an outing to the zoo once during a summertime.”

It was silent then. It was a curling silence with the snow rippling through the yellow gleam of the street lamps.

“I’d better go in, sir. Thank you sir. Um, see you Saturday, sir?”

“I wouldn’t miss seeing that polar creature with you for any loot in Madagascar.”

He paused before saying goodbye and added, “You’re good at word figuring. What wouldn’t you miss to see it?”

“I wouldn’t miss it for anything,” Sylver said, laughing. “Did you hear what they’re calling the polar bear show?”

“What’s that?”

Sylver turned to the house when he said it. “The Antarctic Dream. It’s so amazing it shouldn’t even be real.”

:::::::::::::::::::::::

2

November 7th, 8:00 a.m.

Joe Riley wakes up after a bad dream, reaches to his side for Muriel only to find the bed empty. He stumbles out of the bed, leans over his dresser and stares into the calendar: November 7th. Note: The Antarctic Dream. “Ahh,” he whispers to himself. He starts to reach for a bottle of wine, but pauses, and looks out into the balcony where a thread of cold wind feathers up to meet him. There is Muriel in the snow, drinking a cup of cider and musing over the disarray of her world. Beautiful, complicated, magical disarray. He saw her like he did when he was looking for Davy. The same shoulders cloaked with blue, the same yellow hair playing with the wind. The same green eyes when she turned around as she said: “Mr Riley, everything is going to be okay.”

The morning of November 7th seemed to jump into Sylver’s arms. He tumbled out of bed the moment his eyes flicked open and pasted his eyes through his window. There was an unusual amount of snow on the ground, and the avenue forestry was sapped with ice.  Sylver remembered. He had finished a drawing the night before and had stayed up so late working on it that the whole thing felt vague. But he turned to his little desk by the window and saw that it was there on top of some cluttered papers, waiting. It was a polar bear modeled after the photograph in the flyer, with a few creative exceptions. Sylver had drawn the creature in a sailboat, since he liked the sea so much, with a golden pocket watch hanging from one paw and a plain orange bandana wrapped round the trunk-like neck. The sailboat was poised on a still green span of water. Sylver had painted it from the side so you could see just one black eye as the polar bear set sights on some distant bergs.

“No creature should sail alone,” Sylver had poetically mused. The sketch of Sylver’s body stood just a little behind the bear. He wanted a good way to inquire the horizon, so he fastened a bronze pair of binoculars to his eyes. Portable windows.

Sylver assigned the drawing to a spot on the wall beside his window. He went back and forth from speculating the outdoors to appreciating the painting, and soon got so acquainted with both views they became a panorama: still and long and cold. Sylver blinked. The world beyond his window must have blinked at the same time, for standing on its two hind legs in the snow, towering above the frozen apple saplings, was a polar bear. Sylver’s heart reeled, and though he meant to jump backwards, he found himself pressing his face against the glass and staring. The bear was intently looking up into Sylver’s window with a pair of inquisitive black eyes. Strangely, and to Sylver’s shock, it wore an orange bandana around its neck and cradled a golden pocket watch in the crook of its arm. With the other paw, it unmistakably waved. A million thoughts flashed through Sylver’s brain. He returned the wave hesitantly as the bear, encouraged by the response, began urgently pointing at the pocket watch and making gestures suggesting it wanted Sylver to come outside, that time was running short. Sylver stepped away from the window for a moment, trying to compose his thoughts. For a moment he listened. The entire house was silent, except for the ticking of the big wooden clock downstairs. He looked outside again to check if the bear was still there; it was, and was still waving and tapping the watch.

Sylver slipped into his clothes and tiptoed downstairs into the parlor. His own muffled steps sounded like gunfire in comparison to the silence. His mother wasn’t anywhere to be seen, but there was a cup of warm cocoa on the windowsill and a brief note, addressed to Sylver, laying next to it: I’ve gone for a bit of a long walk this morning. I’ll be home before Mr Riley arrives. I love you.

The morning’s strangeness had only lengthened. Sylver drank the cocoa, pressed the note into his breast pocket, and then slowly opened the front door. He felt the rapid chill of the wind and snow as it curled through the neighborhood eaves. Before he set eyes on the polar bear again he saw that the street, the walk, and the shoppes were all regularly intact. There were no dreamlike figures gliding through the walls. The antarctic creature, now visibly smiling at Sylver as it tucked the pocket watch away, was the only abnormality. It spoke in a rumbling, melodic voice that reminded Sylver of icebergs colliding and collapsing: “You’re name is Sylver, right?”

“Y-yes. You talk.”

“I’m not an ordinary polar bear.”

“You look like the one I painted. He was only make-believe though.” The bear lumbered forward until its pointed nose rested a foot away from Sylver’s.

“Do you think I’m make believe?” It breathed silently, but lines of mist came at length through its nostrils, dissipating in the snowfall.

“I’m not sure,” Sylver admitted, looking deeply into the curious black eyes. “Where did you come from? Are you from the zoo?”

“Shh! I’m trying to escape. They found me on one of their ex-po-tishuns.”

“On their what?”

“Ex-po-tishuns. You know. Ex-cur-sons. Ad-ven-ters.”

“Ah! They found you in Antarctica. On an expedition.”

“Smart lad. But I’M trying to get home. I don’t suppose you want to come along, do you? I’ve a sailboat ready and everything.”

“I don’t know,” Sylver said. “What if you eat me on the way?” He paused for a second and then added, “Mother would be really worried.”

“It’s all been arranged with dear Phoebe,” the bear said. “She’s given me complete permission. And even if I do eat you, it wouldn’t be much to worry about. My belly is as big as bowling alley.”

Sylver made no reply. He lifted a hand and touched the bridge of the bear’s nose with the tip of his finger. It was hard, warm, encouraging. Sylver flattened his palm out and settled it atop the furry head.

“You see?” the creature whispered. “I’m just as real as you make me.”

Sylver felt the snow settle in the exposed portions of his neck, watched the vapor unfurl from the bear’s parted jaws, and the only question he really had left was: “What’s your name?”

“Only time will tell,” the bear replied. “Come on. It’s time to set sail.”

Before Sylver knew what was happening, he found himself astraddle the bear’s back, watching his familiar neighbor fly by as they thundered away down the alley. The orange villa soon lay frozen behind them. Everything was a blur. Colors and figures united, walking people were wiggling grass blades. The bear’s fur was thick and warm against Sylver’s stomach, and real, brute strength was rippling through its arms and legs, and fierce, coarse oxygen was flowing through its lungs. It felt sort of like a launch in a rocketship. Nothing outside the portal is discernable, but the inside beats with life, and you know reality is touching base with the stars.

The bear skidded to a stop beneath London Bridge, breathing heavily and looking up and down the riverbank in search of something.

“Aha!” Bound to a small pier in the shoals was a sailboat. It was the color of a pale sunset and looked about ten feet long, spangled with a green sail and banner. The bear asked Sylver to “dismount.”Once he did, the bear clambered into the boat and stood upright for a time, testing the balance. Logically the boat should have sunk on the spot, but it looked to be as buoyant as ever. The polar bear looked to Sylver once the boat was steady and said, “Before you say no to getting into this contraption, you need to know two things.” Sylver was standing next to the water, unsure if it was the freeze in the air or in his heart that was making him so numb.

“This world has some strange things in it, and this sailboat is one of them.”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better about getting in?” Sylver asked.

“No. It’s supposed to make you feel better about where you’re going.”

“Can you promise me I’ll come back?”

“I can’t promise you that you’ll want to come back.”

“You’re a mysterious bear.”

“It’s a mysterious world, Sylver.”

Playfully, the polar bear spun in a circle and then performed a couple of impressive somersaults; the zoo must have wanted polar acrobats.  It ended up at the other end of the boat behind a brass steering wheel, and with a grin, patted a little green stool beside it, saying, “Aboard please. We’re due in Antarctica by midnight!”

“So soon?” Sylver said as hopped into spot.

“When you’re on the sea, time is all mixed up. It’s like a dream, almost.”

A little gold dollar

I found in my collar,

Heavy, beautiful and bright, you see.

A clever green dragon

Dark as a mead flagon

Soon asked to have it, have it, from me.

“For your gold dollar,

That you found in your collar,

I’ll give you the body you want,” it said.

“Big, small or lame,

Dumb, smart or tame;

Anything at all, alive or plain dead.”

“What a fair bargain,

And no empty jargon,

Are the words you speak to me.

For such a lovely jewel,

To give away I’d be a fool,

And yet a polar bear is the body I’d be.”

“That’s a lovely song,” Sylver remarked. They were moving swiftly over an expanse of blue water now; it must have been sometime in the afternoon. England was nowhere in sight. It wasn’t snowing. The sun shone and dipped its rays into colorful, teeming depths.

“It’s an old myth,” the bear said softly. “I call it “The Polar Bear Hymn.”

“I didn’t really understand all of it, honestly. Is it true?”

“True? What do you mean? It was truly a poem, written from true feelings.”

“I mean did all that stuff really happen, with the green dragon and all the rest.”

“Oh! Yes of course.”

“So what were you before you were a bear?”

“A man, of sorts.”

Sylver was fingering the rim of the boat, staring into the water as it rushed by, blinking when the salt got into his eyes. “Of sorts?” He faced the bear with a frown. “So you changed into a bear just because you wanted to?”

“For a little bit I am. I needed one more holiday here in the world before going on to the next.”

“My father and I used to go on holidays. Every day seemed like a holiday with him.”

“Tell me about him,” urged the bear. He let the pocketwatch dangle in front of him for a second then put it back, inwardly murmuring, “We’ll make the lights.”

“I just remember he wanted to go on adventures. He and my mother used to spend a lot of time together, drinking coffee in the mornings and wine in the evenings.”

“Both delightful beverages, in their proper place and time.”

“We used to go to the zoo. He loved penguins, and all the winter animals,” Sylver continued, dipping his fingers into the water.

Dozens of other thoughts marched through his brain, but none of them found a way out before the bear said, “Your mother is a remarkable woman. But she needs more than coffee to get through the day.”

III

November 7th. 9:00 a.m.

Phoebe walks to the cathedral in knee high snow, tossing a glance behind her shoulder before she opens the front doors. She shakes when she sees the striking beauty of the sculptures, the color and life of the mosaics. It has been six years since she has felt the warmth of the candlelight, since she has heard the mysterious echoes of the children’s choir in the balcony loft. She makes her way, unashamed, to the foremost pew. Sitting down and staring upward into the spacious concaves above her, she whispers, “Forgive me. Forgive me for not believing.”

The stars were already stippling the east and the sun was sinking into a purple horizon. Sylver had his head burrowed into the bear’s lap, fast asleep. The bear kept his eyes trained on the south, waiting, and softly recited his benediction:

At the end of all things,

At the end of all dreams,

Silver trumpets are calling me home.

The green ice is calling,

Gold light is falling,

And it’s time to return to my tomb.

“Sylver,” he whispered, “we’re here.”

Sylver lifted his head. The darkness perplexed him at first, but as soon as he rubbed his eyes, the world cleared and blushed into being. Above him, the sky was so populated with silver stars that it looked like a vault of jewels; to the south, green, purple, and blue auroras undulated like flailing ribbons, replacing the sunshine and swathing the figure of an enormous mountain.

“The edge of Antarctica!” the polar bear declared, standing on its hind legs. “We’ve made it home.” The boat veered under some icy arcs and came up right next to a sheer slab of mountainside. Sylver was so close to the wall of blue green ice that he was able to reach out and run his fingers against its surface. The water underneath them, clear as crystal and alight with phosphorescence, was swirling with penguins, seals, and whales.

“What is this place?” Sylver breathed.

“I call it Mezma,” said the polar bear. “It’s one of the places in this world where you are simply mesmerized by beauty, inspired by color.”

“Mr Polar Bear,” said Sylver. “Who are you really? I don’t believe this is a dream anymore. I need to know.”

Without warning, the bear dove cleanly into the water and vanished into the seaworld traffic.  After a minute of silence, it reappeared and toppled into the sailboat, holding something in one paw.

“I had to get your present.”

Opening its paw, it continued, “These are more than just binoculars, Sylver. They are ‘portable windows.’ Every time you look through them, you’ll be able to see Mezma. You’ll reenter our little Antarctic adventure.”

“Just like the ones in my drawing,” Sylver mused, taking the binoculars and toying with the fine dials. “But, sir, you still haven’t answered my question.”

“What question was that?”

“Who are you truly? What’s your name?”

There was a period of quiet, as if the world took in a deep breath, stored it in a pair of cold lungs, and was holding it there.

“I had to take you on one last holiday, Sylver,” the creature finally said. “I gave that gold dollar, that I found in my collar, so I could come back to you. I’m your father. I’m Davy.”

The bear’s sad black eyes turned a human blue, a color not unlike the passing mountain of ice. “But it’s quite time I go home. Yes, my time’s up. The green dragon is giving my dollar back tonight.”

Sylver felt as if he had dove head first into the ocean and was suspended in the cold, devoid of thoughts or feeling. He could only manage a few words, “Will I ever see you again?”

“We’re practically neighbors,” Davy replied with a laugh. “Mezma is just a glance away.”

Sylver nodded, gripping the binoculars and taking a final look at the mountain, the stars, and the polar bear. “I believe you. I will always believe you.”

November 7th, 10:00 a.m.

Sylver is staring through his window into the blank avenue. He has set the binoculars on his desk, but hasn’t looked through them yet. He hears his mother come through the front door downstairs as she hums a distantly familiar tune. Sylver trots into the parlor and meets eyes with her. Phoebe’s braid is neat but her face is red, and her ringlet lays disheveled on her head. She smiles widely; Sylver doesn’t remember the last time he saw those perfect rows of white teeth. They hug, they cry, they know. They’ve both seen their polar bear.

Joe Riley runs up to the orange villa and raps on the front door. Sylver and Phoebe answer it together.

“Sorry, old sport,” Joe said, giving a sigh and mopping his head over with a mittened hand. “There isn’t any bear. It’s all over the news! Escaped.”

A little gold dollar,

I found in my collar,

And so dragon green sends me away.

Past kingdoms, past Mars.

Past Mezma, past the stars,

I’m in the good world, now, to stay.

the end

Since last summer I've been in the process of expanding this piece into a short novel. Hopefully the rough draft will be complete before the summer 2017. I'll be sure to share it with you once it's finished! -Peter