The Yellow Sign

I woke up in a hospital room and the rain was pit-pat-pattering against the dirty gray-yellow reinforced glass. The place was dark and damp, and smelled like old chemicals that someone forgot to rotate. Oh rotate, the room was rotating in front of my eyes, like a spin-spin-spin was about to happen but it never did and like I was about to tip forward, but I did not. The corners where the walls should meet looked bent and the walls didn’t seem to actually meet. But how?

The lights went out, or maybe I was extinguished for a moment, and when everything came back, I was not alone in the room. My guest sat on a little rickety metal-and-green-Formica chair. He (she?) had her lips pursed and her eyes looked really tired, like she was about to fall asleep. She spoke tiredly, softly, too. She spoke in a quiet voice, like she was mindful of the other patients, but were there other patients there? I couldn’t tell. I couldn’t hear any of them. I could smell something like people-smells mixed with the chemicals, but I did not hear any breathing, only machines, an air circulation system, the rain against the windows, and her voice. What she said seemed to fade in and out, or maybe it was me who was fading out. I was swaying in the winds which blew outside the sturdy walls.

”Of course, he is all tatters now,” she said, “Flapping in the wind, he’s so old. But he gets excited when he talks about the stars. Aldebaran. When he says it, his voice sounds like the echo of the church bells we heard when we were both young. It was so, so long ago I can barely remember. I can hardly tell which parts are memories, which parts are stories told over and over until they solidified, and which parts are just imagination. It’s hard for me to stay awake, but I try to listen to him.”

Was she my mother? Was she talking about my father? It was hard for me to stay awake too.

”And Arcturus,” she continued, “He lights up when he talks about Arcturus. He points to specs of light in the sky, but I can hardly see anymore, and they are like a paste of light to me. Like a smear of something rather than something. But to him they are stories of travels and adventure. To him they are women he met, other women, not me, I can tell. To him they are memories of the time when he was alive. He would come back to me at those times, I remember vividly, and he would tell me his stories back then too. I always knew what he was omitting, or whom he was omitting. I could always tell what he had been up to.”

I whooshed out and it was like I was falling falling falling, except there was no bottom that could crush my bones, no stone tiles to absorb all this energy, so I just fell. Is this what it’s like after you die? I was thirsty.

When I flickered back into the room, she was squeezing some water from a sponge onto my lips. So I could communicate with her, it seemed. It was not just a monologue. The thirst was a little less at last. She continued.

”He misses those days, now he is so thin he almost flaps in the wind. But his core is still solid crystal, he can still withstand, it seems. He is a yellow tatter in the fog when we walk back home. His yellow against the different-yellow lights as we approach. I can hardly see anymore, but I see some colors and some shapes. I see your face now, and you look like him. Like when we went on one single adventure together, far, far away. He pointed out a yellow sign that meant a lot to him, and it meant a lot me, but just because of what it meant to him. I was in love. I was in love so much, it was like a disease. Now I know it. I wanted what he could not give me, but he still bent himself to be a little more like what I needed. So I let him go and let him come back to share his stories with me.”

I was extinguished again and this time it felt longer. Like it was never going to end, and I was afraid. But when I came back, she was still there.

”He is like a rag in the wind now, and all I can see is his color. I thank the stars, and I try to remember what he says about them, but it’s not important anymore. He cannot give me what I need anymore, and you cannot give me anything either. I am alone now. But it’s not your fault. Not your responsibility.”

I tried to speak to reassure her, but I could not remember how to make words. I could almost remember the yellow sign she had spoken of, and I wanted to make it, but I didn’t know how.

She looked at me and I couldn’t tell what emotion was engraved on her face-plate. I was too far gone, too much devoted to Hastur or Aldebaran or Artcturus. Too much like my father’s (?) stories. I had spent too much time in misplaced-time and misplaced-affections. Just like he had. I should have considered her at least for part of my life. But I did not. I selfishly decided it was time to end myself without thinking about how much it would take out of her.

That was the last time I saw my mother. A room I could hardly tell was real, in a reality I had long since abandoned and almost forgotten. I could hardly tell what she was saying and now I will never see or hear her again. My last chance is gone.

Maybe I can learn from this. Maybe there will be chances in this place too. Chances to give love.

Posted by: Paweł Kowaluk