It was strange seeing the world as a photo negative. I pushed the sand under foot, felt it slide forward and out, acting just as sand should. I found a small, round rock on a little dune and dropped it into the water. It plopped into the dark grey sea with a very ordinary splash. The wind kicked up, for just a moment, and it whistled through the thin golden stalks of grass with a familiar tone. Aside from the place’s color, everything appeared to be almost the same.
Minus the people. On my side, this beach was hardly ever empty. By day, the pristine white sand (this cloudy twilight was what passed for daytime here) was perpetually filled with beach-goers in various stages of undress. They soaked in rays from the warm sun and swam in blue-green water so clear one could see straight to the bottom even out in the middle of the inlet. Huge tortoises meandered up and down the beach, trinket-stuffed baskets strapped to their flat-top shells. Beside them, their owners shouted out the extraordinary and unlikely restorative powers of their wares.
Even at night there were people here. The other here. Lovers would pad along the water line, look out at the silhouette of the distant cliffs and wonder how they ever got so lucky to be in that place, at that moment, with that one person who made them, finally, whole.
On my side, the beach was everything good about light and warmth and the energy of a crowd in full bloom. On this side, it was starkly different. And yet, it wasn’t quite opposite. The dark cliff faces were foreboding but still awe-inspiring. The water lapped at the beach’s edge, and it was quiet and calm and soothing. Even the thin sheets of ice had their beauty, reflecting as they did the rich hue of the black sand dunes. This place was too dark and solitary for him, I thought, but not too dark and solitary as a rule.
I wondered, though, if it was the sort of muted anti-beauty that was best left untouched. Bewitching to gaze upon but made dangerous through any interaction. Even if that was the case, someone must have taken that chance. It was, after all, what brought him to this place.
Warnings were all well and good, but they felt less dire now that I was here. Remonstrations by my local portal representative, my temple overseer and my soon-to-be wife had held a tenor of disaster. I’d known people who had passed through the portals, who’d come back and been, if not enlightened, at least more aware of their own lives. And none had come back in some way twisted or broken. As far as I knew, no one had ever failed to come back at all. I supposed the portals would be disassembled if anyone had.
Plus, as I’d put it to my detractors, I wasn’t on the hunt for some vague adventure. I’d crafted a very specific plan. I was looking for someone in particular. On my side, before I stepped through the portal, I’d been sure I would find my man. But here, on this side, I felt much less certain.
Still, I’d come to search, and my time was not unlimited. I walked down the beach, away from the foreboding cliffs opposite the small inlet, toward a small cabin nestled among the dunes. It was strange to see the beachfront empty yet stranger still to see anyone living on this dark version of it. But a thin tendril of smoke issued from the chimney, and candlelight flickered through the bolted-down shutters. Someone did, circumstances aside, live here.
Before I even approached the small steps leading to the cabin’s minuscule porch, the front door eased open. An older man, maybe fifteen years my senior, stood in the frame. He had salt-and-pepper hair buzzed short to just this side of bald, and he was tall, fit enough, but surely too skinny for his frame.
“You’re lost?” the man asked, and his voice was almost kind.
“Not exactly,” I replied. “I’m looking for someone.”
He nodded. “You’d better come in.” And he turned back inside, leaving the door open.
I padded up the steps and entered the cabin. Inside it was homier than I’d expected. An iron brazier, with a few lit hunks of driftwood, sat in the fireplace. A pair of wooden chairs were tucked under a homemade table. A few mismatched paintings hung on the cabin walls. Through a cracked door on the back wall, I could see the bedroom. A thick, comfortable duvet stretched across a decently big bed.
“Not many people come out this way,” the man said. With what he must have thought was surreptitious nonchalance, he slid a drawer closed in a small corner dresser. He pointed to the chairs under the table. I dragged one out, sat down, and he took a seat in the other.
“I’m not looking for just anyone,” I answered. “It’s someone quite specific, actually.”
“Alright.”
“I’m not sure how to explain,” I started, then paused. I realized I hadn’t given a lot of thought of how to put in words the target of my search. It was all clear and organized in my head. But saying it out loud made it seem, and there didn’t seem to be a way around this, completely nuts.
“Best to just get it out,” he advised. I took heed.
“Years ago, I was on something of an impromptu trip, and I had a travelling companion. We’d become fast friends early in the journey. After some meandering, we set a distant destination, determined not to end our trip until we had reached it.
“But as time wore on, I found our tastes were not as aligned as I’d originally thought. He had some notions that were logically sound on their own, but didn’t fit in with the travel plan we’d put together. I thought it put us in undue danger at certain points, though danger from what I could not have said even then.
“Eventually, we got to a small town that I’d never heard of, but he knew well. After a long night and more than our fair share of drinks, I admitted to some of my misgivings about the slowly morphing plan. And I give him credit because he put up some kind of fight. But in the end, he understood that each of us has our own destination to which we are drawn.”
As I spoke, he stood up and pulled a kettle away from the fire.
“Tea?” he asked.
“Sure.”
From a cabinet in the kitchen that was little more than an outcropping of the cabin’s main room, he produced two mugs. As he poured two cups of steaming tea, he took a quick glance at the dresser in the corner. Mugs full, he set them and a bowl of honey on the table.
“What happened when you reached the destination?” he asked, prompting.
“We didn’t,” I said. “The next morning, I realized I no longer wanted to get there. I’d lost the desire completely. He went on, and I took a different road out of town.”
“And that was the last you saw of him?”
I nodded and took a sip of tea. It was fresh, the leaves recently dried and full of flavor. The honey looked fresh too, but I hadn’t seen any beekeeping equipment. The town was probably nearby.
“Well how can I help you? Even if you gave me a detailed description, he might look far different now,” the man pointed out. His face held a quizzical look, and he seemed to dutifully turn the issue over in his mind. “Plus, this place is pretty out of the way. And that’s by design. A lot of people come out here specifically to avoid being found.”
“That is not hard to believe,” I said in haste. It was already out of my mouth when I realized he might mean himself, and I began immediately to backtrack. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to-“
He waved me off. “Don’t worry about it.” And again, a quick look over at the dresser.
“I’m afraid I was only able to take a few days off work,” I continued, thinking it wise to get back on topic. “A local guide might be a big help.”
“Afraid I don’t know any.”
I nodded, processing, then ventured a guess. “I could pay.”
He snorted at that and shook his head. “I’m no guide.”
“It would only be a few days. And this doesn’t seem the most populated place. I’m sure we could find him even faster if we-“
“I said I can’t,” he said, almost a snap, and there was a momentary flash of fire in his eyes. He set the mug down on the table and took a moment to compose himself. “I’m.. I’m sorry about that.”
“That’s alright,” I answered. My sense of comfort had quickly faded. I suddenly felt keenly aware that I was in a strange cabin on the other side of a portal alone with a man whose name I didn’t even know. This was probably not the wisest place to seek help in searching for someone who may very well want to stay hidden.
“You came through a portal?” he asked, his voice settling back to his previous, ordinary cadence.
I nodded, then figured I had one last chance to abandon caution. “You did too?”
“No,” the man answered. He looked down at his mug, eyes intently tracking wisps of steam that formed, rose and vanished. “Not a portal.”
That didn’t make sense. All the science showed humans weren’t found through the portals. The travel guides, the portal reps, and especially the temple overseers were all pretty clear about that point. If I met anyone on my travels, they would have come from our side. I opened my mouth to inquire, then thought better of it.
Because the man was lying. It wasn’t a very good lie, and he knew it, and he knew that I knew it. Whatever had driven him to come here, he wasn’t interested in bringing it up with some stranger just passing through. Probably not even with himself.
With himself…
I looked past him to the little dresser in the corner. And the drawer that he’d tried to close without my noticing. I had no idea what was in that drawer, and it was then my curiosity dried up. Because I realized I was lying too.
I knew exactly what was in it.
Before I could stop myself, I looked from it to him. His eyes had been guarded before, smart and welcoming though wary. That was gone now. They were wet, and pleading, and I knew that wouldn’t be enough. That drawer would open again. Maybe not right after I left. Maybe not until the night fell, or until the colorless excuse for daytime rose again tomorrow. But it would open again.
“Is she…” he started to ask, but it caught in his throat. He couldn’t go on.
I put down my tea and stood. I didn’t want to answer. It wasn’t my place. This whole trip had very clearly been a mistake. In that moment, I guessed why we had never found people on the far side of the portals. Those places, the other worlds, were not fit for the lives of men.
I was out the door and down the steps in moments. I turned up the beach, back the way I’d come, but something held me back. I paused. In truth, I hadn’t expected to find my old traveling companion. I wasn’t sure I had even wanted to find him. Being honest with myself, I’d thought this errand would be one of those stories where the trip itself is the point of the whole affair.
He was standing in the half open doorway, holding his quickly cooling tea. His face had been restored, impassive once more.
“The portal’s that way,” he said, pointing, mistaking my hesitation for a loss of bearings. And he made to close the door.
And I think that’s why I said it. He’d gotten himself out here, and he knew he was doomed to stay. Whether he was angry or sad or resigned or some strange sense of content, he understood he had to be out here. He knew it was his only option, and he’d taken it on the chin.
“We’re getting married,” I said. “When I get back. She’s…” She’s what? Excited? Nervous? Successful? Still beautiful?
“Happy. She’s happy.”
He closed the door, and I heard a sturdy lock catch. And I made the long trek up the black sand beach to the portal in what must have been record time. I wanted to make that return trip, to go back through a portal for the last time. I wanted to tell the temple overseer and the portal rep that they were right.
And I wanted to tell her she was wrong about one thing. Yes, he was broken and lost and there was absolutely no saving him. And he had looked far older than he should. But he could still smile if the smile was meant for her.
The Tall Tale Year 