Two Edelweisses Atop the Alps

Michael Freshcomb broke into this party where I was coercively being hazed and saved me.

“No, man! No tail wagging. I don’t even know you. Halie Field asked me to. She’s sweet on you, if you cared to know,” he said after I was ensconced around a safe corner. Mirabeau-like, he talked the hazers to just drop it. And they miraculously did! That was my introduction to Michael Freshcomb.

There was also Dan Farncombe, whom I never saw in school before. He came over to me, a few days after Freshcomb saved me.

“Hello, Said. Dan Farncombe. Your savior says five sharp at the park,” he whispered.

“But I have somewhere to be this afternoon!” I tried to protest as though I knew what he was about.

“Sans bullshit! Don’t miss it, is all I know,” he said and left me solo.

I had to break my parents’ hearts that evening because I was dying to know what Freshcomb and Farncombe had wanted me for. And there they were: on the furthest bench from view. Those two boys started to give me the creeps.

“You could’ve chosen a bench where I could’ve spotted you easily. Or you could’ve told me what bench exactly you had meant to meet me at,” I was frustrated because it took me a long while to find them.

“You found us, didn’t you, Said?” Freshcomb said smilingly.

“What is this?”

“This what?” Farncombe said.

“THIS – pointing at both boys – the two of you!”

“It doesn’t matter. Listen, we want you to borrow James Joyce’s Cambridge Centenary Ulysses, the 1922 text. It’s a huge edition. Dustjacket, fading green. Book, dark blue,” Freshcomb whispered into the heart of the three-headed creature he called for with a gesture from his index.

“And by borrowing he means stealing,” added Farncombe with a whispered laugh that came out husky.

“Woah! Woah! Woah!”

“Wisht, boy, wisht!” they hushed me collectively.

“I’ve heard about how vulgar the book is… Heeey! You’re both, what? fifteen!”

“Will you do us this favor or not?”

“So now you’re playing the do-me-a-favor-I-do-you-a-favor kind of game, huh? And what’s with all the whispering? God help me… Where’s this book at?”

“Mr. Bradstreet’s mansion,” Freshcomb said.

“What? You made me skip the viewing of a rare film with my parents at Bradstreet's, and you want me to go back to the same place later as a thief?”

– You see, Mr. Richard ‘Dick’ Bradstreet is a rich man in town. Those who knew him called him Dick Brad. He’s a collector of films, books, artifacts and what not. There isn’t an occupation that is dearer to him than receiving guests from all over town and beyond, to have tea and conversate with, and view his collections. Mother and father were scheduled for a rare viewing of How a Mosquito Operates, an American 1912 animated short Dick Brad recently got his hands on and restored –.

“What film?” said Farncombe.

“Never mind what film! You two… you… No. I want to know what you are about.”

“Us? We’re nobody’s. We’re edelweisses that wish to live unbothered atop the Alps,” said Freshcomb.

“I don’t understand…”

“Will you read a book with us?” said Farncombe invitingly.

– I saw that Freshcomb started as though his companion had said the wrong thing, as though it never occurred to him that Farncombe would ever run his mouth like he did; then he managed to cover for his dislike and discomfort with a determined stare he shot at me –:

“This is most absurd! Read a book with you?”

Then, Dan Farncombe produced a book from his backpack. Michael Freshcomb still hid his dismay. I didn’t bother to flip the pages through like anybody naturally would when they were handed a book. It was Walden.

“So, this is weird-boys book club then!”

“Wisht, boy, wisht!” they hushed me again collectively.

“I don’t understand. You choose such an obscure bench to meet, you want me to steal a book for you and you refuse to tell me what...”

“Aah! Just take the book, already. Read it and you’ll see,” said Dan Farncombe, strainingly affirmed by his companion, Michael Freshcomb.

That evening, my parents never seized talking about the animated short and how a shame it was I didn’t get to see it. I could see they were hurt. They really wanted me to see it so bad. I promised to pay Dick Brad another visit with them. Maybe it’d be the time I get to locate where this Ulysses edition Freshcomb and Farncombe wanted me to borrow:

“And then I’ll think about when and how to do the deed,” I told them later.

They were so excited upon my presenting the idea. But they didn’t appreciate the fact that I hadn’t touched the book they gave me yet. I promised I will.

And on came the shock upon me that night, more thundersome than the whole of this affair: it wasn’t Walden! It was a copy of The Handmaid’s Tale wrapped in a cover of Walden:

“What’s going on here!”

“Have you enjoyed Walden?” said Freshcomb.

“It’s The Handmaid’s Tale for God’s sake…!”

“Wisht, boy! We don’t know what you’re talking about. Answer this one simple question: have you enjoyed Walden?” he said even more firmly.

They could see how disturbingly overwhelmed I was. They sat me down under the nearest oak, for my condition didn’t allow them to look for the furthest one. One of them offered me a bottle of water.

“Relax, man… See, have you ever thought of where to go in life and couldn’t figure it out? So, instead you chose to go wherever the universe took you?” said Freshcomb.

“What are you, two maniacs, talking about?! You’re only fifteen! I’m eighteen and I just started life!”

“Tsk, tsk, tsk… you’ve lived on this earth for eighteen years, so far doing nothing?” said Farncombe.

“Oh, yeah?! Name me one thing you achieved in your fifteen pampered years on earth!”

“Relaaax, relax, man,” added Freshcomb.

I told them that the last thing I wanted to see then was their faces. I promised them to read the book and they left. Then I devoured The Handmaid’s Tale in one nocturnal sitting. I skipped school the next day against my parents’ wishes for I was unable to open my eyes no more. As much as my skipping school bothered them, mother and father gifted me a copy of Montaigne. I woke up at lunch time, and I found the book lying on my nightstand. “And read To Philosophize is to Learn to Die,” my mother said later when I kissed her and father. They couldn’t contain their mirth. Thank God they didn’t think of flipping through the pages of Walden!

And I chanced upon the two boys as I was strolling in the park feeling the fresh afternoon air in my lungs. The two devils made me watch a video where Margaret Atwood, the author, directs a flamethrower at an unburnable edition of The Handmaid’s Tale. Guess what? The wicked thing doesn't burn! It was all so surreal to me. Still is.

Halie Field, and I became boyfriend and girlfriend. As for the Ulysses edition they wanted me to steal, I tried and I failed miserably. Dick Brad caught me red-handed and reported me to my parents who grounded me after school and on weekends for the next three weeks. Grounded at eighteen. A first since I became of age, or did I ever… become...? The afternoons I was grounded saw me one time and another looking out my window as Freshcomb and Farncombe waved at me from outside. They'd stand planted there, steadfast, like 'two edelweisses atop the Alps.'