Sans Neige

How am I supposed to know if it was for the better or the worse? I grew up ordinary—middle-class, suburban home. There were trees and streams, but being in the middle, I never suffered the hardship of the poor, and I couldn’t grasp the frustration of the rich. I guess it’s an advantage, but when I was young, I knew what I wanted. Only the Navy had jets, fast jets. They flew very high and very fast. I wanted to feel those wings. If I had been a pilot, I would have touched the wind, but they couldn’t accept me. My school graduated me, but my grades told a different story. I wanted to reach greater heights, but I blew it and landed back in the middle. In the middle of the red-light district. That’s where I saw her.

My colleagues and I just got paid and wanted to blow off some steam, but I had bills to pay, and they had women. I waited outside Carnival, surrounded by neon and girls behind storefront windows like puppies at a pet store. It was tempting, but I lent my last dollar to a card game. I’d smile and wave back to the girls, and then I wished they’d just unplugged everything.

I stood on the shores of people, and oddly enough, it was mostly couples, or at least that’s what I noticed. The weather was beautiful for a walk, and so I walked, one of the crowd. The token third-wheel, which was fine with me. There are books about this, but none seemed to apply to the predicament to which everything is taken or claimed, one way or another, by motives I saw right through or perhaps saw right through me. It was hard to tell, but then again, I didn’t ask. I had my hands in my pockets and started noticing the color of people’s shoelaces. I tend to do that.

“There is an untouched place in the stars, completely free of all the troubles that are plaguing our world! I dreamt our children flew there and found peace. Found God! It’s not far from these trivial delights. Even you.”

She was passing out handwritten pamphlets, and because no one took one, I did. I must say my motives were completely selfish. She was beautiful and possibly insane.

“Hello, my name is Manna. Did you know we’re blind to the tears of God?”

“I can’t say I’ve noticed…”

“And that’s what’s wrong.”

“Wrong? With what?”

“Everything! These words, your voice, all of it. It’s going to be gone. Everything. All we can do is go to space now.”

“O-k, I’m going to get going.”

“Will you come?”

“Where?”

The pamphlet she handed me had a date, time, and location. I said, “Yes,” and it felt wrong.

“Nice to meet you, Manna. Adios!”

Those were my last words to her. I was gone, just as quickly as she said hello. She spoke to strangers about heaven and space. I looked back and couldn’t help but notice the sense of purpose that seemed to brew within her. I wouldn’t say I was jealous, but it definitely hit a note where I’d been stringless. She wasn’t a freak. I used to be so disengaged that I didn’t notice freaks, but now I don’t even believe in them. I believe in these wet brick walls and rusted-out garbage containers with locked-up plastic lids. The chicken some kid tried to sell me in a cage, or my family’s visceral inclination to flick off Death, but I heard Manna. She never looked up, so I did and thought I saw why she was so focused here, down on Earth. I couldn’t see any stars, just a light purple sky that rubbed against the city and the fun. I remembered many stars, and wondered what early humans thought of them before electricity, before a world of fire and smoke. I wondered what it looked like on the other side. I wondered what it would be like to look at Earth from orbit. Where we just a bunch of blinking lights? Where we like stars? I bet it’s quiet, that’s for sure, and then I noticed Manna was gone.

I walked back over to Carnival, and none of my colleagues were around. I asked the coat check attendant, and she said they left.

“Together?” I asked.

“No, they left separately. Do you have a coat you’d like me to grab?”

“Um, I’m wearing mine.”

I walked back to my place. The crowd was thinning out, but the city lights remained on, and street jesters did their tricks, but there were fewer people, and as I walked by a streetlight I’ve never seen on, I heard, “Psst.”

I couldn’t tell if he was a hobo or a tired clown, but he said, “Psst,” again, and waved me over as he looked side to side as if we were supposed to be alone. “You look like a good guy. The name is Ralph Ralphie.”

I bent down to shake his hand.

“Nice to meet you, Ralph, Ralphie. I’m.”

“Lost. You don’t know where you’re going. You lie around all day, waiting for the Earth to take a giant dump on your chest, but.” He padded his pockets. “Hey, you wouldn’t happen to have a match, would you?”

I’ve never had a pack of matches on me, but I searched frantically.

“Uh, nope.”

“What was I saying?”

“How I’m waiting for the Earth to shit on my chest.”

“Oh, yeah, that’s right. The Earth will shit on your chest. You sure you don’t have a light? I’ll split this cigar with you.”

“I don’t.”

“Hm. Well, it was nice chatting with you.” He rolled over to his side. “I can’t stick around; I have to find my sister. She’s a street preacher, and I kind of hang out here until she’s done.”

“Manna?”

“Who?”

“Manna. She gave me this.”

Ralph took the pamphlet and never gave it back, but he studied it. He looked at it for a long time.

“Space, huh?”

“I guess so. So, is Manna not your sister?”

“I don’t know who Manna is, but this is interesting. Where did you get this?”

“Manna.”

“Where is she?”

“She was down and to the right in the plaza in front of…”

“I’m kidding, yeah, she’s my sister. Total nutball. You smoke grass?”

“No.”

“You should.”

“Why’s that?”

“I dunno. I do.”

My expression, my attitude, was live and let live, but the way his shirt didn’t cover his stomach, and the fact that people were walking around him on the sidewalk, irked me. I did not express this. I walked away from Ralph with a shiver running down my spine. I thought about cavemen and the discovery of fire. I saw slaves building great pyramids against their will, dying in the process. I heard a child in its mother’s arms for the first time, and I bumped into Manna. She handed me a pamphlet, and because Ralph had my old one, I took it.

“You can only find peace through God.”

I don’t know if I needed peace, but when I looked back, she was looking up, and so did I. It was snowing. The stars were falling. They were coming for Manna, and I said so, but she was gone again, and I was happy. At one time or another, we wanted to feel those wings, and whoever Manna talked to brought the sky to us.