23

PART 2

Adam sat cross-legged, watching the sunrise. The lightest brushstroke of contentment painted his face. Orange and purple never blended so well.

Time passed, passes and flows onward, only … which way. Adam couldn’t decide. Was time a river which ran backwards, and man the stagnant vessel through which it was viewed, something eternal and essential without which time itself couldn‘t exist? Or did time flow forward, with man riding atop it like a wave, caught up in it, flipping end over end, with no control?

For the time being, neither view suited him perfectly.

“I’ve lost my innocence,” he said, “I’m confused by opposing views. I can’t decide which door to walk through.”

“You are a man apart,” Leah said, eyes half open. Or half closed, Adam couldn’t decide. “You can do things, and see things no one else can. You must be lonely.”

“No,” he said, “not anymore. I’ve lost it. I’ve been cut off from eternity.”

He no longer communicated with the infinite. He was a man possessed of basic senses. Five devils through which the world entered and his spirit escaped. He knew that the world had gotten inside of him, like a disease and rioted. He was no longer whole, pure.

“You never used to talk like that,” she said, “what’s gotten into you?”

He got up from the damp, grassy hill, slowly, wiped the dew from his butt, and said,

“Devils.”

***

He turned the invitation in his hand, end over end and read it once again.

Your presence has been requested by Henry Falconer, to attend the bonfire of conscience at Philistinian Forest Resort and Vacation Retreat for the final weekend of July, this year. Please RSVP ASAP.

He studied it, viewed it from every angle, and placed it down gently on the table. He couldn’t make up his mind about going. His first instinct was to ignore it and not attend, but curiosity tugged violently at him. Curiosity and the slight buzzy nag of obligation. Falconer had paid his rent for the month, with the promise of continued financial assistance for the foreseeable future. Why didn’t seem as important as how. How the arrangement could have been made with his landlord without his knowing about it, or sensing it, but it was done. Strangely, Adam hadn’t seen this development coming.

Still, why seemed a good question, too.

But, he if couldn’t answer either of those, what was a question he could have answered.

He had his top what man on the job.