‘I ended up here the same way anybody does, with a death, a pain that rang so hollow I could not simply… go on. Everyone expects there to be this big moment, some sort of explosion going off right outside your head to warn you, but the truth is, there’s nothing, not so much as a sound. See, they know. They know that if you understand what’s happening, that if they give you enough time to react, you will. You’ll run. So they don’t warn you and by the time you get it, it’s far too late, something disastrous has already happened and you’ll never get to go back to your old life again.’

The master’s voice is calm, but not passionless, as if he’s telling an elaborate story. He takes an interest in it, just enough to make it sound real, but nothing more. On occasion, his eyes drift from Mona’s pale face to the wraiths at his door, the sufferers waiting to be noticed and plucked from their torment. Jesters, clowns.

‘My own explosion was by form of a call, not in the middle of the night, followed by no dramatic silence whatsoever. I was a much different man back then, as you can imagine. I worked inside a very tall building on a particularly busy street of our city. I worked well with numbers, listened to very different stories in that time.’

It wasn’t the first time he was telling this story. Mona couldn’t be sure how she knew exactly, but she did. Fleetingly, she wondered how many like her he’d met, how many had come and crawled back into their darkness to await their trials? And the master, he was still here. Eternally here, eternally listening.

‘I received a phone call. I was just leaving the building, on my way back home, but then the next moment, I was not. I was… sitting down. Telling everyone that was milling about me that no, I was not alright. I was trying to convey what the caller had told me, but the information didn’t seem to be getting through. I thought perhaps they couldn’t hear me, so I tried speaking louder, but I was incoherent for the most part. They gathered something bad had happened with my daughter, but not much more than that, I believe. On the other hand, I don’t think I’d really understood it myself at that point.

‘You see, there had been an accident, a car crash. My daughter had been, it seemed she was in someone’s car. There was a man she’d been seeing, called Michael. Mikey, everyone called him. Or rather, almost everyone, except for myself. And the only thing that I could think of, in that moment, the only thought existing in my mind was that I hadn’t even known my daughter was seeing someone. It was the first time I was hearing about this Michael, from the nurse who’d been kind enough to call.’

For Mona, it was a real exercise in concentration to break through the dismal atmosphere that had fallen on the place. If she hadn’t known any better, she might’ve actually believed the storyteller’s words.

‘Around the office, they all knew my daughter, although she hadn’t been around for at least four or five years. I would take her in with me, especially when she was small, and that’s how roughly half the office ended up coming with me to the hospital. Now that I think of it, must’ve looked quite disconcerting from the outside, almost like a funeral procession, all these cars lined up one after the other. Made a mess of the hospital, too. There were all these people coming in and out, asking if I needed anything, some of them not saying anything at all, just… staring.

‘Nevertheless, whenever I think about that night, I always remember myself being alone. I can’t recall one single being in that waiting room with me. It seems that all the faces in the world turn meaningless when the right one is absent. Of course, by the time our makeshift convoy reached the hospital, it was too late. My daughter, she was about your age, she was… I’d like to say she looked a lot like you, except that’s not quite true, just a trick of the brain. I’m sure you could be the exact opposite of you and my mind would be saying the same thing. In truth, there are so many things about my daughter I can’t seem to remember… like her name. For the longest time now, I haven’t been able to remember what she was called. I get these sudden urges, I feel so sure it’s right… here.’

The master put out one pale, thin hand in front of him and suddenly, he didn’t look so imposing, so masterful, but Mona knew better than to fall for that. It was all a ploy, it was all just part of the story.

‘But then, it’s gone. I open my mouth, certain I’ll call her this time, but nothing ever comes out. After my daughter died, I rapidly found myself slipping away. Being less in the real world and more here. But I’m sure this feeling is far more fresh for you than it is for me.’

He glanced at the girl just enough to catch an almost imperceptible nod, her gaze for once cast down.

‘At first, it was a few moments, then a few hours, then finally, a full day. In the brief time I was spending in my old life, I was so lost, so distanced from everything that had once given me pleasure, that somehow made the waking world even worse. At least here, I could mourn for my baby in peace, and so one day, I just didn’t bother crossing back. Same as everyone, I was presented with a choice – swim or drown. Move on or let go completely. Like everyone here, I chose to let go.’

There seemed to fall silence, not just over the room, but over the outside world entirely. For those few seconds, the piercing cries of the mourners pierced no longer, the howls of the shadows grew quiet, to mark the passing into the darkness of one of their own.

‘But how did you get here?’ pushed Mona, with only half her voice. She was beginning to wonder if she hadn’t made a mistake asking for this story to be told, thinking maybe she hadn’t been as ready as she thought. After all, this was only her first time here.

‘By the same path my predecessor came here, by the same road that will one day carry forth my successor. I told a story.’

‘This story?’

‘Perhaps. In my time in this chair, I’ve told many stories. I told the story that needed to be heard, at the time, and I won my place here.’

‘Was it true? Your story, is it what actually happened?’

The master blinked, sorrow gone entirely from his eyes, and flashed an almost magnanimous grin. ‘Of course, all stories told in this hall are true, are they not?’

The bleach blonde girl said nothing. After all, the story was over. All that was left for her to do now was go on her way, bide her time until the hour came for her to tell her story again, and then, she would know better. She would have built such a story that it would be impossible for the master not to like it.

She stood up, but lingered, much to the chagrin of the other mourners, who were by now getting restless outside the heavy doors.

‘Why don’t you just leave? Why don’t you just approve a story, so that you can be free?’

Once more he smiled, albeit less than the first time. ‘Because if it was so easy, then anyone could do it, and then, anyone could be free of their suffering. In a few years, this place would lie abandoned and that cannot be allowed. Only the right story can free me from my suffering.’

‘Then perhaps you and I are not so different.’

She would’ve liked to remain in the presence of the master, even to just sit in the corner and listen, alongside him. She reckoned that way, she’d have her story polished and ready in a matter of months, a year or two at the most. But that would be an unfair advantage. Only the master got to listen to all the stories, for only the master could decide. As for the rest of them, they did what they’d always done, they mourned. They waited for the day when their story would be heard somewhere and their pain forgotten.

The bleach blonde girl trailed off out of the great hall and the master gestured for the next mourner to come in.

The End

Beautiful image with great thanks to Pixabay.