The Obscurity of Air
The Edge of the World was swinging tonight; if it was to be all of their last trips then why not do it in style? Michael, in his military uniform, breast embellished with copious medals, scanned the grand lounge of the zeppelin. A large bustling crowd, shoulder to shoulder, were being supplied with an endless stream of canapés and alcohol and entertained by a swing band. This was truly the most lavish one way trip in history.
The lounge inside the grand zeppelin, The Edge of the World, was vast and decorated to the highest degree of opulence with bouquets of red roses in vases ten feet tall dotted amongst long gold-rimmed leather couches, and above them, great chandeliers draped from the ceiling.
Michael leant towards the side window and caught a glimpse of the dark orb in the distance that scientists and journalists had dubbed, “the hole in the sky”. It was a mystery as to where it had come from, or how it had formed, but what amused Michael the most was who would want to fly into it?
“Serenity”, supposedly. He was here now himself, he’d have the answers soon enough.
An urge commanded him to start moving through the crowd, perhaps it was the allure of the great orb but Michael felt an itch somewhere deeper within. Is there something I need to do here first?
As he moved along the edges of the crowd he was taken by a large poster beckoning him to look, and he obeyed. Michael raised his half-empty glass of champagne to the valiant soldier printed in bravery — or naivety? The text read: The Corps of Engineers, United States Army. Below the soldier's feet, shapes resembling trucks poked out of the fog; like a crashing wave, flashing memories of men clutching at their throats, swollen eyes spinning in their sockets, pervaded Michael’s mind. He shook his head, eyes shut tight, begging the haunting echoes away.
He stepped back, and as he did he collided with another body. A woman yelped, Michael swivelled, and as she came into view he was struck by, not just, her beauty but of something more familiar. A pale face. Rouge lips. Their gazes met, had he seen those eyes before? The light blue, the curvature of her lashes. For a moment he was dumbstruck.
“I’m so-“
“At ease, Captain!” Where had he heard that voice before?
He was so confounded by her shoulder-length brunette hair and white feather headdress decoration, he found himself asking, “Don’t I know you?”
“Of course.” She held her cigarette up to her mouth. “You know everybody here.”
“I do?”
“We’re all the same. You, me, him,” She pointed to an intoxicated man in an alcoholic stupor beneath a dining table. “We‘re all searching for an out, or should I say, an in?”
The woman motioned with her hand behind her towards the hole in the sky, its darkness lay against the sky like a mole, its presence growing ever larger. A one-way ticking clock.
“Let’s hope the government weren’t lying when they said we‘d “find anything we’d ever wanted” on the other side of the hole in the sky.”
“The government? Lie to us? Never.” His sarcasm was married with bitterness in his mouth.
“I’d say it’s a pretty bad time to stop believing, there’s no going back now,” Michael became distracted by people pushing past them, trying to get to the bandstand. “They said they’d proved it, right? They’d managed to speak to others that’d gone in before, all said to be in pure bliss. Tranquillity, you know?”
The crowd surged, pushing them closer together. Shock forced a nervous giggle out of the elegant woman.
“Considering we are now apparently so close, I’m Cheri.”
Michael could smell her perfume. Oranges. Where had he smelt it before? A memory of a goodbye?
He cracked an awkward smile, “Michael.”
“Are you hoping for a great escape, Michael?”
“Anywhere is better than here.” He felt his grip tighten on his champagne flute, his cheeks flushed. His mind recalled bombs and remains of bodies poking up out the dirt. He turned his face away in shame.
“You don’t like the Edge of the World?” Cheri enquired.
“I meant the world. No more Governments, no more-“ He trailed off but picked his head up and caught her gaze, “Goodbyes.” Why had he felt the urge to do that?
Cheri cocked her head, her eyes tracing as if searching for something, a torch deep in the darkness.
“What are you running from?” Michael questioned, he straightened his badges of shame. He’d asked that same question before, somewhere else, some other time. He was certain.
“Running from?” She patted his cheek, the satin felt cool on Michael’s skin. “Oh no, running towards.”
“Not love then.” As if plucking a harp, shame panged through Michael. Do I love this woman, or, perhaps, once upon a time?
Cheri blinked, contemplating, she flicked her cigarette.
The bubble in the sky was now visible at the front and clouds parted around it as if trying to escape its gravitas.
“I did love once, but the war scrambled his brain.” She trailed off, caught in remembrance. “I left, but I can’t remember for the life of me where I went.”
The words resonated, blown across the sea itself to meet them; Cheri seemed in a distant reverie. Was she remembering the same things as him? A woman leaving, a child in a crib.
“Love is like air, don’t you think?” She flicked her cigarette, ash flaked away.
Watching the remnants, Michael somehow knew what she was about to say, “Omnipresent and obscure.”
“That’s right.” Cheri frowned.
Was it through the hole he would find what he was looking for?
A waiter slipped through towards them, arm supporting a disc of a silver tray, he stopped and asked, “Coffee, sir? Madame?”
But before he could answer Cheri interrupted, “He takes two sugar. I’m fine, thank you.”
As the waiter spun away an eerie and palpable silence closed in around them, the crowd of guests had shrunk. Cheri’s face, held in a rouge lipped grin, morphed to a grimace as if a dawning of a distant realisation were confusing her.
“How did you know I take two sugars?” Michael asked her.
She pulled herself away from her daydream and replied, “I-I don’t.”
He was sure he was here for something else, right in front of him? Why was he here?
Cheri went to speak, and as she did, Michael interrupted her, “I’m not crazy.”
She bit her lips, “That’s what I was going to say.”
“I know.” Michael sensed a change, “I‘m not crazy.”
Or are you?
Roses once stacked blood red had turned to a pale white, the band once serenading with a brass led waltz no longer sounding for they had disappeared. Neither musician or instrument remained.
He turned to Cheri who was staring at him, tracing his frantic movements, “Are you ok, Michael?”
He grabbed her hand and motioned towards the front— but was there a crowd? The mass of people now a small smattering. They were struck in awe as they reached the colossal front windows of the lounge deck, the hole neared them at an alarming rate; to the naked eye it appeared like a dark bubble, void of all light, but around its circumference, otherworldly tendrils spun out in an infinite spectre of modulating colours.
He was supposed to be here.
“Something is different.” Cheri mused.
Michael nodded. He agreed. He attempted to recall any moments before The Edge of the World but his mind would not allow it; he had no choice but to accept his inability to recollect. His thoughts were wholly present, on the lounge, the hole in the sky. On her, Cheri.
“How did you get here?” He asked.
“Well, I-I-“ but Cheri’s voice trailed away.
“You don’t remember, do you?”
“No, but something else is coming back,” She frowned. Searching.
Without turning, Michael reached out and found Cheri’s hand and when their fingers interlaced electricity, aching and urgent, passed between them.
Michael’s mind was filing through memories, they were washing into one another. Melting and smashing, converging and dancing. Burning tanks and trenches became Cheri and a baby, Cheri leaving him. How was this possible?
But as his minds whirring slowed the memories fell in order, “We have been here before, but not at the same time.” Was he crazy? No.
Now Cheri turned, “I don’t understand.”
“They promised, if we entered the hole in the sky we’d find whatever we wanted, whatever we’re searching for,” Michael’s face met Cheri’s, “But it’s not in there I’ll find it, it’s right here. I found you, finally. And I’m getting you back.”
A tear fell down Cheri’s cheek, unaware, and she found herself mumbling, “Michael, I’m sorry,”
Her mind asked: have you left Earth before? And she knew it to be true. Vertigo swept over her, her legs gave way and Michael caught her as she buckled.
“I-I-“
“Cheri, we’re not flying into the hole,” He squeezed her hand, the ominous orb now filling their view, “We’re flying out.”
Cheri’s face started to light up with remembrance, “You came for me.”
A weight lifted. Michael scanned around, the deck was empty; nothing remained but dark leather seats and golden frames. Tingling within him turned to numbness, was all this an illusion? Was the hole even real?
It must have been, for as the Edge of the World drew ever closer to it, Michael sensed a force pulling them in. The sound of metal screws twisting in their sockets met a low groan of an undefinable force; Cheri covered her ears.
“I’m scared, Michael.”
“Me too.”
“What’s on the other side?”
“Us, I hope.”
They embraced, and as they did, Michael felt their bodies twisting towards the front of the lounge and out the windows. Their forms compressing and stretching, pulling and pushing, and yet despite it, he felt her still close to him, and he to her. An incomprehensible white flushed over them and their minds met and begged the question, where are we going now?
