Midnight Wonders

2.4.0. The Silence of a Neighborhood

The streets were empty during the day. He'd never noticed. No cars rushed about, no neighbors walked around. There weren't even any stray cats or dogs. Luc was the only one running. He was the only one there.

He stumbled off the path and into the green, pushing past branches. The signpost was sticking through the trees, tall and straight, the only thing unchanging in the twisting, gnarling greenwood.

He reached the bench. How long had he spent sitting there, waiting?

He had no time to spend, now. Luc looked toward the green hill, where it too stood tall and unchanging.

Someone else was there. A man, in a brown tunic, with brown hair and a figure, and perhaps demeanor, that reminded Luc of something he'd seen before. Someone he'd seen before. Luc ran to the hill, to the man. "You're—" It was caught on an inhale, and Luc wasn't even sure what he had wanted to say. He froze, and the pounding in his chest seemed to intensify. The man turned to look at him, green eyes wide.

"It's still morning," the man said. It was different, Luc realized, than he'd remembered. Or he'd imagined. The man's voice. It was soft and warm and light and almost sweet.

"Afternoon," Luc breathed.

"What?"

"It's the afternoon," said Luc. "I—How do I get in?"

The man stared. "In?"

"In the hill."

"You want to get in to under the green hill?"

The phrasing was odd. Luc wondered if the man spoke English natively. He had, perhaps, an accent, a slight lilt to his vowels. He had something of a lisp, and maybe that was all. Luc nodded.

"You can't," the man said flatly.

"But you can?"

"How do you know I can?"

"I saw you."

"I don't think so."

And Luc could not say that he knew what he had seen, because he did not. "I...I need to get in there. My sister—"

"Your sister?" said the man, as if he did not believe it.

"I think she might be in there." As he said it aloud, it suddenly became all the more silly, and he wondered if he were not getting influenced by his third-graders.

The man continued to stare at him. Luc wondered which of them was the odder: he, a disheveled schoolteacher who could not stay still even in sleep and who believed his sister was somewhere inside a magically hollow green hill; or he, a disheveled stranger who was dressed as if he'd come from a fairy tale and who could possible enter a magically hollow green hill.

"You can't get in," the man said again.

Luc inspected his face. It was a very clean and pleasant face. No, not quite pleasant. Pleasing. It was impossible to read. Luc didn't know it well enough. Third graders were not very good liars, with the awkward mannerisms they had not yet learned how to hide. They tried to bury them with enthusiasm or silence. Luc found that his students did not lie often, and when they did, it was not to be dishonest or malicious. They lied most often when they hoped to please.

Luc did not feel pleased, so he thought the man might have been telling the truth. But he was not so naive to forget the ocean of difference between a third-grader and a grown adult. He couldn't tell the age of this stranger, but he looked grown. Grown enough to lie to a stranger and know how to hide it.

"Why not?" said Luc.

"No one can get in."

"I have seen you," said Luc, as if saying it enough times would make it true. It was true, he thought. He had seen the man enter the hill.

"The last time you were here." Luc wondered if after their encounter in the middle of the night, the man had begun to come during the day so as to avoid him. Luc felt oddly hurt at the thought. It was not as if he had been waiting for the man at the station. No, of course not. He corrected, "The last time we spoke."

"I don't remember that."

That too, was a faint sting. "What are you here for, then?"

The man looked at him. The way he blinked was very noticeable. It was not slow, but every time his lids flickered across his green eyes, Luc noticed. He could count every time the man blinked, he thought, if they stayed there long enough, unmoving and silent. With nothing in their gazes but each other. "I am here," said the man, "for hazelnuts." And in one fluid motion, he gestured to the surrounding trees above them and the hazelnuts littered on the ground beneath them.

The man bent and picked one up. He reached into a pouch for his nutcracker and split the wooden shell of the hazelnut.

"That seems much easier than a hammer," said Luc.

The man looked at him. "What?"

"Nothing."

The man brushed away the broken shell and peeled the papery skin off the hazelnut. The bits landed on his brown shoes. He looked at Luc again. "Have you ever tried raw hazelnuts?"

Luc counted his blinks; five of them. "No," he said, and it was almost a whisper.

The man let the hazelnut fall from between his fingertips and roll back onto his palm. He held it out to Luc. "First times should be memorable."

Luc had the oddest sensation. He almost felt like weeping. But he did not think he felt any sorrow. "Thank you," he said, and took the hazelnut.

He ate it, and already it was familiar. The pasty texture, smooth across his tongue and against his teeth. The earthy taste, warm and deep and rich. But of course, it was not like the first time.

"Do you like it?" said the man, and now there was something odd in his voice. It was rather uncomfortable to hear, though the words slid smoothly into Luc's ears.

"Yes," said Luc, feeling like weeping again. He missed Cora. "May I have another? To remember."

The man took another hazelnut and cracked it, peeled it, handed it to Luc. As Luc ate, the man bent and collected a handful of hazelnuts. He straightened and held them out. "There will be many more to forget."

Luc took them, and he held them in his hands. He counted the man's blinks. Seven. The man turned away.

"Your sister is not here," said the man, not looking back.

Luc counted two blinks from the man's profile, the gentle flick of his eyelashes. "No."

"You cannot get to under the green hill."

"No," Luc agreed.

The man looked at him. He blinked, thrice.

It was a dismissal. Somehow, Luc could recognize that on him. "Goodbye," he said.

The man blinked twice. His face softened, ever so slightly. "Goodbye."

Luc turned and walked away, into the trees. Slowly, softly, his feet barely making a sound. He put the hazelnuts into his pockets, and they rattled against each other.

"Green Hill." Luc glanced over his shoulder. The man was facing the green hill, looking very small. "Open and let your poor knight in."

"And his furtive follower," Luc whispered.

When the door opened in the hill, and the man slipped inside, Luc ran after. The door in the hill stayed open. It was narrow, but just large enough to fit him. Inside, he saw nothing. It was perfectly dark. He took a breath, though he was not sure why, and stepped into the darkness.