Charlotte Gaspel: Demons and Ghosts

VI: Intermission

The night was very young, the sky was a greyish blue, the rain was in the air like salad at a family dinner, not this particular family, but a family with the possibility of nourishment every night. Through the window you could see the drops crashing furiously to the ground. There wasn't much thunder and it looked like it was going to be a quiet night.

It would have been nice if the whole family started playing a board game. Dreaming is free. What the family was really doing was getting busy. Jeff was looking for possible places to run away and start a new life and Clara was cooking and organizing the family's bills at the same time. All those months of saving were not going to be in vain. Charlie, on the other hand, was in bed, documenting all the sacred fables in the book he had acquired. He had planned to do it in the kitchen, sitting at the table, but the dark circles under his father's eyes indicated that staying there was inappropriate.

I guess you'd rather know what Charlie's doing in his room than watch his parents struggle with stress. I don't blame you.

Charlie was lying belly down on his bed with the book in front of him. He wasn't very comfortable; lying in that position wasn't helping his tummy ache. Maybe it was a bad meal, maybe it was from forced exercise, but it wasn't very urgent so he didn't think much of it.

Eventually, so many repeated words became boring. She decided to put the book aside and start distracting himself in the other known way: he stood up and gently closed her eyes, raised his arms and gracefully began to dance ballet. Her feet moved with extreme care around his central axis; his arms made smooth movements in the air and, as a whole, he seemed to be in a trance-like state where he could control what he felt, using the outside world as a stage.

Dancing was his greatest hobby. Whenever he could, he would play with his legs as he walked, doing little jumps or simply shuffling his feet on the floor.

During that little performance in his room, he remembered the time when he played with the library ladders. He used those ladders designed to reach the high shelves to see through one of the windows that almost touch the ceiling. That's the only safe way for him to see the mafia building.

It was not a singular building. It used to be a luxurious three-story restaurant; I'm talking about long before Soufreville suffered an economic crisis, before the birth of The Coffin boss. On the outside it had no eye-catching paintings, it was more of a concrete exhibition. Inside, the large rooms where the tables used to be now contained offices, bars and recreational areas. But all Charlie could see was the grey concrete part and transgressive graffiti.

In and out of the building came and went gentlemen in purple suits, gang members and ordinary people going about their business. Charlie might suspect something about it, but for the most part, he did nothing more than observe. He never talked back about the injustice around him. Fear was a good repellent against those with the ability to change the world, and no doubt Charlie was one of them, but he feared. He feared losing everything by opening his mouth.

The thought of all that wouldn't let him dance. He went back to bed and closed his eyes. He thought of a world where everything is perfect. Like I said, dreaming is free.