Wise Men

Chapter 5

I got back to the dorm late that night, but Revelin wasn’t there either. I took out my phone and texted him to see if maybe he was getting a relaxing coffee or something akin to that, but I received no reply. My next plan was to call him, but it had the lifespan of a fly because the call went straight to voice mail. I waited an hour as went plan C, but no one came to the door. There was only one final plan to try.

It would have been an hour walk, but after snatching a few bills from a pair of slacks he wore yesterday I hired a taxi to take me out to the river side. Instead it took the better part of twenty minutes looking sightlessly out of a window covered in a thick film of grime and dust, watching the scenery’s slow descent from well kept buildings to broken streetlight and unkempt roads.

The driver gave me an odd look as he came to a stop. I didn’t give him an answer as to why I would want to be here. Instead, I unrolled wrinkled bills from my pocket and all but threw them at him. I added an extra twenty and told him to stay put.

Fierce winds buffeted me as I exited. The ground was unwelcome to my feet and reminded me with each crack of my shoes on the loose asphalt that I should turn around and leave. A bent and broken chain link fence lined the edge of the road. The asphalt crumbled away enough that the tops of grass could be seen peeking out from under the iron. One gate stood vigil in the middle of the fence, left ajar. I pulled it open enough to walk through, and the hinges shrieked in vain as flecks of red rust fell away.

I had found this place by chance in my freshmen year. Wondering my strange and forlorn roommate, I had gone to an address he had left by his desk, half covered by a pile of falling textbooks. That evening two years ago I found him half dead with booze and heroin in his blood, hardly able to stand on his own two feet. He looked up at me with eyes so blood shot they were almost scarlet and pupils so dilated that his green eyes had gone black. I could have sworn he was bleeding, but he had outer wounds on his pale flesh. His eyes were pleading for me to clear the infection from his cuts.

“Help me back to campus.”

He wanted me to save him that night. And perhaps it was only that day he wanted my intervention, but I would never be able to sleep wondering if he was dead beneath a bridge. This night I found him again in that very same place. The bridge itself was a stone, mold covered structure that had been there longer than I had lived. The water was an obsidian tide that flowed in and out on the banks of the yellow sand, silver in the glowing moonlight. One candle glowed next to him, a pitiful flame that sputtered and shook with each wind, but somehow remained to cast a light that seemed to bring back to earth the celestial grace that the silver sand withheld.

 I approached Revelin where he sat, his back resting on the edge of the bridge half of his face illuminated in moonlight the other in candle light—half an angel, half a man. I could never be sure which he was. He was smoking a Cuban cigar, the kind reserved for special occasions, and a dusting of white powder covered his finger tips. Two plumes of smoke left his nostrils, tinted the mixing white and golden lights in their mysterious curls. I saw faintly the etching of a cross on the old wax candle. Two beer bottles sat discarded by his leg, where the dancing reflection of the candle was warped and distorted.

“I didn’t know she had the gall to slap me,” he said before breathing in another puff of smoke.

“She’d surprise you, if you let her.”Silence. “I’ve got to get you back to the dorm, Revelin. I have a taxi waiting.”

“Have you ever wondered what it would feel like to fall into that black water, Christian?” he asked suddenly. “Would it be as hot as smoke or cold as ice? Would it be as smooth as it filled your lungs or fill you with agony?”