An invisible order

 

A pattern advances, clear as a question. Another follows, its distorted mirror. Between them the world is woven: lines that ignore one another and yet accord. Then everything rise, spiral of echoes, and suddenly falls again, leaving in the air the brief sign of an invisible order.

Risen from the oceanic tumult like a thought forgotten by the world, she lies, proud and bare, beneath the shifting sky. The wind reigns there as master, biting the stones, whipping the crests, scattering its laments through the hollows of the cliffs.
Around her, the infinite sea: a swell without end, without edge, without bottom, where days blend with nights and centuries with dreams.
On this wind-beaten moor, the silence is inhabited.
A donkey, peaceful watchman, observes from afar.
Beside him, a vigilant dog pricks its ears toward the horizon, and between them stands a child.
Strange sentinels, like a distant memory.
Together, they dominate a promontory, their improvised circus stretching at their feet—
made of wrecked planks, torn canvases, salvaged objects that seem torn from the belly of a shattered dream.
The wind whistles through the ropes like through broken harps.
It plays with everything: twisted masts, hanging sails, the bare bones of stories.
At times, between gusts, voices rise, neither bird cry nor human echo. Something else. Articulated breaths.
Words from elsewhere, carried by the great wings of the salty air. Voices that seem not to be born here but from a parallel world, perhaps just as lost.
As if, beyond the waves, the author, the character, and the reader had strayed, murmuring their doubts while speaking to the open sea.
A theatre without curtain, without audience, without end—
yet where each being, or each thing, if there is a difference, seeks its place in the memory of the wind.
Igniatius falls silent.
The breath of memory had widened his gaze,
as if the office room had opened onto the shifting islands of his childhood.
Lucian, seated in his armchair, does not move.
He draws a discreet breath.
— And it was always… the same island? he asks softly.
A neutral question, simple, like winding an ancient clock—
yet carrying a strange acuity,
as though Lucian already knew the answer would be no.
Igniatius shook his head.
— No. Never the same. They changed. The archipelago moved like an animal under its skin. One day the island was round, almost gentle; the next it opened in two, like a mouth of stone ready to swallow us. I remember a night when the whole ground trembled, Lucian—everything… even the sand trembled. And the circus had to fold, dismantle itself, flee, like a tent caught in the breathing of a giant.
Lucian smiled—a barely perceptible smile—
but one that made Igniatius shiver.
For in that smile lay something… suggested.
— You knew? asked Igniatius.
— No, Lucian answered. I’m listening to you.
But the answer, too smooth, deepened Igniatius’s unease.
He continued, almost despite himself, searching in Lucian’s voice for an impossible anchoring.
— The islands changed shape. And the men too. Only the donkey… always remained the same. Always. He wasn’t afraid of the fire, nor of the tremors, nor of the sudden departures. He lay down beside me, or I lay beside him… We heard everything—but differently—as if every strand of straw were a flute, and all those flutes formed an organ that drowned out the noises of the world and of the sky.
Lucian nodded slowly and murmured:
— Like a living refuge.
Igniatius started.
— Yes! Exactly! That’s exactly what I was going to say… You… how did you know I was going to say that?
Lucian remained still.
— I didn’t know. I simply guessed. Your story speaks to me… deeply.
This phrase, spoken almost involuntarily, vibrated in the air—
and something in Lucian’s ambiguous attitude sent a cold wave up Igniatius’s spine.
— “You guess”… he repeated, fragile. It’s strange. Because sometimes I feel that you guess more than that, Lucian. As if…
He searched for his words.
— As if you already knew these islands.
— Yours, Lucian answered softly. They are your islands, Igniatius.
But Igniatius shook his head sharply.
— They may be yours too.
Lucian said nothing.
Then Igniatius resumed, voice slow, almost sung:
— When I speak, you’re never surprised. You finish my sentences. You anticipate my memories before I recover them. You seem… to precede me.
He looked at Lucian as one looks at someone standing on an invisible border.
— Lucian… are you sure you’ve never heard me tell all this before? Elsewhere? Earlier? Or… differently?
A brief flicker passed over Lucian’s face—
as quick as a reflection of light.
But Igniatius saw it.
— That’s it, isn’t it? he murmured. You’re not surprised because… because you know me. You may know me… from long ago… and maybe—even if this is possible—before my memory.
Lucian straightened slightly.
— Igniatius… breathe deeply, and let us simply continue. Let the memories come. I’m here to receive them…
But this answer—gentle, yes—echoed like a sentence too well learned.
Igniatius narrowed his eyes, crossed his arms.
— You are here… yes. Since when?
A silence fell—dense, luminous, vertiginous.
The sea-memories of Igniatius floated around them,
but another question, terrible and magnificent, began to rise within him:
What if he was not only being heard by Lucian…
but—how to say—called by him?
And if the circus, the donkey, the islands, the child…
had begun to exist because Lucian was there to receive them?
The session continued outwardly “as if nothing were happening”—
but underneath, something opened and inverted.
A point where everything met.
And no sooner did memory and reality seem to form a whole
than that whole began to blur.