The End of the World

CHAPTER TWELVE



A Clean Start



Top loader? What was that? Something to do with the top of my head? Clamps and wires attached to my skull? Perhaps they tapped into your brain impulses and cranial activity and what have you as a means of transporting you back. It all sounded a bit Flash Gordon to me, but still…why not? I’m sure time could stop here just the same as it could anywhere else. After all, my father was stuck in the 1970s long after it was fashionable. Long after it became fashionable again, in fact. Interesting, I thought.

My reverie was interrupted by the sound of squeaking wheels. Presently Mrs. Anna appeared, pushing before her a large, battered, rusty-looking washing machine. This, needless to say, was not something that had entered into my conjecture.

“Here we are,” she said, as she tipped it upright in the middle of the floor.

“What’s that?” I asked, more as an expression of bafflement than an actual question.

“What does it look like?” she said, as she unwound a power cord from the back of the contraption and plugged it into the nearest wall socket. “It’s a washing machine.”

“Yes, but that’s…that’s…”

“Old – yes, I know. So sorry we don’t have all the mod cons for such distinguished company. I guess your pampered little soul will just have to make do.”

“I’m not complaining, I’m just–”

“Consider yourself lucky,” she chafed. “Not so long ago we were still using washboards – and that made for a very rough ride, from all accounts.”

“Yes, I’m…I’m sure this is much nicer. Just, um…well, not exactly what I was expecting.”

“Well, that’s life – and you wanted more of it, so get in,” she ordered.

“Inside it?”

“Yes.”

“Right…right you are then.” I hesitated for a moment, the peculiarity of the situation forcing me to question whether this was all some sort of bizarre joke she was playing on me. “Right now?” I asked.

“Of course right now – unless you have something more important to do?”

“No…no, right,” I said, as I tentatively climbed inside of the rusting hulk, trying to keep my balance as I did so. As I stood there, waist-high in the machine, with Mrs. Anna fiddling with the controls, I began to feel quite silly. After a while though, and much to my surprise, I soon found myself beginning to feel quite at home in it. Almost as if I’d been there before.

As she continued to twist and turn the various knobs and dials on the rear of the appliance, a question of pure practicality came to mind. “Mrs. Anna?” I called out.

“Now what?” she griped.

“This may seem like an odd question, but…does it need…you know…soap powder or something?”

“No, no, no – a good rinse is all you need.”

“And, um…fabric softener?”

“Certainly not!” she exclaimed, as she came back around to the front of the machine. “Someone like you – are you crazy? You can’t afford to be any softer than you are already. You’d last even less time than before. What you need is a good soak in hard water to toughen up that sensitive skin of yours.”

“Yes…yes, I’m sure you’re right,” I said, as the water level in the machine began to steadily rise. “You strike me as a very wise woman, Mrs. Anna – very wise indeed.”

“Me? Hah!” she laughed. “I am not wise, I just talk a lot. I only met one wise person in my entire life – and I’ve had a long one, trust me. It was a gentleman who came through here some time ago by the name of Marcel…Marcel Proust. Perhaps you know him?”

“Not personally, no.”

“Such a wonderful man,” she said, reverently, her face suddenly brighter and more animated than I’d ever seen it. “And, oh, how wise. One day I asked him for some – I couldn’t help it. ‘Marcel,’ I said, ‘how can I be like you? Why you don’t give me some of your wisdom? You have so much already.’ And you know what he said?”

I shook my head.

“‘Mrs. Anna,’ he said, ‘we don’t receive wisdom – we must discover it for ourselves after a journey that no one can take for us or spare us from.’ Can you believe that? But that was Marcel…he was a hell of a guy.”

“It sounds like it.”

“All right, down you go,” she said, with a wave of her hand.

“This is it?”

“It is.”

“No…no final words?” I asked.

“It’s a rebirth not a funeral. Or maybe you want some big fancy introduction before you make your grand appearance back in the world again, huh? You want some big build up like Elvis Presley, is that it? And, oh my God, don’t even get me started on that one! My God! The tantrums, the scenes – it was unbearable. I wanted to kill myself!” She wiped her brow again and sighed. “But here – who would notice?”

“No, um, if this is it, I’ll just…I’ll, you know…” I began to lower myself down into the washing machine, wondering if I should hold my breath now or wait until I was fully submerged, when Mrs. Anna suddenly cried out.

“Stop! Wait!”

“What is it?” I asked, greatly alarmed.

“I forgot one thing,” she said, before taking my head in her hands and kissing me gently on my forehead. “There…a little kiss for the little boy that got lost in the woods.”

“I shall miss you, Mrs. Anna.”

“No you won’t. You’ll be too busy living to remember dying. Now go – leave our little undiscovered country.”

“I will, I’ll remember you, no matter where my voyage takes me.”

“Ah! That reminds me,” she cried. “One last piece of wisdom Marcel left me with – and I will leave you with.”

“Yes?” I asked, eagerly.

“‘Mrs. Anna,’ he said, ‘the voyage of discovery is not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.’” She placed her hand gently on my head and said simply, “Use them well.”

“I will,” I promised.

As I resumed lowering myself down into the water, Mrs. Anna began to lower the lid over my head. Just before it closed completely, I cried out to her. “Goodbye, Mrs. Anna!” I yelled, the whooshing and swirling of the water almost drowning me out.

“Oh, this isn’t goodbye, my little spoon-fed comrade,” she said, with a wry smile. “Better we just say…au revoir.”

She began laughing to herself as she closed the lid, making one last turn of the dial as she did so. Despite the noise of the machine and the gurgling of the water all around me, I could, at least for a little while longer, still make out sounds from the room beyond, specifically the sound of the front doorbell ringing.

“All right, all right, I’m coming!” I heard Mrs. Anna yell, impatiently, followed by the sound of the doorbell again. “My God, what is it with you people?” she bellowed. “You want to live faster, die slower, and still you’re not happy. I swear you get worse by the century. Enough already!” I could just make out the sound of the doorbell ringing again, this time insistently, and then one final, exasperated roar from Mrs. Anna. “Oh shut up!”

And then everything seemed to blend into a swirling, soothing oneness. As I became swept away by the warm, comforting waves and cascades around me, I could feel my conscious mind being gently erased, like little bubbles disappearing into the ether, until at last wiped clean, ready to start afresh as someone new.

Of course, I’ll never know who it is that I came back to be. I could be anyone, I suppose. Anyone anywhere in the world. Or perhaps I’m not so very far away. Perhaps I’m someone you glanced at across the street on your way into work this morning. I could even be your next-door neighbour. Or perhaps…just maybe…I’m you.

Make it count.