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1995
Literary Art
Visual Art
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The Face
Erik Kennedy
I still remember that face, swirlng out of the fog. At times it still comes to me in dreams, I always wake from these in a cold sweat. And try as I might, I cannot purge her visage from my mind. Visage. Perhaps I use that word because it is an ugly sounding word — one that conjures horror, and yet she was beautiful. far more beautiful than anyone else I have ever beheld.
I wake my wife sometimes with my dreams. She's gotten used to them. She says it's alright, wipes my forehead, and gives me a glass of brandy. Sometimes she gives me sleeping pills. I don't like them, because they always make my dreams dry and yellow, like over-exposed film. But at least the face doesn't appear in those. At least with those dreams, my hands don't shake in the morning, and I can pour a cup of coffee without spilling.
She walked along the cliff in the moonlight, a hundred feet above the tide. A fog has rolled in, concealing the stars, but the moon almost caused it to glow. She may be there still ... I have never gone back. I wouldn't know. But somehow, I think she is. It would fit. It's the knowing that counts. That's why I still have the dreams.
I was far too young at that time; too foolish . . . But I don't think any man could have been wise enough. She was dressed in a white silk nightgown. The damp fog plastered some of it to her body; the rest was flapping in the wind off the sea. Her black hair was damp, too. and plastered down. She wore a crown of seaweed, like small children sometimes do, probably picked up from the beach below. Her back was to me. The moon gave enough light that I could see her back, marble white and flawless.
As I watched, I became aware of a rhythmic murmur. It was soft and difficult to hear against the crashing of the waves, but it gradually grew louder. I realized it was the woman, singing in a quiet voice. I couldn't recognize the words, though the language sounded beautiful and ancient, and almost seemed to keep time with the wave below.
A short gust of wind brought me from my reverie. I was shivering inside of a heavy coat. She must have been freezing. I called out, asking if she was cold. For a moment, the whole spell semmed to be shattered. She stopped walking, didn't turn. My words fell heavy and dull in the mist. The only sound I could hear was the crashing of the waves. Then, softly, without moving or turning around, she started singing again. The song grew louder, and I could separate the words, if not catch the meaning. My feet flowly moved me towards her, closer and closer. Finally I was able to assert some kind of control, and stop; but there my feet froze, and I was unable to move. She turned and kept on singing, and, arms stiff at her side, advanced towards me one step at a time. My whole body froze. I was only able to look and listen. Her shoulders were finely shaped; and though she was slim, she was not boney. I could clearly see her nipples, erect in the cold mist, for her nightgown was plastered up against them. My eyes followed the delicate curve of her side down her thigh, to her bare white feet. The next thing I remember is looking up. finding her face only inches from mine.
The cheeks were high, and the jawline was well defined, like layered satin over bone. The nose was thin and sharp, and the lips were small. She kept on singing, and her teeth were like pearls in the moonlight. She was pale ... so pale . . . Her eyes, though . . . Once I saw her eyes. I could not focus elsewhere. They were the blackest pools of midnight. I saw my own soul reflected in them, small in the pupils' tiny mirror. She stopped singing. Her eyes smiled. In a whispered voice she said, "My love . . . you have returned for me . . ." She lifted her hands to her white shoulders and pulled on the straps of her nightgown. It fell off onto the ground. She took one more step and her arms were around me.
She put them inside my coat, and pushed it off. Now I could feel her body, her hands, her lips . . . and they were cold' so deathly cold. I had to warm her . . . My hands wrapped around her back.
And as I entered her body, it was like ice ... cold, hard ice ...
. . . Grimly, I pushed her sleeping form off of me to my side. I turned my head and looked over the cliff, out to the sea. The fog had lifted and the moonlight danced across the waves. I felt cold breath on the back of my neck, heard the waves. I felt cold breath on the back of my neck, heard the soft singing again. I turned to look at my lover. She climbed on top of me again and cradled my head in her arms. Her hands felt slimy now; not just cold, and as I raised my head and looked at her breasts and shoulders, I saw that they now had a greenish tinge. I looked at her face again. The skin was gaunt; the ears and nose seemed nibbled, picked at, but not bloody. I could clearly see the roots of her hair in her widow's peak, on her eyebrows. She shook her head and laughed, kindly, gently, and lowered her face to kiss me. Her hair brushed against my cheek; cold and slimy. Her eyes were still alive and dancing. Her mouth was filled with cold, salty seaweed.
I remember pushing her off and rolling away . . . falling through the night air, and the cold harsh crack of my spine as my legs bent under me and my body went numb. I remember the tide washing around my ears as I stared up into the stars; cold pricks of light so far, far away.
Nereid, Sirine, Rusalki . . . I've heard those terms and many more since that night. The doctors say I'm very lucky. I've regained almost full use of my limbs. They pass it off as a dream, a hallucination. . .No one ever found a nightgown, or any footprints but mine on the rocky shore. But no dream has ever been so real. . .
Some nights I lose all feeling again, all mobility . . . my body feels as cold as death, and I can't get warm. Then my wife pulls close to me, cuddles me and tells me it will be all right. But somehow, I can't believe her, because instead of sparkling sapphires, I see two pools, black as midnight, dancing in a cold, hard face. . .
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