Basal Ganglia (8 page)

He will try and talk his way to the baby before applying physicality. Use the words that now seem to exist between them. Should his words fail to find receptive ears, he will push Ingrid aside. If such overt action results in distress or anger, he will endure it. Anything can be endured. All one need do is wait. Emotions are short-lived creatures, quick to drop their essence like a cloud drops rain.

In the Occipital Chamber he pulls away a section of luminescent moss, wrapping it gently in a cloth, which dulls and preserves its glow. A smaller section is pulled away which he eats, allowing his body to experience the mental and physical strength it provides. The moss sits comfortably inside, breaking down without complaint. In the Sylvian Fissure he washes. The water is weaker than before. Less inclined. It drips rather than flows. Like a tear one tries to prevent. He moves the pathetic wet around his body, feeling it evaporate beneath the heat of his hand. The occasional cough of grey water douses him, before the pathetic dripping continues. His skin only relinquishes its filth with persistence. Trapped grime bleeds from his body, washing away, dying in water traps.

…

Ingrid is compelled toward an action she is unable to reconcile. There is an addition to her son she longs to make. A conscious addition contrary to the principal of natural development she has tried to abide by. Within this compulsion is a sense her son is not yet complete. As though whatever existence it possesses is a step away from true existence. Time is spent focusing on this addition. Rationalizing it. Building reconciliation between what she wants and what she deems right. Rationalization works to marry one extreme with the other, shaving off edges. Pushing toward the middle. Finding common ground where none has reason to exist. With commitment, anything can be correct.

Ingrid is able to find the reconciliation she desires via Rollo. When she has completed the final addition, Rollo will be able to interact with his son. This is a commitment she makes with discretion, trying to mask the commitment from her deeper self who understands the lie. The commitment rests on a precise course of action Rollo, although not aware of it, must abide by. Her commitment allows for its own retraction should Rollo deviate from the highly specific path she has built for him to follow. It is a path so complex not even Ingrid comprehends it. One she hopes Rollo will fail to follow. The commitment is designed to rationalize the baby’s addition, and in that aim, it is successful.

Ingrid’s son is moved to the Frontal Chamber. Into light. He is placed on his back, staring up at folds in the ceiling, taking in nothing. Taking in every detail. A needle’s eye is introduced to red thread. The baby’s belly juts outward, waiting for the needle’s kiss. Ingrid’s hand swoops toward the belly. The needle slides easily inside the child, who continues his entranced stare. Sewing’s dance begins with caution. An unfamiliar pattern is expected. Ingrid’s hand will guide the pattern into knowing. Stitching finds rhythm. Rhythm grants pace. A shape is forming on the child’s new belly.

A red circle.

The circle concludes. Ingrid places the needle within its parameter and begins the rhythm once more. A slight change. The circle is smaller. The larger circle must accommodate it, but only just. The new circle must allow for a smaller circle to sit within it.

A red circle within a red circle.

Another circle begins to form within the second, becoming a third. Ingrid maintains a focus beyond her. A careful hand amplifies with greater care. Precision becomes more important and more difficult to achieve as the circles decrease in size.

A red circle within a red circle within a red circle.

Ingrid continues her task, attaching increasing importance to each new circle. The smaller the circle, the longer it takes, as the intricacy and care required intensify. The baby remains still, ever patient. Allowing the addition to its body. Understanding, via Ingrid’s understanding, this needs to happen. Its belly absorbs the concentric circles into its identity.

Ingrid has decided the circles will be her son’s name. A name that fights verbalization, but a name that encapsulates everything a name seeks. In their world of unuttered names, a name should rise above its spoken form, becoming more than speaking allows. It is tailored to their fort world. It clings to its belly. Always transmitting identity. Distinguishing it from all else unlike any name before it. The memory of thread sewn with care speaks beyond the merely spoken. Perhaps if Ingrid possessed such a name, it would still have a purpose. It would mean something beyond the pragmatic need to label one thus when placed against the other. In this thought, Ingrid resents her name. Unlike Rollo, she will never forget her name. She will never forget his name. Perhaps beyond the pragmatism of labeling, all names mean something.

Her son sits complete. A part of their world. Informing all to come in whatever capacity that might entail. Ingrid picks up the baby and stares into the detail of her handiwork. The circles are imperfect, which in itself possesses its own perfection. Gentle hands under each plush arm pull the baby toward Ingrid’s face. The raised belly circles meet her forehead, tarnished with the sweat of concentration. A circuit forms between mother and son that will never break. Energy is born that powers the connection.

…

Rollo lurks at the Prefrontal Chamber’s entrance, training his ear to interpret sound. He is unaware Ingrid and his baby have moved to the Frontal Chamber, rendering his aural vigil redundant. His ears invent non-existent sound, which his brain processes as real. A rush of air from a distant vent becomes a threnody dedicated to Rollo’s isolation and want. It is the imagined voice of Ingrid poisoning his child against him with hateful words devoid of truth. The resonance of wastewater drip is the baby responding to Ingrid’s ventilation words. Nothing abides by his need.

He must enter the Prefrontal Chamber and confront the realities he invents. Regardless of his mental dissuasions, Rollo must know his child. He picks at the thread securing the sheet separating him from the chamber. The air that escapes does so with desperation. Stale air, trapped and longing to mix with fresh air beyond the chamber. This is what Ingrid has been taking into her body. This is the baby’s reality. He tears away at the rest of the sheet, forcing the stitching apart. Stale oxygen floods and engulfs Rollo who keeps his mouth shut, not wanting to breathe whatever spite Ingrid has forced upon it. The Prefrontal Chamber sucks at the outside, giving itself back to the fort’s bloodstream where it can flow with freedom.

The Chamber has lost all light. Faint tendrils of illumination reach from outside, but find quick death in the totality of the darkness. Rollo unwraps the moss collected from the Occipital Chamber and allows its light out, throwing itself upon every surface, lending it familiarity. His eyes navigate the newly revealed space around him, seeking out Ingrid. Attempting to understand. The cots are empty, as are the chairs. No one is there. Rollo’s search transitions from careful to frantic. The power of absence overwhelms him. He would rather feel Ingrid’s spite than the enormity of such loneliness.

11.

The body speaks the mind. Converting thought to physical language. Always betraying what we fear to speak. Eyes divert when lies occupy us. A hand obscures the face when fear overwhelms. We stare at unspoken objects. Nothing is hidden, only ignored. Our protection consists of another’s self-obsession. When lost in themselves, another will never see you, whether you seek their gaze or not. Should one attract another’s gaze, know that the language of your body is easily understood. Bodies communicate beyond the imperfection of words, occupying a language unbound to form. We understand the body of another because we understand our own.

Ingrid hears the frenzied sounds of Rollo’s search, knowing she possesses the object he wishes to find. Furniture toppling and clamoring crockery. Peace disturbed by growing desperation. Both her son and the Frontal Chamber must be protected. Rollo is lost to a primal drive that demands his son. If she remains in the Frontal Chamber, she may be discovered, along with the importance she bestows upon the chamber. If she leaves the baby in the chamber and confronts Rollo, his search will grow more frenzied. It feels as though little choice remains outside of taking the baby to Rollo.

She carefully lifts her child and slides him beneath her shirt, allowing it some semblance of safety, however illusory. Its woolen skin presses against the skin of Ingrid’s belly, creating the slightest itch. Almost imperceptible. An itch that longs to grow rather than lose itself beneath scratching fingernails.

The Frontal Chamber is left behind them. Ingrid moves toward Rollo, one hand holding her son against the security offered by belly and shirt. The other is clenched into a fist so tight it consumes her fingers. This fist is unconscious in its manifestation and serves only to offer a place in which to store the growing fear. The veins in her hand swell with trapped blood denied passage to whitening fingers. She stares at the sheet torn away from the Prefrontal Chamber’s entry.

Ingrid has underestimated Rollo. She predicted a turn of events that failed to eventuate, allowing Rollo to exert himself. He asserted his desire in a way defying precedent, wavering from his own pattern. Moving without Ingrid’s understanding into a new pattern. This unknown pattern represents danger. In Ingrid’s mind, if he is capable of forcing entry into the chamber, he is capable of feeding Ingrid imperfect materials in which to build the baby. Her conviction grows. Her paranoia has been justified beyond reasonable doubt. Rollo is capable of terrible things.

Rollo, more than before, must be kept from the baby.

In the new air of the Medulla Chamber, Ingrid is forced into spontaneity. The sound of Rollo’s calamitous search maintains its urgency. While he remains convinced Ingrid and the baby are in the Prefrontal Chamber, Ingrid has an opportunity to seek safety. It seems unlikely that Rollo’s Prefrontal search will last much longer. He will eventually reach the conclusion he is alone and broaden his efforts.

Although the Frontal Chamber calls to Ingrid, offering sanctuary to her and the baby, it is a risk she will not take. Should Rollo’s search find them there, a great deal more will be lost. A part of Ingrid lives within that chamber and now, a part of her son too. It is a manifestation of their heart. In the absence of a biological childbirth, it is the organ they share. It represents the necessary separation of Ingrid and Rollo and the coming together of Ingrid and son. It is a place where separation finds strength in its voice, allowing for the development of her own possible truth.

She moves toward the Central Sulcus Emergency Tunnel. It is an obvious place to hide, somewhere Rollo will know to look, but her position will be temporary. Here she will formulate a plan. Although unspoken, it is understood the fort belongs to Rollo. While Ingrid spends her time sneaking between the Frontal and Prefrontal Chamber, Rollo is always out there, absorbing aspects of the fort only he understands. She is trapped within an extension of Rollo and somehow, within this extension, she must avoid Rollo.

…

Strewn failure surrounds Rollo. He has torn the interior of the Prefrontal Chamber apart, searching for his baby. The absurdity of his search resides within the impossible nooks in which he has directed focus. Beneath cutlery, inside cups. The layers of sheet that comprise the floor. Anything that occupies space has been examined with increasing violence. Within the frenzy, every action is rendered reasonable. A shattered plate represents only the elimination of a potential hiding place rather than the destruction of property. It never occurs to him Ingrid and his baby are not there. Rollo has underestimated Ingrid. He has projected an old pattern upon her that no longer seems to apply.

He sits among the refuse, feeling the bite of broken flotsam penetrate his skin. The frenzy leaves him in layers. Each layer injecting clarity and reassessment. With the removal of the first layer, it becomes apparent his child is not here. Time has been wasted and his attention was directed incorrectly. As the second layer of frenzy leaves, his recently concluded actions call attention to themselves. The damage he has caused. The loss of self-control. A pronounced fear weighs down his stomach and agitates the passage of blood. Consumed food begs for release, launching campaigns against him, failing, regrouping, and starting again. Rollo’s stubborn body denies release. Muscles strain, closing off all exits, allowing the tumult of food to grow further agitated.

When the final layer of frenzy leaves, it is replaced with the knowledge he is now feared. Unpredictable action now defines him and, in Ingrid’s eyes, he cannot be trusted. Evidence of Ingrid’s newfound perspective lay around him, reinforcing and feeding. This perspective prevents access to the child. His eyes have not yet learned the language of its appearance. It exists in a whorl of abstraction reaching for impossible form.

Rollo needs to convince Ingrid he is not what she assumes him to be. Current evidence aside, he feels as a father he has much to offer. The fort stands as testament to his capability. He stands up, picking shards of broken glass and china from his skin, watching rivulets of interior ooze out. Something inside him has left. The presence of this blood is the presence of his life. When absorbed in the patterns required by the fort, there is little opportunity for Rollo to understand he possesses life. Something so fundamental. Instead he feels component in mechanizations beyond him. The thought follows that Ingrid too is in possession of a life no less complex and confusing than his. The two of them, rather than mere components, are the cause of the mechanizations they abide by. These mechanizations are themselves subject to other mechanizations. There is no end. All things feed off one another, forcing life’s momentum to continue. In this dance of consumption and consumed, all things act in accordance to a balance.