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Full Circle

The Circle of Time

By Shobha GallagherPublished 3 years ago 10 min read
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She jogged down the same route in the Mer Bleu neck of the woods. She knew the paths and their bends as intimately as her own heartbeat pounding beneath the glisten of sweat. There was a reassurance in the thud and crunch of her running shoes on the earth as she moved at a steady pace, her honey-coloured ponytail swinging left to right.

The woods were drenched in autumnal colours - bronze, saffron, copper, russet gold that flamed from the trees. Some of the leaves were already floating from their branches and drifting to the ground, completing the circle of decay and the evergreen promise of spring renewal.

Her ex-boyfriend, Timothy had always preferred to bike down the river path determined to tone his leg muscles for the ski season ahead. He had a purpose to every undertaking. She could picture him even now wherever he was, biking in the early hours of morning wearing his grey-and-blue helmet, missing out on the last hurrah of autumn, clueless to the honking of the Canada geese as they departed South in V-shaped formations, the mesmerizing undulations of starlings over rooftops, the squirrels skittering up the trees.

Thankfully, their six-year-old boy was more like her in every way, delighting in the minute details of life - being ecstatic when three Monarch butterflies flitted in their garden that summer, and then worrying if they would make it safely on their southward migratory journey. It felt good to be a single mom, watching cartoons with him and raining handfuls of popcorn into their mouth and giggling as it rolled down their necks. Timothy would’ve raged if he had seen the popcorn scattered all over the sofa, carpet and coffee table.

“Namid - what kind of name is that?” he had asked a week into their relationship. She should’ve taken the cue from just that. But she was in a dreamy space.

“My grandmother was Native Indian and she gave me that name. It means dancing star…isn’t that beautiful?”

“But your mom could’ve found names like Naomi, Nicole, Nadia?”

She had changed the subject then. “So do you like your helmet?”

“Yeah. Nice one. Thanks.” He put an arm around her as she leaned into him.

A year later, their son Anand was born. His cherub face in a blissful smile - his mission of being born to her, accomplished.

“What? Anand? What kind of stupid name is that? Native American again?” Timothy fumed.

“It means bliss, Timothy. It is not Native American. It is a name from India. A Vedic astrologer suggested it.”

“Ridiculous! Did you even ask me? Or do you just consult your kundalini yoga meditating freaks! I was writing down a list of boy names - Ryan, Arthur, Bram. For once respect my wishes, Naomi!”

“My name’s Namid, Timothy. I hate it when you always call me Naomi! My son’s name is Anand!”

Timothy had stared at her for long. “You know it’s not gonna work…I mean us. And it’s just not about names. Have it all your way.”

When she came home, he had packed his bags and left - snipped from her life. It was in that hollow emptiness that she realized how much she missed Timothy. He had been the organizer in her life, cleaning up after her, the bedsheets always crisp. When he comes back, she would apologize and change the baby’s name to one of his choices.

Did names shape life patterns, she wondered. Anand and Namid were names that were too spacey, too blissed-out, unanchored to the womb of the earth. She needed to stop flitting from job to job, putting up vision boards of abundance, with Lotto Max tickets stuck in-between those disjointed collages. She was twenty-six and needed to set her goals for 2016 in motion. For Anand, for herself.

She veered towards a little clearing to pause and take deep breaths. She squatted on a flat rock relishing the autumnal breeze and looked out towards the river. She no longer hoped for the grey-and-blue helmet to flash by on the bicycle path.

The rock heaved a trifle as she bent down to tighten her shoelace. On her peripheral vision, the trees seemed to be wrapped in a soft gold fog, the air crackled and she was sure she saw glittering sparks that flashed and vanished.

Stumbling back from the rock, she realized in a lightning flash that it was the same spot she had seen in her dreams. That flat rock adjacent to the angular one. The same trees, this strange clearing in the woods. The air took on a chill as she recalled the misty male figure who was part of it - standing in sea-deep silence. He had whispered her name aloud one night and she had jolted awake screaming, panting hard. Timothy had quietened her then and wrapped his arms around her. “Nightmare,” he had said. “It will pass.”

The figure had appeared a few more times. Last week he had come again and traced a triangle on the earth near the rock.

Her eyes now dropped to the spot. She almost shrieked.

The triangle was there. The earth beneath it now swelled and sighed. Guzzling down the water from her bottle, she panted: “Just breathe.”

Once the figure had held a spade and stood quietly at the spot. She had sat upright on her bed that night frantically trying to erase his constant appearance. “Go away,” she had hissed thumping her pillow hard.

She had called her sister Ayla that night.

“Yeah? What is it Nad?”

“Ayla…can you come over tonight?”

“Nightmares again?”

“Yeah, please…”

“Actually I was going to ask you if I could,” said Ayla. “I have to leave this apartment in a week. I don’t want to go to mom’s place…”

“Stay with me. You can do your studies here and babysit Anand.”

Namid had hugged Ayla tight when she entered the door, weeping into her shoulder.

“Wow you are shaking,” her sister said, quite alarmed.

**********************************************************************

The triangle seemed to lift off the moving earth now. A fierce determination swept over Namid. This has to end, she said aloud. She pulled out her cell phone and called Ayla.

“Yeah?” Her sister answered lazily.

“Ayla. Drop off Anand at mom’s and bike here. Get a spade.”

“Wha…?”

“Do it. You know where I go jogging. I will wait for you on the path.”

“Nad - are you okay?”

“Ayla - just do it.”

It was almost 45 minutes before Ayla showed up. She had wrapped the spade in a big industrial garbage bag and tied it around her back.

“Don’t give me that look, Nad. You know mom and her questions. I had to make up a ton of stories, plus Anand was not too happy being woken up. What is going on?”

Namid strode towards the rock. Ayla followed her dragging the bike down the uneven path to the clearing.

“The spade,” Namid said.

“What the heck is going on?” asked Ayla, concerned and confused.

“This is the spot I keep seeing in my dream, Ayla. Remember I talked about the triangle - look there it is! I need to get this over with.”

Ayla gazed at the triangle marked out on the ground. “Nad - it could be anything…”

“The spade, Ayla!”

Ayla unwrapped the spade from the bag and passed it to Namid.

“Stand there in front of me while I dig so no one from the path sees us.”

Namid thrust the spade deeper and deeper into the earth at the centre of the triangle. They both heard the clink as the spade finally struck metal. Squatting down both began to scrape out the earth with their bare hands. Namid made deeper cuts with the spade around the spot, careful not to damage what lay there. The space that opened at the centre of the triangle finally exposed a foot-wide box. They gazed at it in disbelief and in unison pried it carefully from the womb of the triangle.

“What is it?” Ayla asked in shock.

Namid dusted the earth off the box and shoved it into her packsack as Ayla began to wrap the spade back into the garbage bag. They walked back home in silence, a host of thoughts buzzing wildly in their heads.

“Call mom and ask if she can keep Anand for the night.”

“Yeah,” Ayla agreed.

As they reached home, they rushed inside shutting out the world. Namid removed the box and placed it gingerly on the coffee table.

“Well it is locked,” said Ayla and brought the hammer from the toolbox.

“Nad- focus. You need to do this.” Ayla handed her the hammer.

The rusted lock came apart easier than expected when the hammer struck it twice.

Namid unlatched the box and eased the lid open in fear and suspense.

A small black notebook, dark as charcoal, glistened on top. With trembling hands, Namid lifted it from the box and placed it gently on the table. There were two taped brown packages beneath. Ayla brought a pair of scissors and as Namid cut open the packages, their eyes widened. Inside was a thick stack of dollar bills. They sat back frozen.

“Oh my gosh,” said Ayla in a hoarse whisper.

Recovering from the shock, Ayla began to count the money.

“Nad, there’s twenty-thousand frigging dollars here! Nad!” She shook her sister.

“I heard, I heard. That man - who is he? The one who showed all this to me in my dream. What if he comes back here!”

“Nad-he is not real.”

“Not real! What do you make of all this then?” she screeched. “ I want no spooks in my life!”

They both sank into each other’s arms, looking around in case the figure appeared from somewhere, from nowhere.

Ayla fell asleep on the carpet, exhausted. Namid kept her eyes open, not daring to switch off the lights. She slid the black notebook towards her and opened the first pages, dimly trying to recall the familiar handwriting.

The date was June 9th.,1988 and obviously addressed to his wife. “I am so happy darling that a beautiful baby will soon come into our life. I will do everything to provide for our boy.”

He then confessed he had got involved with drug dealers and had hidden portions of the money. Sensing the gang had got wind of it, he had buried the box with the money and the black notebook near the rock that they both had frequented. He had drawn the secret code of the triangle at the spot hoping she would find it. “I don’t know how long I have. The baby will bring you bliss. Call him Anand. Love you forever, Mandala.”

Namid gasped as she was swirled into a past-life … to a cabin in the woods. She saw herself in pale blue nightwear, her belly swollen, waiting for him to return home. She barely heard the soft padded footsteps at her door, the lock being turned by gloved hands. Two men wearing hoods loomed over her. She sobbed and pleaded with them to spare her and that she was pregnant. The black hole of the gun was the last image she saw before she bled into the shining darkness of death, her dreams of motherhood and family life shattered forever in that moonless night.

She was now being sucked into the waves of time - back to the University café. The year 1985. His bronze-brown skin, dark hair and eyes had fascinated her. He was shy, adjusting his glasses as she approached him - the boy from India.

“I’m Namid,” she said. “And you?”

“What does it mean?” he had asked.

“Dancing star,” she replied, her eyes sparkling.

“Such a beautiful name,” he had breathed.

“And yours?”

“Mandala,” he grinned awkwardly.

“Meaning?”

“In Sanskrit, quite simply and profoundly, it means a circle…”

spirituality
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Shobha Gallagher

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