Ignis Fatuus
By: Kim Czigarenko

I

Sage sighed and flicked at her cigarette disinterestedly. She picked up the half full snifter of bourbon in front of her and gave the amber liquid a cursory swish around. She took a mouthful and swallowed, savouring the slow burn the liquid left in a trail on its way down her throat. She sat forward in her wicker chair and looked over the balcony railing into the street below.

The evening sky was quickly deepening from azure and pink to purple and indigo. The lights in the street below were slowly starting to come to life and along with them, the steady stream of merry-makers were beginning to wend their way from night club to night club in their attempt to discover the New Orleans nightlife they had heard so much about.

She lifted her snifter to eye and peered through it into the street. There was a softening effect to the landscape below that she had come to enjoy. Gone were the harsh electric street lamps and gaudy tourists. In her imagination she superimposed a scene with the flickering gaslights and bustling mercantile market that had at one point dominated the French Quarter. A time, she admitted to romanticise, knowing that it had its fair share of social problems, but she couldn’t help but think that it was a far more elegant time to live.

Sage lowered the glass again and allowed reality to set back in, and was once again assaulted with the vision of puffy tourists in obnoxious T-shirts with "New Orleans" emblazoned on them in large and bawdy fonts.

She brushed a loose strand of her shoulder length black hair behind her ear, put her drink back down on the table, heaved another sigh and lit another cigarette. "Go down to street level if you’re bored," came a voice from across the table. Slowly turning her head, she let her ice blue gaze settle on the man seated across the table from her.

Lucien had not even looked up from the laptop he had situated in front of him in order to fully acknowledge it was even her he was talking to. Or if indeed he had said anything. Perhaps it was just in her imagination he had spoken at all.

"I never said I was bored," Sage ventured in the hopes of perhaps engaging him in some sort of conversation.

"You have been shifting and sighing and almost prostrating yourself now for the better part of an hour. Either you’re bored or want me to think you are. Either way it’s obviously not having the desired effect you wish it to have. Unless your goal for the evening was simply to annoy me." Lucien finally looked up from the screen and across at Sage.

How long had things been like this between her and Lucien, she couldn’t remember. Surely he had not always been so callous toward her feelings. Or had he? There must have been a time when she could remember what first drew her to him. She still kept a vague memory of a laughing and funny boy who she felt she could tell even her deepest secrets to… Had he ever been that or was it just the way she liked to think of him. Even if he had been, that memory bore very little resemblance to the man who now sat across from her, demanding an answer in his own passive way.

Sage opened her mouth to say something to him, but then thought better of it and sat back. "It’s nothing," she finally said and with that, the conversation was over and he went back to typing on that infernal machine.

Sage bit back a bitter tear and picked up the snifter again and took another swallow. Where had her life gone so wrong? This was not honestly where she had pictured herself at all at 30. Sage took another mouthful from the glass, stood up, turned and walked into her apartment.

In the time she had been out on the balcony, the rooms of her small apartment had been washed in darkness. As she moved into her living room, her changing perception seemed to cause shadows to move and skitter and to seek refuge behind the furniture. And from that vantage point they would peak out and coax Sage further into the room. She loved the way that even the most mundane of her belongings seemed to take on an almost otherworldly feel.

The large love seat, which by day was in simple hues of tan and earth, came out now dressed in its ethereal glory of gray and white. In a forgotten corner, an easel still sat on a drop cloth. The vivid colour of the not yet completed portrait of Lucien had been drained out and replaced with shade upon shade of gray. Some light enough as to be almost white, but most in deep charcoals to black. Sage turned from the portrait, disgusted with herself. It had been months since she had even picked up a paintbrush, never mind actually effecting one single stroke.

Amid all the spectres of her own furniture that now filled the room, were shadows with eyes, which seemed to track her every movement. By day, again the illusion would be shattered and these small creatures would be replaced with her nic-nacs and statuettes she would pick up from antique vendors in the market. Sage hesitated in turning on the light and just let the cold gray shades of the room fill her.

So much was it the reflection of how she felt inside that she felt more at home here in the shadows of reality. A light gray shape she had not noticed before caught her attention. Sage took another swallow from the glass, which now seemed to contain a brackish black liquid as opposed to the bourbon of only moments before and turned to investigate the new shade.

When Sage turned to face the shape full on, what she saw caused her to drop her glass and bring her hands up to her mouth. The gray hue in front of her now was not caused by another piece of her own furniture. It was formless and yet seemed to move and writhe and billow in among itself. This was no ordinary inanimate object; this thing was alive and starting to take shape before her.

Sage gasped and tried to call out to Lucien, who she could still plainly see staring into the screen before him, his face cast in a deathlike blue hue. The words would not form in the mouth and as she tried in vain to reach back to the lamp behind her to turn on the light and banish this latest apparition, she seemed to become transfixed in the rhythmic undulating of the mist before her.

The world around Sage dropped away into total darkness, and even the ever-present sounds that the nightly partiers would kick up seemed to fall way from reality and become the actual muted shades.

As Sage stared transfixed into the mist it no longer seemed formless at all. It had a face, or at least the beginnings of one. But Sage could most definitely now see eyes and what appeared to be a nose forming right in front of her. As she watched she suddenly knew that this was not just any face before her, but the face of a young woman. Soon limbs and clothing became less vague and solidified in front of her. The grayness was lost and soon Sage found she was looking at a solid but luminescent woman. Her brown hair was tied back at the nape of her neck with a green ribbon, which matched exactly the leaves of the flowers in the print of her dress. The dress itself was a pale yellow with sprays of pink roses. Hands encased in delicate lace gloves clasped on to a hat in the same pale yellow as the dress.

The woman’s mouth was moving but no sounds ushered forth. In the violet eyes of this strange visitor, Sage saw unspeakable sorrow. Sage seemed to move toward this woman, but not of her own volition. She watched in horror as one of the woman’s gloved hands let go of the hat and started to reach toward her. Suddenly the voice that Sage could not find before came back in a vengeance and she screamed for all she was worth. Everything around her suddenly went black.

As the blackness lifted, Sage started to once again recognise the familiar shadowed furniture of her own living room. Lucien was bent over her, fear and impatience playing across his features. "Did you see her?" Sage asked as she got up from the floor.

"See who?" Lucien asked somewhat gruffly.

"The woman…"

"What woman? There was no woman. I heard you scream and fall. Came in here to see what was going on and found you passed out. Cut my foot on the glass you dropped for my effort, too."

"No there was a woman. I saw her clear as I see you now. She was right there." Sage waved her hand in the general direction of where the spectre had stood.

"Sage, you are drunk. You imagined seeing something that wasn’t there, scared yourself out of about ten years of life and passed out." Lucien shook his head slowly as he ushered Sage through to her bedroom.

Even though she knew she could not convince him that what she saw was real, she knew it had to be. Really, she hadn’t had that much to drink and she was not in the habit of hallucinating even when she did. As she lay there, quiescent, Lucien turned to leave the room.

When he got to the doorway he did not turn back to look at her but said, "Really. You do have a habit of seeing things how you want to see them and not how they truly are. It was only a matter of time before that grandiose fantasy you insist on living in became more real that what was actually in front of you." With that, he left the room.

His words stung Sage more than she would have liked to admit, even to herself. Had her life really become so empty that she insisted on now making real her own fanciful imaginings to fill the void?

The tears that she had been so valiantly holding back before suddenly came forth in a torrent of emotion. Soon, worn out and throat stinging, she fell into an uneasy slumber.

 

 

II

The full moon peeked her face through the open blinds and cast the room in an opalescent pallor. Sage shifted restlessly in her bed. The blanket had fallen away and the moon painted her skin with a soft white sheen.

As the moon tracked her course through the night sky, the shadows also twisted and moved. Some lengthening and growing to almost ominous proportions, while other slunk away to hide in the darkened nooks and crannies. All of them kept their silent vigil over the young woman, who twisted once more then suddenly gasped as her face drew tight with unvoiced thought.

In her dream, Sage found herself walking down Basin Street. She hadn’t been to that part of The Quarter in quite some time. She used to love to walk from Bourbon along basin and pass by St. Louis Cemetery No1, the famous "City of the Dead". She had never gone inside the cemetery, though, preferring to look in from the outside and think about what wonders the above ground tombs might hold.

It was a bright day and she was taking her time. Re-memorising the route and all of its mysteries. As she drew closer to the gate of the cemetery, she noticed that the woman in the yellow dress was there. The woman smiled and waved at Sage as if they had been old friends and one point, recognising one another from afar after a period of absence.

The woman beckoned to Sage to follow her and entered the gates of the cemetery. Sage hastened her steps in the hopes to catch up with the phantom and when she turned the corner and looked through the gate, she was nowhere to be seen, but Sage walked in and started to hunt frantically up and down the rows of concrete blocks. Each one engraved with the name of the person whose body they housed. Up and down the aisles and alleys of similar concrete bricks, each one seeming more sullen and ominous than the next. The sky overhead seemed to darken as she passed by block after block of houses of the dead. Until finally she looked down one of the wider alleys and saw her mystery woman.

She stood before a tomb and looked at it. She then looked at Sage and smiled a wan smile and pointed to the tomb. Again her mouth started to move but no sound came out. "Pardon, I can’t hear you," Sage said to her.

A look of great sadness stole over the woman’s face and she again tried to speak. Again Sage heard nothing. The woman then turned and walked behind the tomb. Sage rushed over and peeked around the corner, but the woman was gone.

Sage awoke with a start. Her usual early morning languor had been replaced with a desperate need to get up and go to St. Louis Cemetery No1 to see what it was that the phantom woman had been trying to show her.

She got ready in record time and called a walking-tour company to find out when their next tour would be going through St. Louis No.1. Scribbling a hasty note to Lucien as to her whereabouts she left to join the tour.

As she entered the cemetery for the first time, she was surprised to see how much it actually did fit her ideal in form and structure, but nowhere near as threatening. There was something almost calm and not cold at all about the raised cement graves, lovingly restored and whitewashed. They were not the gray cinder blocks of her own imaginings at all.

As the tour wended its way through the cemetery, Sage realised that they were headed into the area that was in her dream. As she peered down the newest corridor that the tour was filing down, she saw what it was she was looking for. The tomb that had been indicated by the woman in her dream. Sage headed toward the tomb, an interesting interplay between fear and excitement waging out a war for dominance within her. Not fully knowing what to expect of this tomb and why it should have been so important that she see it. Perhaps it was a member of her family that had died in some tragic and mysterious way, and the only was her soul would rest was for Sage to figure out the mystery. Perhaps it was the location that was important and not the words on the tomb at all. Maybe it was the scene of a tragedy of some grand proportion. Sage hastened her step and when she stood finally before her destination she was, well disappointed to say the least.

Gone were any thoughts that this grave was somehow connected to her in any way at all. It was only the tomb of Marie Laveau that stared back at her. What was it about this tourist attraction that was so important that she see? She looked at the monument, covered in its small gifts and sacrifices of alcohol and food. X upon X marred the face of the tomb, but still there was nothing special about it that Sage could decipher.

As she kneeled down for a closer inspection of the tomb, she did not notice that a shadow passed had passed over the sun. "Interesting testament to New Orleans’ colourful past wouldn’t you say?" Sage jumped up and turned to see the owner of the shadow looking past her and at the tomb.

The young man seemed lost in thoughts of his own as he stared transfixed at the tomb for a moment. The sunlight played about his gold hair, picking up the red highlights when the small breeze playfully tossed it up in a mock sacrifice of it’s own. This stranger did not seem to notice he just looked at the tomb. Arms folded across his chest, his manner depicting that there was something he was seeing that Sage could not. Soon, the tableau was shattered as he spoke again.

"They say that the spirit of the old voodoo queen still haunts this place. That she will grant wishes to those who leave her sacrifice and seek vengeance on those who have done wrong." The accent gave him away as a native New Orleanian in scant moments. He shifted his gaze and looked at Sage, who found herself momentarily dumbstruck as eyes the same colour as the sky after a storm met her own.

"I thought only tourists really came here, but you sound like a local to me." Sage could have kicked herself the moment the sentence left her mouth. Whatever happened to "Hello", "My name is…" and "Pleased to meet you…"?

"Usually, yes," the man said with a small smile, "But I have to admit, I love it here. Too dangerous now to come alone, so you have to be marginalized into a tour. But there is something that keeps bringing me back to this tomb. Something about the all-encompassing belief of those who leave there sacrifices and mark the tomb with an X for good luck. It makes me feel, well, hopeful… I guess that’s the best way to describe it. That maybe there is a point to it all and that there is something after this."

"I dunno." Sage replied, "Don’t you find that there are times where you would find it more comforting to think there is nothing after this? I mean if someone has an ultimately disappointing life, would it not be better for them if they did not have an eternity after this one to regret it?"

"No. Maybe if someone has led what he or she would consider a ‘disappointing’ life then they deserve to relive it over and over for eternity. The only way life would be a disappointment is if you just let it happen to you and did nothing to affect your own destiny. Then maybe they deserve to think about it for a while."

"That’s pretty harsh. Why would you want to punish them?"

"Life is a gift and much to short to waste. Think about the odds against just the right chain of events to have happened for life to exist at all, never mind life with the sentience to have the conversation we’ve just been having. Gives a new perspective, doesn’t it?"

Sage opened her mouth to answer but then looked over and saw that the tour had moved on. She made a hasty excuse to the stranger and followed to catch up with the group. That was one conversation she would never regret leaving, so she resolved herself to. What a self centred and annoying man.

After the tour, Sage beat a hasty retreat in order to avoid having to have any further contact with that man. She rushed back over to Bourbon Street and decided it was too early to return to her apartment and decided to go for a walk instead. She strolled in among the tourists who filed in and out of the shops and boutiques that lined the street, searching for that perfect souvenir for that loved one. Sage just walked and watched, and tried not to think about what the stranger in the graveyard had said.

It was just after sunset when Sage returned home. She opened the door and walked into the darkened foyer and crossed to the kitchen. She poured herself a glass of bourbon and went out to the balcony to find Lucien. As predicted, there he was installed in front of his laptop and didn’t even look up when she took her customary seat across from him.

"I went to St. Louis Cemetery No. 1 today." Sage finally ventured.

"I read your note. Was it everything you expected it to be?" Lucien answered.

"No. Actually it was much better than I thought it would be. I was expecting it to be cold and, well, dank. But it really isn’t. We should go at some point."

"Sure, at some point."

Sage looked out over the railing and into the streets below. The lights from the numerous taverns and nightclubs cast orange, green, red and purple hues with their neon lights and the whole place seemed alive. She heard talk and laughter, and the hollered greetings of friends that promised the "meet up" in the Quarter. Sage smiled and then reached over and pulled a cigarette from the pack on the table and lit it. She sat for a while, eyes closed, just listening to the hum of the lights and sounds of voices. When she was finished her cigarette she walked into the living room and the shadows.

Still inviting her in to their mysterious world, they did not seem so spectral this evening. She found certain warmth to the lights ad darks and the way they blended seamlessly into shades of gray. She passed through to her bedroom and fell onto the bed.

That night she dreamed of the woman again. The strange silent figure in the pale yellow dress was walking ahead of her through the French Market. She seemed to glide effortlessly through the myriad of stall selling fresh cut flowers, food wares and bric a brac. Sage, though, found that she had to navigate with some effort. Every time she was almost caught up to her phantom guide, someone or something would get in the way. First it was a burly fishmonger trying to entice her to buy some fresh crawfish form his stand. While trying to circumnavigate him and keep her attention on the path of the woman, she nearly knocked over a bread stand.

Finally she got through the maze and saw the woman standing in front of an antique shop Sage used to frequent. She stopped and beckoned to Sage and then disappeared into the shop.

Sage followed her in there, but when she entered the store the woman was nowhere to be seen. Sage awoke from the dream. It was still the dead of night and the shadows were doing their nightly waltz across her room to the unheard music the moon played to them. Sage rolled over and tried to go back to sleep, but she was filled with a deep longing to go to the store to see what it was the woman wanted her to see.

 

 

III

The next day, Sage found herself walking up Decatur Street toward the French Market. Again the day was bright and warm. The sounds and smells from the market assailed all her senses as she approached.

Brightly coloured stalls filled with that day’s goods greeted her and she found herself at first wandering aimlessly through this much-loved territory. Merchants competed against each other for their share of the clientele, singing the praises of their own merchandise over that over their neighbours. Sage bought a piece of buttered baguette from one of the stalls and ate it on her way to the store.

"Marie’s Antiques and Oddities" was at the far and mostly forgotten end of the market. It was set in the recesses of a Spanish-style row of townhouses and from the outside was barely noticeable to the average passer by. But inside, Marie stocked some of the most rare and most unique items Sage had ever seen. Even though Sage usually became so engrossed in talking to Marie that she never really remembered ever actually buying anything from her.

A scale model working antique carousel was one of the main attractions that always drew Sage to the store. She could stand for hours engrossed in the small scene, watching the tiny horses go up and down on their endless track. Beautifully hand sculpted people watched or rode the carousel. Her favourite part, a small boy dragging on his father’s arm and pulling him toward the brightly lit ride. She could almost hear his small voice rising above the bright music "Just once, Papa, I want to ride on it once."

Sage was in such a state, engrossed by the model, when Marie managed to sneak up on her. "Ah, ma chère, it has been far too long since I have seen your pretty face here, non?" the plump and pleasant faced Frenchwoman pulled Sage up into a fierce hug, "I was begging to worry about you, petite. Never since you were a little girl has there been such and absence from you."

"I’ve been busy…" Sage lied, "Far too much work for me to get completed and still have time to socialise."

"Ah, but that’s not true. Madame Murray was here just yesterday and said she has not seen a new submission from you to the gallery in quite some time."

"Well, I haven’t felt overly motivated in quite some time."

"Perhaps, you thought your carousel would give you some? Oui?"

"Non, Marie, I was here looking for something. And I am really not sure what it is."

"Well there are times when the very thing we are looking for is not able to be bought in a store, but do not tell my other patrons that! I would not want to go out of business."

Sage laughed along with Marie and then spent the better part of the afternoon talking to the woman and telling her about her odd dreams and the annoying stranger from the cemetery the day before. Marie listened to Sage’s story as she made a pot of coffee for the two of them and after a while said, "So you think this woman is trying to tell you something? And now you are motivated to find out what?"

"Yes," Sage admitted, "Am I going mad finally?"

"No, ma chère, this is the first time I have seen you with such fire in a long time. Perhaps it was madness before that drove you away. Perhaps this woman, she means something to you. Perhaps she is trying to help." Marie poured the coffee.

After their conversation, Sage went to leave the store, but quickly re-entered. Outside the store, talking with another young man was the stranger. "Marie, I can’t leave quite yet. There he is. That man from the cemetery."

"Oh do let me have a look," Marie pushed a bit passed Sage and looked out the shop window into the street, "Mon dieu, you did not tell me he was so handsome. Well now I understand why it is that you find it hard to stop thinking about this man. Perhaps your ire would be better served in another way with this young man."

"Marie, don’t be so presumptuous. I mean just because he’s good looking and smart doesn’t mean that I am necessarily attracted to him."

"But you are."

"What makes you say that?"

"You said it, just now. I was not the one to say you were attracted to him, you did."

Sage bit back her initial response and just said, "Well, even if I was. It’s moot point. It wouldn’t be fair on Lucien."

The oddest look passed over Marie’s face at the mention of Lucien’s name. But Sage knew there was no love lost between them. She had never liked Lucien, and she had the feeling that the sentiment was mutual. But soon the stranger moved on and Sage was free to go.

Sage walked back to her apartment via the Café du Monde where she ordered a ginger tea and salad. It was well past sunset when Sage arrived back at the apartment. She did not even try and engage Lucien in conversation. Instead she went over to where her easel was and turned on the desk light.

She removed the half-finished portrait and set up a fresh new canvass. As the mood took her she started to mix the colours. Like a thing possessed she just let the spirit guide her and soon something began to take shape in front of her.

There in her painting was the carousel with its twinkling lights and ornate horses. Soon the park began to take shape around it and then Sage recognised it as being the City Park in the downtown. Soon small people began to emerge from their hiding places within the canvass, but unlike the model in the shop. These people were dressed in a closer to modern style. Soon she noticed that her brush was heading for the yellow and then there she was. The woman started to take shape in the canvas. Holding her pale yellow hat in one hand, but the other hand was being pulled away from her body. As Sage watched her brush move almost in a dance of it’s own a little girls started to emerge on the other hand of the woman. The little girl was pulling her toward the carousel and pointing excitedly. It fascinated horror; Sage then saw that the little girl had black hair.

Sage jumped back, dropping the palette and brush. She quickly went into the bathroom and splashed cold water on her face, but she could now hear the voice of the little girl deeply planted in her head, "Just once, mama, I want to go on the ride just once."

Sage went to bed, but that night she did not dream.

 

 

IV

The next day, Sage got up and left for the City Park. She did not bother to write a note to Lucien, seeing as he bothered so little with her these days, that he never even came in off the balcony to find out if she was in or not.

Sage packed up the canvass with the new painting and her paints. Soon she was sitting on the edge of the large fountain at the park’s centre. A small dark shape on the large white edifice. The teal coloured tiles caught the water in the basin and sent it dancing and twinkling in the sunlight. But Sage was not looking at that. She was alternately studying her painting and the scene before her.

Everything was as she had depicted it. The trees and lamps were in the same spots as the painting but there was no carousel. While she was looking down at the painting a shadow passed over her work.

"You do that? It’s really good." Sage looked up to see the stranger standing over her and looking at her painting.

"Thanks you, but its not done yet."

"Really, looks done to me. But then I have an untrained eye. I really like the way you captured that old carousel." The stranger sat down next to her to get the same vantage point she had.

"You mean there was actually a carousel there?"

"Sure was. Was still there and working when I was a kid? You must remember it. They only tore it down about 11 years ago."

"I was born in New Orleans, but spent most of my time in Toronto. That’s in Canada." Sage replied almost absently.

The stranger laughed, "Well that’s twice we’ve met and twice you’ve insulted me."

"We’ve never actually met."

"Pardon?"

"We’ve never actually met. We’ve run into each other twice, but we’ve never met."

"Well, I’m Greg. Greg Murray. And you’re Sage Thibault."

"How did you know that?" Sage asked astonished.

"You signed your painting. Well, that and I recognised the work anyway. My sister in law is the curator for the "Nouvelle Galloire" in the New Orleans Museum of Art. She’s a big fan of yours."

"Yes well, we all have our problems." Sage smiled.

"She says that your painting seem to carry a life of their own, that just looking into them you could almost feel as if you could crawl right in and exist there. Some people say you already have…"

"What?"

"You know, that you live through your paintings because you don’t really know how to live."

"That’s not true. And besides I haven’t painted in some time."

"And disappeared off the face of the earth…"

"Well, that’s… that’s… none of your business actually. You are the most annoying person I have ever met. Seeing as we’re being candid here."

"Ah, anger. Good emotion to start with. Better than deadening all your feelings isn’t it?"

"What is with you? Why are you trying to get me angry at all?"

"Something to do with what you said in the cemetery the other day about having a disappointing life."

"I never said I did."

"You would never have brought it up at all if you didn’t. Well, I would just hate for you to see your life as being a disappointment."

"So you’re here to help"

"Yup"

"You’re very vain if you think that I would even begin to consider you a help in any way."

"Meet me tomorrow night."

"What?"

"Meet me tomorrow night. For dinner. At Lafitte’s."

"No."

"Why not?"

"I don’t like you for one."

"And for two?"

"I have a boyfriend."

"Well seeing as ever time I see you, you seem to keep only your own company… I’m sure he won’t miss you then either."

"You really do have an elevated opinion of yourself." Sage said as she started to gather her things together to leave.

"Then you’ll meet me?"

"Maybe." She smiled as she started to walk away.

"At eight… that’s still eight even in Canada!" Greg called after her.

Sage hurried home though the market, wanting to tell Marie the news. But for some reason when she got there she got disoriented and every time she thought she was traveling down the aisle that would bring her to the store, it was not there. She wandered around and around searching for the shop. "Sage, get hold of yourself. You’re just excited." She kept repeating to herself. And she was. The prospect of going someplace to meet up with someone made her feel alive in a way she had not in a while.

When she got home, the lights were off and Lucien was not there. "Probably for the best," she said to herself. She would have a hard time explaining to him her good mood without lying.

She put the canvass back on the easel and took one more look at the portrait of Lucien on the floor. A pang of guilt struck her, but she pushed it into the back of hr mind. Even his image did not seem to notice her. There he would always be. Sitting in front of that damn laptop. "Oh well," she thought, "At least my life won’t be disappointing any longer."

Sage went through to the bathroom, took a long hot bath and retired to her room to read for a while. Lucien still was not home when she finally turned off the light and went to bed.

 

V

The next day mostly passed without incident. Sage was looking forward to seeing Greg again and seeing f this time she would be able to stump him and make him eat his smug words. Lucien must have come in long after she was asleep and left before she got up, because he was not there when she awoke and she didn’t remember him coming in.

At about 7 p.m. Sage got ready and left her apartment and went down to the road below. Bourbon Street was again just staring to come to life when she emerged from her building and started to wend her way through the merry-makers on her way to Lafitte’s. She soon found herself standing outside the door to the old blacksmith shop trying to summon up the courage to go in when a voice from behind her "Is you being compunctually early something else that I will just have to deal with?"

Sage turned to look at Greg and said, "Well, I think if I can put up with the fact that you are a self-centered egoist who always thinks he’s right; then I guess you’ll just have to."

"Touché," Greg laughed as he pushed the door open and led her inside.

Sage could not remember when she had enjoyed the company of someone so much. Sure he was still a bit opinionated, but she found with careful maneuvering that she could avoid arguing the points he made, but instead making it the choreography for a grand verbal dance the two of them engaged in. They talked for a long time. She found out Greg was a history teacher at Marigny High School and that for the most part enjoyed his job. She in turn found herself indulging him in stories she never told anyone, like how she had been an orphan for as long as she could remember. That after the death of her mother, she was moved to Toronto to live with her aunt and uncle. Not that life hadn’t been pleasant there, but that she always felt the need to return to New Orleans in an attempt to fill the void she always felt.

"Did it work?" Greg asked.

"Oh, for a while. I was inspired by this place, especially its history and the local colour of how New Orleans should be."

"Should be?"

"Well, see that’s what caused me to stop painting. In order to paint, I always saw things how they should be, and was happy. But then slowly, the fervor of moving here wore off and I started to see things as they are. I guess I just found it disappointing."

"Well then there’s the difference between you and me. You expect life to be, well, larger than life so to speak and so when it does not live up to your high expectations, you’re disappointed. Whereas for me, just the mere fact of life is enough to cause me to wonder. Maybe it’s al those years of studying history, but it never ceased to amaze me how all of those events had to occur in order for you and me to be sitting here right now."

"Are you trying to say that all those civilsations rose and fell just so we could have dinner?"

"Nope. What I am saying is, life is not a passive thing. You don’t sit back and let it happen to you. Life is active and aggressive and every one of a person’s actions matter."

Sage was still tossing that idea around in her head when Greg spoke again, "Come on. Let’s go to the museum. I think maybe it’s time to revisit your own past."

Sage and Greg walked in relative silence to the New Orleans Museum of Art. Greg ushered her through to the "Nouvelle Galloire" and over to her own exhibit. Sage looked over and gasped. There is all was under the title, New Orleans: A Fantastical Journey.

There was the old market place with its dressed up patrons. There was the outside of Marie’s Antiques and Oddities with the plump shopkeeper waving from the door. And there in the corner was the woman.

She was exactly as Sage had seen her. Pale yellow dress with the sprays of flowers. Delicately gloved hands held a matching hat in front of her. Chestnut hair pulled back at the nape of her neck in a green ribbon to match the one on the hat. Violet eyes with the look of such sadness. The title was simple really "Mother". And finally she understood. She understood everything. How long had she locked herself in a world of paints and imagination? How log had she denied herself of the living world. Finally she understood what it was her mother had been trying to tell her, but she was deaf to hear, "Yes, sweetheart you may go on the ride. But remember to have a very good time. You only get to go around once."

Sage let Greg walk her home. No longer fearful of what Lucien might say. She had a suspicion she would not be seeing Lucien again. Finally Greg stopped and asked her, "You okay? You’ve been really quiet."

"Yes I am, Greg. I haven’t been for a long time. But I am finally okay."

FIN

© November 17, 2000

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