The Old Age of a Reflection

I see myself old, every night. Tonight he was already sitting on the edge of my bed, weeping so quietly that I could hear the tears falling on the blanket. - Don't let me touch you. His palm lay three fingers from mine. Beneath it the fabric had yellowed, dried out and begun to crumble. I didn't move. The old man smiled with my own toothless lips. - I too once pretended to be asleep. The first night he sat by the door. I thought it was my father's coat on its nail.

Then the coat raised its head and whispered: - Is Kliuvchyk still afraid of the dark? That was what I called my wooden bird. No one knew about it. The old man had my scar under his chin, my crooked little finger and the little mark by my ear. On his knees he held another Kliuvchyk - black, gnawed, with my name scratched on its belly. Before he appeared, the clock always stopped at 3:17.

The fire in the stove shrank to a blue speck. Behind the wall my mother's breathing broke off. Even the snow outside the window stopped falling. Then the smell of old age, of medicine and of a long-shut chest crawled through the room. A single dry exhale sounded in the windowpanes. I would open my eyes and see: the old man was sitting closer than the night before. I counted his places. First night - the door. Second - the chest. Third - mother's chair.

Fourth - the edge of the rug. Fifth - the leg of the bed. In the evening I sprinkled flour on the floorboards to see the tracks. In the morning the floor was clean. Only two furrows from fingernails ran from the rug to the bed. By the bed leg lay a broken, yellowed old man's fingernail. When I touched it, my little finger ached as if it were the one that had been broken.

Mother boarded up the mirror, because a mirror is reality turned backward and his landmark - so she said. She left a candle burning and lay down beside me. She held my hand and whispered a prayer. At 3:17 her fingers went light as an empty glove. I turned my head. Mother lay beside me, but her face was smooth, without eyes or mouth. There was pounding at the door. - Ostap, open up! I'm in the hallway!

I hid under the blanket and shut my eyes. In the morning mother said she remembered my hand in hers. And then she woke up behind a locked door. Then mother remembered her grandmother's words: - Old age comes as a guest. Do not speak with it. Do not offer it water. If it weeps, do not reach out your hand. And do not look into the mirror at night. The next night the old man was already sitting by the mattress.

- My name is Ostap too, - he said. - You hid your father's crooked awl under the stove. - How do you know that? He looked at me a long time with wet eyes. - I have waited seventy-nine years for this night. He coughed as if dry branches were rubbing together in his chest. I handed him the water that stood by the bed. It is a sin to grudge water. Our fingers met over the rim.

At once my back began to ache, my gums went empty, and the air grew too heavy for my chest. I saw an empty house and a door I had sat beside longer than I knew how to count. My finger wrinkled, the nail turned yellow. And in the old man's gums one white milk tooth slowly grew. On the boards by the bed were scratches across the grain. Every night the old man had clawed with his nails to come closer.

- As long as you look at me, I will not move. Tomorrow night leave the house before 3:17. I looked. He sat quietly, pressing his hand to his chest. My eye began to sting. I blinked. His knee had already pressed into the edge of the mattress. In the morning I put Kliuvchyk by the threshold so I wouldn't forget to run. At 3:10 I ran out into the hallway. It was nine steps to the threshold. I took twenty. Then fifty. Am I outside already? Did I escape?

The door kept receding, and the walls slowly closed in; space was swallowing me without chewing. I fell with Kliuvchyk in my hands. I opened my eyes at 3:17 in my own bed. Snow was melting on the soles of my feet. The door was gone. In its place hung a mirror. The old man sat on the edge of the mattress. His reflection was already lying on my pillow.

The reflected palm touched my cheek. A round cold mark stayed on my skin, though the old man was still clutching his hand to his chest. - I too lay here at seven years old, - he said. - My old man touched me, and I woke up in his body. I don't want to take your life all at once. He wasn't lying; he took it a year at a time. Mother pounded on the vanished door, but every blow sounded from under the bed.

And memories drifted through my head: the neighbor's girl, or was it a boy, sleeping under the cherry tree, no, only the old man. The old man's fingers began to uncurl. I covered myself with the blanket, all sounds vanished, and it grew hopelessly lonely: why is there no one beside me? Have my children forgotten me? And my grandchildren? The mattress sagged beside me. An old man's cough stirred the hair on the back of my neck.

- Don't hide, - he whispered. - I too believed a blanket doesn't let time through. A palm settled on my cheek. One more breath and I had grown up, buried my mother, forgotten my father's voice and spent uncounted hours clawing at these boards. When the room returned, my hands were old. On the bed sat a boy with my face. When the clock started again, I was sitting by the door.

On the bed slept my seven-year-old self - the one who had not yet seen me a single night. On his chest lay a brand-new Kliuvchyk. The boy opened his eyes. - Grandpa, why are you crying? I leaned out of the mirror and dug my nails into the boards. - Don't let me touch you. As long as you look at me, I will not move. He blinked. The floor creaked softly under my knees. Only a few steps were left to the bed.