The King

I am the king from another place. I don’t know where it is. Maybe I’m lost.

I remember what happened many years ago when I was very young. When I was still in school and lived with my parents and my brother. We lived on the farm. I felt an explosion in my head one morning just after my mother called me to get up. An explosion of light. Then I felt this warm feeling in my chest like when my mother put the breakfast on the table in front of me and ran her hand through my hair. I knew everything had changed but I didn’t know, I didn’t know what had happened. That was when they started talking to me.

One voice was huge. It came from that same place in my chest. It was the one who told me about being king.  But that was later after the other voices came and got me all worked up. They didn’t like me. They kept whispering hateful things like my mother taught me never to say and sometimes they shouted.  The first time, it was just that huge voice. I couldn’t quite make out what it was saying. I just kept trying. I had to pay attention.

Sometimes the government talked to me from the TV in our livingroom to tell me how terrible I was and that they were coming to get me and everybody else like me. They didn’t let me go to school. My mother got scared of me.

They kept taking me places. I ran away. I lived rough. I had people who liked me and then people who hurt me. It’s been a long time.  The police came and got me from time to time. They’d take me places in hospitals where other people were shouting and shuffling around in the halls. For a little while I didn’ hear the voices because of the medicine they gave me. I felt pretty lonely without them but I didn’t get so upset and worried.

One day the voice in my chest came back and told me about being king. I’ve liked that. It’s a good job. Now I’m in this place in a house. There are other people who live here. There’s one old woman I know from somewhere but I don’t tell her.

Each morning I get up. I wash my face in the sink in the room I share with a man I seem to know but whose name I don’t. He seems like a nice man. He hardly speaks. Sometimes he looks at me. Sometimes he looks at the floor while we’re getting dressed. He’s pretty old. He grunts at the floor after he’s buttoned his last shirt button and reaches for his walker.

I sleep in my shirt and underwear. They protect me. I just put on my pants with the belt I got in another time from the bag at that place where they let us sleep. That place where people scream and sometimes fight. Where demons are allowed to come and go. The man who sleeps in my room lets me go out the door of our bedroom first when we go to breakfast. He’s not one of those guys trying to get me from inside the walls, part of the gang. I think they don’t like it when he’s sleeping here with me.

Now I’m in this place in a house. There are other people who live here. There’s one old woman I know from somewhere but I don’t tell her. Each morning I get up. I wash my face in the sink in the room I share with a man I seem to know but whose name I don’t. He seems like a nice man. He hardly speaks. Sometimes he looks at me. Sometimes he looks at the floor while we’re getting dressed. He’s pretty old. He grunts at the floor after he’s buttoned his last shirt button and reaches for his walker. I sleep in my shirt and underwear. They protect me. I just put on my pants with the belt I got in another time from the bag at that place where they let us sleep. That place where people scream and sometimes fight. Where demons are allowed to come and go. The man who sleeps in my room lets me go out the door of our bedroom first when we go to breakfast. He’s not one of those guys trying to get me from inside the walls, part of the gang. I think they don’t like it when he’s sleeping here with me.

I sleep in my shirt and underwear. They protect me. I just put on my pants with the belt I got in another time from the bag at that place where they let us sleep. That place where people scream and sometimes fight. Where demons are allowed to come and go. The man who sleeps in my room lets me go out the door of our bedroom first when we go to breakfast. He’s not one of those guys trying to get me from inside the walls, part of the gang. I think they don’t like it when he’s sleeping here with me.

I’ve been here a little while. It’s a nice place. The lady here most mornings likes me most. She calls me Mr. Moon because my face is so round, she says, and shines like the moon. I like that name. I don’t tell her my real name. She’s pretty short with a black hair down to her shoulders. I think she’s from China with those eyes but she speaks our language. She has a different laugh from other peoples’.  I like it. It kind of tinkles up high and then goes down low and then it keeps going for a while like the water that drips from our faucet. It tickles me in my chest. Sometimes it makes laugh a little. Sometimes though I wonder if she’s trying to get inside me. Then I get worried.

I take the medicine she gives me in the little white cups, two orange long ones, two little white ones and a bunch of big ones white and blue and pink. I count them and see if I’m allowed to take them today. The friends will tell me. I listen. Sometimes they tell me not to take the orange ones. Sometimes the white. The lady says I have to take them so I can go outside today.

Sometimes I have to fight with my friends. I tell them I’m king. I have to go outside. I take those pills. Then she gives me a plate with breakfast on it. I put my head down and look at the food on the plate. I decide which part I can eat and I stick my fork in and just put it right in my mouth and chew it. Sometimes it’s good like the pancakes. They let me put lots of butter on them even though they say it’s not good for me, for my heart. It feels good.

I keep looking at the plate until I only see food the man in my head says I’m not allowed to eat then I get up, pick up my plate, shove my chair in with my foot and take the plate over to the sink to wash it off. I put it in the dishwasher like that lady showed me to do that day when the taxi dropped me off from that big hospital.

Then I look outside to see whether the sky is blue or grey. I can see from next to the kitchen sink. If it’s blue I’m ready. If it’s grey I go back into my room and get the sweater from my top drawer and put that on. I’m dressed in my sacred clothes. I’m ready.

They’re telling me now. You’re almost too late. Some of the most important people have already gone by. You’re the king. You have to greet them all or they will know. They’ll send their invaders through the night air right in and suck on your brain. I’m a little scared. I run a little out the door, over the ramp to the end of the driveway. Now I’m calm. My day has begun.

They’re coming by in cars, little ones, big trucks, those big black things with windows you can’t see through. Some on bikes. Some on motorcycles with hoods that hide them. Most of them are kings and queens like me. Some are Satan’s evil creatures. I think he sends them mostly in the big trucks with dark windows so I won’t see.

I greet them all. They told me how to greet the other kings and queens. I’ve known for some time. I’ve practised. You put out your left leg. You look up to see them. They want to know you’ve seen them. Then you bow your head down with a long sweep of your right arm over your head. Then a wave.

I do it just right. They know who I am. I know who they are. The ones who have practised, who were taught, who really know, look at me and wave or bow their heads. It’s good then. It feels good inside me.

Some are afraid. Maybe they don’t know who they are. All day. I never get tired of it. It’s good to greet them all. To see them. I forget about the brain suckers until a dark window goes by. Then there’s that sound in my ear. Sometimes I have to put my arms over my head. But mostly I just look at everyone and bow. To see. I go in to lunch when that other man comes out and calls my name.

I haven’t told him my real name but I know when he calls. Sometimes I lie down and take a rest after lunch. It’s tiring being king, but they tell me I have to do it. There is danger. Sometimes I don’t feel good, I feel sick in my legs and my body and I just can’t get up, but they tell me I have to or I will be sent away. So I go out. When the man calls me, I go back in for dinner. The people aren’t coming by this place much by then, out on the road.

After I’ve put my dinner dishes in the dishwasher, I start my other job. I sit in the chair by the door and watch to make sure none of the gang comes in. They’ve told me that’s my job. Otherwise, the people from the gang will get in. The really bad ones. The ones from the cars with the black windows and other ones. Sometimes in other places they’ve attacked. I screamed and I fought but they got me and took me away to some big hospital. I don’t have enough people to see there. Just sometimes one king or one queen. I have to be here.

The man at night wants me to come play cards with the other people from the other rooms but I just tell him no. If he bothers me too much I go to the bathroom and come back. I don’t talk to anyone, even if they talk to me. I’m just quiet.

When he comes to lock the front door I go to my room, take off my pants and hang them on the bed. I can’t take off my shirt or my underwear. They’re sacred. They protect me. I lie down.

Sometimes I sleep. When they’re not banging on the walls and roaring at me. I need some sleep. For tomorrow. The others need me to see them. To greet them properly so everything can flow through me. Like butter on those pancakes. Like the light that comes into my eyes through the window at the kitchen sink. I am the king. The sound from my chest tells me. The warmth from the middle of my chest.