PART ONE: AUTOPOIESIS
CHAPTER ONE : The Initiate
Smith Academy, Cape Cod, Massachusetts,
Spring Equinox, March 21, 2013
"Come sing, come drum, come dance. Come dance the spiral dance!" -Ubaka Hill
Jolie crawled out the louvered window and onto the third story roof of Power’s Hall, the girl’s dormitory at Smith Academy, the place her heartless father had shipped her, stateside, when she’d needed him most, at the worst time of her miserable, pointless life. Instead of being home in Scotland with her friends and what was left of her sad, lonely family, she was stuck with a bunch of stuck up, insanely rich, ridiculously dressed, prepsters who said things like “wicked pissah” and couldn’t pronounce their “r”s. The New England teen elite. Of all the places in the world, why the hell was she sent here?? And why so freaking far from home?
Jolie leaned back through the window and grabbed hold of her doumbek drum, its hollow copper body cool on her palm, and then sunk down indian-style on the slant of the shingled, century-old roof. Over the tops of towering red and black oaks and budding maple trees that lined the quad below, Jolie could see a mirage-like sliver of Smithport Bay and it immediately lifted her spirits, momentarily taking her mind off her pain. Squeezing her fingers into the front pocket of her threadbare, favorite Levis, she fished out half a joint she’d pocketed from David Tuttle, a janitor all the kids called Easy D because he’d flunked out of Smithport Academy back when they were all still wearing pull-ups. It was a lucky run-in she’d had when she was trying to dodge stodgy old Coach Johnson, her lame track prison-guard, behind the gymnasium during practice. Sports were mandatory at Smith Academy and Jolie figured that long-distance track was the least competitive, least team-oriented sport known to humanity and would give her as little as possible face time with an after-school baby-sitter wanting to regulate her every move from 3 to 5pm five days a week. Plus, running, well yea, no-brainer. Jolie was used to running.
She lit the charred end of the flattened doob, inhaled and held it in. When the rush of mellow hit her brain cells, she exhaled with a sigh and promptly stubbed the little torch out again, just wanting a little cloud cover to shut down the constant anguish she felt over losing her mom only nine awful months ago. A short blotto of reprieve. Knowing she was never going to see the person around whom her whole life revolved had cracked Jolie’s heart in half. Nothing would ever be the same. But Jolie was sick and tired of crying and didn’t give a shit about her life, so at least she could have this one good feeling: playing her drum. She placed the cool, hour-glass shaped, pounded metal frame between her thighs and sensed the emptiness within the copper shell. It was adorned with sanskrit writing tapped into the metal, a present from her mother during a dig she’d been on the year before in Egypt. Her mom was part of the team excavating the multitude of newly discovered pyramids still buried along the Nile, the central project she was working on only months before her disappearance in the region of China formerly known as central Tibet.
The elegant sanskrit lettering, which meant something like: “I bow to my own divine nature” circled the top of the drum near the taut goatskin head. Jolie didn’t really understand the meaning of the sanskrit message, but the drum had instantly become her most prized possession and that controversial dig in Egypt had also made her mom famous when she’d unearthed a super ancient diary-type-scroll thing written by some old yogis back in an era older than dirt, way before people were even supposed to exist. Like even when the dinosaurs lived. That pissed a lot of people off and her mom had even received death threats for providing evidence that messed with both the evolutionists and creationists world view. Apparently some really powerful spoon-fed scientists, religious pontificators, and other mouth breathers didn’t appreciate having their beliefs about humanity debunked over night. That’s why Jolie’s dad had begged her mom not to go on her annual summer expedition to middle-of-absolutely-nowhere 15,000 feet up the Himalayan Mountains in search of the very controversial relics of Shambhala, which her mom told her was some mythical land where enlightened people lived happily-ever-after. It was even recorded in the most ancient Hindu and Buddhist texts. Her dad even tried to go with her, but Marlese had snuck off a week early, claiming she was just going to visit an old college friend for the weekend in London first. Then she never came back.
Dum! tek ka, Dum! tek ka, Dum! tek ka, Dum! tek ka.
Jolie sunk in further, drumming the beat, merging with the rhythm. Her body softened, her mind slowed to stillness. This attunement, this oneness with the drum was the way Jolie knew how to connect with something greater than herself, Dum! tek ka, Dum! tek ka, Dum! tek ka, Dum! tek ka. Jolie dropped further in, bigger, expanding, vast. Out of her grief, skyward, her depression evaporating, boundless space opening into infinity.
Five minutes in, Jolie’s worries disappeared completely, no homework, no friends left behind overseas… no dead mother. She let go completely into a feeling of freedom that was saving her through this unbearable loss of her mother and cruel abandonment by her dad. Dum! tek ka, Dum! tek ka, Dum! tek ka, Dum! tek ka, then the tears slid down her round cheeks and Jolie let them come, looking through them, far off past that life-saving sliver-view of the bay, and beyond, across the Atlantic... towards home.
…
Hopping off her baby blue cruiser, Jolie let it drop against the medieval-looking fence that enclosed the section of the Smithport Cemetery reserved for the really, really old dead people. Jolie came out here every chance she could after track practice, often skipping dinner just to enjoy the peaceful quiet of the place and to chill with the dead. She had no idea why she was so drawn to cemeteries, she just accepted it as part of who she was, yet another weird part, and left it at that. Sometimes self-examination was just overrated. It wasn’t only the peacefulness Jolie was drawn to. Cemeteries exhilarated her, thrilled her, called to her. Why resist? Besides, the six-foot shrubs, half-buried crypts and that wrought-iron, witchy fence made Smithport graveyard the perfect private spot for getting high before evening study hall, which was becoming a bit of a routine for Jolie the last few months, since the start of Spring semester, when her dad had forced her to come back to the Academy from Scotland after winter break, even after she’d begged to stay home.
Tonight, instead of a well-preserved roach, Jolie pulled a package wrapped in brown paper from her oversized, white canvas backpack, which usually carried a ridiculously heavy stack of textbooks which Jolie was certain would give her an early-onset kyphosis. Of course, Jolie’s other provisions added weight to her heavy load— her thick, hard-covered sketchbook-journal combo, an emergency novel, myriad snacks for when the munchies struck, stainless-steel water bottle, pepper-spray (her dad insisted), a tactical defense pen (also her dad), and her swiss-army knife, in case she needed to whittle on demand. The mysterious package took the place of the books tonight.
It wasn’t too heavy but it was large enough, about a foot wide, a foot tall and ten inches deep. Large enough to totally stretch the seems of her pack. Her roommate had brought it up to their dorm from the mail room after lunch just before fourth period, where Jolie was lying on her bed, waiting until the absolute last minute before she had to leave for class. Calculus was not her friend.
The parcel didn’t have any return address and the letters were written in what Jolie recognized to be kanji, possibly Chinese. Not that she had any idea what they meant, but her mom always had manuscripts and communications from people all over Asia who were colleagues and friends. She’d even tried to get Jolie to learn Mandarin, claiming it would replace English as the global language of the future.
Jolie was definitely blowing off calculus class now! Tài bàng le!
Instead, she hit the stairs two at a time, road the banister on the last stretch, hipped the silver release bar to get out the door and then bounced across the quad to where her bike was jammed in with two dozen others, locked to an overburdened ten foot rack. She didn’t get much mail at school, let alone packages, and Jolie was going to milk this diversion dry.
What if the package was from her dead mother?! A clue, something, anything to help explain what had happened.
She wrangled her bike out of the tangle of metal frames, hopped on clumsily, overshot the seat and promptly fell over sideways, hitting the brick pavers with a clang and a loud “Oof!” She got up, climbed back on the cruiser, took a steadying breath, then sped off down the two-lane track towards the old Smithport cemetery, feeling hopeful for the first time in months. What if her mother wasn’t dead? What if she was trying to contact her? Why wasn’t there a return address? The questions climbed right out to the farthest limbs in Jolie’s mind until she arrived at the graveyard and finally ripped that package out of her bag. She tore through the brown paper to find a dark red box held closed neatly with a gold ribbon. Though her nails were chewed down to nubs, Jolie managed somehow to loosen the knots and then tucked the regal looking ribbon into her bag. The smell of sandalwood filled her nose. Jolie took a deep whiff and removed the lid.
…
Her breath stuck in her chest as Jolie stared at the contents of the box. She couldn’t believe it! Inside was a smallish, seriously old, like LORD OF THE RINGS old, looking drum. A kind she had never seen before. She carefully pulled it out of the box and held it at arms length. Lately, Jolie’s vision had gotten kinda bad for seeing things close up but she hadn’t yet told her dad she needed glasses. Her plan, as vague as it was, was to delay that embarrassing moment for as long as possible and basically just remain in denial. Just add it to the list. Besides, Jolie kind of liked things being a little blurry, it gave her a comfy sense of distance from the rest of the world.
The drum was about ten inches across and double sided, with two heads facing away from each other, the whole thing only about eight inches deep. The two heads connected at a seem in the middle, which was wrapped with a dark red leather band that extended into a thick straight strap about six inches long. On opposite sides of the band, around the middle of the drum, hung two thick red silk strings and on the end of each was a pellet the size of a marble encased in leather.
Jolie took hold of the drum by the strap handle and slid her fingers under the far side of the waist, her thumb on the near side, pointing back towards her face, her hand forming a crescent moon under the center of the drum. Jolie instinctively began to rotate the drum, rhythmically, left to right, holding her forearm exactly vertical, the heads of the drum pointing sideways, perpendicular to the ground. The pellets struck the two opposing drum heads as Jolie swiveled the waist, gaining momentum, but keeping it steady, rhythmic. A strong “poom!” emitted from each skin as the pellet hit, loud, strong, commanding. Immediately, Jolie was transfixed by the beat and by the familiar and natural feel of the instrument in her hand. Her wrist swiveling side to side, back, forth, back, forth. Poom-poom! Poom-poom! Poom-poom! Poom-poom! So familiar. Poom-poom! Poom-poom! Poom-poom! Poom-poom! A distant memory rising. Poom-poom! Poom-poom! Poom-poom! Poom-poom! A swirling energy encircled her. It increased in intensity. Poom-poom! Poom-poom! Poom-poom! Poom-poom! A lightness lifted her inside, a blissful feeling she knew from playing her doumbek, but this was…more, palpable, synesthesic, she could see the sound, feel it. The tempest twisted around Jolie, spiraling outward, widdershins, the circle of energy widening, funneling skyward. Entranced, intimately knowing, Jolie committed herself to the sound, transfixed yet crystal clear inside, the vortex brightening her from the inside out.
Then she saw her.
A young woman with ginger-colored skin and jet black hair twisted on top of her head, completely naked and emanating brilliant golden light. She performed a ritualized dance in a spiral of flames before her, in precise time to the drum. For an instant, the woman turned her face to Jolie, and her penetrating glance sent a shiver up Jolie’s spine.... Then brakes screeching, gravel scrunching under rubber, a car door slamming and a young man’s voice interrupting loudly, “Hey! Mcleod! You’re in a world of hurt! You gotta get back to campus a-sap! Dean Powers is having a coronary. Hey! Jo-leeena!”
Gavin Smith, great, great, great grandson of Smith Academy’s founder, Russell Newton Smith, reached up to the archway of the wrought iron gate, his hands wrapping around the pointed spikes at the top. His untucked blue oxford rose up with his reach, exposing taut abs and a blush-inducing view of his hips and pelvis. He knew it. With sandy blond hair that had so far outlasted puberty and was long enough to push back behind his perfectly proportionate ears, a ridiculously waspy nose, clear skin, killer blue eyes, and about to hit six-one any day now, Gavin Smith was used to being looked at. He really liked it. His main winning skill was unabashed charm, topping even his position as forward on Smithport’s state-champs three-years-running Lacrosse team. Perfecting his sweet but sexy smile was a covert operation Gavin drilled in front of the mirror most nights before hitting the sack, if he was alone, which, lets face it, wasn’t that often anymore now that he was a senior.
“My name’s Jolie, you idiot.” It was the best she could come up with while trying to figure out why the fantastical asian girl with the glowing body had turned into Gavin Smith, the stuck-up gorgeous babe-dude with the glowering ego from her hated math class. Jolie regained her bearings, just barely keeping from falling over dizzy, and shoved the drum back into her bag. She felt woozie from the, um, whatever it was, confused by what she’d seen, and was totally embarrassed at being caught out by the most popular guy on campus while she tranced out at the local creepy burial ground. I mean, half the dead people in the place were probably Gavin’s family members stretching back to the freaking Mayflower. “Whoa, easy there, Jo Jo,” Gavin flashed the winning grin, “I thought all you Scottish lasses had boy names ending with i-n-a, like Jamesina, Adamina,” he leaned forward further and tilted his head, “Gavina?” Jolie was enjoying the view. Even if she was fairly out-there compared to most things normal she did have a beating heart and discernible pulse. This guy was hot, and popular, and flirting with her, or at least teasing her. A lock of that blond mop had fallen over his right eye, and toned ripples pressed against his unusually cool-looking Academy-regulation apparel in all the right places. Her mouth just kind of hung half-open, eyes deer-in-the-boy-lights.
“McLeod,” Gavin hopped down the entryway steps toward her, “You’re a strange bird.” He stared intently, “Like a puffin, right? Celtic, colorful, in a strange way, just floating along on the waves. And then all of a sudden just diving deep, fishing, out on the harsh, cold, north Atlantic.” He capped his soliloquy with another murderous grin. Jolie felt herself blush crimson. But then Gavin's gob went serious. No more superstar smile. He took another step toward her. He was only two feet away from her and Jolie was still parked in the same spot, half bent-over, one arm elbow deep in her back pack and clutching the mysterious drum that had just blown her mind.
“What the hell are you doing at the graveyard, McLeod?” Jolie peered up at Gavin, squinting in the glare of the setting sun behind him. “I hate calculus,” she said without affect. Jolie had perfected the blank visage in order to survive her last nine months of agonizing grief. Gavin kept talking, but Jolie no longer heard him. She swiped a swath of her untamed mane behind her ear, swung her backpack over her shoulder and charged past the towering inferno, who, thank God!, didn't impede her escape.
“Thanks, Gavin,” Jolie mumbled, swinging her leg over the middle bar of her cruiser. Without looking back, Jolie started pumping the pedals. The vision she’d experienced in the graveyard receded with the spinning wheels of her cruiser, her rucksack concealing the mystery she couldn’t know she was racing toward. Only one question remained as the last foggy details of her strange fantasy drifted away: Who in the hell is…
She whispered the as yet incomprehensible name. “Gah mook?”
END PART 1, CHAPTER ONE: The Initiate
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