Tegel
Paul looks at the lake, over the long desk that faces the balcony in their apartment in Tegel. Small white sails peppered the quiet water surface, it is now late March, the sun is shining brightly on the water front, early walkers, some joggers, are enjoying the early morning peace. A lot has happened since their return from France. He’s concluded his sponsorship contract, and after discussion with Sarah and Solange, agreed to the rental of the large apartment in Tegel. Sarah’s back to the UK for a few days, in conference with her team there before coming back to Berlin for an extended period. Paul expects Solange with him in the evening after she’s finalised her contract with the Charité hospital.
The Hour of the Bull
The apartment is still half empty, with only the lounge, his room and Sarah’s room furnished. An empty room at the back is full of exercise equipment still to be unpacked. Paul reflects on the changes he’s made to his thesis, and the preparation for a second phase now that the sponsorship is agreed. He found a copy of a Russian novel in Julian’s papers, called “The Hour of the Bull” by the author of Andromeda, his dad’s favourite classical science fiction story. The description of the spiral structure of space drew Paul’s attention immediately. Julian left no note on his reading as far as Paul’s searches have uncovered so far.
2012
He’s continued his reading of Julian’s blog archive and diary: in 2012 his dad was a prolific blogger, to the extent of “stalling” on the novel. Yet Paul is unsure of the reason, apart form Julian’s distraction, covering all sorts of subjects, from Shibari to topology, and a permanent dialogue with fellow bloggers and commentators. On the post he’d shown Sarah, Julian appears as an anonymous narrator, Marcel’s fashion in La Recherche. Julian is cast as one of the characters, the tone being that of a strong showing of the characters will, and a rather timid position of the author. The three women in that scene are Sarah, Jane and Melissa, plus the girl who lets the narrator in: Ruth. Paul cannot recall seeing Ruth mentioned anywhere else.
Thesis
Magda, his tutor, has sent him a stack of notes and suggestions about the thesis and the proposal he left with her before his departure for the UK. Paul has four or five hours free before Solange’s arrival. Sarah will be back the day after. Paul turns back to Julian’s blog, where he stopped reading a post titled “From Shibari to the Klein bottle”. The year 2012 was happy for Julian, though the onslaught of his illness was present in some of the posts. Paul also wondered if there was a reason why many of the blogs Julian quotes, or refers to, stopped publishing after the end of that year. His sources of inspiration are amazing: history, art, erotics, poetry… The archiving preserved the comments but not the stats, so Paul is unsure of how popular the blog really was then. Julian was inspired by the Bushido as in this post, from July 11, 2012:
Bushido
“Their ragtag troop walks through the deep ravine, sharp rocks cutting through their feet, the rain drowning rivulets of blood down their legs and cloaks. They are starving. Only faith in their beloved leader keeps them walking.
At once they see him: a powerful Samurai knight standing immobile as a statue on his horse, his sword drawn, in front of them, barring the way. “Who’s your leader?” the knight asks, “bring him to me, now”. They hesitate.
“I won’t let you pass without seeing him, there, in front of me.”
In small steps, as in slow motion, their leader walks to the knight.
“Is it me you are calling for, my Lord?”
“O, really, this is too amusing”, says he, looking down at the slender woman and her grey cloak.
“My Lord, I am leading these poor people to the other valley.”
“No you won’t”, says he laughing, dismounting swiftly and approaching her, sword in hand.
“My Lord, I am asking for safe passage for this troop, they are hungry and exhausted”, says she, as he lifts his sword. She stands, immobile, rain running down her face, in front of the knight, towering above her.
“Would you stand against me, woman?” says he, still as ice.
“I won’t, my Lord, this will” says she, as she draws her short Wakizashi from under her cloak, and in a fluid gesture, so fast he does not react, disarms him.
The knight looks at his sword on the ground, smiles: “Your knife is too short to worry me, but you are brave, and the Way of the Sword has no quarrel with bravery”.
And the knight mounts his horse and leads them to the valley.
swords glitter in the rain –
believers hold their breath in hope
knights walk the sky”
Composure
Paul turns to another piece: “Composure” about a small snail and a sexy French lady, hilarious. However serious his illness became, Julian’s sense of humour is present in all his writing. Somewhere in the following eight years, something happened, that eventually killed him. On July fourteenth, 2012, Julian had written in a post in response to eleven questions:
“Are you still friends with your best friend from childhood? sadly not, actually the subject of The Page, my unfinished novel (in a way)”
Paul looks at a list of blogs that were referred to often in Julian’s own writing. Some are still active and Paul bookmarks them. Were these bloggers in regular communication with Julian? Solange will be here in one hour. He clears the desk and starts planning their evening. He will propose a lovely fish restaurant near the lake.
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