The Tale of Ajziou

Here is a fictional story I wrote from my creative writing class of '09... or was it '10? I can't even remember anymore. Anyways, before you read, I must give a few disclaimers:

A. If you must look for a message in a story that may hint a little too much of giving a message, it is not in any way anti-faith. I myself am a man of faith, though I have not always been one. I know what it feels like to have God in your life voluntarily vs involuntarily.

2. If you must read into the characters more than I meant you to, know that if I was to represent any one of them, it would be the Wizard and NOT ALFRED!! That being said, you are to relate to these characters in your individual way. Destroy the author and read on at your own risk.

III. It is a bit lengthier than my usual posts, so make sure your not in a tight spot for time as you might have a hard time walking away from such a gripping story.

Four: Leave your literary criticisms to the dogs. They are better writers than me anyways.

So, without further adoodoo, here's one of my very first shots at complete fiction:

The Tale of Ajziou and the Day of Forgetfulness

            There once lived an old and wise and perhaps crazy man who tired of tax collectors and telemarketers, so he declared himself a “wizard” and straightly left modern society to dwell by himself in the mountains of Montana. Unfortunately, if one finds himself wise and wizardly, there is often a congregation who call themselves his “disciples.” Thus it was that in his quest for solitude, this wizard found himself followed by a few scores of somewhat dim, yet ever faithful disciples. They founded a colony cut off from the rest of the world, and when they approached him to know what the town should be named, he simply sneezed and turned away about his own business once again. Thus the town was named, “Ajziou.”

            Among these somewhat dim, yet ever faithful disciples was a simple man named Alfred. He was in all senses very plain, he and his father having lived in a modest hovel and gardening lemons that they would distribute to the rest of this community called Ajziou. Every day Alfred would go about his business, following the same routine with carefulness: awaking before the sun to prune the lemon trees before the morning dew even dissipated. Then he would make his rounds through the community, collecting whatever things were necessary to collect in order to maintain a small plantation of citrus fruits in Montana (which may seem improbable, but do remember that the town is governed by a wizard, which governing seems to override any natural laws that were necessary to be overridden). All these necessities were provided freely by the other community members, for the wizard had forbidden any financial medium of any sort. In fact, the wizard allowed the people to live under his watch on very peculiar conditions. He enacted laws and forbade much of what was common to man, including celebrations of any sort after the setting of the sun, competitive foot-races, jokes that belittled one’s mother, and romance of any sort. The wizard attached great shame to the breaking of any of his rules, and the somewhat dim, yet ever faithful disciples followed these rules with unflinching zeal.

Alfred was particularly careful not to be the first caught in excruciating shame, however painful it might be to him to follow these rules, for painful it was indeed. As mentioned before, romance of any type was forbidden (for the wizard considered the world overpopulated as it was). Yet with every daily trip, what brought Alfred more joy than anything else was his stop at the store of jars of water, where he would take his allotment of jars of water from a most interesting hostess. Actually, she was quite plain, but Polluxa, the store’s hostess, was always there with that special smile she reserved only for the stalwart Alfred. He never ceased to think of her, thinking that to let her image escape his mind would take her from him for an eternity, or at least until the next day when he would collect water from her again.

The exchange was the same every day, as only a few hours after dawn he would walk in and give her the same greeting.

“Hello,” he would say.

“Good morning,” she would reply.

Then she would smile, and a very flushed Alfred would concentrate hard on his feet as he swiftly collected his jars of water and left in a hurry, not even breathing until the store door was closed behind him. With that gasp of air, he would smile as well, knowing that there was great meaning to his otherwise dim, yet ever faithful life. How it tortured him, every day, to see her and avoid that great taboo of love or affection or passion or crush or any sort of nomenclature that the whimsical poet would attach to such desire.

This continued for several years in the community of Ajziou. Every citizen did their part, and every citizen heeded the strict and arbitrary code of the wizard. Then one day, the wizard called a gathering of his somewhat dim, yet ever faithful disciples.

“My people, gather around and speak not a word, for your wizard wishes to further impose his knowledge upon you,” said the wizard to his people.

“Years have passed, and you have been ever faithful to the code that has kept us in  harmony and out of each other’s personal space and most of all, a very dull and boring people.”

At this declaration, the people felt to cheer, but resisted knowing the wizard had mandated silence.

“For your strict adherence to this code, I seek to reward you and curse you at the same time. I grant you all a day in which the rules of this community may be forgotten!”

At this, the people audibly gasped and looked about, as if the reactions of their peers would confirm that the wizard had spoken such blasphemy against himself.

The wizard continued, “Now, I understand that you may have been taught things regarding inescapable shame relating to the breaking of these rules, but I have prepared for this as well. I, the most powerful wizard in the land, shall cast a spell of forgetfulness which will cause you to forget any shame by the time you rise in the morning for the next day.”

Now the shock of the somewhat dim, yet ever faithful disciples turned slowly to interest, then acceptance, then to celebration, and it only took over five minutes for the people to begin shouting for joy and praising the name of the good wizard for his merciful and whimsical acts, but by that time, the wizard had already had his fill of the crowd and was no longer found among them.

The people chatted amongst themselves now, working up in their conversation a day full of the most rampant and anarchistic intentions. Only a few hours stood between them and their blessed day of unprecedented autonomy. For Alfred, there was but one thought: Polluxa. As he thought about her, he soon found that his feet were carrying him to that very store in which he had already visited her that day.

There he soon stood at her door, wondering how his feet had seemed to have taken him there without his permission. There he was nonetheless, so he raised his hand to knock on the door, but hesitated. The day of forgetfulness had not yet been forgotten, so it was still forbidden for him to approach Polluxa about any intentions of romance. Then again, he was only going to ask her to set aside some time for the morrow to…  meet. A simple meeting was harmless enough, wasn’t it?

It was now late in the evening, and Alfred continued to struggle with this dilemma when suddenly the door opened and there stood Polluxa, preparing to retire the night. She was surprised a little by this man on her doorstep, but only a little. She chose to be shocked by few things in her life.

“Hello,” he said.

“Good evening,” she replied.

With that, she shut the door behind her and walked off toward her house, leaving a dumbstruck Alfred on the front step. Perhaps it had been the light, but he was sure she had given him that same smile, only there was more of a hint to it this time—at least there was more of something, right?

That fateful day of forgetfulness was born like any other day. At the rising of the sun, Alfred was already about his work, doing his normal duties as he figured lemons still had to follow natural laws, even on a day when all canonical laws were void.

The rest of the town woke as if on any other day, and the people went about their somewhat dim, yet ever faithful business as usual. Alfred felt no different until he went up to the door of Polluxa to collect his allotment of jars of water.

He walked in, but before he could say, “Hello,” he noticed there was a dark haired man there with her. He was leaning against the wall and speaking casually with her. Apparently, not everyone felt that they had to go about their usual duties.

At the sight of Alfred, the dark haired man promptly excused himself and left the store quickly. Alfred stood there for a moment with a puzzled look on his face as he studied the floor, wondering what this meant.

“Good morning,” she said.

Alfred quickly looked up and smiled, then, without a word, went about his business and collected his jars of water as usual. On his way out, he was so out of sorts that he dropped one of the jars for the first time ever, shattering it on the floor and spilling its liquid contents all over the floor.

Before Alfred could even react, Polluxa was there with a mop and a bucket, first collecting the pieces of glass and placing them in the bucket. Alfred muttered an apology and began to help pick up the shards of glass. The task seemed impossible, which was comforting to Alfred as he had an excuse to stay longer in her presence.

“Don’t worry, it happens quite often,” came Polluxa’s clear reply as they took care of the larger shards.

Alfred stooped to place what seemed to be the last piece of glass in the bucket, and with a sigh of feigned relief, he stood and faced Polluxa. She gave him that smile again, at least for an instant, and then she had the mop in her hand and was about her business, wiping the floor and spreading the water out so that it would not be hazardous to anyone who came in.

That smile. For once, Alfred returned it, even if Polluxa didn’t notice. With a great feat of courage, Alfred spoke to her:

“What do you usually do when you’re done here?”

“Oh, I clean the store and then just head home to my family. Nothing real special,” she said as she continued to mop.

“And is that your plan for tonight as well?”

“I don’t know, perhaps I will run about after the sun goes down and start loud and gawdy conversations with everyone I see!”

This act was surely forbidden—at least on any other day.

A moment passed, and Polluxa continued to mop and Alfred continued to stand there. Eventually, she looked up, gave him that smile again, and then went about her business once more. Once again, Alfred’s spirits soared.

“Polluxa,” he said, and the name fell awkwardly from his lips, yet the saying of it alone gave him a thrill that he had never before experienced in his life.

She paused from her mopping and looked him in the eye, “Yes, Alfred?”

Alfred swallowed, and then smiled like a drunken maniac, “Why not we spend the evening together?”

“Why not?”

Alfred was puzzled, for her answer hinted neither towards acceptance or denial of his invitation. He had invited her, right? The conversation was becoming difficult to recall, and all his thoughts were muddled. He knew his face must have been absolutely crimson as he began to rapidly lose his stamina for conversations with others.

He gave up on his quest, and picked up his jars of water, but for some reason he mindlessly placed one in the bucked of broken glass and took that up in his arm as if it was part of his daily pull from the store. He walked out the door, but didn’t get far.

“Alfred,” Polluxa called from within the store.

He turned, perhaps a bit too swiftly as he nearly lost another of his jars.

“Yes?”

“You don’t need to take that bucket.”

Alfred’s expression quickly fell. Another dashed hope.

“Of course,” he said.

“It’s alright. Why don’t you just return it at sundown tonight. Right here.”

It took Alfred a moment to realize the meaning of what she had just said, but only a moment. With a smile and an almost-laugh (the sort of laugh that seems to escape you when a vast amount of excitement has hit you more suddenly than a cannon ball to your unsuspecting stomach), he nodded vigorously and said, “Ok.”

In his excitement, he only dropped one more jar of water on his trip home.

There were still many hours until sundown. The town of Ajziou still seemed hesitant to indulge in those activities that it had been deprived of for a few years now. Eventually, the people began to congregate outside the wizard’s curiously shaped house—a small cylindrical building with no windows and one door—in order to seek his wisdom and guidance on this strange day. Perhaps some of them were even seeking reassurance that their plans were still fair game by the wizard’s standards, but his door remained adamantly closed. Presently, the waiting people became restless, and a wrestling match began, followed by a choir, and then an absolutely scandalous love-making fest, and then by all sorts of unrestrained anarchy. By the time the sun had dipped below the horizon, the people of Ajziou were in an uproar that would put any Mardi Gras to shame. People gathered from all over the town to this one spot directly outside the wizard’s house as if he lorded over the revelry with his edict of lawlessness.

One man did not join the congregation, but instead waited across town right outside the store that distributed jars of water with a bucket of broken glass in his hand. Alfred went over his plans for the evening in his head again and again, but felt more as if Death was waiting behind that door than his blessed Polluxa.

The sun had already been down for an hour or so when he heard his name.

“Alfred?” Polluxa called from behind him.

He quickly turned around to greet her, a bit surprised that she wasn’t inside the shop.

“Hello,” he said.

“Good evening,” she replied, and walked up to him and took the bucket and set it just inside the door. Then she closed it behind her and turned around and looked at him.

“Well, what shall we do now?” she asked.

“Uh—perhaps we can go for a walk?”

The next morning Alfred woke up very tired, for he had gotten little sleep the night before. He hummed contentedly to himself as the previous day’s memories made his steps lighter and his mood brighter. It wasn’t until he began to prune the lemon trees that he realized this was a bad thing.

He hadn’t forgotten! The laws were now in full force once again, and the shame of the previous day’s activities began to crash down upon him and burn his naïve little conscience.

The pruning of the lemon trees became a very difficult task. The thought of going about the day’s activities and facing the townsfolk became daunting. He would have to collect jars of water from Polluxa as usual. Oh, Polluxa! How could he ever face her again?

Eventually, he found his feet taking him automatically there as they had done for so many years. He walked in, this time without a “Hello.”

She did not meet his eye. Instead, she found the floor unusually fascinating today.

“Polluxa,” he said.

She looked up. Without even the hint of a smile, she said, “Yes?”

Without even thinking of the consequences, he quickly asked, “Do you remember? Yesterday?”

She looked honestly puzzled, “What are you talking about, sir?”

“Yesterday? Do you remember doing anything—with me?”

Still looking puzzled, she shook her head, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“The wizard’s spell worked for you then?”

“What spell?”

“He cast a spell—a spell of forgetfulness, so we wouldn’t remember what we did yesterday.”

She gave him a smile, but this time there was nothing special about it, “I suppose it did.”

Alfred couldn’t believe it. It seems the spell had worked, just not for him. What had he done wrong?

He left the store in a panic and returned home, shirking the rest of the day’s activities. He huddled in a corner of his house, going over in his head again and again what had happened, starting from the previous evening up to the disastrous present.

Eventually he came up with a plan. He delivered a whole basket of lemons to the wizard on a weekly basis. The wizard was fond of his lemons, so an early visit should please him immensely. He gathered a basket of lemons and headed for the wizard’s home.

            He stood there a moment after he dropped the usual basket of a dozen or so lemons on doorstep of the curiously shaped house of the wizard. After summing up his courage, he finally knocked on the door.

            Almost immediately, the wizard answered as he usually did, and with a short “Thank you,” took the basket, turned, and shut the door as quickly as he had answered.

            Alfred had to sum up his courage again before he knocked a second time. This time there was no answer. A third knock, and still no sign of reaction from within.

            Alfred was about to leave until he thought once again of returning to his normal life, bearing that awful shame from yesterday. The thought was more unbearable than facing the most powerful man in Ajziou, and so he opened the door and stepped inside.

            The interior of the home was very peculiar. The small circular room was completely surrounded by glass casing in which there was an aquatic scene, with live aquatic creatures.

            On the center of the room was a desk, and at that desk the wizard was writing something, seemingly oblivious to Alfred’s intrusion. Stacks of paper covered the face of the small desk, as if the wizard did nothing but write behind the walls of his own home. Alfred quickly noticed a knife on the desk as well as a glass bottle of some sort of red liquid. Beside the wizard’s desk on the floor was the newly acquired basket of lemons, and he momentarily paused from his writing to take one, cut it in half with the knife, and pour some of the red liquid on it. The wizard began to suck on this decorated lemon and continued to write for a while before Alfred realized that he was either being ignored, or the man had not yet noticed his presence.

            “Sir... Mr. Wizard, sir...” he said.

            The wizard looked up abruptly from his writings. “Oh dear, there is someone in my house!”

            “Forgive me, but I must speak with you,” said Alfred.

            The wizard waited a very long, awkward moment before responding, “As you can see, I’m very busy. You must say what you are here to say in fifteen words or less.”

            Alfred was puzzled by this, and for a moment began to work his message over in his head.

            “Um...”

            “Fourteen.”

            “What?”

            “Thirteen.”

            Alfred took a breath, and then walked down the steps to directly face the man at the desk.

            “Your spell did not work on me.”

            The wizard waited another long moment, counting the words on his fingers, before saying, “What spell?”

            “The spell of forgetfulness. I have not forgotten my actions from yesterday,” said Alfred.

            “A spell of forgetfulness? Well, I must have forgotten all about it. Remind me what it was all about.”

            “You promised us a day in which the rules would be dismissed, and afterward a spell of forgetfulness would cause us all to live on without the shame.”

            The wizard mulled this over in his mind for a bit: “Did I now? Well, I suppose I am more clever than I remember.”

            “Please, you must help me forget what I did yesterday. I can’t bare to go on with such... memories!”

            “Hmph,” said the wizard, “If the spell did not work then, I don’t think it will work this time for you either.”

            “Then there is nothing you can do?”

            The wizard shrugged, “Probably not.”

Alfred sat on floor and bowed his head in despair. In a moment of seeming lucidity, the wizard had compassion on the young man, and rose from his desk to walk over and sit next to him.

“My boy, I really love lemons with hot sauce. I am old and little else can reach my taste buds anymore. People may think I am odd, but I am not ashamed of the things I love.”

“That sounds disgusting,” muttered Alfred, without raising his head.

“That’s not the point. The point is that pointy thing that you are supposed to stumble upon yourself in a moment of rare… undimness. You know, draw your own conclusion sort of thing.”

Alfred looked up, “So what are you saying?”

“I’m saying I like lemons with hot sauce, and this house may not be your ordinary house, but I think it’s clever and I built it with my own hands, and they all ask me ‘Why don’t you have a bed to sleep in’, and I assure them that the desk works fine and I must be practical.”

“Wait,” said a skeptical Alfred, “You built this place yourself?”

“Why not?”

“You’re a bit old for manual labor.”

“My boy, I am a wizard. But the train is running off the tracks. Let’s try to get back to the pointy thing. Remember, you are having a hard time from shame, yet I tell you to not be ashamed of what you love.”

“But you were the one who mandated the laws! You were the one who forbade that which I loved! You were the one that promised such unbearable shame! How could you say…”

The wizard threw his hands up in innocence, “My boy, I didn’t force misery on anybody. Before you accuse me of all sorts of villany, let me tell one thing. Or maybe a few things. I gave the people these laws mostly so they would stay out of my hair, and only somewhatly for the purpose of watching strange specimens in a strange situation. People are very strange specimens, no? Anyways, one law I deliberately never arbitrated upon you people was the one saying, ‘You must remain here and abide by my arbitrary whims’, so if you must pin your misery on me, than by all means leave this absurd community and be miserable elsewhere. Do spare me and yourself, though. I rather enjoy your lemons. I prefer their company to most people’s, actually.”

Alfred’s emotions quickly cooled, and he soon found that he was shaken by this conversation with the man who he had followed religiously these past few years. He was shaken, yet strangely comforted.

“I do love the lemons,” said the wizard, “so do keep up the good work. Then again, you don’t have to, do you?”

Alfred’s only reply was, “I’m sorry for disturbing you, Mr. wizard, sir.”

Alfred returned to his house—his simple house, with his simple father, and his simple lemons. He asked his father to take over the business of collecting jars of water, not daring to explain why. His father agreed, but a few days went by and his father suddenly disappeared, leaving the whole lemon business to Alfred alone.

These disappearances were occurring regularly now, leaving only the dimmest and most faithful disciples still in the town of Ajziou. Reluctantly, Alfred returned to the routes of collections to keep the lemons going, which brought him once more to the doorstep of the store where jars of water were distributed.

He walked in, and without looking up, said, “Hello.”

There was no reply. The store was vacant.