The conversation that we had when you visited remained in my head for a long time after you left, and I began to see signs that reminded me of your warning — not the deaths of my beloved wife and my beloved firstborn, but signs in great nature. You said that unlike other creatures, the oaf understands that he is destroying the world for selfish reasons and that if he were to correct his actions, he might halt the destruction. Are we destroying the world? Well, there is this present year of ceaseless winter. I have heard say that the wildernesses are flooded and that the rain is headed to the cities. This is destruction, is it not? But is it worldwide? Who is to say? Nevertheless, I would try to do something about it. So I united with several like-minded companions and we campaigned for an audience with the great leader, who after many months and much agitation on our part agreed to meet with us. He listened politely and with great patience about our need to mend our ways, to apologize to great nature by putting things back the way they used to be, and afterward he gave us assurances that if we did not end our fascination with these doomsday prophecies, he would have us arrested and severely punished. Well, I have another son at home and my parents to care for, so I relented. Now, do not you despair over us. The oaf is strong. We will survive. We also are a part of great nature. We are natural creatures. The great creator does not hate us. This is not his punishment of us for our wickedness and our indulgences. As the great leader and his advisors said, “Though for us it may be the last day, for the earth, it is not the end of days. For the earth, it is but a dark day.”
With tears in her eyes, Rose cried, “That’s it? That’s the message?”
“That is the entire message,” Jack said.
Jack’s final trip took place six years after that last one — six years for the man, two years for the oaf — and when he and his stepson the man-oaf returned, he would not speak of the trip at all, no matter how hard his wife pressed him.
He surrendered to her the large bag of silver and the bag of gold that was twice the size of the silver, and he told her, “We shall live out the rest of our days on these bags. We are wealthy for the rest of our days and all the days of our children, but I shall nevermore return to that world and I shall nevermore speak of it.”
It was the son, the man-oaf Mike, who told her about that final journey to the world above the firmaments.
He said, “The oceans cover the face of the earth. What little dry land exists is overrun with rats and other vermin, and their hunger is great. Where are the bovins and hosses and dogs and cats? Under the water. The sun is overly hot. Even the stars shine too hot. The ocean boils. To journey in the heat of the day is to risk death by fire. Better to journey at night. Life? We found a few mans piloting a boat and rode with them to see what was left of the world. They shared their food with us and we our provisions with them. Their meals were harvested from the sea — fish and the green weed that floats on the surface. We saw no birds while we were there. It is a world without birds. We asked the mans — for they were talking mans — where the cities and villages were. Under the sea, they told us. Charting our course by the stars, we rode with the mans to the place where your master Zloty once lived. The place where your master Zloty once lived was covered by the ocean. There was nothing for the eye to see but water. We sailed to a small island that was not covered by water, and the mans had set up a village there, but the water was rising. The man in charge told us, You may not believe this, but this is the very peak of a great mountain, not an island, and soon, in a year, maybe two, it shall be covered. We shall have to find another place, or live forever on the boat. On the island, they had silver and gold which they did give to us, for mans know not the value of silver and gold. In fact, the mans cursed the silver and the gold, believing that they were somehow to blame for the demise of their world, though they could not explain specifically how. After a few days, they returned us to the top of another high mountain — the same that has the cave in which the portal between the worlds is hidden. It must have been high tide. When we had arrived there in that world a few days before, the cave atop that mountain was dry land. But now as we were departing, the cave floor was covered with the ocean up to and over Jack’s head and so I carried him on my back through the cave and to the portal. We went through and managed to close the firmament door above us, but water gushed through it, raining down on our heads as we descended the stairs. It was a thing I never wish to see again. A world as it passes away. A world that is dying.”
“The day of the oaf is at an end,” Rose said, bitterly weeping. “Mother was right. Oh, fi, fi, fi, she was right.”
14
Mike
When Mike reached the age of 119 and a half, he weighed a slim 302 pounds. He had never been a big eater and thus had always kept his weight down: he stood 9’6".
He was 119 in man years, which was the age of forty or so in the reckoning of the oaf. He had the appearance of a very tall, powerfully built gentleman of middle-age years with a full red beard. He walked with a back that was erect and proud despite his years, for as an oaf, he was still in the first third of his life.
As an oaf in the world of oafs, he would have been called shorty.
Down here, they called him big man, listed him in Guinness, wrote textbooks and newspaper articles about him. A marvel of nature. A mystery of science. Ageless. A big oaf — and that last was not said as a compliment. It was said because he had never been able to excel at the sport of basketball — never been able to excel at any sport despite his gift of great size.
Solitude suited him. There were too many questions down here, and he didn’t like being a celebrity anyway — too many cameras, too many reporters, too many questions.
And his family was gone — mother, stepfather, brother, sister, and even the son that he loved — fi, fi, fi, the life of man is so brief.
And so Mike moved to the mountain to think — to the mountain, whose snowy peak touched the clouds that hid the portal between his world and theirs.
His home was on the mountain, and he had lived there three years, three man years, one oaf year, before he made up his mind to see his plan through to the end.
He had decided at last that he was more oaf than man, even though that other world had passed away. He had been there with his stepfather on that last trip through the portal so many years ago. He had wept when he saw the devastation, because even back then, in the back of his mind, he had lodged the plan to remain there forever.
Before he had crossed through the portal, he had been planning to tell his stepfather these words at the end of their silver conquest: Now, you go back to Mother and brother Bob and sister Janet and tell them that the big boob loves them, but he just does not fit. I just do not fit, Father. I am a freak in that world of yours and I am not going back. I will remain up here with those of my own kind, and I am changing my name to Tlotl. You and Mother will just have to learn to deal with it.
And Mike, who wanted to be called Tlotl, knew that his stepfather, a wise and reasonable man, would have understood and supported his decision.
Jack would have nodded and said, Just help me get that silver back through the portal, kid, and you do what’s best for you. I’ll tell your mom. She’ll learn to deal with it. We’ll come up and see you from time to time. Don’t you worry about us. Live your life the way you see fit.