The Eidolon

The Eidolon peered through the water reeds, which appeared like protective iron spikes preventing the early mists from climbing the banks of the lake, no breeze or gentle wind aided the soft wafts of water vapour to advance to the warmer land, the majestic globe of water hung back, sulking behind the dark mask of the day. The bullrushes increased the impression of a prison boundary, although their brown heads were disintegrating and eroding with age, devoured by the march of time. In the delicate milky half-light of the approaching dawn, the vast water monster looked about its prison, and there was no escape. The grey misty dawn light would not allow it to perceive the guards clearly on the banks. The opening curtains of the day heralding those tall deciduous sentinels, now falling in their age, littered the ground with their rotting summer celebrations, soon their fragrant summer smells would fade into decaying memories around their roots.

It was the time in the year for the night to be selfish, to ponder and absorb the light, constrain the light of the shining orb, and only begrudgingly let the splinters of illumination enter the edge of the stage later in the day’s performance. The night gathered its forces from the north, in the darkness the thieves could steal the summer gaiety and carefree ambivalence, as day by day the air changed, and slowly the decaying, aging process of nature started capturing the most vulnerable. Those languid summer butterflies quivered when the wisps of cold air appeared like daggers attacking from the north, returning to capture, to lay siege on the late summer days and nights.

The Eidolon knew this time well, it was advent time, the time of calling. The time of rebirth was coming. Rebirth of the trauma.

The Eidolon lived in the lake, it was at one with the lake, it was at one with the water. The water was calm, at peace in its surroundings, like a huge luminous multi-coloured stone setting on the earth, by the master craftsmen, nature itself. Only the sun and the moon knew of the lake’s birth. Only the sun and the moon knew when the Eidolon took its first pneuma, its first breath in the universe, and only the stars knew of its purpose.

The car appeared suddenly from the trees. Any purring engine noise was muffled by the sentries of the lake, but they stood motionless; agelessly watching the human made monstrosity destroy the day’s gentle haze, its laziness was interrupted. The slow cracking of twigs and grating of small stones disturbed the natural noises of the environment, all the surrounding nature looked on silently at the intrusion to their solemnity by the slowly moving alien monster arriving at the lake house. Like any monster it left a destructive trail in the pristine natural environment, the fallen leaves crushed into a swollen sodden mold imprinted with disrespect, by the crazy laughing tyre design.

The Eidolon looked on from behind the spikey reed bank of the lake, the waiting was over.

The passenger door swung open, and an elfin figure of a girl slowly appeared from behind the open door. It wasn’t a girl, it was a slim petite woman, as she tightened the quilted coat around her torso, her movements confirmed that this wasn’t a young teenage girl at all, it was indeed a woman. She had a slim figure that would remain unchanged for all her adulthood, right through all stages of life. By the lake in the summer in her bikini she would be the envy of all the onlooking woman, muttering in jealousy at her slim contours, as well as the forbidden ambitions and bright staring eyes of admiring man. She was blessed with that type of figure, and at first sight, mistaken for a fledgling young girl. It was compounded by her lack of self-awareness, her innocence to her own physical beauty. Natural beauty is enhanced by the person wearing it when it is never overstated, or neither understated with shyness or self-consciousness. Unaware of the staring crowd, her adoring audience went unnoticed, and she was unashamed of the focus, the aurora of the scantily clad beauty was an uncontrived sight to behold.

From a distance a stranger could not imagine the torturous shadow that this woman was now carrying inside. Only the Eidolon could see. See through the quilted coat, see through the imagined scantily clad bikini, see inside, the heart, the mind, the soul now dark with grieving and a never-ending regret. The shadow had its victim firmly in its grasp.

The shadow was wrapped around the woman far tighter than the quilted coat, and there was no defense against its hunger. The shadow was a slow cold psychological harmful killer, continuously gnawing at the good memories in the mind and joyous heart, draining the spirit like the emptying of the last bottle of summer wine. The envious onlookers from the past would be aghast as the beautiful body had slowly dissolved and paled from her summer ripeness. Her beautiful complexion had disappeared and now replaced by parchment. Her beautiful skin, which had once created a masterpiece of human form, and which had previously enhanced her beautiful slender smooth body form, could no longer prevent the protruding bones, her skeptical frame was now pronounced as gradually with each day she became more emaciated.

The car door opened on the opposite side and a tall man exited the driving seat and stood. Where once this man had stood tall and proud, the trauma had bent his skeptical form, now his normal pose was hunched. His head bowed; it was though he was cowering from the previously beautiful happy woman now engulfed by the dark shadow. Life and the trauma had fatally bitten his essence, his soul. The tall sentinels watched in empathetic silence, as a sudden gust of wind whistling an ethereal tune to remind all in the scene at that very instant; to pay homage and respect time. The watching Eidolon knew well about this scene, and how it would end.

The man and woman walked to the lakeside log cabin. The log cabin blended into the surroundings, as had been culled from the tall sentinels towering above the squat manmade structure. It was connected, but also disconnected from the origins of its past nature, a temporary shelter, built by creatures with the misconception of protection from evolution, from trauma. The man and woman climbed the steps onto the porch and avoided looking at the still body of water, the lake. The water was silently calling to them, until the wind gusted up wisps of waves on the glassy mirrored surface, reminding them it was watching and remembering.

The Eidolon came to the window of the log cabin and peered into the building. It watched the man and woman packing up items, mostly clothes. Both were shrouded in their own thoughts, in complete silence, and worked in complete isolation for one another. The man broke the uneasy silence.

“Shall we do it? Are you ready?

The woman nodded solemnly.

They both walked to the door, and opened it, and commenced to walk down the steps along a path towards the wooden jetty. They were carrying flowers. The bright colours of the flowers, yellows, reds, and crisp bright green of the stems were out of place with the sombe late autumn day. One could imagine if this was a movie scene, or a stage setting, there was a spotlight on the flowers, and there was, a poetic spotlight of life, growth, and positivity, in complete contrast to that day, the falling.

They arrived at the very end of the jetty, and the woman who was carrying the flowers paused for a second and then jettisoned the flowers and the loose wrapping into the still solemn water. For a fraction in time the flowers flew in slow motion, until they lazily fell onto the body of water. It burst the impression of a glass mirror reflecting the sky above, small splashes, ripples cascading outwards into ever increasing circles, which also reflected the sky, white puffs of cloud, blues quivered in the water like a fairground mirror, but the luminous dark green of the water’s below returned as a reminder. The flowers drifting chaotically in the water floundering for a purpose, a direction, a current to ride.

Suddenly, a child’s soft toy created a small splash as it entered the dark green waters, it was surrounded by a chaotic mess of floating flowers. The glimmering button eyes and stupid smile on the face of the soft toy, brought a sudden sob from the woman, and intake of breath from the man. Their memories were creating lines on the soul that only the chiromancers of the spirit could interpolate.

The woman and man whispered a soundless prayer, mouthing the child’s name.

The lake already knew the child’s name, and the Eidolon, watching from the reeds, knew where she was.

An eidolon originates in ancient Greek literature; it is an image, an idol, apparition, phantom, ghost. It is a spirit-image of a living or dead person, a shade or phantom look-alike of the human form.