The ship finally docks, after lurching and worrying its way west for a month. The tiny cabin, the plunging horizon, the inquisitive overtures, the cold and the rain. Nature is terrible—terrible. I won’t meet their eyes. But, in a moment, this moment, it falls away. I have forgotten. Everything is forgotten, everything is new. I’ve lived this so many times in my mind that I am hardly present to my present. Everything shimmers; I watch myself walk down the gangplank and onto the dock, hovering a few steps above the planks and stones. No one knows; not yet. Not anyone. Not him. I have a secret name. I have a secret language. I have a secret mission. There are practicalities of course, I must see to my bags. I must find rooms. I must remember who I am, and who I am pretending to be. And then, in this place—finally!
My life will begin.
