Chapter 6 of R.M. Dolin’s novel “The Dangling Conversation,” February 22, 2024 – Part 1 of 2, see conclusion in The Ghosts Within
ISABELLE: “As a matter of fact, I do, usually just before dawn when night’s causally quiet and I’m awake with this unsettled feeling I might not be alone; not a scared kind, more like a benevolent ghost’s visiting with things she has to say, stuff I need to hear. It’s weird, my ghost either can’t speak or I can’t listen because nothing ever gets said. I’m sure it’s my great grandma who’s come to explain what happened. From what I’ve pieced together, her decisions and the aftermath of consequence significantly impact every generation that follows. I ask Dad if there’s some sort of scandal, but all he’ll say is no one here, or back in Spain, talks about such things since talk can’t change what happened. It’s an odd answer given he loves telling stories about our family’s proud history.
“His vagueness escalates my imagination, and I’m left to determine what secrets keep her from heaven; why God’s made entry conditional on my hearing whatever it is she needs to say. It seems she had a lover, which is definitely scandalous back in 1936, in the midst of a revolution. There’s a photograph of her my Abuela keeps hidden and only shows me if I ask. In the photo, my Great-Grandma’s young, incredibly beautiful, and intense. The picture’s a group of freedom fighters in a forest dressed like commandos. They’re holding guns and grenades while staring menacingly into the camera; everyone except this handsome man who’s smiling warmly at her and her baby. Did I mention she’s holding my Abuela who can’t be more than a few days old. If you crop out the other freedom fighters, this unidentified man, my Great-Grandma, and my Abuela make a perfect family portrait.
“It’s romantic, in a forbidden love kind of way. Imagine, in the midst of intense conflict, two people fall in love and have a baby; something you’ll never see in a John Wayne movie. But she did, and that makes her even more heroic, at least to me. It is a mystery though; I mean about the guy beside her; who is he and why does she need to tell me about him? I don’t know because she’s not talking, no doubt ashamed, confessing’s never easy. Her visits didn’t start until after my divorce, so whatever I need to hear has something to do with navigating a world not built to grasp such subtleties.”
KYLE: “We all have ghosts, mine’s still here even after saying what needed to be said; even after the first time almost kills me. Between moving to DC and meeting Nadia, I’m a bit of a wreak; manage to convince myself love’s not possible. Somewhere in there though, this feeling builds; a restlessness that can’t be satiated. As it grows, so do my bike rides; first by a mile, then a mile more, until I’m riding well over a hundred miles a week. The more I ride, the more this need keeps me in the saddle as if the road’s driving me to some yet to be disclosed rendezvous; I know it’s weird, but there’s no other way to explain it.
“I’m on the road one day alone with my thoughts and this ratcheting restlessness reaches a crescendo I simply can’t out pace. That’s when I decide the only way to wear it down is a protracted ride on another continent. I can’t tell you why I choose Europe, perhaps the logo on the side of a close contact truck or something I pick up in my periphery on a passing billboard; all I know is once the idea takes hold, it must be done. That’s how fate works, it infiltrates your mind with nonsensical ideas and ill-defined notions that are so damn-ass crazy they scare you, but not so crazy you don’t allow yourself to be seduced. You recognize it’s something you have to do, even though you’re unsure what’s to come from it.
“The ride will be from Barcelona, Spain to Milan, Italy along the French Riviera; fifteen-hundred kilometers of open road to be traversed in ten days, three of which are reserved for rest or unanticipated mechanicals. This is by far the craziest, most irrational thing I’ve ever done; it’s not just the riding, there’s complex logistics, like mapping the course, getting a passport, booking airlines, and pulling together the lightweight gear necessary to camp along way. The entire time I’m prepping, what’s pushing me is this sense that on some metaphysical level something profound is gonna happen. Of course, it’ll be a grand adventure, but I’m talking about something far more off key and way beyond the foolishness of a boy on his bike.”
ISABELLE: “My Abuela talks like that about her Mom’s decision to fight Franco. She never met her Mom, I mean of course she did, every child does; there’s even a photo to prove it, but they never meet in a way that allows for memories or any kind of relationship. They were captured shortly after that photo was taken and Franco had my Great-Grandma executed because if one courageous peasant women is allowed to rail against his tyranny, others will be inspired, which quickly leads to a war that can’t be won. History is rich with stories of men and their petty little quests for power and greed that don’t amount to anything, but one thing’s crystal clear, once women join the fray, things become existential. So, he shot her, had no choice really, at least not from his perspective; they lined her up along some faceless wall in a nameless village beside other freedom fighters and that was that.
“At least the bastards have the decency to find my Great-Grandpa, which is another heroing story. He comes from a wealthy family that owns lots of land for both farming and livestock; they also have an elegant restaurant specializing in farm-to-table cuisine. He has just taken over restaurant operations when the revolution starts and wants to join the resistance with his beautiful wife, but his father says no, his obligation is to his family and their business. He does find ways though, when Franco’s army takes over his village the officers decide to use his restaurant for meals and meetings, he eavesdrops on conversations and passes information on to the resistance.
“It’s dangerous for sure, not only for him but his entire family. He doesn’t weigh his responsibilities like most, men of selfless integrity never do. Franco’s generals like him but when they learn his wife’s a freedom fighter, they hold him responsible. They use him to lure her comrades into a trap, but he exposes their plot, which leads to his torture. For days they beat him, threaten him with death; even say they’ll kill his entire family. When none of that works, they order his execution, still he refuses to betray his beloved wife. They tie him to a post in the town plaza because he’s too weak to stand. They line up a firing squad and force all the villagers to witness, even his parents. The officer in charge blindfolds Great-Grandfather while offering one last chance to be spared; again, he refuses. His mom begs for mercy while his dad tries in vain to bribe those in charge.
“So, the count-down begins: “Ready-“ the officer in charge shouts as his soldiers assume their pose. “Aim-” he continues as each executioner shoulders their weapon. Just as he’s issuing the fatal final word, a courier roars into the plaza on his motorcycle imploring everyone to stop. The officer reads his dispatch, tosses it to the ground in disgust, and storms off the plaza. As my Great-Grandpa’s parents rush to release their son, his brother picks up the dispatch and cries out in anguish; the general in charge of Franco’s northern army has rescinded the execution because the accused traitor’s wife has been shot, leaving a small infant. The order, signed by Franco himself, goes on to say all properties and assets owned by my Great-Grandpa’s family are to be seized and my Great-Grandpa must immediately leave Spain with his child.
“The instant he learns his beloved wife’s dead, he finds out he has a daughter, and he’s impoverished and exiled. But he doesn’t leave, at least not yet. He doesn’t join the freedom fighters either, how could he with an infant to care for. He finds ways to resist though; not only to further the cause of freedom, but to avenge his beloved wife and his precious daughter who’s been ripped from her mother’s arms. He needs to make amends for the pain and suffering he’s caused his family. But in the end, all that loss, all that suffering, is all for nothing because Franco remains in power and his corruption continues to rob Spaniards of their freedom, dignity, and wealth.
“He eventually comes to America and raises my Abuela. I never meet him, but she says he’s a kind decent man who loves her dearly and only talks in tender terms of love and longing for his beloved Isabelle, which is why he never remarries. I do wonder though, if he knows his wife had a lover and that maybe his beloved daughter isn’t his? I doubt it would matter, not to a man like him; men of such rare honor are all in for love and never waver. I wish I’d met him, just to know that once in my life I knew a man who loves on that level, with such profound depth it’s never questioned, let alone diminished. Just imagine, he so loves his wife he’s willing to die rather than betray her, even though she betrays him.”
KYLE: “I start my journey done with love, the aftermath of life methodically chipping away at souls until we become our own gravediggers, burying stuff we can’t face so deep it never surfaces, until it does-, and it always does. I arrive in Spain believing the journey’s about burying my past, but boy am I wrong. I get through Spain straight away and France pretty much on schedule; Italy is where things bust wide open.
“My last day in France begins like every other, me mumbling displeasure while waiting for the campground office to open so I can collect my passport and hit the road. I’m walking past still sleeping RVs with a fresh croissant and coffee to that flat patch in back of every campground where cyclers are permitted to pitch their tents. There’s a building bank of clouds hovering over my Mediterranean morning that look lost, as if searching through love after tearfully being told it’s over. But is anything ever over, or is the far-off horizon casting the sky in daylight darkness to confirm the previous eight days were nothing more than a prelude for what’s to come? We know the answer as soon as we pose the question with the same certainty, we know the last time we see someone isn’t really the last time we see them, not when ghosts find ways to haunt us.
“I muscle through breakfast while breaking camp, the last thing I need in the mountains to Milan is getting caught in a storm; the climbs are challenging enough, and mountain storms can be a bit terrorizing; especially descents. If it were up to me, I’d have been on the road at dawn to get ahead of this mess. But rather than stew over French inefficiencies, I opt for another cafe and croissant. Today’s ride is gonna be hard, with the Italian mountains as intense as that storm rolling in from Africa.
“I repack my panniers optimistically hoping they’ll stay dry, particularly my journal, the only thing of value that remains after thirteen-hundred hard fought kilometers. Something on the whispers of last night’s wind foretold today would be more than a hard wet ride; I can’t explain how I know; I just do. But that’s not new, the ride through Arles, and Van Gogh’s sunflower fields, took me beyond the boundaries of sanity; hot driving headwinds that pushed-, and Pushed- and PUSHED, to the point it had to be personal. Today will be different, the mountains to Milan are hard for sure, especially the three ten percent climbs waiting like predators culling the weak, but nothing can be more unfair than the hot hard winds of Arles, or way they expose the madness of memories.”
ISABELLE: “My Abuela grows up on memories, her dad does his best to talk about what it’s like in Spain and what causes her mom to fight Franco. “Sometimes, mi hija,” he would say, “one has a higher purpose. You can no more ask a Priest why he gives up worldly desires than you can ask a freedom fighter if their sacrifice is worth the suffering. Your Mom’s an amazing woman who believes deep in her soul that her country, and the future of her family depend on her.“
I ask my Abuela why her dad doesn’t fight, but all she’ll say is each of us gets called in our own way, with our unique consequence. We look at a man like him and wonder where’s his photograph in commando clothes, then you step back and remind yourself you don’t get to judge; especially over things you have no knowledge and no hope of knowing. My Abuela loves and admires him, and that’s good enough for me. You look at me and don’t see a freedom fighter, not really a fighter at all. I certainly didn’t fight for my marriage-, at least not enough to save it. I can though, imagine how my Great-Grandpa must have suffered and the amazing way he loves his wife all way to eternity. Such courage in the face of tremendous disappointment is something I can’t fathom; and if I could it would scare the hell out of me.”
KYLE: “That’s how my day’s shaping up, whatever I’m trying to outrun is closing in and I’ll admit, it’s unnerving. Finally, though I get started; I push past Nice and cross Monaco without changing gears. My legs are fresh, the saddle’s soft, and winds remain mostly calm. Mid-morning vacationers have yet to cram the narrow roads and the glass-half-full part of me is believing I’ll skirt this storm. Once past Monaco though, the smooth terrain abruptly ends. “So,” I mumble between breaths all the way up the day’s first climb, “this is Italy.” To stay optimistic, I focus on the vastness of the Mediterranean and the way it marries with the dark looming clouds such that it’s impossible to tell where salt waves end, and freshwater rain begins. It’s around then there’s this disquieting realization I’m the only traveler on the road; what the hell do Italians know they’re not sharing with the rest of the class?
“Steadily I traverse the winding road to Genoa, hugging the rocky Rivera like danger clings to risk; the narrow shoulder gives way to crisp cut cliffs that rise then fall into wind carved ridges rolling down to smooth sand beaches where wild waves pound the shore in an erratically increasing crescendo. Most days this would be beautiful, today though, headwinds displace the calm in a way that pierces remnants of my soul with a sobering unsettledness that would cause any reasonable rider to abandon the road. I would too, only I must make Milan tomorrow, two hard days of mountain climbing means I must press on irrespective of consequence. During premeditated planning I padded my journey with three buffer days, but broken spokes in the Pyrenees cost me one, then a night at Cassis turned into two because I lacked the stamina for the steep climb out. And of course, there’s the lost day in Arles where I had to get my head straight before continuing; but I don’t want to think about that, no point revisiting what happens when the mind loses its footing.
“Atop a barren ridge overlooking the sea, I lean my touring bike against a rock guardrail and stare down at powerful waves pounding against isolated rocks, shooting geysers so high I get sprayed. I don’t understand the sea, so much anger and emotion, the embodiment of everything I strive to avoid. Rain that’s traveled all the way from Algiers suddenly and unabashedly arrives; the chaos I’m rushing to outrun is here, and it reminds me of a novel I once read about Barbary Coast Pirates from a region called Kabyle. I would like to be a pirate; “Kyle the Pirate from Kabyle,” I shout to the sea. “Rebel for adventure, rescuing peasants from a wretched life at the hands of maniacal monarchs and oppressive rulers. Living high on the sea where yesterday goes unasked, tomorrow unwritten, and today filled with possibilities for adventure.”
“Pirates would weather, weather like this,” I convince myself while settling back in the saddle and pushing into the menacing storm. “Even they can’t outrun their past; can’t save the world cause they’re barely able to save themselves.” There, I said it. I promised I wouldn’t, but I did; the reason wretched from me by the emotional interrogation of the pirate’s code. The real reason for this journey, this bike ride from Barcelona to Milan, to prove life is constant motion; that I can move forward because the past is not frozen, that we’re allowed to think about a future as meaningless as pretending to be Kyle from Kabyle?”
ISABELLE: “My Great-Grandpa’s a pretender, how else can he keep a photograph of his wife with her lover, holding a child likely not his. I suppose he knows it’ll be important for Abuela cause it’s the only picture of her with her mom. I’d have burned it. I’d of destroyed any memory of someone I so loved who betrayed me so badly; and at least nine out of ten rational people would agree. Then again, that’s because we don’t know real love. We’re quick to judge men like him as weak and pathetic, we scoff at him for being blind & stupid, and yet, on some level we want so badly to be like him, to know for even a moment how it is to be so in love; a love that lingers long after tragedy and loss have faded.”
KYLE: “There’s another angle to the photograph ya know, just as different people watching the same tragedy have different takeaways. What if he’s not a fool and you got the story wrong? What if the photograph’s his beloved wife holding their only child, and she loves him as profoundly as he loves her? What if she never betrays him and that man in the photograph isn’t her lover but someone named Mateo; your Great-Grandpa’s closest and most trusted friend; a man tasked with protecting her. You’re already thinking Mateo’s don’t exist, but I knew one once, a man of so much honor and integrity I would trust him without question to keep safe the woman I love. Your Great-Grandpa can’t be there for reasons you laid out, so he entrusts Mateo to be his stand-in. And that’s just what Mateo does, he honors his oath, even in death. You have to admit, my version’s plausible, which begs the question, what is your Great-Grandma really trying to tell you?”
ISABELLE: “While I prefer your interpretation, there’s fundamental flaws that cannot be discounted; first off, Mateo’s don’t exist, not then, not now, not ever, and his love is abundantly clear from the way he looks at her. You can argue all you want about honorable valor and denying love, but in reality, the world spins on a different dime. You can of course speculate she loves her husband so much she denies Mateo’s advances while sequestering her feelings for him, but if that were so, why is there so much secrecy around what happened? What’s the point of her visits, to tell me not to give up on love, every couples counselor and Hollywood movie works that tired script so God wouldn’t be keeping her from heaven over such nonsense. Go ahead and believe theirs is the greatest love story ever told, meanwhile, I’ll stay grounded in reality. I can certainly appreciate how romantically profound it is to have your version; that flowing through my veins is the DNA of perhaps the greatest lovers of all time-, that I have within me the capacity for such things. Who wouldn’t want that to be their story?
“You’ll say her deal’s letting me know that just because things have never work out doesn’t mean they can’t or won’t in the future. Go ahead, tell me the reason she never says anything is because she doesn’t have to, that even questioning which of our two stories is captured in that photograph is reason is enough for her to get to where she needs to be. No one can say for sure, but what I do know is that regardless of which truth is real, I want to find a man like my Great-Grandpa; if such men even exist, because his kind of love is a gift from God.”
KYLE: “God does grant such gifts, but you won’t find them, they find you, and likely, they won’t seem much like a gift, at least not at first. I began my journey to Milan convinced love immortalized by poets and playwrights doesn’t exist, that it’s all the hapless imagination of desperate minds. Somewhere on the road though, with endless hours to think, I realize I’m beginning to ask the right questions. But even then, I know they’re only secondary to what’s chasing me, what’s somehow tied to the storm inching closer by the minute.
“I make the outskirts of Genoa just as the storm heading north collides with me moving south, and by the time I find the longshoreman’s bar in the unrestricted part of town, I’m cold, bone weary wet, and accept the rain’s not about to abate, which means serious decisions need to be made. Before stepping fully inside, it’s painfully clear this joint serves hard men looking for an after-work drink, or one last shot of espresso before hitting the docks. Normally I avoid dive bars, but not in this storm, I need a place to hole up and am damn ready to defend my right for it to be here.
“Every scorn-filled eye glares as I make my way to a small table near the rear kitchen and no sooner do I slip off my bright yellow rain suit and lean my soaked panniers against the wall, than this burly fellow with bright red hair in a floppy mess, plops down across the table. “By a bloke a drink?” he asks, “too damn cold to drink alone.” I stare at this stranger who’s more a homeless bum than hard-living longshoreman, uncertain if I should respond. “Name’s Jeffreys,” he says extending a hand, “but most these bastard blokes call me Father J.”
“You’re a priest?” I blurt out.
“We don’t all wear fancy frocks ya know.”
“You’re the last person I’d expect in a place like this.”
“You and me both.” He leans in. “I started out to be Pope, we all got goals ya know. Somewhere along my journey to Rome, God detours me to this miserable hellhole to minister to these unrepentant sinners.” He twiddles remorsefully with the grimy saltshaker. “This is likely as close to the Vatican as I get.” He verbosely slaps both hands on the table. “But we’re not here to talk about me, a bloke like you blows into a place like this on day like today, there’s gotta be stories; the one we see, and the one hiding below the surface you’re reluctant to tell.”
“No stories,” I answer, “just on a bike tour and got caught in the storm.”
“Oh, there’s a story, otherwise you wouldn’t be biking alone. People aren’t built to be alone, so let’s start there. What’s your name?”
“Kyle.”
“Nice to meet you Kyle, where you from?”
“Kabyle.” Not sure why I say that; don’t mean to, but then again, it’s no one’s business where I’m from.
“Kyle from Kabyle!” Father J shouts with a grin, “sort of just rolls off the tongue. We do get our share of Kabies coming through, damn good sailors.” He leans in and lowers his voice, “Nobody messes with em, not even the Mafia, ya get crosswise with a Berber, things don’t end well.”
“The waiter, who’s just as unwashed and rugged as the men he serves, brings coffee and two Longshoremen specials: eggs, chucks of sausage, crispy couscous, grilled tomatoes, and bread. Three bites in, the inquisition resumes. “You’re not really from Kabyle. I mean for starters, you’re a Yank, accent gave you away straight up. But no worries, on these docks, everyone’s hiding something.”
“That mean you’re not a Priest?”
“Oh, that I am, and can prove it.” Turning around, he faces the full room, “Guys! Who the hell am I?”
In a loud chorus, the hard-living longshoremen respond in unison, “Father J!”
“Ya see, as advertised.”
After a few more bites, I come clean. “I’m from Kansas.”
“I’ll be damned, Kyle from Kansas. Phonetically appropriate, but poetically empty if ya ask me. I’ll be staying with Kyle from Kabyle, far more gravitas, which in place like this is a matter of life and death.” He mops up egg yolk with his bread. “Pirates are a hardy but foolish lot. They’re out there pursuing adventure, but what they’re really doing is running from whatever they hope chases at a slower pace. I’m betting whatever’s set you about is the same something that got your crazy ass out in this storm. But ya can’t be foolish enough to believe you’ll outrun or escape it’s freaking consequences.”
“You don’t talk much like a Priest.”
“I know,” Father J answers with contrition. “I’m a sinner for sure. But given I spend all my time around these rapscallions, I do okay. I’ll never be Pope.” He mops up the last of his couscous. “But ya know, if I was in France, I’d speak French. If I was in Germany, I’d preach in German. But I’m here on these docks, so I minister in longshoremen. At least that’s the argument I’ll be making at the gates.” He looks up with a grin, “no one wants to arrive at the gates and find em locked.” Just as we finish breakfast, the waiter returns with two fresh espressos. “So, Kyle from Kabyle, you’re not going to confess the deep dark reason for your journey, and that’s fine, but what’s next?”
“Figure to hunker down till the storm passes.”
“Not much for coastal weather, are you?” Father J laughs. “This storm ain’t going nowhere, hell it ain’t even started raining, not like it’s gonna. Ya oughta find a nice hotel and hole up for a couple days.”
“Can’t, have to be in Milan tomorrow and there’s a whole lot of mountains between here and there.”
“Then take a bus, only option ya got.”
“No, this journey started on my bike, and that’s how it has to end.”
“Spoken like a true Yank. Ya set some stupid-ass goal then die trying to make it. Ya best be moving then before this storm really kicks loose. The road to Milan goes east before turning south so who knows, maybe you outflank it. But then again,” he adds with a sardonic grin, “maybe ya don’t.” He leans in as serious as can be. “Once it gets to raining in those mountains, best keep to high ground, water rises fast in the canyons.”
“He’s right about outflanking the storm and once you know something must be done, wasting even a second is a sin. So, I slip my still wet rain suit over still soaked clothes and am just about to leave when-
“We both know you could change your flight,” Father J looks up with a confessional seriousness that evaporates any doubt he’s a priest. “Something in you needs to suffer, it covers you like stink on shit. So go my misguided friend, climb your mountain in the rain, suffer to elude whatever it is you foolishly think you can outrun. I’ll be here, praying you survive the day.”
“I stare at this oddly out of place Priest. “Thanks, I think.” He semi-smiles and as I make my way to the front door; the last thing I hear before barroom noise is subsumed by the pounding anger of Mediterranean rain bouncing off cobblestones like bullets against an executioner’s wall, is Father J shouting, “Which of ya sinners is gonna buy your favorite Padre a drink while I cleanse you of your sins?”
>>> Conclusion in Next Chapter <<<
