The Lake

Alzheimer: Do Ghosts Cry? | home

The Lake

They all used to go and walk around the lake. Some wanted to be as near it as they could, some wanted to be as far away from it as they could, some watched it all the time, some never looked at it.

The Lake was there;

The Lake was Theirs.

John had no real feeling about the lake, even if he knew that everything would end there.

Looking at the lake, you simply saw an ordinary Lake, neither big nor small, neither deep nor shallow, with small waves, seagulls playing over it. Some pretended that they could see that the ripple was forming a pattern, that they could see the figures being built up in the ripples, that they could guess what number would come up.

For John this was nonsense, the numbers were totally random and nothing he did or thought could change the numbers. The numbers belonged to the lake.

Some thought they could buy more time, they brought gifts to the lake, they brought bread, they brought fish, they brought even clear spring water, they would bring their gifts and kneel on the Lake side.

Some would fill a bottle of water with Lake water, some would drink it, some would wash their eyes with it.

John carried his wrist number under one of these fashionable net skins, they were so cute, you believed that if you looked you could read the numbers and when you tried the numbers were so uncertain. He very much despised that fashion that spread amongst the trendy ones of carrying false numbers or even multiple numbers.

Of course everyone knew, from the first day he reached an age of understanding, his number, his color.

The Government was constantly trying to vote new laws so that groups would not form but people were so irrational that the laws had no power against emotions. John had an even number, he felt nothing about it, it was a number like any other number but he had noticed that most of his friends had even numbers.

John liked dating women, of course the number had nothing to do with his liking or disliking of a women but he felt that women with even numbers where more peaceful, more balanced, while women with odd numbers were more exotic, more unpredictable. It was fun to spend some time with a women who had an even number, but if he had to share his life, he did not think that he could do it with a woman that did not have an even number.

Johns number was blue; In a way it made his life easier, he would not dream of dating a red or a black or a brown ring woman, he would only date women who were yellow or blue, he had even tried green but in a way he felt to uncomfortable;

They all read the newspaper and watch the news on the Total Immersion. The number would come up mostly at sunset, but it hd happened that the number did not come up for two or three days, and in his life time it had happend once only that the number had appeared twice in the same day.

The black market on numbers was nonsense, yet it was so active and profitable. Nobody wanted to have a number with the one digit in it or the seven digit, you could buy on the black market other numbers, John did not even want to know how these ring numbers were made. he could understand the fear for the one digit, they all were telling about the day when the ripples showed only one digit, that digit had been "one" and that day, nearly half of the population had Immersed;

The statistical of the newspapers were the first item anyone would read in the morning. The statistics were showing that even numbers were called more often on Mondays and that red was called more often on Fridays. The most recent studies by the most powerful computers were beginning to produce models that could predict which numbers that would appear during the next month.

Lovers knew of course their mutual numbers, and they would exchange them in times of love and intimacy. The most popular Total Immersion Shows were always about a man and a woman who, when the number came up, he would give his number to her and take hers and start preparing for the Immersion, but she would lure him to drink one last drink and when he felt asleep, she would take back her numbers, kiss him on the eyes and walk to the Lake.

Have patience, it takes 10 seconds

John had had good parents, they told him that the number would come up, there was nothing he could do about it, it would be pointless to walk round and round the Lake, watching the ripples to see the number appear.

Where did the number come from, so many thought they knew, so many proclaimed their believes.

What happened with your number after the Immersion, did it go to another person, they had tried and checked and checked and some claimed the numbers never died, some claimed the numbers were always different.

When your number appeared, you had a few hours to pack your belonging, write some last messages, then you walked to the Lake, you joined the group and slowly you went into the Lake.

Next Page