Dinner at the Centre of the Earth by Nathan Englander

Author:Nathan Englander
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Orion Publishing Group

2014, Limbo

Oh, how it torments him, the sound of that shot. The General practically leaps from his chair.

He drops the newspaper on the side table. But the paper keeps dropping. The table isn’t there.

The General finds it behind him, beneath Lily’s weaving, pushed up against the wall. Atop it, in place of the tea he was drinking, sits a small clay menorah, caked with wax. It is wonderfully misshapen, with pencil-bored wells spaced too closely together, ready for the candles that will burn too quick. A masterpiece one of his grandchildren made in school.

This makes the General smile, doubly so, as he spies, between the feet of the table, the crumpled foil from a chocolate coin.

He can’t understand why the menorah is still out, the floor still unswept, all the way to October, almost a year after the holiday fell.

And if the calendar really stands at 1967, then who are these grandchildren he already loves, so far from being ushered into this world?

It is not right, the General knows. It has been, for some time, not right.

The General does not run to the road to find his ghost of a son. He does not call for Lily, already gone. He will look for a mirror, is what he decides. For it cannot be both present and past, and the General wants to see which face he wears. He wants to know if he is old or if he’s young.

On his way to the foyer, where the closest mirror stands, the General pinches himself—hard. He feels the pinch and feels sure that he’s not dreaming.

He follows the pinch with a deep, deep breath, and he knows too that this must mean he is not, himself, yet dead.

But that shot, then, how can it keep on shooting?

None of it makes any sense. Unless, unless.

The front hall mirror is covered with a sheet, as if the General inhabits a house of mourning. He wiggles his toes and looks down at his feet. He’s not surprised to find himself padding around in socks, as if newly bereaved.

Nobody wants that, the General thinks. And the General closes his eyes tight-tight.

Reopening them, the General is relieved. Yes, he must have been dozing. It is the simplest explanation—for he is seated again, the copper tray table that Lily made back at his side. On it stands his mug of mint tea, the steam twisting off in a wisp.

Cautiously, the General lowers his gaze to his lap to find that the two bowls are where the two bowls belong. A comfort, followed immediately by another. His dear Lily—he has been calling for her—peers out from the kitchen, a towel in her hand.

The General wants to ask her what is amiss. But then there is the sound of the shot—distracting.

Leaning back, the General says aloud to himself (for he knows, already, his dear Lily will not answer), “Maybe it is that I am not well.”

He is a legendary strategist, the General. He has always been able to see the best way out, even in the midst of chaos.

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