“The days are bright and filled with pain
Enclose me in your gentle rainThe time you ran was too insane
We'll meet again, we'll meet again....”
It is no wonder I never noticed the other entrances, designed this way, obviously with the intention to be invisible to anyone who did not know where they exist. Besides that the lighting is not so good in the distillery dungeon, there really are no visible clues nor signs that would reveal that they are there nor hints where they hide. As well, there is no consistency to the underground’s structure of cellar floors and walls, curving around in a tomb-like catacomb maze; nothing to suggest there are underlying secret passageways; hidden openings; secret latches disguised by bricks, camouflaged cracks in the walls; no trace at all of any entrances to secret tunnels.
And after the phone call that abruptly ended, leaving me with more questions.... and the vodka for company ....I spend a few hours reading through Jörn’s emails....
Where he explains about and exactly where the tunnels go.....some go on for miles....
and lead to exits above ground that then lead to roads and highways through a cover of woods and forrest —yet .... to my amazement ! other shorter tunnels lead simply to parts something like ordinary rooms of a kind of house. And I discover from this, sleeping chambers with en suites —a sauna— and—guess what else? a gym that would not be hard to imagine who thought of this addition so— a complete underground bunker dwelling that only makes sense seen this way through these complexities of blueprints that read somewhat like maps
But it is the discovery of the en suites in the blueprints which has me quickly quite interested and suddenly find myself avidly and aggressively searching for the way in and after some time of studying all of these I take to search to explore to find these nether regions.
It seems this more domestic part of the underground is west of the stairs where I remember Jörn had been trapped with the bats when I had found him compromisingly dressed in drag. And, according to the blueprints, there is a shallow man-made pond outside above, sealed by plexiglass beneath the pond to let in daylight and solar heat, serving too as a kind of skylight.... wow, daylight; it’s been so long
It is tricky to find the brick that hides a coded keypad to the doorway down and after the frustrating search for the opening and several rereads of the map, and, about an hour later, take my phone with me to open the email and save myself the trouble, it finally reveals itself. And while it would not win awards for interior decorating for any home magazine, it has a certain charm that I think would have appealed to Tolkien, with its rounded interior walls that look like white stucco but are smooth and reflects the daylight and the wide round bed of the first chamber neatly situated right under the skylight. Here the quiet takes on the peacefulness of a monastery and it seems to be somehow heated from beneath the floor.
Because I am curious, I search for the other chambers that seem to let out from here; another bedroom, this one with bunk beds and then a kind of old library or den with vintage leather bound books, a pool table and an ancient looking pinball machine and a jukebox with very outdated music ....Elvis’ Blue Suede Shoes and the Beatles ‘Help’
yeah .... I get the ‘Help’
But it is the bathtub that captures my undivided attention as all the taps actually work and after a rinse of it, is clean enough to use and don’t waste too much time before trying it out discovering that here too there had been particular attention to detail; I find bath oils infused with patchouli, bergamot, eucalyptus and lily of the valley that —are not vintage but like the honey and cacau, obviously are rather newer additions
Still, I go back up to hunt through Cabaret shipments in search of fresh clothes to ad hoc my current lacking wardrobe, although most articles I find are not exactly my personal taste, I raid the shipment boxes on the conveyor belt for whatever I may improvise.
And long soaking in a sunken tub made of cement but surprisingly smooth inside, it is quite sometime later before I leave it, glad to be clean and human again and wrapped in a boudoir burgundy velvet robe. The round bed, an interesting place to throw myself upon, looking up at the odd glow through the plexiglass, when shocking the silence all around the hobbit tomb, my now fully charged phone alerts a call
“Hello?” I sit up
“I shouldn’t have left you there,” he says, and his bewildering, tactile voice pervades me
“Jörn....”
and then nothing else seems to follow but a very long and tense agitated pause; just strained dead silence follows. I hear him awkwardly clear his throat.... and ....it dimly starts to occur to me that he is trying to apologize.
Without the presence of him and just the sound of his voice —after so many weeks, the effect it leaves on me washes over like an avalanche I could not have prepared for
“Duva?”
But I don’t know what to say
“Are you there?” he asks
“Yes.”
“Did you hear me?” and again, it washes over me and yet it is also what I hear in it, something different I never heard and am not prepared for
“I heard you,” I say
“—it just sounded like the call got dropped....” he curses under his breath to himself in Swedish ....but I find I am shaken by something even there in this that I can hear that I never have; it is something in the subtle nuance of his tone and he says it again, “I shouldn’t have left you there....”
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