"Ian Watson - My Soul Swims in a Goldfish Bowl" - читать интересную книгу автора (Watson Ian)

Ian Watson
My Soul Swims in a Goldfish Bowl
v1.1 тАУ 2005-09-13 by reb: all obvious errors corrected; NOT checked against hard copy

This terrible cough. It tears me apart every morning when I rise, like a dawn wind: the cold of morning meeting
the warmth of the night and sucking it out of me. ThatтАЩs the picture I have of it, as though IтАЩm sleeping in
some yak tent on the high steppes somewhere, not in a town flat. ItтАЩs been happening for over a week now:
ten, fifteen minutes of convulsive, hacking strain; irritating to Mary, who thinks itтАЩs deliberate, a mannerism, a
parody of middle years, a protest. ItтАЩs all dry; nothing comes of it.
The Doctor tapped my chest last night, harkened to his stethoscope, peered down my throat. Nothing.
Congestion? Something stuck in my windpipe. No. Tonsillitis? No. Digestive troubles, tickling the coughing
reflex misleadingly? None that IтАЩve noticed. He has me booked for an X-ray, but the possibility remains, as
Mary believes: habit spasm, hysteria. Myself doing it. To protest at something in our lives, in my life.
So it comes. In the bathroom, the awful hurricane from within. And I grip the firm white washbasin with both
hands, as lungs implode and eyes bulge, as I shed tears of blood (so I fancy). Will I burst a blood vessel this
time? Will I have a heart attack?
And at last, at last, this morning I do cough up something. Something quite large. Rotund, the size of a
thumb nail. It lies squirming on the white enamel. Phlegm alive.
What is it? I wonder in disgust as the tears clear. Part of my lung? A living gob of lung, still breathing the air тАУ
fresher air out here than in my chest? It pulses gently, wobbles, throbs. ItтАЩs alive. What on earth is it?
A cancer, a tumorous growth, still growing fresh cells, unaware that it has lost its host? Some other unknown
parasite that has been living in me? Surely no such thing is known. Look, it still quivers with undoubted
independent life.
An abortion, a thumbnail foetus has erupted not from the womb (which I obviously donтАЩt have) but from my
chest, and rests there, still alive. Some of the spirit of sickness, finally exorcised, which my bloodshot
overstrained eyes somehow perceive тАУ in the style of some juju witchdoctor who spies out the soul of
disease. The Philippine faith healers supposedly pull impossibilities, nodules, out of the body to cure itтАж
Have I, then, become a faith healer in extremis? Can I march up to sick people now, plunge my hand into
their bellies and chests and tubes, and haul out their diseases, alive and squirming? I prod it with my finger.
Wormlike, it contracts, bulging another way. Yes, itтАЩs a living being тАУ or antibeing. Dare I wash it away? Or
should I shuffle it into a matchbox, keep it prisoner?
I tap the plug in the sink, wash warm water in тАУ and it floats, swims around like a sluggish tadpole.
тАЬMary, come and see! IтАЩve coughed something up. ItтАЩs alive!тАЭ
She comes into the bathroom, then, and peers into the bowl.
тАЬCan you see it Mary? Here!тАЭ I poke it, and it tumbles over in the warm water, rights itself. тАЬYou do see it,
donтАЩt you? Say you do. It came out of me just now. It lives.тАЭ
тАЬOh I can see itтАЭ
тАЬMaybe thatтАЩs the spirit of the sickness. IтАЩve coughed it out at last?тАЭ
тАЬIt isnтАЩt that, Tom.тАЭ She backs off, her expression diffident. тАЬDonтАЩt you realize? ItтАЩs your soul. YouтАЩve lost your
soul.тАЭ
тАЬMyтАжsoul? YouтАЩre joking! How can it be my soul?тАЭ
She retreats from me. Detaches herself. The bathroom is very white and clean and clinical, like a surgery.
The thing in the sink circles, executes a flip.
тАЬWhat else can it be, Tom? What else lives in you? What else could you lose?тАЭ She peers at me.
тАЬYour[YouтАЩre?] soulless now. The soulтАЩs quite a little thing, you see. It hides inside everyone. Nobody ever
finds it, itтАЩs a master of disguise. It doesnтАЩt have to be all together so long as its atoms are spread out around
the body in the right order, one in this cell one in that. But yours has clotted together, itтАЩs condensed itself тАУ
and youтАЩve ejected it. Lost it.тАЭ
тАЬBut,тАЭ I poke the thing gingerly, тАЬwhat gives you so much certainty? Such conviction!тАЭ
тАЬYou donтАЩt feel certainty anymore? ThatтАЩs because you lost the thing that gives conviction, faith, belief. I