Mosaic

A short story
by Greg Harris

Mosaic needs all the pieces to fit. I claim that nothing is out of place. We have just moved in together. She fusses, hangs a picture, eyes it. I remain sitting. Clouds drift past. Mosaic knows this goes here and that goes there.

I've been day-to-day all my life, sometimes moment-to-moment. I don't have a plan. I suspect that I am completely lost and that Mosaic knows it. I have not belonged anywhere for some time.

Mosaic marks a spot and presses in a fixture. Alice is framed in Wonderland over a bookcase. Lamplight in a corner flows onto a wall. The painting seeps into the furniture. A cat sculpture smiles above the fireplace. Mosaic bends to smooth the tapestry. She places a prism on the center of the table. Color rays catch my eye. Sifted in a kaleidoscope, the room takes shapes. I am caught within her fluctuating reality.

I've never had it together. I cannot discern the meaning in objects. Things as they are amount to order for me. A mess can be beautiful. Everything in soup is in place. Control is imaginary. I'm part of the all but not sure how. Drifting becomes a way of life. Coincidences happen to everyone. At any gathering of twenty or more people, two of them have the same birthday. We are living a mathematical equation that repeats itself. The world is full of loose ends that will never be tied.

Mosaic drives a blue convertible and wears '50s sunglasses. She wishes she could program the sky. Ambiance is a key to her day, and night. The idea is to filter out the other until all is you. On the floor, she stacks hobbit books and fairy stories that journey through a thousand pages. Behind her, iron rods hold silvery drapes. Plush pillows pile in the middle of it all.

She lights a candle on a stone holder. Music peeks out in sly beats from behind a velvet couch. She says she needs to reach a different state, be teleported to another realm and transcend this one.

The atmosphere shakes with uncertainty, emanating from me. I feel fragile in a now that trembles. I cannot envision a clear field ahead of me. Even one duty, obligation, or commitment is a blot on my psyche. I'm anxious that I've misjudged reality. My answers don't work. I'm in shambles, need saving, helpless beneath a crumbling façade, on the brink of disintegration. I reel, squirming. Maybe it's okay to leave important things unfound.

Mosaic anticipates events converging into a now that holds all pieces at once. When her visual field fits together, the landscape reveals a miracle. Consciousness is transformed. An inevitable synchronicity assimilates her. Life becomes a path that's visible. The universe falls into place. But Mosaic senses her vision is incomplete. She is missing a piece.

To me, nothing feels permanent. Everyone awaits a moment that doesn't exist. There was a time when I knew where I was. What I understood was stamped, validated, and filed: "Final." But that time, I now realize, was alive.

Mosaic glides across the room, and the impermanence manifests. I can see time moving in events, see that it never stops, and know that constant motion is the same as stillness.

Every human being wants something to believe. I stand on the mandala design of the tapestry. I am closing in on a hidden, higher meaning. We are desperate to find ourselves, find a reason, find salvation. If we do, we are advised to let it all go. A circle is the one true universal symbol.

The tapestry on the floor begins spinning. I have no goal anymore. I am not waiting for anything. I have arrived with everything at this exact, particular moment. A richly detailed design holds more than I can know at once. All possible information is alive and available to me. Events and artifacts coalesce into one time, place, and identity. There is nowhere else or further to go. The unfolding has stopped. I close my eyes and find myself in an embrace. There are no pieces in the mosaic.