Li Bai and the Doorways of Night
Two friends spend an ordinary evening at the pub. But who is their companion?
A summer hillside. Early morning. Between the trees, the chimney of a hut is just visible, caught in a noose of light.
A shabby man in a cloak walks up the road towards the hut, next to a beautiful companion.
They pass beyond a turning and are lost to sight.
Dawn’s left hand is in the sky. The stars are vanishing. One bird starts to sing, then another.
A very similar figure in a similar cloak — if anything, a little dirtier — emerges from the ditch by the road, clutching an almost-empty bottle. Even from far away, it is clear that the alcohol has not worn off. He staggers almost in a circle, takes a final swig, and casts the bottle aside. Then he meanders downhill towards the village.
A tavern, late on a warm summer’s night. Above, dazzling stars. Through the windows we hear musical laughter, then, beneath it, a fizzing, popping sound. Faint odours of rosemary and spices mingle with the scent of wine. A man staggers past the doorway, gazing confusedly about him. He is dressed in an elegant jacket which, however, is torn at the collar…. It is DU YU. He wanders towards a corner table, zig-zagging slightly.
DU YU: You’re here, but you were back there!
He leans over the couple at the table — a beautiful young girl, deep in conversation with a black-bearded man in a dark cloak.
DU YU: As wind along the waste…
LI BAI (for it is he) raises an eyebrow.
LI BAI: Du Yu? Where have you been?
THE BEAUTIFUL YOUNG GIRL laughs again. You look… ah… tired.
DU YU: I know not whither….
LI BAI gazes into the girl’s eyes with a mystical intensity. He’s been with the stars… outside, it is as if they are moving. Like a painting….
THE GIRL: Shall we go and see? Oh… but is your friend all right?
LI BAI: He’s used to it. He shakes the great wine glass in his hand, in which just a few deep red leas are visible, and gives her a meaning look. A writer, too.
THE GIRL: Ah, a “writer”….
DU YU: But are there two of you? … Where’s my jacket? He hunts confusedly around the room. My jacket!
Li Bai takes the girl’s arm. As they walk outside, a small tortoiseshell cat rubs and stretches itself against Du Yu’s leg. The girl laughs again and slips her arm around his waist.
DU YU: A chequerboard of nights and days…. He gasps. The moving finger writes. Li Bai, you fiend! You will be sorry!
Indeed, indeed, Repentance oft before
I swore – but was I sober when I swore?
The same tavern. Du Yu, Li Bai and the girl are sitting at the same table.
DU YU: You don’t understand. It is like… what’s it called. Cache invalidation. He laughs. They say there are only two hard things in computer science. Cache invalidation and naming.
Li Bai is sunk within himself. He hunches over a pool of spilt wine on the table, mopping it up with a corner of his dirty and tattered robe.
LI BAI: Waiter! Another and another cup!
DU YU: Cache invalidation and naming the Unnameable Name….
The girl appears uninterested. She glances at Li Bai. Dabbing at the wine obsessively, he seems barely within reach.
DU YU: It can be done! True, the timing is not yet perfected. True.
The girl gets up.
THE GIRL: I don’t know what you are talking about, and I don’t care. Computer science. Cache invalidation! “Counting the doors!” Du Yu looks up in surprise. Li Bai keeps mopping at his wine. You said you were writers! And neither of you bothered to ask me about myself, not even once!
I’m an artist. A painter! She walks out of the door without a backward glance.
Far away a gong chimes, signalling the first shì of night.
Sunset. A few last rays slant through the tavern windows. Li Bai and Du Yu are sitting at the bar. Li Bai is nursing a large, three-quarters full glass of red wine. In the corner, a girl at a table appears to be reading. Du Yu and Li Bai raise eyebrows at one another.
They stroll over.
LI BAI: What are you reading? We are writers ourselves. Can we sit down?
The girl looks up and smiles politely. She shuts her book.
The stars are out. In the corridor leading to the back rooms, a blue glow flickers into life, then deepens to indigo, flickering with green, yellow and grey. Du Yu appears to step through the glow from nowhere. He shakes a little ash from his jacket sleeve.
As Du Yu returns to his seat, the glow hangs in the air, forming an arch, slowly fading. It dies away just as the waiter comes past, on his way back to the bar. He sees nothing, but sniffs at the air with a puzzled expression.
Du Yu cocks his head and looks at the table and the couple seated there. Li Bai is sunk in thought, holding a wine glass.
DU YU: What were we talking about?
LI BAI: I don’t remember. About writing, maybe?
DU YU: Never mind. He sits down between Li Bai and the girl. The moon is extraordinary tonight… and the stars. Writing is wonderful. But words cannot paint! She turns towards him. Tell me more about you.
Li Bai stares into his wine glass morosely, tipping it from side to side. How full is it?
At the windowsill, a tortoiseshell cat is cleaning its fur.
The sky is still faintly lighter in the west; against it, the tavern is a dim silhouette. A few crickets have started to sing, and the first stars are coming out.
DU YU: It took me so long to find. I had to hunt through the works of 11th century Persia. Then an obscure Victorian translator gave me some clues. The mechanism is very simple. The ability to step into one door, and out through another. Just a few herbs and the right incantation. I keep them ready on scraps of paper.
LI BAI: But aren’t there paradoxes? If you go back, can’t you change the history that sent you there in the first place? Are there separate realities?
The GIRL is looking mildly bored. She is scratching the ears of a small tortoiseshell cat which has settled next to her.
DU YU: No, no, it’s nothing so complex. When you create a new timeline, the previous ones are erased. Cache invalidation. People will have no memory that anything different ever happened. The alternatives, it’s as if they’re on the other side of a Möbius strip. You can travel to get to it; but you can never cross directly over the edge. For you, it’s as if they had never existed. Of course, there can be some awkwardnesses… leftovers. Sometimes the traveller has to make a few arrangements. I believe the element of surprise is key.
LI BAI starts to laugh, and declaims with grand gestures: A chequerboard of nights and days, where Destiny with men for pieces — the sweep of his cloak knocks over his wine glass — oh!
The cat jumps down, coughs, mews and rubs its paw over its head. Dark wine pools on the table, which has seen plenty of it before.
Night again outside. The girl is nowhere to be seen.
LI BAI: So what is it like when you’re through there?
DU YU: It is hard to describe. Something like a hotel corridor. A set of doors. But not inside: you can see the stars everywhere… not just above you, but everywhere. You’ve just come through one door. You walk left or right, and pick another.
LI BAI: And how do you set the target time?
DU YU: It’s complicated… you have to guess the right door… I still haven’t worked it out precisely. Do you remember last week, when I came to your hut so late? I had just come back. I got the time wrong. If I had known, I could have stepped back through the portal. But I didn’t realise until it had faded. It only opens briefly. I thought it was before midnight…
LI BAI: So did I!
DU YU: Yes, we had both time travelled. I, through the incantation; you, via the mechanism of the grape. He holds his wine glass up and looks through it. This will change everything. Human destiny… a set of doors….
LI BAI: You pick one and go through.
DU YU: But now we can pick a different door!
LI BAI: Every mistake I made… unmade. He stares into his hands.
DU YU: That’s right. He glances towards the empty seat.
Li Bai looks up at him. His eye is bright.
DU YU: Excuse me. He gets up, picks his jacket from the back of his chair, and walks towards the back room corridor.
A low drumroll is heard from the village: the central hour of the first shì.
LI BAI to himself: Myself when young did eagerly frequent
Doctor and saint, and heard great argument
About it and about: but evermore
Came out by the same door as in I went.
In the darkness of the corridor, strange words are spoken. A light begins to glow, blue-grey-red. Fizzing sparks appear.
Darkness. Stars. The tortoiseshell cat is asleep on the window sill. The waiter must have gone home. Du Yu and the girl are talking low. Li Bai is slumped in his seat; he has finished his wine glass again.
DU YU: Shall we go out to see them? Perhaps at last you will understand how to put them into paint.
GIRL: I have been trying for years… she nods.
As they walk outside, Du Yu places his hand lightly on her arm. He has forgotten his jacket; it hangs on the back of his chair. Probably, the evening is so warm that he will not need it.
Li Bai slumps deeper in his chair. Is he snoring?
Last rays of sun slant through the tavern windows. Li Bai and Du Yu are sitting at the bar. They get up and stroll towards the girl in the corner.
As they pass the back room corridor, a pergola of fizzling flame suddenly appears. In a whoosh of sparks, Li Bai comes through. He steps boldly forward and grabs Du Yu by the collar. There is a brief struggle – the sound of tearing silk – then Li Bai pitches Du Yu back through the portal. It fizzes again and goes out completely.
Li Bai grabs himself by the arm. The shock of recognition. He whispers urgent words into his own ear. The original Li Bai turns and heads out of the tavern, manhandling an unnoticed wine bottle into his cloak on his way.
Li Bai walks towards the table. On the way over, he encounters the tortoiseshell cat. He stops, bends down and pets it. He scratches its ears, then its chin. It purrs with pleasure, batting at him with its paws. The girl is still immersed in her book. He sits down opposite. She glances up at him, raising an eyebrow.
For a long while, he says nothing. He seems almost to curl up into himself. Then:
LI BAI: I paint — with ink —
His look is so intense that she bursts into laughter.
LI BAI: Waiter!
A glorious late summer evening. A tavern sits at the edge of the village. Into it walk two men, one wearing a rather smart silk jacket, the other a dirty grey-black cloak.
A tortoiseshell cat is sunning itself on the windowsill.
LI BAI: Waiter! He produces a huge glass from the folds of his tatty cloak. He turns to Du Yu. A flask of wine, a book of verse, and thou —
DU YU: When did we ever come to this bar and leave together?
LI BAI: There is always a first time, my friend.
The Bird of Time has but a little way to flutter—
When I showed this to Li Bai, he described it as “an absurd farrago”, while Du Yu, who has just accepted a Chair at a major university on the East Coast, pointed to its “problematic aspect of orientalist fantasy”. However, if you liked this content, then I would love you to do three things:
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