I get a message and now I have to check the tapes. In the closet of the Jupiter, there’s a lot of reel-to-reel tapes, cassette tapes—both standard size and microcassette. There’s VHS and DVDs, too. Betamax. CD-ROMs, minidiscs, DATs.
I find the one I need, on the sixth shelf, near the right, close to the closet door.
Written on it in what appears to be my hand writing is: SETH—1/98.
I have no memory of making this recording, let alone what might be on it. So I have a bit of curiosity steeping in mah blood as I make my way through the house looking for a piece of equipment that will actually play the fucker.
There is one, I find, in the conservatory—the uniquely named Green Room—by an ornate and uncomfortable chair, on a baroque end table. I sit there, and load the tape—suddenly remembering I will need coffee for this. And to pee first.
So I do all that, then go back to the conservatory, get situated, start the tape.
The familiar sounds of the machine whisper in the Green Room. Then we hear some talking. It’s my voice first, which is surreal to hear since I don’t recall any of this.
The second voice is Seth, I guess, though he sounds a bit different than when I interviewed him the other day.
As I listen, I find myself wondering if all of this—our lives, our deaths, our rebirths—is just replaying the cruelties we’ve inflicted upon other beings until we can, when faced with each act again, no longer do that particular cruelty again but instead react with kindness, or at least a kind of caring distance.
After the machine clicks off, signaling the end of the tape, I sit and stare for a moment, then retrieve the tape and return it to the Jupiter Room closet.
The bed only gives a little as I flop onto it, roll into the center, stretch out my legs—first spread wide, then crossed at the ankles.
This tape, this investigation … this room, the whole timeplace gives me a melancholy that I have long shed. It doesn’t fit me anymore as I’m trying to wear it. Yet there is something undeniably compelling about it all, the mystique of things long gone half understood, like personal artifacts or dead languages. It’s intriguing to my mind still, and the mind wants to keep going; it wants to continue.
With some acceptance of this, I roll off the bed and get up, smooth out my slip, and head for the bathroom.
As I leave the Jupiter once more, I notice, almost without noticing, Laus Veneris hanging over the bed.
I think about that while I pee, wondering what it might mean.
Play procedures
I don’t provide a transcript of the conversation. (In my defense, I don’t remember it.) If that bugs you—or even if you just want to—go ahead and write it out. But if you do, you need to include one detail, regardless of what else happens in the convo: Seth discloses that there is a slim, trim ROM card inside of a peach, in a cage, on the top floor.
Think about the various cruelties in your life—both the ones you’ve endured and those you’ve inflicted. Notice who dealt them to you, and the people you were cruel with or to. Make a fearless inventory of these cruelties. This is a map. It’s a map for your life—or part of one, anyway. It’s not just a map; it’s also a compass. And it’s not just for this life, but for many—maybe all of them. All of them until the end.
Have a look at Laus Veneris. Think about what it might mean, hanging here in this room at this time in this place. Consider incorporating it into one or more of your stories.
The Laus Venris is a midevil equivalent of a Senate hearing. The witness is being questioned about their past associations. This dove tails with the part about making a list of cruelties both inflicted upon others and those we have inflicted on people we know. But 500 years ago, one did not have the option of taking the fifth.
Glad the reel got played even if there wasn't much to go on...