D: L&L - Part 36 | Tin Man: The Deep Dark of the Heart

Because I cannot stop I chop.

I stop at the bottom of the steps, the slick stone stairs, the scent of her hair perfume on the air around me. A cloud, a fog, a memory lifting in my head, soaking through the iron tin of blood that has haunted me for so long. Her hands her touch her love have lifted the settling dust of my life, have blown away the rust that makes my joints ache. She has revived me, resurrected me, more than the sleeping wakeness, more than the flower hands of my Jumbly, lost to the dry winds of death that sweep now across the land of Oz.

Her land. My Nimma’s land, she says. She is Nimma but not, she says. She is Nimma but more, but better, and her skin her lovely hands her curving cheek has the slightest hint of color.

You will do this for me, she says.

“So be it,” I say, and start on my way, out of the castle, beyond the massive doors and rusty portcullis of Kiamo Ko.

The mountains hover in a low dusting of purple fog. I’m surprised I didn’t notice this before on my way through the valleys and over the hills, but I was tortured by the memory of Jumbly’s death, a whore’s red mouth, the slashed throat of an innocent, Snickety’s warning and banishment. I had stumbled my way to the only place I knew to go, besides my own crumbling palace: the hollows of Kiamo Ko.

And now I know why. It was to find her. To find my love, my all, my Nimma. The seamstress of my life. But once I got to the center of her I realized it was not my Nimma, but a seemly-scented shadow, a hollow pink seashell echoing her voice, mirroring her soul. But at this point, I’ll take even that.

I don’t know exactly who she is, but I really don’t care. What do I have to lose by helping her? I know what she wants. Is there anything else? What I want I cannot have. What I want, I did…terrible things. My fingers rust with the red stain of those things I cannot undo.

Because I cannot stop I chop.

This thing that touches my empty place. She knows about my past – this ghost, this host of a body who holds my Nimma – she knows about the blood that nearly rusted my fingers closed, the hearts not my own that beat in my chest to move my body, to slick my creaking hinges. At the time, I didn’t know of another way. And as the bodies fell, my empire rose; those in the know cowered and bowed, crawled to my metal feet and polished my shining tin. And all the while, the heart of their mother, their brother, their lover beat within me.

You could have it all back, she had whispered, the not-Nimma, in the warming yellow light above the mountains. You could have a palace and power and everything that goes with it. Protection. Life. Love. The pink skin of a man. The blue skin of a Winkie. The heart of a creature that breathes and lives and dies and falls to ruin.

I had turned from her, my metal body sliding on the moldering sheets of a bed not meant to be slept in for decades, facing the gaping hole, a window on the clouds knitting together in the hollow spaces between mountain peaks. My Nimma, when I was a man, loved to watch the sun rise above the forest trees. She would turn her pale face to the warming light and touch the curve of my lips, and smile. 

“What if I don’t want it all back?” I asked this not-Nimma, this shadow with my lover’s face, her scent, her falling hair, the delicate touch of her fingers on my metal chest. I can feel it, and yet, I know she’s not there. “I don’t know what I want. I don’t know what I deserve – what does a monster deserve?”

A monster, not-Nimma had laughed, a high crackling sound, like thrown fire. Well, you are certainly that. How many people were there? How many Winkies fell before your ax? She had sniffed, I’m surprised your empire didn’t rust faster, all that blood running through it.

My metal feet don’t get great traction on the rocks and uneven terrain of a mountainous territory. I bound off a cliff and land with a calamitous clunk. It’s taking me longer to get out of the mountains than it should: my footing is loose and my balance off. My joints ache and moan in protest – I overexerted myself with not-Nimma.

The slippers, she’d hissed over one perfect shoulder, a light viridian glow, sliding a thin strap toward her long neck. Beneath the layered long locks of hair, I could swear I saw a dark tint in the growing light of morning through the open windows. Nimma’s hair was light, nearly white, sunshine itself spun into hair. The Ruby Slippers; you remember those, right?

I blinked – my lids clicked. “How could I forget them. That stupid girl had the key to her escape all along. We made that god awful journey for nothing. What came of it? The witch murdered, the scarecrow crowned the Emperor of Oz – that’s what. The Lion got a medal – like that’s supposed to prove that he’s brave. He’s not brave – he’s a psychopath is what he is. He bleats out on the airwaves like a king, and he drowns his sorrows in whores and filth.”

Not-Nimma turned, and in the growing light her profile was beginning to drip, to soften, her sharp Nimma features fading before my eyes. The condescending, taunting smear across her face would never have shadowed that of my Nimma. And still I listened, still I stayed.

The Ruby Slippers are the key to getting it all back, not-Nimma said, gathering the skirt of her nightgown and kneeling beside me on the bed. The Ruby Slippers are all I… we need to take what is rightfully ours, to take the crown from Glinda, she snorted, the good witch.  They are the only path back to your love.

I watched her, and as the sun slipped past the castle walls the mossy cast of her skin faded, her face sharpened into the contours of my Nimma’s that I knew so well I could draw with my eyes closed, and had, many, many times before. It was as if I were watching sunlight play on the surface of a pond, and every now and then I could glimpse the life teeming beneath, just before a ripple in the water and the surface smoothed, lit, and my Nimma returned.

Glinda is the key,” Nimma said, straddling my shining silver lap, leaning over and pressing her hands on my hollow, echoing chest. You know what she is.

I frowned. Nodded. I knew. Everyone knew. I knew and I looked away. I knew and I watched the Scarecrow fall. I knew and I stepped off the cliff.

The Ruby Slippers will change everything.

I sat up and gathered her in my cold arms, felt the warmth of her body along my metal limbs. I tucked my face into the curve of her neck – so warm, so soft, so human. “What else?  What would you have of me?”

Let nothing stand in your way.  Bring your Nimma the Ruby Slippers.  Bring back your lover.  Let no one stand in your way. Do what you do, Nick. Chop.