This memoir through self-contained chapters, each offering a unique lens into the multifaceted nature of existence. Inspired by my previous work, 'The Code: Horizon of Infinity,' and its exploration of mind travel, these stories invite you to journey alongside Aetheria, 'Consciousness,' of a toddler girl who uses mirages to shape destiny. Her yearning to be born and mirror her consciousness, at birth she elects her name: Sunshine. Soon, dark forces threaten her existence… 

This chapter explores the complexities of a budding relationship amidst the backdrop of a Jewish wedding, hinting at underlying tensions and the enigmatic nature of love and prejudice. 

YD6-53(SHEh) A Jewish Wedding Enigmatic Prophecy Of An Anti-Semitic Relationship 

Stepping to a halt at the curb, Francine lends a glance at the couple seated in a horse-drawn carriage. The middle-aged man and woman bathing sunlight behind the bench of the high-seated driver - clip clopping. . . - 59th Street at leisure, crossing the intersection. Francine, in her dream, didn’t eye jab, other than my intrigue for the looming harnessed horses. Catching behind the couple’s romantic ride. Across the street, in the distant shade of overbearing flocculent foliage, to an arcade of dark old tree trunks. A pair of horses stomping hooves, in front of a driver idle on a carriage bench awaiting sightseeing passengers for his vacant carriage. 

We cross the street, across the curb, passing the statue. Stepping across the plaza under the far-reaching branching canopies overbearing the shadows, to pent-up dark hefty tree trunks behind a Scholars Gate and among scattered Sundayers entered Central Park.

The sinuous, shaded path beckons us deeper into the forest. Moonlight, filters through the dense canopy, cast dapple of cowhides. I lost sense of orientation, surrounded by massive tree trunks in a somber procession, old roots claws. The trees cracked wide to sunlight. Gradually revealing bleeding pools of green lawn. With vibrant kaleidoscopic colors of scattered figures — sitting, bathing, conversing in vivid skimpy clothes up to the wooded backdrop, a puzzling 5th Avenue’s mottled fenestrated row of facades.

I turn away from the lawn, scatter figures in vivid skimpy hues across the gritty intersection apron. Drawn across from a forking path’s sharp, swerving curves evanescing toward the sculptured stone fountain terrace, phantoms my ex-Yael yonder. My mind drifts back from Yael’s disappearance as I withdraw atop the boxwood hedge. 

On the corner turning hedge, I lend an eye to the ruinous bare ground beneath the hedge. Alluding to boundless wild animals traversing spindly stems of dead wood gnawed from a thriving greenery. From their wild gateway into the adjacent property, I’m gazing over the green hedge, to the shining slopes of mitered saddled roofs. Nestled in a triad’s realm corner, my wandering thoughts. I advance with an urge to get my bearings. Glancing back, messaging eyes. ‘My Little Sparrow, I’ll be right back!’ 

I meet Francine’s questioning eyes. ‘Where is he off to?’ She frowns. 

My strides tether to a hazy memory, seeking a vantage view of the shining roof with the night I groped the driveway into the pitch darkness that swallowed the rooflines. Then I’m led by a bungalow silhouetted by an interior lighting filtering out a leading string of windows spilling and reflecting underneath the eave and the ground, a path turning at the facade’s far end. Finding a marquee, leading me through the entrance to a hallway attended by a trio of women hosting a Jewish Singles Night into the phantom of Erin’s yonder.

With a mirage over the gritty yellow apron, Aetheria suscitates my curiosity about the roofline. Kneading in my mind an architectural simile. A few weekends back, by the frustration of rowing a barge into a head breeze, to my horror, I’m left with a blurry perception of the boathouse. 

I edge closer to the hedge. In my nearing strides, exposed underneath the eave, saddled on a wide expanse of glazed facade. A glaze wash, the interior to a snow blanket that covers an array of dressed tables. Staged at the waterfront, the deserted reception hall, until off-right, a shadow approaches the gapping access way. 

A man in a black tuxedo, respectful, he pauses along a flank wall adorned with a stone fireplace. His gaze slips into the aisle through the tables across the reception hall. Lackadaisical, he advances in his steps, dreamy, draped with a white tallit around his shoulders. He crosses the wing of white-dressed tables until he meets the blank end wall. He turns toward a folded-back glass door against the wall. Trailing him, left me to surmise. The loner needed a fresh breath after attending an Orthodox wedding ceremony. 

As the leader crosses the hall, another loner, his head adorned with a Yarmulke, follows a dozen strides behind. Hesitant, yet drawn into the aisle by his dreamy gaze. He trails in his wake, disconnected, yet in unison. He steps out onto the waterfront deck. Each lost in his, own thoughts, staring, dreaming into the turquoise water. Soon joined by another black attire figure lining up against the white backdrop. Neither of these men notice me standing behind a trimmed top hedge, watching the unfolding scene from a distance — I'm unseeing in their private worlds.

The opening from which these three loners emerge, shadows a woman’s figure leaving aside the banquet table, appears, half-obscure by the jamb of the wide opening. She turns her back to an extended buffet table, pauses. Unveils her role as an usherette, standing poised, a guest list folder in hand. Her posture speaks for itself. ‘Guest! Here I am. I’m here to greet you . . . assign your table.’ Her gaze hovers into a herded crowd of invitees still inside the distant hall.

“Mon petit moineau, viens ici ! — My Little Sparrow, come over here!” I called behind me. Her moon in Aries, to shine into my world, she’s reluctant to deviate from the strait of her path. As I persist with anchoring eyes, she slows her stride. Poised before the hedge, I persist, she lingers to curve her strides, lending me some attention. Half-hearted, the cowgirl in jeans and shirt and sunlight in her long frizzly hair waving over her shoulders. She leaves her midst among a few strollers, sharpens her course toward me. Until she pays no heed, looking over the hedge, her frown telling. ‘What do you want me to see?’ 

While she paces in her cowgirl’s boots, crunching on the gravel. She pauses an arm’s length away on my right. Her blooming gaze vaults the hedge, and the turquoise glaze of the pond, to the deck. Her eyes offer me the gift of her stare. Until, she begins absorbing the three penguins standing sentinels at the water’s edge. 

The usherette stands behind. While soft but vibrant, trickles of colored women and men weave through a snow blanket of tables. The men, uneasy, glanced in the background, blind to the blossoming vases and glittering ceramic place settings. Debating whether to return indoors, join the crowd. Each in his stride heads for the open side door.

Francine’s head jerks, caught by the dark grip of a feline’s claws and jaws, to the retrieve of her eyes. Her gaze sweeping away from the scene. Her eyesight steeplechase over the hedge, landing on the gritty apron at her feet, dawdling searching for her earlier tracks. She spills the secrets of her mind, as though her nostrils scent a stench oozing from a restaurant waste container in a dark hotel alley. 

Francine retards a stealthy pace, lingering, wavering, sidling a turnaround, at encapsulating the atmosphere, beneath Aetheria’s mirage. Francine’s eyes brush her path across the sun pooled, gritty apron. Seeking rest. Finding herself alone in the big park's branching, gritty paths. She eases her step as she heads toward the kaleidoscope of colors to strange figures sunbathing on lawns, bleeding into distant woods, bearing her quiet turmoil.

By the branching paths yielding to our arrival path, Francine’s steps falter. She glimpses back, easing her pace halfway across the intersection’s apron. With a wavering anxiety spying on me, she assumes to follow our earlier trail, out of her looping path. Brings us closing in, together stroll along the leading light-dabbed path. Until the street ahead - whoosh, whoosh, whoosh … - to flickers the passing gleaming cars. 

We emerge from the woods. Foliage giving way across the street to a few barrel vaulted canopies to blurry marble lobbies among fenestrated classic ashlar towers. We veered under peering windows, watching us along the sidewalk as we were bound for downtown. Devoid of green foliage, on a weary course through creepy shades along accompanying facades. Crossing crack opening up to reflective street paving. A mottled jumble of concrete and glass margins channels our way, tapering into the distance.

We step approaching the bow of the New York Times Building, docked in a sea of traffic, scrawling screens flashing endless loops of advertisements. We advance into the midst of flickering lights and dancing neon. My gaze lands on the boarded-up corner, fading into 42nd Street — a jarring reminder of the Wall Street’s Black Monday crash. 

On Broadway, the weekday chaos of intersecting 7th Avenue gave way to the Sunday placid spirit. Traffic trickles, bypassing lanes, edging the flurry of tourists crowding the sidewalks. My thoughts spiral to the stalled Nathan’s restaurant project. The real estate giant, The Reise Organization, a promised grand opening. ‘Here? At the city’s throbbing heart?’ the sighting, to linger on hopes for a contract uncertain.

A sidewalk at random, impeded by a subway guardrail, the bright line disk in my mind weaving through the underground maze of connections. We descend through the hatchway around the corner of the fluorescent-lit tunnel, winding up to the platform. We were met with an air pressure, the phantom of an enveloping draft. The prelude to back step from the edge of the silver rails in the darkness. Across the dark ballast, swoops to flickering windows flash cinematographic glimpses of evening leisure exhausted parents and children, figuring plonked and weary in their seats, lost in their thoughts, gazing in their worldly interior. 

The door rolls open. We step on board, doors to seal behind, under our feet to a floor tug. Plunge into the dark tunnel, mirror our ride. We punctuate flashing stations until we reach “Rego Park - 63rd Dr.” and disembark. Walk the familiar lit underground. Rising to the asphaltic multitude of lanes scarce with traffic. Turning our backs on Manhattan’s distant skyline. We enter the deserted side streets. 

Francine, transplanted from the University of Strasbourg, after the past weeks, fluid in her pace. Shuttling daily to Gaetano Pesce’s South of Houston Street’s Manhattan studio. We face the tapering fenestrated brick facades from apartment blocks, to the supermarket’s whitewashed storefronts wrapping the street corner. The mile-path, apartment blocks jagged, dwarfing houses pressing deeper into Forest Hill. 

With the terrace houses in view, we relent our pace, for the final stretch home. Shortcut in diagonal across the double driveway. We step down the ramp, to pause. With a jingle of keys, I unlocked the door and waved Francine through. Entering behind her, locking the door, I lose her across the galley kitchen, vanishing through the gapping doorway. As the room opens to the double bed, by the headboard, Francine kicks her boots. She springs onto the bed, crawling along, settling into a lotus pose between the pillows.

Emerging from the kitchen doorway, I turn around to perch on a folded leg — a bedpost emanating a twisted-stretch refreshing sensation. Without losing sight of Francine in line with my shoulder. The glitter in her eyes of encountering the absurd escape staircases, attenuates. Our street chatter churns to pique Gaetano Pesce’s other artist in the studio and flows across our Aladdin rug to her home she left in France. Francine talking, as from my heavenly mind, her mother’s shadow cross in the corridor doorway to my sister Ingrid behind a desk in her office. Francine fills me in, the best friends benevolent in Belfort’s bureaus of a Christian charity organization.

Aladdin’s rug stages, ghosting Frank and Nancy Sinatra, dual, to the folly of my mind, while Summer’s Helios perched over the western sky, casting a growing shadow into the courtyard. The rear neighbors’ fenestrated row of houses lingers shadow beneath the eaves. Before Nyx, darkens the afternoon sunlight. Aetheria’s mirage in the courtyard, in glinting daylight, suscitate a symphony echoing in my head with refrains, the song’s lyrics rhymes. “I practice every day; To find some clever lines to say; To make the meaning come true…”

Francine smiles dreamily, lost in her thoughts. Rhyming in my mind, ‘… But then I think I’ll wait; Until the evening gets late . . .’ As my future stretches, a steeplechase on a field, crossing water jumps and barriers. A tangled track of uncertainty. I must forge ahead, past Francine, who had set for a man in her life at “35 years old . . . ” Before I unleash My sun in Warthog and my moon in Gemini, a celestial dance embroils my heart. Aetheria suscitate to carve a path with Francine, the clarity of the lyrics punctuated. ‘And then I go and spoil it all; By saying somethin’ stupid like . . .’ amid our conversation, in a deep voice. “My Little Sparrow!” I say, gazing deep into her eyes. “Veux tu me marrier — Will you Wed me?” I ask. 

I’m gazing into the depth of her eyes, as a little girl's expression shades her face, riding a merry-go-round. Until Francine erupts into laughter with a mocking undertone. Pitches beyond a joke. Her giggle wavers, and prolonged annoyance, feeling myself sinking, drowning in a sea of shame, to an angry gasp, asking, “What’s so funny.” 

‘Let her giggle play itself out,’ I thought, fixing her. She doesn’t respond to her hilarious outbreak, until, in a sudden serious voice, she corrects me. “Tu ne dis pas marier, On dit épouser — You don’t say wed. One says, marry!” talking goes on, my interruption didn’t leave a cue over my trick question. ‘It’s obvious.’ lingers my thought. ‘I can't entrust my heart to you.’