"Well the time will come When the wind will shout All stripped down All stripped down And all the sinners know What I'm talking about All stripped down All stripped down When all the creatures of the world Are gonna line up at the gate" Tom Waits

The place is reached by a shall bamboo raft, personally ferried—hand over hand—by its occupant via paired pullies. The little island is not far from the mainland, and was unoccupied and unnoticed until Julia noticed it, and took it for her own. The water is shallow, the bottom leaf, shingled and dark, it parts around the squat craft with a slow roll, reluctant as oil. At island's edge a neat stone walkway leads from the tiny dock to the island's only dwelling. A small wind chime, its tubes hollow bones of various sizes and species, sings, if there is air enough. It is a subdued song, its notes dulled yet no less sweet for that muffling, that plays background theme to your approach.

If you are in that place, and poised to enter, you perhaps already know what to expect as you knock on the door and are bade enter. Your skin, if you listened to it, would tell you this is a dry place, but your other senses are shouting so loudly. Scent, perhaps the most lascivious of the senses, more agile and precise than touch, speaks of warm damp and decay. The signature scent is one of sweetness poised on the edge of spoilage; if one were to open up a bag of dried peaches, one might find its base note; the other instruments are, in turn, sharp as the back-of-the-throat bite of decay and sweet as the flowers that only root upon corruption and mix its leaf mold autumn with the summer honey of their scent song.

The room itself is, in great part, shaped by the expectation of its viewer. It is a place of dreams, after all. In default it will seem simple, freshened by a twilight breeze that carries its ever present symphony of scent. A bed fills its center, not snugged to any wall but poised as a diamond within the setting of the room. A small closet, a dressing table, and a mirror, washstand glinting fresh spring water close at hand, occupy the walls. On one window, south-facing to catch the late sun, a small, flat flask of Burberry wine, perhaps the only thing of this world present, rests on the sill, cleverly positioned to throw its reflection upon the room's only mirror, at this its occupant will preen for her outings into the realm that has claimed her.

The dreamer, if he exists, the one who sees Julia as she exists deep in the coils of her own self perception, might see, instead of a neat and crafted cottage, a rough structure of bamboo and creepers, or banyan leaf and damp thatching; and the wide bed, crisp cotton sheeted, little more that an almost equally aromatic toss of straw.

Seeing is believing, however, and truth is 95% belief and 5% evidence. Julia appears in elegant repose as she lounges on her bed, a light shift, black and seemingly spider woven, her only covering. It is crocheted more tightly—twin doily circles—over the ribs where her breasts would be, and a dark, tight-woven triangle fills the space between the twin points of her hipbones. A single candle on the dressing table throws dim light into the depths of her eye sockets, a tint of humor, and shimmer of invitation; the illuminated eyes do not stray from the door.

"Midnight, one more night without sleepin", Watchin" till the morning comes creepin" Green door, what?s the secret you're keepin?"?"Marvin Moore

Just as Julia has neither lips to shape words nor breath to propel them, she also lacks ears with which to corral sounds loose upon the air, and eardrums to facilitate their tympanic translation to the mind. However, since she can 'speak" by way of an act of will, her words appearing disembodied upon the air near whomever she wishes to communicate with, perhaps the very will to speak is enough to reach her.

It seems so, because within the little dwelling she turns from her posed repose, whitetwig hand splayed across her lipless mouth in surprised excitement, and scrambles to her feet. It is the work of moments then to preen'smoothing her sundress against her ribcage, hip and leg bones, brushing stickfingers across the side of her skull as if fluffing unseen hair"and then, composing herself, she strolls to the door, swings it inward, and, lipless teeth opened in a smile, fairly beams upon the travel-bedraggled figure seated before her. Her words flutter into the air around the girl, soft as the beat of moth wings against a lampshade.

"A visitor! How wonderful! Please come in and enjoy the hospitality of my little home. I believe I have some wine somewhere; might I offer you a glass??"

And here she leans toward the girl, empty eyesockets hooded with shadow, the voice appearing out of the air softer than ever, hushed with a complicitory secrecy.

"I fear I would not be able to join you in such a libation, though"I find it goes right through me"."

"Someone showed me a picture and I just laughed Dignity never been photographed I went into the red, went into the black Into the valley of dry bone dreams"—Dylan

As her "guest's" discomfort became obvious, Julia's twighand, fingers spread, moves to her open mouth again in surprise. If the girl would only attempt to speak, that very will to communicate might make its way through, might make the leap that allows the skeletal girl to hear and speak without the usual fleshy prerequisites.

She is not without powers of observation, though, and her empty sockets soften, steal faint light from leaf-dappled pools. Gracefully, every movement of fleshless joint smooth as any dancer's, she squats in front of the girl, balanced perfectly upon her toe-bones, whiteheels high, stick hands joined in front of her knees.

She tips her head to one side, studying the troubled apparition before her, the gesture girlish, inquisitive, precocious. One hand reaches out, plucks something from the green tangle to one side. It is, depending upon the level of attention focused upon it, a crackling-brittle frond or an intricately woven lady's fan. In either case, stirred gently in the air, it directs a conforting breeze upon the girl. Julia's disembodied voice follows it, soft as dew settling upon swamp lily, playing melodies around the steady kindness of those leaf-rhythmed eyes.

"You can hear me, then, and I think I can you if you only wish to speak. We find our ways, you and I, of decorating ourselves with the rare gems of what others would call things lacking."

She continues, her vague voice a radio just barely heard, though from one phrase to another it can morph from lullabye to canticle to urban blues and back.

"You are familiar to me, and you seem less surprised, perhaps, by my unique beauty than many are at first gifted glance. You are not of the dream world. Not exactly. But you are perhaps a product of fantasy all the same? Whatever, you are welcome here, guest. Please accept whatever comforts you might find in my little place, in the home of Julia Here..."

"Love seeketh not Itself to please, Nor for itself hath any care; But for another gives its ease, And builds a Heaven in Hells despair.' Blake

"Ana."

The thought of the name speech enough for the earless to hear, the intent of the girl's request all clarity and precision to her would-be hostess.

"Ana." She 'speaks' it in turn, willing the soft syllables upon the air, "Ana will find some comfort here, and perhaps companionship. We are, it could be surmised, kindred spirits..." and here her laugh sings bright in the moist air, glass bells stirred by raindrops. "though I am neither kith nor kin, and do not presume to know your lineage..."

She lifts her fleshless chin, eyesockets closed tight with shadow, as the questing hand alights, soft as a dragonfly, upon her cotton draped ribcage. Ana might startle to find the striped-bone outline that strains against that fabric seems surprisingly soft, as if the hand does not quite meet it but hesitates upon a surface unseen, to fid that it even provides an effection illusion of warmth, if illusion it is.

Lipless teeth spread, as if gasping a breath, and then her own whitetwig hand repicates the journey, presses its birdweight against breast almost as severe of her own.

For a moment they stand like that, a bow of cranes, nothing sensual—at least not in a carnal sense—in the shared gesture; it is, more truly, a meeting of hearts, its simple beauty belying whether there is a beating heart between the two.

"Come in now," sunlight caromed off water paints a soft blush upon her ivory cheekbones. "Inside there is rest and sustainance and time. Inside there will be Julia Here and Ana Now. Inside, though some silly gods would seem prone to deny us the comfort, you and I shall talk!"