An Autumn Sideshow

An Autumn Sideshow

By - Robert Aaron Goldsborough

      The autumn wind lifted brown leaves high into the air and danced them into wide cartwheels.  Large oaks and cedars sighed with relief at the loss of their burdens.  Out past the forest’s edge a gentle melody rose from a calliope.  Edward ran toward the music, the crunch of the dried leaves under his feet building giddy pleasures in the pit of his stomach.  He ran faster.  The melody gained volume with every stride.  The sun hung high in the late morning sky, piercing naked branches on its descent to the forest floor.  Edward loved a carnival.

         This would be the last carnival that would pass through his town this season and he would not let God or his father stop him from having some fun.  The woods thinned as he approached the edge of the forest.  He raced out onto the pasture and up a small hill.  His young eyes filled with excitement as he came to a halt and took in the view of the carnival.

         At least a dozen small, multicoloured tents were planted in a circle around an enormous canopy of drab green.  Tall poles topped with red and gold banners circled each of the smaller tents. Flags flapped and rustled in the wind, streamers painted bright slashes in the air. Costumed jesters pranced and gamboled about the ground in vivid streaks of color.  Metallic poles supported carriages for rides, moving with enthusiastic scraping sounds.  A carousel whirred with the gleeful music of the calliope, spinning all manner of wooden beasts in tight circles.  Edward grabbed his head with his hands to settle the moving colors into solid forms and smiled.

         With the deepest reds and brightest golds that Edward had ever seen, the words 'Kaufman's Karnival Extrordinaire' were emblazoned on a banner that spanned the entrance.  Edward gawked at the finery the carnival displayed, not in all his eleven years had he seen a place of amusement dressed with such dazzling opulence.  He entered with his head bowed in childish respect.

         Edward moved through the crowd of sightseers until he found the ticket sellers’ booth.  His anxious hands dug deep into the pockets of his faded jeans fishing out nickels and dimes.

         "I'd like some tickets please."

         "How many, sweetie?" The old woman asked in a voice that reminded Edward of his long dead grandmother.

         "As many as this will buy!" he shoved the change through the narrow slit.

         "Hmm. I'll give you ten for your nickels and dimes young prince."

         Ten tickets were far more than Edward had expected.  He stood up on his toes, greedily grasping the treasure in his tight little fists. Forcing all but two into his pocket, he went in search of the singing carousel.

         His feet carried him through the mass of gawkers, allowing him brief pauses to gaze in wonderment at all the carnival had to show.  There were jugglers dressed in rainbows.  Clowns in maniacal facepaint rode miniature bicycles while tying balloon animals.  Dancers and magicians performed feats surrounded by spectators. Tents stood tall and ornate to either side.  The sounds were bustling, the people were merry and Edward's heart fluttered like the crimson flags.  Chances to win prizes were in the tents just ahead of him, he was not interested.  He walked past the rows of refreshment until a sign stopped him in his tracks.  The sign, in large dripping letters, was inviting the public to come and enter a large purple tent and view its exhibits of atrocity.  Edward sidestepped to view a detailed painting of what the carnival claimed to be a bodiless woman.  The next sign boasted a painting of a bearded lady.  The last sign was simple; all it read was 'Freaks-two tickets'.  Edward could not resist the temptation.

         With the carnival barker paid Edward stepped past the purple canvas door and into the tent.  Violet sheaves of rough fabric danced the boy into the dim interior.  The tent wall stood up on his right closing him into a narrow hallway made from a patchwork of faded colors. 

         A pallid green tapestry, like the grass of a late summer’s field, twitched to life.  With an upward flutter, bars were exposed for the gaze of the small boy.  Straw lay all about the cage floor.  Empty bowls, like the ones Edward used to feed his dog and torn blankets tangled with the debris of the cage.  The tapestry had hidden more than just these nominal artifacts of neglect, though.  The air held deeper breaths in the dark than Edward had first realized.  Animal sighs woven into the pungent atmosphere reached his ears to center his gaze on the shadows.  The shadows formed brighter reflections and Edward could now form images on the backs of his eyes.  An animal, half covered by a blanket, was lying in the rear of the cage.  Pupils strained to steal more light from the scene.  He could not make out the beast's head.  Then it rose.

         A bedraggled mane of auburn draped down towards the spine and loosely hung about the shoulders.  The coat of the animal was a rough, worn orange, tinted as if by frost, with the slightest silver.  A tail, like a leopard’s, slithered out from under the blanket.  Edward watched in slackjawed anticipation as the feline stretched out its back toward him.  He had never been this close to a mountain lion, let alone an animal of this wild variety.  Then it turned.

The face, and not the cat-like face Edward had expected, was female.  The slender lips split wide apart stretching back across the human jaw to expose teeth, jagged and sharp like African cats.  The mouth stretched to abnormal proportions in a silent yawn.  The long tongue flicked across the rows of pointed white razors then closed.  The necked straightened allowing the eyes to settle on Edward's gawk.  Fur, short and just as orange as the coat, traced the subtleties of the face, but not enough to lose its human appearance.  Then the eyes expanded to their fullest allowing the dim lights to reflect on the small green circles around the black pupils.  A stare, deep and unnerving, went to his brain unhinging his childish curiosity.  Edward began to tremble at the spectacle.

         "This is no cat." The boy's brain whispered.

         He had seen lions and tigers in his schoolbooks, and this was not one of those.  The reality of the image choked his throat sending his head reeling for oxygen.  Dizzy, he leaned against the bars.  The steel was cold, penetrating his thin skin, forcing a quick gasp of air down his throat.  He stood back from the bars refocusing on the two circles of green still staring at the backs of his eyes.  He blinked and rubbed his eyelids, trying to make this image of nonsense disappear.  With hands moist from nervous tears he dropped his arms and allowed his eyes to refocus.  All he could see was green.  The curtain had dropped and the scene was played out.

         A sound like falling leaves turned the young eyes towards an ascending orange sheet.  Edward accepted the new movement as a means of escape from the previous sights.  It was another exposed cage, the contents of which were less discernible than the first, except for the figure that seemed to command attention at the center.  A bleak flame carved shadows around a female face.  Eyes stared out from behind a mat of disheveled dark hair.  The light, though meager, still allowed Edward to focus on the person.  She was definitely a woman with an age that seemed not to accept her appearance.  Dirty rags wound tight around her body and wove themselves with vines displaying streaks of soiled flesh.  The mass of grime-soaked cloth and vines was held to her by brown, leather straps that held tiny rodent skulls.  Her arms were held to her bosom where a bundle of even dirtier rags was gripped with white knuckles.  Tiny clicks came from the bundle like dry twigs snapping under foot.  The woman's face turned towards the bundle and Edward could see the collection of small bones fastened into the pile of her ratted hair.  Her eyes softened, peering into the bundle as if a mother cooing to her child.  A strained exhalation mixed in the air with the clicks.  A bone dropped from the bundle and hit the cage floor.  A tiny limb appeared and it was nothing more than a bone itself except its color was of a light blue. 

         "What is this?" he asked himself.

         The mother's face pulled back from her bundle and grimaced.  Her lower jaw slid down to a painful length flicking a tongue out of her mouth carrying the carcass of a rat.  Edward lurched backwards as the slender tongue delivered its gift to the bundle.  A shrill barrage of clicks and excited breaths received the dead rat.  Fierce shudders racked the mass of dirty rags and with a loud snap the bundle relaxed.  Edward, on the other hand, was stock still with eyes the size of moons against the exterior tent wall.  He breathed again when the drape fell once more with the sound and colour of autumn leaves.

         This was more than he had ever expected.  The world in which he had existed was peeling back from the edges exposing the rotten glue that had held it together.  Than the final drape rustled and began to lift.  Like the edge of the universe slipping away the black velvet fluttered upwards.  This was a cage just like the others.  Edward strained his eyes through the dim light seeking out the new fiction that his mind could not accept.  There was nothing there.  There was no straw on the floor or bedding of any kind.  There was no other light.  No other anything was in this cage.  The exhibit must have escaped, he thought.  He turned to go shaking his head in disbelief when there was a slight tug at his pant cuffs.  Turning, he looked down and saw a small hand reaching out from the bottom of the bars holding him.  Edward’s eyes traced the slim arm back between the bars and found a pair of brown eyes staring back at him.  There was nothing here a moment ago, he told himself.  The brown eyes stared back at him.  There was no malice or evil intent in them.  It seemed there was no emotion behind those eyes at all. 

         “Who…are…?”

         The figure rose slowly as if being raised from water and Edward heard a slick sucking sound as if the water did not want to relinquish its purchase.  Edward stared as the eyes settled on a form that was his height.  The light was dim, but Edward saw what was standing before him.  Yet, this was not possible.  He was staring into his own brown eyes, because he was staring at his identical twin.  He gulped deeply in his throat and his twin did likewise.  Edward blinked his eyes to remove the scene and the twin did likewise.  They both moved their shoulders in a mimic of each other’s shudder.  They both winced and stared as if in amazement of the other.  The twin was even wearing the same dirty striped shirt and elastic banded jeans.  Edward moved his hand forward as if to touch the other boy hoping to find nothing more than a mirror touching back.  Their fingers met and Edward felt a cold steal into his flesh as the other boy grimaced showing more than just teeth.  This was not a mirror.  This was something maybe from the world on the other side of mirrors, but just a reflection it was not.  Edward’s feet were moving before he realized he was in a retreat.  The world had just bared it’s fangs at him and he knew now that it could never smile at him the same again.  He ran past the green and orange drapes.  Flying out of the purple tent he did not see the red banners dancing merrily or even the colorful clowns.  The carnival was all wrong now.  The whole world was wrong now.  He knew and feared that it would never be right again.

         Through the bare forest his legs pumped and his lungs heaved.  Across the empty field on the other side of the trees he barreled.  He ran to the road that led straight to his home.  Down the road he raced sweat streaming off his body like rain.  Home was all he knew right now.  Home where you knew who and what everyone and everything was.  The comfort and safety of a home.  If there was anyone about he did not heed them.  His mind was focused.  He had to tell someone.  He needed to be reminded that this was the real world and things like that in the tent had no place in this real world.  His mother would tell him that.  She would tell him of the active minds of young boys.  She would explain it all away and he would be soothed.  He would be right again.

         He ran down his street passing houses and sweating only the way young boys in a run can.  He did not even look up when he approached his porch, but leapt the three steps and dove through the front door pausing only to scrape off his dirty sneakers.  He yelled for his mom as he jumped the stairs two at a time for the second floor.  She was in the bathroom at the top of the stairs, poking out her head when she heard his cries.

         “Edward, are you okay. What is it?” She looked down at him from her towering adult height.

         Edward stared back blankly breathing in great gasps of air and running with sweat.

         “Edward?”

         There was nothing in his brain that seemed to work right.  He stood there sweating with his world crumbling about him and he could not push a word out of his dumb struck mouth.  His tongue lolled about like an aimless caterpillar.  His hands twitched and pulled at his pants.  He could not function properly even to tell her his story of horror.

         “Ah, too much running kiddo.  The bathroom’s yours. And take a shower while you’re in there.  You’re absolutely filthy.”

         Edward stumbled past her nodding his head in agreement.  He slammed the door and began to undress.  The water ran out of the faucet clean and clear.  He forced himself to wait for the tub to fill up wanting to just be in there where water made sense.  With the tub full he slid in burying himself in the warm liquid.  Then he buried his face in his hands and sobbed.  He washed trying to clean the images out of his mind.  He toweled off and caught a glimpse of himself in the bathroom mirror.  He shuddered and dropped his towel.  That was going to take sometime getting used to again.

         Trying to towel dry while avoiding eye contact with the mirror was no mean feat.  Edward slipped several times bashing his shoulder against the tub.  It was worth it though, to make sure that those eyes were not staring back at him in his home.  His mother called up the stairs that dinner was ready.  He poked his head out of the cracked door to answer and jumped across the hall to his bedroom.  He flung the towel over the bureau to hide the mirror.  Hair tussled, a clean pair of jeans with a t-shirt wrapped his body in a comfortable security telling him he was indeed safe at home.  His socks plodded down the wooden stairs.  Familiar creaks and groans from the wood were inviting and placating.  His hand slid down the banister marking his passage with the squeaks of flesh against wood polish.  At the bottom of the stairs his father was just arriving through the front door.  The big parent hand rested on Edward’s head and raked up the tangles to standing. 

         “Evening Edward. All your chores done?” Edward’s father spoke to the wall as he hung up a large brown jacket on a hook.

         His mouth opened as if to respond, but he was afraid a rant about what he had seen would flow out like an unwanted rush of water.  So he held his tongue.  It was at least better now that he was sinking back into normality.  The bath had melted most of the shock away.  Besides, here at home what could possibly be amiss?  The apparition was far away and getting further the more his safe and secure home soaked into his small bones.  If he never mentioned it, maybe it would be like it never happened.  Now, that would be great. 

         The table was immaculate as always.  Mounds of fluffy white mashed potatoes sat up in their blue glass bowl.  Vegetables of various colors peered back at him.  He really did like vegetables, but it was every boy’s duty to despise them just the same.  The center of the table hosted a beautiful spiral cut ham bejeweled with yellow rings of pineapple.  Those were, of course, Edward’s favorite and he would sneak off as many as he could.  The sweet tooth always won and he never seemed to mind.  Even if there was ice cream afterwards he would make sure and satiate that tooth no matter what.

         “How’s the ham boys?” Edward’s mother asked.  This was her practice ham before the holidays started.  This year they would be hosting the extended family and she wanted it to be right.  Even with Christmas two months away, it was never too early to try and make a great impression.  She knew she had it.  This ham was perfect.  Edward nodded his head with his mouth stuffed to capacity with the sweet meat.  Edward’s father simply leaned over and pecked her on her cheek smiling those sideways smiles of his.  She beamed.  The meal was hailed with even more vigorous head nodding and applause.  The food was devoured and then picked over.  The adults retrieved coffee from the kitchen and sat back down with their plates pushed away from them. 

      This Edward knew was when they were going to talk and stare at each other for a while.  Normally he would leave the table at this time and play in the yard until nightfall.  He had to make as much time of this as possible, because soon they would be calling him to go to bed.  When they started these stares it meant he was going to bed early and he never wanted that.  Instead, though, he sat in the chair pushed to the edge of the table and picked at the meal, as if he was not quite done yet.  His parents paid him no attention.  They were locked into the details of their days and the glories of the meal. 

      The sun slipped past the windows forcing the electric bulbs to work harder in their illuminations.  The conversation between Edward’s parents was also slipping into quieter tones.  Edward himself was growing weary allowing his eyes to close.  He was starting to drift off when a loud knock came to the front door.  Edward’s parents murmured as to who it could be at this hour.  Edward slid off the chair with a wave stating that he would see.  His feet were heavy in his cotton socks.  He was tired and he chalked it up to his unspoken day.  His right hand went up to the brass door knob and turned at it.  It was locked.  Of course it was locked.  He fumbled with the twist hearing the thin metal inside settle.  The knock came again startling him.  The knob turned and Edward inched open the wooden door.  A tall man in a grey suit stood on the porch in darkness with his back to the door.  The man had not heard the door open.  Edward cleared his throat in a bad mimic of his father trying to get his attention.  The grey suit spun on a black soled heel to look for the throat clearer.  The man’s eyes searched about his own height and then lowered to see the little boy staring out of the doorway. 

      “Are your parents at home little man?” The grey suit asked.

Edward’s father had followed him to the door and opened the inches wider leaving the boy feeling rather exposed to the stranger.

      “I’m his father. May I help you? The last thing we need tonight is a salesman. So if that’s what you are please, leave.”

      “My dear sir. I am not selling anything at all, but giving away for free.”

Edward hid behind his father’s legs just enough so that he could still hear.

      “Not a scam. We do not need anything for ‘free’” Edward’s father accented his point about free by making quote marks in the air with his fingers.

      “No, no. You see I am from Kaufman's Karnival Extrordinaire.  I am going door to door asking if you have already been to our humble carnival in the meadow or not.  Because if you haven’t I have free tickets for you…and your family of course.”  The man stared down at Edward smiling with a gold capped tooth.  The gold shone in the meager lighting on the porch.  Edward wanted to retreat further inside.  The Carnival with all it’s abnormality had come to his home.  They had found him.  Now he wanted them, the man especially, to go away and leave him and his normal life alone.

      “If I may just step in for a moment…”

Edward’s palms broke into a sweat.  He was tugging on his father’s pant leg and sobbing. 

      “Well Edward, would you like to go to the carnival on Saturday?”

Edward looked up at his father’s face in a state of near panic.

      “We’d love to go. Wouldn’t we?”

The stranger handed over a small hand full of tickets, never taking the glare of his grin off of Edward.  His little boy hands released his father’s pants and his little boy legs ran into the house and up the stairs.

      “Going to bed now!” Edward yelled.

The door closed with a hushed thud and Edward heard the muted voices of his parents down at the bottom of the stairs. He was used to that muffled sound of them speaking from below, but now they were talking about him.  What if they asked him about his sudden need to go to bed?  They would not understand.  Parents never heard what a kid was trying to say.  No matter how he said it, they would not hear what he meant.  He needed a lie, and quick.  He heard their heavy adult feet climb the stairs.  Edward locked the door on the bathroom and scrambled to apply the green paste to his toothbrush.  That would give him a few more minutes to think.  He did not want to verbalize the incident in his home.  It was bad enough that they had found him, but for right now the carnival had come no closer than the porch.  It had not entered.  Thoughts about old movie vampires came to his mind.  You had to invite them in.  He had not.  No one had invited them in.  Inside it was still normal, practice ham for dinner to be praised, parents speaking in hushed, glossy eyed tones, and it would stay that way.  A light knock on the bathroom door pulled him out of his thoughts.

      “Edward? You okay?” His mother asked.

      “I’m bwushing my teef.”

The door grew silent and he waited to hear her walk away.  She was waiting for her answer and like the good mother she was, she would wait. 

When all else fails, because no kid really wants to lie to their parents, you justify yourself with stupidity.  That was what Edward had decided.  After all, he was just a stupid kid.  He rinsed off his brush and rinsed out his mouth.  The knob turned in his hand.  There was no turning back now.  She was on the other side of the door and she wanted an answer.  The door swung inward and Edward was left feeling bare.

      “What’s a matter Eddie?”

      “Don’t know.” He stared at his socks in absolute mortification and hoped it was enough.

      “Okay then. If you’re all cleaned up, go crawl into bed and I’ll tuck you in in a few moments.”

What luck, it had worked and she was not going to pressure him on it.  Edward sighed to himself.  She would be back to tuck him in, maybe she would not start back up with the questions.  He dragged his feet across the hall to his bedroom, tripping a bit on a loose sock.  He flicked the light on and was startled by a reflection in the window.  At least it was not me at the door, he told himself.  Edward slithered out of his clothes and rifled around his piles of clothing for his pajamas.  He wanted the ones with the cowboys on them tonight.  The little images of tough cowpokes with six guns blazing always made him feel more confident.  Sometimes on weekend mornings he would run around the house for hours, shooting his fingers off like guns at the varmints that rustled the cattle, in these pajamas.  He crawled under his covers and waited for his mom to come in.

      After an eternity of staring at the ceiling and trying to figure out what would make the ceiling more interesting to look at his mother came in.  She sat at the foot of his bed and smoothed out a tall crease from the covers.  He looked at her and she looked back with a slight smile.

      “You sure you’re okay tonight dear?”

      “Sure mom just tired. Long day. Running and all.”

She nodded in agreement, but he did not think that she really agreed.  After all, he couldn’t ever remember a time when he saw her run.  Oh well, as long as that was all of the questioning.  She stood, kissed him on his forehead, and turned for the door.

        “Well, I guess we’re going to the carnival on Saturday. I used to love carnivals when I was younger.”

She turned the light out and left Edward staring at her silhouette against the closing door.  We’re going!  His mind screamed.  That would be okay though, his parents would be with him and nothing could happen to him as long as they were around.  He sighed to himself again and turned on his side.  He was facing away from the window because of the nasty fright he gave himself with the reflection.  He was growing sleepy.  After the day he had, who could blame him.  Sleep was normal.  He wanted normal set back in its place.  His eyelids drooped and closed tight.  His mind still raced.  Enough for one day, he told the thoughts spiraling around his skull.  It is late and even monsters have to sleep, he thought to the spiral.  Then the spiral threw out an arm and touched his conscious.  What about those vampires, it asked.  You have to invite them, he answered.  They really did not look like vampires now did they?  His eyes flew wide and a new horror shook him.  They did not look like vampires.  What if they were some other monster of the night?  Then they would not be put on display for little boys to gawk at, he thought.  His eyes closed again.  This time his mind was appeased enough to keep them closed.

      After Edward had passed into the realm of sleep, his father heard a dog barking outside.  He got up and laid the book he was reading down.  His slippers were next to the foot of the bed where they always were and he put them on.  He wrapped his blue striped robe about him and went downstairs.  He moved without a sound so not to wake his wife or Eddie.  He went to the front door and let himself out.  The dog was in the street facing down something in the front yard.  Its bark was growing ragged and terse.  Edward’s father reached back inside the door and turned on the porch light.  A yellow glow lit the yard distracting the yipping canine and it ran off down the street.  The man looked around the dark yard and was ready to admit that it must have been a late night raccoon or something when he saw something.  There was a leg sticking out of the bushes to the side of the house.  He knew this leg, a small leg wearing little boy jeans and little boy shoes.  It was Edward’s leg.

      “Eddie? What are you doing out here?”

The figure sat up and turned its eyes at the man.

      “Son? Are you alright?”

Edward’s father reached down to help the thing with his son’s jeans, shoes, and even his eyes up out of the grass. 

      “Eddie? What..? Why..?”

There was not a word from it as it took the boy’s father’s hand and let him lead straight into the house.  He locked the door behind him and turned to question what he thought was his son further, but it was gone.  The man took the stairs two flights at a time to catch up, thinking that Edward had gone to his room.  He peered through the partially open door and saw Edward sound asleep in his bed.  Must have been sleep walking, he told himself.

      “We’ll talk about this tomorrow. If you weren’t sleepwalking.” He said.

Edward started awake believing he had heard his father’s voice.  He groped around for the light switch on his night stand.  The lamp lit up the room.  Edward rubbed back the light from his eyes with the backs of his hands.  I must still be asleep, he thought.  He was trying to focus on whatever it was at the foot of his bed.  It was him.

      “This is not a dream.” Edward’s voice answered his thoughts from the foot of his bed.

The twin sneered an impossible mouth full of moving razors.  Edward’s scream was caught in the back of his throat by an invisible hand.  The twin melted slightly at the middle pouring a dark puddle onto the bed.  The puddle rippled and fused into Edward’s legs sitting cross legged on the covers. 

      “You can not scream unless I want you to. And I don’t want you to.”

The voice was Edward’s, and it made Edward’s head ache like a pinched nerve.

      “You are going to stay here quietly while I go kiss your parents goodnight.”

The boy with the mouth full of razors liquefied, tearing eyes, nose and mouth it a hole that was filled with the dark liquid that slid across Edward’s legs and onto the floor.  Edward was locked, sitting upright and unable to move.  The dark puddle flowed past the bedroom door and made wet sucking sounds as it crossed the hallway down to Edward’s parents’ room.  It was quiet for a long time.  Edward’s mind screamed in panic forcing tears to blur his vision.  All he could do was wait and listen.  There was a dull thud, like something heavy hitting the floor across the hall.  It was followed by the sounds of something heavy being dragged across thick carpet.  The tears were stinging Edward’s eyes, but he could not wipe them away.  A few more moments ticked away and Edward saw movement in his blurry field of vision.  A large dark shape wrestled something onto the foot of Edward’s bed.  He blinked and cleared most of the wetness away.  An impossibly thin figure was reaching a dark liquid limb towards his face.

      “Go ahead and scream now. There’s no one left to hear you.”

And Edward screamed, he screamed so hard his chest burned as if filled with fire.  Then everything went black.

      It was dark for a long time.  Edward could not tell how long it had been dark, but it felt like days.  It hurt when he tried to move, but he moved anyway.  He wanted to see some light, any light.  There was a noise and he twisted his head in the direction to see.  The noise was a shuffle like shoes on grass.  Edward strained his form through the pinched nerve pains to try and see.  There was another sound, a sound like autumn leaves rustling in a light breeze.  Then dim light faded into view.  Edward moved again to try and see more.  There was a wet sucking sound and he moved another few inches.  In the dim light three figures were standing, staring at something over him.  He knew these people.  His father and his mother were there holding hands with a boy.  Not just any boy, but him and he saw his mouth open.

      “See dad there’s nothing there. What a jip.”

      “Yeah, your right son. This carnival is a jip.” Edward’s father answered.

      Then they turned and walked away from what they thought was just an empty cage that held nothing.  The black drape fell.  The calliope played a dancing song.  The crimson banners and brown, dry leaves danced.  The carnival tore down their tents and moved on.  They left nothing behind that did not belong right where it was.