A chameleon lived for a long time in a terrarium.
It was not a desolate place. Under the warm lamp it had created a small world for itself: a stage made of paper, a palm tree, a doll. Sometimes it put on plays, just for itself, while a fish watched from its bowl, mouth slightly open, as if it wanted to marvel. The light made everything soft and golden.
But beyond the glass there was an incessant rushing – like a stream of words, thoughts, meanings that never came to rest.
One night the terrarium stood on the roof of a car.
The ride was fast, almost silent, and far below them a highway of glowing letters stretched through the darkness. Thoughts sped along it like vehicles, restless, glaring. In the glass, however, there lay a strange stillness, as if an invisible hand were holding the world still.
Then came the jolt.
The terrarium began to slide, tipped, fell. Glass shattered in the air, sparkled like little rainbows before it reached the ground.
The chameleon jumped out at the last moment, landed in the grass at the roadside, trembling, gasping for air. The fish had disappeared. The stage too. Everything that had been familiar was gone.
In the grass a boy was kneeling. Dark hair, a simple coat, on it a small golden crown pin.
He seemed as if he did not quite belong here.
“Hello,” said the chameleon.
“Hello,” replied the boy.
Thus their encounter began.
The chameleon told of the loss: of owners who had driven away, of the doll, of the fish, of the loneliness that suddenly filled everything. The boy listened. Something in him grew warm, as if someone had lit a candle.
“Then I want to be your friend,” he said softly.
They sat down in the grass.
The boy was called Peter. He told of another planet, of kingdoms, of water that was missing there, and of a queen named Alice. He spoke of an advisor, the Hatter, of crazy ideas and of the ability to fly – not through strength, but through calm. When he became still and thought of something beautiful, he became light as a feather.
But here, Peter said, it was too loud.
The thought highway rushed too close.
They set off, away from the noise, toward a green hill in the evening light.
At first the ascent was gentle. The grass whispered past their ankles, rocks appeared, cold and solid. The chameleon showed the way, nimble and sure. Peter followed, groped, slipped, found support.
At an almost vertical wall he doubted.
The chameleon held him.
Together they made it up.
From the summit the land seemed calm, like an unfurled carpet. The thought highway was only a thin thread on the horizon.
Peter placed his hand on the chameleon’s heart.
“Thank you,” he said.
Further up they found a mountain lake.
Mirror-smooth. Two abandoned deckchairs stood on the shore. They sat down, let their legs dangle, watched as the forested slopes were reflected in the water.
The wind brushed over the lake, carrying away the last loud thoughts.
Only a soft plop of a wave remained.
In and out.
Peter fell asleep.
The chameleon stayed awake.
It counted stars. Felt the warm ground. And thought, without words, with a clarity it had not known for a long time:
This is where I belong.
And when morning came – for of course there is always a morning, even after the quietest escape – it was no longer the boy sitting on the shore.
There sat, in the deckchair, Dr. Peter AuDHS.
He was the same, and he was different. The coat was gone, the pin was gone, but the look had remained: that look that can both participate and assess, that wants both to comfort and to order.
Next to him sat the chameleon, legs dangling like a small, old creature, and both looked down into the valley.
Far down below, far below the mountain lake, far below the mirror, the thought highway stretched. It still glowed. The vehicles were still driving. Words, reasons, memories. They drove as if they had to arrive.
Dr. Peter AuDHS leaned back as if he finally had nothing to take care of.
“Drive,” he said softly, and it was not clear whether he said it to the thoughts or to himself.
And he let them drive.
