The Clarion

“We all lined up for our whipping by the shouting beauty and tender traumas of life. All of us so sensitive, and now this beautiful girl, with soft brown hair that was shot with gold in the sun. Another one of us starting to stumble.”

Peter plays the trumpet and works in a kitchen, partying; Stasi tries to climb the corporate ladder and lands in therapy. These sensitive siblings struggle to find their place in the world, seeking intimacy and belonging – or trying to escape it.

A promising audition, a lost promotion, intriguing strangers, a silent lover, and a grieving neighbour—in rich, sensual scenes and moody brilliance, The Clarion explores rituals of connection and belonging, themes of intimacy and performance, and how far we wander to find, or lose, our sense of self.

Alternating between five days in Peter's life and several months of Stasi's, Dunic's debut novel captures the vague if hopeful melancholy of any generation that believes it was never "called" to something great.

Wednesday

Head to toe, black. Nothing fancy about it — black pants, black button-up shirt, and my nicer shoes. I didn’t go to be noticed or seen, just to be a dark figure in a dark room, one of many.

We closed at 10 p.m. and Hassan, Danielle and I cleaned up and shut down for about half an hour. I had been wearing a knee-length apron so my pants survived the shift. I changed my shirt in the bathroom and checked my wallet for the second time to see the white baggie, and I counted my 20s. My shoes had an unknown spattering on them so I wiped them with a bit of paper towel I had wadded up and put under the tap for half a second. That was not a noticeable detail for anyone, I did it for me.

It was cold outside, colder than it had been any other day this week. I liked it. It sent a bright shock down my throat and into my lungs, and the lights of cars and shops seemed sharper, fractured. Hassan locked the door and the three of us said goodnight. White clouds of breath hung in the air around us as we turned and walked in separate directions — me crossing the street, south, Danielle going north to the subway, Hassan walking west, bare hands pushed down into his pockets.

Most Wednesday nights I did the same thing: I worked the closing shift and then I went downtown to a club we called Fifteen. The real name was actually Veni, Vidi, Vici, marked outside with the letters VVV. But adding up the numerals we called it Fifteen — VVV was awkward to say, and the full name even worse. You could tell if someone was new to the club when they said the letters or name, but when someone said Fifteen, you knew they knew — a secret handshake for the regulars.

Wednesday was an off-night, and it wasn’t a high-end, expensive club. It had a bit of character, it was a bit crooked. But it had a great house DJ and the bartenders didn’t care who you were — they got you drinks, fast. Even if you looked painfully ordinary. Those of us that went regularly grew quite fond and, whenever you went somewhere else, it always felt cold and shallow. There was no lineup on a Wednesday night, no cover.

I walked south for a long time, then turned left. I passed a handful of clubs and their throbbing sidewalks outside. One place, Silk, usually had a lineup, even on an off-night — I walked by two women standing outside wearing furs. And a guy too, near the end of the line, there was actually a guy waiting in a fat fur coat. Those shaggy shoulders — ridiculous. But I was fascinated and pretended not to look closely as I passed, still catching the winks of light from huge diamond studs in his ears. I had my hat pulled low over my eyes; I wasn’t the kind of guy he would notice.

I crossed the intersection just before Fifteen and again I remembered the convertible. I had even started calling it Convertible Corner to myself, this intersection, waiting at the light. It was a scene I couldn’t seem to describe properly to anyone — although I tried, a lot, usually while drinking. And yet I couldn’t shake the image either.

This past summer I had been coming here on a Wednesday night, a balmy July dusk, one of those midsummer dusks that fades slow. The sun had set hours before but the city cement was still warm. The air — the vertical stripes of sky still visible between the buildings — was glowing electric blue. And I was coming here, crossing this corner, and sitting at the red light was a white convertible, top down, full with five people. Two guys at the front, three girls at the back. The girls had sat up on the tops of the seats, the back of the car, so they were higher than anyone else. Everyone was young and everyone was beautiful. But they were stopped at the light for a couple of minutes, so the guys turned the music down and, in the awkward pause on the corner with everyone looking at them, especially the girls perched high on the back, everyone got out their phones. I stared at them, witnessing something — I don’t know what. Crossing in front of the car, I looked directly into the open convertible facing me. Music down. Everyone on phones.

For some reason I kept trying to describe this scene to people. Sometimes even strangers, when I had been drinking. The image, the picture of it in my mind, had stuck somewhere; I guess it was so funny and lonely, both. I think everyone assumed it was something about phones, some condemnation, a tired complaint, but I don’t know — that didn’t feel like what I meant. Not all of it, anyway. It was something about those moments in life we were most hopeful, the mundanely exotic things we wanted, the big nights in hot cars, the simple smallness of it all. The moments we were awkward and hopeful — and something innocent in that awkwardness. And that’s the part that lingered, that’s the only reason I remembered the white convertible. So in my mind it was Convertible Corner, this intersection, because I thought of it every time I crossed the street right before I got to Fifteen. And I always looked up and down the streets as if I might see the car again, and I thought of them as I went down into the club — forgettably young and beautiful, forever innocent and awkward. Everyone longing for that Big Summer Night and all its memories, fading like a comet tail.

I got to Fifteen, with the big guy Cody standing outside in a black parka, no hat on his shaved head. The sidewalk pulsed slowly, thoughtfully. There was no lineup so we just nodded at each other as I went in, tapping lightly down the steps into the basement. Cody didn’t need to chat.

Here was the moment for HSPs — you could walk down into a place and feel your whole body change, like a lizard rippling in colour and heat. Fifteen was hot and dark, painted in orange and black and gold. And the music, the bass — the earth pulled out from under you and then pushed back into your body. It was world-destroying and utter creation, almost religious. My life of 25 minutes ago was gone. This reality was a deep movement beneath that, unreal, exquisitely rendered.

But it was also just a club in a basement. I ordered a double rye and soda at the glowing bar. I drank it quickly, leaning against the bar but facing away, looking at the sparse open area where people would start dancing in an hour or two; I waited for the next moment when the rye would spread a warm pool inside me. It did, unfailing. I ordered another double and moved off to the side to drink it slower.