The Lost Children (Tas Owake), Part Three: Never Broken (Yaiy Tyinohayon)

(Read part one here, or read part two here)

I was very young when I first stepped into my tree, too young. Otwan, being older, had already begun that, and I wanted to catch up with her. So, one day, I slipped away to play by myself, to find my way to my tree and be in it for the first time, if I could.

Qetawiwoy, as I explain to you, is the word for those of us born with trees and with separate bodies from trees. Qeta, tree. Wiwoy, those woy who look human, as you understand it. We do not enter our trees until both bodies are strong enough to be together and separate at the same time.

Kay-tuh, you say. It is close enough for now.

I entered the tree easily, slipped in as though between sheets of rain. Deceptively easily. Inside, I was caught in the ebb and flow of life inside the bark. The pull downwards of sunlight to roots. The rush up of water to leaves. And the vast web of forest around me, the chatter of the other trees, the touch of their roots next to mine. It was so… big. I had spoken with so many other tree woy before in our silent way, could pass days with Otwan without saying a word aloud if we didn’t have to remember those around us. But here, inside. Here was the whole world and I was so small in it.

So small.

Almost nothing.

Enough to be nothing.

To be lost inside.

To be nothing but tree.

STOP THAT. The words jolted me back to myself. Who are you?

I shivered, there inside, only barely holding to the thread of myself that kept me separate.

Who are you?

Weyai, I said, and the saying of it gave me back my own skin.

Weyai, good.

What are you? I asked, politely: Kayehuwawohut? Whoever was speaking to me hadn’t been polite, but that could have been oversight. Or perhaps they could tell I was still young. Either way, they didn’t answer.

What else, Weyai? What’s the rest of your name?

The rest of my name?

For a panicked moment, I didn’t know, and couldn’t say.

Weyai! Weyai!

I don’t remember!

What do you remember?

I thought hard.

I remember Otwan.

Otwan?

My sister. Otwan Hiqwayaqiqatiy. The name came to me easily. Oh! I’m Weyai Hiqwayaqiqatiy. I settled, in my tree, myself only, the vast forest still accessible, but outside of me.

There was a pause, and I was blessedly at peace again.

Nice to meet you, Weyai Hiqwayaqiqatiy. Now, can you get out of your tree?

I don’t know how.

There was a chuckle. One of Hiqwayaq’s daughters going into her tree unsupervised. Well, Weyai, press up against your tree from the inside. Can you do that?

I think so. I made myself as big as possible within the bark and came to the edge of me. It tickles.

Good, now. Step out.

Step out? But how could I—I saw the place where my tree and the air met, and I remembered that I had a body that wasn’t a tree and if I had slipped in like that, then…

***

Otwan begged me not to go.

I hear it too, Mother had said. Follow it. And I would have followed without her being Hiqwayaq. I would have followed it only for the heavy sadness in her words, for the echo of a chainsaw. For the reason I touched my tree with affection, and where my heart ached for the touch to be felt.

***

“I don’t understand,” says the woman I sit with on the back porch of a house surrounded by trees. To human eyes, we both appeared as such—as two women sitting together while the breeze wove around us and cooled our skin. Speaking human words.

“Qetatyawoy,” I respond.

She shakes her head.

“Qeta, tree.”

“I remember that part.”

“Tyawoy—a woy who is… in between. Whose form isn’t set.”

“A tree being without set form.” She frowns, staring at the forest.

I nod.

“But I have a form. And a tree.”

“Kayehuwekeq?” I say softly, and the woman draws back. You called to me. A world full of trees and you called to me.

***

We could be like sisters, too, I said. We had spoken often after that first time, when she had taught me to leave my tree, and we had taught each other so many things since.

Wouldn’t Otwan get jealous?

I don’t th—

Her cry of pain shot through me.

What’s wrong?

She didn’t respond, and so I ran on child-legs and stepped through bark to reach from within my tree to where she was. To where the buzz of the chainsaw was the roar of a beast in my ears, where the savaging of her bark, her body, left an empty space as though not even air could fill it.

Step out! I cried.

I can’t! I’m not like you; I can’t!

Step out! I begged. Step out, step out, step out!

But the pain overtook her and her voice stopped. The tree cracked, fell to the ground, and it was empty.

***

You stare at me now.

“You thought I was dead,” you say.

“For years.”

“I thought I was alone.”

In the telling of our stories, you had told me yours. How your tree had fallen to reveal a girl, and you were taken in by the people who had killed your home without knowing, were given a new name.

“Why didn’t I remember you?” you ask.

“You didn’t call me until after your tree regrew,” I say. “Maybe it was less painful to forget.” But I don’t know. A qetatyawoy with a body like mine. A qesutlhowoy with legs. I reach for your hand, and my heart is warm when you take it.

You stop, turn your eyes to our entwined fingers. “Weyai. I knew that name when I heard it. There was a… like lightning in my chest.” I feel you shaking through your hand in mine.

“Minerva,” I say, carefully. Inawa, my mouth wanted to say when you first said it, to bring you to us that way, but you corrected me, and now I say your name to you.

You grab me into a hug, arms tight around my body.

“I can’t believe I never told you my name then.”

Holding you as tight as possible, I shake my head and hold my breath, waiting.

“I am owake no more,” you say, and draw your own breath. “Kayiyi Minerva Thiessen.” My heart swells until I’m sure my body can no longer contain it.

Minerva.

My friend.

Never broken.

(Read Minerva's story before this one in The Tree Remembers)

The Lost Children (Tas Owake), Part Two: I Hear it, Too

(Read part one here)

Otwan takes in every detail of this Ewulin. Despite her clear voice, a wrinkled brow and one hand held behind her back as she rubbed her thumb. Replaying the young woman’s entrance in her mind, she detects an unusual gait.

It’s as though she’s still learning to walk, she tells her sister. And expects the ground to be liquid. I believe her that she’s qesutlhowoy.

She speaks as though she’s a human learning speech, Weyai replies. And with a name like that… I haven’t heard any like it.

Owake, then?

“Daughters!” Their mother laughs. Beside her, Ewulin shifts, bites her lip. Hiqwayaq pats her hand and addresses her. “I take it you haven’t met any tree woy?”

“I haven’t.”

Hiqwayaq gives Otwan and Weyai a smile. “Keep your comments aloud, daughters. Or perhaps listen to what I’ve called you to hear.”

Some days ago, a crow came to Otwan and bowed its head before croaking a message from her mother: “Bring Weyai and join the lhai and lhaiqi as we meet to discuss what to do about the owake.” As woy, neither gods or spirits, as humans would term it, Otwan and her sister weren’t to be in such a meeting, but when the highest lhai and your mother tells you to come, you come. And all the rest obey.

Hearing the invitation, Otwan had thought her mother needed Weyai to provide account of the voice she’d been hearing, spoken as a tree woy would, but with human words. To what end, Otwan didn’t ask. The owake were lost; lost were the owake. Live too near the places where this world and the human world touched, and crossover happened. But once someone from this world forgot they weren’t human, well. How do you find them?

Hiqwayaq brought up the topic from time to time, as far as Otwan heard from Yehan and other local lhaiqi, but nothing changed. Not that talking appeared to have made this change possible.

“What I remember first,” Ewulin says, “is being alone in a deep pool in a forest a little like this one.”

Alone?

Weyai takes Otwan’s hand, echoing Otwan’s horror at the thought.

“I lived there for—I’m not sure how long. My earliest memories are few and far between. I lost our speech. I learned human speech from the ones who would visit the pool, and I thought I was the only one of me there was.

“One day, a human fell into the pool and drowned. She looked like me. I swam out of the water and had legs; I don’t know how. And pretended to be her for a time, until I learned about the ocean again. Until I came home.”

A qesutlhowoy without the ocean… Otwan didn’t know what she would do without the trees. And a being of their world without any of their kind, with only humans, knowing they weren’t one of them? She squeezed her sister’s hand.

But this Ewulin, this supposed owake-who-was, couldn’t have endured that kind of pain.

“I don’t believe you,” Otwan says.

Otwan…

Hiqwayaq, calming the angry eruption that burst from the rest of the listeners following Otwan’s comment, says to her daughter: “Why not?”

“How could anyone survive being away like that, knowing they weren’t human? Knowing…” she trembles, glad for her sister’s touch. “Why not try to return sooner?”

Quietly, Ewulin only said, “I didn’t know there was anything to return to.”

***

I believe her, I say to my mother, but Hiqwayaq doesn’t respond. Not being a tree being, my mother didn’t communicate often like that, and usually didn’t say anything back. But I think she always hears. I’ve never fully understood how, if she’s not like Otwan or me, but she can.

Still, bolstered by knowing what I’ll say, I speak aloud.

“I believe her.”

“What?” Otwan nearly pulls away from me.

My mother nods and addresses everyone. “The qesutlhowoy that Ewulin returned to have checked everything thoroughly and I am convinced. An owake has returned. And it could be that there are still owake who think they are human but, for the sake of those who are alone—” I feel Otwan’s shiver at the word through my hand— “and who know they are such, we cannot leave them there without some effort to bring them home.”

“Oh, like we’ve always done?” says Iyhan, lhaiqi of a small pool-glade some way from here, near a thin place between ours and the human world. “We’re so good at leaving the human world alone.” She was still just young enough that disgruntled worked for her.

“You might have been owake yourself,” Hiqwayaq reminded her gently. “If things had occurred differently.”

Iyhan closes her mouth, her expression softening. “How do we find them if we don’t know how to identify them?”

Who are you?

I should tell Mother about the voice. And, as I look to her, I find her eyes meeting mine.

I hear it, too.

(Read the conclusion here.)

The Lost Children (Tas Owake), Part One: Kayehuwekeq?

The leaf bent under the weight of water, a single drop too large for the new shoot to hold and, with unselfconscious grace, green bowed to shed blue from its back.

With the same quality of motion, the girl knelt to cup the leaf with one hand.

“Not broken,” she said with a smile. “Never broken.” And stood, giving the leaf a stroke almost absently, but with a great deal of affection. Behind her, her mother reaches out and the two leave, hand in hand, before mother stops to pick up child and carry her home.

***

A tree now stands there, tall, still young by the count of trees, and I stand with it, watching the time when I was small in my memory.

Never broken, but others have not been so lucky. I remember the day, one of so many, but the day I knew, the bite of the chainsaw as the man who held it cut through wooden flesh, not knowing what it held.

“How many lost?”

“Too many,” says my sister, Otwan, coming to meet me. “Ready?” I nod, giving my tree a caress before we depart to a meeting with lhai, what I suppose humans would call gods.

“Has mother forgotten we’re woy?” I asked when Otwan first told me of the invitation. She shrugged.

“You know they wouldn’t dare say no to her.”

I supposed being Hiqwayaq has its advantages.

***

Who are you?

A voice reaching out from the distance, the farthest distance and the closest.

Who are you?

But it does not respond to that. So I try answering.

I am Weyai, daughter of Hiqwayaq.

Who are you? The voice echoes mournfully, and it is only now I realize we do not speak the same language. But I heard and responded as if its “Who are you?” was my native “Kayehuwekeq?”

“Kayiyi Weyai Hiqwayaqiqatiy,” I said to the silence after my question, before I realized, but now all I hear is the mournful echo of “Who are you?” and though I understand the words, I am too shocked to respond before the sound fades.

“Kayehuwekeq…” I taste the word.

“Weyai?” Otwan’s eyebrows are drawn together as she bends to see my face.

Human words again, I say, through my tree to hers. Spoken like this.

Did you tell her…?

I lift my head sharply to meet her gaze. I thought you had.

Otwan stares, open-mouthed. Then why…?

“Daughters!” Our mother says with amusement, dark hand raised to call for silence. She wears her summer aspect, golden and green, with brown between, and her hair brightens the forest with its burnished sunlight.

The lhai around her and the lhaiqi, the minor gods, among them stare at us only a moment before muttering and shifting as a group of strangers arrive. The man and woman weave through those at the far end, a young woman of about eighteen following behind, auburn hair nearly red when in the spots of dappled sunlight. The lhaiqi of this forest stands before them, stopping their approach.

“I am Yehan,” she says, “And this forest is my domain.”

The woman and man draw back with a bow. “She comes here at the behest of Hiqwayaq.”

Woy, then, to speak formally like that with a lhaiqi. Not tree woy, like myself or Otwan, I don’t think, as they do not respond to the unseen reaching out of the trees around them, nor are they connected with plants for the same reason.

“I am Ewulin,” the young woman says, voice wavering. Odd name. And human-accented words—could she be? But no, wrong voice. And too young. The voice wasn’t clear as they usually are in that communication, but something in me knew the speaker hadn’t been this young.

Kayehuwekeq.

Humans don’t have lhai, woy, the rest. They don’t care. Their “Who are you?” could be to any kind of being. Why assume the voice called to one close to it? But it did. I don’t know how I know, but I know it did.

“Let her past,” my mother says. Yehan draws back and Ewulin, glancing quickly with furrowed brow to the lhai and lhaiqi around her, approached my mother, the highest of the lhai. Hiqwayaq, with a wide, genuine smile, beckons for the girl to come to her and takes her hand with a comforting squeeze. “Tell them what you told me, and do not worry about formal address.”

Ewulin, keeping hold of my mother’s hand, turns to face us. She takes a deep breath and squares her shoulders.

“I am Ewulin,” she says, “Qesutlhowoy. And I used to be an owake.”

Murmurs breaks out, first at her assertion of being qesutlhowoy, louder at owake.

She has legs, says Otwan, sounding dumbfounded. But I heard her real question behind the obvious comment. More so than a qesutlhowoy—a sea being which would look to a human to be part fish or other marine life—having legs, an owake found.

A lost child.

Found.

How does someone who forgot what they are return from the world of humans?

How do you undo the felling of a tree?

Kayehuwekeq?

(Flip the page to keep reading.)

Here We Leave

When all has fallen,
fallen to the ground
and, deeper still,
into the flesh
and the ashes have subsided,
the storm has passed, eye and all
we are in the calm that follows, that precedes,
that is
without deception
calm

here we make our decision

here we make our peace

here we leave

Come to Me

Come to me
In my hour of need
Lord, you sustain me

Come to me
When I am weak
Lord, you sustain me

Though my lips may fail
And my heart be overcome
You sustain me

Come to me
Lord, you sustain me

I cannot see a path
But you are with me
I do not know the way
But your rod and your staff, they comfort me
I am drowning in myself
You lead me beside still waters
I wail and tear at my hair
You make me lie down in green pastures
“How?” I cry, “How can this be?”
You restore my soul

Lead me out of my anger
Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death
Bring me back to peace again
I shall fear no evil
What do I do when all are enraged around me?
You prepare a table for me in the presence of my enemies
Oh Father, Father, comfort me
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life
Grant my broken heart release; take away this pain
The Lord is my shepherd
I come to you
I shall not want

Come to me
When I am weak
Lord, you sustain me

Come to me
In my hour of need
Lord, you sustain me

Though my lips may fail
And my heart be overcome
You sustain me

Lord, come to me
I will dwell in your house forever

Don't Let This Be the End

“Stop!”
Ears pressed
Hands straining
How many voices need to speak before silence comes?
I am three again
Stop, please stop
Please stop, please

Lassoed into the middle
Not the middle
Lassoed nonetheless
Why did you have to tell me
Everything?

Stop

Please stop

Angry words are steel swords
They aim to rip hearts out
Leave the whole bloody mess on display, dripping

Why did you bring me in?

Do I join the burgeoning war?
Or choose to hold my fury mute?
These inherited passions threaten to kill, maim and destroy
I want, with a calm mind, to reason
But my mind wants to rage
And the raging mind disembowels

Why can’t you stop?

Hurt blossoms at the fingers of wrathful hearts
Pain births its children
And I am
in
pain

why could we not have been patient instead?
calmed our hearts to seek
calmed our minds to understand
it is not our place to decide the motivations of another
and yet we do, calling it righteous fury

Life and death lie as choices
On our hands
on the hands of everyone rearing for expression

I want to scream so you will stop
Why
Why did you choose this?

Destruction has expensive PR
compelling branding
an award for the path of least resistance
Its fans, its followers
Hold to their lips a megaphone
Preaching quick success
All while
The jaws of their master
Tighten unnoticed around their waists

I am pulled by its sway
It promises distraction with cacophony
Security with chaos
The assurance of everlasting invalidity
My senses are assaulted
Do as we do
And you will be justified
Your foes will be quelled

But they aren’t my foes
They aren’t anyone’s foes

Is it simpler
To drown in the sea of perception?

Wait
Wait
Eyes closed
Head down
Quiet
Quiet, please
No more

Volcanic winter falls as fire ebbs
Ash in hair
Mouth
Breath
Like snow, minus healing
Excrement instead of clean water

We have ruined this island
It stands disconnected
Sullen in its cover of failure
Will it re-emerge?
I pray not
Its land may become fertile
But only when the volcano dies
Alive, it forms clouds
But soot can neither bring rain
Nor dissipate

And I am afraid
Afraid of this island dying
And staying dead
So please stop
Please
I am afraid

‘Come to me,’ whispers life.
‘Come to me.
Bring me your sorrows,
your detached, bleeding heart
Bring me your blackened life
and watch.
Allow a single drop of rain
onto your dying skin.
Cup the leaves of one seedling
in your hands
whisper songs to it.
Calm the force behind your violence.
It is not what you think
Build again those dreams and visions
Yours, and of those around you
Strengthen the architecture of wonder
Do this
And you will turn around
To find beauty
Already emerged and flowering
Already waiting
For those who have eyes to see
Come
Choose me;
your world will burst
into green.’

Can’t you hear it?
Won’t you hear it?

please stop

listen

before you destroy each other

But you are still yelling
How do I turn away without shutting my ears?
My eyes?
I want my heart to receive sight of you
I want to breathe in your words
Please
Don’t let
This

Be


the



end.

The Mountain is Falling, part two

“What is truth?” asks my Father. (Read part one.)

“You.” I pause. “The forest?”

“And why did it die?”

“It wasn’t the whole truth.”

“A partial truth will never sustain a forest.”

“And there were rocks underneath.”

“Were there?”

I think. “No? Yes? I couldn’t tell. The roots might have got to them. They were buried.”

“A buried truth will keep the water from sinking in.”

At this, I squint at him. “But there wasn’t any water.”

“You didn’t get far enough for anything to change. What was the petrified wood?”

“What do you mean, I didn’t get far enough?”

“What was the petrified wood?”

I sit up, affronted. “No, what is this about not getting far enough? What do you mean?”

Gentle: “What was the petrified wood?”

I squint again, but it’s clear he won’t say anything about that until after I’ve answered his question so, with a sigh: “It was the forest.”

“And what is it now?”

“The mountain.”

“Do you see the cycle?”

The cycle?

Pain.

Fear and confusion.

Stepping back.

Partial truth.

Death?

“What’s the petrified wood?” I ask.

“Death,” he says.

Death.

Pain.

“What breaks that cycle?” I ask.

“Forgiveness.”

“I knew that.”

“If you already knew that, then why did you ask the question?” he says this not as a reprimand. He really wants to know the answer.

“That feels like the forest.”

“The mountain is falling,” my Father says, “and it falls to pieces. Those pieces grow a forest, but the forest dies and its bones are bleached by the sun-”

“They were bleached by the wind,” I remind him.

“Its bones are bleached by the sun,” he continues, “and I bring those bones to life.”

“Is that the only part of the cycle where things can change?”

“I haven’t finished the cycle.”

Eyebrow raised, I say nothing, but I listen. He has caught my attention.

“I bring those bones to life and they form a mountain. The mountain falls and, by my life, the forest grows, bigger than before. It is a process, you see.”

“But I feel like I’m missing something!” I cry. “This can’t be all there is! How do I know the forest will grow into a whole truth? How do I know the mountain won’t fall?”

“Why does the mountain grow?”

“The wind.”

“No.”

“Fear.”

“It comes together to protect itself. And then it gets hurt. What do you think it’s trying to protect itself from?”

“The sun,” I say nonsensically. I don’t know where it comes from.

“Who is the sun?”

“You,” I say, just as nonsensically.

“And who are you?”

“The moon.”

“Where are you?”

“In your arms.”

“Is the cycle still going?”

“It’s on pause.”

“Do you want it to stop?”

“Yes.”

“Then hold me, and let me turn your mountains into forests that will never die.”

“Will it take a long time?”

“It doesn’t have to. But that depends on you.”

“What do I do with the mountain?”

“Give it to me, and I will face it for you.”

“It can’t be that easy,” I tell him. “That feels like the forest, too.”

“A full truth partially received becomes a partial truth in the heart of the receiver. What was missing in the forest this time?”

I bury my face in him. “Animals.”

“So let me sing animals to you.”

And he does, a melody sweetly filling the emptiness that once was a world, the emptiness that is paused time, for to pull out of time for a moment is as if the world no longer exists. Softly spreading tendrils of white, yellow, gold, turning to scarlet, the notes twine the air around us. Notes of green and blue follow, the vanguard of a rainbow profusion as vines bloom and tender leaves open to brush against my cheeks. The buzz of insects chase after the ever-unfolding fragrance, bringing the blossoms nearer to fruiting. Butterflies thread through the space, purple wings vivid as though made of light, but it is the Father who is the sun.

I close my eyes and breathe in the music.

But how do I stop the mountain from falling?

“No,” says my Father gently. “That is the wrong question. How does a tree live?”

It takes in the sunlight. It takes in water through its roots, nutrients from the ground. It is made strong by the wind that presses against it.

“What does the tree do to make sunlight come to it?”

Nothing.

“The water?”

Nothing.

“Nutrients? Wind?”

Nothing. “It draws near to them?”

“Where do you find life?”

“In you.”

“How close am I to you?”

My arms tighten around him in answer.

“And how does the tree draw nearer to the sun, when the sun has already reached close enough to enter its veins?”

I open my hand to see a tree sprout from my palm. Light pours down on it; it opens its leaves to drink and, in so doing, raises arms to reach back.

“If you try to stop the mountain from falling because you yourself are not connected to life, the ground will not become ripe for a forest. If you tend a forest of partial love, that forest will die. And its death will grow into a mountain until it falls. But none of this is the path. Does a tree walk?”

“No.” I resist the urge to tell him the forest was about truth, not love. His hand in mine was knitting together something in my heart and the distinction became less important. Where else is truth found, if not love? If not him?

“So where does it go?”

Up.

“Come to me.”

But we’re together.

“Come to me.”

As the tree and the sun are together, yet they each continue to reach.

“Come to me.”

The mountain rises before me, a gnarled mess of ancient wood-become-stone. As it falls to dust and the forest grows up around me, I find myself surrounded by butterflies.

I stand in my forest, holding hands with my Father. As I lean against his shoulder, we begin to sing.

The Mountain is Falling, part one

The mountain is falling and the pebbles made from its crushing weight race to me and pile around my toes.

The mountain is breaking and the stones that couldn’t be made any smaller roll over the pebbles onto my feet, digging their jagged edges into my skin.

The mountain is crumbling and rocks form hills around me so I won’t be able to move forward when I come to my senses and regain the use of my muscles.

The mountain is split in two and the boulders race towards me, some stuck in the field of their weaker brethren, others flying past me, a few set to collide and I raise my arms but they bounce and land somewhere behind me, some stopping, others continuing on their incessant way.

The mountain is falling and now its bulk towers over me as it loses its balance and I am trapped against this wall of rock that came to rest against my body and in my mouth and in my nostrils and in my eyes and in my ears and I can’t go that direction but the mountain is falling and the mountain is falling and the mountain is falling…

I am the rock in the avalanche and as I grope behind myself, I realize I parted the waters and the air behind me is clear of disaster.

I step back.

The mountain crashes before me, its great bulk pulverizing all that came from it until lesser parts are dust and least parts are less than dust.

I face the mountain, trembling.

“The way is clear, the way is clear,” booms a voice around me.

“The way is gone,” I say, “The mountain has fallen.”

“The way is clear, the way is clear,” the voice says again as if I’d said nothing. “The mountain is gone.”

The mountain sinks into the ground and the grass grows over it, the trees sprout and reach into tall, spindling birch only to fall and die and decompose as new trees grow, over and over until the dirt covers the stone and there is nothing left of the mountain.

“The way is clear, the way is clear,” says the voice.

“The way is not clear,” I say. “The forest has obliterated it.”

“The way is clear, the way is clear.” I wonder where the voice gets its information. “The forest is ready.”

The forest dies without animals, carbon dioxide used up and nutrients leached from the soil, and the wind bleaches the fallen trunks, petrifies them.

“The way is clear, the way is clear,” says the voice.

“There is no way,” I say. “There’s nothing.”

“The way is clear, the way is clear. The mountain is building.”

The petrified logs shift with the changing seasons as the ground shifts, shift with the winds that dance through, shift with the earth as it moves, restless, beneath them.

The petrified logs clump together and entwine their branches until there is no beginning or end, they hold together, huddled against the cold and the rain.

They form the mountain.

“There is no way,” I say. “The mountain must fall.”

The mountain is falling.

I stamp on the ground, done with this game, and grow until I am a giant, taller than the mountain could ever be, taller than the sun is high and the world is a speck beneath me.

“Where do I go,” I cry, “When I don’t know the way I’m going?”

I lift my face to gaze into the eyes of my Father. He reaches for me and I let him take me into his arms to hold his adult daughter close to his chest.

He takes the world-speck between his thumb and forefinger and quietly smashes it to nothing between them.

“You had a whole world to learn in,” he says. “What did you find?”

“Nothing goes the way I want it to,” I say into his shoulder.

“That’s not true.” His voice is gentle and he holds me out to bend down and look into my eyes. I choose to meet his, though mine are downcast. “What did you learn?”

“There’s no way out,” I say. “There’s the mountain and the rockslide, the forest and death, and none of them are right. None of them are real.”

“What is real?” he asks, casually. “Someone once asked me that of truth. What is the mountain?”

“Pain,” I say, and close my eyes to hold him tight again and nestle my face into his shoulder.

“What is the rock field?”

“Fear and confusion.”

“Why did you step back?”

I pause. “I didn’t want to be buried.”

“Good. What is the forest?”

“Life.”

“But it died.”

I sigh. He sits, and I rest on his lap as I think.

“It’s me.”

“You think you’re missing something?”

“Maybe? I know I’m not, but what if I think I am? What if I’m operating out of this assumption that I have nothing but plants and all this oxygen but no one to breathe it?”

He doesn’t answer, but gently asks again, “What is the forest?”

“Nothing. It’s a lie.”

“What kind of lie?”

“But isn’t it some sort of truth, though? Because it did live, for a little.”

“What is truth?” But he says this seriously.

“You.” I pull out my head to look at him again, speaking with the earnestness of a child concerned that her parent doesn’t know something terribly important.

“What is truth?”


Read part two.

The Kitten Psychologist and the Kitten Come to a Conclusion

(Just jumping in now? Read the previous installment, The Kitten Psychologist and What the Kitten Did, or start at the beginning with The Kitten Psychologist.)

Both Worn Jeans and Green Shirt looked at me.

“Well, I have been having a hard time getting patients.” I said. “How did you know?”

“You told me about it. Before you knew I was sentient. And you’d told everyone else about it just before then, if not so bluntly as you did me.” The kitten glared at its owners. “What else did you think all those tales of financial woe were about? So, since you nodded and listened and did nothing to help, I decided to do so. After all, I had problems, and here was a psychologist in need of patients. You would have paid for the sessions if it had been your idea.”

I vaguely recalled that day—it had been at a party. Unfortunately, I’d been so down I’d had a little too much to drink to remember details.

“So you do have a heart,” I said. My friends bristled, but the kitten gave me a wry smile.

“I wasn’t about to let you know that. I am a cat. But,” it sighed, “it appears circumstances have forced me to reveal myself. Don’t go telling anyone.”

“I’d thought you were just being down on yourself,” Worn Jeans said to me.

“How are you paying for this office?” Green Shirt asked.

“Weren’t we here to talk about…” I waved my hands in their general vicinity. To tell the truth, I was embarrassed to admit that the only way I’d been able to afford the office for the past year or so was by subsisting off of less-than-stellar food. Which hadn’t helped my emotional state, that was for sure. “Was this only about the bank, or is there more?”

“Well, clearly there’s more,” remarked Worn Jeans.

And then proceeded to say nothing more.

“Ah, yes, well.” The kitten cleared its throat. “I went to more than the bank.”

“You what?” said both my friends in aghast chorus.

The kitten ignored them and addressed me instead. “Have you heard of the cat cafe that opened up in our neighbourhood?”

“The Cat’s Paws?”

“Take a Paws. Yes. They’re… willing to give me a job. If I have a bank account so they can deposit my paycheques.”

My friends and I all sat back. Hadn’t the kitten lectured me at length about the unfeasibility of kittens getting jobs? In great detail? Over Skype and email? Without giving me a chance to say much more than three words in a row?

“What will you be doing?” asked Green Shirt.

“Roaming their establishment, entertaining their customers by virtue of being feline. In return, they would provide me the means with which to pay off the debt I have incurred and, afterwards, continue to make use of this fine psychologist’s knowledge and experience.”

“Provided everything you do is your idea,” I said, a little dazed at being called a fine psychologist.

“Precisely. I do have my dignity to maintain.”

“And that’s why you went to the bank,” said Worn Jeans, as though not quite sure to believe these words.

The kitten nodded.

“You did all of this to help our friend?” asked Green Shirt. Oh. Wow. I hadn’t even thought of that.

“A friend who did everything possible to help all of us when my first strategy fell apart.”

“So what do we do now?” asked Green Shirt, but not of me. Of the kitten. Worn Jeans had also turned away from me and to the young cat.

The kitten, in turn, drew back and gave me a pleading stare.

Be honest, I mouthed.

The kitten’s head drooped, but only for a moment. It took a breath, drew itself up, and said, with the kind of poise only a cat can have:

“I cannot do this by myself. Will you help me?”

Maybe one day, the kitten won’t need a psychologist. Maybe one day, I won’t need a kitten. That’s what I’d thought more times than I could count ever since I decided to grow a conscience. But, before I left my office on Wednesday with my friendships intact and the kitten, impatient, had already gone outside, I paused a minute with Worn Jeans and Green Shirt.

“It’s hard to think it was scared of going outside when it first spoke with you,” said Worn Jeans. “I wish we’d known, but it looks like you really helped.”

I guess I did.

“Will our kitten’s visits be enough to help you keep afloat?”

“Not really, but it’s better than nothing.”

“Anything we can do?” asked Green Shirt.

I considered. Referrals would be great, but how awkward was it to tell your friends to go to a psychologist?

Probably no more awkward than telling them their cat was sentient.

“Let your kitten make its own choices,” I said. “And if you hear of anyone needing a psychologist, send them my way.”

“What if those people include us?” asked Worn Jeans.

“Just make sure you pay me,” I said, with a bit of a forced chuckle. My friends smiled, but I remembered our previous sessions. “How about, for now, let’s focus on being friends for a while. I’ve been moping around by myself long enough.”

“Sounds good to me,” said Worn Jeans. “Want to come over for dinner tomorrow?”

“That sounds amazing. I’ve… uh… been having a lot of Kraft Dinner lately.” I paused. Did I want to leave the reason in the blanks for them to fill in? But I supposed that, for all the talking we’d done, it was the things we hadn’t said that had led to all this trouble in the first place. “For the last year, actually. That’s how long my finances have been this tight.”

“Then,” said Green Shirt, putting a hand on my shoulder. “Come over as often as you like.”

There once was a little kitten who had decided that the outside was bad. One hundred percent, unequivocally, without question or shadow of a doubt dangerous. And yet, one day, outside it went.

Now the time had come for its psychologist to go outside, too.

And, once my friends and the kitten had left the building, that’s exactly what I did.

--

This story was first published on my Patreon. :)

The Kitten Psychologist and What the Kitten Did

(Just jumping in now? Read the previous installment, The Kitten Psychologist Tries to Be Patient via Email, or start at the beginning with The Kitten Psychologist.)

Wednesday arrived, and 2:55pm found me in my office, sweating.

I’ve really got to turn the heat down in this place.

Oh.

It is down.

Well, crap.

I’d cancelled my other appointments that day when it became clear partway through my first one that all I could think about was this one. This one in thirty minutes. My lunch tried to regurgitate itself. It did an excellent job. 4 out of 5 carrot-flavoured lumps for effort.

Who knew a kitten would be so much trouble?

I did.

And I went for it anyways.

And now I’m here.

Was the thermostat actually working, or just pretending to work?

I simultaneously wished the kitten’s owners would come early and that they’d never come at all. Between ripping this experience off like a bandaid and waking up to find it a dream… I honestly didn’t know which one would be better. Maybe the bandaid.

I sighed.

Yeah, it was the bandaid.

2:57.

What if I didn’t show up? I could escape out the window, right? Three stories isn’t hard to climb down. I’m sure it’s not.

2:58.

My knee bobbed like a squirrel on cocaine. When had that started. Stop that. Stop it. Gah. Now the other one was doing it.

2:58.

Still?

Agh.

Okay, this is ridiculous. Pull yourself together. Or at least pretend to.

The door opened. I jumped.

The kitten entered first, followed by Worn Jeans and Green Shirt.

Oh dear lord.

I licked my lips.

Had I had enough to drink today? My mouth was undergoing desertification.

“Hello,” I said. Cleared my throat.

“Tell the psychologist what you told us,” Worn Jeans demanded of the kitten.

‘The psychologist.’ Ouch.

“I went to the bank,” the kitten said.

“You what?”

“We’ve obviously got to supervise it more,” said Worn Jeans, arms crossed.

“Wait, wait, two months ago, your kitten was too afraid to go outside. Period.”

“It was?” asked Green Shirt. “I didn’t know that.” Both of my friends had been sitting tensely and, due to my nerves, I hadn’t noticed until now that they both… softened? Not much, but enough to remind me to listen. To focus.

I took a deep breath.

“Well, I’m not now,” said the kitten. “Obviously.” Its usual arrogance faltered for a split second when it glanced at its owners, but it soon regained its composure. “Since the source of all our arguments seems to be money and how to get it, it followed that I should start by opening a bank account. However I end up acquiring money, I must have some place to put it first. And let us not forget that this all started because I was paying you out of an account not my own. It was the logical course of action.”

Never mind Voldemort. Now I was dealing with Spock. Or Spocklemort? Voldepock? “So you have an account now.”

“Of course not. The idiot banker refused to open one for me.”

“Because you’re a cat.”

“Because I have no money. And I’m underage.” The kitten scoffed. “Underage. The whole system’s felinist. I needed to be accompanied by a parent or guardian, apparently. Which my humans refuse to do for me. Neither will they lend me any money with which to make my first deposit.”

“Can you blame them?”

The kitten eyed its owners. “I suppose not. But still. I’m trying to be responsible, here. You would think they’d see that.”

“And how are you supposed to pay back your loan, exactly?” asked Worn Jeans.

“I’m working on that!” the kitten retorted.

I made what I hoped was a placating gesture to both of them. “I’m confused. Why are you talking to me about this?”

“Don’t you see?” Worn Jeans’s hands jabbed the air. “It went to the bank. On its own.”

“Why is this even a problem?” Green Shirt exploded.

What the what now? The kitten and I exchanged glances, but said nothing.

“Honey…”

“No, really, why do we need to make a big deal about this? It went to the bank to open an account. That’s not a crime.”

“And whose money will it fill that account with? Ours?”

The kitten flicked its tail.

“It’s going to pay us back. It said it would.”

“It stole money from us for weeks, why would we believe what it said? And why does a kitten need money?”

“Because your friend needed help!” the kitten yelled.

And now for the thrilling(ish) conclusion!

--

This story was first published on my Patreon. :)

Farewell

The birds have flown
go on, go on
Their dark-rising shapes giving way
To the dark-arriving clouds
Thick with thunder
and the cleansing rain

Zac (Storm Foxes)

(I've posted a few excerpts from this one, which is circling in various forms in my head. This repeats some of the plot points of previous iterations, but in a different form. It's... getting there. Slowly.) 

I remember the anger most of all, driving me through the freezing, early snow. I couldn’t feel my toes in my boots and my ears hurt like they’d fall off, but right at that moment, I hated my father so much it didn’t matter. I hated him enough that I brushed aside the early nips of the storm foxes’ teeth. I hated him enough that, striding through the bush, I wasn't even scared. I hated him. He was going to pay. 

I reached the old, rust-red railroad, abandoned in the bush decades ago, the faltering line demarcating native eucalypts and wattles from plantation pines. Unlike the eucalypts, the pines looked natural in their coverings of snow. ‘Look at us,’ they seemed to say. ‘We were made for adversity.’ 

So, it seemed, was I. 

It was anger that propelled me through the darkening forest as wind spat snow in my face. It was anger that drove me deeper and deeper into the trees that loomed overhead, blocking the light that glinted in storm foxes’ eyes. But it was grief, when at last I reached the Winter King’s clearing, that brought me stumbling to my knees. 

I was eight, and Mum had gone.

“Fix it,” I told him, the Winter King, with his great stag antlers and all-seeing eyes. “Bring her back.”

He smiled sadly. “You know I can’t.”

I challenged his gaze. “Send your foxes. Find her.” The storm foxes, riding invisible on the wind, nipped at my ears, my nose. I ignored them. 

His smile vanished. “They are not my foxes any more. They no longer do my bidding. I could not send them if I tried.”

“Then make me one.” My heart hammered in my chest; this was it, this was my father’s punishment, the thing I’d set out to do. He’d driven my mother away, and now I would leave him too. “Make me a storm fox, and I’ll find her.” If I could ride the winds as they did, I’d find my mother wherever she was. Nowhere in the whole wide world would be too far. I’d find her, and I’d bring her back. 

The Winter King’s eyes glazed up with tears. “Is this really what you want?”

My jaw ached. “I do.” Cold burned my fingertips. Alive. I felt alive, so damn alive; nothing could touch me now. 

The Winter King bowed his head. “So be it.” 

I stood, too agitated to kneel, robbed of the fight I’d expected. “I hate him,” I said, though it was none of the Winter King’s business. The storm foxes circled me, red fur and cream throat, black eye and white tooth, glimpses magically visible in the gloom. “I never want to see him again.”

The Winter King laughed without mirth. It sent shivers down my spine. “Be careful, child. You’ve lost one parent already.”

I scowled and swatted away a fox that nipped at my ear. “I’ll find her.” 

The Winter King bowed and faded away.

The foxes’ nips grew restless, daring—a toothy, masochistic leer. For the first time, fear trilled along pathways that anger had made. 

I didn’t scream when they tore into me—I’d asked for this—but I couldn’t stop the tears from rolling down my face. It didn’t take long before blood joined them, trickling from my eyebrows, dripping off my earlobes, oozing from wounds on my neck and scalp. 

I closed my eyes, alive. It hurt, but in a way that was normal, natural: the physical response of a body being torn apart. For the first time since Mum had walked out, the pain in my heart dulled. 

The sharp, sweet iron of blood overtook the crisp smell of the pines. My pulse rushed in my ears until I couldn’t hear the quiet yips of the foxes any more. Slowly, I sank to the ground, fighting against the impulse to shelter my head. 

Maybe something had gone wrong. Maybe the Winter King had left me to die. Walked out on me, just like everyone else eventually did. 

I tried so hard to be good. 

Under all the pain, something began to itch. I opened my eyes. At first all I could see was a haze of red—blood, maybe, or fox fur? It was hard to say. But then the musk of fox grew stronger, the iron of blood faded into the background just a little, and I realised the trees were taller than they had been. 

No. I was shorter. 

I swiped blood from my eyes—

Ow. I had claws. I stared at my hand—paw—hand? I had paws?

Oh. I realised the storm foxes had withdrawn a little, and that the pain had changed. Instead of the sting of open wounds, I ached like I’d run to Melbourne and back. And I had paws. 

I tilted my nose to the sky and yipped with delight. I was a storm fox, and now I’d find my mother quick as breathing. 

I leapt off the ground, ready to soar with the winds and the snow. For a heart-buoying moment I flew—

The ground smacked into me like disappointment, and I discovered the truth: I was a fox. Not a storm fox. Just a fox. 

Foxes couldn’t cry. I was glad.

The Peace of the Gods

Under the maelstrom sky, a pond. Beneath that pond, a wellspring. Around that pond, the forest. The heads of the trees nodded over the small liquid hollow, needles a lattice as though the spring had reached into the air to form a shield against the violence of the atmosphere.

Into the peace it created, saint Gih arrived.

This was before his power; this was before his fame. Saint Gih came to the wood of Belameh while the goddess fought the first battles of the uprising, when doom lay on all their foreheads. A poacher, he entered the wood, seeking the white deer the hunters spoke of in reverent whispers, the white stag whose antlers shone like the moon. The antlers which, when ground to a powder, would keep a man from death.

Saint Gih arrived at the pool.

The spring lay beneath, unnoted, unseen. From it poured all the water of the air. Saint Gih had entered the clearing to escape the storm; Saint Gih had arrived to find the source of its chaos. Though he had found no deer in the wood, the lightning across the sky remained atop the water. The pool held it, branching to one side, branching to another.

And in the image held there, saint Gih found what he sought, though he did not know it.

A deer stood at the edge of the pond, a doe white as the moon. Saint Gih raised his bow. If he should not cheat death this night, at least he should eat. The arrow flew, shot truly, bent awry in the air that rose above the water. The doe fled into the darkening wood.

Though he did not know it, saint Gih’s death left him.

Before him, an arrow. Beneath it, a wellspring. The power that shielded the storm held half a weapon at eye level, and saint Gih stood transfixed. He turned to the sky, the dome above him, grown out of nature as though shaped by hands. He turned to the trees, arced when they should be straight. He turned downward, and saw the lightning in the water.

Saint Gih saw the storm in the water.

The words of those who were not yet saints came to him out of the spring. The words of those who fought the gods entered his mind and churned therein. He could not deny what he had once doubted, and though they saw only defeat, under the sky he saw their victory.

Under the sky he saw their peace.

Leaving the arrow, he entered. Leaving his bow, he drowned. Leaving himself, he submerged. And the wellspring rose to meet him. The wellspring poured through him to the clouds. The wellspring put the lightning into him. Saint Gih, who had hid from battle for fear, though that fear ate him until his shrinking heart sought the secret the trees hid, broke the surface converted to their cause.

He arose saint Gih, firstborn of the entombers of gods.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This story, first published on my Patreon, comes from my work in progress Hunter and Prey, which will be the third book in the White Changeling series. It may have differences in the final book, as this is taken from the first draft, but I anticipate it will remain mostly the same.

The other books in the series so far are Hidden in Sealskin and Like Mist Over the Eyes.

The L.A.O.S. Part 8

 Catch up on Part 1!
(Or maybe Part 2?) 
(How's about Part 3?) 
(Part 4!)
(Ooo, Part 5...)
(6! It's Part 6!)
(Seeeeeeeven!)

Inside, my new acquaintance gave me the nod as he split to join his team halfway down the room. I sauntered up to the top table and plunked down like to Megan like nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

I mean, comparatively, nothing had, right?

Megan shuffled her chair around to shoulder me out.

“What?” I said. “I came back.”

Greg’s gaze burned right through me, accompanied by a chill sense of dread as a hand landed on my shoulder.

“Chris Webb? A word, please.”

She was a stern-looking teacher, hair pulled back in a tight bun, heavy-rimmed glasses weighing down her nose.

My stomach twisted. I’d been in trouble before, obviously – though I wasn’t like some of the guys, I didn’t look for it deliberately – but this was different. I’d never been in trouble before when I’d been trying not to be. “I’m sorry,” I said, trying to forestall whatever might be coming.

Stern Teacher just raised an eyebrow at me and led me to the corner of the room. “Just stand here a minute with me, please.”

I leaned against the wall, arms crossed tight over my chest – and swallowed. Two other teachers stood at the table with the Losers, rummaging through their papers.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“You’re not supposed to leave the premises,” Stern Teacher said, echoing Megan’s words earlier. “This is a closed event. Who knows what you might have brought back with you.”

I jerked and nearly lost my balance against the wall. “Like what?” What did they think I might bring back? The plague? Ebola? Bird flu?

Stern Teacher pursed her lips and nodded towards the table. “If we find anything there that looks like it might be calculated to aid your team, any unpermitted materials…” She trailed off and relief flooded over me. I hadn’t brought a single thing back in with me; there was nothing to find.

Then one of the teachers frowned, staring at a sheet of paper in his hand. He passed it to the other teacher, who also frowned, before starting in my direction. It was Megan’s death glare though that really had me feeling queasy.

The first teacher waved the paper under my nose. “How did you get this?”

I stared. The paper was unfamiliar, thicker and creamier than regular paper, and more to the point, I’d never seen what was printed on it. I squinted. It looked like… I drew in a sharp breath.

“Yes,” the teacher said smugly. He handed the page to my stern babysitter. “A complete list of all the questions from the contest. All rounds. Verbatim.”

The Stern Teacher echoed my gasp. Perhaps she wasn’t so stern after all. But then – “Mr Webb, what do you have to say for yourself?”

“I… I… Nothing! I didn’t bring it in! I’ve never seen it before!”

I’d been in trouble before. Plenty of times. Even sometimes when I hadn’t actually done anything wrong. But I’d never been in trouble in front of a crowd full of people containing not a single person who’d be impressed by it. And worse: Megan caught my eye, and the death stare had melted. Instead, sheer and abject horror widened her eyes, followed very quickly by such an intense loathing, I actually considered phasing through the floor right there in front of everyone.

See, Megan? I wanted to tell her. This is why I don’t care.

The teachers finished their murmured conference behind me and my stomach jolted as I caught the final words: “…disqualify them.”

I shook the teachers off and strode to Megan, heart pounding like it wanted to burst through my veins. “I didn’t do it,” I said, wishing that if I just stared hard enough into the depth of the ocean, it would believe me. I’ve been to the ocean twice. Both times, it was utterly merciless, dumping me over and over and over, grinding me into the sand until I coughed and choked and conceded defeat.

The oceans of Megan’s eyes were just as cold.

“I didn’t,” I said. “But I’ll find out who did.” And just as suddenly as that, I knew that I would: that despite their stupid dorky glasses and perfectly knotted ties and passion for a Maths trophy that mean exactly squat out there in the real world, I would find out who had done this to them, because even though caring hurt so much I couldn’t breathe, having Megan stare at me like I was dog crap she’d stepped in when she’d expected fresh, clean snow was worse. A million orders of magnitude worse.

And as I walked away, escorted to the staff room by a posse of excitedly concerned teachers buzzing like bees over the prospect of Real Discipline, Pubic Boy caught my eye and winked. And I remembered: we weren’t the only ones who could phase.

A stupid Maths competition was one thing. Someone who had every reason in history to hold  grudge against us and could literally walk through walls, people, and anything else that stood in his way? I glanced back at Megan. She’d never let me protect her now. I’d never wanted to protect anyone before. Fights – real fights, not things staged and choreographed for show and reputation – they ended badly for me. But this time… I ground my teeth. Pubic Boy was going down.

[Continued next month...]

The Remarkable Insight of Jellybeans

They sit on the lounge they bought together, curled up in opposite ends while the TV blares. He sounds like the TV, droning on, talking with monotonous fervour about his job, his friends, his bike—and she can’t make herself care. It’s like ads, like prime time, like seeing the same reruns month after month after month, and what was clever and funny once is now mundane. It makes her think of canned laughter and dishes, taking out the garbage and catching buses. Forever, it’s been like this; he talks, she listens, never interrupting, never interjecting, the perfect girlfriend, the perfect listener, perfectly selfless, an empty vessel just waiting to be filled—and he’s never asked about her day, not once.

He pauses for a breath and, carefully, she lifts the jellybean jar from where it has been resting against her tucked-up ankles, out of sight but not out of mind, cool glass pressing against bare skin, ice in a desert storm. She unscrews it with perfect, measured movements, not too quick, not too loud, not wanting to interrupt his train of thought.

He glances over. “Can I have some?”

He hadn’t wanted her to buy them, called them a frivolous waste of money, and as soon as she got them home she felt like he was right; jellybeans had no   place in their pantry, nowhere to sit that didn’t highlight their out-of-placeness, garish in the cool dim company of potatoes and garlic, practical tinned tomatoes and stockpiles of penne pasta. He hadn’t wanted her to buy them, but she’d known all along he’d finish most of them, because that’s just how it was, and she’d never interrupted.

“Sure.” She peers down at a jar full of sugar, bright colour and empty calories, flavour that kisses the tongue then vanishes, leaving the mouth cloyed with generic sweetness. Bright colours, like fruit, or hummingbirds, or hope. She chooses a dark brown one speckled with white and twists around, arm extended so she can pop it into his mouth, a sugar pill, a placebo. His tongue brushes her fingertips, bird-like, here-and-then-gone, and she returns her fingers to her lap and rubs them on her skirt.

“Yuck,” he says, screwing up his nose, eyes never leaving the TV. “I hate the coffee ones.”

“Sorry,” she says, and fishes a second bean from the jar, brown, with white speckles. “Another?”

He nods, and stares glazedly at the telly; he has exhausted his supply of conversation topics, and she is unsurprised, because every night they are the same, and they are limited, and they are never hers, like the books kept on display to impress the neighbours or the ornaments that line the hallway. She presses the jellybean against his lips, a tiny act of rebellion, and he takes it without looking, and again she scrubs her fingers on her skirt.

He makes a face and spits out something that was perfect once, but is now half-chewed and mangled, its clear, worthless centre exposed: a shot of glucose, an empty hope, a painted, hollow corpse. “I just said I don’t like the coffee ones,” he snaps, shooting a sideways glare into her temple where it pierces, lodges, and she can almost feel the blood trickling down.

“Sorry!” she says defensively, resisting the need to rub her temple. “I didn’t mean it.” But a thrill stirs inside her stomach. He’ll believe her, of course he will, because she never interrupts—but this time, she meant it, and she hears alarums sound and horses neigh, and the clash of sword on shield.

“Hmph.” He reaches into the jar and scoops out his own handful, multi-coloured like the eggs of a rainbow, then scoffs them down all at once, chewing indiscriminately.

What’s the point? she wonders. Why have different flavours in the first place, if you won’t stop to savour them? She closes her eyes and selects one bean,        just one, its sugary surface smooth and slightly sticky. Without opening her eyes, she places it delicately on her tongue, closes her mouth around it like a secret, sucks it close and concentrates. Sharp, sweet but acid, tart—not lemon, but something close. Grapefruit, she decides, and rolls it between her teeth, trying to make the flavour last—but of course, the flavour’s gone and she’s left with that same inevitable, generic sweetness.

She feels the same; just a generic sort of sweet, a hollow-caloried person-shaped lump, valueless, worthless but for fleeting gratification that weighs heavy afterwards on the tongue. Does he feel that way about her? Although she listens, does it satisfy him? After the first flavour of their relationship is gone, is she still enough? She watches as he grabs another handful of jellybeans and sucks them down, swa-llowing them like liquid, concentration on the sitcom never faltering. Yes. He is satisfied with bright colours that smack of hope. Empty nutrients comfort him.

She remembers the man she saw earlier this evening, dark and tall, striding between the rows of the fruit market with confidence like a million-dollar cruiser amidst dinghies. He’d confronted a seller over her bruised nectarines, their blushing skins marred by brown stains of abuse. He’d caressed ripe lady fingers, inhaled sour green mangoes, savoured a dark burgundy grape. Not everyone is satisfied with hollowness, she realises. She is not satisfied.

He shifts beside her, mindless, and she knows that any moment now he will ask for his nightly cup of coffee—supermarket coffee, over-roasted coffee, old and dull and cheap coffee. But she is sick of crappy coffee; it reminds her of days spent under the flickering eye of fluorescent light bulbs, walled in by partitions covered with geometric patterns in sensible colours meant to detract from the fact that really, they are padded. A shiver touches her spine and she stares at the jellybeans, wondering.

And of course, “Coffee?” he says, and she wraps her fingers around the neck of the jar and decides. Generic sweetness is not inevitable. “No,” she says as her heart tries to break open her rib cage, or burst her veins with blood flow. She touches her fingertips to her temple.

He tears himself away from cued laughter and crude humour to give her an incredulous stare. “What do you mean?”

She shakes her head, lips sealed against the weight of what she has said. She can’t repeat it, it’s too heavy, it will break her jaw with its passing—but she has said it once, and maybe once will be enough.

He raises an eyebrow. “Bad day at work?”

And there it is, the very thing she’s been waiting for all these months, the thing she thought she needed to hear—only now, she realises it’s not enough. It’s jellybeans, with the gloss of hope on top hiding emptiness inside, and he, who is satisfied with handfuls of sugar and cheap, dirty coffee, will never be enough. She thinks again of the man in the markets, of sun-ripened strawberries made sweet with heat, of apples crisp and fresh so the juice runs down her chin when she bites into them, and she turns to him with eyes full of tears, with hands full of jellybeans, and a heart full of fruit. “I’m sorry,” she says, and catches his arm before he can turn away, before  he can dismiss her words as platitudes. “I can’t stay here,” she whispers, begging him to understand and knowing perfectly well that candy and cost-saving never can. “I’m leaving. I’m sorry,” and she’s not.

While he sits there in stunned silence, she passes him the jellybean jar and stands. “You’ll be fine,” she says, and smiles. “What we have is replaceable.” Gaping, he watches as she walks to the bedroom, where she picks up her blackwood jewellery box that holds the antique necklace she asked her grandma for when she was twelve, empties the single drawer in the dresser that holds all the clothes she’s ever chosen for herself, slips on her favourite shoes and rummages in the depths of the wardrobe for the pale blue fake-crocodile handbag she’d fallen in love with at the county show, the one he hated so much she’d never dared use. It smells of feet and old carpet, pencils and overripe bananas. A smile spreads across her face as she gathers up all the decisions she’s ever made, and carries them to her car. “I’m sorry,” she says as he stands on the porch, still speechless.

But she’s not, and she drives away with the satisfying sweetness of mangoes on her tongue.

From Two Comes All

There was a goddess who pulled two points together
Unconnected
Unrelated
They were nothing
They were something
She held one in each hand
Lifted above each shoulder, as if in blessing
Brought her palms together
Not enough to touch
She didn't need to
She knew
The points only needed proximity
A moment
Before pulling her hands away
And an entire web expanded between them
A world, created on two poles
A world, created
By two points
Two hands
And the possibilities have never stopped growing

The L.A.O.S. Part 7

 Catch up on Part 1!
(Or maybe Part 2?) 
(How's about Part 3?) 
(Part 4!)
(Ooo, Part 5...)
(6! It's Part 6!)


I was still fuming when I got back (having successfully devoured a Mc-Bigger-Than-My-Head Burger and two large fries), so much so that I rounded a corner and ran smack into someone’s back. Said someone swore and rounded on me.

“Watch where you’re going, Private Boy,” he said, looking me up and down. “Private Parts.”

I flushed, hands fisting at my sides. “Piss off,” I snarled, with what was fast becoming my usual astounding genius. Master of Wit, that’s me.

“Piss off yourself,” Public Boy – Pubic Boy? That seemed fair – replied, vicious grin lighting up his face. “Especially since you’re, oh, I don’t know,” he looked at his watch, “five minutes late. That little pocket rocket you have on your team, she won’t be too impressed about that now, will she. Been giving you the cold shoulder all morning. Think what she’ll do now.” He tsked and shook his head.

My cheeks felt hot and my jaw and fists hurt from clenching. How dare… I mean, it’s not like… And seriously! But most of all: what the hell? I inhaled, long and slow, and forced the tension away. “You know what?” I said, wrestling my voice towards normal. “You’re right. I am late. I should go.” I turned and walked away. Megan should be proud.

Pubic Boy snickered. “Oh yes,” he said. “Don’t let me faze you. I’m only a public student. My words should just… pass right through.”

I froze, heart jolted. He knew. He’d seen me phase through the door earlier and he knew. What else could that mean?

He snickered again. “Don’t let me detain you, though. I’m sure you’re just dying to straight-line back to your little friends. After all, they clearly need you.”

I flexed my fingers and worked my mouth, trying to make my dried-out tongue function. “What do you want?” I said slowly, wondering if I could just walk away from this. A chill ran over my shoulder, skin contracting and shivering as something fluttered over it.

“That depends,” Pubic Boy breathed against my neck. “What’ve you got to give?”

Abruptly I realised what the strange feeling in my shoulder was: his hand. The feeling wasn’t on my shoulder, it was in it – which meant that his hand… I gagged, and the motion jerked on his arm, which sent panic spinning through me. I gasped for air and forced down the chants of ‘Chris-fit, Chris-fit.’

“Easy now,” Pubic Boy said, steadying me with his free hand. “Stand still!”

I tried, fighting to stay upright against the whirling in my stomach. The world blurred and I tasted bile, panting, gasping. Breathe, breathe, breathe! I shouted at myself, covering my mouth and nose with my hand. I sucked at it, slurping in the air, but it forced me to slow down and I gulped, swaying.

“Dude.” Pubic Boy sounded concerned. How touching. He shook his hand free with barely a second of effort and grabbed my shoulders, spinning me to face him. “Seriously?” He wrinkled his brow at me. “Just chill, okay?”

I nodded, releasing my mouth and inhaling myself fully upright. I squeezed my eyes closed. I’m fine. I’m fine. “How did you do that?” I said with my eyes still closed.

I felt him shrug. “Same way you walked through that door.”

Guilt surged in the pit of my stomach. Megan would be livid. Crap. I was late. She was probably already livid. I exhaled shudderingly and opened my eyes. Questions. I’d been about to ask him something. I stared at his arms, still propping me upright. Oh yeah.

I dragged my gaze upwards to his face, just registering the concern in his frown before it vanished and he was sneering. “But,” I forced out. “Can’t you only do that with inanimate objects?”

“Inanimate?” His sneer deepened back to a frown.

It was my turn to sneer. I shook him off and straightened my tie. “Inanimate, doofus. Not alive.”

Anger flashed through his eyes. “I know what it means, Private Parts. But why should that matter?”

I rolled my eyes. “Oh, I don’t know: maybe because living things are complicated. Their molecular structure is irregular. Doesn’t that make it harder to phase through?” I bounced a little on my toes. In spite of myself, I was intrigued.

Pubic Boy shrugged again. “Glass is irregular. Wood is irregular. Didn’t seem to stop you with the door.”

I opened my mouth to retort – and stopped. Damn it. He was right. I blinked and close my mouth.

He snickered at that. “So, going to break that one to your dear little friends? They are your friends, aren’t they? You all looked like you were having such a good time.”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “Funny. No. I know them, that’s all.” Which was true: they weren’t my friends. They were the League of Extraordinary Losers, and sure, they’d invited me in when the rest of the world had shut me out but that didn’t mean I liked them – except maybe Megan, because hello, hot and intelligent.

So why was my heart pounding like I was trying to convince Dad that it had been Mitch that had wrecked the car that time, and not me?

Pubic Boy raised an eyebrow. “That so.” He paused, then continued in a rush. “And do they… you know.” He flapped his hand ineffectually. “Phase.”

I shrugged, trying to ignore my still-pounding pulse and the tiny voice that was whispering that this was a guy who’d pretty much attacked me just a few moments ago. “Maybe.”

“Of course they do,” Pubic Boy murmured to himself. “That’s why you’re with them.” He hesitated again, twisting up his mouth, then stuck out his hand. “Evan,” he said. “Evan Frampton.”

“Chris,” I returned, shaking his hand after only a fraction of an instant. So he’d tried to muscle me; the rivalry between public and private schools was as old as their existence, and he’d let up pretty quickly. “Chris Webb.”

He nodded. “Well, Chris Webb. We’d better get back inside, or your Pocket Rocket might just murder us both with her eyes.” His tone suggested that he wouldn’t be surprised if that turned out to be a real possibility, and I chuckled. Well, why not? We were a bunch of people who could walk through walls, after all.

[Continued next month...]

Alone

He lingers over his approach to the front door, breathing deeply, filling his dry, creaky lungs with the scent of home. Stone and damp, old tomatoes and dust. His life encapsulated by a perfect smell.

And he’ll never smell it again. The soulbond is drawing to an end, he can feel it, feel the weight lifting. Two days, he estimates. Two days and the bond will be gone. He’ll be alone for the first time in years.

He casts his gaze over the two storeys of the little house, crammed in at the end of a high-walled alleyway—and yet the only place he’s ever been able to breathe. The gang—his family, the ones he chose and raised—are like that. They kept him going when there was nothing else to live for.

He winces. What is he thinking? They need him, his protection—and he needs them. He pauses stiffly on the front step, rubbing the age from his knuckles and the pain from his face.

He opens the door and Tara storms out into the hall. She attacks the stairs without even a glance in his direction. His mouth bunches tightly as he suppresses a laugh. Oh, yes. This is home.

He steps inside and closes the door behind him, smoothing a hand over wood more worn than he is. He takes another deep breath, basking in the warm smells of oak and brass polish.

A sigh, from the living room. Is that her? Fortuitous, if so. The more of them he can avoid today the better. Dying is hard enough without having to say goodbye. Especially when one must die alone.

He creeps across the hallway, floorboards gently protesting, and pauses for a moment in the doorway to drink in the scene. The bay window to his left lets in the little light available in this bottom storey of a back alley, softly illuminating the furniture older than he is—and probably in better condition. His lips twitch in a half smile.

And there, curled in the single armchair by the fireplace, bathed in flickering firelight, sits Jessana. He smiles at the contradiction of the literary novel in her hand and the assassin’s knife lying on the table next to her, loving it even as he hates himself for nurturing the killer in her. But it had been necessary, a choice of her life, the life of his almost-daughter, against the lives of faceless, impersonal others. He’d kept her alive by teaching her his skills.

He tenses, thinking of what he is about to do; it feels precariously like abandoning her. Pain stabs at his ribcage. He sucks in air that tastes like age and smooths the mask over his face. They will never know about the pain—but the goodbye he can’t delay much longer. So he straightens from the wall, squares his shoulders, and enters the room.

Jess glances up and smiles. “Hello!” She unfurls her legs to get to her feet, but he waves her back down.

“No need for that.” He lowers himself into a nearby chair and nods at her clenched fist. “What have you got there?”

Jess sighs and rolls her eyes, putting down her book and offering her other hand. “Tara found it.”

“Unusual.” The glossy black ring seems the antithesis of Jess, shrouded in darkness as she is haloed in light. For a moment he feels as though it tugs at his soulbond; but the moment passes, and it is just a ring, if an unusually deep black one.

“Very,” Jess responds. “And I don’t even want to know where she got it from, especially if it’s where I think she did.”

“And where might that be?”

“A dead body.”

“Oh, Jess,” he says, laughing. “You’ve got your hands full with that one.” He grins; Jess grins back.

“Is there any hope?” she asks in mock despair.

He sobers. “Funny you should say that,” he murmurs. “I was just thinking the other day that she reminded me of someone.” He shoots Jess a significant look.

She responds with a wry smile. “Okay,” she says. “I give in. I’ll persevere with the little monster.”

He chuckles. “Good girl.”

The silence stretches. Jess glances at her novel, then back at him. “Did you want something?”

It’s time. It has to be done. His mind races for things to say, anything other than what needs to be said. Nothing comes, so he inhales and begins. “Yes, Jessana, I do want something.”

Her body language changes, becoming more alert. “Is everything all right?”

He smiles. “Everything is fine. In... in a manner of speaking. You see, it appears that I have...” He swallows, almost choking on the lie. “I have a son.”

Jess jerks in surprise.

“Yes,” he continues, finding his rhythm. “I was somewhat shocked myself to discover it. But the main point is, he is quite unwell, and his mother is unable to support them with all his medical expenses.” A slight pause before the climax of the lie. “I loved his mother very much. I... I have found a job.” He stares at the floor, sick to the stomach. “I'm going to live with them, and support them.”

He risks a glance at Jess, whose shock is written on her face. Shock, but not disbelief. That’s a good sign. He presses on, the hardest part behind him. “The house will need a new leader, Jessana. I want that leader to be you.”

“Me?” she says, incredulous. “Why me? There are others much better qualified. River is the eldest, choose him! Or Patty, she knows how to get everyone moving. Or Alek, or...” She flounders. “Why me?”

He smiles gently. “It has always been you, Jessana. From the moment you arrived. Don’t you notice how they follow you?” The whole world worships the ground you walk on, he doesn’t add.

Jess squirms. “I suppose so...”

He takes her hand. “They will support you. Never alone, remember? Do it for me?” He blinks back the tears that threaten to clog his eyes. Their motto, everything they live by—but he has to throw it away. He can’t cling to false hope, can’t risk having the bond transfer to someone he loves when he passes on.

Jess nods, exhaling. “Okay,” she says. “For you.”

“Then good.” He claps his hands once together and smiles. “That’s settled.” He makes to rise.

“When do you leave?” Jess says softly, and he feels her eyes probing his facade for the truth, pinning him back in his chair.

He shakes off her gaze, stands and closes his eyes; turns away from love and comfort and joy.

“It’s today, isn’t it?” she says.

He nods.

“Oh.” And she is there, beside him, wrapping her arms around him, and the tears that he’d promised he wouldn’t shed are coursing down his cheeks, making rivulets to rival his wrinkles.

Slowly, her soothing works its way into the crevices of his soul and the tears subside like dust settling to the ground. Jess pats him on the shoulder. “You should go, then,” she says. “Wouldn’t want to be late, now, would we?”

He smiles, a false, brittle thing that he erases before it cracks his fragile exterior. He flees to the front door and jerks it open, determined not to look back. He steps out, pulls the door—but Jess catches it and props it open, standing to watch him leave.

He walks away down the alley. Midway, Jess calls. “Wait!”

He steels himself, knowing he can’t deny her the chance for goodbye. He tenses as he meets her gaze, so piercing he thinks it might kill him there and then.

“Wait,” she says again.

“Yes, Jessana?”

“How much longer do you have to live?”

And there it is, the very thing he’s been trying to avoid, the reason he’d concocted the story of the job and the family in the first place. And despite it all, in spite of all his acting and plotting and planning—she knows. She still knows.

He works his tongue to moisten his suddenly dry mouth. “Not... Not much longer,” he says in a voice that rasps like dead leaves.

“How long?”

Those eyes. Stars of Fate, those eyes... He presses his own closed and forces the words out. “Two days.”

The silence and curiosity opens his eyes. Their gazes lock, and she nods. “Two days. Stay nearby. I’ll find you.”

“You can't!” he says, hands clenching. “I won't have the bond jump to you!”

Jess smiles sadly. “It can't. I'm already bound.”

He reels like she's slammed the door in his face. Jess, his precious, perfect Jess, is soul-bound too. No wonder she'd seen through his lies.

He nods. “Nearby.” She deserves that much. He turns to leave.

“Wait.”

Something thuds into the ground behind his feet, and he glances down. Her knife. His gaze flicks to Jess.

“For the pain,” she says.

He nods and picks up the knife. “For the pain.” Tucking it into his belt, he walks out of the alleyway for the last time.

Behind him, words echo down the street that smells like home. “Never alone, Guiro. Never alone.”