Until today, I was merely tolerated, but my patience has finally borne fruit. The oldest of the three males approached and I stood before him, eyes respectfully downcast. He muttered another incomprehensible speech then thrust his spear forward, offering it to me. Tentatively, I accepted it, raising my eyes to try to determine what else was wanted.
He nodded toward the cooking fire then rubbed his bare, protruding belly with slow, exaggerated motions. His meaning was self-evident. He wanted me to find food for the tribe. Instinctively, I knew that this was a test, that if I succeeded, I would have proven myself one of them. I smiled and nodded, indicating that I understood, then turned and left them.
There is no apparent pattern to the appearance, or disappearance, of the does. Sometimes, I see several in one day, or perhaps the same one several times; sometimes, I see none at all. I prowled the upper floors at first, reasoning that the presence of the tribe below would scare them off. Room after room proved empty, emptier than ever before. I now wonder what will happen once all the flammable materials in the house have been exhausted. Will we be reduced to eating everything uncooked? Will the house grow cold when winter comes, if it hasn"t, already? I have no idea what the date might be.
A familiar fear a.s.sails me. What happens if I fail this test? Will I have another opportunity to prove myself or will I be forever disenfranchised? As this possibility grows more prominent in my thoughts, I find my early confidence giving way to nearly paralytic anxiety. What if I cannot measure up to the tribe"s standards? What if I am not man enough?
It is much later now. I have failed. It would have been bitterly disappointing to have tried and fallen short; it is immeasurably more devastating to have faltered even before making the attempt.
I had nearly despaired of finding my prey before fatigue forced me to sleep. A dozen or more visits to every room had been unproductive. Exhausted, I sank into one of the few remaining armchairs, in what used to be one of the guest bedrooms. I must have dozed off, because I woke with a start, having slipped partway down, banging my elbow painfully against the carved wooden arm.
Eyes stared into mine from only a meter away. It was a doe, head raised from where she had been grazing on one of mother"s rugs. She watched me closely but without evident alarm. My spear was resting against the wall, near my right hand, and I reached for it very slowly, not wanting to frighten the animal off. She seemed oblivious to her danger and my heart raced with the prospect of making the kill, winning my admission into the tribe. I closed my fingers around the shaft and slowly raised it over one shoulder. My legs were stiff and sore, but I couldn"t strike while sitting, so I pushed up, ever so slowly, until I was fully erect, the spear poised for the strike.
At the last moment, as the muscles in my arm tightened for the final blow, the doe raised its head and looked at me and there was something familiar and almost human about its face. In that moment, I hesitated and lowered my arm. The doe took one last bite of the carpet then wandered off, unconcerned. I never saw her again.
The tribe was no longer camped in the foyer. Even the burn mark was gone, although the missing furniture has not been restored. I don"t understand, but I know that I will never be one of them.
Later. I am more confused than ever. I found the nursery again, although this time, my childhood toys and furnishings were mixed with more recent items: the desk from my study, the mirror I brought back from Paris.
I have gotten into the habit of avoiding my reflection in the bathroom mirrors, and the haggard and unshaven man who looked at me with panic in his eyes seemed like a stranger. But I paused this time and took stock of myself. True, my hair was long and my beard full, but neither was as disreputable as I had imagined. In fact, the longer I regarded my image, the more content it appeared. There was something familiar about the eyes and the expression, something that I finally recognized.
There was a touch of the doe in my face, or a touch of my face in the doe. I don"t pretend to understand that, either, but I think I am beginning to comprehend what has happened to me.
I glanced down into the foyer a few moments ago and something seemed out of place. It took a few seconds to register, but then I realized what it was. The front door was back. Stunned, I turned away, wondering what it meant, excited by its presence but worried, as well, worried about what it might mean, what might lurk beyond the door. Whatever it was would be the unknown; I was certain of that.
Suppressing my anxiety, I descended, but by the time I arrived, the wall was back in place. I expected to feel shattered by the discovery, but that wasn"t the case. I know now that when I am ready to face what lies beyond, a world in which the rules aren"t known in advance, and in which I have to find my own way and decide for myself what paths are worth following and which are not, the door will be there and I will open it and walk through and never look back.
But first, I have to get my house in order.
Don D"Amma.s.sa is the author of seven novels and three non-fiction books, as well as 150 short stories and several hundred articles related to speculative fiction. He has been writing full time since 2001.
Stone Dogs.
By Paul Jessup.
Thursday: English Lit.
The trees outside of the window are crystallized, frozen into a dance by the ice storm. Mister Harvey is reading a pa.s.sage from The Wasteland. But I can"t hear the words.
I only see his lips.
Thick, beautiful lips. The words coming out of them deep and bellowing. I hear some girls whisper and giggle behind me. I know they are thinking the same thing I am picturing him naked.
Maybe binding him up with his tie to the radiator in the back of the cla.s.sroom. Gently ripping the clothes from his body. Forcing him to love me, even though it is forbidden. Maybe I shouldn"t be writing this down? But that"s part of the thrill, I guess. Maybe he will come over, spy my notebook. Spy my trembling hands writing this. Peek over my shoulder and see these hidden words. This language shoved between pages like skin in a sheet.
I get a small thrill, a quick chill, even as I write this. He walks closer. Do I keep the book open? Leave the page naked for him to see? Yes. Of course.
He didn"t even notice. Walked past me. Invisible girl. I see his eyes spy the ones behind me. Always the ones behind me, the murder of pretty girls in the back of the room. Those beautiful little waifs, black hair cropped around their shoulders like feathers. The dark, staring, unthinking eyes. Like pools full of drowning children.
All guys look at them. The three of them all alike. Dressed alike, eyes and hair and mouth alike. Pet.i.te, perfect. Like swords lined up in the back of the room.
I will not write their names here. This is a book that will be buried under an ash tree. In a jar filled with broken gla.s.s and used coffee grounds. The names and words written here have power. I will not honour them with such a thing. Instead, I shall call them "the crow girls". "The sword girls". "The unkindly ones".
Thursday: Algebra The numbers on the chalk board do not look like math equations. They look like alchemical recipes. Like magical formulae. Circles, overlapping. Plotted with strange symbols, letters that contain hidden meaning. I wonder if there is a connection, somehow. Between the mental world that imagines such equations and the physical world, where such equations enact out their duties.
Maybe that is what magic is. That bridge between the two. Occult power existing in the actuality the merging of two worlds.
You may think I"m a strange girl, to think such thoughts. You"re right.
But that doesn"t mean you know me.
The trees outside dance faster. Sped up, animated dance. Whirling wittershins in sleet dresses. The ice smacking against the window. It sounds like a man, sitting outside and rapping against it.
I see snow and ice piling up. The trees are waist-deep now. Frost crystals spread across the pane of gla.s.s, like white, spidering fingers, crawling. Fractals. I could plot out their course in equations and predict how they will grow.
There is power in that.
Magic.
Thursday: Study Hall.
This is a windowless room. I cannot see the snow, the ice. I cannot see the trees dance. But I feel them, hidden behind the molding, grey walls. Shaking their bodies. They tinkle-tinkle-tinkle when they dance. Like a music box.
This teacher is just an overpaid babysitter. He sits in the back, scolding those who speak. We cannot talk. We cannot do anything. We are supposed to study.
I think I will read, instead.
Did I ever tell you about my favourite book? It"s an epic fantasy story, called "Stone Dogs". It"s very strange, very surreal. I happened upon it by accident at a used bookstore. I saw a wall of the same thing dragons, elves, dragons. Beneath these rotting and yellowed covers, I saw a single book, on the floor. Face up.
The cover was a thick paper that was textured to the touch to feel like human hair and bone. The ill.u.s.tration on the cover was a line drawing of a little girl feeding on a dragon. The dragon was dead; the girl was pet.i.te.
I bought the book with my lunch money.
I"ve reread it 46 times, already. I can"t stop reading it; it is a compulsion. Each time I read it, pages change; words change. Paragraphs are never quite the same with each reading. The characters morph; the landscape changes. Even the map in the back is constantly moving with each read, constantly morphing in shape.
And yet the plot is always the same.
I"ll tell you about that some other time. I only have a half an hour left to read and I MUST read. I feel all drunk and fuzzy even thinking about it. Thinking about that book. In my hands. Like hair on the scalp of a head running between my fingers.
Thursday: Lunch I usually go outside to eat, Geoff and me walking around the back lot talking and eating. Not today. Today, they said we are trapped inside. That the snow and the sleet and all the ice are far too dangerous for anyone to leave.
I feel caged. Sitting here, in the gymnasium, chewing on a stale salami sandwich. Geoff sits beside me, but he"s not talking. He"s just looking at crumpled mountains of paper in front of him. Scattered next to him are books on architecture, on engineering. On equations for worlds and universes. And a metal compa.s.s. And an ink and quill.
I would bother him, but I know he is working. Designing a world of his own, a galaxy of his own. Geoff is a writer of sorts. A creator. He has over thirty notebooks in his locker, filled with histories of this imaginary world, genealogies, genetic code for various creatures, the planets around it and the number of stars in the sky.
I know interrupting him now would be a big mistake. He gets angry when his work is disrupted; he yells and screams and throws his books at me. He is my only friend. I have no choice but to obey the whims of his imagination. I eat my sandwich in silence.
It smells like feet in here.
I want to go home.
Thursday: Biology.
The walls are plastered with the bodies of dissected animals. They are beautiful. Pinned open and revealing their innermost secrets labeled and categorized with painstaking detail. Like an open pocket watch, the clockwork displayed for all to see.
Geoff"s world is like that.
Orderly, open. Naked and catalogued.
I don"t listen to my teacher speak. She has a very nice voice, quiet and trembling. Like she is about ready to scream at any moment. A hidden hysteria in the background.
Her actual words are meaningless, pointless. There is nothing to learn when she speaks. Just words. Hollow things. I look instead at the pinned-open body of a pig foetus. The parts are so perfect. Like they are made of gla.s.s.
Thursday: Art Cla.s.s We have a kiln. But it is out back, covered by snow and ice. We can"t get to it to retrieve our sculptures. I fear I will never see mine again. It was a cat with wide eyes. I call it "Fear of Mice".
So, instead, we are treated to a slideshow on Renaissance Art. The boys in the back giggle at the nude women. I hear someone bark out the word "fat!" and another, "chubby chasers!" and I feel ashamed.
Am I like that to them?
At the end of the show, the teacher stands in front of us. Her name is "Glenda", like the good witch. She has no last name, none that she will let us speak. She is tall and thin; her arms are branches and her feet are roots. Her dress is brown and green, and she looks like a tree. The ice will be coming for her soon. To crystallize her.
She gives the usual speech. About beauty back then being different. That thin people were considered ugly and poor, and fat people beautiful and rich. She looks at me and winks.
I want to kill her. I hope the ice comes for her soon, turns her into a frozen tree, stuck dancing in the sleet and wind. If I see any ice, I will betray her. Give away her location. Let them come, find her. Swallow her whole.
Thursday: American History We don"t learn about real American History. We only learn the same mythology everyone is always taught. About Pilgrims. And Columbus. About JFK"s death and MLK"s life. We never learn the real stories. The little histories.
My dad has a collection of books in his attic. They are diaries from the Civil War. This is history. I"ve read most of them but not all. They are by civilians, soldiers. Wives and artists. There are no famous people. No war heroes, no presidents or congressmen.
My favourite one was written by a 14-year-old girl. There was a yellowed picture stuck in the pages. She looked like me. That is why I am writing this. This is real history. This is what happens when you aren"t famous. When you are invisible.
My teacher says something. I had to stop writing for a moment there, to listen to it. He got a note from someone outside in the hall. A shadow behind the crooked gla.s.s door. The note said that we are trapped. The teacher reads this, tells this to us with an air of authority.
We are snowed in. We cannot even open the doors.
I look at the window and all I see is a wall of white.
I feel like crying, but I don"t. I don"t want to be known as the girl who cries. That is worse than being invisible.
The note continues. Authorities are trying to find a way to get us out. It could be a day or two, at the least. We are to stay in the gymnasium overnight. The faculty will be laying down beds for each of us.
When the teacher is done reciting, he looks out the window. His face is convulsing, twitching. His eye is moving, like someone is pulling a string and making it go. His lips peel back in a sneer.
He was never attractive. But here, in this state of half-madness, he is downright ugly. I want to stand up, to be excused. But the bell has not rung yet; the period is not over. There are still more lies to be learned.
I am going to pull out my book and read some more. I need to be away from here for a little bit. I need to be someone else, somewhere else.
Thursday: The Gymnasium.
I write this in my bed. Well, it is not really a bed. It is a blanket on the gymnasium floor. With a pillow. The pillow and blanket are grey. The floor is cold and hard. I can see my breath as I write this. Rising from my mouth. The ghost of my words.
My pen has a light on the end. It was a birthday gift last year, from my mom. Before she crawled under the bed and into the tunnels beneath my house. I am glad she gave it to me. At the time, I thought it was a stupid gift. Tonight, it is a lifesaver.
I crouch beneath the blanket as I write this. I can hear sounds around me. Even though they separated us boys on one side, girls on the other I can hear people sneaking and talking. Whispering, moaning. The shuffling of blankets and the sighs of s.e.x.
I wonder if Mister Harvey is out there. Crawling beneath the blankets with the sword girls. Just the thought of it makes me sad and embarra.s.sed. And yet, at the same time very aroused.
I am going to play a game. I hear moaning now, several voices. And people whispering be quiet and hush, and please don"t get me in trouble. I am going to try and guess who each of them is. Try and figure out what is going on beneath other grey blankets.
Names escape me. I am awash in the sounds, the rubbing of bodies. I feel a b.u.mp next to me and know that whoever is right over there is doing something as well. I feel a soft touch of skin, an electric sensation all along my body.
I am filled with thunder. I hear them, moaning, moving. Thrusting. Faster. That skin rubbing up against mine. Accidental contact. Motion, emotion. Flames inside of me.
I have to put the pen down.
I have to put this notebook down.
I know I will feel guilty in the morning, even though I will do nothing wrong.
Friday: The Gymnasium.
In the morning they give us stale donuts and bagels. The donuts are hard; the bagels are chewy. I eat like it is my last meal. I made sure to check to see who was lying next to me last night to see who those mysterious figures were. n.o.body was there. Just an empty grey blanket and pillow.
I read after breakfast. First period will resume at nine am, like it does every morning. It seems there is no reprieve from the schedule. No matter how much the world has changed.
Everybody else chats while I read. I hear them, in the distance. Like muttering echoes from behind a wall. Talking the usual talk. Boys, colleges, work, who is cute and who is not. Who is cool and who is not. The names always change, but the pattern is the same.
I am at my favourite part of the book. The main character is a peasant girl named "Alisandre". She is very pretty, with dirty-blonde hair and intense eyes. In the book, her only desire is to become a knight.
The section I am at now is her trial for knighthood. Fourteen different rituals must be observed. A dragon must be slain. Sacrifice of self and family must be undertaken. Each time I read, it the rituals and trials change. But the result is still the same. She is knighted by the Prince of b.u.t.terflies. This is the first time she meets the Prince. When the Prince"s hand touches her shoulder, she falls in love.
Now for a little explanation. The magical land where the book takes place is called "Iblio". In Iblio, gender and rank are determined not by birth, but instead by trials that are a.s.signed to each station. With each gender and t.i.tle come responsibilities and awards, as well as rules for how you are supposed to act and what you are supposed to do and whom you are supposed to marry. What time of the month you are to have s.e.x, what day of the year you are supposed to give birth. What you are supposed to wear and even how you are supposed to wear it.
Geoff would love the appendices in the back of the book. They go into exquisite detail on the different ranks and genders, and the different trials and honours awarded. It is the sort of thing he would read and re-read over and over again.
Even though the prince and the knight are in love, they can never do anything about it. It is forbidden. One of them would have to undergo the trials of the princess, and neither of them wants to do that.