A Dawn of Mammals Collection

by Lou Cadle

  By the time she had only half-exhausted this clay source, the first net of fish had been caught and was roasting on the fire. She could smell them from here, and she wondered why animals hadn’t been attracted to the smell. Maybe the noise of the humans, or the heat of the fire kept them away. Or maybe to them, cooked meat smelled like ruined meat.

  No animals but humans cooked.

  At the lake, Hannah washed her hands and checked Claire’s neck, then joined in the brunch feast, trying some of the cooled snake meat as well. Cold, it was very chewy.

  Rex said, “Claire used some of the snake guts to fish with. She got this thing.” He prodded a fish fillet with a stick. “It’s new.”

  “Did she say—?” Jodi began, and then shook her head at herself. “She can’t talk. Duh, me. I wonder if she knows what it is.”

  “It looked like a normal fish,” said Ted. “I mean, like you’d see in a fish shop. Like a—I don’t know. Perch or something?”

  “Sure tastes better than these herring,” Dixie said. “I’m sick of them.”

  Everybody was. The oil was strong, and it made most of them belch. But it was food, with what Hannah assumed was high-quality fat content, and fat meant calories. She had worried that they’d get diarrhea from so much fat, but in fact it seemed to have the opposite effect on her.

  “Fruit,” she said, reminded. “I want some of you guys to hunt for a ripe fruit this afternoon.”

  Bob said, “We probably could use some vitamin C.”

  “We’re getting plenty of D,” said Nari. “That’s the one the sun gives you, right?”

  Hannah said, “I think I’ve read that organ meats will give you most of the vitamins you need. And eggs are good, if we can find any bird eggs.”

  Ted said, “I can climb trees and raid nests.”

  “There might be nests on the ground too,” she said. “It’s just a matter of stumbling across them.” She went to the lake to wash her hands of the fish oil. “So who volunteers to hunt for a fruit tree? Or berry bush. Either will do, as long as the fruit are ripe.”

  Ted said, “I’ll go.”

  Rex said, “If you all don’t mind, I want to work on figuring out the most stable lashing to make the frame for the hut roof.”

  “That’s great,” she said.

  Laina said, “I’ll go with Ted.”

  Dixie said, “Well, I don’t want to stay here.” She threw a glance Hannah’s way. It was not a friendly glance.

  So much for the apology mending that fence. “Great,” was all she said. “Be careful, guys. Remember that game trails might be dangerous.”

  The rest of the day, Claire insisted through gestures, she wanted to continue to fish. Because she couldn’t call out for help if she needed it, Hannah assigned Jodi to keeping the fire going, transferring coals to the pit, and burying the bricks to bake. “And if you can figure out some way to make the fire hotter, some design, all the better.”

  Rex’s face grew thoughtful at that.

  Bob started digging up the next patch of clay soil they’d found. Zach and Nari collected grass. Hannah went back to forming bricks, which she was getting better at with every hour she put into the work.

  She hauled them out to the fire every time she had a half-dozen made. On her third trip out, she asked Claire to sit down at the fire with her and Jodi. Claire was a lesbian, she had said, but it wouldn’t hurt her to hear this too.

  Hannah knew she was blushing as she said, “We need to talk about sex. And birth control.”

  Claire’s eyes went wide. Jodi found it a good moment to poke at the fire, which worried Hannah even more, that she wasn’t making eye contact.

  “I don’t know how much you guys know about the history of women and childbirth. But until about a hundred years ago, getting pregnant was incredibly dangerous. When our food supply is so uncertain, and the vitamins we’re getting are anyone’s guess, it could be really bad for you to get pregnant. Or for me. Any of us.”

  Claire nodded. A little too enthusiastically—she winced and put her fingers delicately to her throat.

  Hannah went on. “Women die in childbirth. Babies die in childbirth. And babies require a lot of special care we can’t give them. Not to mention, they cry. Cries like that? They’d attract predators, sure as we’re sitting here. So if you had a baby, I’m afraid your chances of seeing it eaten by something like the hell pigs would be high. And I don’t know about you guys, but I sure didn’t bring anything along on the hike for birth control.”

  Jodi still was stirring the fire, which didn’t need it.

  “Jodi? You hearing me?”

  Claire stared at Jodi, then back at Hannah, and then gave Hannah a little smile.

  Jodi said, “Yes, ma’am.”

  “I hate to be so blunt, but here it is. If you’re going to have sex, oral sex only. Don’t even get near doing anything else.” She stood and brushed herself off, glad it was over. She had thought she would never have to have “the talk” with a girl until a dozen years after she’d had her own kid, if that ever had happened. “Let me know if you have any questions. See you in fifteen with another load of bricks.”

  She was a dozen steps back into the woods when she heard footsteps behind her. Jodi trotted up. “Yes?”

  “I want you to know,” the girl said, and then stopped and looked around, as if hoping to find her next words written somewhere on a tree trunk.

  “Go on,” Hannah said.

  “I’m not. We’re not. I mean,” she said, blowing out an exasperated breath. “I don’t even know for sure he likes me.”

  Hannah had to work not to laugh. “He likes you.”

  Her face lit up. “Really? You think so?”

  “Well, I guess you’d have to ask him to know for sure. But no matter how much you like each other, I was serious back there. Serious as death. No intercourse, or near-intercourse, or anything like it.”

  Jodi nodded.

  “That it?”

  “Yes. I just didn’t want you to think we were, you know, shirking on our work.”

  “Or forgetting to watch for predators while you were kissing,” Hannah said.

  “Oh,” Jodi said, in a small voice.

  “It’s a dangerous world,” Hannah said. “I hate to begrudge you a moment of fun, but please don’t forget that.”

  “Okay,” Jodi said. She turned to go and then stopped and turned back. “But you did know Claire is into girls, right?”

  “I did. But you never know. When animals don’t have mates available, almost every species will turn to same-sex interactions instead. I figure it might go the other way too, for Claire.”

  “I think Dixie might—” Jodi said, and then stopped herself with a little shake of her head.

  Hannah’s worry shot up. “Might what?”

  Jodi opened her mouth, hesitated, and shook her head again.

  “Look, if I need to know it, please tell me. It’s not gossip if it saves a life.”

  Jodi could be seen to have an internal debate and come to a decision. She said, “I think she has an implant.”

  “Ah, well, thanks for telling me. I won’t mention to her that you said anything.”

  “Okay. I better get back to the fire.” She turned and ran back out of the trees.

  If Dixie did have a birth-control implant, that’d be one small worry off Hannah’s mind. But she’d have a talk with Nari and Dixie and Laina too, as soon as she found a chance.

  She pushed it to the back of her mind when Rex came up to her and showed her a lashing he was trying. He had wrapped two sticks perpendicular to each other and lashed them by crossing the cord over in an X. “I’m experimenting with how many times—how few times—I can get away with, and how much anchoring I need to do.” He wiggled the sticks back and forth to show that they were stable. “I figure if we pile up boughs and stuff on the roof, they’ll need to hold some weight, so they have to be able to bear the load even better than this.”

  “Yeah, we don’t want
a roof crashing down on our heads at night. And don’t forget if it rains, the roof will get heavier as it absorbs water.”

  “Good point. Also, I really wish we had brought more vines from the Paleocene. I think they’d work better for this.”

  “We haven’t looked here yet. Let’s you and I remember to. There might be vines, or a tree with bark that strips and stays flexible, or other sources that don’t require as much braiding or twisting.”

  “Everything takes so much time.”

  “That’s the truth. But once we have the bricks fired, we’ll be able to build the walls in no time flat.”

  “Which reminds me. I think you should make some holes in some of the bricks, for the uprights to slide into. Here.” He got down on his knees by her supply of raw bricks. There were still three she hadn’t hauled to the fire yet. He jammed his stick into one of them. “I don’t know how you’re planning to build the bricks together. Like offset them halfway, or what. But if there was a hole down the top course of bricks, or better, two courses, we could set the framing into them, then mud it up to make it hold even better.”

  “Yeah, I see what you’re saying. Sure. We just need to know what we’re doing ahead of time so the holes are placed right, and we can take it down two levels of bricks.” She said, “Hey, Bob, come over, would you?”

  The three of them sat and worked it through. Bob said they should mortar to make it work. Hannah had already worked out how many bricks she’d need of the size of cabin she was planning, so once they had the design worked out, she was easily able to compute how many of the bricks would need to have the holes drilled in first.

  “Maybe leave a stick in there,” said Bob, “so it doesn’t collapse as it’s baking. If the stick burns away, no big deal, as long as the hole keeps its shape.”

  Ted, Dixie, and Laina came back. Their arms—and Dixie’s small backpack—were full of yellow fruits.

  “Good job, guys,” Hannah said, “but we don’t need that many until I test them and make sure they’re edible.”

  “They’re edible,” said Ted. “Laina knew what they were.”

  The fruit were completely unfamiliar to Hannah. “Really?”

  “Sure,” the girl said. “I saw them in Columbia, growing in plantations, and in people’s yards too. They’re cashews.”

  Chapter 12

  “Cashews?” Rex said. “You mean the nut?”

  “The nut’s right there, at the end of it,” Ted said, pointing. “Isn’t that cool?”

  Laina said, “But you can’t eat the nut raw, just like it is. I don’t remember why, but you can’t.”

  “The fruit is edible?” Hannah said.

  “Absolutely. It’s a little—I don’t know the word. Not tart, really, but it puckers your mouth.”

  “You didn’t try any?” Hannah said.

  Laina looked guilty and worried.

  Ted said, “We all did.”

  “But you guys,” Hannah said. “We don’t know for sure. I mean, they may have changed in forty million years, right? This fruit could be toxic.”

  “I feel okay,” said Ted.

  Hannah felt like banging her head against the nearest tree trunk. She’d been over and over the food-testing procedure. She had three people—including herself—who were the only ones who risked testing foods, to keep everyone else safe. And these kids had jumped right over all that caution and eaten a strange food.

  “They’re pretty sour,” Dixie said. “And it’s like they dry your mouth out.”

  “Astringent,” said Bob.

  Laina said, “That’s a good word for it, yes. In Columbia, people waited until they dropped on the ground. Every morning, people would go out and eat them and toss the nuts aside for dealing with later. The fruits were really squishy, and juicy, and you got messy eating them.”

  “These weren’t messy either,” Ted said.

  Laina said, “They’re less ripe. We picked them. I think you’re really supposed to wait until they fall.”

  Rex said, “I want to try one.”

  “No!” Hannah said. “Not until we see if these three are okay.”

  “I feel okay,” said Ted.

  Bob said, “You have an expert at finding wild foods, and she told you how it’s done, but you just went ahead and ate anyway.”

  Laina said, “But I knew what they were.”

  Bob gave her a severe look. “You knew what they become. It was foolish, and I’m surprised at all of you.” He sounded disappointed, and they all three looked ashamed.

  Hannah said, “You’re sure you’re okay? None of you are feeling dizzy? Or strange? Urge to vomit? Stomachache?”

  Dixie said, “What would you do if we were?”

  “Make you stick your finger down your throat and vomit,” Hannah snapped. “And I’m thinking about if that’s what we should do anyway.”

  “Sorry,” said Ted, “but I don’t vomit. I mean, pretty much nothing makes me vomit at all.”

  Bob said, “Ted, your face looks red.”

  “It does?” He shrugged. “I’m fine.”

  “Hannah,” Bob said. “Look around his mouth.”

  Hannah walked over and looked more closely at Ted. The skin around his mouth did seem to have a redder tinge. “Okay, maybe it’s time to make you guys puke it up.”

  “I feel fine,” Dixie said. “It wasn’t all that great-tasting, but I’m not in the least sick. Is my face red?”

  It wasn’t. Only Ted’s.

  “Really,” Laina said, “don’t worry. People everywhere eat the fruit.”

  “I’d feel better about it if we were in the modern world. I’d feel better about it if I’d ever seen a cashew fruit for sale in the store.”

  Bob said, “Maybe they don’t ripen in transit.”

  “What?” Her anxiety was reaching such a high pitch, she had a hard time understanding what he might mean.

  “Bananas can be shipped green. So can pineapple. They can be ripened with gas or will just turn ripe on their own. So the shipping costs are minimal. But something that won’t ripen except on the tree, that can’t really be shipped around the world. Maybe that’s it.”

  “It’s the taste, I think,” said Laina. “There are better-tasting fruits.”

  “That could be,” said Bob. “Persimmons aren’t very popular. Crab apples are perfectly edible, but no one eats them, and you definitely don’t see them in stores. Maybe we should just wait and see.”

  “But if the fruits are poisonous, then it’d be too late,” Hannah said. “I think you should all make yourselves vomit.”

  “No,” said Dixie.

  “Can’t,” said Ted.

  Laina said, “I don’t see any reason to. I feel perfectly okay.”

  Hannah felt as if she had a rebellion on her hands. But she couldn’t force compliance. Either they were willing to make themselves puke, or not. She could hardly sit on them and force it to happen. She looked helplessly at Bob.

  He shrugged. “I guess we should get back to work. And keep an eye on them.”

  “Don’t hover,” Dixie said. “I hate that.”

  Zach and Nari came back then, with another load of grass.

  “Fine,” Hannah said. “Dixie, you work on cordage. Laina and Ted, you get the hand axes and consult Rex as to what size of trees and limbs we need to construct the frame for the top of the house. And if any of you feel sick, in any way, mention it immediately.” Though she had no idea what she could do if they did. At some point, forcing vomiting would not solve the problem any more. “And nobody,” she said, “nobody ever do that again. It only takes a day to test a food. We have fish. There is no reason to take such a risk even if we didn’t. I don’t care if you run across a banana tree with ‘Dole’ stickers on every banana. We still go through the testing process.”

  She was glad making bricks required so little focus. She was still able to accomplish something despite being distracted with worry.

  Ted went through a phase where his face—arou
nd his mouth, where the fruit’s juices had touched him—was definitely red. But neither of the girls had the same symptom. And after ninety minutes, Ted’s skin went back to normal. They all seemed fine. Dixie was short-tempered, Laina quiet, Ted full of barely contained energy. For those three, that was typical.

  She had Jodi and Claire cook the fish an hour earlier than usual, and everyone ate. They needed to build another debris hut for Dixie and Claire before they lost the light.

  Dixie was nervous about sleeping on the ground again and started talking about it as they banked the fire for the night. “Maybe I should sleep up in a tree.”

  “You might fall out. And the snakes might live up there anyway,” Hannah said.

  “Then at least build it out by the beach.”

  “They might live out there too. And we know for sure animals drink out of the lake, so a lakeside shelter seems the riskiest option of all.”

  “The grass.”

  “Definitely there are snakes in grass.”

  “I’ll stay up all night, then.”

  Bob said, “Dixie, you can’t. There are dangers all around us. The chances of another snake making trouble tonight are remote. Besides, it’s Claire who was hurt. Look at her. Does she look nervous?”

  Claire tried for a smile that wasn’t entirely convincing, though Hannah appreciated her effort. She hadn’t eaten, but she had managed to swallow small sips of water, which gave Hannah some optimism she’d recover fully.

  Hannah’s urge to care for the girl all day had been strong, but she had been thwarted not only by the need to work on the cabin, but by her utter inability to do anything to help Claire heal. She couldn’t do anything about that, but maybe she could reassure the girls in one small way. “Look, why don’t you two take our shelter, if that’s okay with everyone. All the little sticks are off the ground, even. And we never saw a snake. Everybody can build a new one for Laina and me.”

  Ted said, “I’ll find a good spot.” He, as well as the rest of the cashew fruit group, seemed to be fine and had eaten the fish enthusiastically.

  Zach said, “I’ll help you pick a spot.”