Lydia's Mollusk

by Sean Monaghan

  "Mm-hm. The water is cool and crystalline. Clearer than the ocean."

  Arnt took a pancake from the stack and put it on a separate plate. He poured syrup and squirted on some cream and spread some jam. He rolled the pancake into a tube, lifted it and bit off the end.

  "I want you to keep your phone on you," he said.

  "Yes sir."

  "At all times."

  "I might go swimming again."

  "Prop it on the shore so that it can see you."

  Lydia sighed and took another bite. It really was very good. A pity he wouldn't be around longer.

  "I suppose we need to get the doctor back again," she said, looking at her arm. "This is changing."

  "Yeah." He did look worried, that was for sure.

  "This is nice, though. You and me. Sitting. Talking. Haven't really talked since Dad—"

  Arnt threw his rolled pancake onto the plate. He stood. His chair scraped on the floor. He strode away. Out the kitchen door. Out into the yard.

  Darn. Just when it was going well.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Lydia showered. She ran it cold and the new bristles on her arm liked it, almost bending into the flow.

  The news filtered through at her from the shower's speaker. A missing child had been found in Nebraska's Black Hills, Alphabet were extending their donations and support schemes to all low income families, contact had been reestablished with New Origin on Mars.

  The water was soothing, though several times the shower told her that the temperature was well below optimum.

  "It is dangerous to shower so long at such low temperature," it said. "Please allow me to turn it up."

  "I'm fine," she told it.

  When Lydia was done, she dried using one of the plush peach-colored towels from the estate. Dad had always kept things fresh and new, and the towel seemed to actually smell of Mom. It was unnerving. Particularly after Arnt's momentary tantrum.

  The bristles in Lydia's arm were moving on their own now. Like little feelers. Trying to find something.

  That should have been unnerving. It wasn't.

  She dressed quickly. Track pants and a hooded sweatshirt. Dark green with Celtics across the front. A pair of fluffy boot slippers.

  Arnt was back inside, washing up from breakfast. Lydia got a dish towel and started drying.

  "You know that people haven't actually washed dishes by hand since 1983," he said. He didn't look up from the water.

  "That long," she said. "Really?"

  "Something like that. Automation and reconstitution."

  "People just have a hopper by the table and toss everything in. Machine stamps out new crockery for the morning and composts everything else."

  "Very efficient." Arnt took a dripping plate from the sudsy water and put it into the rack. "But you don't get to have this kind of time together."

  "Bonding over chores."

  "Sorry I got upset before."

  "No big deal."

  "It is. Clearly I have unresolved issues around losing them."

  "Don't we all?" Strange way she'd said it. There were just the two of them.

  Arnt put the last plate into the rack and waved at the sink to release the water. The mechanism whirred and the water swirled down the plughole.

  "Let's go and see the doctor," he said. "It's getting worse. Your arm."

  "I know. But I feel fine. That's what's weird, isn't it. Shouldn't this hurt? Shouldn't I feel exhausted with the energy it's taking from me?"

  "Road trip," Arnt said. "We should take you to a lab somewhere."

  "Shreveport. Wasn't that were Wills sent my biopsy samples?"

  "Mmm. Bit of a trek."

  "Overnight at least."

  "Takes me away from the ocean." Where had that come from? She glanced at the wall. The painting with the boys about to slide down the face of the wave.

  "The ocean," Arnt said.

  Lydia took the last plate and Arnt picked up the rack, giving it a bump with the heel of his other hand to knock off the drops.

  "You're drawn to it," Arnt said, tucking the rack into the cupboard space below the sink. "You were drawn to the lake. We could plot a course that takes us by waterways and bodies of water. Canals and rivers."

  "Sounds very complicated."

  Something squeezed at Lydia's arm. From within. As if there were strings pulling together.

  It didn't hurt, but the sensation was unnerving. The strings seemed to run right up past her elbow.

  "Lyds?" Arnt said.

  "What? I'm okay."

  "You're screwing up your face."

  "I'm fine."

  The dish towel and the plate fell from her grasp. The plate made a glassy, shattering sound on the floor. The towel fluttered. Pieces of ceramic skittered away, spinning and rattling.

  Arnt grabbed her shoulders. Guided her to one of the dining chairs. Got her seated.

  Her tongue felt thick. Dry.

  "Water," she said, but it came out more like wa-wa.

  Right away he was there with a glass and she drank, almost gagging.

  Arnt took her hand. He pulled it toward himself.

  The bristles leaned toward him. They were thicker and more uneven.

  Like the dying and dead tendrils from the head of her mollusk. How they'd been when Lydia had found it.

  "What is this?" Arnt said. "Something more growing from them. This is real serious, Lyds."

  "Yes."

  "Let's get down to the doctor's right now. He needs to see this."

  "He's retired, remember? A small town doctor. He already said that."

  "Yes. Let's get down there. Now."

  "He might not even be up."

  Arnt smiled. "He'll be up. Trust me."

  "We'll have to walk. I don't have a car, remember?"

  For a while when she'd first come out, she'd had a small two-seater Toyota runabout. The thing had chewed through its batteries when idle and with how small her life her had become—walks to the beach and to the store—she was barely using the vehicle.

  Ed, bless him, had offered to take it off her hands, and then said he could give her rides if she needed to get to the city. He went in regularly. And, he'd said, if he wasn't going, he could give her an afternoon loan of the car.

  "It's not far to walk, though, right?" Arnt said. "Come on, let's go."

  He let go of her hand and reached to her elbow to help her up.

  "I'm not an invalid," she said.

  But she reached around and took his elbow.

  Which brought her forearm alongside his forearm. The sensation was odd. Like a tingling. Like an opportunity.

  The bristles shifted. They turned.

  They dug into Arnt's skin.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Lydia's stovetop made a ticking sound, followed by a quiet pip. The element was now safely cool.

  Arnt's eyes widened.

  "Lyds?" he said.

  She kept hold of his elbow. The bristles from her strange wounds were burrowing into his forearm.

  "Lyds. Stop. Let go." But Arnt kept hold of her elbow too.

  "I don't know what's happening," she whispered.

  From outside came the squawk of a bird. Wind ruffled Lydia's hair. Had she left a window open somewhere?

  Arnt's eyes were going glassy.

  Lydia felt energized and lucid.

  Arnt's knees buckled. He dropped. For a moment he was kneeling. Lydia kept her grip on his elbow.

  He kept his grip on hers.

  He fell back. Landed with a thump,

  "Arnt!" Lydia said.

  She'd fallen with him. Landed on her knees hard.

  A tingle ran through her left arm. She let go of his elbow. He'd already let go of hers.

  The bristles all hung limp from the holes in her arm and hand. The looked like strands of seaweed lying across rocks at low tide.

  What had she done?

  Arnt was breathing, but it was ragged. Puffy. His eyes were closed.

 
Had he hit his head when he landed?

  Lydia stood. Found her phone. Called Doctor Wills.

  Except that the phone rang and rang with no response.

  "Please," she said. "Please, please, please pick up."

  After a minute she set the phone down. There was some way to set the phone to call back, and have the internal system run the call, but it was complicated.

  Right now, she needed to focus on Arnt.

  Kneeling by him, she checked that he was still breathing. What would she do if he wasn't?

  But he was. And it was more even now.

  She stretched out his legs, trying to make him more comfortable. Weren't you supposed to roll people onto their side? So they didn't choke if they happened to vomit?

  Something like that.

  She dragged him over and pulled his arm out.

  The one where her bristles had touched.

  Tiny puncture wounds.

  Chapter Sixteen

  By the time the doctor arrived—summonsed automatically by Lydia's phone—she had Arnt up on the sofa. He'd started to come around, but was still woozy.

  "Bad morning all around," he whispered.

  "Hush now. Let's see what the doctor has to say."

  Wills was wearing a lumberjack jacket, tan corduroys and a winter beret that looked like it had been stuffed and flown in from Scotland.

  "Cold?" Arnt said.

  "Always."

  From outside came the honking of geese. They periodically took to the air and flew in a wide V, right around the town and off to one of the other bodies of water around. One of the many charms of living in the place.

  "Seems like I'm making a whole lot of visits to your part of town," Wills said.

  "It was an accident," Lydia said. "I didn't..." She trailed off.

  Her living room was little larger than the kitchen. She had a small house, which was fine with her, but it felt crowded with three.

  There was the sofa, an ageing thing that was soft and cozy. Piled with sheets and blankets now for Arnt's stay. The smelled musty from years in a closet.

  A stark white Dreslen coffee table that had come from the estate, stood just in front, with an old, partly-done jigsaw puzzle and a small vase with some pretty purple clenullias.

  On the wall opposite was one of her paintings. A mountain scene with three gliding condorenes. Their bright red, featherless heads in stark contrast to their huge black wings and bodies.

  Wills set a black, top-opening bag on the table and sat on the edge of the sofa's middle cushion.

  "Tell me again what happened," he said. "Your phone tried to explain it, but didn't seem to have many points of reference. You pushed him over, or he fell and you tried to catch him."

  "He went to help me up," Lydia said. "I had a moment." She explained about the bristles.

  Wills frowned. He reached to her without even looking at Arnt.

  "What?" Lydia said.

  "Your hand. Give me you hand so I can see."

  "I'm not doing that. I'm not letting the same thing happen to someone else."

  He flicked his fingers. "Just show me. You don't have to let me hold it."

  Lydia held her arm out so he could see the holes and their new flaccid bristles.

  Except now the bristles weren't flaccid at all.

  And they weren't really bristly.

  They were waving gently. Soft and lively.

  "This is getting worse, isn't it?" she said.

  "I don't know about worse," Wills said. "It's certainly getting interesting."

  "Look at Arnt. See how he's doing."

  Arnt looked up at them sleepily. He took a deep breath.

  "I'm feeling all right," he said. "Head's a little sore, but that's about it."

  "Well, let's start there." Wills reached and put his hands on Arnt's forehead. "You hit it on the floor? When you fell?"

  "I suppose."

  Wills worked his hands around Arnt's head. At one point Arnt winced.

  "Yes," Wills said. "A nice little bump there."

  "His arm," Lydia said. "What about his arm?"

  Wills took his hands away and reached for Arnt's right hand.

  "Careful," Lydia said.

  "Always." Wills lifted Arnt's arm and looked.

  There were no marks where the bristles had dug in. No wounds of any kind.

  It looked just fine.

  Chapter Seventeen

  The wind was getting up. Ruffling the macrocarpa tree and bringing the vague hints of rain. Lydia closed the windows around the house—she didn't even remember leaving the one in her bedroom open.

  Doctor Wills finished his examination. He'd drawn blood samples from Arnt. A couple of drops, now safely in a tiny vial.

  Lydia stood in the doorway between the dining room and the living room. Arnt lay on the sofa, awake, but resting still.

  "The equipment I have at home can centrifuge and start the run," Wills said. "But I'll have to send the analytics away to be checked."

  "Shreveport?" Lydia said.

  "Cooperville. The hospital there can turn around results very quickly. Hopefully they can just run it on remote through my gear and we won't have to send fresh samples in."

  "He's all right, though? Just a bump on the head."

  Wills grabbed her left hand and pulled it forward.

  "Please," Lydia said.

  "Professional only. What's best for the patient."

  The tendrils—that's what they were—leaned toward him. They bobbed. As if ready to do what they'd done to Arnt. Dig in.

  Arnt wasn't going to be all right. It wasn't random. Despite what the doctor might think, the bump on the head wasn't the worst of it.

  It was easy to see the link between what had happened to her out on the beach, and what had happened to Arnt in the kitchen.

  What she'd done to him.

  "I think we should biopsy one of these," Wills said.

  "You already biopsied me."

  "Still waiting on the results."

  "Right. Shreveport, not Cooperville."

  "That's right. That said, I should hear later today." Wills looked over her arm again. "I really think you need to be admitted to hospital. These need to be removed. Surgically."

  A twinge ran up Lydia's arm. All those strings tightening.

  The tendrils tipped back. Withdrew partly into their holes.

  "Huh," Wills said. "As if they understood me and didn't like the idea."

  Lydia frowned.

  "It wasn't that. It was more like they responded to my understanding of it."

  "I get being worried about surgery. It's a frightening prospect."

  "No. It's more like they're part of me now. I can feel it." With her right arm, she touched her left elbow and bicep. Well above the sites of the punctures, hard holes and new tendrils.

  "There?" Wills's eyes widened. "Oh. I'd thought first it would be exploratory surgery."

  "We need to get her to a hospital," Arnt said. "Don't let her go back near a body of water."

  "What?" Wills said.

  "I'm getting drawn to water," Lydia said, focusing on Arnt, rather than Wills.

  "I'm looking out for you," Arnt said.

  "Yeah," Lydia said. "Yeah you are."

  Chapter Eighteen

  Cooperville hospital was a low, long building. A single story, set up like an H with very short legs near the main entry, and long legs behind. As if the H had pulled its pants up so its belt came almost to its shoulders.

  Inside it had a generic disinfected smell, with the vaguest hint of strawberry. The floor was heavy white linoleum and the walls had the scars of hundreds of bumps and scrapes from gurneys and wheelchairs.

  Inside the front doors, a kiosk greeted Lydia and Arnt warmly, with a friendly smile. As friendly as a machine shaped like an old-style fuel bowser could be.

  People bustled around. Some in scrubs, some in white coats, some just in jeans and tees, or some other form of street clothes.

  A panel in
the kiosk opened and a thick black chit wound out.

  "Take this along the corridor on your right," the kiosk said. She sounded slightly southern. "Room one thirteen. Samena will help you."

  Samena turned out to be a woman of Doctor Wills's vintage. She had a stethoscope draped around her neck and seemed ready to pounce on either of them to take their heartrate.

  She guided them into an office with a cluttered desk and a window that looked out into a garden area between the long legs of the H. Two tan gazelles strolled along, their straight horns black and sharp. They were small. No more than four feet tall.

  In short order, Samena had Lydia on an examination table and was peering into her eyes with a light-lens device. From the wall above, slender robotic arms waved, lenses and blades on their tips.

  Arnt moved back to stand at the office's window. He tapped at his phone, squinting.

  "Don't you go too far," Samena said to him. "I need to take a look at you too."

  "I'm fine."

  "Right." Samena looked back at Lydia. "He always like that?"

  "Always," Lydia said.

  The robot arms moved along Lydia's own arm. Little jets of laser darted around, coruscating on her skin as if it was some miniature concert venue.

  A section of the wall near the base pivots of the arms popped out, molding and flickering as it turned into a display, out on its own arm. Samena looked at the display and swore quietly.

  "That's not good," Arnt said.

  "It's not too bad," Samena said, but it didn't sound convincing.

  "I know it's bad," Lydia said. "I passed out when it first happened. I've watched them growing. Continuously. And changing. And I can feel them right up my arm. As if it's all blending with my body."

  "Mm-hm."

  "As if it's relentless. And then what happened with Arnt."

  Arnt was lucid now. Well. There didn't seem to be any impact on his arm. There was still a bump on his head, but that was about the worst of it.

  "Yes," Samena said. "I saw that on the notes your doctor sent through. We'll take a quick look at him too."

  "I'm fine," Arnt said.

  "No, you're not," Lydia said.