by A. J. Betts
He panted, ‘Don’t be stupid.’
‘I’m not!’
‘You nearly went down there again.’
My outstretched fingers sensed it – the coolness of air. The open hub. The temptation of water. He was right: I’d almost fallen in again. Was that so bad?
He gasped as he said, ‘I wouldn’t have the strength . . . to bring you back.’ I believed him. ‘Please, don’t run.’
‘I should. I know what you are.’
‘Don’t –’
‘I know what you do.’
‘Good,’ he snarled, and it startled me. ‘You know – good. So stop running.’
He was heavy on me, keeping me still. All of me ached. I wanted to fight but he was stronger. Each effort drained me. The taste of blood whorled in my mouth. I struggled until I couldn’t.
Tears trailed down my cheeks and neck. I was supposed to be with a boy tonight, but not the son, not like this, clothed and angry. Fighting. Losing.
‘Don’t run,’ he said again.
I would if I could, I thought. I’d run. I’d tell them all.
He remained heavy and close. His skin was tinted blue and I could see the veins in his neck.
I thought it was the stars that made him blue, until I noticed the dim glow of a light above the rice tank. Without that, I would hardly see anything at all.
My eyes were adjusting. My breathing was slowing, steadily, as was his. His breaths were warm on my cool wet skin. I shivered.
His hand, when it eased, peeled away finger by finger. His grip on my wrist softened. Then, bit by bit, his weight eased from me as he lifted himself, though he remained above, across my stomach, his knees either side, locking me in.
‘Don’t run,’ he begged. ‘Please.’
But by then the urge had gone. Where would I go? The son knew the night better than me.
‘Are you well?’ he asked, almost kindly.
Well? I’d been sinking down a cold, wet hub. I’d almost met God and I’d wanted to. How could I be well?
‘Luka was only a boy,’ I said.
‘He still is. He’s in the sleeper.’
‘He is?’
‘Yes.’
I knew how smoothly the son could lie, but even so, I wanted to believe this.
‘I’m supposed to be marrying him tonight. Doesn’t he like me?’ I wondered if he’d changed his mind. Was it because I’d been too pushy? Too plain?
‘It’s not that. He’s not your match. He was, in the records, but when I checked the family tree . . . You can’t marry Luka. Ever. I’m sorry. I told him after dinner. I tried to tell you, but couldn’t find you. You weren’t in the garden. He was disappointed, you know. Luka.’
‘He was?’
‘Of course.’ The son’s weight shifted. ‘I don’t kill people.’
‘I don’t know what to think of you.’
‘Don’t think the worst. Are you going to run?’
I shook my head.
‘Good. I’m exhausted.’
He eased himself off me. When I lifted myself to my elbows, I watched him shuffle along to sit at the safety mark of the hub’s round edge. I saw his familiar profile: the jaw with fine stubble; the nose that came to a point at the end, like the judge’s. He was obviously the son, and yet I could be fooled into thinking he was just a boy when he sat like that, his shoulders curled over and his hands cupped beneath his thighs. He gazed down at the water’s surface where more blue lights were pulsing and twinkling.
‘I knew you were in here,’ he said. ‘That night. With Aunt Kate.’
‘You saw me?’
‘I smelled you.’
It surprised me. I hadn’t considered I smelled of anything.
‘Like honey?’
‘No. You’re more like . . . smoke. Paperbark.’
‘I saw what you do to people.’
‘Bodies,’ he corrected. ‘Not the living. I wouldn’t – I didn’t hurt Luka.’
‘No?’
‘No.’
The son’s words were as slippery as water, but they were all I had.
‘Then why’s the hub open?’
If it wasn’t for body pieces to be lowered into, or for meat to be lifted up from, what was the purpose of the opened netter hub in the night-time?
The son shrugged. ‘I just like it here. Like this. Don’t you?’
Like was the wrong word. The hub had the mood of a shimmering dream, the kind I would wish to return to every night, if I could. The kind that would pull me back, despite the dark.
‘I come here to think, sometimes,’ the son admitted. ‘Tonight, I had to think of the best method of telling you about Luka.’
‘That was the best method?’
‘Well, I didn’t expect you to be . . . partly dressed.’
‘I had a problem with buttons,’ I explained. ‘You scared me.’
‘I didn’t mean to scare you. And I wasn’t going to hurt you.’
With that, I crawled closer to him. Closer to the edge.
Who’d have imagined water could be like this? At the surface, blue lights drifted and knocked, while below, others were suspended at varying depths. It was impossibly beautiful and, it seemed, inexplicably sad.
The son unfolded his long legs, his toes probing the water. Blue dots flared at the disturbance. When he circled his calves, the lights spun like children playing.
‘Are they signs from God?’ I asked.
‘I don’t know.’
‘Are they plants? Or meat?’
‘They are what they are.’
Then they’re stars, I thought.
‘They only glow at night,’ said the son, ‘and not always. I don’t know why. I haven’t worked out the pattern.’
I imagined him, the son of the judge, sitting in the stillness and watching, thinking, night after night. Stirring blue wonders while the rest of the world slept. A starry, secret solitude.
I understood why he would come. I felt at peace there too. Perhaps it was the blue lights that mesmerised. Perhaps it was Aunt Rose’s medicinals finally taking effect, soothing my nerves. Whatever it was, I felt unburdened. Staring into the swirls, I believed I could say anything.
When I asked the son if he was God, he shook his head.
‘What you saw doesn’t change everything,’ he assured me, his eyes shining blue. ‘There’s still a God.’
‘There is?’
‘There is. And there’s still a heaven.’
‘Good,’ I said. ‘I thought I was going mad, but I wasn’t, was I?’
‘No.’
‘The drip was real. And . . . Aunt Kate.’
‘You’re not mad.’ He grinned a little, crookedly, as if he alone knew me. And I knew him. ‘You’re just a girl with headpains.’
‘I know you get them too. That’s why you were in the way that day. You weren’t mending –’
‘I was.’
I nodded, remembering the wet circle that had disappeared as it dried. ‘You were. How did you fix the drip?’
‘With a bond.’
‘Bond?’
‘It’s a kind of glue, like the children make paper with. But mine’s stronger.’
‘Where does it come from?’
‘I make it.’
‘How?’
‘With seaweed.’
Seaweed was the soft leafy rope that small meats nibbled on in netter house tanks. Seaweed was slimy and plain, not an invisible, mending thing.
‘But how?’
The son laughed. ‘You really need to know?’
‘Do you think I’m silly for asking questions?’
He hesitated, smiled to himself. ‘Not at all. I boil it for a day, strain it, then simmer it for another day. Then I let it set like a jelly, so it’s wobbly.’
‘How do you know what to do?’
‘The same as you know how to care for the bees. The same as kitcheners know how to follow recipes, and doctors know which medicinals to use. Because I’ve been taught.’
‘By the judge?’
He nodded.
‘Are the drips signs from God?’
‘The drips happen, that’s all. They appear every now and then, and I fix them. The engine-service way’s been like that for generations, though we don’t know why. It’s not a sign. It just is what it is.’
‘You mend them. Then you stay there because that way . . .’
‘Makes the headpains vanish. Yes.’
‘How?’
He shrugged. ‘Pressure, maybe. It must’ve been built differently to the others.’
‘Built?’
‘Created.’ He sighed, then moved a foot, making the stars skip. Blue lights flared afresh, and for a moment his skin was aglow: blue chin, blue neck, blue chest. ‘Hayley, I don’t know everything. I don’t know why that way’s different, I just mend the drips and treat my pain, when I need to.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I said. I knew how difficult it was for me to hide my headpains from the rest of the world. It must be almost impossible for the son.
I wriggled further forwards. With an arm outstretched, I dragged a fingertip across the surface, making the blue lights skim and spin behind it.
‘Is this magic?’ I asked.
‘Phosphorescence.’
I tried repeating the word, unsuccessfully. ‘We should show Celia,’ I said, visualising how her face would light up. She’d forget the disappointment of marriage. ‘I’ll catch some in a jar.’
‘You can’t.’
‘I can.’
I heard the son exhale. Saw him shift the position of his hands. ‘What do you think would happen if Celia saw this?’
‘She might forgive me.’
‘She’d ask questions, exactly like you. Where does it come from? What does it mean? Why would God send it?’
‘So?’
‘So I don’t have the answers, apart from God works in mysterious ways. I know its name – phosphorescence – but I don’t know why it comes or what it’s doing here.’
I swirled the water with my hand. I didn’t mind there was no explanation. It was enough just to see it, wasn’t it? To marvel at its strangeness.
‘Celia can’t know about this,’ I heard the son say. ‘She’d tell the other girls, who’d tell the women and men, until the whole world would know and they’d all be asking questions and debating its message from God.’
‘Is that so wrong?’
‘Of course it’s wrong.’ He turned his face towards me. ‘Everyone would want to come in the night to do this. And then what? They’d start breaking curfew and then there’d be worse things than unanswered questions.’
‘Adultery,’ I murmured.
‘Adultery. Accidents.’ The son’s gaze returned to the shimmering hub. Stars were nudging his calves, wanting him to play. ‘And what if they wanted to come on the night of a death? What if they found me at the hub with a body and a knife, like you did? What would happen if Celia saw that? Do you think she’d still feast on meat if she knew what was exchanged for it?’
I grimaced. I hadn’t thought of it as an exchange: butchered body parts for meat. ‘Why would God ask for that?’
‘I don’t know,’ he said again, and I caught his frustration. Beneath his thighs, his hands quivered. They were the hands of a boy who cared too much. A boy who had no choice but to do terrible things. ‘I don’t know everything,’ he repeated, ‘it’s just how it’s been since the second generation. The son or daughter sends the dead as bait in the night, and God gives us a catch in return.’
‘But why would He –’ I stopped myself. The son didn’t know.
‘If the others saw a butchery,’ he continued, ‘do you think they’d still say their prayers so they’d be collected for heaven when they died? Would they keep working hard and living by the rules if they knew what God wanted to do with them? Would they still believe their lives matter? That any of this matters?’
I said nothing. These weren’t questions he sought answers for. He already knew, and so did I. If no-one believed in heaven, there’d be chaos.
‘People need to sleep peacefully knowing their lives make sense. They need to wake up in a world without unknowns. People need routine,’ the son went on, as if compelled to, as if he’d said this before; as if he’d been practising this speech his whole life. ‘People need to believe in a God that wouldn’t ask for butchery. They need to feel safe from bees that can kill, and drips that appear for no real reason. You tend the hive, Hayley – I tend the night. I fix the dangers, because nothing good comes from fear.’
‘But you’re afraid,’ I said, for though he’d spoken like a judge, I heard the fear in him, and it was greater than any I’d known.
‘It’s my job. I wish it wasn’t.’
I wanted to soothe him – there, there – and tell him everything would be all right, but he knew too much to trust in stories.
‘Thank you,’ I whispered, and then, ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t be.’
I smoothed my palm across the water. Stars dipped at my touch. I didn’t want this night to end. It was more significant than any marriage; more important than anything – everything – that had ever happened to me. This night was real. He knew me, and I knew him, and there were no secrets anymore.
‘What did you say this is called?’ I asked, cupping my hand under the blue lights.
‘Phosphorescence.’
I tried to say it but the word tripped up my tongue. I tried again.
‘Don’t worry,’ the son said. ‘You’ll forget it anyway.’
‘I won’t.’
‘You will. You’ll forget all of this.’
‘Impossible,’ I murmured, my fingers raking at water. If God’s face had risen to the surface it wouldn’t have surprised me. I would have even thanked Him. ‘I could never forget this.’
‘It’s only a dream,’ he said.
‘A dream?’
‘For you.’
I turned to see him. Blue lips, blue eyes, lowered.
‘What do you mean?’
I swallowed, recalling the taste of the leaves Aunt Rose had given me. She’d said they were necessary for relaxation for marriage. Was that what she’d said? Then there was the wine and the tea. Had it really been passionflower? Or something else?
‘What did the aunt give me?’
With lips pressed together, the son said nothing. A muscle quivered in his jaw.
‘What were the leaves?’ I asked. ‘Were they for marriage? Or forgetting?’
He dipped his face. I could no longer see his eyes.
I understood. ‘They’re for madness,’ I said, then pulled myself closer to him. ‘But I’m not mad.’
‘I know.’
‘Then stop it.’
‘The council thinks you are. They know about your headpains and the feverfew hidden in the strawberries.’
‘Who told?’
‘A gardener girl. It doesn’t matter. They know you’ve been imagining –’
‘But I haven’t!’
He nodded. He knew. The council, though, believed otherwise, and soon the whole world would too. From now on I’d be referred to as a mad one. I’d be treated like Fiona, childish and stupid and worthless.
‘You were supposed to remain in the garden, Hayley. You’re not a son or a judge. You’re just a girl in the wrong way at the wrong time, with too many questions.’
‘Make it stop. Please.’
I no longer wanted to forget, not even the bad things. I’d rather live with the memory of butchery than forget about this night. I didn’t want to lose phosph
orescence, or my new knowledge of the son. I didn’t want to lose myself.
‘I’ll be quiet,’ I pleaded. ‘I won’t tell anyone, I promise. I’ll keep it a secret: a responsibility. Just make it stop, please.’
Sorry, he mouthed.
How could I possibly forget this: the son taking my hand and gripping it in his; tears slipping down his face. His beautiful blue sadness for me.
Sorry.
Even the stars throbbed in sympathy.
‘How much will I forget?’ I asked.
‘Enough to be happy again.’
Chapter 14
Days cycled through their colours. I sensed them through my skin.
The world breathed out, breathed in; rhythms no longer applying to me.
I knew my name. I knew the word for plum. I knew other things but their sounds came out wrong. After some time, I stopped trying.
Doctors gave me medicinals. Mothers fed me, though I wasn’t a baby.
Was I?
Children whispered from the other side of a bamboo wall. ‘She’s not very old.’ Giggles.
‘I’m Hayley!’ I told them, but my voice was strange and the children cried until a teacher ushered them away.
Someone else came. A leaf in my mouth. Cold tea.
‘Luka,’ I said. Tried to say. ‘Where is he?’
‘There, there,’ said a woman. ‘You’ll be well soon.’
Sometimes I dreamed of blue. Not the blue of delphiniums in the spring, or the stripes of a blue-banded bee. Not the thin, spreading blood of a dying octopus.
Blue like tiny beating hearts.
Blue like swirls at my touch.
Twinkle, twinkle, little star, I hummed.
‘That’s a good girl, Hayley. A good girl.’ The doctor’s voice.
It comforted me. I wanted to be a good girl.
A woman bathed me. My body came to shape in her hands. Toes, feet, calves, knees.
‘Oh, petal, what have you done to yourself?’ Cloth dabbed at my tummy. In my head I pictured a wound.
The woman’s tongue made a clicking noise. ‘The garden can be a dangerous place.’
No. Not the garden, I thought. A quiet way. A broken box that cut me. A boy with fire in his eyes who held me down, but it wasn’t adultery. What was it?