by RABE, JEAN
She thought about going home, but she didn’t dare. She had not sold any matches, and her father would beat her—as he did every time she came home without any pennies. Besides, their home was little warmer than the street. Wind whipped through the roof of the tiny attic where they lived, though rags and straw had been stuffed into the cracks. Living there had gotten worse, especially since grandmother had died. The frail old woman had been the only one who had ever shown the girl kindness.
The streets were starting to ice up now, stealing the last bit of warmth from the little girl as she picked her way forward. Light shone from every window, and she could hear voices raised in celebration of the new year. She lingered near one house, inhaling the scent of apple pie, until a man going inside shooed her away.
Darkness came quickly, and the little girl huddled between two houses farther down the street. She crouched and pulled her legs to her chest, trying to get her naked feet off the cold stone. Her hands were numb, and she thought a match would be such a comfort. It was good she had not lost all the bundles. She took a match and struck it against the wall—scraaatch! It crackled and blazed with light. The beautiful flame warmed her as if she were in front of a big iron stove. She loved watching the orange halo of light as it snapped and burned along the wood. The smell of faint smoke entered her nostrils and invigorated her fading senses.
But the small flame died quickly. She lit another, and the friendly light warmed her feet, but she knew it wouldn’t last long. She needed to light a real fire if she was going to get truly warm. Her favorite thing was watching a fire in a hearth. That was the only time when she forgot about how truly alone she really was. The little girl looked for something to burn, but the alley was barren. It would be so easy for her to sit and light the rest of her matches, then let the cold take her.
Or she could get up and keep going. Endure the pain in her feet and find something to burn. She tip-toed through the layer of fresh snow, her feet feeling as if they were being poked with a hundred sharp nails with every step. The few people on the dark street pretended not to see her.
A shrill laugh caught her attention, and she saw the boy who had stolen her shoe duck into a rundown shack attached to an old stable. She crept toward it and peered through a hole in the wall. Five boys sat in a circle on a floor covered with moldy straw. Gold watches, wallets, embroidered handkerchiefs, and coins spilled across a dirty rug. They ogled the loot and congratulated each other, then the oldest boy handed each of the others a round pastry. They all tore hungrily into their meals as the oldest pickpocket counted the stolen loot. The boy with the cruel grin tossed her mother’s clog on the fire. It began smoldering in the hearth as the boys ate and prodded the pile of items on the floor, recounting the details of their robberies.
The little girl watched her dead mother’s shoe go up in smoke. Tears came to her eyes, and she felt as if the thieves were taking her mother away from her forever. It didn’t matter that her mother had died when she was born. She felt as though she had known her mother through those shoes. Her mother was solid, strong, and through those shoes went with the little girl wherever she went.
Now the connection was gone.
The pain in her heart hurt worse than the pain in her blue feet. She was tired of being walked upon by everyone around her, and the thieving boy had destroyed what little comfort she had left. She had walked all over the city in those shoes.
The boy had taken her most valuable possession.
Oblivious to her spying, the boys sat warming themselves beside the fire and stuffed their faces with sweet bread. The little girl’s stomach ached. She couldn’t remember the last time she had eaten. It wasn’t fair. Why should the mean boys be warm and fed when she was not?
Something burned within her and told her to take action.
She was done letting every person in the city walk all over her. Just because she was a poor little girl didn’t make her any less important. Her grandmother had always told her that, but until this moment she didn’t believe it. This would be her chance to prove her grandmother right. She would finally make sure people knew how special she really was.
She got out a match and crept toward the entrance to the shack. She struck it against the wall; for a moment she watched the flame, and then she slid it under the door. The straw on the floor caught fire, and she barely felt the pain in her feet as she ran to the other side of the shack and peered into a knothole.
The piles of straw caught fire at once. She stood warming herself and watching as the orange flames grew into a bonfire and climbed up the wooden walls.
The boys came running out the other side, cursing and coughing as the smoke rose into the sky. The fire spread, and she basked in the heat.
She stayed and watched the pain on their faces as their hideout and stolen plunder went up in flames. Now they would be on the street in the cold, just like her.
When a small crowd appeared, the little girl finally backed away from the flames and fled down an alley toward the main street. The girl found herself across from the shop where the merchant had raised his fist at her. In the darkness, she couldn’t see any sign of her lost shoe still buried in the road. No carriages trundled down the empty street, so she crossed it, trying to stay on the frozen parts of the ground. But her bare feet were soon covered in icy mud. She made her way to the back of the shop, which had the façade of a house. She could see through the glass of a tall window where a great table had been laid out with a magnificent feast.
The smell of a roast goose and fresh baked bread wafted out, and she saw the fat merchant stuffing meat into his mouth. He licked his greasy fingers as the woman and three children around the table kept their heads down and their mouths shut. She reasoned that he used his fat fists against them as well. They all seemed miserable, even as they ate from fine porcelain plates on a clean tablecloth. One of the children pushed away his plate and crinkled his face. Did any of them even know how much they had when so many had nothing?
Her gaze lingered on the goose that had to be stuffed with plums and apples. She imagined it rising up from the table and dancing toward her. The little girl shook her head and noticed the pile of broken crates beside the house. They had been shielded by the roof and very little snow covered them. She lit a match and used a piece of her tattered dress for the tinder. The cold wood refused to burn, but she struck match after match until the crates started to smolder. She warmed her feet as the flames spread and the merchant’s house caught fire at last.
The flames went up the wall, and in the glow of the light she imagined the tallest and most beautiful Christmas tree she had ever seen. Thousands of candles and ornaments adorned the branches. She sat staring at the beautiful tree and bathed herself in the heat. The candles on the tree rose high into the air and became stars. The brightest candle on the top of the tree turned into a shooting star that streaked across the heavens.
“Someone will die tonight,” she whispered to herself, remembering when her grandmother told her that a shooting star was a soul going up to God.
Screams inside the house made her flinch. The stars and the tree disappeared. The fire had spread under the roof and smoke belched out of the eaves and the windows on the second floor. The fat merchant stumbled out of the doorway and his family followed. The little girl hid in the shadows and watched them as they stared in horror as the fire consumed the roof. Flames spread to the white tablecloth on their feast table and the merchant cursed God for his misfortune. If the man and his family only knew what misfortune really was.
The little girl wondered if they would appreciate what they once had now that it was gone. She scurried away on bare stone, as the snow around the house had melted from the heat. The warmth in her feet soon faded, and she wished for the comfort of her mother’s overlarge shoes.
The deserted streets gave her no comfort, and the raw soles of her feet ached as she walked on the ice and snow. There was still one bunch of matches tucked in her apron. One more fire might see h
er through the night.
A cold wind blew from the cemetery where her mother was buried. The girl hurried past it. The stone bridge over the canal was covered with ice, and she used the railing for support to avoid slipping to the ground. The snow was deeper in the decrepit neighborhood where her father had his tiny house. As she trudged onward, the air burned as she sucked it into her lungs. The cloud of steam coming from her mouth became bigger, and she forgot what it felt like to be warm and safe.
The back door to her father’s house was open, and she slipped inside. His two hauling carts piled with canvas sheets occupied the lower level. All the shovels and picks that had once hung on the wall were gone, sold off to pay for her father’s time at the taverns.
The stairs up to the attic where they lived creaked, though she heard no sound of movement above her. The door opened with a loud squeal, but her father didn’t stir from the bed where he was passed out. A large mug lay on its side beneath the bed, and the smell of a strong drink lingered in the air. He wouldn’t give her a beating on the last night of the year. She was finished getting beaten by him.
The wind whistled through the roof as the little girl glanced at the empty hearth. There was nothing to burn. She remembered when her grandmother died that her father stripped the body of its woolen garments as fuel for their fire. If he hadn’t spent all of their money at the alehouses, they could have bought wood or coal. Grandmother might still be alive.
The little girl went back down the stairs, consumed with a loathing for her father. She climbed into the cart with a canvas sheet that her father used to cover the loads that he hauled. She could barely feel the last bundle of matches in her apron because her hands were so numb. She failed to bring the first three matches to life, ruining them as she kept scraping the heads against the cart until they broke. Her fourth try succeeded, and the yellow-orange glow lit up the dark room.
She found the edge of the fabric and teased it with the flame. The canvas smoked, and then caught fire. A black ring appeared, and then spread quickly. She climbed out of the cart and pulled the burning canvas under the stairs. She pulled the sheet from the other cart and added it to the burning pile.
One match remained, and she held it tight as noxious smoke filled the room as the flames came to life. She backed into a corner where she could still feel the heat. The fire leaped onto the staircase and headed toward the door to the attic where her father slept.
The room filled with smoke and heat. She heard her father coughing, and the fire became so hot that the little girl’s body began to thaw at last. It was a glorious feeling, even though her feet ached as they warmed. The glow reddened her cheeks and dazzled her eyes. The cart house had been ugly and gray, but now it was alive with scintillating light. The flames danced, forming little fairies in the air. The girl knew in her heart that fire was the most beautiful thing in the whole world.
The smoke made her eyes fill with tears, but she blinked them away to witness the glorious display. She coughed, and the heat filled her lungs, melting what had to be icicles inside her chest. Sparks swam across her vision, and she realized she couldn’t breathe. If she got up now, she could go outside, escape the smoke and flames. But the fire was so captivating. It became a roaring blaze in a giant hearth that she could not look away from.
Out of the brightest light came the ghostly form of her grandmother. The old woman’s eyes glowed like embers as she reached out with long fingers made of black smoke.
“Grandma! You came back for me,” the little girl said as she noticed the slightly crooked grin on the old woman’s face. “Please take me with you! I’m ready.”
The little girl’s hunger turned to a gnawing pain as her grandmother took her into her arms. She felt hot and smelled the sulfurous odor of burning matches. The warm embrace became hard and constricting. Her grandmother’s face changed to an ugly scowl and the little girl felt the fear that came on the darkest nights. Something was terribly wrong as they went down through the base of the fire to a place where it would never be cold and everyone understood the need for revenge.
CLOCKWORK HEART
Ramsey “Tome Wyrm” Lundock
Ramsey “Tome Wyrm” Lundock uses the nickname instead of his “meat body” name in e-mail. His first article, “Marybelle for Arrivers,” appeared in Polyhedron Magazine in 1999, published by the gone but not forgotten TSR. In college he was involved in the Role Playing Gamer’s Association, eventually becoming the Campaign Director for Living Verge. He graduated from the University of Florida in 2002, with degrees in Physics and Japanese, and went to work on his parents’ longhorn cattle and thoroughbred horse farm. On June 7th, 2003, he had the incomparable thrill of watching their horse Supervisor run in the Belmont Stakes. He worked on the farm and wrote freelance until restlessness drove him back to academia in 2005. He spent one year at the University of Florida and is currently a graduate student in the Astronomy Department at Tohoku University in Japan. His hobby is visiting Japan’s castles and ruins.
With all of her clockwork heart, Pinocchia wanted to be a real girl. If she were a real girl, she wouldn’t have to spend all day doing the cooking, cleaning, laundry, and any other task Master Geppeto dreamed up for her. And Master Geppeto wouldn’t beat a real girl for the slightest mistakes.
As if on cue, Pinocchia felt the familiar boot smash down on her back, forcing her to the floor.
“I told you to scrub the floor, not just move the dirt around, you worthless puppet!”
It was true, Pinocchia was only a puppet. But she was not an ordinary puppet. Like all of Master Geppeto’s inventions, there was more than simple clockwork under her skin. When gears and springs alone would not meet his needs, Master Geppeto resorted to components like fairy dust and unicorn blood.
The kick had landed just as she was reaching to wring out her scrubbing rag, so she had been up able to catch her fall. Her outstretched hands had knocked over the water bucket, and now Master Geppeto’s foot held her to the ground as the cold, dirty water soaked into her tattered work dress.
“I ought to rip you apart and start over! Can’t even scrub the floor right. A machine without a useful purpose has no reason to exist!”
He lifted his foot. Pinocchia raised herself to her hands and knees and waited for the next blow. Instead, Master Geppeto turned and walked away. He muttered, “Clean up that mess.”
Geppeto was at the washbasin, strapping a leather and wire contraption over his shoulders. It encompassed his head like deranged scaffolding. He buckled a leather strap around his forehead to hold the demonic halo in position. Finally, he wound the key on the chest harness and pressed the release lever. Three brushes jabbed viciously in and out of his mouth, contorting his lips into lunatic expressions. The rhythmic ticking of the mechanical assault continued as a mint-scented foam ran out of his open mouth, reminiscent of a rabid dog. The contraption yanked his head backward. A metallic “sprong” sounded, followed by another as two springs uncoiled, shoving rubber stoppers up his nostrils. Water from a small copper tube filled his gapping mouth to the brim. He stood there, making the gurgling sounds of a drowning man, with water trickling down his face and neck.
The gurgling noise stopped. Master Geppeto’s eyes went wide with fear. He clutched frantically at the framework surrounding his head. Without warning, his head snapped forward and the water in his mouth gushed onto the floor. He panted as he unstrapped the leather and metal contraption.
Master Geppeto found his small, thick wire-rim glasses and examined himself in the mirror. He was showing his age. His white hair was thinning on top. He let the rest grow long and wild to make up the difference. He had three days’ growth of stubble, except for the ugly acid scar on his right cheek where no hair would grow. He stretched his lips with his fingers and nodded in satisfaction. “No fresh cuts on the gums or cheeks. I think this mouth cleaner is coming along. Maybe add some guide rails to make sure the spit ends up in the basin, and figure out why the gargle timer keeps sticking.”
He glanced down at the water and white foam on the floor. “Pinocchia, clean this up.”
Pinocchia left her current task. Master Geppeto loomed over her as she wiped the floor around the wash basin. He didn’t speak again until she had finished. “Bedtime. Time to put the tools away.”
“No! Maser Geppeto, please don’t lock me in the closet.”
“You can go in the closet, or I can throw you in the closet. Your choice.”
Pinocchia knew there was nothing figurative about his threat to throw her in the closet. He was remarkably strong for his advanced years. She whimpered and shuffled past Master Geppeto. She opened the door to the workshop’s small storage area and stepped inside. She heard the door slam behind her and the tumblers turn inside the lock.
She could hear Master Geppeto moving around the main room, probably undressing for bed. She heard the bed springs sag under his weight. With a soft “huff” the weak candlelight creeping under the door disappeared.
The darkness was absolute. Pinocchia wasn’t afraid of the dark. She had been locked in this closest too many times to be afraid. And come morning, without fail, Master Geppeto would beat her for “hiding” in the closet instead of getting up early to make breakfast. She sat down ever so slowly and softly, scared to make any noise, lest she wake the master from his sleep and incur his wrath.
In years past, she would have only had to wait a little while until her gears ran down; then next thing she would know it would be morning. But Master Geppeto had gotten tired of her running down at inopportune moments and had installed a self-winding coil made from fairy gold and Egyptian iron. All she could do was wait until morning and wonder how Master Geppeto would beat her. Today, he had used only his feet and his bare hands, so he was overdue to strike her with his belt or with a twitching rod. The one bright side, he probably wouldn’t use one of his heavy or sharp tools, which would make major repairs necessary.