The Year’s Best Science Fiction: Fifth Annual Collection

by Gardner Dozois

  As ever, Florey gulped down several mugs of cider as he wove the spell of his tale, my family spread before him and the evening darkening beyond the various ridges of the house. My mother was in the front of the audience, flanked by my aunts like a queen amongst her attendants, a gnarled walking stick I recognized as my grandmother’s lying like a scepter in her lap. I couldn’t stop looking at her.

  “More cider,” Florey said, and I quickly poured, spilling some. He drank and held out the mug again, said to no one in particular, “Best drug in all the worlds, alcohol, because it’s the oldest. Though I’ve something in my pack that would make you all feel as if you were in the very hands of your God.” He drank again, then pushed the mug into my face, saying, “Drink, too, girl, go on.” I closed my eyes and sipped. Sweet, with the faintest bitter tang beneath. My mother had put in mead to disguise the taste of the ivy. Florey tilted the mug, but I closed my mouth so that the cider ran down my chin and spilled onto my dress.

  “Flower of the forest, this girl. Where was I? Yes, the ruins, circled by bare ground that had been poisoned to keep out the jungle, the ruins in the sunlight. Picture it,” he said, and briefly closed his eyes. “But you all know about ruins, yes? Ruins all over the Earth. They’re all around you. You’re living out your lives”—he belched—“your lives in the wreckage of the past. It’s in your faces, I see it in your faces. Christ, and your eyes, too, like holes in the past.” Florey leaned forward, staring intently at his audience. I could see a dark rim of dilated pupil circling the silver caps in his eyes. “You’re feeding on me, on my words. No more.”

  People began to whisper; I saw Rayne say something to my father, who nodded grimly. The spell had been broken.

  Florey staggered to his feet. “No more, no more tonight.” He swayed, and cider spilled from the mug. “No more. Head too thick. Fresh air and exercise. Clary—” Florey reached for me.

  “No!” It was my mother, on her feet, with my aunts rising around her. Florey turned and reached inside his vest, and my mother swung at him with the stick, knocking aside his arm and sending him sprawling, striking him again as he tried to rise. Then all the women were upon him, and I saw his hands amongst them, claws extended, slashing and slashing again, and somehow he was free, staggering back while Aunt Genive knelt over a puddle of blood, her own blood dripping from her torn face. My mother stood over her; Florey’s light-stick was in her hand.

  The men were all on their feet now, and my father started to say something but my mother silenced him with a look. “He raped Clary. This guest you brought under our roof. He’ll die for it.”

  Florey held out his hands, glancing at the crowd behind my mother, glancing at me. “You can’t hurt me with that,” he said. “I have protection, remember?”

  “But I can put you to sleep,” my mother said. “I know how to do it: my daughter told me.”

  “Ah, your daughter.”

  Then Florey sprang, but not at my mother. I was seized and spun and found myself pulled tightly against him, his claws at my throat. “You can’t put us both to sleep. Give me my weapon.”

  My mother shook her head. Some of the men were beginning to edge out of the crowd, and Florey called to them. “If you love this girl, you won’t go for your guns, or follow me either. I’m walking backward now. Don’t follow. Come on, Clary.”

  His right arm crushed my right breast; his claws pricked my throat. I moved backward with him, stepping amongst the seedlings in the newly turned field, then onto the rough grass beyond. My mother stood still, my family gathered behind her. Then Florey grabbed my wrist and yelled, “Run!” and dragged me toward the trees. People shouted and a deadening tingle started up my back; then we were in the darkness beneath the pines, my feet flying of their own accord as I struggled to keep up with Florey’s long strides. His grip was a circle of pain on my upper arm; when at last we stopped and he let go I felt blood trickle down my side from the four closely spaced wounds made by his claws.

  Florey looked back through the dark trees. “Sonics work only at close range,” he said. “Fortunately. I thought we were almost done for, girl, but they aren’t following. Not yet, anyway. Come on.”

  “They might leave you alone if you let me go.”

  “I don’t think so. You’ll have to come with me after all. Don’t cry. You wanted adventure.” He pulled me close, stooping so that his eyes glittered a handbreadth from mine. His breath was sickly sweet. “There was something in that cider. My heart is pounding in my head.”

  “My mother—”

  “Oh, of course, your mother.” He gripped my arm, and as we half-walked, half-ran through the dark forest, he talked and talked, his fear bleeding out in ravings and threats and sheer bluster that I hardly remember now. All of us in the forest were barbarians was the gist of it; we had betrayed our inheritance. “Elysium sank low enough when war cut us off from Earth, but not as low as you. Just two hundred klicks away, girl, ships lift for every world in the Federation, while here it’s all superstition and darkness. Christ! First you tried to make me into some kind of god, and now this.”

  He gave me a little shake, glared at me, and dragged me on. We were near the bridge now.

  And then I saw someone coming toward us through the shadows. It was Elise. When his dog recognized Florey, she growled, her ears flat. Florey whispered to me, “Keep quiet, girl. Or I’ll mark you so no one’ll want you.”

  Elise hailed us cheerfully enough, but he was obviously puzzled. Florey grinned. “We’re just out for an evening stroll. Hoped we’d run into you. How are you, boy?”

  “It’s dangerous in the forest at night.” Elise was looking at me; I tried to smile, failed, and looked away.

  “Don’t worry, boy. You know my weapons. Remember? Go on down and we’ll follow in a bit. I want to see how the bridge is holding up. Clary’s father was asking after you earlier, seems he wants a word with you about something.”

  “Is it all right, Clary?”

  Florey was watching Elise now, and had let go of my arm. It was my last chance, and I took it. I said, “I saw you both, this afternoon.”

  For a moment neither Florey nor Elise understood; then it struck them both. Florey slashed at me, but Elise’s dog reached him first, knocking him down and climbing his chest, growling. Florey’s fist swept across her muzzle, and the growl became a high-pitched whine that cut off as Florey slashed again. I backed away until I fell over something, a pile of pine wedges with an ax beside it. As Florey scrambled to his feet, I threw the ax to Elise.

  “Now boy. Now Elise…” Step-by-step, Florey moved toward Elise, who slowly backed away, the ax raised at his shoulder. “Remember what you told me, what I told you this afternoon? You don’t want her, I know; I can give you everything you want. Come on now.”

  Elise’s face was a white blur in the twilight; I couldn’t see his expression. He had reached the edge of the gorge and glanced at the drop behind him before he said, “No.”

  “Then I’ll go. That will be all right, yes?” That cloying voice, smooth and sticky as honey. “Just go, leave you be.” He was almost on Elise now. I couldn’t move. And Florey reached out, just as Elise brought the ax down.

  The blow swung Florey around. He sank to his knees, clutching at his chest; darkness spilled over his white fingers. Elise swung again. Without a sound, Florey toppled over the edge.

  After a moment, Elise threw the ax after him, turned to me. “I love you,” he said, and ran. I called after him as he plunged across the bridge, but he didn’t look back. Soon he was lost amongst the trees on the other side.

  There isn’t much more to tell. Outsiders came looking for Florey a few weeks later; it seemed that he had killed someone important in San Francisco and had been on the run ever since. But we had burned his body—it had washed up by the ford—and told them nothing. My father had the bridge cut down: I think my mother made him do it. For a while I used to climb up to the clearing where it had been and sit alone and think, but then I became
betrothed to someone else.

  No, not your father. I’m not quite done.

  Things had changed. Florey’s stories had spread amongst the families, and month by month a few people left the forest for the larger world; in turn, this slow exodus brought the curious to us, off-world tourists in search of the more outré corner of Earth, illegal hunting parties, once an archaeological team that spent an entire summer digging over the ruins where Florey had taken me.

  And Elise came back, just once. Two years after he’d run away. He’d become a freespacer, sailing the sea of space between the stars, had gained a swaggering, bold manner and sought to impress us with wild tales of the wonders he’d seen.

  But we were no longer in need of stories. The old days were dead, buried with Florey, our oh so temporary king. They won’t come again. Soon after Elise left the forest, I left, too, abandoning my family and the kindly, slow-witted man to whom I’d been betrothed, whom I’d never really loved. And came to the city, yes, and met your father. As for the rest, well, you know it as well as I.

  NEAL BARRETT, JR.

  Perpetuity Blues

  Neal Barrett, Jr. made his first sale in 1959, and for the last thirteen years, has been a full-time free lancer. His short fiction has appeared in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, Galaxy, Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine, Amazing, Omni, Fantastic, If, and elsewhere; his novels include Stress Pattern, Karma Corps, and the four-volume Aldair series. Born in San Antonio, Texas, he now lives in Dallas with his family, a dog, and a cat. His story “Sallie C” was in our Fourth Annual Collection.

  Nineteen eighty-seven was a particularly good year for Barrett. His first hardcover novel, Through Darkest America, was published as part of the Isaac Asimov Presents series from Congdon & Weed, and received a good deal of enthusiastic critical response. During the year he published a string of brilliant, gonzo, and unique stories—“Perpetuity Blues,” “Highbrow,” “Diner,” “Class of ’61”—that have been exciting strong reader response as well as a slew of Nebula recommendations. Any one of these stories might well have been worthy of inclusion in a “Best” anthology—and, indeed, another one of them appears later in this collection—but my favorite is the one that follows, the funniest story you’re likely to read this year (and possibly the strangest), in which Barrett regales us with the odd misadventures of little Maggie.

  PERPETUITY BLUES

  Neal Barrett, Jr.

  On Maggie’s seventh birthday she found the courage to ask Mother what had happened to her father.

  “Your father disappeared under strange circumstances,” said Mother.

  “Sorghumdances?” said Maggie.

  “Circumstances,” said Mother, who had taught remedial English before marriage and was taking a stab at it again. “Circumstances: a condition or fact attending an event or having some bearing upon it.”

  “I see,” said Maggie. She didn’t, but knew it wasn’t safe to ask twice. What happened was Daddy got up after supper one night and put on his cardigan with the patches on the sleeves and walked to the 7-11 for catfood and bread. Eight months later he hadn’t shown up or called or written a card. Strange circumstances didn’t seem like a satisfactory answer.

  Mother died Thursday afternoon. Maggie found her watching reruns of “Rawhide” and “Bonanza.” Maggie left South Houston and went to live with Aunt Grace and Uncle Ned in Marble Creek.

  “There’s no telling who he might of met at that store,” said Aunt Grace. “Your father wasn’t right after the service. I expect he got turned in Berlin. Sent him back and planted him deep in Montgomery Wards as a mole. That’s how they do it. You wait and lead an ordinary life. You might be anyone at all. Your control phones up one day and says ‘the water runs deep in Lake Lagoda’ and that’s it. Whatever you’re doing you just get right up and do their bidding. Either that or he run off with that slut in appliance. I got a look at her when your uncle went down to buy the Lawnboy at the End-of-Summer Sale. Your mother married beneath her. I don’t say I didn’t do the same. The women in our family got no sense at all when it comes to men. We come from good stock but that doesn’t put money in the bank. Your grandfather Jack worked directly with the man who invented the volleyball net they use all over the world in tournament play. Of course he never got the credit he deserved. This family’s rubbed elbows with greatness more than once but you wouldn’t know it. Don’t listen to your Uncle Ned’s stories. And for Christ’s sake don’t ever sit on his lap.”

  Maggie found life entirely different in a small town. There were new customs to learn. Jimmy Gerder and two other fourth graders took her down to the river after school and tried to make her take off her pants. Maggie didn’t want to and ran home. After that she ran home every day.

  Uncle Ned told her stories. Maggie learned why it wasn’t a good idea to sit on his lap. “There was this paleontologist,” said Uncle Ned, “he went out hunting dinosaur eggs and he found some. There was this student come along with him. It was this girl with nice tits is who it was. So this paleontologist says, ‘be careful now, don’t drop ’em, these old eggs are real friable.’ And the girl says, ‘hey that’s great, let’s fry the little fuckers.’” Uncle Ned nearly fell out of his chair.

  Maggie didn’t understand her uncle’s stories. They all sounded alike and they were all about scientists and girls. Ned ran the hardware store on Main. He played dominoes on Saturdays with Dr. Harlow Pierce who also ran Pierce’s Drugs. On Sundays he watched girls’ gymnastics on TV. When someone named Tanya did a flip he got a funny look in his eyes. Aunt Grace would get Maggie and take her out in the car for a drive.

  Maggie found a stack of magazines in the garage behind a can of kerosene. There were pictures of naked girls doing things she couldn’t imagine. There were men in some of the pictures and she guessed they were scientists, too.

  Aunt Grace and Uncle Ned were dirt poor but they gave a party for Maggie’s eighth birthday. Maggie was supposed to pass out invitations at school but she threw them all away. Everyone knew Jimmy Gerder chased her home and knew why. She was afraid Aunt Grace would find out. Uncle Ned gave her a Philips screwdriver in a simulated leather case you could clip in your pocket like a pen. Aunt Grace gave her a paperback history of the KGB.

  Maggie loved the freedom children enjoy in small towns. She knew everyone on Main who ran the stores, the people on the streets and the people who came in from the country Saturday nights. She knew Dr. Pierce kept a bottle in his office and another behind the tire in his trunk. She knew Mrs. Betty Keen Littler, the coach’s wife, drove to Austin every Wednesday to take ceramics and came back whonkered with her shoes on the wrong feet. She knew about Oral Blue, who drank wine and acted funny and thought he came from outer space. Oral was her favorite person to watch. He drove a falling-down pickup and lived in a trailer by the river. He came into town twice a week to fix toasters and wire lamps. No one knew his last name. Flip Gator who ran Flip Gator’s Exxon tagged him Oral Blue. Which fit because Oral’s old ’68 pickup was three shades of Sear’s exterior paint for fine homes. Sky Blue for the body. Royal blue for fenders. An indeterminate blue for the hood. Oral wore blue shirts and trousers. Blue Nikes with the toes cut out and blue socks.

  “Don’t get near him,” said Aunt Grace. “He might of been turned. And for Christ’s sake don’t ever sit in his lap.”

  Maggie kept an eye on Oral when she could. On Tuesdays and Thursdays she’d run home fast with Jimmy Gerder on her heels and duck up the alley to the square. Then she’d sit and watch Oral stagger around trying to pinpoint his truck. Oral was something to see. He was skinny as a rail and had a head too big for his body. Like a tennis ball stabbed with a pencil. Hair white as down and chalk skin and pink eyes. A mouth like a wide open zipper. He wore a frayed straw hat painted pickup-fender blue to protect him from the harsh Texas sun. Uncle Ned said Oral was a pure-bred genetic albino greaser freak and an aberration of nature. Maggie looked it up. She didn’t believe anything Uncle Ned told her.r />
  Ten days after Maggie was eleven Dr. Pierce didn’t show up for dominoes and Ned went and found him in his store. He took one look and ran out in the street and threw up. The medical examiner from San Antone said Pierce had sat on the floor and opened forty-two-hundred pharmaceutical-type products, mixed them in a five-gallon jug and drunk most of it down. Which accounted for the internal explosions and extreme discoloration of the skin.

  Maggie had never heard about suicide before. She imagined you just caught something and died or got old. Uncle Ned began to drink a lot more after Dr. Pierce was gone. “Death is one of your alternate lifestyles worth considering,” he told Maggie. “Give it some thought.”

  Uncle Ned became unpleasant to be around. He mostly watched girls’ field hockey or Eastern Bloc track and field events. Maggie was filling out in certain spots. Ned noticed her during commercials and grabbed out at what he could. Aunt Grace gave him hell when she caught him. Sometimes he didn’t know who he was. He’d grab and get Grace, and she’d pick up something and knock him senseless.

  Maggie stayed out of the house whenever she could. School was out and she liked to pack a lunch and walk down through the trees at the edge of town to the Colorado. She liked to wander over limestone hills where every rock you picked up was the shell of something tiny that had lived. The sun fierce-bright and the heat so heavy you could see it. She took a jar of ice water and a peanut butter sandwich and climbed up past the heady smell of green salt-cedar to the deep shade of big live oaks and native pecans. The trees here were awesome, tall and heavy-leafed, trunks thick as columns in a bad Bible movie. She would come upon the ridge above the river through a tangle of ropy vine, sneak quietly to the edge and look over and catch half a hundred turtles like green clots of moss on a sunken log. Moccasins crossed the river, flat heads just above the water leaving shallow wakes behind. She would eat in the shade and think how it would be if Daddy were there. How much he liked the dry rattle of locusts in the summer, the sounds that things made in the wild. He could tell her what bird was across the river. She knew a crow when she heard it, that a cardinal was red. Where was he? she wondered. She didn’t believe he’d been a mole at Montgomery Wards. Aunt Grace was wrong about that. Why didn’t he come back? He might leave Mother and she wouldn’t much blame him if he did. But he wouldn’t go off and leave her.