by Del Howison
“I hadn’t thought.”
“Well,” he cries, “we’ll fix them.”
“How?”
“There are thousands of us tonight in the Elysian grove. I lead. We will kill! They have neglected us too long. If we can’t live, then they won’t! And you will come, friend? I have spoken with many. Join us. The graveyards will open tonight and the Lost Ones will pour out to drown the unbelievers. You will come?”
“Yes. Perhaps. But I must go. I must find some place ahead. I will join you.”
“Good,” he says. You walk off, leaving him in shadow. “Good, good, good!”
* * *
Up the hill now, quickly. Thank God the night is cold.
You gasp. There, glowing in the night, but with simple magnificence, the house where Grandma fed her boarders. Where you as a child sat on the porch watching skyrockets climb in fire, the pinwheels sputtering, the gunpowder drumming at your ears from the brass cannon your uncle Bion fired with his hand-rolled cigarette.
Now, trembling with memory, you know why the dead walk. To see nights like this. Here, when dew littered the grass and you crushed the damp lawn, wrestling, and you knew the sweetness of now, now, tomorrow is gone, yesterday is done, tonight lives!
Inside that grand tall house, Saturday feasts happen!
And here, here, remember? This is Kim’s house. That yellow light around the back, that’s her room.
You bang the gate wide and hurry up the walk.
You approach her window and feel your breath falling upon the cold glass. As the fog vanishes the shape of her room emerges: Things spread on the little soft bed, the cherrywood floor brightly waxed, and throw rugs like heavily furred dogs sleeping there.
She enters the room. She looks tired, but she sits and begins to comb her hair.
Breathlessly, you listen against the cold pane, and as from a deep sea, you hear her sing so softly it is already an echo before it is sung.
You tap on the windowpane.
She goes on, combing her hair gently.
You tap again, anxiously.
This time she puts down the comb and brush and rises to come to the window. At first she sees nothing; you are in shadow. Then she looks more closely. She sees a dim figure beyond the light.
“Kim!” You cannot help yourself. “It’s me! Kim!”
You push your face forward into the light. Her face pales. She does not cry out; only her eyes are wide and her mouth opens as if somewhere a terrific lightning bolt in a sudden storm had hit the earth. She pulls back slightly.
“Kim!” you cry. “Kim.”
She says your name, but you can’t hear it. She wants to run, but instead she moves the window up and, sobbing, stands back as you climb in and into the light.
You close the window and stand, swaying there, only to find her far across the room, her face half-turned away.
You try to think of something to say, but cannot, and then you hear her crying.
At last she is able to speak.
“Six months,” she says. “You’ve been gone that long. When you went away I cried. I never cried so much in my life. But now you can’t be here.”
“I am!”
“But why? I don’t understand,” she said. “Why did you come?”
“I was lost. It was very dark and I started to dream; I don’t know how. And there in the dream you were and I don’t know how, but I had to find my way back.”
“You can’t stay.”
“Until sunrise. I still love you.”
“Don’t say that. You mustn’t, anymore. I belong here and you belong there, and right now I’m terribly afraid. A long time ago we had a lot of things to love, a lot of things we did together. The things we did, the things we joked and laughed about, those things I still love, but—”
“I still think those thoughts. I think them over and over, Kim. Please try to understand.”
“You don’t want pity, do you?”
“Pity?” You half-turn away. “No, I don’t want that. Kim, listen to me. I could come visit every night; we could talk just like we used to. It would be like a year ago. Maybe if we kept talking you would understand and you’d let me take you on long walks, or at least be a little bit closer.”
“It’s no use,” she said. “We can’t be closer.”
“Kim, one hour every evening, or half an hour, anytime you say. Five minutes. Just to see you. That’s all, that’s all.”
You try to take her hands. She pulls away.
She closes her eyes tightly and says, simply, “I’m afraid.”
“Why?”
“I’ve been taught to be afraid.”
“Is that it?”
“Yes, I guess that’s it.”
“But I want to talk.”
“Talking won’t help.”
Her trembling gradually passes and she becomes more calm and relaxed. She sinks down on the edge of the bed, and her voice is very old in a young throat.
“Perhaps”—a pause—“maybe. I suppose a few minutes each night and maybe I’d get used to you and maybe I wouldn’t be afraid.”
“Anything you say. Tomorrow night, then? You won’t be afraid?”
“I’ll try not.” She has trouble breathing. “I won’t be afraid. I’ll meet you outside the house in a few minutes. Let me get myself together and we can say good-night. Go to the window, step out, and look back.”
“Kim, there’s only one thing to remember: I love you.”
And now you’re outside and she shuts the window.
Standing there in the dark, you weep with something deeper than sorrow.
You walk away from the house.
Across the street a man walks alone and you recall he’s the one that talked to you earlier that night. He is lost and walking like you, alone, in a world that he hardly knows. He moves on along the street as if in search of something.
And suddenly Kim is beside you.
“It’s all right,” she says. “I’m better now. I don’t think I’m afraid.”
She turns you in at an ice-cream parlor and you sit at the counter and order ice cream.
You sit and look down at the sundae and think how wonderful, it’s been so long.
You pick up your spoon; then you put some of the ice cream in your mouth and then pause and feel the light in your face go out. You sit back.
“Something wrong?” the soda clerk behind the fountain says.
“Nothing.”
“Ice cream taste funny?”
“No, it’s fine.”
“You ain’t eating,” he says.
“No.”
You push the ice cream away from you and feel a terrible loneliness move in your body.
“I’m not hungry.”
You sit very straight, staring at nothing. How can you tell her that you can’t swallow, can’t eat? How can you explain that your whole body seems to become solid and that nothing moves, nothing can be tasted.
Pushing back, you rise and wait for Kim to pay for the sundaes and then you swing wide the door and walk out into the night.
“Kim—”
“That’s all right,” she says.
You walk down toward the park. You feel her hand on your arm, a long way off, but the feeling is so soft that it is hardly there. Beneath your feet the sidewalk loses its solid tread. You move without shock or bump in something like a dream.
Kim says, “Isn’t that great? Smell. Lilac.”
You touch the air but there is nothing. Panicked, you try again, but no lilac.
Two people pass in the dark. They drift by, smiling to Kim. As they move away one of them says, fading, “Smell that? Something rotten in Denmark.”
“What?”
“I don’t see—”
“No!” Kim cries. And suddenly, at the sound of those voices, she bursts away and runs.
You catch her arm. Silently you struggle. She beats at you. You can hardly feel her fists.
“Kim!” you cry. “Don’t. Don’t be af
raid.”
“Let go!” she cries. “Let go.”
“I can’t.”
Again the word was “can’t.” She weakens and hangs, lightly sobbing against you. At your touch she trembles.
You hold her close, shivering. “Kim, don’t leave me. I have such plans. Travel, anywhere, just travel. Listen to me. Think. To have the best food, to see the best places, to drink the best wine.”
Kim interrupts. You see her mouth move. You tilt your head. “What?”
She speaks again. “Louder?” you ask. “I can’t hear.”
She speaks, her mouth moves, but you hear absolutely nothing.
And then, as from behind a wall, a voice says, “It’s no use. You see?”
You let her go.
“I wanted to see the light, flowers, trees, anything. I wanted to be able to touch you but, oh God, first, there, with the ice cream I tasted, it was all gone. And now I feel like I can’t move. I can hardly hear your voice, Kim. A wind passed by in the night, but you hardly feel it.”
“Listen,” she said. “This isn’t the way. It takes more than wanting things to have them. If we can’t talk or hear or feel or even taste, what is there left for you or for me?”
“I can still see you, and I remember the way you were.”
“That’s not enough, there’s got to be more than that.”
“It’s unfair. God, I want to live!”
“You will, I promise that, but not like this. You’ve been gone six months and I’ll be going to the hospital soon.”
You stop. You turn very cold. Holding to her wrist you stare into her moving face.
“What?!”
“Yes. The hospital. Our child. You see, you didn’t have to come back, you’re always with me, you’ll always be alive. Now turn around and go back. Believe me, everything will work out. Let me have a better memory than this terrible night with you. Go back where you came from.”
In this moment you cannot even weep; your eyes are dry. You hold her wrists tightly and then suddenly, without a sign, she sinks slowly to the ground.
You hear her whisper, “The hospital. Yes, I think the hospital. Quick.”
You carry her down the street. A fog fills your left eye and you realize that soon you will be blind. It’s all so unfair.
“Hurry,” she whispers. “Hurry.”
You begin to run, stumbling.
A car passes and you shout. The car stops and a moment later you and Kim are in the car with a stranger, roaring silently through the night.
And in the wild traveling you hear her repeat that she believes in the future and that you must leave soon.
At last you arrive, but by then you’re almost completely blind and Kim has gone; the hospital attendant rushed her away without a good-bye.
You stand outside the hospital, helpless, then turn and try to walk away. The world blurs.
Then you walk, finally, in half-darkness, trying to see people, trying to smell any lilacs that still might be out there.
You find yourself moving down a ravine past the park. The walkers are there, the nightwalkers that gather. Remember what that man said? All those lost ones, all those lonely ones are forming tonight to move over the earth and destroy those who do not understand them.
The ravine path rushes under you. You fall, pick yourself up, and fall again.
The stranger, the walker, stands before you as you walk toward the silent creek. You look and there is no one else anywhere in the dark.
The strange leader cries out angrily, “They did not come! Not one of those walkers, not one! Just you. Oh, the cowards, damn them, the damn cowards!”
“Good.” Your breath, or the illusion of breath, slows. “I’m glad they didn’t listen. There must be some reason. Perhaps—perhaps something happened to them that we can’t understand.”
The leader shakes his head. “I had plans. But I am alone. Even if all the lonely ones should rise, they are not strong. One blow and they fall. We grow tired. I am tired—”
You leave him behind. His whispers die. The pulse beats in your head. You walk from the ravine and into the graveyard.
Your name is on the gravestone. The raw earth awaits you. You slide down the small tunnel into satin and wood, no longer afraid or excited. You lie suspended in warm darkness. You can actually shift your feet. You relax.
You are overwhelmed by a luxury of warm sustenance, like a great yeast, being washed away by a whispering tide.
You breathe quietly, not hungry, not worried. You are deeply loved. You are secure. This place where you are dreaming shifts, moves.
Drowsy. Your body is melting, it is small, compact, weightless. Drowsy. Slow. Quiet. Quiet.
Who are you trying to remember? A name moves out to sea. You run to fetch; the waves take it away. Someone beautiful. Someone. A time, a place. Sleepy. Darkness, warmth. Soundless earth. Dim tide. Quiet.
A dark river bears you faster and yet faster.
You break into the open. You are suspended in hot yellow light.
The world is immense as a snow mountain. The sun blazes and a huge red hand seizes your feet as another hand strikes your back to force a cry from you.
A woman lies near. Wetness beads her face, and there is a wild singing and a sharp wonder to this room and this world. You cry out, upside down, and are swung right side up, cuddled and nursed.
In your small hunger, you forget talking; you forget all things. Her voice, above, whispers:
“Dear baby. I will name you for him. For him …”
These words are nothing. Once you feared something terrifying and black, but now it is forgotten in this warmth and feeding content. A name forms in your mouth, you try to say it, not knowing what it means, only able to cry it happily. The word vanishes, fades, an erased ghost of laughter in your head.
“Kim! Kim! Oh, Kim!”
BLACK MILL COVE
LISA MORTON
IT WAS STILL dark, forcing Jim to pick his way through the treacherous thistles and spiderwebs by the narrow beam of his flashlight. He stumbled once, his boot caught in an overgrown rut, and then he found the dirt track that ran along the shoreline. Even though the season had just opened and this morning was one of the lowest tides of the year, he realized he was completely alone on the path, and he thought, Maybe Maren was right—maybe this isn’t such a good idea.
He’d left his wife in the warm bunk back in the camper, but he knew she was only pretending to sleep; they’d argued the night before, and now she was giving him the well-honed Maren Silent Treatment. She’d read an article in the paper last week about two divers who had been attacked by a shark while abalone hunting. One man’s arm had been ripped off, and he’d bled to death in the boat before they’d made it back to shore.
“It says this happened about twenty minutes from Fort Ross, north of San Francisco,” Maren had told him. “It’s where we go, Jim.”
“Honey, you know I don’t dive,” he’d tried patiently to remind her.
“You wear a wet suit.”
“You’ve been with me, Maren. We go at low tide and shore-pick. I’ve never been in water deep enough for a shark.”
“But you always go alone, Jim. It’s not safe.”
Maren had already decided that she didn’t want him to go, though, and the argument had ended very badly. She’d come with him on the winding three-hour drive from San Jose, but he knew she wouldn’t make the two-mile hike down to the cove in the predawn chill, and he hadn’t asked her to. He just hoped that when he returned to the campground with a full limit of the rare shellfish, when they’d been cleaned and it was her turn, the sweet scent of the delicacy frying in butter would cause her to forget the argument.
It’d happened before. Too many times.
When they’d married, he’d made it clear that he was a hunter. Sure, he had a job, family, friends, other interests—but his life was about that oldest and most sacred of sports. Nothing made him feel so connected, so pure, as putting meat on the table, meat he
’d taken with his own hands. The hunt was usually difficult, sometimes even tedious, but that always made the final victory that much more satisfying. In fact, Jim could have said that when he was out in the field, in pursuit of his prey, was the only time he really felt alive.
Maren had endured his hunting trips, but she never actually picked up a gun or fishing pole or catch bag. He supposed it was just the difference between men and women; men were by nature the hunters, women the gatherers. Still, he was constantly left mystified by her desires. Maybe a child … but when he’d suggested that, she’d told him she wasn’t ready. He didn’t understand what she was ready for. After five years of marriage, he still didn’t understand.
He tried to stop thinking about Maren and their failing marriage as he hiked another mile along the thin dirt lane worn between the weeds. The sound of the surf was somewhere off to his left, and its quiet, without the pounding of an incoming tide, soothed him. The path veered to the right, but Jim spotted the fallen gray tree limbs that he used as a signpost. He left the trail behind, once again picking his way through nettles and dying grass. He knew from experience that he would walk about two minutes before he came to the cliff, and he moved slower now, swinging the flashlight beam until he spotted the edge.
That was another thing Maren had argued with him about—the difficulty of reaching Black Mill Cove. After a three-hour drive on hairpin curves along the frightening Highway 1, the cove was still another forty-minute trek from the campground. It was bounded by steep cliffs on three sides and open sea on the fourth; only one narrow ravine, half hidden by brush, offered a way down that didn’t involve actual climbing. Jim liked to hunt alone; what if he got hurt down there, couldn’t get back up? He’d tried to tell her, of course, that the cove’s isolation was what made it ideal. In the three years since he’d found Black Mill Cove, he’d seen only one other hunter working it, and he’d been scuba diving. He knew he could always get his limit of the elusive abalone in the small cove.
By the time he pulled up at the cliff top above the sea, all thoughts of Maren had fled his mind, as he focused on the task before him. First he had to make his way cautiously along the edge until he spotted the patch of shrub that he knew marked the ravine. He stepped carefully around the brush, and lowered himself down onto a boulder three feet below it. He was in the ravine now, and he knew he’d have to find the rest of the way down by touch alone. He put the flashlight into his belt, and started down.