I wonder what Molly is expecting to do about me. She might try to come and get me. For sure not driving a car. I wonder what she’ll do when she finds out I’m gone. I wonder if she knows about how Buck is. Except maybe he’s only that way with somebody who’s an animal.
I’m too impatient to wait for dark. I start heading back towards the town, but I keep well away from any roads or houses. I suppose it’s pretty far considering how fast Molly was driving. I don’t even know the name of the town, but it has a special smell. I’d recognize it right away.
Later, when I come to a river and a nice pile of brush next to it, and berries, I decide to rest there until dark.
Except I can’t rest. I’m too angry and upset. I need to talk to Molly. I keep on across the rocky foothills.
• • • •
I should have stayed and rested.
At first I think they’re wolves, but then I see it’s a pack of all sorts of dogs. I climb a juniper. They’re making a terrible racket.
Practically right away, here comes a man with a rifle. He shoots towards the dogs and they run off. Then he comes to see what they’ve treed. He stares. Walks all around the tree to look at me from every angle. The shirt and slacks don’t hide that much. My Bigfoot-big-bare-fuzzy-feet are just above his head.
He isn’t dressed like Buck, though he is wearing a cowboy hat. He has a bushy mustache that’s mostly gray. He’s a lot older than Buck. I don’t know if that’s good or bad. He might, all the quicker, take off his clothes and grab me. Is he going to climb the tree and pull me down and then try to do what Buck tried?
“Can you talk?”
Why does everybody ask me that? Do I look so animal? I guess I do.
“Of course I can.”
And I climb a little higher.
“Don’t be scared. I won’t hurt you. I won’t. I promise. Are you hungry?”
Yeah, lure the animal down with a little bite of food.
He sits under the tree and takes off his hat. He’s got a very high forehead. I’ve seen pictures of that. That’s being bald. Maybe when I’m older I could get bald all over.
He takes out an apple and a sandwich and begins to eat. He’s in no hurry. As he eats, he keeps looking up at me and shaking his head, as if, like Buck, he doesn’t believe in me.
“I’ve heard tell of your kind, but I’ve never seen one. Where did you come from, anyway?”
I don’t know what to say.
“Do you have a name?”
What does he think I am? Well, I know what he thinks.
“Of course I do.”
“Mine’s Hiram. People call me Hi.”
“Mine’s Sabine.”
“I never knew a Sabine. Is that from your people?”
“My people?”
“Your kind of . . . Whatever you . . .”
I never thought about being “a kind.” Was he going to say, your kind of animal?
For a minute we just look out at the view of the fields far below us with the sprinkling of black cows, both of us as if embarrassed. Then he says, “You might as well come down. You’ll have to one of these days. It might as well be now as later. When I leave those dogs might come back. You can have half my sandwich and this apple.”
He’s right, I might as well come down, so I do.
I take the sandwich and sit a couple of yards away. I hope I’m not eating like an animal or sitting like an animal. I sit as he’s sitting. I’m hungry, but I slow down. I try to keep the torn shirt shut as best I can.
He leaves his clothes on all that time and afterwards we just sit quietly. I’m thinking maybe I should ask about men taking their clothes off, but then I think I’d better not. Even if he is a man, maybe he can help me get back to the town.
He keeps looking me up and down. He just can’t stop. Then he says, “Sorry, I shouldn’t stare. I’d like to take a picture of you. Of course nobody will believe it. They’ll think I made it up on the computer.”
“Can you drive a car? I’m trying to get back to the town. I’ll let you take my picture if you help me get back. It would have to be at night. And I only need to go to the edge. And if you could lend me a hat, I’d try to get it back to you.”
• • • •
He takes me down to his house. I won’t go in. I don’t care if he thinks I’m a scared animal, I just won’t, and I am a scared animal. He gets his camera and takes a lot of pictures, all different views. I’m worried about it because Molly said I should hide and this sure isn’t hiding, but this is the only way I know of to get back to her. If he’s going to bother helping me, I have to do something for him.
Then we wait till the middle of the night. I apologize for keeping him up.
He never once takes his clothes off. Maybe all men don’t do that. I’ll have to ask Molly. She said everything is on the computer. If she doesn’t know, we can look it up.
He makes me supper. A kind of stew with everything in it. He says it’s called slumgullion. He says it’s a kind of a guy thing. He serves it outside on his picnic table so I won’t need to go in. I’m beginning to think I shouldn’t be so scared. I wonder if my father is as nice.
He sits down to eat across from me.
“You’ve had a bad experience, haven’t you. Or are you just scared of all of us?”
“I like Molly. That’s where I want to get back to. But I had a bad experience with Buck. He took his clothes off and grabbed me.”
Then I tell him all about Molly and the car rolling over and about Buck. I tell him, “You don’t seem like him.”
“I’m not. And when any man takes his clothes off, you take care. I have a daughter about your age. I live by myself, except my daughter comes here for the summer. If I show those pictures I took of you around, you’re in trouble. Everybody will be after you. They’ll chase you wherever you try to hide. You ought to go back up into the hills and let yourself be a legend like the rest of your people are. I’ll hang on to these pictures until you get well away.”
“But I don’t know my people. I’ve never met my father. My mother’s one of your kind. Molly wanted to shave me all over with her dad’s electric razor. Do you think that would work?”
“Not a good idea. You’d prickle. Nobody could get near you. Here, feel my cheeks. I haven’t shaved since yesterday.”
I reach across the table and feel them.
“You sure you don’t want me to take you up into the mountains far as I can drive and drop you off? I’ll give you a knapsack and water bottle and food for a couple of days. That would be best for you.”
“I’d like to see Molly first. Besides, I left Mother’s book there.”
He gets me a shirt of his that isn’t torn. It’s dark green. Better for hiding in than this white one.
We spend time looking up at the stars. He knows the names of everything up there. I tell him my mother did, too. Then we have coffee, though he doesn’t let me have much. He says if I’m not used to it, it’ll make me jittery. And then we go—in his rickety old truck. He gives me a stained old cowboy hat. He says it may not look so good but it’s beaver so it’s waterproof.
He drops me off at the edge of town like I want him to. I think I can smell my way back to Molly’s house, but not if I’m in the truck.
When he lets me off he says, “You know I’ll not use those photos. Better you folks stay a myth. And you better hurry back in the hills. That’s where you belong.”
I’m glad I met him after Buck. I was ready to never get near a man again.
• • • •
It doesn’t take me long to find Molly’s place. I kept pretty good track of where I was. I always know where I am when there are trees and rocks, but I knew I’d have trouble finding my way with all these streets and houses.
I go right back to the playhouse and settle in to get some sleep for what there is left of the night. The pillow and blanket aren’t there anymore, but I take the old dog doll for a pillow. Hi’s shirt will keep me warm.
B
ut first I find my shorts just where I hid them and Mother’s book is still in the pocket.
I want to let Molly know I’m here, but I don’t want to wake her up in the middle of the night. But then I oversleep. Everybody in the house has gone off just like before. I wonder if Molly tried to find me at Buck’s and if Buck tried . . . that with her? But I suppose not. I’m the one who doesn’t count. But I don’t see what difference it makes. Animal or not, I shouldn’t have to get forced into doing something I don’t want to. Hi didn’t think so, either.
So then I have to wait around for Molly to come back. I sneak in and get myself some food. I snoop around again. I wish I knew how to use the computer. I don’t dare try without Molly. She said you could learn about everything there.
I grab some books and go back. I start reading and don’t even notice when Molly comes home. When I realize she must be back, I go look in her window. There she is, on the bed with a magazine. I tap on the window. She gives a shriek when she sees me. It’s good nobody else is home. She opens the window and hugs me. She climbs out and we go back to the playhouse.
She says, “I was so worried, and I didn’t know how to come and get you back, and Daddy won’t let me go anywhere now that I ruined our car. I’m going to have to stay home for months and I have to do chores to help pay for the new car.” She starts to cry.
I don’t know what to do. Mother would have held me, but that’s different. At least I think it is. Finally I reach out and pat her shoulder. That seems to be all right. She does stop.
I ask, “Is it all my fault? You were driving for me.”
“Of course not. I know it’s my fault. I don’t even have a license. Daddy says I have to take the consequences.”
“Can I help?”
“I don’t know. Maybe keep me company now that I have to stay home every single night there is.”
“I’ll do it. Besides, I want to learn more things on the computer. About men.” Then I tell her what Buck tried to do.
She gets really mad and tells me not every boy would be that way, and she is never going to speak to him again, and she’s going to tell all her friends to watch out for him.
“Yes, but I’m an animal.”
“You’re a girl. Anybody with any sense can see that.”
“Thank you.”
“I like your looks.”
I feel like crying, too, but one of us in tears at a time is enough.
“Actually, in your own way, you’re quite decent looking.”
In my way.
“Maybe there’s some kind of medicine you can take that would make all your hair fall out. I’ll bet there is. These days there’s something for everything. I’ll go online and look it up.”
I don’t trust Molly anymore. She doesn’t know as much as she thinks she does. I don’t want to take some pill that will make my hair fall out.
I don’t tell her, but, even though I owe it to her, I’m not sure I want to stay here much longer. Maybe just look up some more things on the computer. Get her to print some pictures of my possible fathers. I don’t belong down here. Hi said so, too. And I miss the mountains. Mother said I was made for them. I was always warm enough up there, even my feet. Mother’s feet were always cold. What if she’s back there by now? Though I know I shouldn’t get my hopes up.
• • • •
Next day Molly pretends to go to school and then comes home. She’s going to go back to school for her dad to pick her up. I guess her dad can’t keep tabs on her all the time.
(Here I am wishing I could go to school and she can and doesn’t do it.)
So we print out all the pictures of Sasquatch, and Yeti, and Bigfoot. None of them look very nice. I like having their pictures, though. I fold them up and button them in the pocket of the shirt Hi gave me.
• • • •
The next day Molly does go to school. She says she can’t afford to miss too much. She’s not doing very well in French (French! I wonder if I could ever get to take that) and math. She says her dad is already angry enough without her failing two subjects. So I have the whole place to myself again.
I go to the house and bring back food and books but then I think I should be reading that little book of Mother’s. Maybe I can find out why she went with such an odd . . . creature. I almost thought “person” but I’m not sure if either my father or I can be called a person.
I pry open the lock on Mother’s little leather book and there, right on the first page in big letters, she’d written:
A TALE OF TRUE LOVE ! ! !
And underneath that:
Except at first I didn’t know it.
I shouldn’t have been climbing alone in such a dangerous place, but I like being on the cliffs by myself. I was having an exciting time on a dangerous little trail. I remember falling. . .
. . . and then, there I was, looking up into big brown eyes. The creature—Mother calls him a creature, too—was mopping my forehead with a cool cloth. He was grunting little sad grunts. As if he was sorry for me. The way he looked—completely hairy—I never expected him to be able to speak, but when he saw my eyes were open, he said, “I thought maybe you were dead.”
I tried to get up, but I hurt all over.
“Lie still,” the creature said. And then brought me water in a folding cup, held my head so I could drink.
I had broken my leg and my arm but I didn’t know that then.
He whistled a kind of complicated bird song and right after that another one just like him came. They’ve got a whistling language. Lots of it exactly like real bird songs. I love that. I never mastered it though. They use our language, too.
The other one wore a fisherman’s vest full of pockets. He had soft vine like ropes. They tied my arm and leg to pieces of wood to keep them from moving. They put me in a kind of hammock, and took me to their hidden village. Movable village. They hardly spend two nights in a row in the same place.
Then there’s a break and the start of a new page.
Dear Sabine,
So this is for me. I’m supposed to read it.
As you see, that’s what I wrote shortly after the accident, and then such a lot happened that I stopped writing. Actually for years. It was partly because I had to take care of you. But now it’s because of you that I’m writing again. I want you to know about us, Growen and me. It was Growen’s brother, Greener, who helped Growen rescue me. All the others were against it. They thought helping me was dangerous. I must have lain unconscious for most of the day before they finally decided to help. If not for Growen, they never would have. I think Growen fell in love right then, but it took me a little longer.
You know, Binny, they’re beautiful. Not like any of the pictures people make of them. You must NOT think they’re like those. And you should know how beautiful you are, too.
Am I really?
At first I couldn’t tell them apart. I mean Growen and Greener, or any of them for that matter. Well, I could tell the men from the women. Then I saw that Growen looked at me in a different way. Hopeful. I almost wrote yearning, but it wasn’t that because he always looked sure of himself. As if what he wanted would come true, it was just a matter of when. As if he knew I’d soon see how worthy he was.
Binny, I hope you’re a grown up as you read this and have fallen in love, too, so you understand.
Should I stop reading and keep this until I’m older? Besides, I haven’t even met anybody to be in love with. Or maybe I can read it twice, now, and then again later.
Of course I didn’t fall in love right away. Everybody and everything was too odd, but when you’re hurting and are treated with kindness, it makes all the difference. Growen was so concerned and helpful and kept looking at me with such admiration.
Except for Growen and Greener, none of the others liked me. They built our cabin and sent me and Growen down from their cliffs and caves and nests.
I don’t know what they’d do about you now. You’re so much more them than me. I hope they find you,
though as long as I’m around they don’t want either of us. I’m a danger. Everything is a danger to them and I suppose they’re right. They can’t have been kept secret all this time without taking great care.
I hope nothing I do reveals them. Can you imagine, all of them shut up in the zoo? Or tourists swarming all over taking their picture? Or yours? Be careful !!!!! Don’t ever, ever, ever go down where it’s so hard to hide!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Oh, my God. What have I done!
I didn’t realize how important it is for me to be a secret. Me just being down here is a danger to all of them . . .. I should say, all of us. And now Hi and Buck and Molly know about me. Hi said he wouldn’t show the pictures but I’ll bet Buck will tell about me. He can’t prove it, though. At least I hope not.
And all of a sudden I want to find my kind so much I can’t stand to sit here one minute more. I have to get back. But I already roamed all over the place and none of them came to me and I never saw a single sign of them.
Though there are several more pages in the book, Mother only wrote a phrase here and there as if she was going to go back and fill them in. One just has: Today Growen died. Maybe she felt too sad to go on except with these little notes.
• • • •
I put on my shorts and T-shirt, and on top of that Hi’s green shirt, and then his wonderful waterproof hat. I don’t take anything of Molly’s, not even cookies. Except I wonder if she’d mind if I took her social studies book. I like the idea of all these different kinds and colors of people even though nobody in it has hair all over. Besides, I don’t think Molly cares anything about social studies.
It doesn’t fit in Hi’s big pockets, though Mother’s book does. I’ll have to carry it separately. I’ll pick up one of those plastic bags that keep blowing around everywhere.
I feel bad that I’m not going to say goodbye. Molly got in a lot of trouble because of me. I ought to stay and help, but I’m not going to.
I’m going to find my people if it takes falling off a cliff and lying there with a broken leg.
Fantasy Magazine Issue 58, Women Destroy Fantasy! Special Issue Page 18