by Guran, Paula
“To her sister’s in . . . Quincy?” The town shared a name with the city south of Boston, the only reason she remembered it. Her mind was filled with distraction to mask strange flurries of her heart. Was she so cowed by authority that she would leave her house in a mess?
“Yeah, Quincy’s about an hour, hour and a half, down the 10 . . . ” Derek was saying in a flat voice that bored even him.
They were talking about nothing. Waiting. They both knew it.
Abbie clapped her hands once, snapping their conversation from its trance. “Well, an old house brings lots of problems. The porch needs fixing. New kitchen tiles. I don’t have the budget to hire a real handyman, so I’m looking for people with skills . . . ”
Derek’s cheeks brightened, pink. “My dad and I built a cabin last summer. I’m pretty good with wood. New planks and stuff. For the porch.”
“Really?” She chided herself for the girlish rise in her pitch, as if he’d announced he had scaled Mt. Everest during his two weeks off from school.
“I could help you out, if . . . you know, if you buy the supplies.”
“I can’t pay much. Come take a look after school, see if you think you can help.” She made a show of glancing toward the open doorway, watching the stream of students passing by. “But you know, Derek, it’s easy for people to get the wrong idea if you say you’re going to a teacher’s house . . . ”
His face was bright red now. “Oh, I wouldn’t say nothing. I mean . . . anything. Besides, we go fishing with Coach Reed all the time. It’s no big deal around here. Not like in Boston, maybe.” The longer he spoke, the more he regained his poise. His last sentence had come with an implied wink of his eye.
“No, you’re right about that,” she said, and she smiled, remembering her new feet. “Nothing here is like it was in Boston.”
That was how Derek Voorhoven came to spend several days a week after class helping Abbie fix her ailing house, whenever he could spare time after football practice in the last daylight. Abbie made it clear that he couldn’t expect any special treatment in class, so he would need to work hard on his atrocious spelling, but Derek was thorough and uncomplaining. No task seemed too big or small, and he was happy to scrub, sand, and tile in exchange for a few dollars, conversation about the assigned reading, and fishing rights to the lake, since he said the catfish favored the north side, where it was quiet.
As he’d promised, he told no one at Graceville Prep, but one day he asked if his cousin Jack could help from time to time, and after he’d brought the stocky, freckled youth by to introduce him, she agreed. Jack was only fourteen, but he was strong and didn’t argue. He also attended the public school, which made him far less a risk. Although the boys joked together, Jack’s presence never slowed Derek’s progress much, so Derek and Jack became fixtures in her home well into July. Abbie looked forward to fixing them lemonade and white chocolate macadamia nut cookies from ready-made dough, and with each passing day she knew she’d been right to leave Boston behind.
Still, Abbie never told Mary Kay about her visits with the boys and the work she asked them to do. Her friend wouldn’t judge her, but Abbie wanted to hold her new life close, a secret she would share only when she was ready, when she could say: You’ll never guess the clever way I got my improvements done, an experience long behind her. Mary Kay would be envious, wishing she’d thought of it first, rather than spending a fortune on a gardener and a pool boy.
But there were other reasons Abbie began erecting a wall between herself and the people who knew her best. Derek and Jack, bright as they were, weren’t prone to notice the small changes, or even the large ones, that would have leaped out to her mother and Mary Kay—and even her distracted father.
Her mother would have spotted the new size of her feet right away, of course. And the odd new pallor of her face, fishbelly pale. And the growing strength in her arms and legs that made it so easy to hand the boys boxes, heavy tools or stacks of wooden planks. Mary Kay would have asked about the flaky skin on the back of her neck and her sudden appetite for all things rare, or raw. Abbie had given up most red meat two years ago in an effort to remake herself after the divorce tore her self-esteem to pieces, but that summer she stocked up on thin-cut steaks, salmon, and fish she could practically eat straight from the packaging. Her hunger was also voracious, her mouth watering from the moment she woke, her growling stomach keeping her awake at night.
She was hungriest when Derek and Jack were there, but she hid that from herself.
Her dusk swims had grown to evening swims, and some nights she lost track of time so completely that the sky was blooming pink by the time she waded from the healing waters to begin another day of waiting to swim. She resisted inviting the boys to swim with her.
The last Friday in July, with only a week left in the summer term, Abbie lost her patience.
She was especially hungry that day, dissatisfied with her kitchen stockpile. Graceville was suffering a record heat wave with temperatures hovering near 110 degrees, so she was sweaty and irritable by the time the boys arrived at five-thirty. And itching terribly. Unlike her feet, the gills hiding beneath the ridges of her ribs never stopped bothering her until she was in her lake. She was so miserable, she almost asked the boys to forget about painting the refurbished back porch and come back another day.
If she’d only done that, she would have avoided the scandal.
Abbie strode behind the porch to watch the strokes of the boys’ rollers and paintbrushes as they transformed her porch from an eyesore to a snapshot of the quaint Old South. Because of the heat, both boys had taken their shirts off, their shoulders ruddy as the muscles in their sun-broiled backs flexed in the Magic Hour’s furious, gasping light. They put Norman Rockwell to shame; Derek with his disciplined football player’s physique, and Jack with his awkward baby fat, sprayed with endless freckles.
“Why do you come here?” she asked them.
They both stopped working, startled by her voice.
“Huh?” Jack said. His scowl was deep, comical. “You’re paying us, right?”
Ten dollars a day each was hardly pay. Derek generously shared half of his twenty dollars with his cousin for a couple hours’ work, although Jack talked more than he worked, running his mouth about summer superhero blockbusters and dancers in music videos. Abbie regretted that she’d encouraged Derek to invite his cousin along, and that day she wished she had a reason to send Jack home. Her mind raced to come up with an excuse, but she couldn’t think of one. A sudden surge of frustration pricked her eyes with tears.
“I’m not paying much,” she said.
“Got that right,” Derek said. Had his voice deepened in only a few weeks? Was Derek undergoing changes too? “I’m here for the catfish. Can we quit in twenty minutes? I’ve got my rod in the truck. And some chicken livers I’ve been saving.”
“Quit now if you want,” she said. She pretended to study their work, but she couldn’t focus her eyes on the whorls of painted wood. “Go on and fish, but I’m going swimming. Good way to wash off a hot day.”
She turned and walked away, following the familiar trail her feet had beaten across her back yard’s scraggly patch of grass to the strip of sand. She’d planned to lay sod with the boys closer to fall, but that might not happen now.
Abbie pulled off her T-shirt, draping it nonchalantly across her beach lounger, taking her time. She didn’t turn, but she could feel the boys’ eyes on her bare back. She didn’t wear a bra most days; her breasts were modest, so what was the point? One more thing Johanssen had tried to hold against her. Her feet curled into the sand, searching for dampness.
“It’s all right if you don’t have trunks,” she said. “My back yard is private, and there’s no harm in friends taking a swim.”
She thought she heard them breathing, or maybe the harsh breaths were hers as her lungs prepared to give up their reign. The sun was unbearable on Abbie’s bare skin. Her sides burned like fire as the flaps beneath her ribs o
pened, swollen rose petals.
The boys didn’t answer; probably hadn’t moved. She hadn’t expected them to, at first.
One after the other, she pulled her long legs out of her jeans, standing at a discreet angle to hide most of her nakedness, like the Venus de Medici. She didn’t want them to see her gills, or the rougher patches on her scaly skin. She didn’t want to answer questions. She and the boys had spent too much time talking all summer. She wondered why she’d never invited them swimming before.
She dove, knowing just where the lake was deep enough not to scrape her at the rocky floor. The water parted as startled catfish dashed out of her way. Fresh fish was best. That was another thing Abbie had learned that summer.
When her head popped back up above the surface, the boys were looking at each other, weighing the matter. Derek left the porch first, tugging on his tattered denim shorts, hopping on one leg in his hurry. Jack followed, but left his clothes on, arms folded across his chest.
Derek splashed into the water, one polite hand concealing his privates until he was submerged. He did not swim near her, leaving a good ten yards between them. After a tentative silence, he whooped so loudly that his voice might have carried across the lake.
“Whooo-HOOOOO!” Derek’s face and eyes were bright, as if he’d never glimpsed the world in color before. “Awesome!”
Abbie’s stomach growled. She might have to go after those catfish. She couldn’t remember being so hungry. She felt faint.
Jack only made it as far as the shoreline, still wearing his Bermuda shorts. “Not supposed to swim in the lake in summer,” he said sullenly, his voice barely loud enough to hear. He slapped at his neck. He stood in a cloud of mosquitoes.
Derek spat, treading water. “That’s little kids, dumb-ass.”
“Nobody’s supposed to,” Jack said.
“How old are you, six? You don’t want to swim—fine. Don’t stand staring. It’s rude.”
Abbie felt invisible during their exchange. She almost told Jack he should follow his best judgment without pressure, but she dove into the silent brown water instead. Young adults had to make decisions for themselves, especially boys, or how would they learn to be men? That was what she and Mary Kay had always believed. Anyone who thought differently was just being politically correct. In ancient times, or in other cultures, a boy Jack’s age would already have a wife, a child of his own.
Just look at Mary Kay. Everyone had said her marriage would never work, that he’d been too young when they met. She’d been vilified and punished, and still they survived. The memory of her friend’s trial broke Abbie’s heart.
As the water massaged her gills, Abbie released her thoughts and concerns about the frivolous world beyond the water. She needed to feed, that was all. She planned to leave the boys to their bickering and swim farther out, where the fish were hiding.
But something large and pale caught her eye above her.
Jack, she realized dimly. Jack had changed his mind, swimming near the surface, his ample belly like a full moon, jiggling with his breaststroke.
That was the first moment Abbie felt a surge of fear, because she finally understood what she’d been up to—what her new body had been preparing her for. Her feet betrayed her, their webs giving her speed as she propelled toward her giant meal. Water slid across her scales.
The beautiful fireball of light above the swimmer gave her pause, a reminder of a different time, another way. The tears that had stung her in her back yard tried to burn her eyes blind, because she saw how it would happen, exactly like a dream: She would claw the boy’s belly open, and his scream would sound muffled and far away to her ears. Derek would come to investigate, to try to rescue him from what he would be sure was a gator, but she would overpower Derek next. Her new body would even if she could not.
As Abbie swam directly beneath the swimmer, bathed in the magical light fighting to shield him, she tried to resist the overpowering scent of a meal and remember that he was a boy. Someone’s dear son. As Derek (was that the other one’s name?) had put it so memorably some time ago—perhaps while he was painting the porch, perhaps in one of her dreams—neither of them yet had been tested by life.
But it was summertime. In Graceville.
In the lake.
Ars Lacuna is a strange city. In this brief tale, we find the daily lives of its citizens revolve around paper, printing, binding, and books.
There’s also a market for parchment . . .
Walls of Paper, Soft as Skin
Adam Callaway
Tomai awoke to whispers. Hundreds of whispers. All whispering at once. A whirlwind of soft sound. Whispers in a dozen different languages. On a thousand subjects. Whispers of dark demands. Of heady passions. Of dread and hope. Whispers of anguish and of ecstasy. Whispers so inconsequential as to be forgotten the moment they were whispered. Tomai rolled over and went back to sleep.
He awoke to silence. Silence, and the sound of Ars Lacuna waking up. Autocarriages growled. Book vendors hawked hardcovers. The city was as it always was, and so was he.
Tomai sat on the edge of his bed. His apartment was small. Ten feet on a side. No windows. Layers of parchment enclosed the room. Walls yellowed and tearing. Ceiling shedding like a lizard. Floor worn through.
Opposite his bed was a door. Next to the door was a washbasin. Above the washbasin was a cracked mirror.
A photo hung from one corner. The photo held a girl. Skin the color of hazelnuts. Purple birthmark staining her left cheek. A circle of dark rouge. She was smiling. Tomai stared.
The sun moved, and he grunted. A tall pile of blank pages served as a bed stand. Tomai grabbed a cigarette from the bed stand. He put the paper roll in his mouth. He used his tongue to roll it around. Across his upper lip. From one side of his mouth to the other. Tomai would do this until the cigarette disintegrated. It was what he did every day.
He opened the door. A small pail of water sat in front of him. Small pails of water sat in front of every door. In every hallway. On every level. He grabbed the pail and washed himself in the basin. Spat out the bitter tobacco grit.
He only had one shirt. One pair of pants. No shoes. He brushed his hand along one wall. The parchment was soft with age. He closed the door, walked down the hall, down the stairs, and into the street.
Parchment Run was four blocks away. Nothing to see in between but beggars. Nothing to hear but rapids running. And logs thunking. And blades screeching.
The pole workers shared a common room, a tent, outside of the pulping section of the Run. Poles twenty feet long. Made of a variety of trees. They took up one wall. Misshaped boxes for valuables took up another. They were always empty.
Tomai walked in through a flap.
“Tomai. Did you hear, Tomai? An entire debarking team swam into the termite’s jaws. On purpose, Tomai!” Kork said pulling at Tomai’s frayed shirt. Kork stood waist high on his tiptoes.
“I can believe it,” Tomai said. He looked for a pine or birch pole.
“Really, Tomai? I can’t. Debarkers have sickle bone arms. They can swim better than any trout, Tomai! Who’d want to kill themselves with features like that, Tomai?” Kork made wild hand gestures.
“I can believe it.”
“Even if they decided, ‘Okay, let’s do this, girls,’ they could have come up with a better way. The autoblades would have made short work of them. The paper sizers down the way too. But being hacked up and digested by a bug the size of a city block though! Really, Tomai? Can you believe it, Tomai?”
Tomai spotted a curved pine pole under a stack of oak. He grabbed it.
“I can believe it.”
Kork squinted. “I’m not talking to you anymore today.”
Tomai dragged his pole through the inside flap. Into Parchment Run. Where the river exchanged a canopy of sky for corrugated tin. Dozens of pole workers were straightening sawn, debarked logs to enter the jaws of the bug. He took an open spot.
“I can’t believe it. I just can’
t believe it,” Kork muttered next to him. Kork’s pole was special. The only reserved pole. It was thin. Very thin.
Hours passed. Tomai didn’t miss a log. Kork didn’t miss a log. Kork didn’t miss a moment to speak. Tomai didn’t miss his mind.
Above the corrugated tin that enclosed the Run, the day fled. Darkness replaced the light that trickled through holes in the tin. Tomai hardly noticed. The lamps were working tonight.
A woman approached Tomai with a dozen loaves of stale brown bread. She stood between him and Kork, tearing the loaves into chunks and throwing them at the debarkers.
“Tonight,” she said. “Behind Xerro’s. Bring coin.”
The woman walked back the way she came. Further down the Run. Tomai sighed.
Hours passed. Tomai and Kork dragged their poles into the common room.
“Want to go get a drink? Bleeding Antons are only a brass a’piece tonight.”
“No.”
Kork left without another word. Tomai was thankful. He walked back into the Run.
Xerro’s was downriver. After the pulpers and shapers and cutters. Before the printers and binders and dealers. It sold stationary.
Tomai saw the woman from earlier. He knew this woman. She had helped him before. Every time, a different disguise. Always the same smell of resin.
Ms. Resin was dressed as a secretary. A Brothers Publishing House secretary. Floor-length gray skirt. White blouse. Auburn hair loose to the shoulder.
“Coin?” she asked, holding out her hand.
“Parchment?” he asked, holding out his hand.
They exchanged items. Tomai gave her two square copper pieces. A month’s wages for a pole worker. She gave him a dozen blank pages.
“I’m running out of people parchment. There needs to be a new plague. Don’t you miss the brittle pink skinflakes?” Resin disappeared through a tear in the Run’s tin.
It was dark. Staring down, Tomai couldn’t even make out his bare feet. He tucked the pages under his arm and left.
The way home was similar to the way there, but different. Two moonbeams instead of two sunbeams. A dead cat. Someone eating it.