Mothers & Other Monsters: Stories

by Maureen F. Mchugh

  I didn't know what to do. If I kept looking for Veronique's grandfather and he got angry he would probably hit me. I nodded and backed away, pulling Veronique with me, then when he stopped watching me, I started around the fire the other way.

  One of the outrunners stumbled up and into us before we could get out of the way. " Fh-?"

  I pulled Veronique away but he gripped her arm. "Boy?"

  His breath in her face made her close her eyes and turn her head.

  "No boy," he said. He was drunk, probably going to relieve himself No boy, outsider girl, pretty as a boy," he said. "Outsider, they like that? Eh?"

  Veroniqque gripped my hand. "Let's go," she said in English.

  He didn't have to speak English to see she was afraid of him.

  "I'm not pretty enough for you?" he said. "Eh? Not pretty enough?" He wasn't pretty, he was wiry and had teeth missing on one side of his mouth. Not Sckarline? With their pretty houses like offworlders? Not pretty, eh?"

  Veronique drew a breath like a sob.

  "Let go of her, please," I said, "we have to go find her teacher."

  "Look at the color of her," he said, "does that wash off? Eh?"

  "Do you know where her teacher is?" I asked.

  "Shut up, girl" he said to me. He licked his thumb and reached towards her face. Veronique raised her hand and drew back, and he twisted her arm. "Stand still." He rubbed her check with his thumb and peered closely at her.

  "Damn," he said, pleased. "How come the old man isn't dark?"

  "Maybe they are different clans," I said.

  He stared at her as if weighing what I'd said. As if thinking. Although he actually looked too drunk to do much thinking. Then he leaned forward and tried to kiss her.

  Veronique pushed him away with her free arm. He staggered and fell, pulling her down, too.

  "Let go!" she shrieked.

  Shut up, I thought, shut up, shut up! Give in, he's too drunk to do much. I tried to pull his arm off, but his grip was too strong.

  "What's this?" another outrunner was saying.

  "Fohlder's found some girl."

  "It would be fucking Fohlder!"

  Veronique slapped at him and struggled, trying to get away.

  "Hey now," Ayudesh was saying, "hey now, she's a guest, an offworlder." But nobody was paying attention. Everybody was watching the outrunner wrestle with her. He pinned her with her arms over her head and kissed her.

  Veronique was crying and slapping. Stop it, I kept thinking, just stop it, or he won't let you alone.

  Her grandfather tried to pull the outrunner off. I hadn't even seen him come up. "No no no no no," he was saying as if scolding someone. "No no no no no-"

  "Get off him," another outrunner hauled him away.

  Ayudesh said, "Stop! She is our guest!"

  "She's yours, eh?" someone said.

  "No," Ayudesh said, "she should be left alone. She's a guest."

  "Your guest, right. Not interested in the likes of us."

  Someone else grunted and laughed.

  "She likes Sckarline better, eh?"

  "That's because she doesn't know better."

  "Fohlder'll show her."

  You all stink like drunks, I wanted to scream at them, because they did.

  "Think she's dark inside like she is outside?"

  "Have to wait until morning to see."

  Oh, my da would he so mad at me, the stupid bitch, why didn't she stop, he was drunk, he was drunk, why had she slapped at him, stupider than Bet, she was as stupid as Bet my little sister, I was supposed to be taking care of her, I was supposed to be watching out for her, my da would be so mad-

  There was the bone crack of gunfire and everybody stopped.

  Harup was standing next to the fire with an outrunner gun pointed up, as if he were shooting at Fhidrhin up there in the stars. His expression was mild and he was studying the gun as if he hadn't even noticed what was going on.

  "Hey," an outrunner said, "put that down!"

  Harup looked around at the outrunners, at us. He looked slowly. He didn't look like he usually did, he didn't look funny or angry, he looked as if he were out on a boat in the ice. Calm, far away. Cold as the stars. He could kill someone.

  The outrunners felt it too. They didn't move. If he shot one of them, the others would kill him, but the one he shot would still be dead. No one wanted to be the one that might he dead.

  "It's a nice piece," Harup said, "but if you used it for hunting you'd soon he so deaf you couldn't hear anything moving." Then he grinned.

  Someone laughed.

  Everyone laughed.

  "Janna," Harup said, "take your friend and get us more whisak

  "Fohlder, you old walking dick, get up from that girl." One of them reached down and pulled him off. He looked mad.

  "What," he said, "what."

  "Go take a piss," the outrunner said.

  Everyone laughed.

  III.

  Veronique stayed with me that night, lying next to me in my blankets and furs. She didn't sleep, I don't think. I was listening to her breath. I felt as if I should help her sleep. I lay there and tried to think if I should put my arm around her, but I didn't know. Maybe she didn't want to be touched.

  And she had been a stupid girl, anyway.

  She lay tense in the dark. "Are you going to he a teacher?" I asked.

  She laughed. "If I get out of here."

  I waited for her to say more, but she didn't. "Get out of here" meant to make someone leave. Maybe she meant if she made herself.

  "You come here from Earth?" I asked. To get her to talk, although I was tired of lingua and I didn't really want to think about anything.

  "My family came here from Earth," she said.

  "Why?"

  "My father, he's an anthropologist," she said. "Do you know anthropologist?"

  "No," I said.

  "He is a person who studies the way people live. And he is a teacher."

  All the offworlders I had ever met were teachers. I wondered who did all the work on Earth.

  "Because Earth had lost touch with your world, the people here are very interesting to my father," she said. Her voice was listless in the dark and she was even harder to understand when I couldn't see her properly. I didn't understand so I didn't say anything. I was sorry I'd started her talking.

  "History, do you know the word `history'?" she asked.

  Of course I knew the word "history." "I study history in school," I said. Anneal and Kumar taught it.

  "Do you know the history of this world?"

  It took my tired head a long time to sort that out. "Yes," I said. "We are a colony. People from Earth come here to live. Then there is a big problem on Earth, and the people of Earth forget we are here. We forget we are from Earth. Then Earth finds us again."

  "Some people have stories about coming from the Earth," Veronique said. "My father is collecting those stories from different peoples. I'm a graduate student."

  The clans didn't have any stories about coming from Earth. We said the first people came out of the sun. This somehow seemed embarrassing. I didn't understand what kind of student she was.

  "Are you here for stories?" I asked.

  "No," she said. "Ian is old friends with your teacher, from back when they were both with the survey. We just came to visit."

  I didn't understand what she'd said except that they were visiting.

  We were quiet after that. I pretended to sleep. Sometimes there was gunfire outside and we jumped, even Mam on the bed. Everyone but Bet. Once Bet was asleep it was impossible to wake her up.

  I fell asleep thinking about how I wished that the Scathalos outrunners were gone. I dreamed that I was at the offworlder's home, where it was summer but no one was taking care of the stabros, and they were all glad, and so I was a hero-and I was startled awake by gunfire.

  Just more drinking and shooting.

  I wished my da would come home. It didn't seem fair that we should lie here and
be afraid while the men were getting drunk and singing.

  The outrunners stayed the next day, taking three more kegs of whisak but not talking about trade. The following day they sent out hunters, but didn't find their own meat and so took another stabros, the gelding I'd shown to Veronique. And more whisak.

  I went down to the distillery after they took some more whisak. It was already getting dark. The dark comes so early at this time of year. The door was left open and the fire was out. Mam wasn't coming anymore. There was no work being done. Kegs had been taken down and some had been opened and left open. Some had been spilled. They had started on the green stuff, not knowing what was what and had thrown most of it in the snow, probably thinking it was had. Branded eyes on the kegs looked everywhere.

  I thought maybe they wouldn't leave until all the whisak was gone. For one wild moment I thought about taking an axe to the kegs. Give them no reason to stay.

  Instead I listened to them singing, their voices far away. I didn't want to walk back towards the voices, but I didn't want to be outside in the dark, either. I walked until I could see the big fire they had going, and smell the stabros roasting. Then I stood for a while, because I didn't want to cross the light more than I wanted to go home. Maybe someone was holding the back, maybe my spirit knew something.

  I looked for my father. I saw Harup on the other side of the fire. His face was in the light. He wasn't singing, he was just watching. I saw Gerdor, my little uncle, nay father's half brother. I did not see my father anywhere.

  Then I saw him. His back was to me. He was just a black outline against the fire. He had his hands open wide, as if he was explaining. He had his empty hands open. Harup was watching my father explaining something to some of the outrunners and something was wrong.

  One of the outrunners turned his head and spat.

  My father, I couldn't hear his voice, but I could see his body, his shoulders moving as he explained. His shoulders working, working hard as if he were swimming. Such hard work, this talking with his hands open, talking, talking.

  The outrunner took two steps, bent down and pulled his rifle into the light. It was a dark thing there, a long thing against the light of the fire. My father took a step back and his hands came up, pushing something back.

  And then the outrunner shot my father.

  All the singing stopped. The fire cracked and the sparks rose like stars while my father struggled in the snow. He struggled hard, fighting and scraping back through the snow. Elbow-walking backwards. The outrunner was looking down the long barrel of the rifle.

  Get up, I thought. Get up. For a long time it seemed I thought, Get up, get up. Da, get up! But no sound came out of my mouth and there was black on the snow in the trampled trail my father left.

  The outrunner shot again.

  My father flopped into the snow and I could see the light on his face as he looked up. Then he stopped.

  Harup watched. No one moved except the outrunner who put his rifle away.

  I could feel the red meat, the hammering muscle in my chest. I could feel it squeezing, squeezing. Heat flowed in my face. In my hands.

  Outrunners shouted at outrunners. You shit," one shouted at the one who shot my father. "You drunken, stupid shit!" The one who shot my father shrugged at first, as if he didn't care, and then he became angry, too, shouting.

  My breath was in my chest, so full. If I breathed out loud the outrunners would hear me out here. I tried to take small breaths, could not get enough air. I did not remember when I had been holding my breath.

  Harup and the hunters of Sckarline sat, like prey, hiding in their stillness. The arguing went on and on, until it wasn't about my father at all and his body was forgotten in the dirty snow. They argued about who was stupid and who had the High-on's favor. The whisak was talking.

  I could think of nothing but air.

  I went hack through the dark, out of Sckarline, and crept around behind the houses, in the dark and cold until I could come to our house without going past the fire. I took great shuddering breaths of cold air, breathed out great gouts of fog.

  My mother was trying to get Bet to he quiet when I came in. "No;" she was saying, "stop it now, or I'll give you something to cry about,"

  "Mam," I said, and I started to cry.

  "What?" she said. " Janna, your face is all red," She was my mam, with her face turned towards me, and I had never seen her face so clearly.

  "They're going to kill all of us," I said. "They killed Da with a rifle."

  She never said a word but just ran out and left me there. Bet started to cry although she didn't really know what I was crying about. Just that she should be scared. Veronique was still. As still as Hat-tip and the hunters.

  Wanji came and got me and brought me to Avudesh's house because outhouse is small and Ayudesh's house had enough room for some people. Snow was caked in the creases of my father's pants. It was in his hands, too, unmelted. I had seen dead people before, and my father looked like all of them. Not like himself at all.

  My mother had followed him as far as the living can go, at least as far as someone untrained in spirit journeys-and she was not herself. She was sitting on the floor next to his body, rocking back and forth with her arms crossed in her lap. I had seen women like that before, but not my mother. I didn't want to look. It seemed indecent. Worse than the body of my father, since my father wasn't there at all.

  Bet was screaming. Her face was red from the effort. I held her even though she was heavy and she kept arching away from me like a toddler in a tantrum. "MAM! MAM!" she kept screaming.

  People came in and squatted down next to the body for a while. People talked about guns. It was important that I take care of Bet, so I did, until finally she wore herself out from crying and fell asleep. I held her on my lap until the blood was out of my legs and I couldn't feel the floor and then Wanji brought me a blanket and I wrapped Bet in it and let her sleep.

  Wanji beckoned me to follow. I could barely stand, my legs had so little feeling. I held the wall and looked around, at my mother sitting next to the vacant body, at my sister, who though asleep was still alive. Then I tottered after Wanji as if I was the old woman.

  "Where is the girl?" Wanji said.

  "Asleep," I said. "On the floor."

  "No, the girl," Wanji said, irritated. "Ian's girl. From the university."

  "I don't know," I said.

  "You're supposed to be watching her. Didn't Ayudesh tell you to watch her?"

  "You mean Veronique? She's back at my house. In my bed."

  Wanji nodded and sucked on her teeth. "Okay," she said. And then again to herself. "Okay."

  Wanji took me to her house, which was little and dark. She had a lamp shaped like a bird. It had been in her house as long as I could remember. It didn't give very much light, but I had always liked it. We sat on the floor. Wanji's floor was always piled high with rugs from her home and furs and blankets. It made it hard to walk but nice to sit. Wanji got cold and her bones hurt, so she always made a little nest when she sat down. She pulled a red and blue rug across her lap. "Sit, sit, sit," she said.

  I was cold, but there was a blanket to wrap around my shoulders. I couldn't remember being alone with Wanji before. But everything was so strange it didn't seem to make any difference and it was nice to have Wanji deciding what to do and me not having to do anything.

  Wanji made tea over her little bird lamp. She handed me a cup and I sipped it. Tea was a strange drink. Wanji and Ayudesh liked it and hoarded it. It was too bitter to be very good, but it was warm and the smell of it was always special. I drank it and held it against me. I started to get warm. The blanket got warm from me and smelled faintly of Wanji, an old dry smell.

  I was sleepy. It would have been nice to go to sleep right there in my little nest on Wanji's floor.

  "Girl," Wanji said. "I must give you something. You must take care of Veronique."

  I didn't want to take care of anybody. I wanted someone to take care of m
e. My eyes started to fill up and in a moment I was crying salt tears into my tea.

  "No time for that, Janna." Wanji said. Always sharp with us. Some people were afraid of Wanji. I was. But it felt good to cry, and I didn't know how to stop it, so I didn't.

  Wanji didn't pay any attention. She was hunting through her house, checking in a chest, pulling up layers of rugs to peer in a corner. Was she going to give me a gun? I couldn't think of anything else that would help very much right now, but I couldn't imagine that Wanji owned a gun.

  She came back with a dark blue plastic box not much bigger than the span of my spread hand. That was almost as astonishing as a gun. I wiped my nose on my sleeve. I was warm and tired. Would Wanji let me sleep right here on her floor?

  Wanji opened the plastic box, but away from me so I couldn't see inside it. She picked at it as if she were picking at a sewing kit, looking for something. I wanted to look in it but I was afraid that if I tried she'd snap at me.

  She looked at me. "This is mine," she said. "We both got one and we decided that if the people who settled Sckarline couldn't have it, we wouldn't either."

  I didn't care about that. That was old talk. I wanted to know what it was.

  Wanji wasn't ready to tell me what it was. I had the feeling that Ayudesh didn't know about this, and I was afraid she would talk herself out of it. She looked at it and thought. If I thought, I thought about my father being dead. I sipped tea and tried to think about being warm, about sleeping, but that feeling had passed. I wondered where Tuuvin was.

  I thought about my da and I started to cry again.

  I thought that would really get Wanji angry so I tried to hide it, but she didn't pay any attention at all. The shawl she wore over her head slipped halfway down so when I glanced up I could see where her hair parted, and the line of pale skin. It looked so bare that I wanted it covered up again. It made me think of the snow in my father's hands.

  "It was a mistake," Wanji said.

  I thought she meant the box, and I felt a terrible disappointment that I wouldn't get to see what was inside it.

  "You understand what we were trying to do?" she asked me.

  With the box? Not at all.

  "What are the six precepts of development philosophy?" she asked.