Sister Mine

by Nalo Hopkinson

  Abby was trying to see into the foliage of the oak tree. “Persistent squirrels, to be up at night.”

  The scent of our supper ginger puddings was stronger out here than in the house. And too sweet. Next time less sugar, more ginger. I got Abs to open the back door of the car. “In you get,” I told the rug. It zipped into the backseat and settled.

  Abby grumbled, “If it tries to put its head out the window so its ears can flap in the breeze, I’m kicking it out of the car.”

  “You’re just jealous.”

  “Says you.”

  I heaved the two white plastic bags of oranges off the counter of the deli store. I huffed at Abby, “Thirty-one oranges are heavier to carry than I reckoned they would be.”

  “You could let me carry one of the bags,” she pointed out. “I’m disabled, not unable.”

  “We’re only going as far as the car.” I put the bags on the floor of the passenger side and got in.

  Abby slid in behind the wheel. “You’re still not going to tell me where we’re going?”

  “Just start the car. I’ll show you.”

  “It’s so dark out here.” Abby flicked her flashlight on and shone it on the ground, searching for the path.

  “Turn that thing off!” I said, “It’s like a beacon to the cops.” We’d been fighting about the flashlight ever since we got out of the car and slipped around the gate.

  “But I can’t see anything,” she grumbled. “I don’t want to trip.”

  “You won’t trip! You’ll be flying.”

  She looked doubtfully at the rug lying on the ground, with me and the bags of oranges sitting on it. “I guess. But why did we have to come here? I didn’t know you were going to trespass on the Leslie Street Spit in the dark at oh-God o’clock in the morning, carrying thirty-one oranges!”

  I hissed, “If you’re going to yell at me, do it in a whisper, OK?”

  She whipped around, trying to see in a full circle all at once. The flashlight traced a giddy halo. “Why? Will something follow the sounds of our voices?”

  “Yup. And it’ll arrive in a car with the words ‘To Serve and Protect’ written on the side, and we’ll probably be fine, ’cause we can just zip away. But the claypickens here who’re making out or trying to get some sleep won’t thank you for it. Come on, Abs. Turn the light off and let your eyes get used to the dark so you can see better. And get on already, will you?”

  Resignedly, she stepped over the birds ringing the rug and sat down. “There are other people here?”

  “In a city full of homeless people, what d’you want to bet that a few of them are squatting out here?” I was panting just from the effort of loading the bags onto the rug. First I spaz out for a whole night, and now I couldn’t catch my breath. Not to mention the headaches and the queasy tummy. Is this what Fleet had been going through?

  Abby was still looking around. “It’d really suck if your haint decided to show up now.”

  I smirked and patted the rug. “I’m safe on this baby.”

  “Are you sure? How do you know your haint can’t fly?”

  I hadn’t thought of that. Quickly, I asked the rug to put us about fifteen feet in the air. Abby squealed when it rose, and grabbed for my arm. “It’s OK,” I said. “Just relax.” I told the rug to take us into the trees.

  Abby hissed, “Make it slow down!”

  “Fine.” I told the rug to head for the beach, andante. It slowed to an ambling pace, the perfect speed for enjoying this trip. It was a very still night, and spring-cool. The water was making quiet lapping noises, like a cat drinking from a bowl of milk. From the lake came the occasional sleepy honk of geese. I could smell the blossoms of green, growing things, and the sludgy scent of goose dung. I could smell living happening, and it was good.

  “Maka?”

  “That’s your wheedling voice. What do you want?”

  “You think you could come and hang out with me while I’m writing a piece that the Nathaniel Dett Chorale commissioned from me yesterday?”

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

  “I’m calling it ‘Unholy Racket.’ It’s an Easter arrangement for large gospel choir, blues guitar, timpani, and solo female voice.”

  I turned and stared at her. Uncertainly, she continued, “I’ll be exploring the notion of ‘breathing new life’ into what had apparently ceased to breathe and why’re you looking at me like that?”

  “When will you let me the hell go? That’s just another excuse to get me back living in the house.”

  “But things are so much better when you’re there!”

  “Except for the constant squabbling, you mean? Besides, I’ve only been away one day. One lousy, stinking day, Abby! You haven’t had enough time to figure out what it’s like to live without me.”

  “It isn’t the first time you’ve gone away, though. Remember that trip you took to hike in BC? Two weeks. And the whole time, I couldn’t get anything right, couldn’t do anything right. When you’re home, I can think clearly. I know where stuff is. I know that the theremin should come in right at the first bar.” She fake-grinned at me. “Hey, maybe that’s your mojo.”

  “Being your security blanket? There’s a name for that: codependency.”

  “Well, just listen to the psychologist. Who died and crowned you Dr. Phil?”

  “Look, I know it’s hard. But we can’t go on living like this. I can’t. It’s killing me.”

  A tear escaped from the corner of one of her eyes. “I need you, Maka.”

  “Not really. Not any more. Look, we’ve reached the beach.”

  She’d kept her nails dug into my arm the whole way. She looked over the edge of the rug. “Tell this thing to sit down, or set down, or whatever it does. I’m not going down there perched atop an oversized doily.”

  “Come on, Abby!” I’d been looking forward to that part.

  “Make. It. Lie. Down.”

  She was really scared. I sighed and got the rug to put down at the top of the cliff. Abby said, “Thank you. And I am never riding on this thing again.”

  “Well, how’re you going to get down to the beach, then?”

  “I have the better part of two good legs, and I know how to use them.” A little unsteadily, she clambered outside the protective circle of the rugs’ wings.

  I handed her her cane. “You are such a spoilsport.”

  “Bite me.”

  I got off the rug and ordered it to airlift the oranges down to the tiny beach and wait for us on the sand there. It obeyed. In the dark, its piebald colours blended well with the beach sand and the shadows of the rocks. I turned to Abby. “OK, now it’s our turn.”

  “I’ve been to the Spit before—remember when Dad used to take us? But I haven’t been down there, ever.”

  “But you won’t take the easy ride down.”

  “That thing is wrong, Maka! Can’t you feel it?”

  It was only the shortest climb down to the strip of shore, barely five feet. “Look, it’s easy to climb down.”

  I scooted over the side of the incline and scrambled down the rocks and chunks of embedded concrete slab. “See? Nothing to—” A rock shifted under my foot and I stumbled a little, but I was practically all the way down already, so I didn’t sweat it. At the bottom, I straightened and looked up at Abby. “Tah-dah!” I spread my arms. “Now you do it. I’ll be down here to catch you if you slip. But I bet you won’t slip.”

  Abby eyed the decline doubtfully. “I don’t know,” she said. “If I tripped like you did just now, I could break my leg.”

  “Well, so could I have! So could anyone.”

  “It just looks steeper now than it did when we were floating above it.”

  “So all that talk about being able to do it yourself was just fronting? I knew it!”

  “Maka, please don’t—”

  “Aw, come on, Abs! Don’t ruin the adventure now, before we’ve barely even begun it. At least get down to the shore.”

  She stared
with longing at the ground below. “I really want to.”

  “You can do this. It’ll be a blast!” I held my hand out to her. “Here. Just give me your hand.”

  “Wait a sec, OK? Take this.” She handed her cane down to me. I took it and rested it on the ground.

  Abby sat on the ground above and slowly worked her way forward until her legs were hanging over the edge. “Don’t hold my hand,” she told me. “It’ll only make me more scared to have you pulling me.”

  “OK then. So first, put your foot on this whitish rock here.” I patted the head-sized rock that gleamed a little with reflected light. “See it?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Then step on this piece of concrete, but watch out for that rebar that’s sticking out. I’m right here. I won’t let you fall.”

  “You don’t know that. I’m a lot heavier than I used to be as a kid, you know.”

  “You weighed a little less than me then, and you weigh a little less than I do now. Besides, who hauls your gear when you do a show? Moi.”

  Abby worked her way forward a little farther.

  “Watch it,” I warned. “Look at where you’re putting your feet.”

  She didn’t. She half pushed herself, half slid over the edge, her fingers splayed out in front of her with a childlike, graceless grace. Her foot thudded onto and then slid off the first rock. Her other leg didn’t quite hold her when her foot hit the piece of concrete, and over she went. I was ready. I stepped forward and yanked her into my arms before she got too close to the jutting rebar. Whoops. It was harder to hold her up than I’d thought. I thumped down onto the sand on my back with Abby on top of me. The sudden pressure of an adult body on my chest shoved so much air out of me that I couldn’t even cry out.

  “Whoa there,” said Abby cheerfully. I had my arms around her. She’d put her hands up to cradle the back of my head. “Wouldn’t want to crack your stubborn head open on these rocks, would you?”

  Then we were both laughing, spurred on to greater hilarity by the juddering of our giggling bodies against each other. Abby rolled off me, still chuckling. She stared into my eyes. She leaned forward and planted a soft kiss on my lips. Hers tasted of ginger. “You goof,” she said tenderly. “You were always the eager one leading the way, begging me to join you. You made me want to push myself a little bit more, try a little bit harder, just so I could keep up with you.”

  “I was? I did?” I sat up, trying to suck air in quietly. I didn’t want her to see how winded I was from climbing down to the beach and cushioning her fall.

  “Maka, for real. You’re the reason I mostly walk with a cane instead of needing crutches all the time. You’re the reason I can stand up in front of an audience of a thousand people. Don’t you remember how scared I was to sing for anyone but you and Dad?”

  “I remember you being a little hesitant, but you got over it. You were made to be up onstage.”

  She swung herself into a sitting position. “A little hesitant? Girl, I was just about peeing myself with terror. You were the one who told me I could do it. Same way you did just now.” She patted my cheek, then reached for her cane and got up. “Now, let’s try this crazy idea of yours, shall we?”

  “My crazy idea? I thought we both came up with it.” I rocked myself onto the balls of my feet and creaked into a standing position. Doing so made my knees hurt.

  “Nah-a-ah,” she replied, shaking a finger at me. “Crazy ideas are always yours, you know that. That’s the deal between us. That’s our thing.”

  Oh, my sister. I smiled, shaking my head.

  She said, “You laugh now. But just you be figuring out how the rass I’m going to get back up off this beach.”

  “You’ll manage. I know you. Up was always easier for you than down.” I didn’t bring the rug up again. I upended each of the plastic shopping bags, rolling the oranges out onto the ground. I tied the empty bags around the legs of one of the bigger rug birds.

  Abby and I contemplated the pile of oranges. Abby said, “What do you figure we do now? Burn them, or something? Eat them? Juggle with them?”

  “They’re wet. They wouldn’t burn. Besides, Mom’s not one of the big guys. Burnt offerings won’t summon her.”

  “You really think he used to meet her here once a month?”

  “I don’t know. I’m going on a hunch here.” I got to my feet, worked a kink out of my back. “I suspect you weren’t serious about juggling them.”

  That earned me a little laugh. “Nah. This is silly,” she said. “I don’t think anything’s going to happen. We should just go home.”

  She was giving up just like that, without barely having tried anything. Oh, but she could get my goat so easily! “Face it,” I snapped, “you’re just not interested in anything that might have to do with our mother.”

  “Face it,” she replied, “she has nothing to do with us and never will. We’re out here at two in the morning with thirty-one oranges and a lot of egg on our faces.”

  Of course that led immediately to bickering, which turned into arguing about which one of us was the more selfish, which became a fight about me moving out, which degraded rapidly into yelling and name-calling.

  “Oh, yeah?” I said. “Well, if you weren’t so bloody stubborn—!”

  “I’m stubborn? Me?”

  I honestly don’t remember which one of us first picked up an orange and slung it at the other. But since I’m quicker on my feet than Abs is, my best guess says it was me. Anyway, whichever of us it was, we ended up winging oranges at each other. A few landed in the water. Abby got me full in the chest with one. A few more split on nearby rocks. One slammed down onto the rug, which undulated to roll the orange off, then crawled to hide behind a sheltering rock. I didn’t know about Abby, but I was nearly peeing my pants from trying to squeal and laugh quietly. We got closer and closer to each other, mock-glaring. I started peeling the orange in my hand. Abby did the same with hers. She began whistling the famous Morricone stanza from the saloon showdown scene in The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. Our grins got broader and fiercer the closer we got to each other. Just before we were within arms’ reach, Abby rushed me. Caught by surprise, I nearly dropped my orange. In seconds, we were smushing our oranges on each other’s clothing, on each other’s faces, crushing the oranges in our fingers until they dripped juice and pulp and filled the air with the sweet citrus smell.

  “No!” Abby said between giggles. “Not the hair!”

  “Too late! No quarter given, none asked.”

  “Oh, yeah?” She jammed the remnants of her orange against my mouth. “Eat it. Eat it!”

  I shook my head and kept my mouth closed as she smeared sticky juice all over my lips and cheeks.

  Abby said, in a soft, hollow voice, “Eat my orange of doom!”

  I laughed, and got myself a mouthful of orange pulp. “Hey,” I said, licking it off my lips, “This doesn’t taste so bad.”

  “It doesn’t, huh?” She reached down and grabbed another orange up from the ground. “Let’s just see how you like one with the skin still on!”

  “Hey!” I tried to wrestle it from her. She tried to reach my face with it. Neither one of us was trying very hard. “You’re the one who—Abs, wait, shush. What’s that noise?”

  “Oho! You can’t fool me like that, you sorry excuse for—”

  “Hush, I said! Can you hear it?”

  She must have twigged that I was serious. She held still and listened. It was a steady dripping, like rain falling on the surface of the lake. “Did your rug fall into the lake?”

  “No, it’s over there. Is there a rain shower coming, maybe?”

  “It’s not rain. It’s more like water falling from the leaves of a tree after a hard rain. Except this tree is getting taller and taller…” She dropped the orange and grabbed my forearms. “MakalookbehindmeIthinkthere’ssomethingbehindme.”

  The hairs on the nape of my neck prickled. I looked over her shoulder at the vast blackness of the lake. I couldn
’t see the horizon point where it merged with the sky. “I don’t see—”

  Abby hissed, “Look up, damn it!”

  I looked up. There were two silvered circles floating above our heads. Whatever they were, they were pretty. They reminded me of something. And they were dripping water on us. Abby looked up and moaned, “Oh, gods…” at about the time that I wonderingly reached a hand up, trying to gauge how big the circles were.

  They blinked. “Holy shit!” They were the size of dinner plates, they were right on top of us, and they were eyes. I grabbed Abby, tried to hustle us out from under the thing. That silver shine; Butter’s eyes glowed like that in the dark.

  Abby fought me. “No! Wait, Makeda! We did it! I think it’s Mom!”

  I stopped and turned back to look. Now that I sort of knew what I was looking at, my eyes could discern it more easily. The creature was some dark colour; black or maybe midnight blue. Its body was streamlined; fat in the middle, tapering at the neck end. It was about the size of the pleasure yachts that people sailed on this lake in the summer. Two paddle-like feet in front. Its back was still in the oil-black water, so I couldn’t tell what that end looked like. Longish neck. Its head looked too small for its body, but that didn’t mean it was a small head. Right now, the creature was bending that head down towards Abby, who’d stretched her hand up to meet it. I tensed, ready to rush in and elbow that thing in the snout, if need be. But it didn’t strike. Instead, it slowed its movement down as its head came closer to Abby. Abby touched its nose. “Mom?”

  It shied away, snorted. Paddled its two front flippers on the rocks of the shore.

  “Try that again, would you?” said Abby. “Can you even understand me?”

  Big, it was too big. I backed up against a boulder. That rubbery, slimy thing that smelled of wet algae wasn’t the mother I’d dreamed of. That thing couldn’t be anyone’s mother. “Abby,” I said weakly, “Come away!”

  She turned a joyous face to me. “She says we should stop squabbling like children! She thought we were Dad. She says he hasn’t visited her in almost a year.”

  The creature butted her gently with its snout. Abby threw her arms around its neck. “Mom!”