“Maud-ee! Peter! You come home, you hear me!”
Sirens. “Aaa-yaaa, aaa-yaaa, aaa-yaaa …”
Dogs barking.
A blast of music.
Trucks rumbling on the highway, engines whining high for the steep grades.
Cars. Thwap! Thwap! Thwap! Thwap! Thwap! Endlessly.
The ground vibrated with noise. The air was shattered by noise.
And the smells. The stink of buses and cars. Oil and smoke. The odor of rotting garbage. The smell of cats.
And lights. Street lights glaring into her eyes. Headlights. Lights from the apartment buildings across the street. Harsh punishing lights.
After a while, she spoke to herself. Get up now. You made it. You’re here. Up. Up on your feet. She pushed herself to her hands and knees, swayed there for a moment, then collapsed to the ground on her back. Her arms and legs were still weak from the blackness. The storm. “It.” She felt raw, bruised. Tears leaked from her eyes, wet her cheeks, ran into her ears.
She tried not to let his name come into her mind, tried not to see the blood, the leaves packed into the hole in his belly. But she saw. She heard. She wanted to howl desperately, blot out the unending noise, the voice in her head, the images behind her eyes. The knife, bloody, coming at her. Acid jetted into her belly. Had she screamed? She couldn’t remember. She had fallen onto her side, rolled over, scrambled and crawled away, sobbing, panting, stumbled to her feet, and run. It was all a blur in her mind. Running through the forest. Moonlight. Wetness of branches and grass. The drum. Thum . . . thum . . . thum . . . thum . . .
She pushed her head back and forth against the ground. Oh, Lishum. Oh, Sonte.
Burrum, what are you thinking now?
A man walked by on the other side of the park fence, singing in a drunken voice. “Oh, bury me not on the lone prairie . . .” He laughed. She heard his footsteps fading.
Her teeth were still numb.
Come on, this won’t do. It’s not like the other time, you know. Here you are. Home. There was a sensible little voice somewhere in her mind. She tried to listen to it obey it.
She stood up, staggering, off balance, almost falling, but catching herself against the boulder. Slowly she walked through the park, out the gate. She flinched as a car roared past tires screeching as it took the corner.
For a long time she stood on the sidewalk, pressed against the park fence, trembling, unable to cross the street. Cars passed with sickening regularity. The glare of headlights. Tires on pavement. Snatches of talk and music from car radios “ . . . weather tonight is fair . . .” “. . . ba-bee ba-bee . .” “. . . users of Corona Cigars know . . .”
A gang of boys, baseball bats over their shoulders, passed her. A man walking a little dog on a long leash. A woman in a black coat and a turban who peered at her, then hurried on, her coat pulled tightly around her.
Zan was dizzy, nauseated. The lights spun in her eyes, spun in her head.
A woman stood at the curb, waiting to cross. She carried a brown paper grocery bag in her arms. Zan stepped behind her and followed the woman across the street, her throat acid. She stepped up on the sidewalk. Safe. The woman walked away. Again Zan tried not to let Sonte’s name come into her mind. She rubbed her hand over the rough brick of a building. She started toward home.
Chapter 32
Talking to herself, whispering, Zan made her way slowly through the half¬darkened streets. C’mon, it isn’t that bad . . . “Yes, it is—I feel so—strange.” Okay, just keep walking, keep going toward home . . . “Yes—okay—” She dragged her hand along the buildings she passed, scraping her palm. The pain was good. It was real. Her sneakers, untied, flopped loosely on her feet. Turn the corner here, third building . . . “I know that.” She hadn’t forgotten where the family lived. “I’m not that far gone,” she told the sensible little voice. A man, passing, looked at her oddly.
She stopped in front of her family’s building. The kitchen fronted on the street. She looked up. Light in the window. Behind her, cars passing steadily. A knot of kids, boys and a few girls, down at the corner beneath the street lamp. Laughter and talk drifted her way. “Henry’s got it . . . Henry’s got it!” “You cheap-skate!” “Naw, it’s Henry—” She went up the steps. “Henry, Henry,” a half dozen voices yelled. The air, clammy, stung her nostrils and her throat.
She negotiated three flights of stairs like someone very old or very feeble. Picking her way up, one stair at a time, leaning her head against the wall, stopping to draw in deep breaths. She wondered at herself. Hadn’t she thought so many many times of these very moments? Imagined racing up these stairs, flinging open the apartment door, crying out her arrival. I’M HOME! HEY, EVERYONE, ZAN’S HERE! She wasn’t sure now how long she’d been gone. Toward the end, she had neglected her calendar, some days forgotten to scratch in her marks. But close to eleven months, she thought. Eleven months. Almost a whole year.
The halls smelled of vinegar and coffee. Voices leaked out from behind each separate door. Little families in little apartments. Closed off from each other. She rounded the landing and started up the last flight. Faster now. Stronger. Eager at last. It was true then. She was home. Maybe she hadn’t believed it till that moment. She stood in front of their door. Brown chipped paint. Three shiny locks. She turned the handle. Unlocked. That meant they were home. Her father, anyway. She stepped into the hall.
The smell of cheese baking. TV sounds from the living room—bright, chattery, fast. Pots rattling in the kitchen. The mirror over the telephone table. She was shocked to see herself. It had been so long. She stared. Was that Zan? Dirt on her forehead. Tanned. Freckles everywhere. Tangled hair. And her eyes—wide, staring, leaking tears again. She was home. From the TV came a burst of laughter and applause. “Ha, ha, ha, ha, hahahahah…”
She touched the telephone and the polished surface of the table. Go on in there and let them know you’re back. The sensible little voice again. Go on, this is what you’ve been waiting for. Them, too.
She took the few steps that led to the living room. Kim and Buddy were lying on the rug in front of the TV, chins in hands, feet up in the air. Buddy’s red head shocked her. For how long had she been mixing him and Lishum in her mind? Her face grew hot with guilt, then, pain. Lishum. She dropped to her knees and hugged Buddy, dragging him off the floor, squeezing his sturdy, squirming body against her. “Buddy, Buddy, Buddy . . .”
“Shh, it’s the good part,” Kim said, not looking up.
The kitchen door swung open, and her mother called, “Enough TV, you two. Come in for supper.”
Zan’s throat thickened. “Mom! Mom, I’m home.”
“So I see,” her mother said pleasantly. She walked over to the TV and snapped it off. “Enough, I said. Zan, looks like you’re squeezing the life out of poor Buddy. Go wash your hands, kids. And watch the noise. Dad is having a nap in the bedroom. Zan, come in the kitchen and help me.”
Halfway back to the kitchen, she paused and looked at Zan, who was numbly following her. “Where’ve you been all day, anyway?” She shook her head, half smiling. “What in the world have you been up to? You’re a mess.” She plucked at Zan’s shirt with a faint air of distaste. “What’re all these awful-looking stains? And your hair—what’d you do to it, honey? It looks like you combed it with an egg beater.” She stared at Zan. “Have you been out in the sun all day?” Her smile wavered, she shook her head in a half abstracted way as if shaking off unpleasant thoughts.
Where have I been all day? Where have I been all day? She had heard wrong. She must have heard wrong. It was that awful pain her head, the noises, the glaring lights of the house, the walls that she felt pressing in on her. She followed her mother into the kitchen.
“Mom, you must have worried. I have so much to tell you. I missed you so much . . .” The tears, leaking again.
Her mother was busy at the stove. “That’s sweet, honey. Get out the milk. Pour the kids each a glass. Let’s get them fed first. Ivan should be
coming home any minute.”
And now Zan knew something was wrong. Gone nearly a year and only, That’s sweet, honey. Get out the milk. She smoothed her hand over the gleaming stainless steel face of the refrigerator. The door swung open at a touch. Shelves stuffed with food, all there for the taking. That’s sweet, honey. Get out the milk. She felt dazed, confused, sick. Was she being punished? Maybe they thought she had run away—all this time. They were mad. Punishing her. Pretend it never happened. Let her see if she likes that!
“Mom, don’t you care?” Her voice was so thin. “Why are you so indifferent?” She was still staring dazedly at the shelves of food.
But her mother was pulling the pan of macaroni and cheese out of the oven. “Oooh, this is hot. Hand me that spatula—” The macaroni pan banged onto the table.
Zan closed the door. Inside her, things were spinning and jiggling, whirring and whirling. It was all happening in her head. Faster and faster. Crazy, whirling, spinning, faster, faster—STOP IT. She leaned her burning forehead against the cool metal of the refrigerator.
“What’s the matter?” her mother said, looking up. “Is something wrong?” She dropped a wedge of baked macaroni onto a plate.
“I think so. Yes. I’ve been away. You act so—”
“Don’t tell me it’s the diary thing still bothering you. You ought to know, honey, you can’t leave things lying around this apartment And, anyway—I didn’t read it but I took a quick look—some of the things you wrote in there, you’d have been better off not to. Know what I mean? It’s better to keep things to yourself, sometimes. Are you listening, Zan? I feel like I’m talking to myself. You seem like you’re a million miles away.”
“Yes, Mom. I heard you. I heard everything.” Her voice strong for a moment then fading out. Because the spinning and whirling were starting again. She couldn’t stop it Couldn’t stop what she was thinking. “Mom—what’s the date?”
“Date? Same as this moming. Twelfth, I think.”
“And the day?” Things going faster and faster in her head.
“Saturday, naturally.” A touch of impatience in her mother’s tone. “What’s this, a game? A riddle?”
“Saturday. The twelfth. Of October?”
“All right Zan, you’re behaving very strangely. Have you got something you want to tell me? Where were you today, all day? Did you do something you shouldn’t have? You look a little funny, too.”
Today, all day. Saturday, the twelfth of October. The sounds of the house throbbed along her skin. The same day. It was the same day. “Mom, there’s something—” She groped for words. “Something happened—” She leaned her head against her mother’s breast. She hadn’t done that for years. She put her arms around her mother, held her tight. “Mom, listen, this’ll sound crazy, I know, but it’s true.” She spoke fast pleadingly. “I went into the park, you think it was this morning, but really it was months and months ago, almost a year ago, and I was caught up in this kind of storm, like a force, and—”
“Zan, I can’t understand one thing you’re saying.” Still pleasant, but an edge to her voice. “Now, is something the matter with you?” She pushed Zan a little away from her and looked at her searchingly. “You look off, somehow. Your color’s wrong. Your skin looks awfully dark! I bet you’re getting sick.” She put her palm to Zan’s forehead. “I’m sure you have a little fever. Your eyes . . .” Her voice trailed off and she smiled crookedly, almost in bewilderment, then seemed to pull herself together. “Lie down, honey, if you’re getting something, maybe we can nip it in the bud.” Her voice grew brisker. She gave Zan a little turn toward her cot “Hop in now. I’ll get you some juice.”
“Yes, I feel sick,” Zan said. She lay down on the cot near the wall. It was narrow, hard. The room was too warm. She was sweating.
Ivan came in, whistling, bumping her cot as he passed. “I’m starved. What’s to eat? Hey, Mom, you should see the stereo Billy’s grandfather said he’d buy him if he passed all his classes this term.”
Zan pulled the blankets over her shoulder, closed her eyes. Her father called from the living room. “Supper ready yet?”
“Five minutes,” her mother said. And to Ivan. “Set the rest of the table. I guess we’ll eat together, after all. Might as well. Cici’s out. Zan doesn’t feel well.”
“Oh, cripes,” Ivan groaned.
Under the blankets Zan was sweating profusely. Her throat was tight with fear and her mind was skittering every which way, like those crazy cars at a carnival that bump into each other. It’s just like always . . . they haven’t changed at all . . . maybe I never left . . . she said it was the same day . . . maybe I’m crazy . . . made it all up . . . what if none of it ever happened . . . none of it was real? Real. The word echoed mockingly. STOP THAT. Then off again, in another direction. She had left the knife. Why had she left the knife? It had brought so much grief, terror, pain, already! But what else could she have done? The knife thrown at her, her terror . . .
She curled up under the blanket with her knees up to her chest, hands in a ball beneath her chin. Remembering something . . . someplace . . . she had curled up like that before . . . Then it came to her, the first night at the caves, when she had slept outside in terror, almost crazy.
Her father came into the kitchen with Buddy and Kim hanging onto his hands. She wanted to cry out, Daddy! Dad! Dad!
“Picked up a bug somewhere, Zan?” he said, and sat down at the table with his back to her. She closed her eyes, didn’t speak.
She slept poorly that night, wakened by dreams of running through the forest, running and running, behind her Diwera, and ahead of her the ravine . . .
She stayed in bed the next day, and then for three more days. She was sick, trembling and weak. She got out of bed only to use the bathroom. Her toes curled on the hard ungiving floors. She breathed in the stale apartment air. Listlessly, she drank a glass of milk and ate a piece of soft white bread. She couldn’t seem to stay awake for long. Burrum came to her in her dreams, calling her, Meezzan, Meezzan, my sister . . .
And Sonte, smiling a little in his prideful way, telling her she had confused the words for egg and smooth stone. And Farwe, crying, Oh, your poor thing! as she examined the insect bites on Zan’s back. Ainu, tickling the baby’s stomach. Keyria, playing his reed, eyes closed. And old Mahu, the Teller, spreading her withered arms and, through some magic or art, creating Miiawa. Goah, his huge eyes clogged with tears as he looked at the blood gushing from his thumb. And Akawa, long, tall Akawa. Hiffaru, standing apart, looking at everything, at everyone, from that small eye. And then coming out of the cave, seeing the knife in Hiffaru’s hand . . . the hole in Sonte’s belly . . . screaming . . . and Diwera shouting . . . the knife flying through the air toward her . . .
Over and over she dreamed of that last night and woke each time, moaning, certain that it had all happened. Until the doubts came again. Had she dreamed it? Imagined it? Made it up?
One morning she sat up in bed. “Cici. Aunt Cici, could you come here?” Cici was in the living room with the two children.
She came at once. “Feeling better, Zan?” She wore a thick, black turtleneck sweater, jeans, and sneakers. “Want to talk? Don’t be surprised if I babble—Kim’s baby talk is getting to me.” She winked and sat down on the edge of the cot.
Zan clutched her arm. “Cici, listen—you know the morning I had that fight with Ivan? Over the diary? And I ran out of the house, I was so upset and everything—”
“Sure.” Cici stroked her arm lightly. “I remember I used to keep a diary, too. Oh, the things I wrote in it! Half of them lies, you know, things I wished would happen to me. My mother found it once, and what a fit she had! Thought her youngest daughter was going straight to hell in a handbasket. And—”
“Cici!” Zan began spilling it out, all of it, at once: the rock, the shattering storm, “It,” finding herself in the meadow, Burrum, Sonte, the forest, the caves—
Cid laughed and bit her lip, moved just a litt
le back from Zan, clasped her hands in her lap. “Honey, I didn’t know you had such a vivid imagination. You know, you sound feverish. I bet you really are sick and not just upset over that diary—”
“You don’t believe me.”
“Believe what, Zan? I believe you’re a better storyteller than I ever thought before. Hidden talent, eh?” She poked Zan lightly on the shoulder. “Look, you got yourself awfully upset over your brother reading your diary, and I don’t blame you for that. Not one bit. I’ll stick with you on that! Ivan really went too far that time.”
“Cici. You don’t believe me.” Forget it. Keep it to yourself. Zan lay back, turned her head. “I’m tired, Cici. Thanks for talking.”
“Sure, hon. You rest. Rest your mind. Try to feel better.”
The next morning her mother took Zan’s chin in her hand. “Zan. Look at me. Now, listen to me. You’re not sick. You have no fever, no sniffles, nothing, except that hangdog look in your eyes! Okay, that’s enough. A diary isn’t worth all this. There are people with real troubles in the world. Now you get up and—”
“It’s not the diary, Mom. It’s not. It’s what I tried to tell you. I was somewhere else in time, I mean, centuries ago, no, thousands of years ago with cave pe—”
“And stop that babbling,” her mother said evenly, “or you’ll have us thinking we’ve got a mental case on our hands.” She smiled to soften her words. “Honey, you take things too hard. You’ve got to learn to have a thicker skin. Now, I’ve gone along with you for four days, but this is it. You’re up and out and to school, this morning. Got that?”
“Got it,” Zan said. Her voice was okay, her own, not weak. She was furious with her mother, furious with Cici, furious with herself. Lying there sniveling, feeling sorry for herself. Her mother was right about that. Feeling sorry because she felt so guilty, so sick and guilty, and at the same time, scared. Scared that she’d made it all up. Did I? All imagination? Could I have?
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