by Various
The jut is an external soul. I had never liked the look of mine: it had a vast forehead, claw-feet and a twist of dried hemp around its neck. The other janut were similar. Jom’s, I recall, wore a little coat of red leather. The room where they lived, little more than a closet, smelled of burnt herbs and mold. Like most children I had at one period been frightened of the janut, for it was said that if your jut spoke to you your death was not far off, but the casual attitudes of Tyom had seeped into me and diluted my fear, and I no longer ran past the altar room with held breath and a pounding heart. Still a strange chill came over me when I glanced in and saw my mother’s bare feet in the gloom, her body in shadow, kneeling, praying. I knew that she prayed for Jom, and perhaps stroked the little figure in the red jacket, soothing her son from the outside.
At last those unhappy days ended in victory for my brother’s soul. The doctors went away, and took their ghastly odor with them; my father’s wife reverted to her usual bitterness, and my bed was moved back into my room. The only difference now was that Jom no longer sat in the schoolroom and listened to our tutor, but wandered in the courtyard underneath the orange trees, exchanging pleasantries with the birds.
After this my father took a profound and anxious interest in me, his only son in this world; for there was no longer any doubt that I would be his sole heir, and continue his trade with Olondria.
Once a year, when the pepper harvest was gathered and dried and stored in great, coarse sacks, my father, with his steward Sten and a company of servants, made a journey to Olondria and the spice markets of Bain. On the night before they left we would gather in the courtyard to pray for the success of their venture, and to ask my father’s god, the black-and-white monkey, to protect them in that far and foreign land. My mother was very much affected by these prayers, for she called Olondria the Ghost Country, and only restrained herself from weeping out of fear that her tears would cause the ship to go down. Early the next day, after breakfasting as usual on a chicken baked with honey and fruit, my father would bless us and walk slowly, leaning on his staff, into the blue mists of the dawn. The family and house-servants followed him outside to see him off from the gateway of the house, where he mounted his fat mule with its saddle of white leather, aided by the dark and silent Sten. My father, with Sten on foot leading the mule, formed the head of an impressive caravan: a team of servants followed him, bearing wooden litters piled high with sacks of pepper on their shoulders, and behind them marched a company of stout field hands armed with short knives, bows, and poisoned arrows. Behind these a young boy led a pair of donkeys laden with provisions and my father’s tent, and last of all a third donkey bore a sack of wooden blocks on which he would record his transactions. My father’s bright clothes, wide-brimmed hat and straw umbrella remained visible for a long time, as the caravan made its way between the houses shaded by mango trees and descended solemnly into the valley. My father never turned to look back at us, never moved, only swayed very gently on the mule. He glided through the morning with the grace of a whale: impassive, imponderable.
When he returned we would strew the courtyard with the island’s most festive flowers, the tediet blossoms which crackle underfoot like sparks, giving off a tart odor of limes. The house was filled with visitors, and the old men sat in the courtyard at night, wrapped in thin blankets against the damp air and drinking coconut liquor. My father’s first wife wept in the kitchen, overseeing the servants, my mother wore her hair twisted up on top of her head and fastened with pins, and my father, proud and formidably rich after four months in a strange land, drank with such greed that the servants had to carry him into his bedroom. At these times his mood was expansive, he pulled my ears and called me “brown monkey,” he sat up all night by the brazier regaling the old men with tales of the north; he laughed with abandon, throwing his head back, the tears squeezing from his eyes, and one evening I saw him kiss the back of my mother’s neck in the courtyard. And of course, he was laden with gifts: saddles and leather boots for the old men, silks and perfumes for his wives, and marvelous toys for Jom and me. There were musical boxes and painted wooden birds that could hop on the ground, and were worked by turning a bit of brass which protruded from under their wings; there were beautiful toy animals and toy ships astonishing in their detail, equipped with lifelike rigging and oars and cunning miniature sailors. He even brought us a finely painted set of omi, or “Hands,” the complex and ancient card game of the Olondrian aristocracy, which neither he nor we had any notion of how to play, though we loved the painted cards: the Gaunt Horse, the Tower of Brass. In the evenings I crept to sit behind a certain potted orchid in the hall which led from the east wing of the house into the courtyard, listening to my father’s tales, more wonderful than gifts, of terraced gardens, opium, and the barefoot girls of the pleasure-houses.
One night he found me there. He walked past me, shuffling heavily, and the moonlight from the garden allowed him to spot my hiding place. He grunted, paused and reached down to pull me upright. “Ah—Father—” I gasped, wincing.
“What are you doing there?” he demanded. “What? Speak!”
“I was—I thought—”
“Yes, the gods hate me. They’ve given me two backward sons.” The slap he dealt me was soft; it was terror that made me flinch.
“I was only listening. I wanted to hear you. To hear about Olondria. I’ll go to bed now. I’m sorry. I wanted to hear what you were saying.”
“To hear what I was saying.”
“Yes.”
He nodded slowly, his hands on his hips, the dome of his head shifting against the moonlight in the yard. His face was in darkness, his breathing forced and deliberate as if he were fighting. Each exhalation, fiery with liquor, made my eyes water.
“I’ll go to bed,” I whispered.
“No. No. You wanted to hear. Very good. The farm is your birthright. You must hear of Olondria. You must learn.”
Relief shot through me; my knees trembled.
“Yes,” he went on, musing. “You must hear. But first, younger son, you must taste.”
My muscles, newly relaxed, tensed again with alarm. “Taste?”
“Taste.” He gripped my shirt at the shoulder and thrust me before him through the hall. “Taste the truth,” he muttered, stumbling. “Taste it. No, outside. Into the garden. That way. Yes. Here you will learn.”
The garden was bright. Moonlight bounced from every leaf. There was no light in the kitchen: all the servants had gone to bed. Only Sten would be awake, and he would be on the other side of the house, seated discreetly in an alcove off the courtyard. There he could see when the old men wanted something, but he could not hear me cry, and if he did he would let me be when he saw I was with my father. A shove in my back sent me sprawling among the tomato plants. My father bent over me, enveloping me in his shadow. “Who are you?”
“Jevick of Tyom.”
A burst of cackling rose to the sky from the other side of the house: one of the old men had made a joke.
“Good,” said my father. He crouched low, swaying so that I feared he would fall on me. Then he brought his hand to my lips. “Taste. Eat.”
Something was smeared on my mouth. A flavor of bitterness, suffocation. It was earth. I jerked back, shaking my head, and he grasped the back of my neck. His fingers tough and insistent between my teeth. “Oh, no. You will eat. This is your life. This earth. This country. Tyom.”
I struggled, but at last swallowed, weeping and gagging. All the time he went on speaking in a low growl. “You hide, you crawl, to hear of Olondria. A country of ghosts and devils. For this you spy on your father, your blood. Now you will taste your own land, know it. Who are you?”
“Jevick of Tyom.”
“Don’t spit. Who are you?”
“Jevick of Tyom!”
A light shone out behind him; someone called to him from the house. He stood, and I shielded my eyes from the light with my hand. One of the old men stood in the doorway holding a lantern
on a chain.
“What’s the matter?” he called out in a cracked and drunken voice.
“Nothing. The boy couldn’t sleep,” my father answered, hauling me up by the elbow.
“Nightmares.”
“Yes. He’s all right now.”
He patted my shoulder, tousled my hair. Shadows moved over us, clouds across the moon.
HONEY BEAR
by Sofia Samatar
First published in Clarkesworld (Aug. 2012), edited by Neil Clarke
• • • •
WE’VE DECIDED to take a trip, to see the ocean. I want Honey to see it while she’s still a child. That way, it’ll be magical. I tell her about it in the car: how big it is, and green, like a sky you can wade in.
“Even you?” she asks.
“Even me.”
I duck my head to her hair. She smells fresh, but not sweet at all, like parsley or tea. She’s wearing a little white dress. It’s almost too short. She pushes her bare toes against the seat in front of her, knuckling it like a cat.
“Can you not do that, Hon?” says Dave.
“Sorry, Dad.”
She says “Dad” now. She used to say “Da-Da.”
Dave grips the wheel. I can see the tension in his shoulders. Threads of gray wink softly in his dark curls. He still wears his hair long, covering his ears, and I think he’s secretly a little bit vain about it. A little bit proud of still having all his hair. I think there’s something in this, something valuable, something he could use to get back. You don’t cling to personal vanities if you’ve given up all hope of a normal life. At least, I don’t think you do.
“Shit,” he says.
“Sweetheart…”
He doesn’t apologize for swearing in front of Honey. The highway’s blocked by a clearance area, gloved hands waving us around. He turns the car so sharply the bags in the passenger seat beside him almost fall off the cooler. In the back seat, I lean into Honey Bear.
“It’s okay,” I tell Dave.
“No, Karen, it is not okay. The temp in the cooler is going to last until exactly four o’clock. At four o’clock, we need a fridge, which means we need a hotel. If we are five minutes late, it is not going to be okay.”
“It looks like a pretty short detour.”
“It is impossible for you to see how long it is.”
“I’m just thinking, it doesn’t look like they’ve got that much to clear.”
“Fine, you can think that. Think what you want. But don’t tell me the detour’s not long, or give me any other information you don’t actually have, okay?”
He’s driving faster. I rest my cheek on the top of Honey’s head. The clearance area rolls by outside the window. Cranes, loading trucks, figures in orange jumpsuits. Some of the slick had dried: they’re peeling it up in transparent sheets, like plate glass.
Honey presses a fingertip to the window. “Poo-poo,” she says softly.
I tell her about the time I spent a weekend at the beach. My best friend got so sunburned, her back blistered.
We play the clapping game, “A Sailor Went to Sea-Sea-Sea.” It’s our favorite.
• • •
Dave drives too fast, but we don’t get stopped, and we reach the hotel in time. I take my meds, and we put the extra in the hotel fridge. Dave’s shirt is dark with sweat, and I wish he’d relax, but he goes straight out to buy ice, and stores it in the freezer so we can fill the cooler tomorrow. Then he takes a shower and lies on the bed and watches the news. I sit on the floor with Honey, looking at books. I read to her every evening before bed; I’ve never missed a night. Right now, we’re reading The Meadow Fairies by Dorothy Elizabeth Clark.
This is something I’ve looked forward to my whole adult life: reading the books I loved as a child with a child of my own. Honey adores The Meadow Fairies. She snuggles up to me and traces the pretty winged children with her finger. Daffodil, poppy, pink. When I first brought the book home, and Dave saw us reading it, he asked what the point was, since Honey would never see those flowers. I laughed because I’d never seen them either. “It’s about fairies,” I told him, “not botany.” I don’t think I’ve ever seen a poppy in my life.
Smiling, though half-asleep,
The Poppy Fairy passes,
Scarlet, like the sunrise,
Among the meadow grasses.
Honey chants the words with me. She’s so smart, she learns so fast. She can pick up anything that rhymes in minutes. Her hair glints in the lamplight. There’s the mysterious, slightly abrasive smell of hotel sheets, a particular hotel darkness between the blinds.
“I love this place,” says Honey. “Can we stay here?”
“It’s an adventure,” I tell her. “Just wait till tomorrow.”
On the news, helicopters hover over the sea. It’s far away, the Pacific. There’s been a huge dump there, over thirty square miles of slick. The effects on marine life are not yet known.
“Will it be fairyland?” Honey asks suddenly.
“What, sweetie?”
“Will it be fairyland, when I’m grown up?”
“Yes,” I tell her. My firmest tone.
“Will you be there?”
No hesitation. “Yes.”
The camera zooms in on the slick-white sea.
• • •
By the time I’ve given Honey Bear a drink and put her to bed, Dave’s eyes are closed. I turn off the TV and the lights and get into bed. Like Honey, I love the hotel. I love the hard, tight sheets and the unfamiliar shapes that emerge around me once I’ve gotten used to the dark. It’s been ages since I slept away from home. The last time was long before Honey. Dave and I visited some college friends in Oregon. They couldn’t believe we’d driven all that way. We posed in their driveway, leaning on the car and making the victory sign.
I want the Dave from that photo. That deep suntan, that wide grin.
Maybe he’ll come back to me here, away from home and our neighbors, the Simkos. He spends far too much time at their place.
For a moment, I think he’s back already.
Then he starts shaking. He does it every night. He’s crying in his sleep.
• • •
“Ready for the beach?”
“Yes!”
We drive through town to a parking lot dusted with sand. When I step out of the car the warm sea air rolls over me in waves. There’s something lively in it, something electric.
Honey jumps up and down. “Is that it? Is that it?”
“You got it, Honey Bear.”
The beach is deserted. Far to the left, an empty boardwalk whitens in the sun. I kick off my sandals and scoop them up in my hand. The gray sand sticks to my feet. We lumber down to a spot a few yards from some boulders, lugging bags and towels.
“Can I take my shoes off too? Can I go in the ocean?”
“Sure, but let me take your dress off.”
I pull it off over her head, and her lithe, golden body slips free. She’s so beautiful, my Bear. I call her Honey because she’s my sweetheart, my little love, and I call her Bear for the wildness I dream she will keep always. Honey suits her now, but when she’s older she might want us to call her Bear. I would’ve loved to be named Bear when I was in high school.
“Don’t go too deep,” I tell her, “just up to your tummy, okay?”
“Okay,” she says, and streaks off, kicking up sand behind her.
Dave has laid out the towels. He’s weighted the corners with shoes and the cooler so they won’t blow away. He’s set up the two folding chairs and the umbrella. Now, with nothing to organize or prepare, he’s sitting on a chair with his bare feet resting on a towel. He looks lost.
“Not going in?” I ask.
I think for a moment he’s going to ignore me, but then he makes an effort. “Not right away,” he says.
I slip off my shorts and my halter top and sit in the chair beside him in my suit. Down in the water, Honey jumps up and down and shrieks.
“Look at
that.”
“Yeah,” he says.
“She loves it.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m so glad we brought her. Thank you.” I reach out and give his wrist a squeeze.
“Look at that fucked-up clown on the boardwalk,” he says. “It looks like it used to be part of an arcade entrance or something. Probably been there for fifty years.”
The clown towers over the boardwalk. It’s almost white, but you can see traces of red on the nose and lips, traces of blue on the hair.
“Looks pretty old,” I agree.
“Black rocks, filthy gray sand, and a fucked-up arcade clown. That’s what we’ve got. That’s the beach.”
It comes out before I can stop it: “Okay, Mr. Simko.”
Dave looks at me.
“I’m sorry,” I say.
He looks at his watch. “I don’t want to stay here for more than an hour. I want us to take a break, go back to the hotel and rest for a bit. Then we’ll have lunch, and you can take your medication.”
“I said I’m sorry.”