The Girl Giant

by Kirsten den Hartog

  “I broke my arm in two places,” Suzy said as she stood and brushed bits of dried grass from her dress. “I have to be very careful with it now in case it happens again. It will always be my weak spot.” She moved her arm so the elbow was close to her ear, and she waved it back and forth. “Sometimes I can hear it cracking,” she said, bringing it next to my ear so I could hear the bones pop.

  I didn’t tell her, but there was no sound except the ringing that came from inside my head. But I treasured the fact that we had something in common, because my bones cracked, too. They popped and snapped with the speed of my growing.

  Suzy walked toward her bicycle and climbed on, and I realized this meant the story was done.

  “But what then?” I asked. “What about your aunt and the shop owner and all that?”

  I climbed on my bike and followed her, straining to hear her answer.

  “Oh, I don’t know. I went to live with her but after a while I went home again.” She called back to me, “Want to ride to the train tracks?”

  “Yes! Sure!” I rushed to catch up to her, to be close in case she fell and injured herself, or got chased by a deadly bee. She looked so small and vulnerable, riding ahead of me with her fine hair flying. And I, in this brief, wondrous time, had superhuman strength. Something was happening to me. My fatigue was gone—I had a new, strange energy. I could lift Suzy up and place her high in a tree; I could drape her over my shoulder and run with her. I’d hang from the railway bridge if she asked me. I’d never been so strong before, and it had to be Suzy who’d given me this new power. She could make the grass glow and the river sparkle. Everything changed in her presence, and I felt sorry for anyone who had no access to her vibrant world.

  After spending the whole day with her, I spent it again in my memory, and sketched her image on pieces of paper I hid in my bedside drawer. She said this and then I said that and then we laughed but what did she really mean by that, and so on. I thought about Grace, whom I’d also drawn, and my dressmaker’s dummy, who had once been my closest friend, and I blushed at the idea of Suzy finding out about them, or seeing the drawings of her that could never do her justice. The embarrassment clung to me; were we so close that Suzy could read my mind? Nothing would be more awful than that: The person I wanted to know most knowing me in return.

  The first time I stood in Suzy’s doorway she had run inside to go pee. I was as big as the door, and must have looked foolish waiting there for her, bulk filling the frame, head drooping for a better look of the Malones’ home. There were dried food splotches all over the stove. A bowl of wilty grapes, covered in fruit flies, sat on the unwiped kitchen table. The house smelled of cigarettes, a bit like Suzy’s hair and clothes did, but stronger. I could hear the television, and through the archway into the living room I could see Patrick’s dirty feet on the coffee table. Then something tickled my legs, and I let out a little scream before realizing it was a cat coming in from outside. It wrapped around my ankles, rubbing and purring. Patrick appeared too—he must have heard me—and when the cat started to walk into the kitchen, I gripped the door frame to steady myself, reached forward, and scooped her up.

  “Sorry, I guess I shouldn’t be standing here with the door open.”

  “It’s okay,” said Patrick. “That’s our cat.” As though to make conversation, he added, “She has kittens, too.”

  The cat jumped from my arms and looked back at me, and I noticed the black ring around her eye, and another around her twitching tail. She fit the description of the cat Suzy said her mother had abandoned outside of town, a cat with kittens. So the cat had found them? Or they had found her? I pictured the cat journeying along the roadside with her trail of kittens behind her, showing up on the front step and demanding to be cared for. Why wouldn’t Suzy have told me? I eased myself down to crouching and put my hand out, and the cat came to me and sniffed my fingers.

  “What’s her name?” I asked.

  “Dodie.” Patrick grinned and his pointy ears moved a little with the change in expression.

  “Oh. Like your aunt? You named her for your aunt?”

  He gave me a weird look and the smile faded. “We don’t have any aunts. Only an Uncle Mo.”

  I was already tallying up the reasons for the misunderstanding. The aunt had been so cruel that Patrick, who was younger than Suzy, hadn’t ever met her. And maybe the cat was really old. She had been named long ago, before the aunt revealed her cruelty. Did old cats have kittens? I was sure they did. I almost asked, How old is Dodie? but I decided I didn’t want to know, so instead I said, “I’ll just wait outside for Suzy—will you tell her?”

  Patrick nodded yes. He watched me stand again, to my full height, and looked at me with wonder. He had hair the same suntanned color as his skin, shorn close so that the bug bites showed around his elf ears. As I stood beneath the big maple tree between our houses, I could see him peering out at me, and I knew in my bones that he would always remember this moment. Perhaps it would grow in his memory, a giant under a tree outside his window.

  I didn’t say anything to Suzy. We got on our bikes and went to the beach, as usual, but as we rode the questions tangled inside me. The yellow string on my handlebars glowed. When had the cat come back? Or was this a different one, with identical markings, and what if Dodie had been an aunt by marriage, is that what Patrick meant when he said we don’t have any aunts, that they didn’t have any real aunts? Did Uncle Mo have a wife? The aunt, the cat, the kittens, the aunt, the cat, the kittens, everything else was pushed away by this new and strange information. I didn’t even realize until we got there that Suzy had ridden to the main beach instead of the secluded place we always went to together, and when she stopped and I pulled up beside her, she said, “I was getting sick of that old, pebbly place. This is way better.”

  She sounded just like herself, but her face startled me. I looked at her and realized I didn’t know her, and seeing the mask slip gave me the scariest feeling. The eyes, the nose—everything was the same, but different. Then she smiled at me, and the feeling was gone. The doubts and the questions had gnarled themselves into a tight ball that could be tucked away and ignored.

  I parked my bike, took the towel from my basket, and followed her onto the sand. There were lots of people at the beach. It was late summer, and everyone was soaking up the last of it before school began again. The sun sparkled on the dark water, and on the other side of the river a canoe passed. I thought of that day with James, the great blue heron nodding at me, and for an instant I wished myself back to that time, even though I was sure I was happier now, with Suzy.

  We spread our towels and Suzy took off her sundress to reveal the red swimsuit beneath. She had small breasts and a waist that curved in like a woman’s. I hadn’t yet grown in any of the places that counted, though I waited for that with a mix of dread and excitement, wondering how it might change me on the inside. Under my jumper I had shorts and a top only—I hadn’t swum for years, as I was afraid of tripping and falling, that no one would be able to lift me. But I remembered the feeling of weightlessness, the silken water on my skin. Suzy loved the water. At our spot downriver, she sometimes stayed under for a long time, and I’d stand on the shore with the water lapping my toes, looking for bubbles on the surface. Where did she go—what would I do if . . . And then she’d shoot up and shout, “Scared you!”

  There was some comfort in the people around, and the lifeguard sitting in his tall chair with his whistle and his life preserver ready. If something happened, someone else would be able to save her. Yet I preferred our private beach, full of rocks and trees, and sharp pine needles that poked out of the sand. Here I kept my shoes on because of the people rather than the pine needles. And as I removed my jumper I could feel the stares that burned hot as the sun.

  Haven’t seen her at the beach in ages.

  Where would she get a suit to fit? See—she doesn’t have one.

  Would you come to the beach if you looked like that?

 
; Don’t sit in her shadow if you want a suntan.

  Who’s that girl with her?

  Ratty hair!

  Pretty, though. Pretty girl.

  I cared more for Suzy than myself, but Suzy didn’t seem to notice anyone staring, not even the brown-haired boy, David, who walked three circles around us before wandering down the beach. He was a grade ahead of me, but I knew who he was. He had dark, deep-set eyes, a pale gash for a mouth. His nose grew straight up into his forehead, like a lion’s. He was actually a striking boy, with broad, tanned shoulders and a lanky frame. He moved stealthily, barely lifting his feet from the sand. There was something awful about such a fluid gait.

  Soon I had blocked out everyone, and Suzy was burying me in sand. She had made a hollow for me, and I moved into it and lay faceup as she poured more sand over me. It took a mountain to cover my body, and the little grains rolled over my skin like minuscule people running this way and that. Suzy was humming a song that played every day on the radio that year, and the sleepier I got the more her voice sounded like fine chimes, far away. The parts of me that were covered in sand were refreshingly cool, but my face stayed warm from the sun above me. I could feel my eyes drooping closed, fluttering open, drooping again.

  I don’t know how long I slept, but when I woke, my face felt tight and burned. I looked at the sky and saw how the cloud pattern was just like sand drifting, as if the sky reflected what it saw below. If I looked long enough I might find myself up there, and Suzy. But where was Suzy? Sand scuttled through my hair as I lifted myself up to my elbows. I saw her down by the shore, squatting near the water and writing something in the wet sand with a stick. I was about to call out when I saw David approach her. He walked over whatever she was writing, and she stood and kicked water at him. Was she laughing? She bent again to write, and again he trod on it. When she stood this time, lifting her foot, he grabbed it, and there she was, hopping, completely at his mercy. I sat straight up and the sand poured off me.

  Had she put her hair up? Before it was hanging down, with just a hairband to hold it back. It had tickled my face when she’d poured the sand over me. But now it was up in a loop at the back, loose pieces escaping.

  David let go of her foot and kicked water back, and she ran splashing into the river. But he was right behind her. The water rose to their knees and their hips, and then they dove in, swimming deeper. I listened for voices carrying off the water, but the ringing in my ears took over and I couldn’t hear what they were saying. I pushed myself up to standing, woozy from lack of food and heat. My belly rumbled, and out of habit I put my hand over it to muffle the humiliating sound.

  A scream from Suzy. She ducked under and I held my breath, but then she splashed up again. Did she see me? Would she wave? I walked across the sand, huge strides, giant leaps. I could feel my hands throbbing, my big legs rubbing together, my cheeks wobbling. Even my breath was loud and large. My stomach gurgled again, and the noise brought tears to my eyes, but I was moving forward regardless. The ground was shaking with my every step, and then I was at the water’s edge and I glanced down to see what she had written, but David’s and Suzy’s footsteps combined had erased the words. The certainty that those words had been about me didn’t stop me from following Suzy into the water, shoes and all. I kept imagining myself falling and not being able to stand, and Suzy running to save me, the water traveling up my nose and into my mouth and me choking and spluttering. There was something so compelling about being helpless. And it would be tragic and she would lean over me crying, and understand how much she loved me.

  The water was up to my knees and then my hips, and my shorts were floating out from my body. My shoes were full, my T-shirt was drifting. Had she seen me yet, did she see me coming? She kept dipping under and letting her toes emerge, pointed, and then her two naked feet, and David would grab them and pull them and then her head would pop up, but she was never facing me, so how could I know if she was happy or not?

  It was only when I reached her that I realized I was crying. Tears were dripping down my face, but they might have been water, no one could really say.

  “Ruth!” said Suzy. “What’s wrong?” She had a half smirk, a kind of you fool incredulous look that made a barrier between us. She glanced at David and back at me. “What are you doing?”

  “Are you okay?” I asked. I knew how ugly I looked when I cried. “I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

  “Whoa,” said David, “is this your bodyguard?”

  Suzy laughed. “Jeez, Ruth—relax. I’m not exactly drowning.” She dove under again, and her two white feet appeared and disappeared, fish jumping.

  I stood looming over David and Suzy. The water came to her chin, his shoulders, but I was only half immersed, and shivering. It crossed my mind that if what she’d written and erased had been about me, it was ridicule, but if it had been about him, it was teasing. I forced a laugh and said something strange, like, “I fell asleep, I think I was dreaming,” and then I turned and walked through the water with leaden steps.

  On the beach, the sand caked my shoes, and I could hear Suzy and David laughing behind me. But I stayed and stayed. Such a long afternoon. When I lay back, the clouds made a magnificent show, bordered by the maples and poplars behind me whose leaves moved with the wind. The wind would be my favorite thing, if I ever had to choose. The trees were giants spreading their arms wide, loving the breeze.

  I was quiet on the way home. Light-headed and sunburned. I felt sorry that my shoes were ruined. The leather would be hard now, and brittle, and I knew the shoes had cost a lot of money. I thought of Elspeth and felt guilty. I had seen her sneering from the picture window the day Suzy moved in. And then my memory tripped on something else from that afternoon: how I had stood grinning at my new friend as chairs had drifted by in the background; a floor lamp had sauntered past; and in a cardboard box, kittens had been mewling.

  Why would someone lie about things that didn’t matter?

  Lies were on James’s mind, too. He had to push them out in order to get any sleep at all in the pink room, where the wedding photograph watched him. He thought about plunking it facedown but couldn’t bring himself to do so, mostly because he feared forgetting to prop it up again and the questions that might bring when Elspeth arrived home. She was in his thoughts more than ever, and in a tender way—and yet he somehow had the ability to banish her from his mind for a blissful pocket of time when Iris presented herself, or when he (yes, he had done so, in the manner of a peacock or a great moose) presented himself right back. To the pink room he whispered an apology that finally helped him sleep, but he would have remained wide awake, agonizing, had he known that in England, Elspeth thought of him as often, was even surprised by the way she talked to him in her head, saying things she wouldn’t say if he were with her.

  She remembered their first few dates, the rapid escalation of their courtship, and their good-bye when he was shipped home. Then her own arrival on his family’s doorstep as he gripped her elbow. All of them with the same open look James had: the brother Norm, his perky wife Tess, the father, the mother. There was a newness, a luckiness about them that was both off-putting and refreshing. The mother had worn her blue hat for the occasion, though it was not a hat meant to be worn indoors, and Elspeth felt embarrassed that she didn’t know. The hat was at an awkward angle as well—and it reminded Elspeth of the hat shop she had left behind.

  In the kitchen, she stood with the mother and mashed carrots wearing a borrowed apron, and the woman, a stranger, really, said, “You should call me Mother, Elspeth. We’re family now.” Which, kind as it was, brought to mind all that she had lost that could never be replaced. The attempt at intimacy had failed, because in avoiding calling James’s mother Mother, she didn’t call her anything at all in subsequent years, except in letters and Christmas cards—Dear Mother—and even then it felt like a silent betrayal of her real mother, who had doused herself in powder after each bath so that her skin had a ghostly quality, a sme
ll of primrose. Elspeth still longed to believe in ghosts; the wish for their existence came between her and living people.

  Elspeth had arranged the aunts’ funeral in England. She had seen Bea and Franny laid to rest side by side in an old, crowded cemetery full of higgledy-piggledy tombstones, beside the graves of her mother and father. She had always meant to secure proper markers for her parents, but she had never done so, and Franny and Bea had eventually taken care of things after she’d left. Her brother was buried on foreign soil, among columns of white stones that were in a way like soldiers, but she had never visited his grave. Now would be the time. Buy a ticket, board a train. But as on the day of the strawberries, she felt unable to move. And there were Franny and Bea’s things to take care of, and their flat to empty so that someone else could move in. It was too late for a visit to Stanley to make any meaningful difference.

  For several days in a row, at the beginning of her trip, she’d gone through the aunts’ belongings and tried to sort things into neat piles of what she could keep, what she could donate, and what she could throw away. She was reminded of that flat space of time after the war, before James had come, when she’d sorted the belongings of her mother, father, and brother. The minutiae of a life were staggering. Hair clips and shoehorns and jars of buttons and pencil holders and clip-on earrings and souvenir spoons and fancy teacups with saucers and embroidered linens and embroidery thread and half-used balls of wool and crochet hooks and dresses and shoes and underpants and slips and insoles and nail clippers and powder puffs—on and on it went. The pile of things she wanted to keep grew large on the first day, but then became smaller and smaller, until the only things left were photographs, a fold-up plastic kerchief for rainy days, and a watch she felt sure had been her mother’s. She slipped it on and wound it, and saw how her hand, wrist, and arm had become like her mother’s, elegantly shaped, but patterned by the fine lines of aging.