Two Girls, a Clock, and a Crooked House

by Michael Poore

  “Fine,” said Mom. “But be safe! And when you find out if you can stay the night, ask if you can call us and check in.”

  “Oh yeah,” said Amy. “Because I can’t just actually call you on my OWN phone, because…let’s see…I don’t HAVE one, like a real person.”

  Her parents kept meaning to get her a phone, for emergencies, and they kept forgetting.

  Mom rolled her eyes and kissed Amy atop the head.

  Amy snugged her butterfly hoodie nice and tight, walked her bike to the road, and zoomed away.

  She had no way of knowing that a bunch of VERY odd things were going to happen to her before she made it back again.

  AMY RODE THROUGH THE woods the same way she always did, as fast as possible. Just as she had expected, the woods were full of shadows. Maybe even ghosts; Amy didn’t pause to investigate.

  Before long she arrived at the leaning house, and there sat Moo on the porch, wearing her cow hoodie, looking at the cows over in the pasture. She didn’t react at all when Amy sat down next to her and watched the cows with her.

  “I got struck by lightning,” Amy said.

  A few seconds passed in silence.

  “Look,” she said, pushing her sleeves up to her elbows, displaying a pattern of dark, branchlike markings on her skin. “See that? They’re called Lichtenberg figures. They explained it to me at the hospital; it’s like a scar left by the lightning. They’ll fade eventually.”

  She pulled her sleeves down again.

  A slight breeze kicked up.

  “Ever since I was in the hospital,” Amy continued, “I’ve been noticing some things I hadn’t noticed before, ever. Like, apparently, my mom and dad—and other people, too—have hearts over their heads. Like symbols. Like the lights on top of a cop car, except instead of saying, Pull over! it’s like they’re saying, I love you or I have a good soul or something. But there’s other stuff, too….”

  She told about the macaroni spirit and the other things she’d seen. She took her time and told all the details she could think of. Moo wasn’t going anywhere, and she never interrupted.

  While Amy was talking, the breeze kicked up a little more. Some leaves blew across the yard, and across the road. Amy’s eye was drawn to the sky, where gray clouds were sailing in.

  Not just clouds, though. The clouds had horses in them. Gray horses with flashing eyes.

  Symbol horses, Amy thought. They were what the soul of the wind looked like.

  “I guess it’s going to rain,” she said.

  Soon, she thought, she needed to ask Moo’s mom if she could sleep over. Her own mom was expecting a call. But not yet.

  “Anyway,” she continued, “Mrs. Barch, my teacher? She had a heart over her head, too, but it had something wrong with it, like maybe—”

  It is going to rain, said Moo. But not for a little while.

  “Oh,” said Amy. “Well, it feels like it wants to. Plus, there are these horses…”

  Amy stopped talking.

  “Did you say something just now?” she asked Moo.

  She turned her head and almost jumped out of her skin.

  Moo was looking at her.

  I said, repeated Moo, that it’s not going to rain for a while.

  Amy realized that the words, the voice, were blooming inside her head; Moo’s mouth didn’t move the slightest bit. Amy felt as if lightning had struck all over her insides.

  “Mrrzzl!” she gasped, five times in a row.

  When they run like that, said Moo, it means it’s going to be windy. If it’s going to rain soon, they just stand there and float and hang their heads and look sad.

  “I don’t know what to say,” said Amy. “I’m in shock or something. It’s like somebody shot me with a freeze ray. You’re telepathizing or doing ESP or something!”

  Maybe it shouldn’t be so surprising, she thought. It wasn’t any stranger than macaroni spirits, or hearts over people’s heads.

  Moo said, Want to walk over to the fence and see if the cows come?

  “Sure,” said Amy. If Moo had said, “Want to paint ourselves bright yellow and do jumping jacks in the middle of the road?” Amy would have answered, “Sure.”

  Then she said, “Wait! Before we go anywhere, I’m supposed to ask you and your mom if I can sleep over. We’re camping out where the Big Duke thingy is supposed to—”

  I know. You told me. They’re being all protective. That would be awesome! Ask Mom.

  Amy jumped up to knock on the door.

  Amy?

  Moo was giving her a serious look.

  “Yep?”

  Don’t mention anything about the talking and telepathizing.

  “I wasn’t going to.”

  And she knocked, and Moo’s mom ghosted her way to the door and said yes, of course she could stay, if it was okay that they had only cornflakes for breakfast, and yes, Amy could use her phone, and Amy called Mom and gave the phone back and said, “Thanks.”

  “Excellent,” she said, hopping off the porch, then turning to face Moo, who agreed that it was excellent.

  Amy took Moo by the elbow and pulled, and Moo stood.

  They walked across the yard, looked both ways, crossed the street, and waited by the fence.

  Moo yelled, “MOO!”

  Some cows mooed back and plodded in their direction.

  These cows are the most free, most happy cows in the whole world, declared Moo.

  That was probably true, Amy thought.

  “What made you decide to talk to me?” she asked.

  I’ve ALWAYS talked to you, said Moo. You just couldn’t hear me till now.

  “I didn’t think you even could talk!”

  Well, said Moo, I can and I can’t. I do and I don’t. I can talk to you in your head because the lightning opened up your brain or your soul or something. But I can’t talk out loud. Maybe someday. And I can’t write. I can read still, and understand what people say, but I can’t make words. I hate it. It’s like being tied up with duct tape.

  Amy frowned. She reached over and gave Moo’s shoulder a squeeze.

  The wind quickened. Overhead, the horses’ hooves were a speeding blur. Amy’s hair flew behind her like a flag.

  “MooOOOOOooooOOOoo!” said the cows, arriving at the fence.

  This whole thing was so exciting! She couldn’t get over it: Moo could TALK! They could be like real friends now! Amy wanted to cry and laugh and jump up and down. Her whole self wanted to BOING like a rubber band.

  Go ahead, said Moo.

  “Go ahead what?”

  BOING all over the place. It’s wonderful! I’m happy, too! I’m just not the BOINGing type.

  “You can hear inside my head,” said Amy, clapping her hands over her mouth.

  Amy, asked Moo, don’t you get it?

  “Yes,” said Amy. “Get what?”

  It’s not just me. It’s YOU, too! Don’t you GET it? You can see and hear now the way I can. Say something.

  “Something,” said Amy, trembling.

  Dur, said Moo. Without using your regular voice.

  Once upon a time, Amy thought, there were three little pigs.

  Something original, maybe. Really? Three little pigs?

  Oh my God. Amy’s eyes stung, and out leaked a single tear. They were telepathizing! This was wonderful, wonderful!

  Yes, said Moo. It’s wonderful. Everything is about eighty thousand times more wonderful than you ever dreamed. EVERYTHING. Before, you could see only the surface of the world; now you can see it all.

  “Look at the clouds!” said Amy, pointing at the horses.

  You don’t have to actually speak, Loud Girl.

  “Loud Girl?”

  It’s a nickname I called you in my head. You know…before you could hear me
.

  “Well…it’s not very nice.”

  It’s not any not-nicer than Moo, if you think about it.

  “You wear a cow costume every second of your life. You moo at the cows.”

  It’s okay. I like it. My real name is Gertrude June Kopernikus.

  “Well, call me Amy, not Loud Girl. Anyway, I think I like talking out loud. It’s what I’m used to.”

  Amy.

  “MOOoooooOOO,” said the cows, getting impatient to have their noses rubbed and some grass handed to them through the fence.

  The cows had little symbolic trees growing on their backs, and green fields and warm sunlight.

  “It’s like the cows are miniature planet Earths,” said Amy, amazed.

  Yep, said Moo. Everything has some kind of spirit. Or theme. Or whatever you want to call it. Look around harder.

  Moo was right.

  The grass underfoot was still grass, but Amy saw that it glowed in a way she’d never noticed before, as if she could discern life running through it. The rough fence under her hands remembered being a tree.

  Not far from Amy’s left foot lay a smooth gray stone. The stone was old and sleeping, she saw. The stone remembered being born way down deep, where the earth was a giant furnace.

  It was too much! Amy squeezed her eyes closed.

  “What IS it?” she asked in a small voice, beginning to be a bit frightened. “These things we can see. Talking between our minds. Are we possessed?”

  Don’t be silly, answered Moo. It’s a kind of science, just like the forces that make the grass grow and gravity happen. People just don’t understand it yet. It’s like Deep Science. That’s how I think of it.

  “Deep Science?”

  Remember in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe how they had normal magic, and then there was the Deep Magic?

  “Yeah.”

  Same idea, except with science. Deep Science kinda looks like magic ’cause we don’t know how it works yet. I think what’s happening is that the universe tries to talk to us, in a way. It sends us symbols and makes its thoughts visible, but not everybody can see them yet. Something has to happen that changes your brain.

  Moo, Amy noticed, had a little glowing cow grazing in the air atop her head.

  Let’s go over the fence, said Moo. I’ve never been in the pasture.

  “I don’t think anyone goes there,” said Amy. Did Moo know about the witch? The witch who had eaten children?

  Everyone knows about the witch, said Moo. Besides, I didn’t say, ‘Let’s go in the woods.’ I just want to go over, into the field. I’m dying to go SOMEWHERE.

  So Amy put one foot on the lowest rail and reached for Moo’s elbow, nudging.

  Moo followed. One foot up, two feet up, one leg over, then the other, and they were there, in the tickly long weeds on the far side, on the cow side.

  The cows watched as the girls held hands and ran off through the—

  I’m not really the running type.

  —as the girls walked off through the grass and stones, through the twilight and the wind.

  THE PAIR CROSSED THE field in a roundabout way that led farther from the fence but no closer to the woods.

  Moo paused, bent, and retrieved something from the ground.

  “Whatdjuh find?” asked Amy.

  Moo opened her hand, displaying two rugged gray stones.

  Take one, she said, so Amy did.

  You must have brought me a hundred stones and rocks by now, said Moo. Today it’s my turn. These are my official “The Day I Found Someone to Talk To” stones.

  Amy sort of wanted to cry. Moo had noticed and appreciated all the various dumb things she had done. It was wonderful to know.

  They dropped the stones into their hoodie pockets and continued walking.

  “I remember when you came to school,” said Amy.

  School, said Moo darkly.

  Amy understood. Sometimes she, too, felt dark about school. But it was interesting sometimes. Like in third grade, when her class had put some eggs in an incubator and they’d hatched into chicks.

  No one did anything like that the day I was there, said Moo. They mostly just stared at me. Mom keeps saying she’s going to give it another try, but so far…

  They hopped over a cow patty so fresh it was steaming.

  “Moo,” said Amy, “what happened? How come you can’t talk, or move on your own?”

  (She surprised herself, asking this. Wasn’t sure she should ask.)

  I don’t want to talk about it, answered Moo.

  “Sorry.” (Yep. Shouldn’t have asked.) “Sometimes my mouth gets out there and says things before I can think them over. Especially with questions. It’s part of being a scientist. Being professionally nosy.”

  They hopped over a log together, counting One, two, three as they did.

  It’s okay, said Moo. You’re nice.

  “I’m not that nice. I steal things.”

  I know. I’ve been listening to you for days and months and maybe a year now.

  Moo must think she talked too much.

  No, said Moo. It’s my favorite thing in the world.

  Moo pulled at Amy’s hand, bringing them both to a stop.

  I changed my mind, she said. I’ll tell you.

  “Only if it’s really all right. Like, really, really triple-truly all right. I don’t want you to feel like—”

  Shhhh, said Moo, squeezing her hand.

  Then she pulled her hand free and crossed her arms over her chest as she walked.

  They passed a gopher hole and a smelly puddle where a cow had peed.

  My mom used to live here, said Moo, a long time ago, when she was little. And she liked it a lot. But when she got older, she met my father.

  Pause. They walked around a thistle bush growing all by itself.

  You know how some people think they’re right about everything, all the time? He was like that. He thought they should move to another city, far away, so they did. He thought they should live in this one house, so they did. He wanted to have an artificial Christmas tree and watch this show or that show on TV, and they always did what he wanted. Then I was born. I don’t think having a daughter was something he wanted, but that’s one thing he didn’t get to choose.

  Moo sounded like she was spitting the words out.

  But he wasn’t just pushy and selfish. He was mean. He got mad so easy, over nothing. Like he had secret buttons, and if you accidentally pushed one, he turned into almost another person. So he used to hit Mom. I think he tried to do it when I wasn’t in the room, but you know how it is—kids see waaaay more than grown-ups think. They think we’re a little bit stupid, so it’s like we have the gift of invisibility sometimes. Anyway, Mom would put up her arms around her head and stay totally quiet and just kind of wait for him to be done.

  Amy’s eyes stung. She had never known that it could be difficult just to hear something. It scared her. She knew that not everyone’s mom and dad were like her mom and dad, but hearing about it for real was something new. She didn’t like it. She wrapped her arms around herself like a bear hug.

  They walked in silence for a bit, making their way across the pasture like a couple of brewing storms. The second time they encountered a thistle bush, they stomped right over it.

  And then one day he hit me.

  I don’t think he was planning on it. I mean, I don’t think he ever planned on hitting, but he especially didn’t plan on hitting me. I think he understood, in his pushy, selfish brain, that hitting his little kid was more…more wrong than he wanted to be. Like he could stand to be someone who hit my mom, but not someone who beat up his kid. You know?

  No, Amy didn’t know. Amy wanted to run away. But she didn’t, and she didn’t say anything, either. Tried not to even think anyth
ing.

  I’m sorry, said Moo. I’ll stop. I’m hurting you.

  “No!” said Amy, surprising herself again. Staring straight ahead, stomping straight ahead, she softly repeated, “No,” and said nothing more.

  They were in the kitchen, and she pushed one of his secret buttons…like she made him a baloney sandwich and he wanted ham or something, and I came in while he was hitting her. And I ran up and shoved him. Which must have pushed about a hundred secret buttons, and he sort of exploded. I’m not sure what happened then….My head hit the refrigerator, I know that. I don’t remember anything else until later, when I woke up at the hospital. When I woke up and couldn’t make words and couldn’t move myself unless someone helped me, like being tied up to a chair inside my own body. But I know what happened next, because Mom told me.

  Moo was crying, and had sped up. Walking faster and talking faster, as if trying to finish her story and also somehow outrun it.

  When Mom saw him hit me, she snapped. She picked up a saucepan and hit him in the head. HARD. And then she called an ambulance and the cops. And later when they saw that I couldn’t talk and couldn’t move, they put my dad in jail. And my mom moved us back here. And you know the rest. So there you go.

  They stomped for a while longer. Amy noticed that they had, for some reason, gone in a big circle. You could see a circle in the pasture where they had left footprints and flat spots.

  Moo seemed to run low on gas. She slowed and then stopped.

  Looking at her for the first time since the story began, Amy saw that Moo was still crying, but not with actual tears. Her eyes were as distant and weird as ever, but Amy could feel the crying happening inside her.

  She threw her arms around Moo and squeezed her like a boa constrictor.

  Mom thinks it’s all her fault, said Moo. And I can’t argue about it with her. She can’t hear me, and I can’t make words on paper any more than with my mouth.

  Amy squeezed harder. She wanted to tell Moo that it was all right. That’s what you were supposed to tell people, wasn’t it? But it wasn’t all right. So she just hugged.

  I think, said Moo, that you are smooshing my liver.

  Amy loosened up.

  I’m not so much into hugging.