Cygnet

by Season Butler

  One feeling I used to get all the time was the sense of having no body. It wasn’t weightlessness, or some awesome floating or flying thing, or an out-of-body experience. All the normal things you can see on yourself, like the tip of your nose or your feet and maybe your cheeks a little or your hair at the sides, I didn’t have any of that. I’d look down and just see the floor.

  I had one trip that I really loved. I was convinced that I was a minor character in someone else’s dream. The feeling was intensely relaxing. I didn’t have to do anything, because everything I did was just a metaphor. And since it wasn’t my dream, I didn’t have to decode the signs. Nothing made sense but nothing had to. It was the greatest experience I’ve ever had; for an entire afternoon I didn’t have to exist. And I came back.

  There’s nothing to be afraid of. People come back.

  Chapter Ten

  I look hard. I blink and strain. Nothing works. I keep trying to say where, where, where? but there’s no breath in me.

  Another landslip while I was gone. Looking at the space where ground used to be is a kick in the chest. My rock is gone. Slipped into the sea without me. By the far corner of the house, the cliff’s edge is only three feet or so from the path that wraps around and leads to the back door. At its widest I have maybe six or seven feet of backyard left. My heart’s not beating right. It beats lumps and gurgles and it hurts.

  Midafternoon. No clouds. I feel exposed. I feel like I’m seconds away from falling.

  Wouldn’t it be just the worst, like an O. Henry story? My parents finally arrive to bring me back to the mainland and they slip off the side with clumps of dirt and rocks before they can get to the door.

  Inside I don’t know what to do with myself. I stick the chicken in the fridge. That’s the one thing that has to be done. Then there’s nothing. The red numbers on the microwave stare at me and I stare back. Lolly set the time five minutes fast. She was like that, efficient even in retirement. I stare and listen for house sounds but there’s no noise inside or out. No more explosions. Nothing. There’s nothing here. My heart’s not beating right.

  Up the stairs to Lolly’s room. She’s not coming back. She’s not coming back. I turn the knob and walk across the floor. It doesn’t matter that my feet make an impression on the soft gray carpet. She’s not here. She’s not coming back. She didn’t want me but she was all that I had. There are more red eyes in Lolly’s room—the DVD player, her TV, her alarm clock. She was into gadgets. Her life was digital. She didn’t trust the things I made in the oven and on the stove. When she lived alone she ate at the Psychedelicatessen or heated something up in the microwave. I had to get my head around the difference between her reliance on electronic things and my mother’s raw-paleo-whole-foods-clean-eating approach, which Lolly found a clichéd rip-off. Mom didn’t think that you could call something that came out of a microwave a meal. Lolly thought of those shortcuts as liberation. She wanted to be efficient and clean, just add water. She bought the appliances that promised to save her time. Time for what? Time to grow old the way she wanted to? When I think about her, I always feel like there wasn’t enough time. If I’d had a few more weeks I could have figured out how to be what she needed. She was just too quick for me.

  When I got here I tried so hard to make myself useful but Lolly didn’t bite. The hard-core separatists aren’t subtle. When Lolly and I went out together, they stared and whispered. As if she wasn’t aware she was making the Swans bend their rules because her daughter couldn’t take care of her own kid. I hated the fact that I’d made her the object of spite. But there was nothing I could do. It was January, and I was glad to have the excuse to bury my head in a scarf and look down as I walked. The wind picked up specks of sea and froze them and spat them in my face.

  I go to her bedside drawer and take out a Valium, pop it on my tongue, and scoop a swallow of water from the tap in her bathroom. A yellow Post-it note reminds me to turn the tap hard so that the water won’t drip. I’m so sick of old folks’ notes and rules and tuts and kindly advice that I almost ignore it and let it go but my phobia won’t let me. I can’t stand to think that the water might make its way in here, into my house.

  I manage to swallow the next one dry because I can’t make myself go back to the faucet and touch the water again. Swallowing takes effort. I have to pull and pull and force spit up into my mouth and try to push it down hard against the pill in my throat. As it tries to stick against the sides, I try to pull up more spit to get it down. Oh God, my heart’s not beating right and I have to get this down.

  Just in case, I take a third and go through it all again.

  My breathing starts to grip onto itself. Lightly. Something gets evened out, those gulping heartbeats start to fall in step with my breaths, and my shoulders drop to what feels like a mile from my ears, and the fear goes out with the tide I can hear outside. I don’t like it. I don’t like the fact that the waves sound the same as the peace that has started to come over me, but I’m alone and it’s better than nothing. This tidal peace is better than nothing.

  I tried so hard to make life easier for her. She always saw my parents when she looked at me. I have my father’s nose, the shape of his eyes. She never liked to look at him. She said she never understood why they always had to do everything the hard way. Why couldn’t she see that I was the only other person on earth who knew exactly what she meant?

  It changed things for everyone else, too—my being here. I’ve picked up bits of the story. There had been a meeting before I got here. Lolly briefed the Swans on my situation and they took a vote. The result was not unanimous. But the agreement was that I could stay a while until my parents managed to clean up. She talked about it in terms of days and weeks, let them picture me mostly in my room in Lolly’s house, tweeting links to BuzzFeed lists or whatever they think kids do with all their time. I’d leave them alone, and they’d leave me alone.

  Three or four days after my parents had gone, I left the house by myself for the first time and ventured into the center. Lolly was off-island doing a day’s work at her old company in Portsmouth, and my mind felt like it was eating itself. I’d try to read or watch TV but my attention was pulled out by the tides, up and down, in and out, shifting frequencies that made my skull buzz. At one point I turned everything off and surrendered to existing in the box of my off-blue guest room with the torture music of the Atlantic tide. When I noticed myself laughing, I knew I had to go outside.

  The walk to the north side of the island felt longer than it does now. The sky pressed down, threatening snow, and the wind followed me like an asshole bully and I didn’t have a pair of gloves. There’s something extra terrible about a freezing cold island, like being lost in space. I’d thought for a second that I could make this a useful experience, pleasant even, that this was actually the perfect place to learn how to knit, for example. But then I realized I didn’t know who to ask or how. Or, rather, it felt like I couldn’t possibly ask anything of anyone. They were already letting me be there, giving me a place to stay so that I didn’t have to make the kinds of choices you have to make when you’ve got nothing and you’re alone.

  I walked past the chapel. It was silent except for the whirring of the wind like the sound when a CD is about to play on an old machine, so I went up to it and stuck my head around the door. Unfortunately it was tai chi that morning; the Swans do it inside during the winter. They all turned and stared at me like I had a foot growing out of my face. Mostly they smiled. I guess they felt sorry for me.

  It’s not like it was the first time I’d felt self-conscious, but I’d figured out how to deal with it in the Bad Place. On Swan, I didn’t know how to be. Because it’s not like when you’re shopping and the store detective follows you around the whole time, so you stay there twice as long, and stop and duck under racks and displays, put a pair of sunglasses on your head and make for the exit and then “remember” at the last minute and put them back. You can tease a store detective who gets on your case becaus
e you have as much right to be there as anyone. But being seventeen on Swan, I really wasn’t supposed to exist; I was a constant reminder of the kind of person the Bad Place prefers—my blank-screen forehead, absence of expression lines, my lack of real knowledge or expertise in anything, really, a stupidity the mainlanders gobble up like baby fat. So I ignored their stares and felt sorry because I was kind of ruining everything. But I thought it would only be a few weeks, a month, two at the most. I only asked Lolly once, and she said they’d be back for me soon. Not as long as this.

  By the time I got to Rose’s place my toes felt solid and they hurt in this way where I couldn’t be sure whether they’d just snapped off. I think I was grimacing when the chimes above her door jingled as I walked in. Rose was up a stepladder stocking a high shelf; she came down, not quickly but lightly, like a strange bird, grabbed my hand, and gave it a massive shake that almost popped my shoulder out of joint. She didn’t wait for me to tell her who I was. It’s not like I needed to, but I’d always assumed that old people liked formality. Not that one, not Rose. She pointed me toward the freezer where Lolly usually shopped, climbed back up the stepladder, and got back to what she’d been doing. I said maybe my grandmother would like something different, that I was actually pretty good in the kitchen. Rose said good luck in kind of a grumble. I picked up some peppers and broccoli, a box of quinoa, and two cans of salmon.

  “You better put on more layers, Small-fry.”

  I found myself grinning. It felt odd. Then I realized that no one had spoken to me for days. Not since my parents left, or when it was Lolly asking me if I needed anything. Mostly she left notes.

  Rose went on. “I’ll be goddamned if you ain’t shaking like a leaf. How ’bout I turn up the fire while you take a seat?” She nodded toward the counter, but when I started to sit on the stool behind it she shouted, “Don’t you dare, mad-moi-zelle. You can put yourself up on the counter. Chair’s for ol’ Rose.”

  Her back was still turned, but she’s the kind of old person who just knows. She has total control of her place, like she and her shop are some kind of team and they talk in a silent, secret language. The red of the heater glowed brighter and started to blow in a louder drone as Rose turned and walked over to me, smoothly so I barely noticed her limp. Then she stopped, her shoulders square with mine, sizing me up. I don’t think I gave anything away, but I was sure that whatever she said next would make me cry like the world had come to an end.

  “Bet you play a shit hand of poker. Seems to me a kid like you needs to know how to play poker.” And just like that she pulled a deck out of her apron pocket and gave me a lesson. A short one, twenty minutes maybe, but she was totally focused, like this was the most important thing she could be doing. And I listened as hard as I could and it was wonderful, not having to think or wonder or worry. Then the bell above the door jingled and Nick walked through. Rose gathered up the cards in a single-handed sweep.

  “I think that’s enough for today. Why don’t you bundle up and scoot on home, get some dinner ready before Violet gets back.”

  I buttoned my coat, took my bag, and headed for the door.

  “Ahem,” Rose growled from behind the counter. Nick was staring, as usual. “What d’ya say?”

  “Thanks, Rose.”

  I was almost finished cooking when Lolly came home. It wasn’t going to be a masterpiece. She didn’t have any real spices—just a jar of some kind of low-calorie, low-sodium flakes—but it was going to be all right.

  From the window above the sink I saw Lolly rounding the path to the back door. She had short gray hair, always neat, like a former first lady. The door opened, closed, and then opened again, banging against the wall of the utility room. She sprinted into the kitchen a moment later, fanning her hands and flinging open the windows. I stepped out of the way when she rushed for the stove to turn on the exhaust fan.

  “What’s burning?”

  “Nothing.” She looked at me like I was lying, and suddenly it felt like I was. The heat from the oven was gulped up by the open windows and door, and the temperature change was violent. “Just peppers. I was roasting peppers on the flame on the stove. I thought I’d make a sauce to go with the fish cakes I made.”

  “Oh Jesus, what a mess.”

  “I was going to clean up when I was done. Are you hungry? It’ll be finished in a few minutes.”

  “No, dear. I had a late lunch.” Then she looked away, like she was lying. “I have to finish some reading; I’m back on the mainland tomorrow to finish up this consultancy job. I’ll be in my room if you need me. And can you please remember to switch on the fan when you cook? Otherwise smells get everywhere.”

  “Yeah, sorry about that.”

  She looked over her shoulder as she left the room. I’d set two places at the table. She looked at me. “No, I’m sorry.”

  * * *

  The crack man is whistling but he won’t pick a tune. He fills the house with the high pitch of the Atlantic wind, the one that drags the waves to my back door. I try to hear something else—house sounds, island sounds—but this thin shriek dominates like a needle through my eardrum, the breeze outside becoming a blade because it shouldn’t be here, inside, taking down the walls with the patience of a senior citizen. If I just stay here, mouth shut, in the quiet of my body, which is soft and still from the Valium, maybe they’ll just forget about me. Please, please just leave me alone.

  My muscles are going soft. The room is spinning slowly. I can’t make anything out distinctly. The deep growl of my stomach barks back at the crack man’s whistle. I should eat something. Lolly liked a quiet house and I’ve ruined it.

  She never asked me questions. I guess she wanted to keep the peace and quiet she’d built out here. She’d earned it. I wasn’t the only one she didn’t talk to. She could have chosen a house closer to the center, but she wanted to be out here, away from everyone else’s shit. And then I dropped into her lap.

  Maybe she didn’t ask me questions because she knew everything about me already. And what she didn’t know, she could fill in with everything she knew about my mother. Which was unfair, but what was I supposed to do about it? I knew she didn’t understand, but she never said anything to me, so I never got the chance to correct her. She just looked at me like I was all wrong, the way you look at a sixth finger or a cat with no tail. Or she didn’t look at me. She was really good at not looking at me. When we were alone in the house, time passed like the forming of a scab.

  Everything in Lolly’s house is digital. Nothing chimes, nothing ticks. Only the phone makes noise, and ever since Lolly died, it doesn’t.

  Lolly’s a clock with no tick and no tock, no pendulum swing, no plastic clack when the minute advances, no second-long flick when the big hand makes its one-degree jump into the next minute, into the future at the exact instant that it becomes the present.

  Talk to me, please, talk to me.

  * * *

  I stumble a few times when I try to stand. I can almost see Lolly looking at me, fucked up and underfed, so high on pharmies I can hardly get up off the floor. I see her seeing me and looking away, shaking her head and letting out a sigh. On my feet I’m facing the window. The day outside is too bright and I’m so dizzy with hunger that I can hardly bring myself to go down to the kitchen to cook. The carpet is soft and thick underfoot. It makes me trip so I steady myself on the furniture and against the walls.

  My mother says I should stand up straight. She says I’ll get a hunchback if I keep walking like this. It’s hard but I try to pull my head up, push my shoulders back. She says I’ll get depressed if I walk around with my head hidden between my shoulders, that if I walk with more confidence I’ll feel more confident. So I try to pull my chin up but I can’t do it without crying; still she insists it’ll make me feel better.

  She says she’s proud of me because I know how to take care of myself. She says, “You’re so capable. I never have to worry about you, my love.”

  “That’s just your e
xcuse to fucking ignore me!”

  But when I scream back at her she’s gone and the house almost shakes with the sickening quiet, and my head drops down again and I want to fall onto the living-room floor until I hear her whisper, “Posture,” gently, in that singsong way she uses when she knows what she’s saying is a pain in the ass but she has to say it anyway.

  “I know, I know.” I think I’m standing up straight.

  I put the chicken on a board.

  “Don’t you dare start before you preheat the oven.”

  Three hundred fifty degrees. Mom fake-frowns at my impatience, so I lower it to 325. I like the click when the oven light switches on; I like the sound the fan makes. The air feels less empty; I lean my head back and listen.

  Then Lolly’s there and she claps her hands at me. She’s right—I’m not paying attention to what I’m doing. This is how accidents happen. This is how absentminded little girls accidentally burn the house down.

  “Leave her alone, Mom. She knows what she’s doing. My girl has always been so capable.”

  I don’t know whose side to take, so I leave them to bicker and turn on the exhaust fan and open the windows because I know that Lolly hates it when I fill her house with cooking smells.

  The horn from the afternoon boat blows in. The three of them could be coming back, all three could be back here in another twenty minutes, and I’ll have dinner in the oven and Mom will be proud because she’s the one who taught me about tarragon and Lolly will be happy that I remembered to open the windows and turn on the fan and my dad will do that thing he does where he says that the food needs something, so he has to keep tasting it, because he’s still not sure and he just keeps taking bites with this fake-confused look on his face until he’s eaten his entire plate of food, because no matter how cool you used to be, once you become a dad you automatically develop some dorky, embarrassing spiel that’s so cute that no one can tell you to fuck off and stop being so goddamn goofy.