Eleanor had asked permission to be courted, but it couldn’t be allowed. She couldn’t throw her virtue to the first boy that caught her eye like I had. It had ruined me, and I wasn’t about to let that happen to my own daughter.
Eleanor became willful, began slipping out from beneath my watchful eye for clandestine meetings. I locked her in. I had the leathersmith fit Eleanor for a chastity belt. Eleanor became incensed. I’d never seen my daughter so angry. But it was for her own good. She needed a strong hand, not like my own mother, who had known and done nothing.
I caught Eleanor one more time, without her belt, with the Millers’ boy, thankfully before the act had been consummated. She looked like a filthy dock whore—hair tangled, dress undone, stockings crumpled in a heap at the foot of the bed. I beat Eleanor that night, and it was then that she had spat her promise through bloodied lips. You can’t keep me from leaving, she’d said. I don’t care how long it takes, how many beatings you give me. You’ll never see me again, and you’ll never know the joy of holding your grandchildren.
I shivered, for I heard the resolve in her words. But I wrote it off as the bluster of youth. I would find a good young man in Crucialis that would treat her with respect, that would court her properly, that would give her a decent station in life.
But within a fortnight, Eleanor was gone.
More and more details came rushing back to me—childbirth, breastfeeding, tantrums, Eleanor’s voracious appetite for the satirical pamphlets that were smuggled aboard Crucialis from one source or another no matter how hard the village worked to stamp them out—but these memories warred with the manufactured history my mind had created to replace them.
It was disorienting, confusing, dizzying, and eventually overwhelming. I screamed, clasping my hands over my head, pleading for the memories to stop, even for a moment, so I could find myself once more. But they didn’t. They came faster and stronger, and soon the towering waves of memories had driven me beneath the surf.
The Guiding Light Hotel Awaits with Open Arms
Private Apartments (en suite.)
Elegantly Furnished Drawing Room
Holy Studies Held Nightly in the Reading Room
Outer Ring, 500 Yards CCW from the Docks
When the chaotic, dreamlike state finally began to recede, it left me exhausted and useless, like flotsam washed upon the shore. I heard the sound of a conversation, but it seemed more like the beat of a kettledrum than a coherent string of words. I was inside my shop near the potbelly stove, my wrists tied to the arms of a rocking chair. The voices were coming from the boardwalk, somewhere beyond the door to my shop.
Silence came, then creaking, and finally Rose swept through the shop as if she owned it and seated herself at the kitchen table. She must have thought I was still in my trance—indeed, I could hardly keep my eyes open—for she ignored me as she picked up three coarse flaxen threads and began forming them into a braid with clumsy, unpracticed hands.
I noticed among the threads a single human hair, long and strawberry blond. Eleanor’s. The lock of hair, still bound by the purple ribbon, sat on the table so near to me that I swear I could smell Eleanor’s scent.
On the stove was a cast iron pot with liquid wax inside. Rose was forming a candle, I vaguely realized, and when it was complete, they would light it and leave me to forget everything I had fought so hard to remember. It was that thought more than anything that helped my mind to clear.
“Don’t do this, Rose.”
Rose glanced over, the surprise in her eyes betraying her. “Relax, dear. This is for your own good.”
“Don’t do this.”
“You should have seen yourself on the green. The same as when Eleanor left. Weak. Crumbling. Bordering on hysterical. Forgive me for saying so, dear, but you’re a much better person without her. Perhaps you can try for another child. You’re young yet, and Joseph’s been waiting long enough for a son. Hopefully you can take better care this time.”
“Please.”
Rose set down the braid and met my gaze. “So you can what, go chasing after Eleanor?”
I was wholly awake now, ready to fight for my daughter. “Yes.”
“You’re a selfish woman, Sue. Eleanor’s gone. Gone for good. But that’s no reason the village should let you go, too. How many customers would Crucialis lose if your wax and candles were gone?”
The wick was nearly complete.
“She’s my daughter.”
Rose looked down at Eleanor’s hair. “Something you saw fit to overlook five times already. But this time will be the last.” She finished the wick and stood, taking the lock of hair with her. “This time nothing will be left behind that you could stumble across.” And with that she opened the door of the stove and threw the hair inside.
“No!” I cried, the scent of scorched hair making me sick.
The piping of the queen came to me. Brrrr, rap, rap rap.
Rose, her face grim, hadn’t heard, or perhaps she was hiding the fact that she had. She began dipping the wick into the pot of wax.
Again the sound came, long and triumphant. The new queen had won her challenge, and by now she would have killed off not only the old queen but her brood-mates as well.
The door jingled and in stepped Joseph, hat held tightly in one hand. He walked through the aisles of the store and entered the kitchen.
“They’ve agreed?” Rose asked.
Joseph stared into my eyes. “It doesn’t sit well with Pastor David, but yes, they’ve agreed.”
The moment I heard Joseph’s voice, the last of my memories fell into place. I had been promised to Joseph when I was fifteen, but I had railed against the decision. I had loved someone else—a deckhand on one of the ships that came to the village often. The very night I heard the news, I had stolen away on his ship, hoping to leave Crucialis for good.
I’d had one night with my lover—dear God, I couldn’t remember his name—but the next morning I was discovered and the captain had immediately turned the ship around, afraid of angering the village elders and losing his ship’s berth. My mother had beaten me senseless, and I’d been married to Joseph within the week. The signs of my pregnancy came quickly thereafter. Joseph had bedded me several times, but we both knew the child wasn’t his. Yet he surprised me. He never once spoke of his suspicions, and he raised Eleanor as his own.
Until trouble struck. Then, it was as if Eleanor had never been his.
Nearby, Joseph was watching Rose as the layers of the candle built.
I whispered, “This isn’t right, Joseph.”
“It is. She doesn’t need you anymore, Sue. And you don’t need her.”
“I do need her.”
Joseph looked up and met my gaze. His grey-blue eyes held a vulnerability I had never seen, but then Rose said, “It’s ready,” and the look was gone.
Joseph considered her handiwork. “That?”
Glancing sidelong at him, Rose blew along the length of the misshapen candle to set the wax. “It’s not pretty, but it’ll work.”
After pressing the taper into a holder, Rose used the whale oil lamp on the kitchen table to light it. An aromatic smell filled the room. Joseph and Rose left quickly, shutting the door behind them.
I stared at the candle, tears flowing freely. I had used the first candle willingly, and I could still remember that it had felt like sinking slowly into the winter waters of the Inland Sea. It had been a sweet release, made all the sweeter in knowing that I’d never have to deal with the shame of my daughter again. But now it felt as if some vital part of my soul were being ripped away.
The smell of the candle deepened. It wouldn’t be long now.
Brrr, rap, rap, rap.
Several bees landed on the table nearby.
“Go,” I repeated, all the while trying to remember my daughter’s name.
I had a daughter, didn’t I?
Dozens of bees flew around the interior of my home, a handful coming dangerously close to the wavering f
lame. Then one struck it, its wings immediately singing. It fell to the table, buzzing uselessly. It was replaced by three more. They, too, were burned, but a dozen took their place, and finally, in a concerted move, a whole host of them converged on the wick, and the candle was doused.
The buzzing intensified.
The front door opened. “Susanna?”
Joseph’s voice.
He stepped inside, and immediately the bees buzzed around him. He shouted, swatting at them before realizing the smarter course was to flee.
I leaned forward in the rocking chair until I managed to leverage myself onto my feet. I dropped my weight onto the chair over and over until it broke and I crumpled to the floor.
I heard Joseph’s voice outside, saying, “Susanna, don’t do this.”
I ignored his calls and picked myself up, pulling at the arms of the chair until my hands were freed. From the cupboard below the counter which divided store from kitchen, I retrieved the small box that held all the money I had. The vast majority of my earnings went to the village’s communal reserve, but I had saved enough over the years. It would bring me to Eleanor.
Feeling the thrum of my bees deep within my chest, I strode to the front door and stepped onto the boardwalk. A dozen paces away were Rose and Joseph. Several of the village elders stood behind them, their faces lit in wraithlike relief by the lamps they held.
I considered sending the bees to attack. They would, if I bade them do so. I could make them forget themselves, forget everything they had ever known. At the mere thought, a flight swarmed over their heads, and they huddled in fear, all of them.
All except Joseph. His face was calm. He looked into my eyes with an expression that begged me to stay. Even now, he couldn’t find it in himself to say it—that he loved me, that he’d be lost if I left.
His reasons for urging me to take that first candle and all the others had been for his sake, not mine. But I couldn’t stay. Not for him. Not any longer.
I allowed the tightness in my chest to dissipate, and the bees began to disperse. Before they had all returned to the hive, I turned the corner and descended the short ladder to my rowboat. I guided it out toward sea as the last of the bees were swallowed by the dark of the night.
I heard no cry of alarm, no call from the harbor. They were too afraid I would change my mind, or that the bees would simply take it upon themselves to do exactly what everyone feared they would.
And soon, I was out among calm, open sea.
Alone.
I remained close enough to Crucialis to view it on the horizon. It wasn’t difficult, caught as I was in the same lazy currents as the village. The most difficult part was the growing feeling that I would have to turn back when my small store of provisions ran out. But then, on my second day at sea, a ship left Crucialis, and I pulled hard on the oars to place myself in its path.
I was taken aboard, and the captain interrogated me for a good long while. He was justifiably afraid of what might happen if he were to harbor a fugitive from Crucialis, but in the end he accepted half of my money to bring me to port and keep silent about it.
As I stood on deck, leaning against the gunwales, I watched the mainland approach. I was scared. I had no idea where Eleanor might have gone, only the name of the city in which she would have landed. I had no idea if I would find her, only that I had to try. And for now, I decided, that was enough.
I felt something tickling my skin and looked down.
A bee, now motionless, on the back of my hand.
I stared, dumbfounded. “And where are you bound?” I asked, slowly lifting my arm.
But then, without warning, it took flight, and was soon lost among the winds.
Shadows in the Mirrors
When Julie saw the booth of charcoal drawings, she waved to her sister to go on ahead, telling her she’d catch up. Nicole looked at her with that infuriating mixture of concern and encouragement, the one that had so often been pasted on her face since Julie had been released from the hospital. It made Julie want to scream.
“I’ll catch up,” she repeated, and finally Nicole waved and moved on to the next booth in the art show.
Julie turned to the charcoals—portraits, invariably, of young girls. Their ages varied from three to seven, and all of them were standing rigidly in the center of the frame with expressions ranging from discomfort to outright fear. If they could have shivered, they would have.
Why anyone would want to paint or buy such trash was beyond Julie, though she had to admit they commanded a certain amount of attention, like being unable to draw your gaze from Iggy Pop rolling around a stage covered in broken glass.
“You like them?”
Julie turned to find a serious-looking, thirty-something man with tribal tattoos running the length of his arms. More tattoos trailed down the sides of his bald head, along his neck, and beneath his black tee. Everything about him shouted at her like an accusation—everything but his eyes, which were soft, like those a callow teenager who’d gotten himself into something deeper than he should have.
“Not really,” Julie said.
He barked out a laugh. “Could’ve fooled me.”
She tried to smile politely, but was sure it came out more like a grimace. “Why children?”
“Because they’re honest.”
Julie considered the drawing in front of her. “Honest means children ready to slit their wrists?”
“Some children do, you know.”
Ass hole, Julie thought. “Some, sure, but I think you like them like this.”
“What, you’re saying I should turn a blind eye to the pain in the world, act like everyone else and just ignore it?” He jutted his chin and shook his head like he’d encountered people just like Julie a million times before. “That’s not me, honey, and that’s not my artwork. You don’t like it, there’s plenty of Happy People producing nice, safe artwork.”
Julie frowned. She was ready to leave and find Nicole, but one picture near the main row running through the center of the massive tent stopped her in her tracks.
Her world shrank. The murmur of the art crowd fell away, replaced by a loud ringing in her ears. Even the light filtering in from the cloud-covered sky seemed to dim, for within that rusted metal frame, within that sea of subtle grey shades, sat Adelaide. Her daughter.
The analytical part of Julie’s mind told her she was imagining the similarities. But her heart refused to believe that. Adelaide had been her daughter.
Hadn’t she?
It was so difficult to tell since the year in the hospital, the drugs and therapy, the pills she popped every morning.
The back of Adelaide’s head occupied the lower third of the piece. She was staring into a mirror, which showed her face against the backdrop of a heavily shadowed room. A doorway stood open behind her, revealing a hallway with a tilted light bulb hanging by frayed wires. Adelaide looked like she dearly wished she could run but had given up all hope of doing so.
Julie turned away, willing herself to leave, but her feet were rooted to the spot. A bitter wind filtered through the art show’s tent while the milling crowd moved around her as if she were no one, as if she had vanished right along with Adelaide.
The prick of an artist was talking with two women. They laughed flirtatiously, and one of them gave his muscled forearm a quick squeeze. He glanced at Julie, and then did a double-take, perhaps noticing Julie’s expression, perhaps realizing which drawing she was standing before. He looked between the drawing and Julie several times, then his eyes ran down Julie—not sexually, but appraisingly, as if she were a threat he hadn’t counted on.
Then he turned back to his groupies.
And Julie could breathe again. She blinked away tears and made sure her sister, Nicole, wasn’t nearby before turning back to the piece.
The expression on Adelaide’s face was more desperate than she’d ever seen a child look. To see it on her daughter made her want to rip the drawing to shreds.
Once aga
in, Julie found herself warring with emotions and memories that told her she had a daughter and the relentless words of her therapist that told her she did not. Most of the time she believed what the doctor told her, but at times like this, when she was standing face-to-face with her most cherished memories, she knew she had mothered a child, and that Adelaide had been ripped out of her life over a year ago. How it was that no one knew her daughter—even her family and her ex—she couldn’t explain. She didn’t care anymore. All she cared about was Adelaide.
And then Julie saw the details she hadn’t noticed before. In the corners of the room, nearly out of sight, were the smiling faces of them. Little eyes, completely black. Tight smiles with the barest hint of black lips. Teeth, pointed and sharp. Arms impossibly thin. The Others, Julie called them, just as she’d seen them in the weeks leading up to her daughter’s abduction.
At the bottom edge of the frame, hanging from a loop of white thread, was a salmon-colored tag. Twenty-five-hundred dollars, it said.
Julie found herself stepping backward, as if a price had just been laid upon her daughter’s life. She felt herself bump into someone, and without looking to see who, she turned and ran from the tent into the chill autumn wind. The rain had picked up again, and it was drumming against the asphalt walkway leading back to the museum.
“Julie?”
No, not Nicole. Not now.
Julie could feel their eyes upon her now that she’d seen them in the painting. They were there in the shadows, in the glass of the cars whipping along Lake Front Road, in the tall glass of the museum’s façade, in the reflection off the glasses of the bald man staring at her with a look of revulsion and pity. She ran to the lakefront, where the concrete patio ended in a black metal railing and a sheer drop down to the broken concrete breakwater. She stood there, breathless, gripping the railing and staring out at the churning waves of the lake. Then, knowing she’d never be able to resist, she looked down at the shallow puddle she was standing in.
Lest Our Passage Be Forgotten & Other Stories Page 12
