by Polly Hall
I turned to find you watching me. I smiled at you and held out my hand so you could kiss my palm. A gesture I had come to expect as if I could collect and carry your kisses.
“Will you do something for me, Scarlett?” You licked at the corners of your moustache and took both my hands in yours
“Anything,” I replied without hesitation and as I looked into your eyes and promised, a pact was made with that look. The purest spell of all. Intent combined with sincerity. A little part of me slipped away.
“Will you stay with me—ever after—I mean, will you be my soul mate for all eternity?”
“Are you proposing to me, Mr. Pepper?” You didn’t get down on one knee but looked deadly serious. Your vulnerability was intoxicating; it made you seem more animal than human.
“More than a proposal. I’m not talking til death us do part. I’m talking eternity—love after death.” That was the biggest ask of anyone, but I’d already decided. You didn’t even need to ask. Love transcends all. Doesn’t it? Even death.
You drew me toward you and planted your mouth upon mine with such force it was suffocating at first. I kissed you back with more passion. Then our breaths grew fast and urgent as you reached beneath my skirt, pushing your fingers inside me while I grappled with the belt on your trousers. I gripped your workshop bench where the swoodle was balanced precariously, its swan’s heads rocking together in rhythm with your thrusts as if nodding encouragement to your proposal.
I later found out that swans have a violent mythology. Zeus and Leda. A woman and a swan—how terrific! Something extraordinary and far more erotic than a man and woman. I imagined his feathery wings beating around her fleshy body. All that phantasmagorical weirdness thrusting into the minds of great artists, encouraging them for millennia to replicate such myths through paintings and sculpture. And taxidermy perhaps?
We seek what is familiar, don’t we? But we cannot resist that which is not—the intrigue, the mystery, the sheer horror of the unusual. The great swan with its terrible look. Yet we baulk from it, shy away and titter, ridicule and fear it. More often than not, we kill it. Those swans you used, positioned in the shape of a heart, were an omen. And Parker the poodle never asked to be paired with such brutal mythology. He was only Penny’s dog, after all, who happened to die at the right time, in the right place. Or the wrong time, in the wrong place.
I thought I heard a hiss and a growl as I left the workshop, or it could have been the door hinge or our dogs grumbling for their dinner. I didn’t think much of it at the time because I was so wrapped up in you.
There were few people in this world I would trust with my life, but you were one of them. I’m not saying that in a needy way, more of a statement of truth, for posterity. You had a way of holding the space around me with such delicacy, unabashed and confident. We would never be afraid of silence, being present with one another was conversation enough, a veritable feast flavored by your rough edges and my sharp quirks. Creatures come alive if they are noticed. Is it not love that fuels the spirit? When we name something, we create it, allow it to materialize.
I often wondered if we would have met at another place and time had we not met how we did. It seemed fated, but don’t most lovers say it was fate that brought them together? Love at first sight is overrated and condescending; there is no love without connection, and how can you connect to someone so instantly, like a battery clicking into a plastic casement? No matter how much technology we use, plugging up our orifices with wires and noise, data repetitively infiltrating our senses through the jittering pads of our opposable thumbs, tap—tap—tap, the truth is, we have souls.
We met by the edge, you and I. I remember it like this because you always said the sea was the last great unknown, an undiscovered part of our world. That roguish day I was searching for meaning by the shore and you were searching for items that could serve as a backdrop to your taxidermy mounts.
The beach was bleak and littered with spoils from the tide’s regurgitated breakfast. A mutated plastic bottle top fused with a shell, a red Connect Four token glaring like a spilled drop of blood on the rocks, and polished blue and green glass sieved clean like jewels among the grit. Twigs and branches were tangled up with seaweed and driftwood on the pale pebbles. The licked stone-smooth texture rolled onto the rocks like alien limbs spewed up from another planet. What is it about driftwood that evokes romance? It was little wonder I was drawn to you—transformer of dead things, creator of curiosities—my beautiful, big-boned taxidermist extraordinaire.
That day could not have been coincidence. Even in my darkest hours, when my faith was seemingly whittled away, I still believed in fate. Was it at this time, when my headaches began to gnaw so frequently, that others’ thoughts infiltrated my own? Or was it that I was weakened by the headaches, less able to control the endless chattering noise that seemed to come from being around other restless souls?
You carried a huge tub of fossils as if you were merely carrying an empty cup. Mainly ammonites, those curly whirlpools of delight exhibited Fibonacci’s sequence on slabs of slate like an old-fashioned teacher’s board. The ambitious patterns seemed to have humility even in extinction, but what do we ever learn? We are absorbed by the past, drowned by sentimentalism, yet somehow we still aspire to timeless values like faith, hope, love. Of course we do, but to prove what? That we are above it all, that we are human, entitled to act like God. As you can tell, I have been mulling this over for some time now. I was intrigued by a mass on the shoreline, so moved closer. We first met looking down at a large creature washed up by the tide. There were smatterings of dark fur over a decaying and deformed animal the size of a small horse; an exposed elongated skull grinned to show oddly shaped teeth.
“What is it?” I asked you.
“Dead,” you said.
That is when I looked up and saw you gazing not at the creature, but at my face.
“I’m Henry.” You offered your hand and I noticed one shortened finger as I reached to shake it, a hand scarred and strong.
“Scarlett.” I smiled.
“Scarlett? That’s my favorite name.” I felt the warmth from your hand on mine, so when you released your grip, I plunged it into my pocket to retain the heat. You towered over me. The wind had started to thrash the waves onto the pebbles and roll them back and forth like a hypnotic lullaby.
Suddenly, thoughts of my father surfaced like flashes of sunlight on the waves, unreachable and fleeting. He was not a big man like you, but he was tall and made me feel protected. I yearned for that void inside myself to be filled with a man. A solid, vital being surging with life. Protector, fighter, creator. And there you were. I wanted to become something else even then, to be noticed, to be transformed by a higher will. There was an ocean inside both of us, huge and helpless, so was it any wonder we sought solace in one another?
I remember you commenting that it was possible nowadays to find almost anything on a beach. Did you find me? Or did I find you? Or perhaps we both followed some innate homing device? But back then I would never have believed that I could feel a connection that intense to anyone but Rhett.
I don’t know why I didn’t tell you at first that my brother was my twin. You never seemed that interested in my family. Rhett and I had an unspoken bond, the kind you find with twins, a connection that excludes anyone else. Like a well-guarded secret we kept from anyone else. Even from you. When we were children, we would roll about together and pretend we were conjoined, wrapping ourselves in a sheet so our bodies were tightly pressed together and breathless. Sometimes I felt a burning inside me to reach Rhett. He was never far from my thoughts.
On Valentine’s Day, the day you presented me with the swoodle, I decided that I needed to speak with my brother in person. That was easier said than done, seeing as I didn’t know where he was in the world half the time. I tried his mobile but it just kept ringing. There was no answering service. I checked on Facebook, but he’d not posted anything since last July when he was travel
ing around Spain. I had sent him an email and hoped he would answer it. I even tried some telepathy, the way us twins do, sat in front of the mirror and concentrated really hard, visualized him calling me. But whenever I opened my mind I seemed to tap into some other frequency where spirits seemed to reside. They wanted me to notice them, to contact them, instead of Rhett. The voices emerged as a soft buzzing at first, then a low thrum like the sound you get in theatres, hundreds of people chattering and whispering before the start of a performance. Then the sounds seemed to infiltrate my head, not actual words but background noise. And the only way to get rid of them was to keep my body moving, to get outside and away from all the interference.
I took the dogs out onto the moor. It was cold but bright, and I needed the fresh air. As I moved, the voices and sounds seemed to swarm behind me like angry hornets. I walked faster and faster and nearly broke into a run, a hurried pace between walking and jogging. The wintery wind was making my eyes water. The dogs were ahead of me on the pathway and I knew it would be dark soon.
I stumbled a little on the ground, which was quite ridged and rocky, uneven in patches. Then out of nowhere a buzzard swooped so low I felt its wings brush my head. It made me shriek out in surprise; I’d never heard of a buzzard doing this to a human. Gulls I would expect to take their chances with a human in broad daylight, especially if there was food, but buzzards were wild. They kept apart from man on the periphery of civilization, in fields and woods. Had it simply flown off, I would’ve thought it was an error of judgment, that it had mistaken my woolly hat for a rabbit or even a newborn lamb. But it did it again, swooping low with talons outstretched in a position of attack. I stooped low and raised my arms above my head to ward it off.
It startled me so much that I wondered if it was trying somehow to communicate with me, to get my attention. With its final brush of feathers against my cheek and outstretched arm I realized in my panic that the voices in my head had stopped abruptly. The animal sounds that were following me had ceased. The dogs came crashing back through the undergrowth, panting hot steam into the darkening February chill, tongues lolling and tails moving at speed. I kept them close by me and we headed back toward home.
When I was nearly back to our house, I saw a field full of swans, too many to count but I estimated well over forty, all sitting or wading across the sodden ground on their wide black feet. Some regally dipped their heads to feed. Others rested with necks curved toward their backs, beaks burrowed in their feathers. I thought of the swoodle and had images of you bearing down on me in your workshop, the swans’ heads butting together. What you had said about us being together for eternity made me walk faster to tell you what had just happened. You would have an explanation.
Then my phone rang. I didn’t normally answer calls when the number was withheld, but I was yearning for human contact.
“Scarlett?”
“Who’s this?” The line was scratchy and sounded distant.
“It’s me—Rhett. Listen I haven’t got many minutes left. Can you call me straight back on this number if it cuts off?”
“Where are you? I’ve been trying to contact you for months.”
“Is everything ok?”
“Yes, why shouldn’t it be?”
“You said you’d been trying to contact me. You’re not knocked up, are you?”
“No, Rhett, I’m not. Why are you calling me anyway? I’m walking the dogs.”
“Dogs? I didn’t know you had any dogs.”
“Henry’s dogs.” Then I realized Rhett had never met you. It had been such a whirlwind romance, and I’d moved in with you soon after we met. He’d gone off traveling long before. And we had not even seen each other at Christmas.
“Did you get my Christmas card? I’m hoping to come back sometime in June.” I hadn’t received a card, and I’d redirected all my post from the flat where I’d been living before I moved. It was just like Rhett to expect me to sit around waiting for him to return.
“Where are you now?”
“I’m just about to leave Romania. There’s a guy I met who has some work for me.”
“Work? What kind of work?”But the line went dead. I wasn’t even sure what he did to earn money, and something prevented me asking, even though he was my brother. It was probably illegal or immoral. He had never had a problem exploiting others. I was nearly home so I thrust my frozen hands in my pockets and hurried up as I neared the house.
After letting the dogs back in their pen, I kicked off my boots and stripped off my gloves so I could redial Rhett’s number and give him my full attention. It rang a few times before a woman answered.
“Rhett?” It clearly wasn’t Rhett but I said his name anyway. The sound of a phone being passed from hand to hand scratched at my ear.
“Yeah, I’m here, sis.” He sounded a bit breathless this time.
“I didn’t know how to contact you. To tell you I’d moved.”
“Text me your new address—to this phone.”
“Okay, but where are you?”
“I won’t be here much longer.”
“Who are you with? What’s that moaning sound?” A muffled giggle and whispering in the background made me press the phone closer to my ear. “Rhett? Whose phone is this? Who are you with?”
“Just promise me you’ll text me your address—soon yeah?” His distraction was even more noticeable. He said something in another language the words muffled as if he were holding the phone against his skin—I couldn’t catch what he said and didn’t even know what language he was speaking. He could pick up languages without much effort, a gift I did not possess. “Sis, you still there?”
“Who are you talking to? Rhett, what are you doing?”
“You don’t want to know—Christ! Got to go, Scarlett. Text me . . .” A louder giggle and some fumbling. Then it cut off with some short beeps. At least I knew he was alive. That was a relief. So that’s why I totally forgot to tell you about the buzzard; Rhett had upstaged it and it was him that played on my mind all evening. Whenever Rhett and I got together, we seemed to create some sort of chemical implosion, and his visits were always preceded by a phone call.
“Do you think he was having sex?” I asked you.
“Who?”
“Rhett. Do you think he was having sex while he was on the phone to me?”
“Possibly? How should I know what he was doing?”
“He sounded breathless.”
“Maybe he was walking. Briskly.” You raised one eyebrow and winked at me.
“He shouldn’t talk to me while he’s having sex.”
“You phoned him—what was he supposed to do?”
“This is my brother you’re talking about. My twin brother. Whom you have never met. He just—well—he wouldn’t do that to me.” Would he?
“Scarlett, my darling. This is the same brother who hasn’t contacted you for months. Who disappears without a trace not telling you where he’s going or who he’s with? And you think he’d have the foresight to pull out before answering the phone?”
I scowled at you. But I knew Rhett. We were close once. Closer than you’d ever imagine. He’d share everything with me. I felt it all unraveling even then but pushed it away as if ignorance were the best strategy. Snatched conversations with him were not enough. I needed something more substantial, time to really open up and talk about our past. Just Rhett and me. Not you and I. But I’d have to wait until June. If he was true to his word.
You lit the fire and I watched the flames lick and spit. Whenever I thought of fire, I thought of Rhett. You know about how he got those scars don’t you? A sort of shared reminder of consequences and our lingering past. Perhaps if he’d returned sooner, things would have turned out differently.
“Bitch!” I spat the word into the air as I lay in bed that night. Whoever he was with, I decided to hate her. I had never liked any of his girlfriends. The other voices landed on me as if they had latched onto the venom in my remark, whispers at first, followed by ho
wling and cackling, like the rasping burn of an unreachable itch.
Christmas Day—Today
Morning
The sun has come up, but it is still dimpsy as we say here on the moor; the night never really gives way to the day at this time of year. We are only just past the shortest day when we begin to beckon the light back, as if we have any say in the matter. The world turns and we turn with it.
I am listening to Christmas music. Carols, of course. Traditional. Once in Royal David’s City, Away in a Manger, Hark the Herald Angels Sing, and—the inspiration for many a taxidermist—The Twelve Days of Christmas, featuring no fewer than twenty-three stuffable birds. (Sorry. I know how you hate that misnomer.) “Taxidermy has evolved into an applied science and art that does not involve the process of stuffing,” you frequently remind me. I’m a little disappointed that you didn’t put the car sticker I bought you on the back of the truck—World’s Greatest Stuffer.
You are showering. I hear the water upstairs and think of the water that has crept toward us out here. It has risen up and up, forcing houses to be evacuated as the rivers overflowed and crept up upon fields and farms and homes. We are slightly elevated here on our small mound, our magic island. At least the rain has stopped, but the water has not subsided, saturating the ground to its limit then freezing over. It smells of retribution—leach dank and vengeful.
Everything is grey; the sky, the silhouettes of trees, the water. I am sick of grey now, yearning for the colors of spring again—daffodil-yellow and crocus-violet. The world stands still, but today I push away the darkness and let in the light. This is Christmas Day after all. You will soon light all the candles and we can celebrate properly, invite the color back into our home.
