The Book of X

by Sarah Rose Etter

  “You also have to be careful out there,” my father says. “Helmet, all right? No bullshit.”

  He passes me a thermos of coffee and I take a swig.

  “Your mother is pissed as hell,” he says with a laugh.

  There are knives in the coffee, but I gulp it down.

  “Oh well,” I say. “I’m tired of cleaning that damn house.”

  My father lets out a howl.

  “Oh, you’re honest today?” he asks.

  I nod vigorously and look out the window as if his laughter doesn’t light me up inside, as if it isn’t a prize, as if it isn’t a thousand golden coins raining down on me.

  ONCE WE ARRIVE, MY FATHER PLOPS AN orange helmet on my head. It has a light on the front that makes the meat bright wherever I turn my head. We each grab a silver bucket.

  “No fucking funny stuff,” my brother says. “We don’t need you collapsing this whole damn vein.”

  We follow the small set of silver tracks deeper into the still-dark quarry and take a left toward the new deposit my brother found. The walkways get smaller and smaller around our bodies, the walls bursting with flesh.

  We reach the smallest part of the quarry, a place we have to kneel to enter. An empty silver cart waits nearby on the tracks.

  The meat around us is the perfect color for harvest. The walls are so swollen they are almost touching, as if we are kneeling in the corridors of a giant heart.

  “Watch us first, then we’ll let you try,” my father calls.

  My father and brother bring their hands to the walls and begin to tug out large wet chunks.

  “The bigger the chunks, the more money we can get for them raw,” my father explains. “So, you can’t be scared to go deep.”

  My brother does just what he says: He reaches elbow deep into the wall and pulls, removing a boulder-sized chunk of meat from the quarry. He lugs it over to the cart, stumbling a bit from the weight of it.

  “See there? That’s a big haul.”

  “There’s a reason they say I’m the best.”

  “You’re up, Cassie,” my father says.

  The wall of meat shimmers beneath the light on my helmet. I pull my arms back and sink them deep into the red wetness of the flesh. The thick scent of blood rises up, fills my mouth and my nostrils until I gag.

  “Now, keep strong,” my father whispers. “Grip what you can and pull.”

  I grip the meat strong and pull back with my whole weight, knot and all. The meat sucks at my arms, but I pull harder. Finally, it comes loose, a bigger chunk than what my brother pulled.

  My father lets out a yelp.

  “Well would you look at that! A natural!”

  I keep going, digging my arms into the wall, hearing that familiar wet suck sound, pulling hard. Over and over again, I fill the carts alongside my father and my brother.

  By the end of the day, the wall of the quarry is dug out good. Blood coats my skin and my hair and my face and my clothes. We ride home like soldiers from a red war, exhilarated, exhausted, muscles screaming.

  “What a fine haul,” my father says. “Fine haul.”

  IT IS MY BIRTHDAY. MY RIBS HAVE BEGUN to show above the knot.

  All morning, I imagine: Frosting, butter, perfectly sculpted sugar flowers.

  In the kitchen, my family rings the table. There is a small pile of gifts, wrapped in silver.

  “HAPPY BIRTHDAY!” everyone sings.

  For a moment, briefly, joy.

  I take a seat and open the gifts: New dress, new pearls, a book, a journal.

  “Now,” my mother says. “It is time for your treat.”

  My body is ready. I will gorge on it, get wild on sugar, explode into a pile of young confetti.

  My mother comes back from the kitchen holding a silver tray. She holds the tray so high I cannot see over it, even though I strain.

  “Happy Birthday!” she cheers. “All for you!”

  A small watering begins in the corners of my mouth as she lowers the tray.

  Disappointment busts black through my veins. Stacks of black rocks are shaped like a three-layer cake. No frosting, no sugar, just granite from the ground, that familiar red glisten.

  THE NEXT DAY, MY FATHER PRESSES A KEY into my palm.

  “Once a week,” he says. “You can come harvest.”

  A real smile comes to my face.

  “Ah! So, she does smile,” he teases.

  And so, it begins: Each week, I spend one day in the quarry, tearing the meat from the walls.

  JARRED COMES TO THE HOUSE TO CALL on me.

  “May I take Cassie on a walk?” he asks my father on the front porch.

  “Better you than me,” my father jokes.

  Jarred doesn’t laugh.

  “Cassie, you have a visitor,” my father calls up.

  WE TAKE THE PATH AWAY FROM THE RED barn, which recedes like an old heart in the distance. My body quickens around him, my pulse, the breath, the lungs trying to catch air.

  “Let’s sit next to the tree,” he says.

  I keep my body near his, in case he is ready to touch me.

  “I rode my bike to your house,” he says.

  “That’s a long way.”

  “Took an hour.”

  I want his words to stop and his hands to move. I always imagine it, this touching, the knee between the legs, the sweet pink sensation, a candy.

  “That’s a long time,” I say.

  Then I smash my mouth onto his, taste the salty metal again, the cut of his braces through his lips to mine. He puts his hands on my shoulders and we keep our mouths pressed like that, motionless, holding our breath. Then he pulls away.

  “Can I touch you?” he asks.

  I nod.

  He puts his mouth on mine and we hold our mouths together again and his hands move up my legs, up past the hem of my black dress. I feel dizzy from wanting more, from his still mouth, from his hands. He keeps going. I hold my breath as he moves his hand up to my knot.

  “I don’t—”

  “Shhh,” he says.

  He puts his mouth on my neck, fingers reaching my knot and caressing it, making me tremble. His hands go greedy, running over the knot, digging into the crevices, gripping the curves of it.

  “You’re hurting me,” I say, panic rising in my throat.

  “Good,” he says, pressing harder against me, pushing my body into the grass, sliding on top of me, grabbing the knot with both hands now.

  He shoves my dress up so my knot and underwear are exposed in the sun. He looks down at me in disgust.

  “Look at you,” he hisses. “You’re fucking gross.”

  “But I tho—”

  “I just wanted to see it for myself,” he says.

  I start to pull my dress down.

  “Leave it,” he grunts.

  He stands up and spits on the ground next to me.

  “Fucking freak,” he mutters.

  My mouth burns where he kissed me. I watch his back recede into the distance.

  I stay that way for hours, until the sun sets, until it is dark, until it is too cold to stay how he left me. I stand up, let my dress fall down, walk home slow.

  THE QUARRY MAKES ME STRONGER. THE fat falls from my body, the knot gets smaller. I can see new muscles in my legs and arms. I work fast as my brother, become the slick machine. Meat smears on me like blood on a warrior.

  At night, my mother runs her finger over my cheekbones.

  “Well, would you look at this,” she says. “Sharp as a knife by now.”

  Little by little, the lemons fall away. The blood turns black beneath my fingernails, which no longer sting. I stand tall when I haul the meat, just like my father, just like my brother.

  ONE DAY, I COME HOME FROM THE MEAT Quarry to find my mother alone in her bedroom, surrounded by lemons. There are lemons on the bed, lemons on the chair, lemons on the nightstand.

  “Just letting them ripen,” she says.

  A wince crosses her face and she doubles over i
n the afternoon light.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask.

  “My knot, it’s been hurting,” she says. “Just something that comes with age.”

  I move closer to her and put a hand on her shoulder. She lets out another strange laugh, her white teeth radiating, pain warping her face again.

  EACH NEW MOON, I BLEED BETWEEN THE legs like an animal. I am tethered to the sky. I bow my head to the cycle, dip my fingers into the red mess between my legs.

  JARRED DOESN’T SPEAK TO ME NOW. SOME days, I want his body on me more than others. Some days, I want his body on mine so badly I could scream into the sky. But we never say a word. I remember his spit in the dirt, a clear gem on the ground that sank into the soil, disappeared.

  THE SUN GETS BRIGHTER, THE SUMMER days hotter and longer. I work the quarry, dig in the field for strange rocks, knife tops, bones.

  In my palm, I hold the bleached summer bones of a small bird. When I shift my fingers, the bones touch, make a soft hollow sound. I keep the bones near me after that, like a totem. They stay on my nightstand where I can touch them when the bad feelings come down.

  ONE DAY, I FIND THE CARCASS OF A DEER. I stare down into its open dead eye, which reflects the world around us in a glistening blue.

  The deer’s belly is split open and its organs spill out: Winding pink intestines next to a deep red heart next to an opaque stomach like a big hideous pearl on the green grass. A sad electricity shoots through me. I memorize the insides, the blood on the fur, in the wide eye.

  JARRED COMES TO ME IN THE AFTERnoon, by the lockers.

  “I want to see you again,” he says.

  My brain swells, goes dizzy and wild with the thought of it.

  “Me?” I ask.

  “Yes, you. Fucking freak,” he says, but this time he cracks a smile like he won’t spit.

  “When?”

  “After school. I’ll walk you.”

  I spend the rest of the day in a haze imagining it: His mouth on mine, his body near mine, his hands on me. The hours ache by. I stare up at the clock and urge it forward.

  I WALK TOWARD MY HOUSE WITH JARRED.

  “I’m sorry about last time,” he says.

  I nod, unsure what comes next.

  We move quietly over the land. The heat from his body makes me quiet until my house comes into view.

  “No one is home until six...” I say.

  We sit on the couch and stare at the wall. The air is electric. I am waiting for something to happen and then it does, then it is his mouth on mine again, this time without the metal, still salt, this time his tongue against mine, a new sensation, our tongues. I go ravenous, an animal, heat growing between our bodies.

  He peels off my dress and runs his hands up the knot. He slides his hands up to my breasts, cups them through my bra.

  “Take it off,” he hisses, and I do, then there is nothing between our skin, his hands on my nipples, then his mouth, a fire.

  He snakes his hand down to my jeans. The zipper parts and his hand is between my legs, his fingers finding the thicket of hair there then stopping cold.

  “Jesus, you’re hairy,” he mutters. “You don’t shave?”

  I flush red and go motionless.

  “Shave?”

  “Down there, shave,” he says. “Girls are supposed to shave that.”

  He takes his hand from my pants. “Jesus, what’s wrong with you?” he asks.

  I open my mouth to tell him I am working with the doctors to get the knot removed. I want to give him hope for our future, but the words won’t come out.

  There is a series of sounds in succession: His receding footsteps, the front door opening then slamming, then he’s gone.

  THE SUN SETS AS I CROSS THE FIELDS, SKY dripping sherbet colors: Light yellow, twilight orange, deep pink.

  At the entrance, I put on my helmet, cast the light.

  Deep in the quarry, I take the left. I let the walls close in on me, down into the deepest section.

  Rage puts me in motion: I claw at the walls with my hands, bury my arms in the meat. I rip the flesh from the walls, screaming and sobbing against the red.

  AT BREAKFAST THE NEXT MORNING, WE sit quietly until my father mentions it.

  “Some animal got at the Meat Quarry last night,” he says. “Strange, because I know I locked it up.”

  The bloody clothes are in the hamper. How long until someone finds me out? A strange calmness has entered my veins since the meat screaming. Nothing can shake me now.

  “I wonder what kind of animal it was,” I say.

  “No telling, but it might’ve been a wolf. That’s how much damage was done.”

  I slide a piece of rock into my mouth to hide my smile.

  “I have to say, the economy isn’t holding strong,” my father says. “Some troubling signs in the paper lately.”

  “Like what?” my mother asks.

  “Unstable dollar, more meat than usual available,” my father says. “Plus, people are eating more spinach these days, less meat. At least, that’s what the reports are saying.”

  All day long, I hum it to myself:

  I am the wolf, I am the wolf, I am the wolf.

  “HAVE YOU EVER SHAVED?” I ASK SOPHIA.

  We’re sitting in her bathroom after school. She has started wearing red lipstick.

  “Of course,” Sophia says. “How else can you show yourself to men?”

  “How did you learn to do it?”

  Sophia looks at me with pity and disgust.

  “You’re not shaving? Didn’t your mom show you?”

  I shake my head.

  Sophia pulls a razor from a drawer and presses it into my palm.

  “Figure it out, Cassie. Jesus Christ.”

  I CLIMB INTO THE WHITE PORCELAIN bathtub with Sophia’s razor. I lather myself up good in the hot water, white soap bubbling all around me.

  I bring the razor to the softest skin there and guide it over me, specks of thick hair falling with the soap to the tub floor. I move slowly, carefully, delicately.

  My knot shifts me and I slip, the razor slicing the skin between my legs, blood dripping from the mouth of the wound onto the porcelain.

  MY MOTHER EYES ME AT BREAKFAST. Today, she is kind, friendly.

  “I miss you,” she says. “It feels like we’re just not close anymore.”

  “I know!” I say. “I’ve just been so busy with school and the Meat Quarry.”

  “She’s getting really good,” my brother says.

  “Look how beautiful you are now,” my mother says.

  She reaches across the table to run a hand over my cheek.

  “Look at your lips,” she whispers. “I wish I had lips.”

  IT IS MY BROTHER’S BIRTHDAY. I MAKE the cake: I crack eggs, whip a perfect white frosting.

  We crowd around the table and sing the song.

  “You all sound terrible,” he says.

  My mother hits his arm. He forks cake into his mouth.

  In the low, low light, across the table, I love him. I want to say it, but it gets trapped in my throat, a motionless red lump, worthless as a heart.

  “I SHAVED,” I WHISPER AT JARRED WHEN he passes me in the hall.

  I watch the back of his head for a reaction. His body doesn’t change, his shoulders don’t tense, he doesn’t flinch. It’s as if no one has spoken, as if I am a ghost.

  Later, a note on my desk:

  Let me walk you home today.

  Heat flushes: Our mouths together again, the skin beneath my skin, his skin above my skin, the warmth, the warmth a new small sun between the legs.

  AFTER SCHOOL, WE WANDER THE ACRES.

  “I like it when you listen to me,” Jarred says.

  “I want to show you something,” I say. “Have you seen the Meat Quarry?”

  “No,” he says. “Where’s that?”

  “Just out this way,” I say.

  I guide him down the road until we reach the gate.

  I slide my key into the lo
ck until it clicks. He follows me inside, his eyes flicking over the flesh walls.

  “What is this place?” he asks.

  “The Meat Quarry. My brother and father discovered it. It’s ours.”

  “What do you do down here?”

  “This is where we harvest the meat.”

  “Weird,” he says. “Smells like hell.”

  “It’s my favorite place.”

  “Come here.”

  I walk to him, body more electric. He shoves his mouth against mine. It’s rough, the way he does it this time, his teeth against my lips and tongue, his hand on the side of my face.

  He lets out a low moan and slides his hand up my skirt, past my underwear, his fingers on my bare skin.

  “Good, good,” he says.

  The heat between my legs grows, glows, turns white. He presses me back against the meat, the walls soaking blood into my back and hair. I don’t mind, I tell myself I don’t mind.

  He slides my dress from my shoulder, a mouth to a breast, his hands roving over my knot, then his fingers finding the space between my legs and pressing inside of me so deeply that it hurts.

  I let out a small cry and he smiles.

  “Too much?” he asks.

  I nod.

  “Oh well,” he says. He wraps his teeth around my earlobe and shoves his fingers in deeper.

  Panic begins in my chest. I push his shoulders back, away from me. He steps back to peel his shirt off, then he’s on me again, his skin against mine, the blood from the wall soaking me.

  “Oh, no,” he says. “We’ve come all this way.”

  I hear the mouth of the zipper, and the same scent from the classroom comes back to me, the scent of his private skin, the pink of him, the sound of his hand against himself. He covers my mouth with his and yanks my underwear to the side. I start to shriek into his mouth. It must sound like a moan.

  “Oh, fuck yes,” he mutters.

  It happens so fast I don’t know what it is, but then he is inside of me, the hardness of him, the tearing of my body, a strange harsh heat searing between my legs.

  He moves against me fast and hard, a terrible friction, faster and faster, until he moans like before, shudders like before, fills me with another heat, and collapses against my body.

  “Wasn’t that nice?” he murmurs. “You liked that, didn’t you?”