Dead in the Water

by Nancy Holder

  Calm. I must stay calm.

  I gave up on the Holy Mother, who wasn’t smart enough or brave enough. She certainly didn’t know how to love enough, with her foolish smiles and her roses and her hopes. So I prayed to the Devil instead. And he came to me.

  He was beautiful, glowing red with a huge penis and round, firm testicles that I knew were loaded with sperm. No mortal man comes close to the devil. He’s muscular and brawny and very tall. The color of his hair changes with his mood—blond when he’s playful, black when he’s angry or stern or amorous. The devil can be very amorous. I never enjoyed sex until I slept with the Devil.

  The only time he hurt my feelings was when he called me Margaret. I can remember rolling away from him and saying, “Are you sleeping with her, too?”

  “Of course not, love. Off course not, my darling. Come back to bed.” Then he grabbed my wrist and practically dragged me onto the mattress. Actually, he did drag me. He takes what he wants. He’s a real man. Not like Margaret’s husband, who stood by and let those terrible things happen to her. I wouldn’t be able to let a man like that touch me.

  I got pregnant by the blessed Father of Hell, and he promised me he would take me and the baby down to dwell with him world without end, amen. “Just don’t baptize the baby,” he said.

  I wasn’t going to. I was blissfully happy. I did whatever he told me. I don’t remember those weeks at all, but I do know we were happy.

  But then I passed a church and the Holy Mother lured me in. I know now that she was jealous. I mean, having the child of God is like a life sentence in a harem. Into the purdah of the faceless nuns who tell you how to be good and sweet. To keep clean and tidy and think clean and tidy; and pick up after everyone, just pick up after them and if they make you bleed, just clean it up, stay clean—

  My God! My God! It didn’t hurt this much with Bryan.

  Well, of course it didn’t. Of course, of course.

  The Holy Mother made me ask the priest if a baby wasn’t baptized, would it go to hell. And the father asked me if I were a Catholic, because that was basic catechism. All the unbaptized babies used to go to limbo, and now they go to purgatory, and when the Lord returns, they will be gathered up into His arms and carried to heaven.

  I got confused. No limbo? Since when is there no limbo? I tried to persist. I asked, what if the baby were…tainted? He looked at me strangely, asked me to explain.

  I left. I was shaken. I thought about my past mistakes—about Bryan, especially—and I wondered if the Devil could be mistaken about things. What if I went to hell without our child? Can the son of the Devil go to limbo? I mean, purgatory?

  Then it occurred to me that what I could have done with Bryan was repented. What I could still do. If I repented and was forgiven, then I could join little Bryan in heaven some day—

  —ah, but only if I was forgiven. They say God forgives everything. But I have slept with his rival and I think his mother is a spineless idiot. And quite possibly, I bear the Antichrist.

  Oh, no, I’ve been screaming again. Surely someone heard that time. It’s echoing. My things are covered with blood, I think. It’s pitch-black in here.

  No, no, no, no.

  Then she came to me. The beautiful woman who said she was a social worker. She said she wanted to talk to me about the baby. Had I considered adoption? It was obvious the priest had sent her. They were on to me, then. That’s when I moved in here.

  And I dreamed about her. I saw her with the Devil, my Devil, and she was kissing him and loving him, and I knew her for who she was: Lilith, Adam’s first wife, who was a witch. Eons ago, she became the Devils consort and she reigns with him in hell—and she steals children. She is known the world over for snatching children’s souls as they enter the world.

  Deceiver! Lord of lies! The Devil had gotten me pregnant so he could give my baby to her. How he broke my heart, I who loved him so. I gave him myself, and all along he had another. He wanted to take my baby. He still wants it!

  Well, I am not giving this baby to anyone. God took my first one. This one is mine. This one is for me to love. No one else has ever loved me, and I deserve someone, don’t I?

  I realized then I’d been passive with the devil, just as the Blessed Mother had been passive with God. I’d become his instrument. I remembered the blank days and nights when I did his bidding and felt nothing but sweet, unquestioning joy that he was pleased with me. Like some parent with a child, or frankly, like the Holy Mother and God. Who did he think he was?

  “Try to get this baby from me!” I screamed at him. “Just try!”

  “You misunderstand me,” he said, but I had ceased to believe him. He can be very cunning, you know.

  I was in despair. I didn’t know what to do. And then, the miracle. The blessed miracle. For my Holy Child spoke to me, from my womb. She—for she is a girl—she said:

  Hail, mother, full of grace. Blessed art thou among women, all blessed be the fruit of thy womb.

  We communed. It was as if she lay in my arms already talking to me. There is a closeness between mother and child, between beings who are joined, as we are joined.

  With Bryan, they told me to push. If they hadn’t done that, if they’d helped me like this, I would have him now, my beautiful boy. I was too trusting, too hoping, too innocent. But his half-sister, my eternal baby, has told me what to do.

  The pain is killing me, and I am glad of it. I’m going. Finally. The rope I tied around my thighs has cut into my skin. It’s so tight my knees are mashes of bruises. My wrists bleed from the handcuffs. But it is blood gladly shed, for her, for the Lamb.

  I am screaming. I am biting at my bonds. I am struggling to separate my legs. The contraction, oh, God!

  But I can stand it. For love of my child, I can stand it. I can do it!

  Through my tears I am smiling. I’m a real woman, not some faded rose of Sharon. Thanks to me, were eternally joined, body and soul. We are one. We will always be one. We will never, ever be separated. What greater love is there?

  I am smiling.

  We’re almost there, little darling.

  We

  I’m—

  I Hear the Mermaids Singing

  Don’t panic, you stupid bitch. Just write it all down and get it out.

  They won’t find this; they won’t ever know you still hear the songs. You’ve conned them this long. What’s to make them grow some brains now?

  But so what if they do figure it out? What have you got to look forward to out here, you stupid, crazy loser? What the fuck is the big allure, these wide-open spaces they call the world?

  Wide open spaces, ha! Tell me, girlfriend. Tell me about that wide-open space of yours, got you into all this shit in the first place. It was because you wanted that boy, and…

  No. No, it went another way. Please, it happened the way you,

  the way you,

  you dreamed it all.

  You dreamed it all. That’s it, period, the end. I wish I could tell you different, hon, but just like on Dallas, it was all a dream. You know, the way you go off sometimes, like that girl in I Never Promised You a Rose Garden; you just zone out, and then

  you hear the voices singing,

  and you hear them sing you a story:

  This, my life:

  Once upon a time, I am the most precious of the Sea King’s seven daughters, fondled and dandled, and loved by all. I rule gentle Pacificus for my father, and I am kind and generous.

  I am the most treasured, the most beautiful. My tail sparkles and gleams, my hair undulates like sunbeam shafts through the water. My skin is pale and rosy as a pearl. And I live in the most splendid of the seven seas, wonder upon wonder: brilliant Garibaldis and purple sawfish laze and bob; anemone carpets of orange, pink, and yellow spread beneath me as I drift, combing my hair; castles of red coral dot my domain, and majestic jade-green kelp forests, towering in the currents, mark my borders. Elaborate curtains of sponges and starfish adorn my bower, and sea treasure and l
uxury surrounds me. Seahorses cuddle me; maidens attend me. Young lords come in great haste at my call.

  Everything I can possibly want.

  And when I am fifteen, I rise to the surface, as is my right, and come into the other world for the first time. The first gasp of air terrifies me, but quickly I get my bearings. New smells enfold me: oranges, pineapples, sandalwood.

  And the first sight fascinates me. It is a ship, sailing upon the dark waves! Long and gray, laden with boxes. A freighter, carrying goods to other lands.

  Oh, ship, oh, wondrous object! And then sharp flashes of lightning crack open the sky, and thunder’s rumblings shoot across the waves. Water cascades from above—rain, it is rain!—and the bulging ocean tosses the ship like a bauble in its hand.

  I am exhilarated. And I sing of its fierce magnificence, this world above, this angel-world. I strain to see men on the ship, for I know there must be some. Those who dwell here possess something called souls, something that allows them to live on, and on, though we of the water live for three hundred years before our bodies break upon the foam. What must it be like, immortality? To live for a hundred thousand storms, a million infinite songs?

  The ship sails on, and I sing of its safety. It disappears, and so do I, back into my perfect kingdom.

  But I think the whole night of the world I have caught but a glimpse of, and I am preoccupied all the next day. I do not hear the pleadings of my courtiers for my attentions; and the justice I dispense in my court is hasty and arbitrary. I hear sad songs in the spire and halls of my palace, lamenting my unfairness, and I determine to set all to rights on the morrow.

  Yet the night was made for the upper world, and I rise again.

  The sky is dark, and the round orb they call Moon glows like…like me. Beyond, a beach shimmers silver; and lush treetops wave in zephyr breezes. Enchanted, I swim closer. I hear laughter, and I sing of it. I sing of the joy of these angel-people, who walk and live forever.

  I long to see one of them. Down below, I have seen only their dead shells—for I assume they must shed their forms and seek new ones, as the hermit crabs do; else how can they live forever? I want to see one move and walk. I want to touch one of them.

  I am bewitched by the thought of meeting one of them.

  And then, as if by magic, the moon shines on a glorious, sinewy man, riding a flat chariot over the waves. Each muscle of his brown body gleams in the magic light; his hair is long and blue-black and flies behind him like a tail. His legs are spread wide, and I am mesmerized by them. I swim toward him, singing a greeting.

  He shouts in reply, “Cowabunga!” and I sing to him. I sing of cowabunga, hello; and as I gaze at him, my body hungers. I have only known this hunger for my father and my sisters, as we swim and stroke each other. My father has coupled with all my sisters, producing offspring; when I turn sixteen, he will couple with me.

  But now I think of coupling with the legged man, though I can’t imagine how. And I sing to him of my sexual desire, of my lust for his strange, exciting body. I sing and sing, and he shouts “Cowabunga!” in reply.

  Then, like the night before, a storm churns the sea into a bombastic symphony. The young god falters on his chariot and tumbles into the sea. I have seen him do this several times before, and he has always recovered and swum to the beach. But now the chariot smacks his head as he surfaces, and his head sinks below the waves.

  For a moment I do nothing, because I assume he will simply shed his shell if he is in danger. But something inside me tugs hard and tells me to go to him and carry him to the beach myself, though my father has expressly forbidden us to go near it. I ignore the feeling and sing to him of waking and swimming, but still he remains beneath the waves.

  My eyes hurt. As you know, we of the sea cannot make the teardrops the angel-people do. For a moment I ponder that, wondering if that is the secret of their immortality, but my eyes hurt worse, pounding, and I find myself darting through the wild waves toward the spot I saw him last.

  I find a shadow in the black water—we can see, even in the dark—and I put my arms around his chest and start for the surface.

  And I cannot stop touching him, everywhere, as he lies limp in my arms. I kiss the back of his head, I nip it gently. I want to open for him, but I don’t understand where his parts are. I don’t know, but I’m shaking for him. The sea foams and boils around us and I nearly lose hold of him in my rapture, the rapture that is the deep. I sing of it, I sing of my need for him, my unfathomable yearning. I want the man. I want to couple with him.

  The moon shines on his face as I reach the breakers and push him onto the sand. Mixed with my desire is a thrill of terror: If I beach myself I am doomed.

  I stare at him, willing him to open his eyes. He lies inert. I run my hands over his body, and I find a hard, stiff shaft between his legs, and I smile: They are not so different, after all.

  As I have done for my father, I do for him. I take him into my mouth and suck, for it gives intense pleasure. I suck harder, harder, though the flesh around his shaft is loose. Then I remember the stories of their clothes and realize he is wearing some, and in my haste I rip them off his body, tearing them into pieces that are caught by the waves and carried out to sea like so many little jellyfish.

  He is marvelous and thick. He is red and pink and he bobs in my mouth.

  And he begins to gasp and sigh and move. He holds onto my head and pushes. He says, “Wha…wha…” and then he releases his hot stream into me.

  Cowabunga, little mermaid. Cowabunga, angel-god of the flat chariot. Ah, a surfboard. Yes, of course.

  He begins to awaken, and I lose my nerve. My father has told me all my life I must have nothing to do with this world, and I am his favorite, most treasured daughter. So I leave.

  But I am ruined now, for the sea. I pine for him, for my legged man. I cannot endure without him.

  I must couple with him.

  I caress my tail; I find my opening and slide my fingers into it. It would not work, he and I. It would not be possible.

  But it must be possible. I must make it possible. Without him, my body will dissolve on the foam and I shall become nothing.

  Though I say nothing of my dilemma, my sisters strive to comfort me. They touch me and kiss me. My father takes me in his arms and squeezes my breasts as I love him to do. They gather round me, all my family, and I am the most loved, the most adored.

  And yet, I am wretched.

  I rise night after night to the surface. Sometimes he is there, and sometimes he is not. And he sings that he misses me, too: Cowabunga, cowabunga.

  Cowabunga, little mermaid.

  I begin to fade away, and my father grows worried. My sisters sing for my recovery from whatever strange illness has befallen me. Dolphins serenade me. The whales chant healing melodies. Even the smallest of snails hum and whistle to soothe me.

  And I know I must do something, and do it soon.

  Though my father would die if he knew, I go to the sea witch.

  Vile is she, with fangs longer than any viperfish; and her bleeding eyes bob on stalks; she is covered with barnacles and pieces of black swallowers; she is an abomination.

  She is my last hope.

  Pieces of black swallowers, and the bones of dead angel-men, poisonous plants, and puffer fish. Horrible toxins she has found in leaking drums, dropped by the upper world. She mixes these up and tells me to drink when I reach the surface. She tells me to drink and that she will take my voice in payment.

  My voice!

  “Your life as a walker will be a living nightmare,” she promises me as she hands me the bottle. “Death and madness are your answers there.”

  And I think of nothing but the dark-haired man, thrusting his shaft into me.

  The bottle burns my hand as I carry it to the surface; the water bubbles, and blisters rise on my palm. I bite my lip and swim quickly, but I am wondering: What will it be like to swallow such a thing?

  And I rise to the world of the air an
d the night, and I see the glorious beauty of the man, and I swim as close to him as I dare. I uncap the bottle and sing to him one last time, oh, cowabunga, and then I drink:

  Lava slides down my throat. Burning it away, burning all away, my voice, my beautiful voice; all my songs, a bonfire in my throat. A conflagration, a holocaust.

  In the morning, I awaken. And he is kneeling over me, and I cannot understand a word he is saying.

  My life:

  I still don’t remember who I am, just some weird chick who tried to kill herself, got drunk, and nearly drowned.

  He found me, gave me CPR. When I woke up, his mouth was pressed over mine and his breath thrust through my lungs, hot and humid. I had a strange thought: Now his soul is in me; now I’m immortal—which now I understand is tied up with all that stuff that got me in trouble in the first place.

  My hand was wrapped so tightly around the Scotch bottle he almost had to break my fingers to get me to let go of it. We kept the Scotch bottle as a souvenir, and it was the first thing besides his fists that he hit me with.

  Keep writing, girl. Keep going. You know you gotta get it out. But god, now you have to remember what a stupid bitch you are. You have to remember all that…that other stuff is a bunch of whacked-out bullshit

  that you still believe,

  that you still relive.

  And you hear songs.

  And you hear…

  shit. You hear jack shit.

  I’m glad for what happened. Don’t get me wrong; we had some good times. Jesus, our sex was incredible. I never could get enough, and for a while, that was all we needed. I guess he got turned on by how weird it all was: Here was this young chick, couldn’t talk, wanted it all the time. He felt like some big hero, taking me in. Found me some clothes of his sister’s, took me to live with him in the little apartment he rented on the beach.

  Yeah, it was great at first, and sex was enough. But I couldn’t do anything. It was like I’d never seen a kitchen before. I wasn’t steady on my feet, even. He was worried about that, thought I was a heroin addict or something. The way I shook and moaned. I told him with gestures that it was my legs, and he tried to laugh it off by showing me his surfer’s knees. Knobby beyond belief. But I never went into severe withdrawal or anything, and I had that freckled, turned-up nose and those perky tits, and the tightest little snatch he’d ever had—he told me that a million times. It was good, living with Bobby. Yes, his name. Bobby.