Spindlefish and Stars

by Christiane M. Andrews

  A boy.

  Portly. Pale. Moony-cheeked.

  Strapped to giant wings.

  He was flying.

  Then he was not flying.

  He was falling.

  There was the ocean rushing up to meet him.

  There he was. There he was no more.

  Clo lay on the floor, angling her spoon this way and that way, following the thread back. She saw the father and son walking an island that was full of blue light and bright cliffs. She saw the father—like her own—an artist, a sculptor, making things with his hands, and Cary as a toddling child watching in fascination beside him. She saw Cary taking his flute into the green hills, trilling happy tunes at the herds of grazing sheep and goats. She marveled at how Cary’s cheeks glowed in the sunshine, how his curls were tousled by the wind.

  She twisted the spoon to see the father’s fateful choice and stared for as long as she could, trying to understand. She saw Cary standing on a precipice, arms outstretched, while his father with trembling hands tied the straps to fasten the crafted wings. She saw him warn his son, voice shaking, not to fly too close to water, or the feathers would become too wet, not to fly too close to the sun, or the wax would melt. She saw how tears had sprung from his eyes as he watched his boy beat his wings and lift up from the cliff. She looked for as long as she dared at Cary’s thread, piecing his story together in as much detail as the small spoon would show her, feeling her own heart break a little for the boy who had fallen and for the father who had lost his son.

  In the next room, she heard the scraping of bowls, the scraping of chairs. She heard the front door open and close. She pulled the spoon from the fabric, rewound the spool, and tucked it oh-so-carefully under the roll of fabric.

  When the old woman entered, Clo was standing complacently against the far wall.

  “Well, granddaughter?”

  Clo nodded.

  “Do you see the beauty of the whole? The larger design?”

  “I do.” This was true. Clo did see the beauty of the larger design. But she could not forget the nightgowned boy coughing—hee—alone there, at the edge of that gap the cat had made, or the soldiers there, at that claw-shredded place, bleeding into the mud. Or Cary, flying, then not flying, but falling and tumbling through the air into the sea. Or her father, still lying on the floor of the swineherd’s hut.

  “Good, granddaughter.” Something like a smile folded her cheeks. “Perhaps in due time you will yourself be ready to weave. Later, of course,” she added. “Much later. Distance and”—she tapped her eyes—“young eyes. You would not want, like your mother, to be swept away by details.”

  At this, Clo said nothing, but she set her lips and nodded.

  The old woman began to turn away but paused, reconsidering. “Granddaughter…” Her mouth opened and closed in empty chewing. “It is good you are here, good that you are here to take up your work.” She looked at Clo as though she expected a response, but when none came, she pointed her chin at the door. “You should return to your spinning. There is more to be done.”

  “Yes. The spinning.” Clo nodded again, though she had no intention of returning to this. “At once.” She turned to go back to her wheel. “But first…”

  “First?”

  “First I might like to sleep. A little.”

  “Sleep?”

  “Yes. Just a little. I have not slept in a long time. And this—seeing my father’s thread and my mother’s thread—has been tiring. And when I begin spinning again, I would like to be fresh.” Clo stretched and mouthed a vast yawn.

  The old woman looked over Clo with a critical eye. “Very well, granddaughter,” she said finally. “Sleep. And then return to your work refreshed.”

  “Yes.” Clo yawned again. “I will return to my work after… just a nap, really.” Backing out of the room, she closed the woman’s door after her. “A little nap,” she said as it clicked shut.

  Clo opened the door to her own room but did not go in. Instead, still standing in front of it, she pushed it so it closed with an audible thunk and then tiptoed to the front door. “Shoo.” She nudged the cat away.

  She eased open the latch, slipped outside, and pulled the door nearly closed—leaving it just enough ajar that it would not make its obvious click—behind her.

  Cary. She had to find him.

  As she tore along the cobblestones, she debated where she would be likeliest to find the moon-cheeked boy. If he was at the boat, repairing nets, how would she reach him? She did not know how to find the passageway—or how she might get past the guard if she did. She looked up, beyond the roofs of the huts to the edges of the cliff high above—was Cary there under his wing? If he was, surely he would see her and come after her. She would try the beach first.

  Clo hurried to the cliff path. Half climbing, half sliding down the stones, she listened for Cary’s steps or voice behind her, but she did not hear him until she had nearly reached the bottom.

  Not his voice—the fragile trill of his flute.

  As she came onto the shore, she saw Cary sitting at the water’s edge. His back to her, he did not notice her arrival.

  She approached quietly, listening to his melody. It was just a few notes, low and sweet and almost mournful. As though the water itself were singing, the surface appeared to ripple at his notes. To Clo, the melody felt full of the sea—not of the water that was full of salt and without an edge, but of the starry darkness she sank through.

  She listened, entranced, watching the delicate little waves spread in the water, until pebbles crunched under her shifting feet and Cary started, breaking off his song. Seeing her, he smiled.

  “Clo.”

  “I’m sorry.” She sat down beside him.

  “For what?”

  “For… for interrupting.” She gestured at his flute. “It was beautiful. Your song—”

  “No.” He tucked his pipe in his pocket, embarrassed. “That was nothing. I was just thinking of when you will be leaving. I was wondering… have you found a way? Did you find your thread?”

  Clo nodded. Sitting down beside Cary, she hesitated, considering how she might tell him. “I did. I found my thread, that is, and my father’s. My mother’s. I’m not sure yet what to do with it—with them—but that’s not why I came to find you.”

  Cary looked at her expectantly, his moon cheeks placid and round.

  “It’s just… Cary, I found your thread.”

  A shadow passed over the moons. “I told you not to.”

  “I know. I’m sorry. But I thought you would want to know.”

  “Clo, I told you. I don’t remember. There is nothing—”

  “Listen. This isn’t about what you do or do not remember. But you need to know. Your thread—it hasn’t ended.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean… you saw the tapestry, right? I know you didn’t see the designs or the images, but you saw the finished fabric, even if it was gray, and you saw the working edge? The edge with all the dangling bobbins—the edge still being woven?”

  Cary nodded.

  “Well, you were right. You have been here a very long time.” She bit her lip. “I’m sorry… I didn’t realize… I didn’t realize how long. I’m surprised you can remember anything. Your part of the fabric—it’s so long ago, it’s been finished for so long, it’s about to be rolled up. And all the threads—all the lives—in the finished part of the fabric, where your thread is, are… done.”

  “Done? All those lives are done?” A shadow overspread Cary’s moons. “Clo, why would you tell me this? What good is it for me to know?”

  “Because, Cary, lives that have been lived have no bobbins. The thread on those bobbins has all been woven into the tapestry. But where you fell into the sea, your thread is still attached. You still have almost a whole spool of thread. Your life wasn’t finished then. It isn’t finished now.”

  CHAPTER THE TWENTY-EIGHTH

  IN WHICH WHAT IS AND WHAT WAS MEANT TO BE ARE EXAMINE
D

  CARY STARED AT CLO, HIS CHEEKS GROWING PALER, PUFFIER, almost planets. “Finished? Not finished? Clo, I fell into the sea. They fished me out of the sea. What does finished or not matter?”

  Clo gaped at him. “You still have thread. For the world. To live in the world. Away from here.”

  “Why are you telling me? I told you I have no wish to leave. There is nothing waiting for me.”

  The sharpness of Cary’s words took Clo by surprise. “But… there is something waiting for you. You still have your own life waiting for you.” She spoke over his shaking head. How could she convince him? “Cary, the world—you should see how you were in the world. In the sun. In green fields. With your father. You were never meant to be here. Never meant to be a net boy. A fisherman.”

  “But I am here. The rest of that thread—what does it matter? It’s part of a life I don’t remember. A life that—as you just told me—is empty of everyone else I’ve ever known. What would I return to? What could I return to?” Cary flung a handful of pebbles into the water.

  Clo saw herself in his angry motion—remembered her own distraught chucking of stones when, so long ago, she first sat with Cary waiting desperately for a boat that never came. “I know you gave up hope long ago,” she said quietly. “I know it’s painful to even think of what could be now, but—”

  Cary shook his head. He did not want to hear more.

  In silence, the two watched the watery rings spread and overtake one another.

  When Cary at last spoke, his voice had grown soft again. “What about you?” he asked. “You’re the old woman’s granddaughter. She was waiting for you. Are you meant to be here?”

  Clo dug her fingers into the stones. “Y-yes,” she said, her own answer surprising her. “I think… yes. I had a ticket. My mother left it for my father to give me. I was meant to come.”

  Cary nodded. Though he tried to hide it, a smile curled at the edges of his lips.

  “But I don’t think I’m meant to stay. At least, I don’t think I have to stay.”

  Cary, moons falling, turned his gaze toward the water. “Why not?”

  “I have a bobbin, too. Almost full. It’s dangling there right when I found the ticket for the boat. And I think, I mean, I’m almost sure… the old woman, the fishermen, the people meant to stay here—no one here has a thread. My mother had to give herself one when she wanted to leave this island. And her line is… rotting. It was never meant to be placed in the tapestry. But my thread, your thread… they’re still there. We were born in the world. We are not of this island. Our threads are waiting for us. They’re bright, shining—”

  “So why are you here, then?” Cary asked bitterly. “Why did you come if you’re just going to leave? Why were they waiting for you?”

  “I…”

  “Yes?”

  “I didn’t know… when I got on the boat… I came because my father’s note… I thought he would meet me. The words save me were in his letter… I thought he needed me, but the ink had splattered, and I couldn’t see what he meant, and I didn’t know how ill he really was.…”

  “And can you save him? You’ve seen his thread, I imagine. Are you meant to save him?”

  Clo closed her eyes. She thought of the ink-splattered note; she thought of the wisp of thread in the fat line of fish gut. She thought of the glittering pain that shot through her body when she pulled at the yarn. She thought of how long her father had been suffering, how long he had hidden his pain from her.

  “Can you?”

  Clo’s chin began to wobble. Be brave enough to let go of always. Clenching her teeth, she turned away from Cary, but a sob broke from her all the same.

  “Oh, Clo. Clo. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…”

  “I don’t know!” Clo wiped furiously at her eyes. “The truth is, he was meant to die years ago. Years ago. My mother gave him her thread to save him, and she didn’t know her own thread was rotting when she gave it to him… she didn’t know he’d be changed, that he’d lose his talent.… Cary, his paintings—they were so beautiful, I wish you could see how beautiful… but when his thread began to rot, he could no longer paint. He tried, but he couldn’t. His thread was meant to end so long ago, and he has been suffering for so long. And I shouldn’t have even known him. I am lucky to have had him for a father at all.…” Taking a long shuddering breath, Clo looked up, eyes wide, at Cary.

  “Clo?”

  “I shouldn’t have known him. I shouldn’t ever have known him,” Clo repeated, her words wondering at first, then certain. “Cary, I never should have known him.”

  Cary nodded, not fully understanding. “You are lucky to have memories of him.”

  “Yes…” Clo drew out the word. “Yes. Memories.” She sat, staring at the ocean, but she was not seeing the ocean. Instead, she was thinking of how her expectant mother had stood on the threshold with her slip of half paffage and her little basket packed full of provisions and her hand trembling on the door. She was thinking of how her father had sketched her mother spinning in the pages of his notebook, drawing her cloudlike and beautiful and joyful and sad waiting for the birth of her child. Spinning for Clothilde.

  She stood, brushing the pebbles that clung to her smock. “Cary… I have to go back. I think… I have to see. Something my father sketched… it’s made me think about my mother, how there might be something else she intended before she decided to give him her thread.… If I look in the tapestry, maybe I can see it there.…”

  As she hurried away, Cary called after her, “Wait!”

  She paused, turning.

  “Did you see my family? In the tapestry?”

  Clo nodded, taking a few steps back toward Cary. “A little,” she said apologetically. “It was hard to see.”

  Cary hesitated, tossing another pebble at the water. When he looked up, his eyes were full of pleading. “I don’t remember them.”

  “I only saw your father,” Clo said carefully, measuring her words. “He was a sculptor, a very good one. The tapestry, well, this won’t really make sense to you, but it bubbles around his sculptures. That happens around my father’s paintings, too.” She shook her head. “But your father, he wasn’t just an artist, he was an… inventor, I think. He made things—just as he made your wings. But something he made, I’m not sure, it was hard to see… something he invented had angered a king, and the king had trapped him on an island. You were trapped with him.”

  Cary squinted as though trying to see the distant island. “I don’t remember.”

  “He loved you,” Clo said softly. She thought of how she had seen the inventor’s hands tremble as he had strapped the wings to his son’s arms. “Your father loved you. He made the wings so you could escape. He was trying to save you, to set you free.”

  “I don’t remember,” he repeated, but his moonish cheeks deflated just a little with a sigh.

  “He did. He wanted to give you freedom. He wanted you to have a different life.” She paused, considering. She thought of her own father hiding his suffering, her own mother sacrificing her thread—how much they gave up for her. “I’m not sure he would have tried so hard to escape if you had not been with him,” she added gently.

  Cary took this in silently. His cheeks deflated a little more.

  “Did he look for me?” he asked after a long moment. “When I fell, did he look for me?”

  “For ages.”

  “Ages,” Cary repeated. Though he was not smiling, his face flushed with comfort. “I wish I could remember.”

  Clo watched Cary shuffling pebbles from hand to hand. She opened her mouth to speak, shut it, opened it again, and finally said, “You know, he did not call you Cary.”

  “No?”

  “No. Icarus. He called you Icarus.”

  “Icarus.” Cary rolled the word through his mouth.

  Clo nodded curtly. She turned to go up the beach but stopped at the entrance to the path. “Do you want me to call you that?” Her voice echoed across the shore.
>
  A long moment of silence followed.

  “No,” Cary’s answer finally came bouncing back. Even from the base of the cliff, Clo could see his smile. “I like the name you call me. That feels like my name. Icarus… that feels like another boy.”

  Lifting her hand in farewell, Clo hurried up the shore path. She was smiling, just a little, pleased Cary wanted to keep the name she called him, but as she climbed, she felt a growing sense of urgency. I never should have known my father. The words felt as solid and sharp as the rocks under her hands and feet. I never should have known him.

  Her father’s sketch. She had to see the moment her father sketched to be sure.

  The faster she climbed, the more the words echoed in her head, never should have known, never should have known, until finally each step thudded with a never never never never.

  Nearing the top of the path, she heard a murmuring that grew steadily more ruckuslike. Two distraught syllables—Msss! Ef! Msss! Ef!—echoed off the stones. Msss! Ef!

  As Clo entered the town, she saw all the townspeople—not with their baskets and barrows as they sometimes were—but frantic, rushing, chaotically clambering up and down the street, calling into nooks and corners and holes.

  In the center of them all, nearly howling, was the old woman, her apple face red and hot.

  “Mischief!” she cried. “Mischief!”

  The cat. The door. The latch she had not closed.

  Clo felt a flash of guilt, then a sense of satisfaction. Good. It was better the cat should be gone. Better it should not tear into the fabric. Better it should not destroy lives.

  In the commotion, no one noticed Clo. She padded through the crowd, past the wailing old woman, and into the house. She shut the door behind her and listened.

  Mmm! fff! The clamor outside was muffled. The rooms were quiet.

  The idea she had—she wasn’t certain. But her father’s sketch… the little basket her mother had packed…

  In the old woman’s room, Clo shifted the few items around. A basket of bobbins. A chamber pot. The stool. The folds of the tapestry.