On Athena’s back, Eden shook her head. “I don’t think this is a good idea,” she said to herself. “In fact, it may be the worst idea ever!”
She dismounted, leaving Athena to graze, and followed Halley into the house.
It took a moment for Halley’s eyes to adjust to the change in light. When they did, she quickly held out a restraining arm to stop Eden from walking beyond her.
“I’m so sorry,” she said. “I didn’t think anyone was here.”
The young woman she had addressed leant against the deeply mildewed wall. She didn’t seem to have heard Halley; at least, she didn’t answer. Alone on the uncarpeted floor, writing fast in a spiral notebook, her posture was hunched and forlorn. On the floor around her were other notebooks, pens empty of ink and pieces of paper crumpled in tight balls. The young woman was talking to herself.
“If only I could decide,” she said. “Then this torture could end. But how can I decide…how can I choose, when I love them both?”
She let the notebook drop to her lap, sighing heavily. Tiny writing filled the entire page.
She looked up, first at Eden, and then at Halley, where she let her eyes rest. “What should I do?” the girl said. “You’ll know – you’re old. I love them both. I can’t decide. It’s agony.”
She chopped her sentences short, as if she had forgotten how to speak to people with any grace. Her appearance validated her words: dark circles under her eyes; lusterless skin; bones sticking out through too-thin flesh. She continued speaking but Halley barely heard the words.
“I’ve been trying so hard to do what’s right, to not hurt anyone. But I don’t know what to do…” She picked up her notebook and pen, and began to write again.
It took a long while, but the young woman eventually tired, and held the notebook out as if to re-read what she’d written. The movement revealed the white skin of her inner arms.
“What happened to you?” Eden asked.
Eden was pointing to the young woman’s right arm. Halley looked where she indicated. Three deep parallel scars ran its length, from the inside of her elbow all the way to her wrist.
Halley swallowed heavily.
The young woman didn’t answer.
“What are you writing?” Eden asked.
The young woman looked down at the closed notebook. “The pros and cons,” she said.
“The pros and cons of what?” Eden said. Her voice betrayed her growing impatience.
“Of Nick and Andy, of course. It will help me choose between them. It hasn’t yet, but it’s got to, eventually…”
She opened the notebook again and continued to write.
Eden and Halley looked at each other, and then at the young woman sitting on the floor. Outside, the sun slipped below the horizon. Light fled the room.
Eden touched Halley’s arm. “How come she doesn’t ask who we are or what we’re doing here?” she whispered. “That’s weird.” Eden looked back at the young woman, who had kept talking to herself softly the whole time.
“I don’t know,” Halley whispered back.
There was something in the room that filled it to the edges of the windowsills, and left no room to breathe. Halley felt over-whelmed, and sank down on her haunches near the thin young woman sitting on the floor.
“You’re so young,” she said, looking into the girl’s down-turned face. “I thought you would’ve been older. I remembered you older.”
She started then, her own words confusing her. It wasn’t possible that she remembered the girl; she’d never met her before. Suddenly she wanted to move, to get away from her. “You must be hungry,” she said. “You’re so thin.” Halley straightened. “Come on, Eden,” she said. “Let’s see what there is to eat around here. We’ll make her some dinner.”
The girl didn’t move, and didn’t answer. Eden shrugged one shoulder, and followed Halley into the next room, letting the door swing shut behind her.
The sight of the kitchen made them stop short. Eden reached for Halley’s hand. Like the wind-chime on the front porch, the kitchen was absolutely covered in spider webs. Some hung from the fridge, and others drooped heavily off the cupboards. Others coated the windows with frostlike patterns. The spiders sat in their webs and didn’t move; their stillness in the face of strangers suggested a certain boldness. It was clear they had learned not to be afraid of disruption. There were no dishes, no evidence of recent meals. Just spider webs and silence.
“This is wrong,” Eden said. “This is all wrong.”
“The spider webs are awful,” Halley agreed.
Eden looked at her strangely. “Not just the spider webs. It’s this room – this room is wrong,” Eden replied. “In winter, Dad used to put my clothes on that radiator in the corner to warm them before I got up.” She pointed. “And on that shelf…the one just behind you that’s all empty…that’s where we kept the jars of grape jelly we made from the summer grapes.” Eden ran past Halley and pulled a small tin from the counter closest to the door. The metal lid made a catching sound as she pried it off with her fingernails. She turned it upside down, and stared inside. “Empty…it was never empty…”
“What did you keep in there?”
“The bayberries…” Eden held the tin to her nose and sniffed. “I can still smell them.” She looked far away, lost in memory. “We picked them from the neighbor’s bushes. Dad melted them into candles for Christmas each year.” Eden looked at Halley with a question in her eyes. “Don’t you remember?”
“How could I remember?” Halley said. “I’ve never been here before.”
Eden couldn’t find anything more to say. She put the cover back on the tin and replaced it on the counter. She was breathing fast, like she might cry.
“Well, look…I guess we’ve got to fix it,” Halley said. “No one else is going to.” With resolve, she reached for the broom, grimacing when her hand grazed a spider web.
“Wait – let me get an empty jam jar and I’ll catch the spiders first,” Eden said, opening the cupboard door next to the sink. The cupboard was full of dusty jars.
“Good idea,” Halley said.
Eden swept the spiders, one by one, into the empty jar. She was careful not to harm their long spindly legs. When the first jar was nearly full, Eden capped it, and took a second from the cupboard by the sink.
“You take them out and set them free,” Eden said. “Make sure you do it quick – I didn’t make any air holes. I’ll catch the rest.”
Halley opened the back door. It groaned with protest, like it hadn’t been opened in years. The glass jam jar felt cool in her hand, the metal cap that read Smuckers in faded letters, even cooler. At the bottom of the steps, she set the jar down on the ground, and opened it with a turn of her wrist. She pulled her hands back quickly. It took a moment for the spiders to figure out where the sudden fresh air came from, but once they did, they scrambled over one another to reach the opening. Halley retreated to the top step and watched the spiders pour from the jar and then scuttle off, freed from their imprisonment. All their legs were intact.
It took five jam-jars to empty the room. After setting the final jarful of spiders free, Halley lingered outside a moment. She stared up at the full moon; its white roundness gave her courage. When she went inside, she left the back door ajar. The cool evening air stirred the dust on the counters. There was still much to do.
With the broom in hand, Halley cleared the cobwebs from all the surfaces. I wonder how long they’ve been here, she thought. She was dirty from the dust and sweat-streaked from their long day. There was only one broom, so Eden sat on the nicked wooden chair at the heavy pinewood table and watched. Every now and then they heard the girl in the next room talking softly. It was a confused mumble, solving nothing. When the spider webs were cleared, and all the surfaces had been wiped down with two damp sponges, Halley and Eden sat across from each other at the pinewood table. They were silent for some time.
“What’s going on here?” Halley finally said.
“You know, don’t you?” She rested her hands flat on the table. “Tell me. Who is this girl? Why is she so familiar to me? And how do you know this house so well?”
Eden got to her feet.
“I’m thirsty. Real tap water will be great after drinking from rivers and canteens! I know – I’ll make some cocoa.” Eden flicked on the kitchen light, a bare, dim bulb that hung from the ceiling over the kitchen table. It did little to light the room, but it was better than the gathering dark. She opened a door and pulled two brown mugs from a low shelf. From another cupboard, she retrieved the cocoa powder.
Without thinking, Halley stood up, opened a drawer and picked out a silver spoon. She fingered the flower pattern on the spoon’s handle, liking its feel. Being imitation silver, the spoon had not tarnished, even after all these years.
Together they stood at the kitchen sink, drinking cold water first, quickly, mug after mug, until their thirst was quenched. Then, letting the hot tap run until the water steamed, they filled the brown mugs again, and stirred a teaspoon of cocoa into each. They remained at the sink a moment, staring out the window into the back garden. Athena’s white coat shone in the moonlight.
“The moonlight makes her look like a horse angel, doesn’t it?” Eden said. “Like she should be up in the clouds…”
Halley let her eyes rest of the broad flat sweep of the mare’s face. There was something heavenly about the horse, about the calm way it watched them through the kitchen window, as if this scene had been enacted a thousand times. “Like a guardian angel,” she concurred.
“I think that girl in the other room could use one,” Eden said, looking towards the kitchen door.
They sat down at the pinewood table, and drank their cocoa. There was no milk. Neither of them spoke until the mugs were drained dry. Halley set her mug on the table, and leaned back in her chair to look at Eden. Eden wasn’t smiling or giggling or even looking at her. She was fingering a scratch in the surface of the table, running her forefinger over it as if to heal the scar it made.
“What’s wrong?” Halley asked. “You look so sad.”
“It’s worse than I thought,” Eden said quietly. “Halley, you’ve got to help her. You’ve got to help her see the truth.” Eden got up to rinse her mug at the sink, and pointed to one of the spiders making its way in through the open door. “Look. They’re coming back. They all will, unless you help her.”
Halley watched the spider move. She’d never feared spiders, but the way this one lifted one leg after another, as if nothing could stop its slow progress into the kitchen, filled her with aversion. Putting her feet up on the support beam under the pinewood table, she pondered what Eden had said. “I don’t understand,” she said. “What truth do I have to help her see? She’s very sad and very strange, but I don’t see how I can help.”
The spider treaded across the clean kitchen floor, and began to climb up onto the cupboard. Others were following.
“It’s not just her. You’ve got to be brave enough to face the truth,” Eden said. She stopped. The look on her face said she’d gone too far.
The kitchen door swung open suddenly, and the young woman stood there, a wraith, swaying slightly on thin legs. She wore a crumpled grey t-shirt and shorts, and she was carrying one of the notebooks.
“Can I come in?” Her voice was weak. “You didn’t answer the question I asked. About who I should love and who I should leave…”
Eden stood up. “You can have my chair. I want to check on Athena.” She slipped quickly through the back door, before Halley had the chance to say a word. Eden decided she was not going back into that room with that crazy, skinny girl, not for anything. She would make herself a camp outside, under the moonlight. It was warm, and she’d slept on this back lawn lots of times.
Through the long night, Athena stood watch over her protectively.
Inside, the spider climbed up into a corner, and began to spin its web. The girl sat down across from Halley.
“Do you know the answer then? Surely you do, if anyone does.”
Halley held her cocoa mug between both palms, wishing it were still warm. She didn’t know what to say. The scratches on the pinewood table were quite deep. Taking one hand from the mug, she traced one of them with her fingertip, just as Eden had done. She looked up. Through the kitchen window, she could see the full moon. “My name is Halley,” she began, taking her eyes back to the girl. “What’s yours?”
“Hope.” The girl said it quietly, as if she couldn’t quite fathom how her parents had labeled her with such an inappropriate name. She lowered her head onto the table, resting it on her long, thin arms. “Why won’t you answer me?” she asked wearily. “I’ve been here so, so long, waiting for your answer.”
Halley fingered the silver bracelet in silence. It was hard to know what to say. No matter what she said, Hope would draw the conversation back to the same thing, the choice between two men. She folded her fingers together and rested her chin on her hands. “Tell me more about your question. Tell me about the two men.”
Hope lifted her head from her arms, visibly relieved to be able to speak of this. “I can’t choose between them. I love Nick. He’s the only man I’ve ever loved. And he loves me – he wrote me poems telling me he did, on baby-blue paper…the paper was so soft…”
She stopped, as if she didn’t want to continue. When she spoke again, her voice was lower, as if she didn’t want anyone to hear what she was saying. “I love Nick, but I want to be with Andy. Something about Nick…something’s wrong. I know, the night I tried to kill myself, I know…he saved my life that night. But he’s hurt me too, somehow…”
She got to her feet and went to stand at the kitchen window, resting her hands on the cool edge of the metal sink.
As Hope walked to the window, Halley saw that her legs seemed bowed, like her inner thighs had shrunken away. In the moonlight, she could see Hope’s arms were fuzzed by soft down, giving her an animal-like appearance. Her jutting shoulder blades were visible through the back of her thin t-shirt, and were the final confirmation. She’s anorexic, Halley thought sadly. I know that look.
Hope, staring out of the kitchen window at the dark, continued to speak. “Sometimes I think about those baby seals – Harp seals, I think they’re called. You know, the cute furry white ones?”
She turned to glance back at Halley, who nodded uncomfortably, unsure where this was leading.
“I think how, once – a long, long time ago – they wouldn’t have been afraid of people. They’d have just sat there if we walked up to them. I bet you could have picked them up, the really tiny ones, petted them.” She made a motion, as if stroking a small animal. Then she shuddered, and her right hand made itself into a fist; she held it enveloped in the other hand. She turned to look out the window again. Halley could feel the tension in Hope’s body.
“It all changed, didn’t it? People began killing them, both the babies and the mothers, clubbing them to death. I can see their blood in my mind, red blood on white snow. I think about them a lot. I think how they must feel – now, after seeing the killings – when a boat full of people lands.” Hope’s hands straightened out. She laid them long and flat on the cool sink, as if she were soothing a burn. “When I’m around Nick, I think I feel the way they must do.” She wrapped her arms around herself as if she were cold. “But I don’t understand it. It makes no sense for me to feel that way. He saved my life…”
Halley swallowed. The image of the seals crowded her mind.
She didn’t want to talk about Nick anymore.
“Tell me about Andy.”
“Andy?” Hope sighed heavily. “He’s beautiful. He’s got this long, lean athlete’s body. His stomach’s not just flat – I can see every individual muscle in his abs. And God, he’s got beautiful shoulders…”
Halley made a face. “Is it just about his body?”
Hope shook her head. She looked inwards. “I thought it was at first, but really, it’s not about his body at all. H
e’s gentle. He makes me laugh. And he’s not scary at all.”
She stopped.
“Go on…”
Hope opened her mouth to speak, looked around quickly, and shut it again, covering her mouth with her fine-fingered hand. The moon shone, round and full through the window. It caught both their eyes at the same moment.
“The moonlight,” Halley said. “It reminds me of a night…”
“Yes!” Hope said, looking at the moon, “Yes! Me too! But I can’t remember it. Each time the moon is full, I think I’ll be able to remember, but I never can. I think if I can remember the night…the night I tried to kill myself…that’s the night it reminds me of…maybe it will help me…get better.” She looked over her shoulder and caught eyes with Halley, and Halley saw her left eye twitch. Hope placed the pads of two fingertips against the spot to steady it. It looked like a well-practiced gesture.
“Maybe I can help,” Halley said.
There was a long silence. Hope stared across the small room at Halley, as if across a treacherous mountain range. “How? I’ve tried to remember so many times. How can you help?”
Halley thought about it. What was it about strong memories? What made them so vivid? She thought about the times she remembered with most clarity: the death of her parents; the first time she’d met Fernando; the first time she’d made love; the first time she’d ridden a bike. What these memories had in common was that she could sense them with her body, could see them projected in her mind. She didn’t remember them in words, but in pictures. Colored pictures.
“What color do you see when you think of that night?” she said impulsively.
“Dark green,” Hope answered, without a moment’s pause. “I see dark green.” Her brow furrowed. “I never knew I saw dark green before. Ask me something else.”
“How about this? When you think of that night, what do you smell?”
“Smell? I’m not sure.” Hope sniffed the air like a young wolf. “It’s musty – like an old attic…or…maybe…like the woods, like old leaves? It’s cold, like it’s nighttime or winter.” Hope crossed her arms in front of her chest. “Maybe this isn’t a good idea. Maybe I shouldn’t remember. Maybe there’s a good reason not to remember.”
Akilina: Out of the Woods Page 17
