People No Different Flesh

by Zenna Henderson

  I slapped the mirror out of her hands-and the mad glimpse of rumpled hair, swollen eyes, raddled face, and a particularly horrible half sneer on lax lips-slapped it out of her hands, stopped its fight in mid-air, spun it up to the sagging plasterboard ceiling, swooped it out with a crash through one of the few remaining whole windowpanes, and let it smash against a pine tree outside the house.

  “Do that!” I cried triumphantly. “Even child’s play like that, you can’t do. You’re stupid!”

  “Could be.” Glory picked up a piece of the shattered window glass. “But today I fed my man and the stranger within my gates. I made a gown for a naked baby. What have you done that’s been so smart? You’ve busted, you’ve ruined, you’ve whined and hated. If that’s being smart, I’ll stay stupid.” She pitched the glass out of the broken window.

  “And I’ll slap you silly, like I would any spoiled brat, if you break anything else.”

  “Oh, Glory, oh Glory!” I squeezed my eyes shut. “I killed him! I killed him! I made him come. If we’d stayed Home. If I hadn’t insisted. If-“

  “If,” said Glory heavily, lifting the baby gown. “If Davy hadn’ta died, this’d be for my grandkid, most likely. If-ing is the quickest way I know to get the blue mullygrubs.”

  She folded the gown and put it away in the dresser drawer. “You haven’t told me yet when Child Within is s’posed to come Without.” She reached for the makin’s and started to build a cigarette.

  “I don’t know,” I said, staring down at my tight hands. “I don’t care.” What was Child Within compared to the pain within?

  “You’ll care plenty,” snapped Glory around the smooth curve of the cigarette paper, “if’n you have a hard time and no doctor. You can go ahead and die if you want to, but I’m thinking of Child Within.”

  “It’d be better if he died, too,” I cried. “Better than having to grow up in this stupid, benighted world, among savages-“

  “What’d you want to come hack so bad for then?” asked Glory. “You admit it was you wanted to come.”

  “Yes,” I moaned, twisting my hands. “I killed him. If we’d only stayed Home. If I hadn’t-“

  I lay in the dusk, my head pillowed on Thann’s grave. Thann’s grave-The words had a horrible bitterness on my tongue. “How can I bear it, Thann?” I whimpered. “I’m lost. I can’t go Home. The People are gone. What’ll I do with Child Within? How can we ever bear it, living with Outsiders? Oh, Call me too, Call me too!” I let the rough gravel of the grave scratch against my cheek as I cried.

  And yet I couldn’t feel that Thann was there. Thann was a part of another life-a life that didn’t end in the mud and misery of a lakeside. He was part of a happy adventure, a glad welcome back to the Earth we had thought was a thing of the past, a tumultuous reunion with all the dear friends we had left behind-the endless hours of vocal and subvocal news exchange-Thann was a part of that. Not a part of this haggard me, this squalid shack teetering on the edge of a dry creek, this bulging, unlovely, ungainly creature muddying her face in the coarse gravel of a barren hillside.

  I roused to the sound of footsteps in the dark, and voices.

  “-nuttier than a fruitcake,” said Glory. “It takes some girls like that, just getting pregnant, and then this here other shock-“

  “What’s she off on now?” It was Seth’s heavy voice.

  “Oh, more of the same. Being magic. Making things fly. She broke that lookin’ glass Davy gave me the Christmas before the cave-in.” She cleared her throat. “I picked up the pieces. They’re in the drawer.”

  “She oughta have a good hiding!” Anger was thick in Seth’s voice.

  “She’ll get one if’n she does anything like that again! Oh, and some more about the Home and flying through space and wanting them people again.”

  “You know,” said Seth thoughtfully, “I heard stuff about some folks used to bye around here. Funny stuff.”

  “All people are funny.” Glory’s voice was nearer. “Better get her back into the house before she catches her death of live-forevers.”

  I stared up at the ceiling in the dark. Time was again a word without validity. I had no idea how long I had huddled myself in my sodden misery. How long had I been here with Glory and Seth? Faintly in my consciousness, I felt a slight stirring of wonder about Seth and Glory. What did they live on? What were they doing out here in the unfruitful hills? This shack was some forgotten remnant of an old ghost town-no electricity, no water, four crazy walls held together by, and holding up, a shattered roof. For food-beans, cornbread, potatoes, prunes, coffee.

  I clasped my throbbing temples with both hands, my head rolling from side to side. But what did it matter? What did anything matter any more? Wild grief surged up in my throat and I cried out, “Mother! Mother!” and felt myself drowning in the icy immensity of the lonely space I had drifted across-Then there were warm arms around me and a shoulder under my cheek, the soft scratch of hair against my face, a rough hand gently pressing my head to warmth and aliveness.

  “There, there!” Glory’s voice rumbled gruffly soft through her chest to my ear. “It’ll pass. Time and mercy of God will make it bearable. There, there!” She held me and let me blot my tears against her. I didn’t know when she left me and I slept dreamlessly.

  Next morning at breakfast-before which I had washed my face and combed most of the tangles out of my hair-I paused over my oatmeal and canned milk, spoon poised.

  “What do you do for a living, Seth?” I asked.

  “Living?” Seth stirred another spoonful of sugar into the mush. “We scratch our beans and bacon outa the Skagmore. It’s a played-out mine, but there’s a few two-bittin’ seams left. We work it hard enough, we get by-but it takes both of us. Glory’s as good as a man-better’n some.”

  “How come you aren’t working at the Golden Turkey or the Iron Duke?” I wondered where I had got those names even as I asked.

  “Can’t,” said Glory. “He’s got silicosis and arthritis. Can’t work steady. Times are you’d think he was coughing up his lungs. Hasn’t had a bad time though since you came.”

  “If I were a Healer,” I said, “I could cure your lungs and joints. But I’m not. I’m really not much of anything.” I blinked down at my dish. I’m nothing. I’m nothing without Thann. I gulped. “I’m sorry I broke your window and your mirror, Glory. I shouldn’t have. You can’t help being an Outsider.”

  “Apology accepted,” Glory grinned dourly. “But it’s still kinda drafty.”

  “There’s a whole window in that shack down-creek a ways,” said Seth. “When I get the time, I’ll go get it. Begins to look like the Skagmore might last right up into winter, though.”

  “Wish we could get some of that good siding-what’s left of it-and fill in a few of our holes,” said Glory, tipping up the scarred blue and white coffee pot for the last drop of coffee.

  “I’ll get the stuff soon’s this seam pinches out,” promised Seth.

  I walked down-creek after breakfast, feeling for the first time the sun on my face, seeing for the first time the untidy tangle and thoughtless profusion of life around me, the dream that had drawn me back to this tragedy. I sat down against a boulder, clasping my knees. My feet had known the path to this rock. My back was familiar with its sun-warmed firmness, but I had no memory of it. I had no idea how long I had been eased of my homesickness.

  Now that that particular need was filled and that ache soothed, it was hard to remember how vital and how urgent the whole thing had been. It was like the memory of pain-a purely intellectual thing. But once it had been acute-so acute that Thann had come to his death for it.

  I looked down at myself and for the first time I noticed I was wearing jeans and a plaid shirt-Glory’s, indubitably. The jeans were precariously held together, bulging under the plaid shirt, by a huge blanket pin. I smiled a little. Outsider makeshift-well, let it stay. They don’t know any better.

  Soon I aroused and went on down-creek until I found the shack Se
th had mentioned. It had two good windows left. I stood in front of the first one, reaching into my memory for my informal training. Then I settled to the job at hand.

  Slowly, steadily, nails began to withdraw from around the windows. With toil and sweat and a few frustrated tears, I got the two windows out intact, though the walls around them would never be the same again. I had had no idea how windows were put into a house. After the windows, it was fairly simple to detach the few good lengths of siding left. I stacked them neatly, one by one, drifting them into place. I jumped convulsively at a sudden crunching crash, then laughed shakily to see that the poor old shack had disintegrated completely, having been deprived of its few solid members. Lifting the whole stack of my salvage to carrying height, I started back up-creek, panting and sweating, stumbling and pushing the load ahead of me until I got smart and, lifting, perched on the pile of planks, I directed my airborne caravan up-creek.

  Glory and Seth were up at the mine. I set the things down by the house and then, suddenly conscious of weariness, made my way to Thann’s grave. I patted the gravelly soil softly and whispered, “They’ll like it won’t they, Thann? They’re so like children. Now Glory will forget about the mirror. Poor little Outsider!”

  Glory and Seth were stupefied when they saw my loot leaning against the corner of the shack. I told them where I’d got the stuff and how I had brought it back.

  Seth spat reflectively and looked sideways at Glory. “Who’s nuts now?” he asked.

  “Okay, okay,” said Glory. “You go tell that Jick Bennett how this stuff got here. Maybe he’ll believe you.”

  “Did I do something wrong?” I asked. “Did this belong to Mr. Bennett?”

  “No, no,” said Glory. “Not to him nor nobody. He’s just a friend of ours. Him and Seth’re always shooting the breeze together. No, it’s just-just-” She gestured hopelessly then turned on Seth. “Well? Get the hammer. You want her to do the hammering too?”

  We three labored until the sun was gone and a lopsided moon had pushed itself up over the shoulder of Baldy. The light glittered on the smug wholeness of the two windows of the shack and Glory sighed with tired satisfaction. Balling up the rag she had taken from the other broken window, she got it ready to throw away. “First time my windows’ve been wind-tight since we got here. Come winter that’s nothing to sneeze at!”

  “Sneeze at!” Seth shook with silent gargantuan laughter.

  “Nothing to sneeze at!”

  “Glory!” I cried. “What have you there? Don’t throw it away!”

  “What?” Glory retrieved the wad from the woodpile. “It’s only the rags we peeled off’n both of yens before we put you in bed. And another hunk we picked up to beat out the fire. Ripped to tatters. Heavy old canvassy stuff, anyway.”

  “Give it to me, Glory,” I said. And took the bundle from her wondering hands. “It’s tekla,” I said. “It’s never useless. Look.” I spread out several of the rags on a flat stone near the creek. In the unreal blend of sunset and moonrise, I smoothed a fingernail along two overlapping edges. They merged perfectly into a complete whole. Quickly I sealed the other rips and snags and, lifting the sheet of tekla shook off the dirt and wrinkles. “See, it’s as good as new. Bring the rest in the house. We can have some decent clothes again.” I smiled at Glory’s pained withdrawal. “After all, Glory, you

  must admit this pin isn’t going to hold Child Within much longer!”

  Seth lighted the oil lamp above the table and I spread tekla all over it, mending a few rips I’d missed.

  “Here’s some more,” said Glory. “I stuck it in that other stovepipe hole. It’s the hunk we used to beat the fire out with. It’s pretty holey.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” I said, pinching out the charred spots.

  “What’s left is still good.” And she and Seth hung fascinated around the table, watching me. I couldn’t let myself think of Thann, flushed with excitement, trying to be so casual as he tried on his travel suit to show me, so long-so long ago-so yesterday, really.

  “Here’s a little bitty piece you dropped:’ said Seth, retrieving it.

  “It’s too little for any good use,” said Glory.

  “Oh, no!” I said, a little intoxicated by their wonder and by a sudden upsurge of consciousness that I was able to work so many-to them-miracles. “Nothing’s too small. See. That’s one reason we had it made so thick. To spread it thin when we used it.” I took the tiny swatch of tekla and began to stretch and shape it, smoother and farther. Farther and farther until it flowed over the edges of the table and the worn design on the oilcloth began to be visible through it.

  “What color do you like, Glory?” I asked.

  “Blue,” breathed Glory, wonderingly. “Blue.”

  I stroked blue into the tekla, quickly evened the edges and, lifting the fragile, floating chiffony material, draped it over Glory’s head. For a half moment I saw my own mother looking with shining eyes at me through the lovely melt of color. Then I was hugging Glory and saying, “That’s for the borrow of your jeans and shirt!” And she was fingering unbelievingly the delicate fabric. There, I thought, l even hugged her. It really doesn’t matter to me that she’s just an Outsider.

  “Magic!” said Glory. “Don’t touch it!” she cried, as Seth reached a curious hand toward it.

  “He can’t hurt it,” I laughed. “It’s strong enough to use for a parachute-or a trampoline!”

  “How did you do it?” asked Seth, lifting another small patch of tekla, his lingers tugging at it.

  “Well, first you have to-” I groped for an explanation.

  “You see, first-Well, then, after that-Oh, I don’t know!” I cried. “I just know you do it.” I took the piece from him and snatched it into scarf length, stroking it red and woolly, and wound it around his neck and bewildered face.

  I slept that night in a gown of tekla, but Glory stuck to her high-necked crinkle-crepe gown and Seth scorned nightclothes. But after Glory blew out the light and before she disappeared behind the denim curtain that gave me part of the front room for a bedroom of my own, she leaned over, laughing in the moonlight, to whisper, “He’s got that red thing under his pillow. I seen it sticking out from under!”

  Next morning I busied myself with the precious tekla, thinning it, brushing up a soft nap, fashioning the tiny things Child Within would be needing some day. Glory stayed home from the mine and tried to help. After the first gown was finished, I sat looking at it, dreaming child-dreams any mother does with a first gown. I was roused by the sound of a drawer softly closing and saw Glory disappear into the kitchen. I went over and opened the drawer. The awkward little sugar-sack gown was gone. I smiled pityingly. She realized, I said to myself. She realized how inappropriate a gown like that would be for child of The People.

  That night Seth dropped the lamp chimney and it smashed to smithereens.

  “Well, early to bed,” sighed Glory. “But I did want to get on with this shirt for Seth.” She smoothed the soft, woolly tekla across her lap. We had figured it down pretty close, but it came out a dress for each of us and a shirt for Seth as well as a few necessities for Child Within. I blessed again the generousness of our travel clothes and the one small part of a blanket that had survived.

  “If you’ve got a dime,” I said, returning to the problem of light, “I haven’t a cent-but if you’ve got a dime, I can make a light-“

  Seth chuckled. “If we’ve got a dime, I’d like to see it. We’re ‘bout due for a trip into town to sell our ore. Got any change, Glory?”

  Glory dumped her battered purse out on the bed and stirred the contents vigorously. “One dollar bill,” she said.

  “Coffee and sugar for next week. A nickel and three pennies. No dime-“

  “Maybe a nickel will work,” I said dubiously. “We always used dimes or disks of argen. I never tried a nickel.” I picked up the coin and fingered it. Boy! Would this ever widen their eyes! If I could remember Dita’s instructions. I spun the coin and co
ncentrated. I spun the coin and frowningly concentrated. I spun the coin. I blushed. I sweated. “It’ll work,” I reassured the skeptical side glances of Seth and Glory. I dosed my eyes and whispered silently, “We need it. Bless me.

  Bless me.”

  I spun the coin.

  I saw the flare behind my eyelids and opened them to the soft, slightly blue handful of fight the nickel had become.

  Seth and Glory said nothing, but their eyes blinked and were big and wondering enough to please anyone, as they looked into my cupped hand.

  “A dime is brighter,” I said, “but this is enough for here, I guess. Only thing is, you can’t blow it out.”

  The two exchanged glances and Seth smiled weakly. “Nutty as a fruitcake,” he said. “But don’t it shine pretty!”

  The whole room was flooded with the gentle light. I put it down in the middle of the table, but it was too direct for our eyes, so Seth balanced it on the top of a windowsill and Glory picked up the half-finished shirt from the floor where it had fallen and asked in a voice that only slightly trembled, “Could you do this seam right here, Debbie? That’ll finish this sleeve.”

  That night we had to put the light in a baking powder can with the lid on tight when we went to bed. The cupboard had leaked too much light and so had the dresser. I was afraid to damp the glow for fear I might not be able to do it again the next night. A Lady Bountiful has to be careful of her reputation.

  I sat on the bank above the imperceptibly growing lake and watched another chunk of the base of Baldy slide down into the water. Around me was the scorched hillside and the little flat where I had started the fire. Somewhere under all that placid brown water was our craft and everything we had of The Home. I felt my face harden and tighten with sorrow.

  I got up awkwardly and made my way down the steep slant of the bank. I leaned against a boulder and stirred the muddy water with one sneaker-clad toe. That block of tekla, the seed box, the pictures, the letters. I let the tears wash downward unchecked. All the dreams and plans. The pain caught me so that I nearly doubled up. My lips stretched thinly. How physical mental pain can be! If only it could be amputated like-Pain caught me again. I gasped and clutched the boulder behind me. This is pain, I cried to myself. Not Child Inside! Not out here in the wilds all alone! I made my way back to the shank in irregular, staggering stages and put myself to bed. When Glory and Seth got back, I propped up wearily on one elbow and looked at them groggily, the pain having perversely quitted me just before they arrived.