Jim Baen’s Universe
Page 34
She saw the bridge to her window, that Wolfbriar had sung into existence so long ago. He reached for her hand.
"Let's go," he said, tugging at her hand. If they walked down that bridge together, it would complete what had been begun; she would be off to Wyoming with him, like Ami on her pegason.
"You're in a hurry," she said.
"You would be too, if you'd been not-out of a trunk for thirteen years," he said, and they both began to laugh.
"My friend is asleep in the other room," Amy said. "But if we're quiet, we can go down to the kitchen and talk-"
"Food, yes, and water, and… um-"
"Next door down the hall," Amy said. "Then just come downstairs. You have been in a trunk for thirteen years, haven't you?"
When Wolfbriar came down to the kitchen there was another bout of figuring things out, because he couldn't touch iron and all of the tableware was stainless steel, but eventually she made a pile of sandwiches for him. "I sought," Wolfbriar said, "to carry off a Singer-of-the-True's daughter. That would have been a not-small not-failure for me to claim, in Elfland, where I have long been thought not-ugly but not-impressive. The deed would have been not-small enough to make not-commoners of us both."
Amy shrugged. "At the time you came, I was very carryoffable. But now I've lived on this side for another thirteen years, and I'm human down to the bone, and, well, it's just different."
"I know," Wolfbriar said sadly. "The ceranin is gone from your soul. I thought the only chance was to lead you over the bridge, right then, and off to Elfland, because I knew your soul would hold you back."
The ceranin?
That gaudy pattern, Amy realized. That picture of all the magic her heart was capable of and of what it might be on the other side-
She ran up the stairs to look. The bedspread was now all gray muslin, but on it was the most amazing layout; in the blue chalk, the same perfect lines depicted every organ of the human body with photographic precision but the clarity that only a line drawing can have. It wasn't gaudy at all; this spoke of precision and of things as they were. She loved it at once.
The bridgehead was at the window, and the long bridge descended across the pool, Little Amy's pool, composed as a mirror in the light of the rising moon; there was the falls, and there the flat rock where the Ute ghosts danced, and there…
She let herself see with her other eyes, and there was the frozen spill from the culvert, and the old borrow pit gradually silting up to become the meadow it had been before, and it was just another redneck homestead in the Rockies. Barely perceptible with her human eyes, the bridge glinted as if outlined in faintly glowing spiderwebs.
The gravel along the shore would crunch and there would be no diamonds in it. The borrow pit had some carp and the occasional whitefish, just garbage fish really, and would be deep green in the summer because of the mud that ran into it and because it was warm and shallow. Amy had smoked her first (and last ever, it was nasty) cigarette over there, sitting with Dennis; she had caught some big gross carp and fed them to Rags, her old buddy of a tomcat; she had thrown rocks at the water out of sheer boredom, and gathered jars of pond water and sat for hours at the microscope, one eye on the eyepiece and the other gazing at her drawing.
She had spent one whole summer of her science project, out there with her snorkel, collecting water at one foot intervals to see how the microbial life changed from top to bottom.
The first human boy she had kissed had been the one that she shot floating bottles with. Dad would save her a case of beer bottles and they'd toss them out in the water and plink until the bottle erupted in a shower of glass shards and went to the bottom, and one day when they'd sunk a bottle after far too many tries, he had carefully set down his pistol, and then hers, muzzles pointed away (they had both had the NRA class), and put his mouth on hers.
"The lakes of Elfland," Wolfbriar said, "do not need glamour to be beautiful. There are no borrow pits in Elfland any more."
She had been to Elfland; as a Singer-of-the-True Dad had been invited, and had taken her. Every pond there sparkled like a jewel, but it had no hydras, no paramecia, just sapphire-clear water. After sneaking out at night, she had sat in the moonlight with Wolfbriar and the glamour had crawled up around them till it was as beautiful-and as untouchable-as a movie of a smiling face projected onto a cloud. She had walked along the walls of the reconstructed town of Casper, and marveled at the smooth perfection of ivory and mother of pearl that went on for miles, and never once seen graffiti, or a water stain.
"Do you know what happened at the end of every one of Dad's books?"
"No," Wolfbriar said. He was standing very close.
She pushed him away. "Little Amy came back to the real world, happy to have been away, but glad to be home."
"Oh," a little voice said.
Amy turned. Samantha was staring at them. "I heard voices and, um-"
"It's all right. Turn on the light, will you? Wolfbriar's glamour is getting to you because of the moonlight."
Samantha reached for the switch and flipped it.
"You're even more beautiful without the glamour," she told Wolfbriar. "I've never met one of your kind before."
Amy suddenly whooped, the reaction and the thought hitting so fast that she wasn't aware that she was reacting until she already had. "Oh, my. Oh, my. Well, it's a petty nasty mean pleasure, but I'm not skipping it for anything. I get to quote Tolkien in Dad's house! 'Yes, Sam, that's an elf!'"
Wolfbriar was staring back at Sam. "You are a Singer-of-the-True."
"Unpublished."
"It does not matter who listens, only who sings. You are a Singer-of-the-True."
"Well, I guess I like to think so."
Amy looked at the clock. Three in the morning. She looked back and from the way Samantha and Wolfbriar were walking toward each other, she realized that the magic that gathered around The Cabin-oh, she'd always known Dad was writing about a reality-had managed everything perfectly. "Why don't you two head down the hall," she said, "and in the morning we'll all catch up. I think you'll find you have a lot to talk about, but I'm all talked out and really sleepy."
They went out holding hands, and she climbed the stairs and slipped into bed, yet again. As she fell asleep, she could see the stars very clearly, and the bridge just barely, and the blue chalk glowed on her bedspread and she realized she might work all her life to be able to draw, just once, as well as what was already on her soul. Tomorrow, perhaps, she would put it in a chest to keep it nice, and then think about how best to take it along home with her, but for tonight, just once more, she wanted to be warmed under it.
As she had figured would happen, just before dawn, they came tiptoeing through, holding hands, as if they had been holding hands for three hours. "Don't go without saying goodbye," she said, rolling out of bed.
> Samantha and Wolfbriar permitted her to hug them both, and Samantha said, "I left you a note. Three CDs of finished work and a short letter to mail to my agent. And a box of my personal stuff to send UPS to Coeur d'Alene; across the border it usually takes a couple of weeks but Wolfbriar promises me they'll have everything I need. I left most of my money to cover your trouble and the postage and all. I'll try to write to you but you know how it usually goes."
She watched them walk across the bridge, or float on air above the borrow pit, and eventually they reached the other side. They stepped off the bridge and turned and waved. A big sturdy pegason descended from the swarm of morning stars, and they were off. She waved until the bright white pegason was just another star, moving slowly as a satellite. Then she went back to bed and slept till noon.
After getting a burger at the grill downtown, she put her now-complete soul into her duffel; she realized she could leave behind the elf-clothes, which were floppy and baggy and uniformly gray-ugly. There was a Victoria's Secret in Boulder, or maybe she'd just go a bit further, down to Flatirons Crossing Mall, hit the major department stores and the trendy-girly stores and so on, spend some of that big pile of Dad's money that had been building up for so long. She'd need makeup, and perhaps to find a hairdresser who wouldn't snicker, and… well, today was going to be expensive but fun.
She looked at the clock. Even if he had decided to sleep in, Derrick would surely be up by now.
He sounded very pleased to hear from her.
"Just me," she said. "Plain old goddam Amy. You know my Dad used to call me that? He had a pet name for me, the abbreviation for plain old goddam Amy, Poga. No, actually, it sounds terrible, but I'd kind of like it if you'd call me that. We can talk about it when you get here. Now pack a bag, and get up here this evening, but don't be too early-shall we say eightish?" She gave him directions and made him read them back.
"Plan to stay tonight and Sunday night, okay?"
"All right," he said.
"You sound funny."
"Stunned. Very happy, but I'm stunned, Amy."
"Amy?"
"Okay, I'm stunned, Poga."
"I like the way you say 'Poga,' Derrick, it's sweet." She stretched luxuriously, cradling the phone against her ear and neck, rubbing where she planned to have Derrick do a lot of kissing. There was no one there to appreciate it but she tumbled her hair around with her hand in a way she knew made her look cute, exposing one pointed ear. Ditch the brown contacts and show the gold eyes, human guys liked that. Haircut, new clothes, girly shoes, come'n'get it undies, the whole froufy nine yards. Like she hadn't done since high school. "And do not show up early. It takes me a while to turn into plain old goddam Amy. But we're both gonna like her."
****
Build-a-Bear
Gene Wolfe
Sighing, Viola picked up the yellow schedule of shipboard activities and glanced at her watch. It was three thirty, still two and half hours till dinner.
“Bermuda and the Bermuda Triangle” 2 Explorers Lounge. She had gone to that one yesterday, and they were into it already. Nothing had happened.
“Line dancing for beginners” 10 Gym. She could line dance nicely already, thank you very much, and did not enjoy being laughed at. Surely there had to be something more interesting than looking at the Atlantic.
“Talent Aboard - passengers display their musical skills.” 4 Seaview room. She shuddered.
“Make your pet.” 9 Captain’s Club. What in the world…?
****
“I’m sorry I’m late,” Viola told the smiling young woman with the laptop. “I didn’t even know there was a Captain’s Club, and the steward I got to help me find it only made things worse.”
“No fret. I’m just glad somebody came. Bellatrix.” Rising, Bellatrix held out her hand. “I’m in the show. Did you see me last night?”
“Oh, yes!” Viola lied womanfully. “That was you! I thought you were wonderful.” She accepted the hand, larger and harder than her own.
“Thanks. But I do this, too, and I get paid by the head. I’ll have to scan your keycard.”
Viola hesitated.
“You won’t be charged. It’s included in the cruise. It’s just way I get paid.” Bellatrix smiled again. “We show folks always need more money.”
“Thank you.” She glanced at the card. “Viola. Sit down, Viola. First we need to talk. Why did you come?”
Wondering when her card would be scanned but happy to sit, Viola said, “It sounded like fun, that’s all. A friend of mine went to something like this called Build-a-Bear, where they made teddy bears. She made her own bear. It’s always in the living room, and she tells everybody who’ll listen all about it. Oh, God! I’m just terrible!”
“That’s good, Viola.” Bellatrix returned the key card. “I like terrible people. What’s your specialty?”
“So I thought I might build a bigger bear than Marian. A prettier one. It’ll kill her.”
“Great.” Bellatrix punched keys on her laptop. “It’s got to be a bear? You don’t want to build a cat or a horse or anything?”
Viola shook her head. “A bear. Marian’s is brown, so I thought maybe pink.”
“Got it. You said big. How big?”
“About like this.” Viola held her hands apart. “This long. That should be twice the size of hers.”
“Ninety centimeters.” Bellatrix punched more keys. “You want it to talk, don’t you?”
“With one of those strings in back you pull? Yes, I’d like that.”
“That will take a bit of doing. Wait a minute.”
“I thought I’d have to sew, and-oh, I don’t know. Pick out the eyes. Make it.”
Still punching keys, Bellatrix said, “You will pick out the eyes. We can do that next. What kind would you like?”
“What color, you mean?”
“Right. More pink?”
Viola shook her head. “You wouldn’t be able to see them.”
“Oh, you would if you looked closely. And she’d be able to see you, of course.”
“A girl bear?”
Bellatrix nodded. “That’s what I thought. Because of the pink.”
“With a hair ribbon.”
“If you want. That would be no trouble.”
“I- I don’t.” Viola felt her cheeks grow hot. “I-I… ”
“You don’t have to explain,” Bellatrix told her.
“I want to. I want to get it off my-my shoulders. I went on this cruise to meet someone.”
“They have singles cruises, too. That might be better.”
“I thought this was one.” For a moment, Viola was puzzled. “Anyway, here I am with you instead of line dancing, and Beverly and Marian both say that’s typical of me. I don’t meet men because I’m too feminine. I hate singles bars.”
“So do I.”
“And I went with Lucas for almost three years, but he played golf. I couldn’t learn, and to tell you the truth I didn’t want to. I didn’t think that would bre
ak us up, but it did. He met a girl with a three handicap and I was - was history. Am I going to cry?”
Bellatrix studied her. “I don’t think so.”
“That’s good. I… I’ve cried too much about Lucas already.”
“How about a pink boy bear?”
Mutely, Viola nodded.
“Nice dark eyes, with just at touch of fire in them?” Bellatrix punched more keys. “We can put a little vest on him.”
“A black vest,” Viola muttered, trying to get into the spirit of the thing.
“Right, to go with his eyes. Now we get into the hard part. Character, and all that. You want him to need you, don’t you?”
“Absolutely.” Viola almost smiled. “I want a warm bear who wants to be cuddled, not just one who sits in the living room and stares at people.”
“Good. I’m with you on that. Brave?”
“Very. He’s a bear after all.”
“Right you are. Smart, too, I’ll bet.”
“Very smart. Quiet, too, and thoughtful. A bear of few words.”
“Strong?”
“Very strong, too.” Viola was smiling now. “A regular grizzly.”
More keys were punched. “Got it. If he’s going to be strong, he shouldn’t be too thin. But you want him cuddly, from what you said. We need a balance of characteristics. I’m good at that.”
“His expression…?”
“Exactly. Strong but vulnerable. Also you’ll want him to be soft when you hold him, without being too soft. Suppose somebody broke in? You’d want a pet who could protect you.”
“You know,” Viola said, “you’re deeper into this than I am.”
“Of course. You should see some of mine.” Bellatrix punched more keys. “There! That should do it. He’s pretty close to standard, really. Some deviations, but we can you use a lot of the regular subroutines. What’s his name, by the way?”