Halley and Eden sat a few moments longer. Halley memorized the woods around her: their scent; their look; their lessons. Then, like the camellia flower she’d watched fall, she knew her time had come. She pushed herself up to her full height. Slipping on the now empty bamboo backpack, she gestured to Eden to follow, and she led the way forward, out of the woods.
Halley had only walked a hundred yards when she stopped suddenly. Eden kept going, bumping right into her back with a bounce and a giggle.
“Why are we stopping?” she asked. She stepped forward to stand next to Halley, who put a restraining arm in front of her.
Eden’s mouth dropped open.
They faced a nearly vertical scree slope, completely bare of vegetation. But for a few rocky outcroppings and some scattered patches of tall yellow grass, there was nothing that would slow their descent.
The scarred landscape was ugly and lifeless.
Thoughtfully, Halley reached down and picked up a handful of dusty pebbles. Scree, just scree. I can’t remember ever going down a hill this steep with just scree under foot… She shook the pebbles in the palm of her hand, listening to their almost musical sound. The air was still and the sound stood alone in the silence. Spreading her fingers, she watched the pebbles slip through and cascade to the ground, some rolling further downhill, continuing the motion that she had begun. It was much drier here than in the forest, where the vegetation held moisture in the earth. She rubbed her hands together and felt the graininess left behind by the dust.
Suddenly breaking the stillness, the wind began to whistle. It had an animosity about it, that wind: it snatched leaves off the nearby trees and flung them at Halley and Eden; it threw bits of debris into their eyes; it stirred the loose dust into tiny whirling dervishes that traveled across the face of the hillside, giving the illusion that the barren descent was alive with small, threatening figures.
In the face of the ugly barrenness, the hostile wind, in the face of the dust dervishes, Halley thought how easy it would be to duck back into the woods, to return to the path she knew. Even after she’d said she couldn’t go back; even if Trance were still in the woods. At least she’d know what to expect. Better the devil you know…
She shook her head. It was time to move on; something was pulling her forward. It was still about saving the baby, but it suddenly was about more than this. It’s about saving me too. This thought hadn’t occurred to her before, but it made perfect sense. The sense of suffocation she’d been feeling for the last few years was lifting. But here, near the woods, it still lingered in the air. That’s open air in front of me. I’ve got to reach it. But first, we’ve got to get down this hillside.
Eden stood by her side, waiting.
It’ll be a rough scramble. Best not to stand here too long thinking about it! “Okay,” she said, straightening her spine, and breathing in deeply. “I’ll go first. Aim for the bigger rocks and the grassy spots. They’ll slow you down a bit.” She pointed out a few places for Eden to aim for. “You ready?”
Eden nodded.
Halley stepped forward, aiming her feet towards a clump of rock several feet down. She immediately slipped, and began to slide. Fast. Then faster. The pace was dangerous. If she tripped, she’d go into a free tumble down the slope. She dropped onto all fours, sliding on her bottom, grabbing at weeds to slow her pace.
But sliding down on her bottom meant she was immersed at head height in dust. Her eyes filled with grit, and she began to cough. She couldn’t see Eden. She shouted for her, but there was no reply. She coughed urgently, trying to clear her throat. Again, she was sliding faster. Her elbows jarred against the earth, her teeth banged together. One by one, her fingernails broke off with sharp bites of pain. After what seemed an eternity, she made it through the dust and could see again. She ground her heels into the earth and came to a skidding stop.
Halley looked behind her, back up the face of the hill. Where are you Eden?
Suddenly, she could hear giggling, and Eden’s small figure appeared. She was on her back too, sliding down the hillside. She was absolutely covered in dirt. The pebbles she’d dislodged slid down around her like an entourage. From her laughter, Halley gathered that Eden had found a way to make the descent more fun. She skidded to a stop beside Halley.
“You looked so funny,” Eden said. “You’re doing it this way…”
She dropped her whole back down onto the ground, pretending to slip down the hillside with every muscle, even her jaw, clenched tight. Then she turned around and clambered back up to Halley. “It’s like riding horses,” she said, sitting back down again. “Or skiing. If you tense everything up, it’s a lot harder. Try it this way.” She got into position. “Try lifting your bottom up and letting your whole body go soft.” Eden lifted her bottom up off the ground, and hovered over the earth a few inches. Her feet were planted in front of her, the palms of her hands hugging the earth behind, her fingers pointing down the hill. She began to move, and then to slide. It looked just like a small child playing at crab-walking on the beach. It worked going down a hillside too: the resulting movement looked effortless. In fact, it looked kind of fun.
Eden dug her heels in to stop, and waited, looking back up the hill, while Halley tried it. Halley was tentative at first, still tense through her legs and arms, and Eden shouted, “Let go! It’s much more fun that way.”
So Halley did. She started slowly, but then she crabbed her way fast down the hillside like Eden, using her arms and legs, her belly exposed to the sky. She caught up with Eden and then passed her. It took a little while to get used to the speed and the slipping a little bit out of control, but when she did, a giggle built in her belly. It bubbled there, until it spilled out over her edges. To her amazement, she too was laughing aloud. Finally, after much dirt, and scrambling, they reached the bottom.
It didn’t much matter that they were both scratched and bleeding from minor scrapes, and that their clothes were torn in several places. Their laughter was what mattered, their doing of this thing-that-could-not-be-done.
When they finally stopped laughing and caught their breath, they looked at each other. At the same time, both said, “High Five!”, and they broke down into a fit of giggles again. It took a while to rub away the tears of laughter from their eyes.
They were facing a tremendous and very intimidating plain. The openness remained unbroken until, hazy and far in the distance, the grey boundary of mountains could just be made out. It was as if the world had grown larger. Halley’s eyes felt like they were stretching to reach to the horizon, and she had to squint to bring the mountains into focus. The plain leading to the mountains was enormous.
It was also almost completely empty. The few scrub bushes that were visible were no taller than Eden’s knees. The sky was immense, a huge blue and white canopy over dry yellow earth, its vastness unbroken by a single bird. It’s like standing on the edge of the world. It looks like one of those old sailing maps where the earth is flat and a ship can simply sail off the edge, if it goes too far.
The view frightened her. But it also left her confused.
Eden voiced her thoughts. “Hey…,” she said, cocking her head to the side, “…this isn’t right.”
“What do you mean?”
“In Mr. D’s Earth Science class…we learned all about these things called climate zones. I got an ‘A+’ on my paper about it.” Eden stopped, obviously enjoying the memory of that success, before continuing. “I’m sure the climate zone we’ve been in is called a ‘humid sub-tropical climate’.”
She sounded just like Halley remembered herself sounding at Eden’s age, using words too big for her mouth.
Eden continued, “I remember Mr. D said it funny, very fast, like it was one big long word humidsubtropicalclimate and I had to look it up in my book to make sure I spelled it right on the test. But this…” she said, pointing to the vast plain, “…this is a tundra. And a humidsubtropicalclimate zone can’t be right next to a tundra!” She stopped, out of
breath, and nodded her head once, with authority.
“Still, here we are,” Halley said.
“Yes…but…”
Eden looked at the mountains.
“Well, it doesn’t make any sense! Not if Mr. D was right about the zones. And I believe him. He’s very smart.” Eden stared, as if by looking for longer she could force it all to make sense. Then she added, breaking into a giggle, “I feel like I’m dreaming a very silly dream! But I’m glad you’re in it, Halley.” Then she sobered, finishing quietly, as if to herself, “I’ve never left the woods before…”
Halley was thinking about the class Eden described. She remembered about climate zones too. Eden was right – what they were experiencing wasn’t possible. But, still, like she’d said herself, there they were. Just the two of them, facing this wide, empty tundra. No other way to go.
A new thought occurred to her: once they entered the tundra, there would be no place to hide from predators, animal or human. She knew it was right to be prepared for predators. Trance is still back there somewhere. He’s tracked me twice already – if he tracks me here… I’ve got to find a way to protect us.
Halley looked around. There were still a few trees nearby, and below one of them was a staff of white wood, stripped of bark, two inches in diameter, and a few feet long. I can use this as a weapon.
The white stick felt rough against her palms. The texture was more noticeable than it should be. It set her fingertips to tingling. She held it thoughtfully, running her fingers over upraised edges where shoots had broken off, and then the smoother areas between the shoots. As she did so, she was stunned to see an image of the baby appear in front of her. She gasped aloud. It was the first time she had ever truly seen it, instead of just hearing it cry.
It was like a movie projector was showing the image against the trees. Around the edges of the vision, the woods were still visible. In the hazy circle where the vision appeared, the baby lay swaddled tightly in a thick white blanket. It was sleeping in a deep pile of brown leaves, under a tree whose branches bore close resemblance to the stick Halley held. Halley looked around quickly. There must be a thousand trees like this one nearby. The stick must be the link, Halley thought, gripping it more tightly, afraid to move lest the vision dissipate.
Halley stared at the baby, and a feeling grew in her. It was like watching springtime – from the first tiny green tip pushing through the winter’s final snow, to the sudden bursting profusion of color. The feeling was a purple and yellow crocus, glowing, growing, bringing life where there was none before. The feeling was hope.
It soared through her like nothing she had ever known before, like nothing she could have described in the commonplace words of love. Her eyes widened and glistened.
The baby was breathing calmly, and Halley watched it for a long, long time, watched its tiny chest lifting and falling. Each inch of it seemed a miracle, and she cataloged the full curves of its arms and legs under the swaddling, the tiny upturn of its nose, the soft down of its hair.
My angel, she thought.
A leaf swirled gently through the air to alight on the baby’s belly, and the baby stirred in its sleep, moving its small mouth in and out of a pucker as if it were dreaming of sucking at its mother’s breast. Its lips moved just a little and shaped into the smallest of smiles.
Halley found herself smiling back at the vision as she held the white stick tightly with both hands. It was as if an unaccountably warm and benevolent breeze had stirred her soul all the way to the bottom.
Suddenly she was compelled to touch the baby, to bring this vision into her reality. She removed one hand from the stick, holding tight with the other hand, afraid to lose the link to the vision. She reached slowly for the baby’s cheek. The baby’s closed eyes relaxed, as if anticipating Halley’s warm touch. Or maybe it was dreaming a lovely dream. She reached the baby’s cheek, and then Halley saw herself in the vision with the baby. Even as she stood watching, she could also see herself kneeling beside the sleeping infant.
It should have been the strangest sensation imaginable, but Halley didn’t notice: she was too caught up in unbelievable softness of the baby’s cheek. Gently, she moved two fingertips along the cheek, then over the smooth forehead, around to the other cheek. The down of the baby’s head felt like velvet, and she ran her palm over it again and again. It was impossible to get enough of how this baby felt. The baby opened its mouth slightly, utterly relaxed and content. It snuggled into Halley’s hand, as if it too longed to be closer than close. Halley could have stayed in that moment forever.
But the vision changed: the baby’s eyes flew open, as if startled. The Halley in the image stood up fast – her eyes were fixed on a point that the “real” Halley couldn’t see. The image of Halley in the vision stretched taller, broader, more ferocious: she was facing something that was threatening her and the baby, that much was clear, and she would protect the baby. No matter what.
Halley drew her hand back quickly, gripping the stick again with both hands and with a new urgency. The stick could be used as a weapon. But her action had an unanticipated effort – now only the baby appeared in the vision. The image of Halley had disappeared.
The baby began to cry. First, it seemed to be crying at the removal of Halley’s hand, as if Halley were the sun and the baby were the earth, and without her touch all was lost. All things would wilt without her. The baby cried with the voice of all the children who had ever been lost in the world, even though it couldn’t yet use words: mama mama mama, its cry said. Where are you? Why won’t you come back? Mamamamamaaaa. Halley’s eyes filled with tears.
At first the baby’s cry held the hope of resolution, as if Halley could get back if she tried hard enough, as if the baby and the mother could be reunited. Urgently, believing it might get her back to the baby, Halley removed one hand from the stick and reached out again, but she found she could no longer touch the image; the baby remained alone. Time passed, and the baby’s cry became the desolate sound of the lost, of those who will never be found.
She watched helplessly as the baby’s mouth opened wide, as it scrunched its eyes tightly closed, as it wailed like it couldn’t bear to be left alone for one moment longer. Halley felt as if her heart was being scraped by a knife; her shoulders pulled up by her ears; she broke out in a cold sweat. She couldn’t help the baby and it was maddening, this powerlessness. She couldn’t even see what was threatening it. From her throat arose a strange, high-pitched cry, like the scream of a mother eagle, sharp beak open, fierce talons raised. The sound foretold the terrible protective violence of a mother whose offspring is threatened. More than this: the sound was the scraping-open of a heavily barred door that must remain closed.
Until the time is just right for it to be opened, Eden thought, watching all this closely. To Eden, the sound Halley made was very scary. Eden didn’t like it. She didn’t like it at all. Worse was the way that even Halley’s eyes had gone cold.
Eden had to help Halley push back her natural instinct to protect the baby, until later, until it was needed. There was a right time for an eagle to tear out throats with its talons, Eden thought, and that time was coming. But it wasn’t now – right now the baby didn’t need Halley’s protection – the threat was only in her mind.
It was good it was, because it was clear to Eden that the powerful side of Halley – the eagle side – was still too dangerous. It couldn’t be released until Halley fully understood its power, its wildness, until she could control and direct it. Otherwise it would overcome her; it might even turn against Halley herself. When she was ready, Halley could use the wildness how she wanted to. Then she would be truly powerful.
Eden touched Halley on the hand. “No,” she said softly but firmly.
She removed the stick from Halley’s hands, and rubbed her small hand across its length, with her eyes closed. She held the white stick out to Halley, who appeared completely unconscious, though her eyes were open.
Halley came back into he
rself. The stick Eden was holding out to her caught her eye. It was about twelve inches long, polished smooth, and whitened by years in the elements. It looked almost like ivory. Even before Halley touched it, it filled her mind entirely. The force of it made the world shift.
How strange. I…just a moment ago… I felt like I could tear out someone’s throat. What was that all about?
Her hands were clenched in white-knuckled fists, and she opened them slowly, staring at them without comprehension. As she reached for the white stick, the violent thoughts and feelings lifted from her conscious mind. She could not for the life of her recall what had upset her – she could only feel that her entire body was tensed, as if for a fight. About her lips, she held the remnant of wildness. She moved her jaw back and forth, feeling her teeth unclench and her lips relax. Whatever this feeling was, it seemed to come from somewhere outside of herself. She disowned it, pushed it away. Even the piercing scream – that unearthly sound she’d made and the only thing that she could remember clearly – she quickly dismissed. It was too scary to have come from inside her.
Halley felt calm and in control again. She held the white stick, moving her finger to touch its sharpended point.
Childish to be reminded of a unicorn, a silly imaginary beast! Absolutely ridiculous!
Still, Halley held the stick with reverence, thinking of unicorns. It felt good to think of them, to lose herself in their image of whiteness and light.
She looked at the stick carefully, turning it slowly in her hands, as if trying to recall something important that was just out of reach. Is what I’m trying to remember about the baby?
Dismissing the thoughts as unproductive, she hoisted her backpack a bit higher on her shoulders, and looked at Eden. “Are you ready to go?” she said. Eden nodded quickly, and Halley led the way onto the plains.
Halley held the white stick in her left hand as they walked. She relaxed with her innermost knowledge that the baby was safe, was waiting for her. Like before, she could feel its pulse in her forehead. So beautiful…my angel. Absently, she rubbed her fingertips together and was perplexed when the word soft fell into her mind.
Out of The Woods Page 11
