State of Grace

by Hilary Badger

  Fern looks from me to Dennis, then back to me again.

  ‘You’re not moving. Why aren’t you getting Gil?’

  She steps closer to Dennis. She’s holding the knife out in front of her like it’s not connected with her body even though it is. It definitely is. At the end of Fern’s hand, the coconut knife’s basically the sharpest, shiniest thing I’ve ever seen.

  Dennis seems all pale and exposed, like something from the lagoon that’s lost its shell.

  ‘Fern, you’re going to cut someone.’

  I drag Dennis away from her, my arm around his shoulder.

  In my head, a prenormal set of words rings out. Not again, no way. I am not letting something bad happen again.

  ‘Listen,’ I say.

  But Fern mashes her lips together and shakes her head at me.

  Beside me, I can hear the smooth in and out of Blaze’s breathing.

  ‘Tell her,Wren,’ he says. ‘You have to now.’

  ‘Tell me what?’

  ‘Okay, alright. If you stop right there, I’ll tell you.’

  Fern doesn’t come any closer but she doesn’t let the knife drop either.

  ‘This isn’t what you think. His name’s Dennis. He’s … um …’

  I look at Blaze, who gives me just the tiniest little nod and smile. Except I don’t say what Blaze is expecting me to. Instead I blurt, ‘Dot sent him. Did you see that big huge bird just now? The bird dropped him.’

  I can’t tell who’s staring harder at me now, Blaze, Dennis or Fern. I’m guessing none of them can believe what they’ve heard.

  ‘Wait,’ says Fern. ‘What?’

  ‘He’s … he’s a new creation.’

  Fern’s round face wrinkles. ‘There’s nothing in the Books about Dot creating anyone new.’

  ‘I know but … Dot’s trying it out. Just temporarily. To see if creation’s ready for new people. Small ones.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Of course!’ I tell her. ‘Just because something’s not in the Books doesn’t mean it can’t be real.’

  As Fern thinks this over, I go on. ‘It makes sense when you think about it. What else are all the empty huts for?’

  That gets Fern nodding. And now that I’ve started, words begin to tumble from my mouth, unstoppable. It’s the blurt to end all blurts, basically.

  ‘Dot wants you to look after Dennis.’

  Fern starts to lower the coconut knife. ‘Me?’

  ‘Of course you. Why not? She loves you. She’s thinking of choosing you on completion night, if you take care of Dennis well enough. It’s … it’s sort of like a test.’

  A grunt from Blaze. But whatever, because now Fern’s smiling.

  ‘She’s choosing me? For real? What do I have to do?’

  It’s kind of prenormal how quick Fern is to believe everything I say. She wants to believe me, I can tell, because believing is the easiest thing to do. I understand that. Believing is how you get to keep things exactly the way they are, all nice and calm and happy.

  I tell Fern, ‘Nothing much. Just make sure no-one finds out about him. Dot … um … she doesn’t want anyone to know she’s testing you, in case the others start wondering why they’re not being tested.’

  ‘That’s all?’ Fern brings her hands together and I kind of shrink away from her. She’s totally forgotten about the knife she’s holding. She’s actually clapping.

  ‘How long for? Just until completion, I bet. That’s when she’s choosing.’

  Completion night. As in, two days away.

  ‘Um, right! Just till then. Dot’s going to take him back to the beyond and make some others just like him.’

  Fern’s looks down at Dennis. She angles her head to one side.

  ‘How do you know all this?’ she asks me.

  ‘I never told you, did I? I can hear her. She told me Dennis was coming.’

  ‘Wait. Oh my Dot. You’re like Gil?’

  I shake my head.

  ‘Gil’s like me.’

  I’m surprised how easily all this is coming out of me. The only problem is I can’t stand to look at Fern while I’m saying it. Or at Blaze. Definitely not at Blaze.

  ‘Gil’s mixed up. He thinks he can hear her but I’m the only one who really can.’

  ‘Oh my Dot,Wren. Seriously? How lucky are you!’ Fern laughs and hugs me. She jumps up and down on the spot, squealing, ‘You’ll be chosen for sure then. We’ll be chosen together!’

  ‘I guess.’

  ‘Maybe Gil thinks he caught it when you guys hooked up or something! That’s hilarious.’

  She shakes her head and her blonde hair falls across the brown skin of her tatas. For a moment, I wonder whether Dennis will ask Fern where her clothes are. But Dennis can’t even seem to form words.

  ‘I know,’ I say to Fern. ‘Pretty funny.’

  The entire time I can sense Blaze, standing silent beside me.

  ‘So everything he’s been saying about predotliness, is that –’

  ‘I don’t know where Gil got that stuff from. Everything’s one hundred per cent normal. I mean, deep down we all know there’s no such thing as a predotly creation, right? Why would Dot make someone like that?’

  ‘Totally!’

  Which is about the point Blaze turns his back on me.

  ____________________

  Inside Dennis’s hut, the air is trapped and still and stale.

  ‘Thanks for your help carrying him,’ I tell Blaze when I finally make it back with Dennis, who won’t stop laughing and flopping all over the place.

  I was thinking Blaze wouldn’t even help Dennis through the window, but it ends up that he does. He even offers me his hand. When he puts it in mine, it feels wooden as the hut itself. Then I’m inside and I know he’s going to say something to me about what happened with Fern. I also know I’m not going to enjoy it even slightly.

  I kind of wish Blaze would just get started, but he doesn’t. Instead he spends ages pouring Dennis water and looking in his eyes and all this other stuff.

  Finally I say, ‘Are you ever going to talk to me again?’

  There’s a little bang from one of the shutters and Blaze goes over there, paying a ton of attention to it, making sure it’s really closed and everything. Then, when there’s no more closing to do, Blaze kind of sighs.

  ‘You’re pretty imaginative.’

  ‘Not a compliment, I’m guessing.’ I slide into one of the chairs beside the table. ‘I had to say something to Fern.’

  ‘You’re best friends. How about the truth?’

  ‘All that stuff about Woodend and FancyVividBlue? Dennis never got the gate open, remember? You don’t even know if that is the truth.’

  ‘What you said definitely isn’t.’

  ‘If I told her Dot thinks I’m predotly, she might have … she was holding the coconut knife, in case you missed it.’

  Blaze doesn’t even bother denying Dot thinks I’m predotly. He just says, ‘How about you? Do you think Woodend’s real?’

  ‘I came to the gate, but I never said I thought you were right.’ Even to me, this sounds lame. ‘I haven’t stopped believing in Dot. The whole way along I’ve known she was testing me.’

  Blaze stays quiet. He doesn’t believe me, I can tell.

  ‘How about Dennis? The way you ran through the storm to get back to him? You were looking after him. Don’t tell me you didn’t think he was real.’

  Those same words flash through my head. Not again, I can’t let anything happen, never again …

  ‘I was making sure I didn’t fail the test, that’s all.’

  Around the other side of Dennis’s bed, Blaze is running his thumb over the bristles on his chin. Now he comes over to the table and sits down beside me.

  ‘I want to know why.’

  There’s hardly any sound in the hut, just the flutter of butterflies’ wings outside the shutters.

  ‘Why do you think you need Dot so much?’

  Really, what I want to do
now is shake Blaze. Or if not that, then scrunch my hands into fists and pummel them on his broad chest. Anything to stop him just sitting there, all big and still, like he’s been planted or something.

  ‘Dot’s why we wake up,’ I say. ‘She’s the reason we pick newfruit and have fun and everything. She’s the answer to any question. Obviously I need her. Dot’s the point of the whole thing.’

  There’s a tapping sound from the shutters. One of the slats starts to wiggle its way open, so Blaze slaps it closed. But he’s hardly taken his hand away before the slat starts moving all over again. This time a butterfly squeezes underneath, bright purple wings all speckled with stars. I’ve never seen a butterfly act that way before. I mean, this butterfly is persistent.

  ‘Maybe there is no point.’

  The purple butterfly loops once around Blaze. Then it finds me and starts circling, like I’m some flower all sticky with nectar and it hasn’t eaten in forever. I mean it buzzes at me, flicking my hair in my face and fluttering its wings in my ears and eyes.

  Batting it away, I come up with the presmartest retort in all creation.

  ‘There is a point. There just has to be, okay?’

  The slats are moving again, two at once now. Blaze flips them closed but another butterfly pushes its way into the hut, fuzzy red wings striped with orange.

  I watch Blaze tip his head to the side as he tries to figure out what’s going on with these butterflies. But even as he stands there, a third butterfly appears. And then, all the other shutters start tapping too.

  Suddenly it seems like the space above my head is full of butterflies in every colour and every pattern Dot ever came up with. Spots, stripes and swirls. Iridescent blue ones, bright green, pink and yellow, even butterflies with translucent wings buzzing so fast they’re just one big pearly blur. The butterflies land on my shoulders and in my hair. As fast as I brush them away, new butterflies appear and by the time I’ve swatted them the original ones are back. They’re in my ears, on my lips.

  Somehow they’re even working their way underneath my sungarb until I can feel their fuzzy, tickling wings all over me, everywhere at once.

  The shutters are open now, all four of them, and the butterflies are streaming in. So many butterflies that I think surely there’s no more room in the air for them all. But somehow there must be because they don’t stop coming. I’m wheeling my arms around, trying to brush them off but there’s no way I can move fast enough.

  I’m covered in butterflies, swamped.

  ‘Must have disturbed a nest or something,’ Blaze says. He’s halfway to the door, ready to get out of there. ‘That’s if butterflies have nests,’ he adds slowly.

  Right then, I’m so not thinking about butterflies’ nests. And I’m definitely in no state to go running anywhere. All I can think about is what Blaze just said and how badly I hope he’s wrong.

  So I get down on the floor next to the bed and cover my face with my hands.

  ‘Wren?’

  ‘Everything’s easier when someone’s telling you what to do,’ I say from underneath my fingers. ‘It doesn’t matter if you make mistakes, because you know Dot’s going to be there, no matter who you are or what you’ve done.’

  I can feel Blaze beside me down on the floor now. Somewhere above my bent head, the shutters are slamming open and closed.

  ‘What mistakes have you made?’

  Right then, randomly, I see Julius. I hear the sound of his voice, really softly, calling out my name. There’s all these other sensations too.

  Lights flashing. Someone screaming. Smoke that smells so real I actually start coughing.

  ‘That’s the whole thing. It doesn’t matter. If I can pass her test, then Dot’s going to approve of me again. She’s always going to love me, whatever I’ve done.’

  ‘You’re so prenice that only someone imaginary could ever love you?’

  When Blaze says that I’m suddenly sure. Without understanding how or why exactly, I know that I am prenice. Pregood. Prelovable. Pre-everything there is. I want to cry then, just burst out howling.

  But I don’t. Somehow I stop myself.

  Instead I say, all muffled into my hands, ‘Dot’s not imaginary.’

  ‘You don’t think that. You’re just good at pretending.’

  ‘I’d rather do that than think like you. Have nothing ever meaning anything. No-one to love you. Just on and on until … what? You don’t even get to go beyond. If there’s no Dot, then this is all there is.’

  ‘That’s right,’ Blaze says over the sound of beating butterfly wings. ‘That’s why we shouldn’t waste it.’

  24

  THE GAZEBO STINKS of flowers. The smell’s so strong, it’s like the air is sticky. The dottracks seem louder and on top of that there are all the colours. Purple and orange and blue sungarb, meshing and clashing and sort of vibrating against each other everywhere I look.

  There’s Dot’s picture rippling on the silky banners dangling from the roof. Even the bubbles are coloured, slicks of queasy yellow and sickly pink swirling all over them as they float away through the lattice. I follow them with my eyes until each one bursts, leaving nothing but foamy dribbles against the bright blue sky.

  Fern whispers from behind me, ‘I came up with the best idea.’

  ‘Yeah?’ I don’t turn around because Gil’s up the front of the gazebo with his fingers laced, watching everything that’s going on.

  ‘I’ll make him a garland!’

  Gil’s looking right at us now. Whatever Fern’s talking about, I’m thinking it’d be way better if she told me later.

  ‘The design’s either going to be random multicolours or stripes. What do you think Dennis would like better?’

  ‘Honestly? Um, both sound pretty awesome.’

  Fern isn’t giving up. ‘But which would he –’

  Gil says, ‘We’re talking to Dot, not to each other.’

  ‘Oh my Dot,’ Fern giggles, ‘he’s so positive he’s going to be chosen, isn’t he? He doesn’t even realise that it’s really you and me who are the ones …’

  At that point, Fern’s voice kind of melts into everything else in the gazebo and it’s impossible to tell one bright, happy, glossy thing from another. I get up from the cushion that me and Fern are sharing and navigate my way to the door of the gazebo.

  If I could just breathe one single, fresh breath of air then I’d be fine again, I know it.

  I get as far as the door. Brook’s there, blocking my way.

  ‘You don’t care what Gil has to say?’

  From the front of the gazebo, I hear Gil speaking.

  ‘I’ve checked everything in the garden and I’m pleased to announce none of Dot’s creations are missing. No animals and no people either.’

  He pauses here so everyone can laugh.

  ‘In time, Dot will tell me why she sent the bird. Until then, we should all stay dotly and make sure others are too.’

  His eyes roam the crowded gazebo. ‘Including you, Fern.’

  Fern’s eyes are closed. Inside her head, I imagine there’s nothing but garlands.

  ‘Fern?’ Gil repeats.

  Finally, Fern opens her eyes but only when Luna turns around to poke her.

  ‘Can I go now?’ I ask Brook.

  ‘No-one’s saying you have to do anything.’

  He takes a step sideways and lets me through.

  A breeze rolls across the lawn and I stand there with one hand on the lattice, gulping down cool air and watching the animals on the lawn. A pair of flamingos at a fountain. Some low-slung type of cat with tassels on the tip of its ears, yawning in the sunshine.

  A gazelle too, only not feeding on the grass or anything like that. The gazelle is staring straight ahead, shifting its weight, steadily and repeatedly, side to side.

  You’d think it was dancing until you saw its dull, glazed-over eyes. How have I never noticed those eyes before? They’re how I know the gazelle isn’t dancing.

  As in, not at all
.

  ____________________

  I had no idea it could take Fern so long just picking flowers. First she wants to go to the orchard to look for vines, but she’ll only pick the ones with little curls of green springing off them. On top of that, the leaves have to be perfect and glossy without one single speck of brown. The actual flowers need to be the most vibrant, fragrant and succulent things Dot ever created.

  When I ask her how much longer until she has what she needs, Fern only says she isn’t sure. ‘It has to be dotly, Wren. I want to look after Dennis. I really, really want to be chosen.’

  If her arms weren’t full of leaves and flowers, I’m one hundred per cent sure she’d be trying to hug me now.

  ‘I figured.’

  Fern does a couple of mini-jumps as she chimes, ‘We’re going to be cho-sen.’

  Then she goes off into a big long ramble about how brilliant completion night is going to be, about the party on the lawn and the coloured lanterns in all the trees and dancing and hooking up … By the time she gets up to wondering exactly how Dot’s going to let us know who’s chosen, I’ve kind of blanked out.

  Once, I liked to think about whether Dot herself would appear before us on completion night or send us some kind of message or exactly what. Now it’s nearly here, my head’s full of too many other things.

  Dennis, Julius, Gil and Brook.

  And Blaze, especially Blaze, asking me, Are you so prenice only someone imaginary could ever love you?

  When Fern’s finally ready to weave her garland, she decides she wants to work in the orchard. She chooses a peach tree and we sit down underneath. Her face is speckled with light and shadow as she makes the base, a twisted circle of vines. She’s really concentrating, rolling two stems together, binding them with a thinner stem, then carefully knotting the whole thing into a circle.

  As Fern works, she hums dottracks. She looks so completely happy, sitting there poking flowers into the circle of vines, testing out the effect, trying out every possible combination of colours as she yabbers on and on and on about being chosen and what her special supersecret purpose might end up being.

  Fern’s my best friend. She has been since we were created. But for the first time ever, hanging out with Fern is giving me a pregood feeling.