Water and Stone

by Glover, Dan

  "Do you remember that eye patch that my aunt Evalena always wears?"

  "Of course I do, silly. It makes her look like a witchy woman."

  "I think something happened to her because of the stone... she touched it and lost her eye. It isn’t safe, Tree."

  "You sound afraid, Church. Here... I'll do it first."

  "No!"

  But it was too late. Even as he steered the truck to the side of the road he watched out of the side of his eye as Tree reached into the box.

  "Oh... it isn’t a stone at all, Church... it's more like water... no, gelatin. It slips right through my fingers."

  Suddenly he was intrigued. He'd listened to his mother's warnings. When she admonished him to never touch the piedra he took her words to heart. Now, though, whatever spell his mother held over him had been irretrievably broken. Tree was his now... or was he hers?

  It felt good to belong to someone, especially a girl as pretty as Tree. Each moment they spent together made him realize how bereft he'd feel when she left him, as she most assuredly would. Though he was increasingly aware of the love growing between them he also grew up in a world where the union of a man and a woman was a rare commodity... unless it was for a night or two of pleasure.

  "Let me see, Tree."

  She was right. He couldn’t be sure that the piedra was even touching his skin... when he attempted to touch it he felt no surface tension as he would have if he plunged his hand into a container of water. In fact, the stone seemed to pull away when he tried to touch it.

  He could hear the remnants of Lorraine's voice in the back of his mind telling him how the stone wasn’t solid nor was it liquid. It was something unspeakable, an anomaly that had its origins in the dawning of time before such things as solids and liquids and gas came to exist.

  "I feel funny, Church. I'm going to be sick. I need to get out of the truck for a minute and walk around."

  Before he could put the box down to help her, Tree opened the door and promptly collapsed in the tall weeds growing alongside the back road they had been driving down. Leaping out of his door Church raced around the truck but Tree was no longer there. Only her clothes remained.

  "Tree? Where are you?"

  "Church... I'm here."

  Her voice sounded far off. It puzzled him how she could have traveled such a long ways in just the time it took him to race around the truck.

  "Where, Tree... where are you?"

  "I'm right here, you silly."

  Her voice was coming from inside the truck but when he looked he couldn’t see any sign of her. Turning around he expected her to be standing behind him but only the swamp greeted his eyes. Something slithered across his shoes. When he looked down a black snake the size of his leg was moving off into the wetlands.

  "Come on, Tree... stop fooling around. Where are you?"

  The box was open.

  He distinctly remembered closing it after putting in his hand to touch the piedra but now the box was sitting wide open. He never left it open like that. His greatest fear was that the stone would somehow fall out... he'd lose it.

  "I'm in here, Church. Come and join me. Take my hand."

  A sort of fog began issuing from the box rolling down the grimy cloth covered seat and congealing into a withered stick of an arm with what looked like a grotesquely shaped shrunken claw attached to the wrist.

  He stood frozen in fear as the claw inched ever closer to him, seeking him out, desiring to draw him into the box. He wanted to turn and flee, to leave Tree there, and to finally be free of the piedra and its curse. But when he tried to use his legs the snake had returned to wrap itself around his feet paralyzing him.

  "No, Tree... no!"

  "Wake up, you silly thing... you're dreaming."

  Opening his eyes at first Church didn’t know where he was. There was a strange scent in the air and a sound filled the room like the rushing of old leaves in a high wind. He had to be inside the box... Tree had pulled him into the stone.

  She was in the bed beside him soft and warm wrapping her body around his. As his mind cleared of sleep he remembered they had taken a room in Miami right on the sea side. The windows were open allowing the early morning fragrance of the ocean to wash over them.

  "Tell me what you were dreaming, Church. You sounded afraid. I thought you were going to kick me right out of bed."

  "I'm sorry, Tree... I guess I was having a nightmare. I don't really remember what it was about though. Something to do with the stone, I think... you touched it and were pulled inside of it."

  "I couldn’t go anywhere without you, Church. I want to spend the rest of my life right here with you."

  Her tiny smile crinkling the edges of her eyes revealed a truth he wasn’t yet ready to face. Did it matter if they were really inside the piedra? After all, he'd been trapped in a tidal wave of toil and anguish and poverty for as long as he could remember.

  The stone reflected the world... that was its secret. It wasn’t that they were trapped inside of it so much as the piedra set them free. They were no longer encumbered by the representations of a reality they'd never actually reach out to touch... bedazzled by light they'd never see as much as perceive as electrical impulses inside their brains.

  The stone was not solid like a particle yet it wasn’t fluid like liquid.... nor was it diffuse like a gas might be. It was something all together different. He wondered if it was possible that the piedra existed in all possible states... something akin to what was known as quantum superposition.

  For a moment he wanted to do as Tree suggested and take the stone to an expert, someone who knew how to deal with something that shouldn't exist. The piedra was not only both solid and liquid and gas at the same time, it was none of them. In fact, the stone probably existed outside of space and time as it was commonly understood.

  That meant that whoever controlled the piedra—if that was at all possible—could bypass death all together by assimilating with it. Was that what Tree had accomplished? Or had he merely dreamed it all?

  Perhaps when dealing with something as strange as the stone, dreams and reality merged into one continuous whole. If in fact they were both inside the piedra could they escape? Or a better question might be, why would they want to? He found himself melting into Tree once more as all thought ceased and only love existed.

  He was finally home.

  Chapter 48

  The old woman was coming for her.

  What could Yani be thinking by sailing to Cuba alone and unarmed? Did she really believe Evalena wouldn't hear of her presence even before she left the mainland? But then again, perhaps she'd brought the piedra hoping its lure might stay the wrath of the woman she once called her sister.

  She'd learned a harsh lesson back in Texas... trusting Yani'd been but one of the many mistakes she made during her time there. Instead of waiting for the piedra to appear she should've been actively seeking it out. She sensed instinctively that the stone was hidden in the area around the decrepit chabola where she spent years living in squalor and poverty yet she never put forth all her power to find it.

  She just wanted to be normal.

  It seemed a strange desire for someone who could have anything she wanted but there it was. She actually enjoyed being part of Yani's family, helping her raise the boy, and taking care of the shack while her sister worked at the hacienda from dawn until dusk seven days a week.

  It was still hard for her to believe that the old life was over... difficult to reconcile the fact Yani tried to kill her after all she'd done for her sister... how she'd raised her, protected her, and kept the wolves at bay even while they were howling for the girl's skin.

  "Give her to us, Evalena... you promised she'd be ours."

  "She needs more time to mature, Hajdani... she'll be of no use to you until she reaches maturity... allow her to have her quinceañera... a few more years means nothing, not to those who'll soon be immortal."

  It was a bargain she was forced to make yet one she n
ever regretted. Had she the opportunity to trade places with Yani she would have, or at least that was how she rationalized the deed.

  They were not people to trifle with... not only did they hold high positions in the government but the families came from old stock. Some of them could trace their ancestors back nearly as far as Evalena's birth, but not quite.

  Of course none of them suspected who she really was... they took her for an imposter... a daughter of a granddaughter who took up the mantle when no one else knew enough to object. She allowed them to believe what they would... it did her no harm to be thought of as a charlatan. In fact, it was better that way.

  Had they even an inkling of the truth, she wouldn’t have lasted a minute in the presence of that cult. Theirs was a special breed of fanaticism born in the time before civilization had taken full hold. If these were the people Yani counted on to help her, she was in for a harsh awakening.

  There hadn’t been enough time to teach Yani or the boy of their heritage... of the power they held, and how it could be vastly magnified by using the piedra. Looking back there'd never been enough time even though it was the one thing in her life with any plentitude.

  Though it upset her at the time, she couldn’t fully blame Yani for wanting to kill her. Had she been kept in the dark, she might well have done the same thing. There had to be a great deal of animosity in the girl's heart to pull the trigger on that gun so many times... losing Billy had been the least of her worries as the bullets were flying thick and hot knocking holes everywhere in the tiny chabola.

  Why hadn’t Yani looked for her in the cellar?

  It seemed odd that she allowed her to escape so easily... or had she planned on sending Church in to finish his aunt off all the while she was shooting? She didn’t think so... the boy acted on his own in dynamiting the cabin. She told herself not for the first time that she should've strangled him when he was a child... the kid was an ungrateful little bastard who'd lead every person he came into contact with to a bad end.

  The entire Ford family lay dead thanks to Church. Had he minded her warnings to him as a child to leave those people alone they'd all still be alive and happy in their misery. Instead, Church went behind her back to court their favor. He should've known better and he would have if Yani had allowed her to discipline the boy in the way he needed.

  "Church is seeing that boy again, Yani."

  "What boy is that, sister?"

  "You know who it is... don't play dumb, Yani. I warned Church to stay away from him but he didn’t listen."

  "I don’t see the harm in Church having a friend, sister."

  She wondered if Yani could see the destruction now wrought... the girl couldn’t say she hadn’t been warned. It broke her heart to think of that family in their graves, especially since none of it had to happen.

  Was that why Yani tried to kill her? Did the girl blame her for the fiasco of the Ford family? While it was true Billy'd taken up with her and came to live at the chabola, he gave himself up of his own free will. The man was no longer a boy. Billy had the right to choose his mate, just as Yani did... just as any free-thinking person had to option of doing.

  Did Yani think she her sister somehow bewitched the Ford family? While there might have been a sprinkling of truth in that recipe, in point of fact those people all decided their own fates by the road they picked to walk upon. While all paths would lead inexorably to death some were more comfortable to travel upon than others. If there was any bewitching done, that was the extent of it.

  "That boy is more than a friend to Church. How long will it be before he finds out who Billy Ford really is, Yani?"

  "I've never made it a habit to keep Church's heritage a secret from him, sister. He knows full well who Billy Ford is, and Rancher too. Why should we hide who we are? I've always taught Church to wear his face proudly."

  "You aren't ashamed that you had the child of another woman's husband, Yani? I thought better of you."

  Her sister's black eyes had blazed hot for a moment and Evalena wondered if she'd said too much... that this time she'd perhaps crossed the line. But then Yani shrugged her shoulders and tossed her head the same way she had a habit of doing as a child. She always had such beautiful hair.

  "Think what you wish to think, sister. I never realized that you were such a moral person that it bothered you to see Church born out of wedlock. Believe what you will of me, but don't take it out on the boy... he did nothing to deserve your condemnation."

  The girl was right. Still, it was hard for her to look at Church without seeing the devastation he was bound to bring to all who came into contact with him. The boy was one of those rare beings who didn't suffer the vagaries of the world so much as he drew those unpredictable circumstances down upon others.

  He was just plain bad luck... yet Yani refused to consider the only reasonable alternative... to end the life of the boy before he had the opportunity to unleash the havoc allotted to him.

  "Take him away from Texas, Yani. Go back to that little town in Mexico where you lived before coming here. Go into the high valley far away from all others. Church will do well there."

  "Church loves living here, sister. Why would I take him to Mexico? He doesn’t even speak the language."

  She supposed the girl was right. Still, things would have gone better for everyone if she'd have simply strangled the boy on the night he was born.

  Chapter 49

  She didn’t believe him at first.

  When Church said he wanted to show her what he had in the old gunny sack she thought it might be a gift for her. When she found out it wasn’t she tried unsuccessfully to stifle her disappointment in the boy... why should he be any different than all the others she'd known?

  "I have to show you something, Tree."

  When she took the box from his trembling hands she looked into his eyes expecting to see delight. Instead, she noticed the fear threatening to overwhelm the façade of normalcy that the boy constantly wore.

  "What is it, Church?"

  He didn’t seem to understand that it was a two-pronged question. Not only was she mystified by what the boy had handed her, she couldn’t understand his sudden shift in emotions. He didn’t answer. Instead, he nodded his chin as if encouraging her to see for herself.

  There didn’t seem to be any way of opening the box. It was a cube about four inches square made of a gold-colored material though it couldn’t actually be gold because if it was the box would be much heavier.

  Turning it over in her hands she couldn’t detect any latch nor were there any visible hinges. Whoever had constructed the box must have used some sort of highly evolved technology... she remembered reading about experiments being done using a carbon based material but wasn’t carbon black? She thought so.

  When she looked more closely at the box, however, she could see a smattering of black threads woven into the golden tapestry... perhaps the box was made of a conglomeration of exotic materials unknown to most.

  Suddenly she must've triggered an unseen latch because the top of the box opened. Something was glowing inside... it looked to be the size and shape of a chicken egg though the more she looked at it the more its form seemed to shift and morph into other contortions.

  The object didn't rest in the bottom of the box... instead it seemed to hover in the center. Even when she tipped the box on its side the object remained stationary, pulsing with an inner light. Or was it simply reflecting the sun? She couldn’t tell one way or another.

  "What is it, Church?"

  She knew she was repeating herself but she couldn’t help it. In all her life she'd never felt so flummoxed. What she was seeing shouldn’t exist. It couldn’t exist. She must be losing her mind... perhaps Church had surreptitiously slipped some LSD into her drink, but why would he do such a thing?

  "My mother calls it the piedra. That means stone in Spanish. She said it's something called the first material... that when it fell from the sky a monkey found it. When she picked it up, or
tried to, it changed her into a woman."

  "Come on, Church... you don’t really believe that, do you?"

  "I'm just telling you what I know, Tree. You don’t have to believe me. I'm not sure I do."

  "It must be worth a lot of money."

  "Who would buy it? I'm guessing anyone you tried to sell it to wouldn't believe what you were telling them... just like you don’t believe me."

  "It isn’t that I don’t believe you, Church. I do. I just don’t believe what your mother told you... it sounds like a fairy tale... a legend handed down from olden times."

  "But don’t they say there is always a kernel of truth in old fables, Tree?"

  She had the sudden compulsion to touch the object inside the box. It seemed to be singing to her... leading her on... and as she listened she thought she could detect tiny changes in the surface of the stone that were somehow related to the music.

  "Do you hear that, Church?"

  "Sure I do... I grew up hearing it. When I was little I always thought it was the sounds of water in the creeks out back... the way they mingled when the two of them flowed into each other. When I got older I realized it was something else... but I never could figure out what it was. One day I followed the sound. It seemed to be coming from that old church that burned down ages ago... all that's left of it are the walls... and inside that old building an enormous sycamore tree is growing. The music was coming from that tree.

  "For a long time I thought that trees could sing... after all, I heard it every night. During the day the sounds seemed to subside but if I listened closely I'd still hear it. After a while I decided it was the wind blowing over the walls of that old church... maybe there was a nook or a cranny that was turning the air moving over it into music. That was where the piedra was hidden... my mother told me that she buried it beneath the sycamore tree when I was just a baby... she said the package arrived about the same time Tia Evalena went back to Mexico after visiting the chabola on the night of my birth. It was addressed to her sister but Evalena never came back. So eventually my mother opened the package and discovered the stone inside."