by Shay Savage
He would have died; I’m sure of that. As it was, I thought Ehd might die of heartbreak when my father left, taking Lah with him.
So, I decided to stay. I stayed with my caveman.
Besides, I’ve known my fate since the day Ehd broke that clay plate. I know I’m going to die here, wrapped in Ehd’s arms. Someday, thousands of years from now, my mother will find our remains in the cave where we now live. I’ve made peace with that.
Lee begins to fuss, and Ehd brings him over to lay him down in my lap to nurse. Lee grabs at my boob and suckles, his little hand opening and closing as his eyelids begin to droop.
Ehd basks in the sunlight beside us as birds call overhead. I smile at him.
“Beh loves Ehd,” I say. I hold Lee up a little as Ehd turns toward the sound of my voice. “Beh loves Lee.”
“Luffs Beh! Lee luffs!” Ehd grins and I can’t help but laugh.
Lee startles as my body shakes and then lets out a wail. Ehd sits up and leans in close, stroking the baby’s cheek until he settles back down and begins to suckle again. Ehd shuffles around behind me, and I lean back against his chest.
“You’re a good daddy,” I tell him.
The sun warms me, and I feel sleepy. I close my eyes for a moment, dozing off. In my barely awake state, I think I hear the white noise machine Mom would sometimes use when she was having trouble sleeping, but the sound is too loud.
With a start, I open my eyes and sit up straighter. Lee slips from my nipple but doesn’t wake from his nap. I look out into the field near our cave and see a whirling sphere of blue and green light. In the middle, amidst sparks of static discharge, the image of my father begins to appear.
Before I have a chance to react, Ehd jumps to his feet and hauls me up with him. I tighten my grip on Lee and try to step away from Ehd and toward my father, but Ehd screams and tightens his grip on my arm.
“It’s my dad!” I yell out as I try to wrestle away from Ehd’s grasp, but I can’t get away. I can see the terror in his eyes as he reaches toward the cave entrance and grabs his flint-tipped spear. He holds it menacingly. “No, Ehd!”
Ehd shoves me behind him and brandishes the spear as he tries to push me and Lee into the cave entrance. I can see the fear in his eyes, and I know he will not hesitate to attack if he feels we are threatened. I push back as I look out to my father, noticing immediately that he’s holding a small bundle wrapped in the unmistakable pink and blue striped blanket used for infants in hospitals.
Lah.
“Ehd…Ehd…” I stroke his arm, trying to calm him. “Relax. He has Lah with him. He has our daughter.”
Ehd lets out a loud growl, baring his teeth as he holds the spear in front of him.
“Ehd!” I scream at him. “Look! It’s Lah!”
I watch my father take a few steps closer to us, and the bundle in his arm moves slightly, then lets out a long, heathy cry. I feel Ehd’s arm tense.
“Lah,” I say again. I point at my father and the bundle in his arms.
My father inches closer, coming into full view. He holds the baby up so that we can see her pink face wrapped snugly in the striped blanket.
“Lah,” Ehd whispers back.
I shove at Ehd’s back, trying again to get around him, but he won’t let me. He growls again as he glances quickly from me to my father.
“Stay back, Dad! He doesn’t understand! He probably thinks you’re coming to take our baby!”
“You have another one?” My father shakes his head. “How long has it been for you?”
“Please, Dad!” I say, ignoring his question as I place a still sleeping Lee on the grass. “You can’t come any closer! Lay her down in the grass! If you put her down and walk back away from her, he’ll know you aren’t a threat!”
“I’m not just going to—”
“Please, Dad! I don’t want him to hurt you!”
My father complies, laying Lah down in the warm grass just a dozen yards from us. She continues to cry, and my heart aches to hold her in my arms, but Ehd is still afraid.
“Let me go get her, Ehd,” I say softly. “It’s okay. We have her back now. She’s okay.”
Ehd holds the spear behind him, blocking my path as he approaches the bundle in the field. When he arrives at her side, he crouches and brushes a finger over her cheek. He moves the blanket to the side, carefully evaluating her condition before he takes her in his arms and stands again. Lah lets out another long, fierce wail.
Ehd lets out a sharp breath, and when I look at his face, I see tears on his cheeks. He leans in close to the baby, pressing the side of his face to hers and inhaling deeply.
I glance up and see my father approaching quickly.
“No!” I cry out, but it’s too late.
Ehd freezes in place as I grab for Lah, and Dad steps forward. My father slams a needle into Ehd’s arm, and Ehd drops to the ground.
“Why did you do that!” I tighten my grip on my daughter, barely able to hear myself speak over her cries.
“I can’t risk him hurting you!” my father says. “It’s a mild sedative, and it was the safest way. He’ll be fine in a couple of hours.”
“Not the point, Dad. He doesn’t understand any of this, and you’re scaring him!”
“Elizabeth, he was going to kill me with that spear if I got too close to him, and you know it. Would you prefer he takes a nap or that we get into a physical altercation?”
I scowl, not wanting to admit that Dad is probably right.
“We aren’t going to leave him out here,” I say. I shuffle Lah to one arm and scoop Lee up with the other. “I’ll take the babies inside, and you carry Ehd.”
I sit next to the fire, stroking my daughter’s cheek. Her brother, still blissfully unaware of what’s happening, naps in the furs next to an unconscious Ehd.
“She’s so small,” I say softly.
Lah nurses quietly as my father settles onto the ground with a small, black briefcase beside him.
“How long has it been?” Dad asks. “In your timeline, how long has it been since I found you?”
“It’s been over a year since you took her. A year and a half, maybe. Why is she so small?”
“A year and a half for you,” Dad says. “For us, it has only been two weeks.”
“Two weeks?” I stare down at my daughter. “How old is she now?”
“I have no idea when you gave birth,” my father says. “Rough guess, four months.”
“Lee was born in the winter,” I say. “He’s almost seven months, I think.” I shake my head. “How is this possible?”
“It’s tricky, all this time travel.” Dad manages to grin. “Getting the date right is nearly impossible. This is my third trip back. On the other two, I was way off on my calculations—once too far in the past, and the other too far in the future. It took a while to get the equations accurate. Too many variables.”
“I’m not even going to try to understand that.”
“Are you going to insist on staying again?” he asks.
“Yes, of course I am. I can’t leave Ehd alone. He was devastated when you took Lah away. He needs me. He needs his family. We belong together, and I’m not going anywhere.”
My father takes a few steady breaths and leans forward to touch the top of Lah’s head.
“It’s you, isn’t it?” Dad says softly. “Your mother’s find—the skeletons—it’s you and him.”
“Yes.” I swallow and look at my father’s crestfallen face. “I’ve known for a while now.”
“I suspected as much,” he says. “The DNA, the button—it all started to fall together when I realized what had happened, but I didn’t want to believe it.”
“It took me a while to accept it,” I say, “but I’ve come to terms with it. I know it’s hard to understand, but this is where I am supposed to be. I’m supposed to be here with Ehd.”
“No other skeletons were found in the vicinity,” Dad says. “I hope that means your children grow up and relocate t
o another area.”
“Yes, I hope so.” My soft words don’t touch my heart. I don’t like the idea of the children going anywhere away from us though I’m glad they will grow up.
“I brought you some things.” Dad reaches over and opens the briefcase. “I couldn’t bring much, but I brought what I thought would be most useful.”
I watch as Dad brings a book out of the briefcase.
“I wanted to bring you an iPad with more information,” he says, “but your mother said anything I brought had to be biodegradable. I had this one specially made out of soy plastics, but there isn’t much storage, and you’ll have to charge the solar cells often to use it. Most of the hard drive is taken up by a book that contains a listing of primitive plants and fungi, their identifying characteristics, medicinal uses, whether or not they’re edible, etcetera. Do you remember how to make proper identification with leaf patterns?”
“Yes.”
“Make sure you’re careful. There are poisonous plants around as well.”
“I’ll be careful.”
Dad takes out several bottles and a syringe.
“Vitamins,” he says, shaking the bottle. “Prenatal, multivitamins, and extra vitamin C and D. They should help keep all of you healthy and make up for anything you might lack in your usual diet. There are also antibiotics in case one of you gets sick again.”
“They should be easy enough to crush into everyone’s food,” I say with a nod.
Lee wakes and crawls his way over to me. He takes a long look at the baby at my breast and scowls.
“Ma, ma, ma!” He reaches out and tries to push Lah away from his food source.
“You’re going to have to learn to share.” I shift Lah over to one thigh and Dad helps Lee get situated to grab onto my other breast. He continues to scowl but seems to relax once he has some milk.
“I also brought this,” Dad says.
I wet my lips, feeling suddenly nervous as Dad picks up the syringe.
“This is for you,” Dad says slowly. “It’s to…to keep you from having any more children.”
“A birth control shot?”
“Not exactly.” Dad sighs and leans back a little. “It will cause you to bleed for several days, and I doubt it will be pleasant. Once the bleeding stops, you’ll be sterile.”
“Oh.”
“You should go ahead and use it so you won’t risk another pregnancy,” Dad says. “It’s too dangerous here.”
“I know.” I let out a long sigh. “It scares the hell out of me, but so far everything has gone well.”
“So far. Don’t risk it again, Elizabeth. I might not be able to convince you to come back with me, but I need to know you’re are going to be…that you are going to be as safe as you can be. I need to know you’re going to live a”—he pauses and fights back tears—“a long and happy life.”
I glance over at Ehd and then down at our two babies.
“I’ll use it,” I say, “but I won’t use it now.”
Dad is clearly displeased, but he also knows how stubborn I can be. He nods and reaches for the briefcase again.
“Your mother had me include this,” Dad says with a sigh. He pulls out a scalpel and a small cylinder. “This is going to hurt a bit.”
“What is it?” I ask.
“Birth control implant,” he says simply. “It will last about five years.”
I stare at him, not sure how I really feel about it.
“It won’t last forever,” Dad says, “and it will be healthier for you to let your body recover for a while, especially since you’ve already had two children.”
I’ve already been wondering how I’m going to take care of both of them at once, and I see Dad’s logic. It would be better for me to hold off for a while before having another one, and all my rhythm method plans haven’t worked out so well.
“All right,” I say. Both babies have fallen asleep on my lap, and I want them out of the way in case this hurts more than Dad is letting on. “Give me a minute.”
I start to stand slowly.
“Da, da, da, da!” Lee mutters, and I wait a moment for him to latch back on. Once his eyes are closed, I gently remove the nipple from his mouth and take him to the sleeping furs.
Ehd is awake, looking at me tentatively.
“Everything is okay, Ehd.” I press my hand to his chest when he tries to stand and his eyes glaze over. “Just relax here. Everyone is okay. You take care of the kids, all right?”
I get the two babies on the furs next to their father, and he wraps a protective arm around them both. He stares at Lah in awe, and I grip Ehd’s hand for a moment before returning to my father.
Dad cleans off my arm and then rubs numbing cream on my skin. I wince as he makes a small incision and then pushes the implant into my arm. He cleans off the cut and then places sterile gauze over it.
“There are some cloth diapers and pins in there as well,” he says when he’s done.
I rub at my arm, and Dad reaches over to take my hand.
“Are you happy, Elizabeth?” he asks. “Are you really okay here? It’s not easy, but I can try to return again. I could bring you anything you need.”
“We have everything we need,” I say reassuringly. “We have plenty to eat, a warm place to live, and we’re together. Now that we have Lah back, I think everything will be fine.”
“But are you happy?” His eyes fill with tears.
“I am happy, Dad. I know it seems strange, but I don’t think I could be happier, not even if I went back home with you. I have Ehd. I have our children. I love them all.”
“I’ll try to derive some solace in that. I’ll also try to convince your mother of the same thing, but she’s not so easily swayed. She wanted me to use that injection on you and force you to come back with me.”
“I can’t leave Ehd. I won’t.”
“I know.”
Chapter 9
Bright sun greets me as I leave the cave to find a tree. My steps are light, and I smile to myself as I cross the snowy ravine and make my way to the edge of the forest. I find a small pine tree and quickly chop it down with the flint axe.
As I drag the small evergreen back to the cave with a smile on my face, I wonder why I haven’t done this every winter. I remember the first time I decided to decorate for Christmas and how long it had taken me to cut down a tree. I’m much better at it now and have even tried to knap my own flint tools. They keep breaking, but I’m determined to figure it out.
Winters are long, and it’s important to keep myself occupied with a new task, especially one that can benefit the family.
I consider for a moment, trying to determine exactly how long it has been since I first arrived in this prehistoric land. When Ehd found me in that hole, it had been springtime; I remember that. Lah had been born late the following summer. She became ill in the winter, Dad took her away, and Lee was born the next winter. This will be my fourth winter at the cave with Ehd.
Nearly five years since I left my own time, my parents, and my friends.
I smile again. I miss my family terribly, but this is the life I chose, and I’m content.
I shift the evergreen to my other hand and drag it behind me as I shuffle through the cave entrance. Lee starts to howl as soon as I walk in.
“Ma, ma, ma, ma!”
“Hello there, sweetie!” I say with a smile. “Are you hungry? Mommy’s been gone for a while, huh?”
I set the tree against the cave wall. Lee crawls over to my feet and I pick him up. Frustrated with her younger but bigger brother, Lah wiggles her butt around, trying to mimic his movements and move across the floor, but ends up belly flopping instead. I snicker and reach down to pick her up, too.
I settle down on a fur and Ehd rushes over to help me get both babies situated, one at each breast. It isn’t easy, but trying to feed one without the other just made for cries. This way was ultimately easier.
Once the kids are fed and curled up for a nap, I go back to the tre
e. Using three logs from the woodpile, I create a triangle to use as a base and set the tree up in the middle of it. I use bits of an old hide to get it to stand up, snickering as I imagine Linus and Charlie Brown wrapping their tree with a blue blanket.”
“Hark! the herald angels sing, Glory to the new-born King!”
“Hoh!” Ehd glares at me from the fire, and I laugh.
“Is that your commentary on my singing?” I place my hands on my hips and wrinkle my nose at him. “Too bad. I’m going to sing every Christmas carol I can think of.”
I begin to string shells together to decorate the tree. I’m much better with a bone sliver as a needle now, just as I am better with flint tools. Though I still break a lot of them, it’s not too long before I have a strand to hang on the branches. I hum “Silent Night” as I finish decorating.
Ehd comes up behind me and wraps his arms around my waist. I turn to him, take his face in my hands, and smile.
“We have the whole family together now,” I say brightly as he leans over and briefly presses his lips to mine. “Christmas means family, and we’re going to have Christmas. I don’t even care if it’s actually December or not.”
Ehd ignores my words and nuzzles my neck. A moment later, his hands are gripping my butt, and he’s trying to direct me back to the sleeping furs. The babies are both napping, and to Ehd, that means sex.
“Not now.” I giggle and grab his hands. “I still have Christmas preparations to finish!”
Ehd looks at the floor and his face drops. I quickly pull him close to me and touch his nose with mine.
“Beh loves Ehd.”
“Luffs!” He clearly isn’t pleased by the lack of intimacy, but he does follow me as I leave the cave again. With the children asleep inside, we don’t go far. Though they are both blessedly sound sleepers, there are many dangers for a baby, and it’s not as if the cave is childproofed.
When the tree is decorated, I start thinking about suitable presents for everyone. I find some very pretty fungi around the base of a tree near the edge of the ravine and think one of them would be pretty on top of the tree, but when I try to grab for one, Ehd stops me.
