{second tuesday tales}

The Making Of Alastair Beckworth, 008: The Ride

It was, his father told him, time to stop pretending like a child in a man’s world, and act as a man his age. The directives he’d been given were to Stop Faffing About and Do Something With Your Life. While his father’s newest wife stood by, bright manicured yands wringing in discomfited silence, Father had read him the riot act, beginning with how he’d done nothing but bother the maids and trouble the gardener since he’d been home, that it had been months since he’d done his A-levels, and that, no, a gap year wouldn’t do, since he obviously had energy to spare, and nothing to turn his hand to but pestering the staff. Something Must Be Done, and It Was Time To Get On With Things. Beckworth Men Were Men Of Worth and it was Time To Be Getting On In The World.

Unfortunately, Alastair had no idea how Getting On In The World was supposed to work.

It wasn’t as if he didn’t DO things already – hadn’t DONE things for the last several months. He wasn’t indolent, and knowledge had always come easily – too easily – to him, falling like ripe plums into his lap. When he’d been six, his mother already gone, he’d found the new nanny, a plump woman with a coronet of gray-streaked brown hair, weeping in the linen closet. Father had caught her teaching Alastair a skipping dance that morning, instead of drilling him his maths, and had threatened to sack her, even though she was once someone’s mum. Even though her husband had passed on, just like Alastair’s mum had, because Beckworth men did not gallivant around when there was work to be done.

If he had asked, Alastair would have told him that the skipping was a way to count that he hadn’t seen before. If he had asked, Alastair would have told him he’d danced that morning for the first time since his mother had died. He’d have told his father that he’d felt the iron bands around his chest begin to ease that morning, for the first time, and felt a little like smiling again, for the first time. But no.

The thought of losing Ms. Nan had stung like jellyfish whips. Alastair had made an unhesitating beeline for his Father’s study and, once his father was occupied, made sure to spill his tea all over the letter Father was typing to the employment agency. As Father cursed and sputtered, Alastair had wept glossy crocodile tears, then made such a hash of trying to “help” him clean it up that Father had bellowed for the nanny to come and take him away. Afterward, Alastair had made sure to be perfect for weeks after, so there was no more talk of turning Nan out after that.

In grammar school, things like spelling long words, and reading longer books had been side hobbies Alastair had pursued while the stalking more thrilling game like finding out why the chaplain was whispering on his mobile phone in the hall, and why the Games mistress would watch the highway every afternoon at three with a gloomy sigh. (The chaplain was a habitual gambler, making book with the local man down the way, while the Games mistress was watching for the lorry driven by her erstwhile love, the Estate Manager from Gorbals Park, who only had time to see her at the weekend.) (Those secrets had been fairly easy to suss out, once he’d cracked the code on the Dean’s phone, and filched the Games mistress’ stopwatch. An alarm had been set for three.) When Alastair had charged home for tea to relate the story to Nanny, she had been by turns amused and exasperated. “You’re going to get yourself into trouble one of these days, my boy,” she’d warned him. Alastair had simply shrugged.

By secondary school, Alastair had excelled at being both a thief and a spy. No longer content just to bedevil his teachers, he kept an ear to the floor – and to all doors – around the manor. Knowing the cook’s son had been bullied by a butler’s daughter put the cook in his debt, after he sorted the snotty little miss as to who really had the right to push others around. Watching his stepmother’s newer, brighter makeup and hair styles as his father’s business meetings multiplied made Alastair set himself to quietly finding out; was Father really away on business, or doing something – or someone – new?

20131213_DSC8849.jpg

Even as he learned what papers on his father’s desk meant, learning the languages of business to peruse contracts and writs, Alastair was writing brilliant essays and arguing confidently in his debate club. While slipping into his Father’s electronic books to track down where he really kept his assets, Alastair was excelling in higher maths, geometry, trigonometry. Just knowing things meant that there was more to know; after chemistry and physics failed to sate him, his satisfaction in knowing there was simply more to know itself a heady lure. If only he didn’t keep getting distracted by the things he knew… there was always something more to find out, though; another fact, another story, another secret just over the horizon. And then graduation had come, and he’d marched out with the rest of his peers, content to wander back to the estate and rusticate with nanny – now retired – for a bit, then, maybe later, attempt university, if he could wrestle down the reams of things which interested him, piqued his curiosity, or looked like things he could do…

And now Father was… ending the fun. He was being packed up, sent off, and locked away in the gray iron-and-cement vault of the London business world. He was meant now to be A Grown Man, a Beckworth Man. A Man of Worth.

Alastair had no idea if he wanted to be a man of worth. Even being a Beckworth was somewhat suspect, to his mind.

“They’re expecting you at Benchmark Monday morning,” Father said firmly. “You’ll stay in my rooms at Broderick’s, and set yourself to shadowing Errol for a few weeks, see what you can learn. I expect you to distinguish yourself,” he added. “At the very least, you can be out of my hair for a time.”

“If that’s what you want,” Alastair said tonelessly, furiously calculating how much time he had, where he could go, and what he could do to escape this.

“It’s what you need,” his father had barked, launching into one of his aphorisms. “Beckworths are men of character, men of consequence. We set our feet on the road and let no one stop us.”

Alastair paused. “Indeed,” he murmured thoughtfully, then looked up, his expression full of false heartiness as he made his decision. “Well, then, Sir,” he said, shaking his father’s hand. “I shall take myself off to London.”

When the family sat down to supper that evening, he was astounded to note that his son had packed a bag, instructed his rooms to be packed up, and had driven himself off in the old gray Audi he’d bought for the nanny to drive, years and years ago. Mr. Beckworth was undeniably piqued – but curious. He knew Alastair was probably not obediently going to show up at Benchmark Ltd. on Monday, ready to do his duty. He supposed he was lucky Alastair had come home after school was finished; he’d expected him to vanish somewhere in the countryside and to hole up with questionable peers at some house party. Instead, he’d come home as if he’d had nowhere else to go. Mr. Beckworth shook his head and applied himself to his steak and peas. There was no telling where someone like Alastair would end up.


It had been a long while since he’d been behind the wheel. Alastair shifted gears noisily, the clutch grinding threateningly. He only tightened his mouth, concentrated, and shifted again. Better. Better. He’d get up to speed back here on these flat country roads, and have things figured out well before he got to the airport.

From there, of course, there was no telling what he’d do. No one actually said that being at an airport meant he had to board a plane for London. Perhaps he’d try a train. A boat. A ship headed for the Foreign Legion. Who were the Foreign Legion, anyway? Pretend Frenchmen, signing up to lose themselves in the desert? Why? What did they have to hide?

How much would it be worth to them to make sure no one found out?

Alastair narrowed his eyes speculatively, his foot easing on the accelerator. Up ahead, there was a smudge of black on the side of the road. As he zoomed closer, it resolved itself into a waving figure, and then he was past. He braked convulsively, fighting the car as it skidded. Clamping his arm around the passenger seat, he wove his way backwards, grateful that there was no one else on the lonely road.

At the black-coated figure, he stopped, and let out a disbelieving laugh.

“Nan?”

The old woman beamed. How she had gotten there, so far ahead of him, Alastair could only guess. She carried only her handbag, a clunky, old-fashioned thing, but which was usually filled with every necessity for a good adventure – boiled sweets, toy cars, handkerchiefs, and the odd cheese sandwich.

Alastair rubbed his chest. Sometimes, he missed Nan, and the little adventures they’d gone on when he was a child. Sometimes he missed the odd dance or gallivant. He wondered if Nan was up for a little fun.

She stepped forward, brows raised. “Going my way?” she asked demurely, waggling her handbag.

It seemed she was.

Alastair laughed, for real this time, and opened the car door to let her inside.

< /end>

This was fun, and reminded me of the Police Adventures stories I used to make up when I was eleven, about my friend Danny and me, being Smart Detectives. I figure that a.) 007 had to come from somewhere, and b.) we’re overdue for a 008 by now. So, here’s Alastair for you, before his Big Adventures (whatever those might be) and you’re welcome.

This month’s image comes from Flickr user Philipp Rein of Augsburg, Germany.

{the cracked kettle: puzzled}

Admittedly, this is a weird story, but the picture prompt eluded me. And yes, it’s late, but I blame the concert(s) in the last seventy-two hours, the coughing, the ground-glass-in-the-vocal-chords sensations, and the four hours of sleep I had last night. Things should get better very soon, because as soon as I post this? It’s back to bed.

Creative Commons prompt this week courtesy of Flickr user Asja.


puzzled.

© 2012 T.S. Davis

It would be, by the doctor’s reckoning, another week and four days before she got that parasite out of her, but Gillian wasn’t really up to waiting that long.

“Are you sure he said the first of the year?” Gran asked, giving a worried look to the slump of Gillian’s spine. Her own back was ramrod straight, her shoulders flung back with muscular strength.

“That’s what he said,” Gillian replied, leaning her shoulder against the door jamb, wincing at a warning muscle twinge on the back of her neck. “He’s scheduled the surgery for the first Tuesday of the year.”

“It’ll be good to see what you’ve got.” Gran’s eyes crinkles at her brief smile. “Every Hoffsteader has had their challenges, but they’ve seen them through. You get to grips with that chap, and you’ll be on your way.”

“Well, I’ve been thinking. I’d feel better if I could be on my way now…” Gillian began.

Gran’s smile vanished. For a moment, it seemed that there was another head behind her own, peering out from behind the column of her neck. “Gillian. We’ve talked about this – ”

“It’s just so big,” Gillian gnawed her lip anxiously, flinching from the shadow behind her mother’s mother. “It’s huge, Gran. I’ve got to know. How can we be prepared if we don’t know?”

“You’re never given more than you can handle,” Gran said primly, lips stitched into a thin line of censure. “You’re a Hoffsteader, Gillian. A Hoffsteader puts her back into it, and she can accomplish anything.” Gran straightened, chin high, and once again resolved into the tough old lady Gillian had grown up with – a solitary soldier who bore her burden, and never mumbled.

“I know, Gran,” Gillian sighed. She did know – nobody, in all the history of her family, had ever been unable to handle anything thrown at them – any curveball, any hitch, any little difficulty. Bad grades, mortgage bubbles, world wars, influenza pandemics – the family was filled with hardcore survivors who took the problems of the world on their backs and slogged onward. Just look at Gran – she was seventy-eight, and she’d held up her own burden, plus take on her daughter’s child.

Gillian wasn’t sure she measured up to the history. She was a gamer – fond of puzzles and wordplay and hours of being a Seventh Level Elf with mage powers in her online gaming world. Reality was more trouble than it was worth, most days. Who wanted the back-breaking, life-sapping responsibilities of the whole world? Who’d voted the Hoffsteaders into being such stalwarts, anyway? Gillian had never had to put her back to anything. Brute strength was for those who had it – Gillian preferred subterfuge. What else was a sharp brain good for, if not for protecting you from breaking a sweat?

“If you’d ever take things seriously, you’d be just fine,” Gran rapped her misshapen knuckle against the tabletop. “You’re a Hoffsteader, and Hoffsteaders stand strong. Carrying this burden might just be the making of you.”

Or, it might just make her crazy, Gillian decided, but she kept her mouth shut.

The weeks passed, bearing the holidays closer. In return for her moment of doubt, Gran supervised Gillian’s time, leaving her not much for her games – except for the stupid Sudoku from the paper – or even for sleep. Her back was a constant ache. If nothing else, the elder Hoffsteader was grimly satisfied that Gillian didn’t quibble, even over extra errands. It was taking Gran’s beast, Scherzo, to the beast-mender that reminded Gillian that she had other options.

Only a moment of subterfuge – excusing herself to the single bathroom in the back, unlatching a few cages filled with an old paranoia, its razor-edged wings flicking irritably, a pair of abject failures and three hyperactive grouchies – all she’d needed. For good measure, Gillian set a cold and sleepy terror she found on the floor to lend what mayhem it could. She’d sat quietly through the exam until distant screams creased the minder’s face. He’d given her Scherzo’s leash. “Would you excuse me for just – ”

The X-ray machine was old, which was to her advantage. She lined up her spine against the plate, held her breath, and pushed the button. She heard the door rattle and leaned away from the screen, holding closed the door.

object #3: bones

“Just a sec – I’ve got to -this beast!” she exclaimed, and held her breath again as elsewhere someone screamed. The beastmender swore, the rattle ceased, and raised voices echoed down the hallway.

Gillian bent awkwardly, hands pressed against the door, pushed the button again. On the screen behind her, a ghostly image took shape.

The bulge on her spine – the traditional monkey on her back – was only partially visible, its thumbs arched at an awkward distance. Her heart thumped once, hard, then Gillian grinned in relief. It seemed she would be another in a long line of successful Hoffsteaders, even as a fly-by-night, silly girl who frittered away her time with games.

The monkey was already locked into a Chinese finger trap.


May the things which hold you be ever so easily defeated.

{the cracked kettle: deliveries}

The Kettlemeister changed up the rules this week to include TWO pictures: from Flickr User Tom T and User hugovk. As always, the story is surreal and original, and dashed out in one sitting – those are my personal rules. I managed, if not a happy ending, a Kernel of Hope (TM). Hope you enjoy.

“Deliveries”

©2012, T.S. Davis

“Mail’s here.” Mabry’s words were barely intelligible through his mouthful of whatever – something gristly and crunchy and possibly insectoid. Jayce just nodded, giving his door wide berth as she walked to the landing and peered down. No sign or sound of her other brother, Toph and his slack-jawed posse of sharp-eared fae, so she moved down the stairs, avoiding the fourth one that creaked, hoping she could just grab a sandwich and vanish without any hassle. A heavy thump as she entered the kitchen put paid to that idea, and she sighed inwardly.

“Package came.” Toph’s chair wavered on two legs, his dark hairy legs in faded board shorts stuck out for balance. Glowing homemade-tatts wound around the bare arms which were crossed across his chest. With his model pure face covered in stubble, and his hair matted in elflocks, he looked Textbook Thug, or at least that’s the image Jayce imagined he hoped for. He needed something to make up for being beautiful, and driving a brick-pink Caddy.

She shrugged and laid two pieces of stale bread into the toaster oven. Keeping her back to him, she rummaged in the fridge, her skin prickling at his proximity. There wasn’t much – some limp cheese, and a bit of pickle. There were only two apples left in the fruit bowl. Jayce expected Ma to leave her a grocery list any day now.

“I said, ‘Package came.’” Toph enunciated the words and let the chair slam down on four legs. His can skidded across the table surface as he hit the edge. “You got something in your ears?”

“Heard you.” Though Toph was mostly a poseur, it wasn’t safe for her ignore him altogether. Mabry seemed so thoroughly spelled at all times, he managed to slide under Toph’s radar; Ma managed to unsee Toph’s thugging entirely, between swing-shifts at the glitter plant and sitting glued to the Netflix in her bedroom, mesmerized by ancient shows like Dynasty. Jayce alone was available to torment. Since she’d turned twelve and hadn’t been affected by the Dust, Toph had realized what she was – and what she could do for him.

“Well, go out back and deal with it.” Toph’s voice was rising into threat. “Don’t see why I hafta tell you every time.”

The Shed of the Angry Cube

Don’t you? Jayce thought but didn’t ask. Instead, she picked up the pace – juggled blistering hot half-toasted bread in one hand, grabbed cheese, an apple, a knife, and shoved the lot into the voluminous pockets of her shorts and went out. The door closed on Toph’s satisfied, “That’s right, you ugly bi – ” and Jayce wished she’d slammed it just a little harder.

Stupid Duster. Stupid fae.

The shed wasn’t out back as much as it was somewhere inward – on a crossroad so it was both here and not there. They’d explained it once – something about ley lines and L-space, but Jayce hadn’t really been in a position to understand. She didn’t get magic, not like most people nowadays. The Dust didn’t touch her, didn’t transform her pug nose and round brown cheeks into Cadbury-plump richness, nor her dark brown eyes into tea-colored soulful depths. She was plain, short, dark -not mysterious in the least. Ma said Jayce was like her grandmother, one of those “salt of the earth” types, and she felt like it – rock salt, maybe. Something jagged and sturdy and necessary. Not like the fae, who simply exuded beauty and sprinkled it on their fawning humans. Not like Mabry, who wafted vaguely through the halls, his attenuated presence known more often by his absence, not like Toph, whose surreal good looks he roughened offhandedly, as did his peers. The magic wasn’t magic, for Jayce – merely work. Only Lightboxes packed with vials of dust to be weighed and parceled into packages, only a cloying sweet irritation on the back of the throat, and something to be showered from her hair.

Only Dust. Stupid, stupid fairy dust.

She’d been at it for an hour at least when her ears popped. Crouched as she was over a Lightbox, tethered to make its lighter-than-air contents stay reasonably close to the floor, she had no time to move before the Crossroad spat out another traveler. The large head and massive eyes were infantile and designed to elicit human attention. The body was stunningly adult. In her spring-bright dress and thistledown wings, Jayce knew this fae before she even spoke, before her fixedly bright expression met Jayce’s wary gaze. Tinkerbelle. The most viciously sweet of the lot.

Bells rang. Jayce grimaced and shook her head. The stupid chiming got under her skin like an itch, and she shook it from her head. “I can’t understand you,” she said, her voice a tuneless flat contrast.

The bright jingle again, and the fae turned her head slowly, eyes wide in her waxy pale face. Jayce shudder, reminded of the multifaceted eyes of a spider in her science text. Even Toph’s crowd was less off-putting, eyes half-mast from their smoking, somehow managing to look a little less mannequin-like with their dyed wings, guyliner and gelled hair.

The fae’s wings – somehow strangely one dimensional – flickered and she moved toward the house, the chiming somehow adamant, louder, sharper. Jayce dropped to her knees and hunched, working her thin latex gloves from her hands to shove her thumb over her ears. Never mind the packing now – the fae’s speech made Jayce feel like she was being divebombed by flying fire ants. She hummed – her only defense – off key and more drone than song, until the itch in the lining of her brain settled to a slightly miserable sting.

Her humming was less frantic now. Shaking, Jayce picked herself up and leaned against the wall, wiping a disgusted hand over her clammy brow. She looked ridiculous, she knew – ashy with Dust and marked with sweat. The fae didn’t like sweat, didn’t like bodily fluids much at all, really. Despite the humans who worshipped them, fetishized them, longed to intertwine with their perfect bodies, the fae considered themselves the mortals’ betters in every way. Only the young mortal-corrupted fey dealt with human bodies, with their sweat and their stickiness. Tinkerbelle was beyond those things, and Jayce knew she’d better get out of the way, before the thing came back.

Fur coat

Which she would, if she could just stop shaking. Why would she come here? Toph always drove to her, always took her where she wanted to go, always came home with the treats, the car, and the friends. Why come to him, to the dull, dim house where his mortality shone so plainly?

The magic might not hurt Jayce, but she hated the fae. Hated their flawless faces and airbrushed bodies, hated the world they’d foisted on humans obsessed with beauty and perfection, hated the life she lived on the fringes – permanently flawed with no hope of redemption. Seeing the fae in her own home made her feel it all too closely, what she lacked, her deficits. She was all too human.

“All right?” Mabry’s hand touched her back. Jayce sucked in a breath and flinched; he must have called her more than twice by now, and she hadn’t even heard him come in.

“All right.” Jayce licked her lips, spat away the cloying sweetness. “I’m fine.”

“C’mon,” Mabry gripped her arm, his long fingers strong. “Hurry.”

Mabry pulled Jayce out of the shed and to the side of the back steps in time to see the door burst open, and Toph stumble out, nearly falling. His face devoid of stubble, his locks smoothed into waves, and his eyes wide with anxiety, he was followed by the fae, who stood on the top steps and chimed imperiously. Too close to hum, Jayce grit her teeth, and Mabry gently covered her ears with his palms. In his uniform of fox fur coat and brimmed black cap Toph looked nothing like the Textbook Thug he tried to be. Instead, he looked like Tinkerbelle’s Dust dealer as he rushed to the shed, emerging with the packed vials in their brick-pink cases, to be delivered to the beauty-addicted mortals in the City.

“Lackey,” Mabry murmured, as the fae followed in his wake. “Only a lackey.”

It was meant to reassure; Mabry knew Topher tortured her, but the words still rang hollow. Yes, Topher was a lackey, but what did that make the rest of them? Mabry, fae-kissed and skimming above it all, Ma, with her willful blindness and her wish-fulfillment TV, Jayce, skulking around the edges of her life, doing what she was told? Even Tinkerbelle answered to someone, to the King of the Fae, or the White Queen. Didn’t they all belong to somebody? Jayce stared down at her Dust-encursted hands, chilled now that her sweat had dried. She wasn’t bespelled, not like Mabry; she didn’t see the world through rosy lenses. They were all slaves.

But, maybe it wouldn’t always be that way.


The Cracked Kettle site is UP! Please check around and see what the rest of the gang is up to this week.

Flickr Fiction Friday: Castles in the Air

It is hazy and sticky out, which isn’t unusual for Shanghai, but is unusual enough for so early in the morning. Even though the sun has not yet risen, the streets are still filled with people, cheek-by-jowl, rushing down the wide streets on bicycles, heading all directions. I wish I was one of them, filled with some kind of purpose, walking briskly. Instead, I am limping along, exhausted, still feeling jetlagged, travel-worn, and weary.

The boulevard outside the hotel boasts a wide, tree-lined walk; the Bund, the concierge called it. Walking along it are many Chinese peoples in plain outfits, doing the slow mantis-like movements of Tai Chi, and getting their morning exercise. A small group of fifteen or so senior citizens are flying kites against the pollution-corrupted sky. I encounter several curious gazes, but do not stop.

My high school had been thrilled we’d been invited to China; our a cappella chorus had worked hard all year, and had gone to the Mozart Festival in Austria only the summer before. Nobody had expected another overseas trip, but Ms. Dunston had a friend well placed in government in Shanghai, and with great excitement, she’d passed along a tour invitation to the school board. The trustees had been impressed enough to bring in the media, and for the last ten days, we’d been traveling with a newspaper columnist and a photographer, as well as with the usual plethora of interested parents and sponsors. We’d been performing every day for two weeks, and had two weeks of tours and performances left to go. Between the jetlag and the sticky, sullen weather, being ‘on’ all the time for the columnist and photographer, we were all exhausted, half-sick, and fractious. Students who were usually quiet and dependable were having screaming fights on the tour bus, and Liesel and Kim had cried most of the way through our tour of the Oriental Pearl Tower in Pudon, which was all aglitz with neon lights and flashing signs. When we got to East Asia Hotel, tearstained and tired, Ms. Dunston announced a curfew, and had instructed us all to go to bed immediately, or risk her wrath. I’d sleep early and deeply, and now, awake before six, I wander the streets with the locals.

Shanghai is beautiful, but strange. As we sing at each outdoor theater and concert hall, I feel too Western and huge, my wide shoulders and full figure the object of blank stares of astonishment by seemingly hundreds of small, compact Asian girls. I realize I am beginning to walk with a hunch, thoughtlessly trying to be shorter, smaller, to blend in. Where is the part of my heritage that is meant to fit here? My face is a flat oval but my skin is caramel crème and dimpled instead of a serene and delicate pale. Jamaica sings out in the bow of my lips, the sway of my steps, in the kinks in my hair. China, had given me only my eyes, which are long and tilted. It seems as if there is something else filling in the blanks, some third cultural fingerprint that only I can see. Even my mother doesn’t understand why I don’t want to be here, why the hair on my nape raised when everyone else thrilled at the word ‘China.’

“It will be such a great experience for you,” my mother, Yasmin had beamed. “Everyone should find out their roots.”

If I wanted to find out my supposed ‘roots,’ shouldn’t I be in Jamaica? The one-drop rule rules the world, I know that; to the Chinese, I am no more one of them than any Westerner. Anyway, I wonder how my mother can be so enthused. My full-blooded Jamaican father didn’t marry her because she is half Chinese, and his parents, as he had told her apologetically, would object – strenuously. He instead contents himself with sending trifles and trinkets from his ticky-tacky homeland, tourist toys meant to demonstrate a love I have not seen.

My mother won’t hear a bad word against him, but I hate my father, and vow I will never go to Jamaica. The problem is, ignoring Jamaica leaves me with my scrap of Chinese-ness, which isn’t enough to count. I am only a quarter, and nobody identifies me as that, either– I am something else. Girls in my class like Lily Wong don’t look at me and find instant sisterhood. Neither can I identify with the ‘one love’ ganja crowd, with their colorful crocheted hats and “Hey, Mon,” speech. I’m on my own island.

And now, I’m in Shanghai.

The air is stained thick with haze, the color of smoke, congestion, and new construction. I look up at the half-finished buildings, the new thrusting up beside the old, as ornate temples and skyscrapers vie for space on the choked and cluttered skyline. I have two more weeks to be here, two more weeks to take hold of something that proves to me that this, too, is my country. I may be only a stepchild, but China, at least, must somehow be mine.


Flickr photographer ^fred^ was the inspiration for this short. Find more fiction prompts at Sunday Scribblings.

Small Fictions: Ascent/Assent

It would be different, watching the Kite Festival alone.

Last year, she’d danced on the sand with her friends from Dickenson. They were all incoming freshman, not yet too sophisticated to gallop about in mad waltzes to The 1812 Overture while the fireworks spiraled color and fire into the sky, and the kites tugged and swooped in a synchronized frenzy.

Last night Baz had phoned on his break, hoping for a reprise of last year with the picnic basket, blanket, plastic wineglasses and general silliness they had all enjoyed, but Cee hadn’t bothered turning him down; she’d just let the phone ring when the Caller ID flashed his name and number. It seemed too much to explain if she said no, and she couldn’t face ‘yes’ yet, not last night.

But it was windy this morning, and the wind had whistled through her sleep and tumbled her out of bed. She’d been halfway down the ladder from the loft before she’d realized she was wearing only one earring. A hasty search through the bedclothes left her scowling and determined next time to not stay up so late, to find some kind of ritual, some kind of routine for closing out the day, for winding down, for closing her eyes on the darkness. She couldn’t afford this disorder, this chaos. She had to pull herself together.

Cee listened to the wind tearing at the trees as she put the eye drops in; one for the left, two for the right. They stung, as usual, and it depressed her how much more the tiny burden of stinging eyes added to her day. Spring was an awakening, a joyous celebration, a preparation for the glories of summertime, but she felt sapless and wizened and dead.

Sitting at the light she asked herself, Why are you doing this? Why even go?

But she’d promised herself. She was going to do everything, see everything, take in as much as she could before the inevitable dimness, before the world turned to twilight. It seemed braver, somehow, if she went alone.

“Stargardt’s Disease,” her mother had intoned sepulchrally, whispering on the telephone to the pastor’s wife the day they had heard. “It’s hereditary, a recessive macular degeneration,” she’d continued, unable to resist displaying her word-for-word memory of the ophthalmologist’s diagnosis before breaking down completely. “How could we have known this would happen? It’s all my fault!”

Somehow her mother could claim responsibility – and thus the central role – in any and all crises. She’d cried for a full forty minutes – full-blown noisy, gulping sobs – when Cee had asked her father to rent her the little walkup by the marina that he’d just refurbished. The single, high ceilinged room with the loft bed, combined kitchen and dining room, cozy living room and wraparound porch was sunny, quiet, and five miles, strong oak door and a chrome-plated, steel-ball padlock away from her mother.

“You can’t move out, Cecil, you’re going blind,” her mother had blurted, then pressed shaking, tragic fingers against her lips.

“Mattie, please,” Dad had sighed.

“I’m not blind yet,” Cecil had argued, summoning her spirit from the basement before it was extinguished in yet another flood of dank, motherly tears. “Dr. Hoenig said she didn’t know how long I’d have… I just want to do normal things until… until I can’t.”

She’d signed up for art classes at UCSD, worked hard on depth and perception, shading and angles. With her store discount, she ate daily parfaits at the First Street Café, examining them minutely to see the play of color and light between the fresh, glistening fruit, yogurt and granola. Every morning she watched the layers of her lattés settle, and she watched as the sun dove headlong into the sea each night. She avoided telling anyone, seeing anyone, and instead spent her time recording the fading world…

–Which was just as bloody stupid and overdramatic as her mother’s way of dealing with things.

For goodness sakes, Cecil. You’re not blind yet.

The parking lot was crowded. Most people just parked at the beach, but Cee preferred to park at the mall, then walk the six blocks down the hill to the marina, cross the street and hit the sand. As the sun warmed her skin, she smelled fish frying, and wrinkled her nose, imagining thick slabs of crisped potatoes drenched in salt and vinegar. The gulls were cursing gutturally, shrieking over scraps and riding the currents. Salsa music boomed from the windows of a jeep as it passed. Right now, everything seemed good to smell, good to taste, good to touch. Cee felt a little pang as she remembered how she’d blown off Baz. He would have bought a basket from the vendor on the corner, and he would have let her eat almost all the chips. She really should call him and talk to him, soon. Baz had a way of eeling in next to her when she had a problem, digging in with his shoulder, and suddenly taking more than half the load. Cee blinked her stinging eyes rapidly and pushed up her sunglasses. She’d call Baz, tonight, for sure. Maybe it was time.

Just as she hit the beach, the traditional ‘Octopile’ began. At a shout from a faraway speaker, thousands of Octopi and jellyfish kites arose from the sand, followed by the requisite number of tropical fish, box kites, geckos, and the odd penguin. Looking up, it was all brightly colored nylon and graceful flight; the kites rippled aloft on wings of graceful beauty. Down below, it was a scene of controlled chaos as excitable kite enthusiasts ran about in short bursts, arms outstretched, urging their kites to defy gravity and rise.

Cee watched as a pair of runners collided, tangled their ropes, and fell headlong. She sucked in a breath, then as they sat up, laughing, she found herself slowly smiling, shaking her head at the absurdity. The flyers untangled themselves and dusted off, talking animatedly, waving their arms and stopping to point at the kites of more successful enthusiasts. Finally, one at a time, they tossed up their fragile crafts of bright fabric and balsa wood, and guided them into the current. After awhile, their kites were indistinguishable from the hundreds dotting the sky.

It was light was making her eyes water, Cecil knew. It was only the light, and not the thought of defying the odds and achieving flight, falling, rising, and trying again.


Notebook:I love kites. Ascent/Assent was inspired, in part, by this picture snapped by Flickr photographer Ffeeddee. More short YA and related tales on the web with Sunday Scribblings and the Merry Sisters of Fate.

Flickr Fiction Friday: Castles in the Air

It is hazy and sticky out, which isn’t unusual for Shanghai, but is unusual enough for so early in the morning. Even though the sun has not yet risen, the streets are still filled with people, cheek-by-jowl, rushing down the wide streets on bicycles, heading all directions. I wish I was one of them, filled with some kind of purpose, walking briskly. Instead, I am limping along, exhausted, still feeling jetlagged, travel-worn, and weary.

The boulevard outside the hotel boasts a wide, tree-lined walk; the Bund, the concierge called it. Walking along it are many Chinese peoples in plain outfits, doing the slow mantis-like movements of Tai Chi, and getting their morning exercise. A small group of fifteen or so senior citizens are flying kites against the pollution-corrupted sky. I encounter several curious gazes, but do not stop.

My high school had been thrilled we’d been invited to China; our a cappella chorus had worked hard all year, and had gone to the Mozart Festival in Austria only the summer before. Nobody had expected another overseas trip, but Ms. Dunston had a friend well placed in government in Shanghai, and with great excitement, she’d passed along a tour invitation to the school board. The trustees had been impressed enough to bring in the media, and for the last ten days, we’d been traveling with a newspaper columnist and a photographer, as well as with the usual plethora of interested parents and sponsors. We’d been performing every day for two weeks, and had two weeks of tours and performances left to go. Between the jetlag and the sticky, sullen weather, being ‘on’ all the time for the columnist and photographer, we were all exhausted, half-sick, and fractious. Students who were usually quiet and dependable were having screaming fights on the tour bus, and Liesel and Kim had cried most of the way through our tour of the Oriental Pearl Tower in Pudon, which was all aglitz with neon lights and flashing signs. When we got to East Asia Hotel, tearstained and tired, Ms. Dunston announced a curfew, and had instructed us all to go to bed immediately, or risk her wrath. I’d sleep early and deeply, and now, awake before six, I wander the streets with the locals.

Shanghai is beautiful, but strange. As we sing at each outdoor theater and concert hall, I feel too Western and huge, my wide shoulders and full figure the object of blank stares of astonishment by seemingly hundreds of small, compact Asian girls. I realize I am beginning to walk with a hunch, thoughtlessly trying to be shorter, smaller, to blend in. Where is the part of my heritage that is meant to fit here? My face is a flat oval but my skin is caramel crème and dimpled instead of a serene and delicate pale. Jamaica sings out in the bow of my lips, the sway of my steps, in the kinks in my hair. China, had given me only my eyes, which are long and tilted. It seems as if there is something else filling in the blanks, some third cultural fingerprint that only I can see. Even my mother doesn’t understand why I don’t want to be here, why the hair on my nape raised when everyone else thrilled at the word ‘China.’

“It will be such a great experience for you,” my mother, Yasmin had beamed. “Everyone should find out their roots.”

If I wanted to find out my supposed ‘roots,’ shouldn’t I be in Jamaica? The one-drop rule rules the world, I know that; to the Chinese, I am no more one of them than any Westerner. Anyway, I wonder how my mother can be so enthused. My full-blooded Jamaican father didn’t marry her because she is half Chinese, and his parents, as he had told her apologetically, would object – strenuously. He instead contents himself with sending trifles and trinkets from his ticky-tacky homeland, tourist toys meant to demonstrate a love I have not seen.

My mother won’t hear a bad word against him, but I hate my father, and vow I will never go to Jamaica. The problem is, ignoring Jamaica leaves me with my scrap of Chinese-ness, which isn’t enough to count. I am only a quarter, and nobody identifies me as that, either– I am something else. Girls in my class like Lily Wong don’t look at me and find instant sisterhood. Neither can I identify with the ‘one love’ ganja crowd, with their colorful crocheted hats and “Hey, Mon,” speech. I’m on my own island.

And now, I’m in Shanghai.

The air is stained thick with haze, the color of smoke, congestion, and new construction. I look up at the half-finished buildings, the new thrusting up beside the old, as ornate temples and skyscrapers vie for space on the choked and cluttered skyline. I have two more weeks to be here, two more weeks to take hold of something that proves to me that this, too, is my country. I may be only a stepchild, but China, at least, must somehow be mine.


Flickr photographer ^fred^ was the inspiration for the Flicktioning. You may perchance find more with the usual suspects: The Gurrier, Teaandcakes, Elimare, Chris, Aquafortis, Valshamerlyn, and Miss Mari.

Flickr Fiction Friday: The Silver Child

and without him

(a him that is, any him would have fit

into that strangely shaped hole

labeled ‘Da’) she was

lost. A bit dreamy, her teachers said,

always telling stories.

and she was shunned (by the girls) in Grade 4

since the time when she spent all recess

rescuing worms. They would have

drowned anyway, she knew, they had only

broken the surface of earth

to avoid the sea of mud.

She named them and gave them

Histories and pasts

And all of them had

fathers

the status quo

and she had nothing but

dirty hands.

“my da said” was how she started

all of her rambling fantasies

and in the schoolyard

under the pines, by the cyclone fence.

he was Red Deer, brave Chief

who hunted while she collected

acorns pine needles dirt

for imaginary feasts.

he was the checker at Costco

with the moon tattoo. At the zoo,

smiley and funny he was

the keeper with the penguins

Dribbling watery yolk-poop on his boots.

(Nobody ever said

“You don’t have a dad.”

Not out loud, anyway.)

By ninth grade she was

Just one of a pack

Pretending that Father’s Day

Was when girls went to the mall

And picked up Sugar Daddies.

Everybody had steps/halfs/divorces, and

She had lost her need, her hole, until

Mr. Bizet, the Art teacher, (“Mr. Bzzaaay,”

the snotty girls said

in their nasal, rich-girl voices)

Brought in pale white stalks

And said, “Draw.”

“Don’t just

tell me what you know

about shading and light.

Tell me

A story,” he said.

“What do you know

about this item?”

And she was back

on the playground

Under the pines next to

the cyclone fence,

Thinking,

Once upon a time

My Da said


These were faery houses.

A cozy community

And in each of them

There grew, in bright white darkness, a family of Ikone

Fey, pale, albino creatures

But with great strength.

And once, in every generation

A silver Ikone was born

“Why is she whispering?


Man, she’s such a freak.


Mr. B., can I change my seat?”

And the silver Ikone

Was the seventh child of a seventh

And though the Ikone

Took the child from its father

Raised it apart in the world

Of the priestesses,

It knew

It had a destiny

To change the world;

A duty to live, apart

From the pure white darkness

And be something greater

Stronger, something deeper.

“I like what you’re telling me,

Ænid. You look like you

Really know your story.”

“Have you ever thought

about writing? You’d be

good at it, I’ll bet.

“Oh, I don’t know,”

she said as if

inside she did not stand

upon the white rooftop

of her tiny home and shout

that she was

the silver child.


Photographer dis cover y has inspired this week’s Flickr snippet with this unnamed photograph, and may or may not be Flicktionated by our rapidly crumbling crew of the usual suspects: The Gurrier, Teaandcakes, Elimare, Chris, Aquafortis, Valshamerlyn, and Miss Mari.

Flickr Fiction Friday: Ascent/Assent

It would be different, watching the Kite Festival alone.

Last year, she’d danced on the sand with her friends from Dickenson. They were all incoming freshman, not yet too sophisticated to gallop about in mad waltzes to The 1812 Overture while the fireworks spiraled color and fire into the sky, and the kites tugged and swooped in a synchronized frenzy.

Last night Baz had phoned on his break, hoping for a reprise of last year with the picnic basket, blanket, plastic wineglasses and general silliness they had all enjoyed, but Cee hadn’t bothered turning him down; she’d just let the phone ring when the Caller ID flashed his name and number. It seemed too much to explain if she said no, and she couldn’t face ‘yes’ yet, not last night.

But it was windy this morning, and the wind had whistled through her sleep and tumbled her out of bed. She’d been halfway down the ladder from the loft before she’d realized she was wearing only one earring. A hasty search through the bedclothes left her scowling and determined next time to not stay up so late, to find some kind of ritual, some kind of routine for closing out the day, for winding down, for closing her eyes on the darkness. She couldn’t afford this disorder, this chaos. She had to pull herself together.

Cee listened to the wind tearing at the trees as she put the eye drops in; one for the left, two for the right. They stung, as usual, and it depressed her how much more the tiny burden of stinging eyes added to her day. Spring was an awakening, a joyous celebration, a preparation for the glories of summertime, but she felt sapless and wizened and dead.

Sitting at the light she asked herself, Why are you doing this? Why even go?

But she’d promised herself. She was going to do everything, see everything, take in as much as she could before the inevitable dimness, before the world turned to twilight. It seemed braver, somehow, if she went alone.

“Stargardt’s Disease,” her mother had intoned sepulchrally, whispering on the telephone to the pastor’s wife the day they had heard. “It’s hereditary, a recessive macular degeneration,” she’d continued, unable to resist displaying her word-for-word memory of the ophthalmologist’s diagnosis before breaking down completely. “How could we have known this would happen? It’s all my fault!”

Somehow her mother could claim responsibility – and thus the central role – in any and all crises. She’d cried for a full forty minutes – full-blown noisy, gulping sobs – when Cee had asked her father to rent her the little walkup by the marina that he’d just refurbished. The single, high ceilinged room with the loft bed, combined kitchen and dining room, cozy living room and wraparound porch was sunny, quiet, and five miles, strong oak door and a chrome-plated, steel-ball padlock away from her mother.

“You can’t move out, Cecil, you’re going blind,” her mother had blurted, then pressed shaking, tragic fingers against her lips.

“Mattie, please,” Dad had sighed.

“I’m not blind yet,” Cecil had argued, summoning her spirit from the basement before it was extinguished in yet another flood of dank, motherly tears. “Dr. Hoenig said she didn’t know how long I’d have… I just want to do normal things until… until I can’t.”

She’d signed up for art classes at UCSD, worked hard on depth and perception, shading and angles. With her store discount, she ate daily parfaits at the First Street Café, examining them minutely to see the play of color and light between the fresh, glistening fruit, yogurt and granola. Every morning she watched the layers of her lattés settle, and she watched as the sun dove headlong into the sea each night. She avoided telling anyone, seeing anyone, and instead spent her time recording the fading world…

–Which was just as bloody stupid and overdramatic as her mother’s way of dealing with things.

For goodness sakes, Cecil. You’re not blind yet.

The parking lot was crowded. Most people just parked at the beach, but Cee preferred to park at the mall, then walk the six blocks down the hill to the marina, cross the street and hit the sand. As the sun warmed her skin, she smelled fish frying, and wrinkled her nose, imagining thick slabs of crisped potatoes drenched in salt and vinegar. The gulls were cursing gutturally, shrieking over scraps and riding the currents. Salsa music boomed from the windows of a jeep as it passed. Right now, everything seemed good to smell, good to taste, good to touch. Cee felt a little pang as she remembered how she’d blown off Baz. He would have bought a basket from the vendor on the corner, and he would have let her eat almost all the chips. She really should call him and talk to him, soon. Baz had a way of eeling in next to her when she had a problem, digging in with his shoulder, and suddenly taking more than half the load. Cee blinked her stinging eyes rapidly and pushed up her sunglasses. She’d call Baz, tonight, for sure. Maybe it was time.

Just as she hit the beach, the traditional ‘Octopile’ began. At a shout from a faraway speaker, thousands of Octopi and jellyfish kites arose from the sand, followed by the requisite number of tropical fish, box kites, geckos, and the odd penguin. Looking up, it was all brightly colored nylon and graceful flight; the kites rippled aloft on wings of graceful beauty. Down below, it was a scene of controlled chaos as excitable kite enthusiasts ran about in short bursts, arms outstretched, urging their kites to defy gravity and rise.

Cee watched as a pair of runners collided, tangled their ropes, and fell headlong. She sucked in a breath, then as they sat up, laughing, she found herself slowly smiling, shaking her head at the absurdity. The flyers untangled themselves and dusted off, talking animatedly, waving their arms and stopping to point at the kites of more successful enthusiasts. Finally, one at a time, they tossed up their fragile crafts of bright fabric and balsa wood, and guided them into the current. After awhile, their kites were indistinguishable from the hundreds dotting the sky.

It was light was making her eyes water, Cecil knew. It was only the light, and not the thought of defying the odds and achieving flight, falling, rising, and trying again.


I love kites. Ascent/Assent was inspired by more than this picture snapped by Flickr photographer Ffeeddee. The Flictionators may or may not be the usual suspects: The Gurrier, Ms. Teaandcakes, Elimare, Chris, Aquafortis, Valshamerlyn, and Miss Mari.

Flickr Fiction Friday: The Power of Eve

His face was red.

Their faces always got red, or, sweat flushed and ruddy if their skin was dark.

They always sputtered, blinked, protested, entreated, hands clenched and angry or limp and defeated. They always groveled, begged, a time or two they’d threatened, but it hadn’t gotten them anywhere, hadn’t changed a thing for any of them, didn’t shift a pebble from the ton of gravel that was the power of Eve when she’d made up her mind.

“No.” She’d said it coolly, or as coolly as one could say no when one was caught by surprise, lying in the yard, reading, trying to snatch a cool breeze from this overly warm evening. Why her mother hadn’t warned her, she had no idea. It was irritating, how Mom and Dad were always trying to surprise her, to get her to be spontaneous, come “out of her shell,” act more her age. And now this boy was kneeling on the edge of her blanket, and she’d had to close her book, make nice and talk to him, and now turn him down cold.

His face was red, but for once it seemed to come more from shame than from anger. He raked his thick fingers through his hair, and it stood up like rust colored exclamation points. He scratched his ear, and furrowed his fuzzy eyebrows.

“Oh.” He nodded a bit, swallowed. “Well, okay. Sorry I asked.”

“Don’t be sorry.” She sighed, fastened a button on her shirt and rolled over onto her back. Above was the fractal formation of the tower, the sky a smudged and fading yellow-orange.

It was weird to have a power line in their back field. Almost every house in the subdivision had one next to their back fence, high voltage wires zapping their pace-makers and making them fear brain cancer, but Eve’s folks had one right on their property. The city gave them a whole three acres because of it, and because of it, they had a bigger house (to go with their bigger chance of brain cancer) than anyone else on the block. Nobody wanted to live there, underneath the high-voltage lines snapping and sparking, but everyone in Rancho Heights envied Eve’s family. They envied them their swimming pool, the pergola with the kiwi vines off the back porch, the mini-golf course, their gazebo with the wisteria and the water feature, and their great big rose and vegetable garden. Eve and her sisters had been the most popular girls at Rancho High forever, and Eve was in even higher demand with every boy on the football team. This boy cleared his throat.

“I wouldn’t have asked, but… well Conan said…”

“Conan is, who? The nose tackle guy? Black hair? Ski-jump nose?”

“Yeah. Conan… he said you were really good.”

Eve sighed, and pushed her hair back from her forehead. “Well, I appreciate the compliment, but ‘good’ is not the point. It’s not fair to me, you know.”

“I know. I mean, I think I know. But…if it’d help, I could pay you…?”

Eve rolled her eyes and sat up, waving her arm at the house, the yard, their possessions. “I don’t need money, really.”

He nodded, chagrined, rubbing his damp palms on his jeans. “Yeah. I kind of got that.”

Eve looked uncomfortable. “Well, the district pays me anyway. Look, I’m not trying to be mean. I do it because I love to. It’s just – every year, it’s the same thing. The whole football team starts talking about me, and then it’s a mad rush, and everybody wants me at once. It’s almost the end of the semester. I can’t, really. I just don’t have time.”

He stood, brushing invisible grass off of his knees with big hands. “Yeah. Coach said you’d say that.” His face is plainly regretful, but a smile crinkles his eyes, and uncovers an unexpected flash of humor. “Maybe next semester?”

“First week?” Her eyebrows arched above the metal frames of her glasses. “It won’t help to have this conversation all over again at the end of next semester.”

“First week,” he promised. “Coach said you’d say that, too.”

She stood and slid her feet into her sandals. “You’re a defensive guard, aren’t you?”

He blinked, then grinned. “Yeah. How’d you know?”

“You’ve got to be the biggest guy in the whole high school, and you’re new. Where’d you transfer from, Texas?”

“Montana.” He looked down at her, smiled and tried to speak quietly as she walked him to the gate. “I hear you graduated when you were thirteen.”

“Fourteen,” Eve shrugged and pushed up her glasses. “It’s not a big deal.”

“Seems like a big deal to me.” He looks properly impressed, then his eyes light with a flash of humor. “Senior year must’ve sucked though, huh? Couldn’t even drive yet!”

Eve winced. “Thanks for reminding me.” She held open the gate.

He paused, his big hands suddenly awkward. He studied his nails, shoved his hand into his pocket. His face was red.

“We’re playing Calistoga Sunday night. Probably the last game I’ll be in for awhile, Coach is gonna bench me when he gets my semester grades, but… maybe you wanna come? Grab some tacos at Tito’s after?”

“Me?” Eve, glancing around the empty yard, at the pergola, the gazebo, hears only the soft splash of the water from the fountain and feels immediately silly at her own question – And her hackles rise. She hates sounding stupid. She hates feeling like the world is laughing at her. She hates kids her own age, hates their little in-groups and code words. “You aren’t going to get anything out of me with tacos and football games. I’m still not going to do it.”

He took a step back, stung by the frost in her voice. “No. We said next semester. I’m just asking about the tacos for no reason. I mean, I mean, I’m asking for a reason, I mean, I have a reason, but not that one.” His face is redder now, and his ears glow like live coals. He hasn’t run away, though, hasn’t taken his eyes from her face.

“Oh.” Eve blinked, glanced back toward the edge of the yard where her blanket and her books lay stacked beneath the power lines. “I… sorry. Yeah. That might be really fun.” She looked up at him, pushed up her glasses and tried out a smile. “Thanks.”

Eve watched him shamble down the drive with that particular loose-limbed, football player walk, and was surprised how good she felt. Hope had the uncanny power of making Eve feel like a ton of gravel had been lifted from her shoulders. She wandered back to her blanket and flopped down on her back, dreaming bigger dreams than the tower above her.


This week’s picture(entitled Power) was taken by Flickr photographer Michael Nagel, and will likely be Flicktionated by the usual suspects: The Gurrier, Ms. Teaandcakes, Elimare, Chris, Aquafortis, Valshamerlyn, and Miss Mari.

Flickr Fiction Friday: Good Girl

Saudé backs into the corridor, the pressure seal ‘shusshing’ quietly behind her. Martrith had warned her they would come, asking, and she shudders at the implication behind the simple question she’s been asked.

When the Egelloc-Sgod stumbled across their galaxy, Earth had believed itself in a position of dominance against the plump, placid creatures. There had been illuminating discussions on technology and medicine, covert discussions of weaponry and cultural aggressions. So much of their world was known that it was thought that they were, in fact, natural allies; that they were in fact meant to be best friends. The Egelloc-Hsorf were humanoid in appearance, with warm, intelligent eyes, slightly lugubrious expressions, bellies which were sleek and bodies which ran to fat. Their blunt clawed hands were clumsy and eager, and only their elongated necks and double rings of sharp teeth destroyed the illusion of cute helplessness. As they aged, their skin produced more hair, then took on a mottled appearance, tingeing a slight brown with cream and black as their years progressed.

Earth was caught off guard when the first of the Egelloc visitors, so droll and witty, changed. How was she to know that this alien race was only in the first of their developmental stages? Egelloc-Hpos were carrion-eaters. Egelloc-Roinuj were flesh eaters. Egelloc-Sroines played deadly games and consumed their prey on the run.

Many had died before a solution had been found.

“You will let us… take your genetics, you know?” Noel, urbane in his ribbed cowl neck and reeking cigarillo had inclined his head, irises expanding and contracting in that nauseating ripple pattern which indicated inquiry. Saudé had known what he meant, even as she had arched a pierced brow in his direction.

“Genetics?”

“You are simply… so lovely. Such a lovely specimen, really well… marked.” The hair on Saudé’s nape lifted as Noel took her drink, then lifted her arm and peered at the capillaries snaking along its length.

“So well marked…” Noel had leaned over her arm, drawn his tongue down the lines, and she’d shuddered, masking revulsion with desire. His laughter coming in soft pants, Noel had looked up, and his irises had flickered once, twice. Saudé had swayed, feigning dizziness while breaking eye contact. The Egelloc-pack could hypnotize with their eyes, but Saudé was not novice enough to hold their gaze overlong. She counted to fifteen in Uzbekistani, refocused. If she did not respond with at least dizziness, Noel, and the few others of the pack hovering on the edge of the conversation would press in, exposing their throats where their poison apertures were secreted. It would take but the lightest puff, and she would be mind-wiped, forgetting who they were, why she stood there, what’d she’d set out to do that day. They were notoriously paranoid for a species which appeared to be so servile.

Saudé brushed a trembling hand over her face. “Genetics. A specimen. Yes.”

“Good girl.” Noel had bowed a little, given her the canine-tipped smile she hated. “Such a good girl. Such a good girl deserves a treat.”

And now, Saudé had slipped away from the party, was making her way to the stall where she Martrith had secreted the vial. Her hands shook, as she un-taped it from the back of the commode. Chocolate, 100% pure Dagoba Theobroma cacao, and she would ingest it…intravenously.

The Pack would not kill her, not today. Her genetic sample would be safely housed in a lab, where, cell-by-cell, it would grow, the rapid-fire mitosis taking place which would create the clones which would be bred and cloned again to sustain the pack. In their kennelships and in their homes, clones of Saudé would wait on them, they would lick her hands, nuzzle her throat, and whimper as she stroked them. She would scratch the bellies of the young ones, luxuriate in their fine hair with sharp-bristled brushes. And then, when they had finished toying with her, they would bite.

And then the methylxanthenes would flood their systems. And then, it was hoped, they will die.

Martrith was NSA, had told Saudé that she would likely be contacted, that she would likely be held up for blame, might die. This action might jeopardize the future of Earth, but it had to be done, now, and ever after, Earth would be more careful in its first contact situations with alien nations.

After tonight, Saudé will go into protective custody, change her name, undergo painful dermabrasion to remove every freckle, sclerotherapy to disguise the veins in her arms which had so attracted the Egelloc-pack to begin with.

Saudé holds out her arms, looks at them in the flickering fluorescent light of the impersonal bathroom stall Slowly, she pulls the thin rubber sash from her pocket, tightens it around her upper arm, frowning slightly at the brief discomfort as the hairs tug. She taps her arm with cold numb fingers, wishing for a junkie’s self-possession, or a diabetic’s steady hands. Martrith has left her only four needles; she needs to do this right. She abrades her arm with the alcohol prep pack, fingers her arm to be sure, then lets the thin hollow of steel bite her arm.

*** *** ***

“Saudé. What an interesting name. Sow-dee. Or is it Show-day?

“Sow-uday.” She smiles pleasantly. “Doesn’t really matter how you say it, though. I know who you’re talking to.”

Noel, standing in the doorway, grins, his laughter coming in silent pants. “Didn’t I say she was a treat? Isn’t she a little beauty?”

“Oh, she is, she is. Well, hop up on the table, won’t you, Saudé, that’s a good girl. And you’re sure you don’t want anything? A little sweet perhaps, or some protein? I know your Red Cross used to give sugar ampoules when humans donated their lifeblood, way back before the synthetics. This isn’t at all the same, but I want to give you something… a treat. Come on, you want a treat, don’t you? Don’t you girl?”

Saudé looks up with a lazy smile. “Treat? I’d like a treat. I’m a good girl. I’m a good girl.”


Spending time with people who mistake their children for pets, and require tricks out of them brought this story to mind. As for the rest – well, I’m always up for a discussion of chocolate and psychosis…just don’t forget that chocolate and artificial sweeteners, will kill a dog, all fictions aside… In other news, the photograph(entitled Blue Nile) is part of hanna.bi’s set, and will likely be riffed off of by the usual Flickr suspects: The Gurrier, Ms. Teaandcakes, Elimare, Chris, Aquafortis, Valshamerlyn, and Miss Mari.