Zombies vs. Unicorns Page 12

  “Well, she is as good as dead,” I said to myself, rinsing the scrubbed cloth and watching the pink cloud dissipate down the stream. “If you ask me.”

  Dreams began to trouble me. Often I dreamed of the dead child. Sometimes he lived, and made wise dreamish utterance that carried no sense when I repeated it to myself in the morning. Sometimes he died, or fell to pieces as he came out of his mother, or changed to a plant or a fleeing animal on emerging, but always these dreams were filled with the scent of him, maddening, unplaceable, all flowers and fruits combining, so strong it seemed still to linger in the room even after I woke, and slept again, and woke again in the morning, so tantalizing that several times I hunted on my hands and knees in the meadow around the cottage for the blossom that might be the source, that I might carry it about with me and tantalize myself further with the scent.

  I woke very suddenly from one of these dreams, and lay frightened in the night, washes of color flowering forth onto the darkness, with the surprise of the wakening to my heart and blood. My hearing had gone so sensitive, if one of my grandchildren had turned over in his sleep back home, I think I would have heard it. Outside a thud sounded, and another, earthen, and then another; a horse was about, not ridden by anyone, but perhaps it had pulled itself loose when tied to browse, and now wandered this unfruitful forest and had come upon our meadow in its hunger.

  When I had tamed my heart and breath, I left my bed and quietly opened the cottage door, to see whether the animal was wild or of some worth. I dare say I had it in mind how useful a horse would be, if it were broken and not too grand, how I might add interest to my dreary life here with excursions, with discoveries of towns within a day’s ride of the tower. I might spend a little of my gold there; I might converse with sellers and wives. Figures and goods and landscapes flowed across my imaginings, as I stepped out into the cold night, into the glare of the stars, the staring of the moon.

  The air was thick with the flower-scent of the dead boy-child—such a warm, summery smell, here in autumn’s chills and dyings! The horse stood white—a stallion, he was—against the dark forest. He was down the slope from the tower. He had raised his head and seemed to gaze at the upper window.

  “Perhaps you are too splendid,” I whispered, but I fetched the rope anyway, and tied a slip-loop. Then across the meadow I crept, stepping not much faster than a tree steps, so as not to frighten the horse away.

  At a certain point my breathing quieted and the night breeze eased to where the low noise issuing from my lady’s window reached me. That rooted me to the meadow ground more firmly, her near-inhuman singing, her crooning, broken now and then with grunts and gutturals, something like triumphant laughter.

  I have often been thought a witch myself, with my ugly looks and my childbedding, but I tell you, I have never evoked any such magic as shivered under that fine horse’s moonlit hide, as streamed off it in the night, fainting me with its scent and eluding my eye with its blown blooms and shining threads. And I have never cast such a spell as trailed out that window on my mistress’s, my charge’s, song, if song it were. It turned my bones to sugar ice, I tell you, my mind to sweet syrup and my breath to perfume.

  And then among her singing another sound intruded, with no voice to it, no magic, no song. It was an earthly sound and an earthy: stone scraped on stone, heavily, and surreptitious somehow.

  Then I knew what she was about, with her mad singing, with her green-tipped baby, with her caring so little for the shame of the queen’s name and family. And I ran—more, I flew—across the meadow grasses and around to the tower door. I must be quiet, or she would hurry and be gone before I reached her; I must be quick!

  I took the prison room key from under its stone and managed to open the tower door silently. I sped up the stairs, put the key in the lock and turned it, with its usual squeaks and resistance. From inside, loud now, undisguised, came the grinding, the push of stone on stone.

  “My lady!” I forced the stiff key around.

  More grinding. Then, and as I flung myself into the room, the stone the girl had loosened from the arrow slot—months of labor in the night, it would have taken her!—thudded down into the meadow at the foot of the tower.

  “My lady, no!”

  She darkened the hole with her body, for the moments it took me to cross the room. My fingertip brushed the hem of her nightgown. Then moonlight and starlight whitened my reaching hand.

  “Madam!” I screamed to the waiting horse, but through my scream I heard the impact of the lady below, the crack of breaking bone.

  “Madam, no! What have you done?”

  I pressed myself to the arrow slot, peering down. The horse stepped up the grass, and I gasped. He bore a fine long spiraling horn on his brow, like some animals of Africa, anteloupes and such. I could smell him, the sweet ferocious flower-and-fruitishness of him, so powerfully that I was not surprised—I did not gasp again—when my lady appeared, walking across the meadow, not limping as she ought, or nursing any injury that I could see. And when she embraced him, he bowing his head to hold her slight body against his breast, and crooking his knee to further enclose her, the rightness and the joy of it caught me in belly and groin, like a birth pain and a love pang together, and I drank of the sight as they each seemed to be drinking of the other, through their skins, through his coat and her clothing, from the warmth they pressed into being between them.

  She held and held him, around his great neck, her fingers in his mane; she murmured into him, and rubbed her cheek on the nape of him and kissed him; she reached along his shoulder and the muscles there, holding him to her, and no further proof was needed than that embrace, and the sight of her lifted face, and the scent in my nostrils of all that lived and burgeoned, that the two of them were lovers and had loved, that the little green-tipped boy had been issue of this animal and this maiden, that the carbuncle on the boy’s brow had been the first formings toward his own horn, that I had been witness to magic and marvels. The world, indeed, was a vaster and much mysteriouser place than queens and god-men would have us believe.

  My mistress led the horse to the tree stump I used for chopping kindling on. She mounted him from there, and rode him away. I shook my head and clutched my breast to see them, so nobly did he move, and so balanced was her seat to his movement—they were almost the one creature, it was clear to me.

  And then they were gone. There was nothing below but night-lit meadow, giving onto black forest. Above, stars sang out blindly in the square of air where my lady had removed the stone. The prison room was empty; the door yawned; the window gaped. Everything felt loose, or broken. The sweetness slipped out of the air, leaving only the smell of the dead fire, and of cold stone.

  I left the door ajar, from some strange notion that my lady might return, and require to imprison herself again. I walked down the stairs I had so lately flown up. Slowly I crossed the lower room to the other gaping door, and stepped out into the meadow. Brightly colorless, it was, under the moonlight, the grass like gray straw, the few late flowers leaning or drooping asleep.

  I rounded the tower. There she was, her head broken on the fallen stone. I scarce could believe my eyes. I scarce could propel myself forward, surprise had frozen so thickly around the base of my spine, where all the impulses to walk begin, all the volitions.

  “My lady, my lady!” I fell to my knees rather than knelt to them. How little she was, and fine, and pale! How much more delicate-crafted are noble ladies, aren’t they?, than us countrywomen, all muscled for fieldwork and family life! But even my thick skull could not have prevailed against that stone, and from that height. Blood had trickled from her eye corner, and her nose and mouth, and poured through her hair; now she seemed glued blackly to the stone, staring to the forest, watching herself ride away.

  This is the end of my story. I told a different one to Lord Hawley when I walked out of the mountains and bought myself a strong little bay mare to ride to the palace and give my information. My lord—I had not
seen him in person before—was small, and his furs and silks and chains and puffed-out sleeves made him seem as wide as he was tall. He listened to my tale most interestedly, and then he released me from my contract, paying it out in full though I had four months to serve yet, and adding to that amount the sum I had paid for the mare, and double the sum I had outlaid for bed and food to visit him, so that I should not arrive home at all out of pocket. He gave me a guard to protect me and my moneys all the way to Steeping Dingle; that guard, in time, was to marry my youngest, little Ruth, and sire me four grandsons and three granddaughters.

  I had no reason to complain of my treatment by the queen’s house; every royal man gave me full courtesy and respect. And though I was sworn to secrecy over the whole affair, the fact that I had had royal dealings, as evidenced by my return with the guard, did much for my standing, and from that time on I made a tidier living bringing out babies than all the other good-women combined, in my village and throughout the surrounding country.

  “The Children of the Revolution”

  Justine: Maureen Johnson’s brain does not work like that of most people. Possibly because it’s already infected. Consider this story a report from the inside and a warning to begin your search for a zombie-proof abode NOW. Stock it well!

  Holly: One of the things I find particularly upsetting about zombies is the idea of being trapped in your own head, unable to think clearly, but still conscious. Forever. It’s pretty much the worst thing I can think of—ugh. Just writing about it makes me shudder.

  Justine: Once again, I thank you, Holly, for pointing out further awesome aspects to writing about zombies. While, yes, I do, indeed, love zombies qua zombies, it’s also true that they are the most resonantly powerful metaphor of all time.

  The Children of the Revolution

  By Maureen Johnson

  Maybe I really should have guessed the moment I saw the children and the room they were kept in. Sure, there’s no way I could have known what was specifically going on … only a lunatic could have guessed what was specifically going on … but something was clearly wrong with the picture.

  The room was a child’s wonderland. What had once been formal dining rooms and sitting rooms and reception rooms had been turned into one massive, long room, separated only by bits of load-bearing walls or massive fireplaces that could not be removed. The walls and ceiling had been painted to look like a blue sky, full of cartoonish clouds. The wood floors had been covered by colorful squares of heavy foam rubber and carpet. At the far end there was a full-size jungle gym, complete with a purple and red tube slide and a small ball pen. There was a fake tree that rose all the way to the ceiling, with a tree house and a swing. There was a book nook, and a play kitchen with plastic pots and pans. There was a section for throwing balls. Televisions were mounted high on the walls. In one corner there were five little beds—a little race car, one that looked like a plastic castle, one that looked like a rocket, one that was covered in sparkles, and one designed to look like a half-moon in a puddle of starry sky. There was everything needed to keep small children very happy. The enormous windows had clearly been treated with something to keep out prying eyes, and were barred for safety.

  The whole thing was sealed off by an extraordinary baby gate—about five feet of a clear fine mesh of very strong plastic, clamped from wall to wall. The mesh was as tall as the average adult and was soft and strong enough to take any assault a child could inflict upon it. A wayward ball had gotten loose, and their mother tossed it softly over the top of the gate.

  “I can’t really take them outside,” the woman explained, “so I tried to bring the outside in.”

  They certainly looked like they needed a little outside time. Their lips were all very dry, their eyes all very milky. Their skin had no luster. I was prepared to blame almost anything on England at that point, but these kids … It wasn’t just the bad weather. They moved like toddlers, even though they were older than that and should have had more of the easy grace of kindergartners. They needed the vitamin D of the sun. They needed to run and play and get a healthy glow and some coordination.

  “They come from all different countries,” their mother went on. “None of them are native English speakers. They know a few words. They’re learning. Watch. Everyone! Look at mommy! Listen to mommy.”

  Five little heads turned. The one closest, a girl started to drool. A long strand of saliva loosened from her mouth.

  “Mommy has to go on a trip. A very short trip. Mommy has to go to London, just for a day. Just for a day.”

  This brought a collective noise of interest from the children.

  “It’s all right, it’s all right. Look at the nice friend mommy has brought to stay with you! Isn’t she nice? Isn’t she pretty? You like her, don’t you?”

  The children all examined me with baffled stares.

  “Ugggnnhhhhhh?” asked the oldest boy, pointing at me. It seemed a little judgmental to my ears.

  “Yes,” said their mother, who apparently understood this. “This is Sofie. You like her!”

  One of the girls stumbled and fell over for no reason at all. She hit the ground with a solid thump, but the thick rubber easily cushioned the fall. She pushed herself back up, and promptly fell again.

  So, yeah. I should have known that these were not normal children. But I thought, Celebrity children. Well, they’re just different. You can’t apply the same standards you apply to regular children. And though they were clearly not doing well, I guess the voices in my brain were telling me that these kids had dietitians and had spent a lot of their short lifetimes on private aircraft (that has to mess with your inner ear balance), and maybe that’s just what being really rich looks like.

  But there was another voice in my head—a quieter one, way in the back, telling me to leave, to get out of the house and away from them, to go back into the rain, to hitchhike to London or starve or even just call home.

  While I can still assign blame, I want to make sure you know this was all Franklin’s fault. …

  Come to England, he said. We will have a romantic summer together picking berries on an organic farm, he said. Wild ponies roam free around the farm, he said. Imagine us with our organic berries surrounded by the beautiful wild ponies, he said. We will read to each other, he said. We will write long letters in real handwriting, he said. We will enjoy the quiet and fresh air and be together all the time, he said. Learn to live, he said. Look at this website I found, he said.

  The website talked about the free room and board on the farm. Three square organic meals a day in the fecund countryside. It presented images of an ecologically friendly, healthy, progressive wonderland with a house full of people from many countries. It showed pictures of carrots and berries and ponies and little English towns and a big English fireplace with a roaring fire. This is where Franklin wanted us to go to be together.

  Of course, he showed me this one afternoon when he was skipping class. When trolls cut classes, you think they are losers. When the beautiful and/or reasonably erudite do the same thing to sit on the library steps and read poetry, you think they are on to something deep. You see only deep brown wavy hair and strong legs, well honed by years of Ultimate Frisbee. You see that book of T. S. Eliot poems held by the hand with the long, graceful fingers, and you never stop to think that it shouldn’t take half a semester to read one book of poems … that maybe he is not so much reading as getting really high every morning and sleeping it off on the library steps, forcing the people who actually go to class to step or trip over him.

  At least if you are me. Looking back, I made a number of bad decisions that now seem glaringly obvious. But that’s hindsight for you.

  I mean, I was a freshman at college, overwhelmed, with too little sleep and an experimental haircut and a bipolar roommate and little to no idea what I was doing with my life. I was out of my depth with Franklin—a beautiful junior, so very dreamy eyed. (Again, I know what that means now.) We met when I basically fell over him
on my way out of the library, which led to three weeks of I-fell-for-you jokes that he laughed at every time. (This is because he was very, very high and had no memory of my telling them before, and also he laughed at everything, including sneezes and radiators and doorknobs and long silences.)

  I guess I was just a little too easily impressed with people that seem beyond me socially. I mean, Franklin had been an actual catalog model for J.Crew when he was thirteen. I think you can maybe understand why it took me a few weeks to catch on to the fact that he was completely and totally full of shit, and that all of his ideas were bad. Specifically, I caught on when I was up to my ankles by the side of an English road weeks later, yanking reluctant blackberries out of a bush full of thorns that tore at my skin while cars whizzed by my back. Alone. In the misting rain.

  See, what Franklin did not mention—or, more likely, did not know—was that “Come live and work on our organic farm in remote England this summer!” actually meant “Be our slaves, stupid students!” No one mentioned that the farmhouse was uninsulated and not really weatherproof, and that the huge fireplace was in the owner’s house. Our accommodation had no such fireplace. The roof leaked on the third floor, and the floors leaned and creaked, and the beds were World War II surplus cots. The website didn’t convey the all-pervading damp and boredom, that it was the land of daily rain and sweaters in mid-June. That the owners were mean and cheap, that hot water was unknown, that there was no washing machine (except in their house, and they certainly weren’t sharing). That the nearest town was a mile and a quarter away down a road with no shoulder. That it was the land of godforsaken wild ponies that charged at you through the bushes when you were least expecting it, looking for apples in your pockets and hating you for not having them, butting you with their massive heads in retaliation.