Post by Anna on Dec 11, 2007 22:32:00 GMT -5
I'd have to say that this was my favorite story I've written, ever.
Where the Stars Used to Be
I will read ashes for you, if you ask me.
I will look into the fire and tell you from the gray lashes
And out of the red and black tongues and stripes
I will tell you how fire comes, and how fire runs as far as the sea.
--Fire Pages
We had it coming, that much I know. Ten thousand years, maybe more. Humans had been wrecking the planet--no, the world--for at least that long. Would it have happened if everybody was special the way we were? If it hadn’t been my idea in the first place? There are too many ifs that I can’t answer. All I know is that I trusted my sisters, beyond anything or anyone else in the world. But it eventually all boiled down to one thought, one idea, one question:
Was the world worth the four of us, even if it was the cause of our destruction?
I guess plants don’t have much to worry about, other than dirt and water and getting picked, so they would probably pay attention to that stuff, even when we didn’t. When I was four, and a lily first slapped my cheek and chastised me for picking it, I turned to Aurora, astonished, and exclaimed, “It hit me! It talked!”
Aurora, being the older, wiser one, seven to my four, snatched it from my hand. “See? You killed it,” she said, staring at me as if I were an alien. She poked it back into the dirt, stroking the stem, not having gripped yet the understanding of solid life and endless death. But it wasn’t just the two of us: once Katie could print, she wrote down complicated conversations between herself and our plants, and Batsy talked to bushes before she talked to us. Somewhere down the line, Aurora must have discovered the consequences of spilling to someone, because she ordered us to stay quiet. What were we supposed to do? We obeyed.
By the time I was eleven, nearly twelve, talking plants had become routine--one-fourth of my life. The rest was split between my sisters. School didn’t even register--Katie and I couldn’t have cared less about it. But Aurora was a straight-A machine who dutifully made me do my homework, so there I was, next to the same fateful lily patch, trying to memorize one more stupid spelling word. “Consequential, C-O-N--shoot, is that an S or a C?” I muttered.
“It’s an S,” hissed the lily bush.
Surprised, I looked up toward one flower that leaned forward over the others. “Thanks,” I murmured gratefully. “How’s the weather down there?”
If flowers could throw nasty looks, this one did. “If you must know, it’s downright filthy. People are killing us off like mad. Watch it!” it added angrily, as I tugged absentmindedly on some grass.
“Sorry,” I said, hastily retiring to pulling on my hair. “Ever thought of going on strike? You know what that is, right?”
A leaf twitched, agitated. “You honestly think we haven’t thought of that? But that’d be supernatural, all of us halting at once. People would go crazy.”
“You could, uh, wilt?” I offered up. They’d think it was something with the soil or water. I wouldn’t tell anybody,” I added hastily. “Just my sisters.”
The patch gave a whistling sigh. “Whatever, kid. You can leave now.”
Three weeks later, November break
“Katie, get the yogurt, milk and eggs. Anna, you can find the vegetables and fruits. Batsy and I will get--well, we’ll get something,” Aurora instructed, shooting a nasty glance and Batsy, who was sitting on the floor, resolutely not moving. “Katie, no running with shopping carts, and Annie, be careful with the tomatoes, will you?”
I threw her a balky look--I hadn’t dropped any since I was five, just a year older than Batsy. Shaking off my annoyance, I pulled my cart over to the peppers--and shrieked. “Aurora! Aurora!!”
She came running out of the pasta aisle, and aggrieved-looking Batsy clinging to her shopping cart. “Anna, don’t shout in the store! What on earth’s the matter?”
I pointed to the vegetable display. On the stand sat several wilted peppers, for sale at $6.99 a pound.
Aurora’s mouth dropped open. “Holy sh--“
I gave her arm a sharp pinch and nodded toward Batsy, who was looking over interestedly.
Aurora bit her lip. “Maybe there was a drought, or something? I don’t know.”
Just then, from the dairy section of the store, came a yell--“AURORA!”
“Uh-oh,” said Batsy cheerfully, dropping raw strands of spaghetti onto the floor, where they splintered into a thousand pieces, never to be put back together again.
It wasn’t just peppers and eggs. The prices on everything but canned meat had up to doubled. “We can’t afford this,” Aurora pointed out worriedly as we trudged our way home.
I glanced into our shopping bag, which contained a pound of apples, a gallon of milk, and quite a lot of canned tuna. “She’s right,” I murmured.
“We’re not going to starve…right?” said Katie doubtfully.
I stopped, set down the bag, and wrapped my arms around her. “No, no, and no,” I assured her, seeing the nine-year-old innocence reflected in her eyes. I hoped I didn’t sound as scared as I felt.
“News...news…where’s…stupid…news…?” I muttered that night, flipping through the TV channels.
Katie grabbed the remote from my hand and punched in the channel number as Aurora came in, carrying Batsy’s toothbrush, which she deposited on the piano.
After several minutes of someone rambling on about politics, we got to the environmental and agricultural news. “Plants all over the continent have been dying off rapidly over the past few days. Scientists have been unable to explain the sudden change, however, the plant population of North and South America has been nearly cut in half. Grocery prices have been steadily rising over the past few days and are expected to triple again before the end of Novemb--“
Aurora had turned off the TV and was walking quickly away. I saw her covering her face with her hands and felt a momentary pang--Dad, who was an environmental scientist, paid for everything but left us mostly alone. I could tell how scared she was; it wasn’t often that Aurora broke down.
“What’s going on?” Katie demanded of thin air, looking rather shocked. “Are the plants going on strike or something?”
Her question hit me over the head and exploded like a bomb, and I found myself up and running too.
Within two more weeks, all the plants were gone--every one. Only a few domestic ones remained alive in each garden, including our lily patch, and we hadn’t eaten anything fresh in a week.
“I swear,” I announced, setting down my fork, “one more can of spam, and I’m going to--“ Katie poked me, pointing at Batsy, who was looking nauseated as she forced down her tuna.
Aurora dropped her fork as well. “Do we have any more grass?”
“NO!” the three of us shouted in unison, remembering the bitter, stringy taste--almost worse than school food. But because of the huge food shortage, school hadn’t even started again. Dad stayed in his office almost twenty-four-seven, madly e-mailing other scientists for clues. We hadn’t gone shopping in a week. We couldn’t afford to heat the house, so we were always cold. Nobody went outside, ever.
That night, I didn’t sleep. I lay awake in bed, turning over a thousand questions in my mind. The one thing that was haunting me was that it was all my fault.
Aurora rolled over next to me in bed, and I saw the glowing whites of her eyes. I tried to turn away, but not before she noticed the tearstains branding my cheeks. “Anna?” she whispered, sitting up. “What’s wrong?”
I opened my mouth to speak, but a cascade of tears made their way out first.
“Sssshhh,” Aurora murmured. “It’ll be okay. It’ll all be okay.” She pulled me into her lap, and I curled up like I was Batsy’s age again and choked out a confession.
“I suggested it to them,” I sobbed. “It was my idea. It’s all my fault.”
“We’ll go ask them to stop,” she said firmly.
“No!” I cried, burying my face in her shoulder. “I can’t, I really can’t.”
“Oh, Annie,” she sighed, wrapping her arms around me and hugging me tight. In that instant, I remembered when our mom was still alive, and she’d take the four of us out at night to look at the stars. “Stars are always there, even when you can’t see them,” she’d tell us. “See those stars? That’s where we all go eventually.”
“Can you see people who are there?” I said, not knowing that soon my mother would be going to the stars too.
She knew. A burst of pain crossed her face, then subsided. “Once I’m up there, you can all look up and see me traced in the stars,” she promised. “I’ll always be there for you.”
You, if you were sensible,
When I tell you the stars flash signals, each one dreadful,
You would not turn and answer me,
“The night is wonderful.”
--Under the Oak
It was ten below zero outside the next morning. I was wearing three sweaters, and my sisters were huddled together behind me. I knelt down next to the lilies and, for one horrible second, the thought occurred to me that they might be dead. But the next moment, the same old flower straightened up, and I heard an indistinct hiss of “Hey, kids.”
“Listen,” I whispered, teeth chattering. “You need to stop, now. Please.”
“Are you kidding?” the flower hissed. “This is going great! Oh, boy, do they value us now…”
“Listen,” I said again, desperately, forcing back tears. “I am begging you. I will do anything you ask. Please, stop.”
The lily twitched, sighed. “Maybe…one thing…”
“Anything,” I gasped.
All right,” the flower drawled. “I want…you.”
I gasped again. “Me?” I glanced back at my sisters. All three of them, including Aurora, looked terrified.
“No, you numbskull, all of you. It’s too dangerous to us to have you four running around.”
I felt a chill up my spine, and realized that the wind had twisted into a tornado and was starting to whip around us. I backed toward my sisters. Aurora pinned me to her chest with one hand, holding me tight, tight. “Isn’t there anything else?” I yelled over the roaring wind.
“Yeah! Anything!” Katie screamed.
The lily laughed, cruel, high-pitched, and wicked. “Not a chance. You take it or leave it--and you decide now.”
I pulled Aurora’s hand from my chest and spun around to face her. “I’m sorry,” I cried, swiping helplessly at the tears running down my cheeks. I hadn’t even noticed I’d been crying. “I’m so sorry.”
Aurora glanced at us--Batsy wrapped around her legs, Katie clinging to her hand, me shivering in front of her. “Okay! Fine!” The wind was picking up now, and a torrent of darkness started to twist around us. Aurora sat on the icy pavement, pulling Katie and Batsy down beside her. I sank down between my two younger sisters, grabbing one of Katie’s hands and one of Aurora’s. Aurora took hands with Batsy and me, and Katie with me and Batsy, until we were all connected to each other.
We’re a circuit, I thought, feeling my first surge of strength in days.
“Ready?” said Aurora bracingly.
“Ready,” I said.
“Ready,” echoed Katie.
“Ready,” Batsy whispered.
“NOW!” Aurora yelled. Instantly, I felt us being lifted off the ground, spinning madly in circles. Batsy was screaming--and then, quite suddenly, she was quiet. “Batsy!” Aurora screamed, reaching for her, but she had vanished.
I felt Katie’s grip on my hand weaken. “Wait!” I cried, but her hand had dissolved on mine.
“Anna!” Aurora yelled.
“Yeah?”
“I love you, okay?”
I glanced into her eyes and saw the dull cast where the sparkle used to be, tears running down her cheeks, a river of words I knew I wouldn’t be around to hear her say. I was clutching at both of her hands now. I squeezed them, only to feel my palms slide through hers. “Aurora?” But she was gone. I curled into a ball, wishing for my sisters more than anything else in the world--and then there was blackness.
When along the pavement,
Palpitating flames of life,
People flicker round me,
I forget my bereavement,
The gap in the great constellation,
The place where a star used to be.
--Submergence
Epilogue
I’m not sure where I am now, but wherever it is, there are no stars at all. There’s nothing, nothing but an uncertain knowledge that my sisters are together, and that I am alone. And I have nothing but a vague feeling of being, a misty existence. I’m not even Anna anymore. I’m a floating spirit, a former me, and I don’t think it was supposed to end this way, when we were the ones who died for everyone else. Wherever I am, it’s just me and a few memories of my sisters that I hang onto like nothing else, the last fragments of myself. And when I can’t bear it all any longer, I close my eyes and feel again the last clutches of my sisters’ fingers before they were gone--a heartbeat, a language made of secrets, for words too hard to say.
Where the Stars Used to Be
I will read ashes for you, if you ask me.
I will look into the fire and tell you from the gray lashes
And out of the red and black tongues and stripes
I will tell you how fire comes, and how fire runs as far as the sea.
--Fire Pages
We had it coming, that much I know. Ten thousand years, maybe more. Humans had been wrecking the planet--no, the world--for at least that long. Would it have happened if everybody was special the way we were? If it hadn’t been my idea in the first place? There are too many ifs that I can’t answer. All I know is that I trusted my sisters, beyond anything or anyone else in the world. But it eventually all boiled down to one thought, one idea, one question:
Was the world worth the four of us, even if it was the cause of our destruction?
I guess plants don’t have much to worry about, other than dirt and water and getting picked, so they would probably pay attention to that stuff, even when we didn’t. When I was four, and a lily first slapped my cheek and chastised me for picking it, I turned to Aurora, astonished, and exclaimed, “It hit me! It talked!”
Aurora, being the older, wiser one, seven to my four, snatched it from my hand. “See? You killed it,” she said, staring at me as if I were an alien. She poked it back into the dirt, stroking the stem, not having gripped yet the understanding of solid life and endless death. But it wasn’t just the two of us: once Katie could print, she wrote down complicated conversations between herself and our plants, and Batsy talked to bushes before she talked to us. Somewhere down the line, Aurora must have discovered the consequences of spilling to someone, because she ordered us to stay quiet. What were we supposed to do? We obeyed.
By the time I was eleven, nearly twelve, talking plants had become routine--one-fourth of my life. The rest was split between my sisters. School didn’t even register--Katie and I couldn’t have cared less about it. But Aurora was a straight-A machine who dutifully made me do my homework, so there I was, next to the same fateful lily patch, trying to memorize one more stupid spelling word. “Consequential, C-O-N--shoot, is that an S or a C?” I muttered.
“It’s an S,” hissed the lily bush.
Surprised, I looked up toward one flower that leaned forward over the others. “Thanks,” I murmured gratefully. “How’s the weather down there?”
If flowers could throw nasty looks, this one did. “If you must know, it’s downright filthy. People are killing us off like mad. Watch it!” it added angrily, as I tugged absentmindedly on some grass.
“Sorry,” I said, hastily retiring to pulling on my hair. “Ever thought of going on strike? You know what that is, right?”
A leaf twitched, agitated. “You honestly think we haven’t thought of that? But that’d be supernatural, all of us halting at once. People would go crazy.”
“You could, uh, wilt?” I offered up. They’d think it was something with the soil or water. I wouldn’t tell anybody,” I added hastily. “Just my sisters.”
The patch gave a whistling sigh. “Whatever, kid. You can leave now.”
Three weeks later, November break
“Katie, get the yogurt, milk and eggs. Anna, you can find the vegetables and fruits. Batsy and I will get--well, we’ll get something,” Aurora instructed, shooting a nasty glance and Batsy, who was sitting on the floor, resolutely not moving. “Katie, no running with shopping carts, and Annie, be careful with the tomatoes, will you?”
I threw her a balky look--I hadn’t dropped any since I was five, just a year older than Batsy. Shaking off my annoyance, I pulled my cart over to the peppers--and shrieked. “Aurora! Aurora!!”
She came running out of the pasta aisle, and aggrieved-looking Batsy clinging to her shopping cart. “Anna, don’t shout in the store! What on earth’s the matter?”
I pointed to the vegetable display. On the stand sat several wilted peppers, for sale at $6.99 a pound.
Aurora’s mouth dropped open. “Holy sh--“
I gave her arm a sharp pinch and nodded toward Batsy, who was looking over interestedly.
Aurora bit her lip. “Maybe there was a drought, or something? I don’t know.”
Just then, from the dairy section of the store, came a yell--“AURORA!”
“Uh-oh,” said Batsy cheerfully, dropping raw strands of spaghetti onto the floor, where they splintered into a thousand pieces, never to be put back together again.
It wasn’t just peppers and eggs. The prices on everything but canned meat had up to doubled. “We can’t afford this,” Aurora pointed out worriedly as we trudged our way home.
I glanced into our shopping bag, which contained a pound of apples, a gallon of milk, and quite a lot of canned tuna. “She’s right,” I murmured.
“We’re not going to starve…right?” said Katie doubtfully.
I stopped, set down the bag, and wrapped my arms around her. “No, no, and no,” I assured her, seeing the nine-year-old innocence reflected in her eyes. I hoped I didn’t sound as scared as I felt.
“News...news…where’s…stupid…news…?” I muttered that night, flipping through the TV channels.
Katie grabbed the remote from my hand and punched in the channel number as Aurora came in, carrying Batsy’s toothbrush, which she deposited on the piano.
After several minutes of someone rambling on about politics, we got to the environmental and agricultural news. “Plants all over the continent have been dying off rapidly over the past few days. Scientists have been unable to explain the sudden change, however, the plant population of North and South America has been nearly cut in half. Grocery prices have been steadily rising over the past few days and are expected to triple again before the end of Novemb--“
Aurora had turned off the TV and was walking quickly away. I saw her covering her face with her hands and felt a momentary pang--Dad, who was an environmental scientist, paid for everything but left us mostly alone. I could tell how scared she was; it wasn’t often that Aurora broke down.
“What’s going on?” Katie demanded of thin air, looking rather shocked. “Are the plants going on strike or something?”
Her question hit me over the head and exploded like a bomb, and I found myself up and running too.
Within two more weeks, all the plants were gone--every one. Only a few domestic ones remained alive in each garden, including our lily patch, and we hadn’t eaten anything fresh in a week.
“I swear,” I announced, setting down my fork, “one more can of spam, and I’m going to--“ Katie poked me, pointing at Batsy, who was looking nauseated as she forced down her tuna.
Aurora dropped her fork as well. “Do we have any more grass?”
“NO!” the three of us shouted in unison, remembering the bitter, stringy taste--almost worse than school food. But because of the huge food shortage, school hadn’t even started again. Dad stayed in his office almost twenty-four-seven, madly e-mailing other scientists for clues. We hadn’t gone shopping in a week. We couldn’t afford to heat the house, so we were always cold. Nobody went outside, ever.
That night, I didn’t sleep. I lay awake in bed, turning over a thousand questions in my mind. The one thing that was haunting me was that it was all my fault.
Aurora rolled over next to me in bed, and I saw the glowing whites of her eyes. I tried to turn away, but not before she noticed the tearstains branding my cheeks. “Anna?” she whispered, sitting up. “What’s wrong?”
I opened my mouth to speak, but a cascade of tears made their way out first.
“Sssshhh,” Aurora murmured. “It’ll be okay. It’ll all be okay.” She pulled me into her lap, and I curled up like I was Batsy’s age again and choked out a confession.
“I suggested it to them,” I sobbed. “It was my idea. It’s all my fault.”
“We’ll go ask them to stop,” she said firmly.
“No!” I cried, burying my face in her shoulder. “I can’t, I really can’t.”
“Oh, Annie,” she sighed, wrapping her arms around me and hugging me tight. In that instant, I remembered when our mom was still alive, and she’d take the four of us out at night to look at the stars. “Stars are always there, even when you can’t see them,” she’d tell us. “See those stars? That’s where we all go eventually.”
“Can you see people who are there?” I said, not knowing that soon my mother would be going to the stars too.
She knew. A burst of pain crossed her face, then subsided. “Once I’m up there, you can all look up and see me traced in the stars,” she promised. “I’ll always be there for you.”
You, if you were sensible,
When I tell you the stars flash signals, each one dreadful,
You would not turn and answer me,
“The night is wonderful.”
--Under the Oak
It was ten below zero outside the next morning. I was wearing three sweaters, and my sisters were huddled together behind me. I knelt down next to the lilies and, for one horrible second, the thought occurred to me that they might be dead. But the next moment, the same old flower straightened up, and I heard an indistinct hiss of “Hey, kids.”
“Listen,” I whispered, teeth chattering. “You need to stop, now. Please.”
“Are you kidding?” the flower hissed. “This is going great! Oh, boy, do they value us now…”
“Listen,” I said again, desperately, forcing back tears. “I am begging you. I will do anything you ask. Please, stop.”
The lily twitched, sighed. “Maybe…one thing…”
“Anything,” I gasped.
All right,” the flower drawled. “I want…you.”
I gasped again. “Me?” I glanced back at my sisters. All three of them, including Aurora, looked terrified.
“No, you numbskull, all of you. It’s too dangerous to us to have you four running around.”
I felt a chill up my spine, and realized that the wind had twisted into a tornado and was starting to whip around us. I backed toward my sisters. Aurora pinned me to her chest with one hand, holding me tight, tight. “Isn’t there anything else?” I yelled over the roaring wind.
“Yeah! Anything!” Katie screamed.
The lily laughed, cruel, high-pitched, and wicked. “Not a chance. You take it or leave it--and you decide now.”
I pulled Aurora’s hand from my chest and spun around to face her. “I’m sorry,” I cried, swiping helplessly at the tears running down my cheeks. I hadn’t even noticed I’d been crying. “I’m so sorry.”
Aurora glanced at us--Batsy wrapped around her legs, Katie clinging to her hand, me shivering in front of her. “Okay! Fine!” The wind was picking up now, and a torrent of darkness started to twist around us. Aurora sat on the icy pavement, pulling Katie and Batsy down beside her. I sank down between my two younger sisters, grabbing one of Katie’s hands and one of Aurora’s. Aurora took hands with Batsy and me, and Katie with me and Batsy, until we were all connected to each other.
We’re a circuit, I thought, feeling my first surge of strength in days.
“Ready?” said Aurora bracingly.
“Ready,” I said.
“Ready,” echoed Katie.
“Ready,” Batsy whispered.
“NOW!” Aurora yelled. Instantly, I felt us being lifted off the ground, spinning madly in circles. Batsy was screaming--and then, quite suddenly, she was quiet. “Batsy!” Aurora screamed, reaching for her, but she had vanished.
I felt Katie’s grip on my hand weaken. “Wait!” I cried, but her hand had dissolved on mine.
“Anna!” Aurora yelled.
“Yeah?”
“I love you, okay?”
I glanced into her eyes and saw the dull cast where the sparkle used to be, tears running down her cheeks, a river of words I knew I wouldn’t be around to hear her say. I was clutching at both of her hands now. I squeezed them, only to feel my palms slide through hers. “Aurora?” But she was gone. I curled into a ball, wishing for my sisters more than anything else in the world--and then there was blackness.
When along the pavement,
Palpitating flames of life,
People flicker round me,
I forget my bereavement,
The gap in the great constellation,
The place where a star used to be.
--Submergence
Epilogue
I’m not sure where I am now, but wherever it is, there are no stars at all. There’s nothing, nothing but an uncertain knowledge that my sisters are together, and that I am alone. And I have nothing but a vague feeling of being, a misty existence. I’m not even Anna anymore. I’m a floating spirit, a former me, and I don’t think it was supposed to end this way, when we were the ones who died for everyone else. Wherever I am, it’s just me and a few memories of my sisters that I hang onto like nothing else, the last fragments of myself. And when I can’t bear it all any longer, I close my eyes and feel again the last clutches of my sisters’ fingers before they were gone--a heartbeat, a language made of secrets, for words too hard to say.
