Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet No. 26 (20 page)

She and I wandered the hills of the country of the dead, holding hands.

I called out for my mother, for my father. She called out for her sister. Neither one of us found what we were looking for. The land of dead never even echoed.

When we came back to the living, we tore each other’s clothes off. I wasn’t twelve yet, and she wasn’t a year older than me. We tried our best in the mossy mountain woods, though. We didn’t know what we were doing.

We tried our best a long time.

AG:
You know what I like to call that? Quitter talk. While you’re at it, why don’t you just start a cult too? (And every reader of Karen Joy Fowler short stories knows the difference between a religion and a cult: “.... a cult is just a set of rules that lets certain men get laid.” On second thought, let’s set the cult idea aside.)

The sad fact is, the middle of nowhere has gotten pretty crowded and I don’t think you’d like every Cormac McCarthy fan you met out there. There are strange things afoot in them thar hills, things that may not be fightable with shotguns, inhabiting land that may not be livable. I have heard tales of humans beginning to hibernate in such places, leaving non hibernating creatures to assume a place in civilization previously closed to their kind. You fall into a deep sleep, shotgun in hand, and your Hermit Shack (TM) is immediately beset by packs of deer who lick your TV screen and poke holes in your favorite socks. They read your novels, then eat the pages they like best, and agree they taste better than bark. You wake to the kind of scene that kicks your paranoia into overdrive. There are humans in the forest. It doesn’t end well.

Dear Aunt Gwenda,

When I was 16 my mother and stepfather bought me a Lane hope chest—just what every girl wanted. Over the next few years I filled it with things for when I was married as young girls are supposed to do. Off to college, out on my own, I took it with me. For twenty-five years I have hauled this big piece of carved cedar of early American design with a rose colored cushion on top from one end of the country to the other. It’s been in my guest room for the past six years. My mother sees it every time she comes to visit. But here’s the thing:

I never liked it.

A couple of weeks ago I sold it at a garage sale for $50. (Pretty good price I thought.) It has never been my style (more Laura Ingalls than Emma Peel) (I aspire to Emma Peel) and I was sick of keeping this thing simply because my mother bought it. But next year she will be back and she’s going to notice that it’s gone. So what do I say to her? Do I tell her the truth? Or say it’s in the store room buried under boxes? Or there was a fire and it was the only thing burned? (A stretch, I know.)

Should I let her know I’ve never liked it? What do you think?

Signed,

All grown up and still terrified of my mother

AG:
Unlike the guy who doesn’t realize he lives on a space station or the one in hibernation, you have several options. Perhaps this hope chest plays a critical part in an alternate reality, and only by sending it there could you prevent a terrible cataclysm from befalling us all. By giving you this hope chest, your mother saved the world, and isn’t that the most important thing?

True, I don’t think even Emma Peel’s mother would go for that one.

Maybe you could tell her of a poor orphan child, taken in during the dead of night. A child with abyss-black eyes and no possessions to her name. A child who needed only the right piece of furniture to travel back to an alternate reality...

Okay, yes, storage sounds good. Possibly hint at redecoration. Otherwise, take the secret of not really liking it to either a) your grave or b) a night when your mother gets really boozy and tells you she never liked it in the first place and can’t believe you kept it all those years.

It could happen.

Dear Aunt Gwenda,

Why does the woman outside my cage always stare at that bright screen and tap on that black-bar-thing in front of her? What’s so interesting about it?

Sincerely,

A Canary in a Cage

AG:
You’re getting so close to space madness, and yet no visit from “maintenance.” Keep trying.

Dear Aunt Gwenda, Why does your cat have 6 toes?

Anonymous

AG:
Why, indeed? An oversight on my part, really.

Had I but known hibernation would become part of the human life cycle…

Now I watch Hem and know that he will use his unnatural thumbs to open the door for the deer. He will already have licked the television and turned down the corners of pages in our books.

We will awaken in confusion wearing unisuits, and remember nothing. Is this a cult or a religion? Someone will ask, and it will seem like something we once knew the answer to, but have forgotten.

Gwenda Bond
(gwendabond.typepad.com/bondgirl) has just finished a novel.

Ted Chiang
was born in Port Jefferson, New York and holds a degree in computer science from Brown University. In 1989 he attended the Clarion Writers Workshop. His fiction has won three Hugos, four Nebulas, three Locus awards, and a Sturgeon award. He lives near Seattle, Washington.

Sarah Goldstein
was born in Toronto and lives in western Massachusetts. Her artwork has been exhibited in the US and Canada, and her first book,
Fables
, is forthcoming from Tarpaulin Sky Press next spring.

Carlea Holl-Jensen
was born on a Wednesday. Since then, her short fiction has appeared in
Pindeldyboz
and
Call & Response
, and she once received a prize. She is confident that you will enjoy reading her blog at hourofgold.wordpress.com.

Patty Houston
lives in Cincinnati with her husband and daughters. She teaches English at the University of Cincinnati and is also at work on a short story collection.

Rahul Kanakia
is an international development consultant based in Washington, D.C.

J. M. McDermott
’s favorite color is dark blue. With five novels forthcoming, he has not been able to keep up with all the activity of his favorite television programs. Forthcoming books include a reprint of his critically-acclaimed Last Dragon, with his new novel Maze from Apex Books, and a fantasy trilogy beginning with Never Knew Another from Nightshade.

Sean Melican
would like you to know that true love exists. Oh, and that Popeye’s is da shizz.

Philip Raines
lives in Linlithgow in Scotland.
Harvey Welles
lives in the Milwaukee of his mind.

Veronica Schanoes
’s work has appeared in
Year’s Best Fantasy & Horror
,
The Best of Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet, Strange Horizons,
and
Sybil’s Garage.
She lives in New York City where she is Assistant Professor of English at Queens College—CUNY. She does not like cats.

Darrell Schweitzer
has also rewritten a good deal of the works of H.P. Lovecraft into limerick form. Among his longer works, he has published about 300 stories and three novels. His PS Publications novella
Living with the Dead
was a finalist for the Shirley Jackson Award. He used to edit
Weird Tales
and now edits anthologies, the most recent of which are
Cthulhu’s Reign
and
Full Moon City
(with Martin Greenberg).

Lindsay Vella
has been assigned a flammability rating of 3 (severe fire hazard). Fires involving Lindsay Vella should be fought upwind and from the maximum distance possible. Keep unnecessary people away; isolate hazard and deny entry. Her poems have appeared in
Spork
, and she lives in Detroit.
v

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