Mira Corpora (2 page)

(11 years old)

 

 

“The spilled drop, not the saved one.”

–Eudora Welty

I STARE AT THE RICKETY HOUSE ACROSS THE street. The girl's bedroom is in the front: The window on the second floor with the black curtains. Usually she peeks out and stares at me with her round green eyes. She's been watching me for days, but rarely acknowledges my presence. Today she's refused to even make an appearance. Maybe she's angry at me for stealing the oranges.

I sit alone in the dining room and wait for her curtains to part. It's late afternoon. Slivers of sunlight filter into the room and gild the bookshelves surrounding the table. One beam falls on the bone china plate that holds the two oranges. An hour ago, I shimmied up the tree near the front door of the girl's house and plucked the only two ripe pieces of fruit.

A noise upstairs jars me out of my vigil. The sound of my mother's drunken footsteps rustling across the floorboards. It's been days since I've seen her. She circulates through the house like a ghost, bumping into furniture. We've been living here on the edge of the woods for 116 days, according to the secret tally I've been keeping on the back flap of the peeling rose wallpaper in the bathroom. Or maybe it's been longer. The tiny scrawls have almost merged into a single desperate slash. This is typical of our cycle. I've spent years moving from orphanage to orphanage. Every so often, my mother reappears to reclaim me. This time I'm eleven years old.

The curtains across the street flutter. I hold my breath waiting for the girl's pale face to emerge, but nothing happens. I'm
so distracted that I don't notice the sounds in the house have grown louder. Then I realize my mother has appeared in the doorway. Something tells me to hide the oranges, but it's too late and I'm too hungry.

Her blouse is wrinkled and there's a stain on her pants. She clutches a crossword book in one hand and a glass of wholesale gin in the other. The alcohol threatens to slosh over the rim. She looks like she's been blacked out for days. “There you are,” she says, as if I'm the one who's been missing. She runs her fingers lightly along my back. Her touch feels like it burns.

She sits across from me and opens the crossword book, wetting the pencil lead with the tip of her tongue while scanning the horizontals and verticals. She's been working on these puzzles forever but almost nothing has been filled in. The book is mostly white spaces and empty boxes. My mother silently eyes the oranges on the plate. It's impossible to tell what she's thinking. She doesn't realize I haven't had a real meal in days.

I start to peel one of the oranges with my fingers, digging my nails into the rind to create a seam that I can tear. My mother slaps my hand.

“Damn it, Jeff,” she says. “I can't believe you don't know how to peel a fucking orange.” She stands up and strides into the kitchen. While she's gone, I nervously pick the lint off my green sweater. The house across the street remains motionless.

My mother reappears with a squat silver knife with a curved crescent blade. She holds out her palm and I hand her one of my oranges. She cuts away ribbons of rind, then chops the remaining white off the fruit at sharp, elegant angles. There are no clinging flecks of rind, no skin left at all, it's shaved down to the juice, completely exposed. She places the glistening nude thing back on the plate. I've never seen anything so orange.

“Don't worry about keeping it exactly round,” she says. “It'll find its own shape.”

She slides the knife across the table.

“Your turn.”

As I begin to sheer the skin from the second orange, the curtains across the street flutter again. The girl's hand pulls back the fabric and one green eye peers out. Then she vanishes.

“Don't be so delicate,” my mother scolds. I've been carving the orange like a soap sculpture. I change tactics and hack off pieces with quick blunt strokes. It's pretty easy, actually. I place the peeled orange on the china plate. I brace myself for one of my mother's explosive rages, but she gives the fruit a cursory inspection and nods. Her highest form of praise.

She cuts both oranges into fat slices and takes a bite. I stuff an entire wedge in my mouth and slurp it down. It's tart but juicy.

“Not bad,” she says. “Where'd you get them?”

“They gave them to me across the street.”

“Enjoy them,” she says. “You're never going over there again.”

“Why not?”

My mother narrows her pupils and my blood chills. It's clear that she's contemplating throwing her glass of gin in my face. She raises her hand, but only takes another slice of orange.

“Because the man who lives there is a big fucking asshole,” my mother says. Her slate gray eyes keep me in their grip. “He's a sex pervert. He just got out of prison and he'll probably be arrested again soon.”

My mind races with this new information. All I can say is “okay.” I try to figure out whether the girl is the man's daughter, or his niece, or something else entirely. I can't decide if her expression held any clues. Before I only imagined her life in that window, but now a whole frame crashes into place around it. Maybe the girl wants to escape and doesn't know how. As I take another bite, the fruit tastes different.

My mother turns back to her book of puzzles and hovers over a clue. I retrain my gaze on the girl's window. We both reach
for slices of orange and absently consume them, bite by bite. Neither of us speaks a word. There's only the measured sound of our breathing. My mother tries out several letters, then sighs and erases them. The sun sinks low and I have to squint to see anything through the glare. It doesn't matter because the black curtains remain closed. Soon the china plate is empty. A sweet and acid odor lingers. I ball the loose orange rinds into a roughly round shape. Something lodges itself under my nails and I carefully study those last flecks of iridescent pulp.

The house across the street is empty. The moon spills a faint light across its front lawn. The night before the man left town, I saw the girl sprinting across this stretch of grass. She was wearing a pale nightgown with a dark stain. She ran swiftly and silently past the orange trees and toward the woods. Then she seemed to vanish. I can't stop thinking about her.

I lie in my darkened bedroom and stare out the window, fine-tuning my own plans to run away. This helps to keep my mind off the pain. It hurts every time I move. I'm lying on my stomach and can't see how serious the injury is, but I can feel the blistered skin. Somewhere between my shoulder blades there's a burn the shape of a clothing iron.

My mother enters the room with a jar of salve. She sits on the mattress and applies some to my bare back. It stings, so I grit my teeth and bury my face in the pillow. The wobbly swirl of her fingertips is a pretty good indication that she's still shit-faced.

“Sometimes I think you ruin my things on purpose,” she says. “You have to learn how to do things for yourself. What are you going to do when I'm not around?”

There's no point in answering, so I don't.

She unrolls some gauze and lays it over the wound. She keeps adding layers, seemingly unsure how many are required. Her
fingers poke and prod the sore while trying to fix tape to the edges. Once the bandage is secure, she turns on the bedside lamp to better examine her handiwork.

My mother starts to sob. She buries her face in her hands. Her entire body quakes. Wracking sounds. Uncontrollable. Normally I'd let the emotional storm blow over, but after a few minutes I reach out and rest my hand on her shoulder.

She slaps at me. “You little shit!” she shrieks. “Don't touch me!” Her eyes are stretched wide and her teeth bared.

She stomps down the stairs. I remain in bed with eyes shut tight, not daring to stir. I map her movements downstairs through the unsteady clomp of her steps. It's a radio play of stumbling sounds and muttered curses. She rustles from room to room, trying to remember her latest hiding place for the liquor. Rattling cabinets, unsticking drawers, scuffling across the wooden floor. Finally the jingling of a glass bottle and a loud belch.

My mother eventually lurches back up the staircase. The long pauses between steps are punctuated by the sound of swishing liquid. Her shadow briefly eclipses my doorway as she steers herself toward the master bedroom. Then there's a loud thud, shaking the frame of the house. The familiar sound of her limp body hitting the ground. There are no further noises. She must be out cold.

I ease myself up from the bed. From the closet, I pull out the bag where I've packed my clothes, the edges padded with wads of bills that I've siphoned off my mother. Through my window, the empty house across the street gives off a haunted glow. The curtains have been stripped from the windows and a bald light bulb burns in a hallway somewhere, dimly illuminating the remaining nothingness.

There are a few things left to pack, including my cassettes of favorite songs taped off the radio. One cassette is still lodged in my walkman. I slip on the earphones and press play. My
head floods with the sound of blown-out amps, drilling drums, and the faintest hint of a woozy melody. It gives me a dose of courage.

Still something is missing. I venture into the hallway and spot my mother's feet sticking out from her bedroom. Her body is sprawled in a heap across the entrance, so I cautiously thread my steps through her arms and legs. It only takes me a second to find her nightgown, which is balled atop the dresser. It's ruined with the imprint of a hot iron where I got lost in a daydream and let it sizzle into the fabric.

I slip the nightgown over my head. It fits surprisingly well. I inspect myself in the mirror. The unfamiliar reflection is an echo of the ghostly girl who lived across the street. It feels as if I've tapped into some of her mysterious spirit.

I grab my bag and ease down the staircase. The creak of each step feels like an earthquake, the recoil of the wood louder than any aftershock. Behind me, my mother murmurs a series of primordial groans. She starts to slur out my name. I bound down the last steps and hurtle out the front door.

I'm running across the lawn. I peer over my shoulder and spot the hunched silhouette of my mother at the upstairs window. I try to imagine the scene from her point of view, looking down at the pale specter in the nightgown streaking through the yard. Instinctively, I head for the woods at the end of the block. Tonight the sanctuary of trees resembles nothing more than an immense and yawning darkness.

I pull up the folds of the nightgown as I run. It feels light and flowing. The wind rushes up and blows against my legs, ballooning the fabric around me. I'm almost there. I can feel myself becoming swallowed by the darkness. I can feel the grass blades licking the soles of my feet. With every step, I'm waiting to disappear.

(12 years old)

 

 

“Suddenly he was saying under his breath, ‘We have a second home where everything we do is innocent.'”

–Robert Musil

I STALL AT THE EDGE OF THE CLEARING. FROM the shadow of the forest, I survey the scene. Plastic tents are ringed in the middle of a meadow. Along the perimeter, hammocks are strung between trees. The camp is mostly empty. Two girls race through the grass, waving lit sparklers. A couple of boys wrapped in wool blankets sit around a smoldering fire. Thin wisps of smoke rise in irregular puffs. I can't believe I'm finally here.

I'd heard stories about a tribe of teenagers who set up their own society in a remote part of the woods. A kid claimed to know the way and for fifty bucks scrawled a map on the back of an old Chinese take-out menu. I hitched rides along logging roads, hiked through overgrown paths, climbed steadily higher into the mountains. It's hard to remember exactly how I got here. And now that I've arrived, I'm not sure what to expect. I keep adjusting the pack on my shoulders. I wad the map into a tight ball. As I venture into the meadow, my entire body tingles.

The boys around the campfire greet me with easy smiles. The dogs sleeping in the grass bound up and lick my hands. Soon a few dozen teenagers emerge from the surrounding woods, returning from various chores and games. Everyone welcomes me to Liberia. We all gather firewood and share a dinner of lukewarm canned soup and petrified beef jerky. “You'll get used to the food,” a girl with a ratty ponytail assures me. I find myself an empty woven hammock and fall asleep cocooned under a plastic garbage bag.

For the first week I'm there, it rains constantly. I help the kids with chores around the camp. The soles of my feet are perpetually soggy. The ghostly skin becomes so soft that I can scrape off ribbons of white flesh with my fingernail. Little mossy growths start to infest the scraggly hairs of my armpits. Even my cassettes begin to bloat with water and breed black spores. It's the happiest I've ever been.

When the weather clears, I start to explore the woods. I tag along with several kids and hike out to an abandoned wild kingdom theme park. It closed decades ago, but nobody bothered to knock down the cement outbuildings, dismantle the cages, or even strip the rusted tilt-a-whirl for parts. We climb the fence and roam the grounds, trying to guess which animals were kept where. The kids say that after dark it's popular to fuck in the cages. There's a rumor the place is haunted. Not by ghosts, but gibbons.

They tell me how the park's foreclosure dragged on so long nobody noticed when the monkeys escaped into the woods. They say the nearby towns have reports about the creatures attacking unsuspecting backpackers. Some kids believe these stories were invented to keep the truckers from bothering us. They say the truckers are worse than any gibbons. They brutally raped two girls who strayed too far from camp. Nobody could stop the bleeding.

Isaac swears the monkeys are out there. He's spotted their shadows in the dark trees, darting limb to limb. He even saw one up close, crouched on the rusty Ferris wheel and chomping on a jagged leaf. It had a pink nose and inflamed ass. Lydia says they might really be out there, but she's also been with kids who run through the forest and imitate the apes for a laugh. They scratch their pits and cling to low-hanging branches, whooping and yattering.

That night, I dream that I'm asleep in my hammock and awakened by a small white monkey. He perches on my chest
and whispers stories to me, his furry mouth tickling my ear. He recites fantastical tales about his ancestors, the impregnable tree fortresses, the ornate weeklong banquets, the mysterious and coveted silver cup, the red poppy funeral garlands, the succession of betrayals that led to the tribe's ruin. In my dream, I'm convinced these stories contain the secret of my own destiny. As he unfurls his saga, the creature observes me with its kind golden eyes.

I awake with a start and expect to see the outline of a tiny monkey scampering into the recesses of the forest. But there's no evidence of any animal. The details of his stories have also evaporated from my memory. In the still of the night, I strain my ears for any sign but there's no hooting or gibbering, not even the pinched chatter of kids playing at being wild.

The truckers come with guns. They're drunk. Beefy red faces. Shallow pinprick eyes. They march into the center of camp and cock their rifles. All of them wear camouflage sweatsuits and orange flap jackets. It's hunting season. They say they'll give the kids a five-minute head start. To make things sporting. Maybe their original idea is only to scare the kids off the land. Watch them flee into the woods never to return. But the kids don't budge. One of the truckers fires a shot in the air and someone screams. A rock is hurled. Another shot. The kids turn around to find a pregnant girl lying on the ground with a bloody blown-out stomach. Then things get ugly.

The hunters' guns seem to fire at once. They explode throughout camp in a kaleidoscope of colors. Gleaming knives are drawn and brandished. The kids are in trouble and know it. They scatter in all directions. Kids running into the forest. Kids cowering behind trees. Kids with contorted mouths, red tongues lolling, screaming for help. Not that it makes any difference.
They're target practice. Bullets in the leg. Bullets in the chest. Bullets in the head. Crimson fountains of blood cascading into the air. The truckers are ruthless. Their thick black mustaches mask inscrutable emotions.

The kids beg for mercy. But the laws of decency are flouted. The truckers pour gasoline on the bushes and fan the day-glow orange flames. They saw off a boy's limbs. There are faces without eyeballs, slick gray organs tumbling loose from chests, a human head planted on a makeshift spike. The truckers fuck girls in the ass. They fuck girls in the nose. They fuck a boy in his detached arm socket. One trucker pisses shimmering yellow streams on the corpses nestled in somber hues of grass. It's a backwater holocaust. A bucolic apocalypse. A total extinction.

At least that's the story the painting tells. It's an enormous work that stretches across several canvases and it takes me a long time to absorb the details. The title:
The Ballad of Liberia
. Lydia created it over several months, hidden away in the woods, veiling her efforts under waterproof tarps. She unshrouds her masterwork in the meadow. Muted gasps are followed by an ecstatic round of applause. The thing is so over the top that everyone can't help but love it.

It isn't finished. Lydia has left some blank spots so people can express themselves, enter into the communal spirit, et cetera. We choose brushes and congregate around the long canvases. There's a hushed air of reverence as we confront the lurid and savage details of the painting. People move between the cans of paint and start applying respectful dabs of color. Some outline the carcasses in majestic shades of purple. Others plop shiny pink dollops on the cheeks of the living. A few jokers apply their strokes to the backside of the canvas.

Daniel throws the first handful of paint. A red splotch that hits Nycette square in the chest. Isaac retaliates by hurling a fistful of yellow at Daniel's face. Nycette pours purple paint on Isaac's head for being presumptive. The mohawked girl takes
Isaac's side and flicks paint at Nycette, but ends up splattering my pants instead. Then Daniel empties an entire can of blue down the mohawked girl's back. Just for the hell of it. And that's when pandemonium really breaks loose.

Soon everyone is coated with paint. Some kids take refuge behind the hammocks, retreat into the woods, launch counteroffensives near the river. Laughter and shouting echo throughout the camp. Lydia and I are the only ones left by the painting. She sits beside the canvas, arms wrapped around her legs, chin resting on her knees, sulking. Her white tank top is a fresco of smeared pigments. Her frizzy red afro looks more unruly than usual. “Do you have any idea how hard it was to drag that much paint out here?” she says.

She asks if I'm an art lover. I say not exactly. She says nobody else seems to be one either. I ask if she thinks the truckers might really attack the camp someday. She shrugs. “People are capable of anything,” she says. While she adjusts the strip of silver duct tape that holds the bridge of her glasses together, her darting eyes give me a once-over. “You want to see my inspiration for the painting?” she says.

We hike through the forest to the abandoned theme park. She scouts to ensure nobody is lurking, then leads us past the empty cages toward the cement office buildings. They seem so boring I've never given them a second glance. In the back courtyard stands a narrow shed. A janitor's storage room of some kind. “I haven't shown this to anyone,” she says. “It gives me nightmares.”

The hinges of the shed are rusted shut, so she forces the door with her shoulder. It's a small concrete room with dingy gray walls. Cobwebs in every crevice. Dust motes choke the air. The light is so dim that at first the place looks empty. Lydia digs her nails into my arm and gestures at the corner. “People are bastards,” she hisses. Then I see it. Against the back wall, pocked
with scabby patches of gray mold, the mummified skeleton of a dog hangs from a noose.

The kids talk about the place in whispers. Everyone calls it the dead village, but the row of condemned houses on the edge of the woods is officially named Monrovia. It's a failed settlement that no longer appears on even the most local maps. Briefly converted into an outpost by the forest rangers, the houses are now abandoned. These once stately structures are marked by decay, wood rot, flood lines, and scattered rubbish. The only inhabitants are three girls who are reputed to have occult powers. Kids occasionally leave camp to visit them and have their fortunes told. Most are too spooked to make the journey.

Lydia says there's a treehouse that offers a view of the dead village. She leads a small group through the woods to see for ourselves. She blazes a fresh trail through the thick undergrowth of weeds and ferns. We follow the blue marks in the trees. They're painted in the hatchet scores on the tree trunks. Every few minutes another blue slash appears. It's the sort of code that you have to know to notice, a clandestine swath of color that beckons us forward.

None of us have laid eyes on the dead village. Isaac wonders what we'll be able to distinguish through the thick foliage. Daniel suspects the place gives off a subtle supernatural aura. Nycette believes the derelict houses have absorbed some of the properties of the oracles who now inhabit them. I find it hard to imagine anything more mysterious than our own campsite. Lydia remains silent. She maintains the steady pace.

The sky darkens. Storm clouds press down upon the treetops. The first raindrops start to sift through the branches. Soon we're soaked to the roots of our hair. Lydia says it's only another hour to the treehouse. Several people turn back, but the rest of us
march onward. We tent our shirts over our heads and train our eyes on the boot prints in front of us. The booming bass of thunder resounds in our chests. Flashes of lightning bleach the air. More people peel off, but Lydia never turns around. Even the overstuffed backpack strapped to her shoulders doesn't slow her tempo. I'm not sure how long it takes her to realize that she and I are the only ones left.

Lydia halts in a clearing and peers up at the pelting rain. She wipes her frizzy red hair from her forehead and adjusts her glasses. I huddle beneath my sweatshirt and hug myself for warmth. “It's right around here,” she says. She strolls under the trees, her head cocked toward their canopies, staring with the intensity of a hunter sighting game. She stops beneath a towering oak and signals to me. The treehouse is nestled high in its gnarled branches. We scale the wobbly rungs tacked to the trunk and squeeze through a narrow opening.

We find ourselves in a musty wooden room built with thick planks. Lydia lights the candles stationed in glass bowls along the floor. The place slowly takes on a cozy feel. Black garbage bags are tacked over the windows to keep out the elements. A stained mattress with rumpled sheets and a wool blanket is flopped in the corner. A sequence of faded magazine photos are taped to the wall: Shots of a naked couple walking hand-in-hand along the white sands of a beach. “I haven't been here in ages,” Lydia says.