THE RAIN WAS different than in the dream world. The haunting music was still distinct, but faint, as if pressed against a massive membrane that separated this world from that of dreams. The sound of the drops hitting earth and flora was like the arguments of fairies, soothing with an underlying hostility. She felt observed by the rain, but did not mind.
Her clothes absorbed the cool water, turned heavy and chilled against her skin. Esther turned back once to view the pale house, misty and beaten by shadows; its half-open window a sleepy eye in the western wall of the one-story ranch home. The milk-toned walls wore sepia shingles like a sharp-angled hat. Father’s room was on the opposite side, and she did not fear his seeing her, nor did she fear his coming to her room late this night. She had learned his patterns, sly though they might be.
The sky danced with flashes, popping bulbs of lightning. The music above her swelled. Horns fattened and swayed, a melancholy dirge. She turned and ran across the knee-high grass toward the trail head. The trees that surrounded the meadow and enclosed their home were old and dense, protruding fingers of oaks, maples, birch and cedars. Beyond the woods, up and over a ridge, was the trail, an old Chippewa path kept alive by the occasional Sunday hiker and the environmental leanings of the local council. The trail was hardly ever used this close to Paw Creek, where her and Father lived, but would take you six miles north if you let it, winding along the big lake to Little Bluff, a quaint tourist town that thrived in the summer and hibernated, like they all did, in the cold months. Esther had never walked the entire way, but she and Mother had often explored the trail, marveled at the long tunnel of trees it afforded those who passed through. Just ahead was the flute where the trees opened, a dividing not unlike the Red Sea, a clear path of thin grass, rock and dirt piercing the old woods like an arrow shaft.
As she strode into the forest’s moon-dipped fissure, she closed her eyes. As rain pattered her head and cheeks and shoulders, she debated whether she truly wanted to continue. She took a breath, smelled the life in the rain. Took another.
A whip-crack of thunder, and her eyes sprang open. A chorus, sweet as a swarm of locusts, sang in her ears. The orchestra bellowed, not from the sky, but from the trees. A swelling coda of dancing keys infiltrated the surrounding wood, and as the rain slapped against earth and leaves it stopped being random white noise and instead took on a melody, a rhythmic beat, a fantastic pulse of notes flowing through her like waves of energy, a complex and torrid symphony as haunting as it was blissful. The wind gusted at her back, pushed her forward despite her uncertainty. The trees were bent unnaturally, the hardwood creaking as the tips arched into deep courtship bows, branches reaching into pointed bark-coated fingers.
This way, they said.
She ran, let the wind lift her off the ground every few steps, gently place her back in stride, heel-to-toe on the wet earth. She entered the trees, felt them watching her askance as they bowed deeper, uniformly directing her steps.
Esther saw the tunnel take a turn just ahead, darker here than at the entrance, the moonlight not breaking through. The crook in the trail was called the Devil’s Elbow, and her mother had said it came from an ancient Indian name, translated roughly to “where the spirits live.” Esther didn’t believe it of course, knew her mother was teasing, trying to frighten her. But now, alone in the dark, Esther thought it an appropriate name. She felt energy here, a tingling that carried from the bottom of her spine up through her neck and along the back of her skull.
There was a sharp break in the song, a stuttering record skip, and the trees groaned and lifted themselves straight as soldiers. She slowed, then stopped. Waited. She was confused, lost without the music. When it started again it was soft. A sonata. The trees cracked and leaves murmured. She watched in wonder as they swayed, gravitating to a synched point, the ones to the left of the path bent nearly horizontal in their reach, the ones to the right dipped so sharply as to be upside-down U’s. She stepped forward to where their leaning tips directed, a sole spot in the earth along the shoulder of the trail. She looked up, spun around, saw the tops of the trees looking back at her with stern, leaf-skinned faces.
The music rushed back like a sharp wind, frenetic and hurried. Gasping, she dropped to her knees and ripped at the soft earth with her fingers, yanked at the top layer of grass, then into the pale brown mud, pulling away rocks and small roots, tossing it behind her as she dug.
She was elbow-deep, fingers bleeding, nails chipped and split, when she finally felt something cold, unnaturally smooth. She wiped and scraped away the remainder of the mud to uncover an object shining and black. Six inches in height and intricately shaped. She pried her fingers beneath it, pried it up.
A ray of moonlight broke through the canopy and she lifted the onyx carving into its shine. The head was a unicorn, the twisting horn protruding from the raised forehead as long as her pinky, the tip sharp as a needlepoint. The body, however, was that of a large man. Brutish, hairy, and hunkered into a sitting position. Unnaturally long fingers sagged over his knees, his chest a mighty barrel, his stomach a protruding gumball. Legs, bent and knobby, ended in hooves.
Esther stood, swayed, felt sleepy. The moonlight was fading, her adrenaline waned. She was cold, wet. Clutching the object to her chest, she sighed and headed for home.
Minutes later she crawled through her window. The carpet squelched wetly beneath her dirty bare toes, the half-open window having allowed in the rain. She set the statuette on her nightstand, then went to the bathroom to dry herself, wash the dirt from her hands and feet.
She found clean sweats, a long-sleeve thermal, and dry fluffy pink socks. Warming slowly, she climbed into bed, scribbled blindly in her journal, then fell into a deep sleep, where no dreams could catch her.
TOO TIRED TO write much tonight. Sorry.
Another nightmare and some found treasure.
New friend, perhaps.
“EAT YOUR EGGS.”
Esther looked down at her plate, the pile of moist yellow scrambled eggs on one half, greasy fat-tipped bacon on the other. Her stomach clenched at the thought of putting any of it into her mouth, so she nibbled at the edge of an unbuttered piece of toast and studied the meal, wondering what she could do to get out of eating her father’s failed attempt at a healthy breakfast.
She kept her eyes lowered as he pulled out a chair from across the table, sat down heavily, picked up the morning paper and slurped his coffee.
Saturdays were Esther’s least favorite day of the week. Monday through Friday she spent at school, and often tried to extend the time away from home by asking for playdates with her friends, or volunteering to help with after-school projects. Anything to keep her from returning home to her secluded prison with Father, who still had no job, paying their bills with the insurance checks that came every month since her mother died.
She poked the eggs with her fork, head bowed, then subtly lifted her eyes to examine the man across the table. Hair graying, thin, and much too long. He looked pale and gaunt, but she knew how strong he was. He had looked different when Mother was alive. Or, perhaps, he had only appeared different to her. Rose-colored glasses of a young girl in love with a daddy who adored her, smothered her with love, protected her.
Now he was the boogeyman. A stalker of the night.
When he drank, as he did most nights, he got depressed, then, especially of late, hostile. It started with visits shortly after Mom’s death. He’d sit on Esther’s bed and cry; she’d hug him and she’d cry. Then he would stay in her bed, hold her, sleep with her until morning. At first, she loved it. But as the months went by, the visits became too ritualistic, too invasive. Esther was getting older and realized how very odd it was. She’d tried to play it off at first, made a joke of it. “Daddy, go sleep in your own bed!” she’d say and throw a pillow at him, or a stuffed bear. Often he’d laugh, take the hint, leave.
But the more he drank, the less of a game it became. The less in control he was. The warmth became a chill that never left her body, the games a sullen acquiescence. When he first started groping her, she’d squirm and jump out of bed and yell at him to stop! And he would. For a while. Until he came home drunk again.
He started tying her down. Used pieces of her own clothing. Sweats or leggings, whatever was around. He’d tie her to the bed and put his hands on her. Angrily so. Sometimes, as if sickened with himself, or with her, he’d push her into the closet and jam a chair beneath the doorknob. Leave her there for the night, often well into morning, until he woke up and summoned the courage to face her.
After a while, she stopped lashing out. Stopped fighting. He never went too far, kept the damage mainly psychological, which she supposed was a blessing. But it was also, she knew, temporary. She was getting older, her body maturing, and he had noticed. It shamed her. All of it shamed her. She would look in the mirror at her own body and break down in tears, hating her own womanhood. Hating the female of her. Hating that she drew him to her in that way. Hating him, but herself more.
During those first months, when he’d become more abusive, the nightmares began. Dreams of storms and music, of being with and losing always losing her mother. Again and again and again.
He looked up at her, caught her eye and held it.
“Eat your eggs.”
She stuck a fork into the bright yellow mush, lifted a small bite to her mouth. They were cool and wet and she wanted to spew them out, but she managed to swallow. Maybe she should start handling the cooking duties. At least then she wouldn’t be eating shit every meal.
She recalled the statuette sitting on her nightstand and smiled to herself. A secret was always a good thing to ward off feelings of worthlessness, of abjection. Secrets empowered.
Then she realized a sad truth: Secrets did empower, but in their case they empowered him. Because his secret, in this particular scenario, was her.