+. weird, world.
even MORE post-weird, world family, similarly lizz's fault:
“You know, most people just ship their kids off to summer camp every year,” Annie pointed out, stretching her legs and wiggling more comfortably into her foldable chair.
They were currently within spitting distance of the Grand Canyon and the sunset was absolutely breathtaking. The sinking sun had set the clouds afire, violent crimsons and explosive oranges made all the more vivid against a sky darkening to a bruised purple at the edges. After the last two days of guiding spirits through doors, the hike up to the remote spot and the prospect of a night so far from civilization that the stars would be brilliant and wild, undiluted by electric lights, felt like a well-earned reward. Robbie and Ben were already conked out in their tents, oblivious to the raw beauty of the sunset, but Charlie knew they’d both probably be up before dawn and communing with nature like the romantic sentimentalists they were.
“What summer camp could compare to this? Ghostly shenanigans and the Grand Canyon. Talk about building memories,” Charlie replied. “I’m glad you found the time to join us-feel like I haven’t see you in ages, girl. Well, no, I tell a lie: I did see you on TV last month, when they were covering that march you were leading on the Capitol.”
“I wasn’t leading it-the Women of the First Nations were,” she countered.
“And you just happen to be the face of the Women of the First Nations,” added Charlie. “My little Annie. All grown up and screaming into cameras, making rich old white men nervous as shit. I gotta admit: I teared up a bit, I was that proud.”
“We’re determined to make this a global cause,” Annie said. “This issue isn’t restricted by state lines. The way Canada’s been handling the violence epidemic against native women; the corporations forcibly evicting tribes in South America and Mexico to make way for strip mining and deforestation. There’s always been strength in numbers, and if we don’t come together to face these threats… Our cultures will only be myths and fairy tales in another hundred, two hundred years. When I think about everything we’ve already lost…”
“You ever need me to hold a picket sign or fill in a crowd, hun, you just ask me,” Charlie said. “Tell me what you need from a good ally and I’ve got your back.”
“Thanks, Charlie. You know what Dom asked me yesterday?”
“Hmm?”
“He asked if I’d teach him Tsalagi. If that was allowed, for someone not of the tribe. I warned him that it’s a tricky language for someone used to the English alphabet, and he just countered by saying so is Russian and he’s got a pretty good handle on that.” Annie shook her head and clucked her tongue. “These kids, I swear. And here I thought I was impressive with my three languages.”
“It’s cute-every time we get together he immediately kicks up a conversation with me in his latest tongue. Helluva lot of fun. I never get to pull out Japanese unless I’m talking to Akiko; it’s good to get the practice.’
“Like you need to practice,” Annie said dryly. “So what new skills have you picked up since the last time I saw you?”
“I have mastered the fine art of refrigerator repair and I’m pretty sure I could beat Bobby Fisher at chess,” Charlie said lightly. “Also I can pliee with the best of them, thanks to all of Amari’s dance classes.”
Annie snorted. “You in a ballerina tutu? Not something I’ve ever pictured before.”
“Yeah, I’m more of a Flashdance-style girl, don’t you think?”
“Mmm-hmm.”
The smell of wood smoke filled the air. Genny leaned back from the campfire she’d set up at the center of the ring of tents, sparks glittering in her hair, and laughed at something Gloria said. Scout leaped up like a frog and then fidgeted impatiently while Olivia and Alberto set to work skewering marshmallows onto long sticks. Amari and Dominic were deep in conversation, sitting at an angle that kept their hands visible in the flickering firelight, and Billie and Boomhauer were leaning against Gloria, one at each leg and each patted with fondness when they grumbled. Dani, as exhausted by recent events as her Daddy, had already retired for the night.
“I should do this more often,” Annie said dreamily.
“Sit outside and get eaten up by skeeters?” Charlie said, slapping another one.
“Yeah. Just sit and stare and think and be. I keep campaigning for my people’s rights, to keep our way of life from dying out, and then I hardly observe the old ways myself. I don’t think I realized just how far I’d drifted from the roots of everything until today. When we were climbing up the path I was so focused on where I put my feet, the rocks that might slip, the wind on my neck, the calls of the birds overhead… It felt really damn good. I need to get away from people and buildings more often than I do.”
“Cross paths with the occasional wolf?” Charlie said with a knowing look.
“If I’m lucky enough to, yeah.”
“Hear anything from the Ukraine lately?”
Annie kept her expression perfectly smooth, refusing to rise to Charlie’s prying bait. “Maybe, maybe not.”
“Aw, you’re no fun.”
“Some of us like to keep our private lives private,” Annie just said primly. “Not everyone is willing to flaunt them like a badge of honor, or however it is you see it. And someone in my position can hardly afford to be a gossipy fishmonger’s wife.”
“I am not a fishmonger’s wife.”
“No, you’re Christopher Robin’s wife and that is never not gonna be funny,” Annie retorted. “C’mon, let’s get some s’mores before Scout and Alberto hog them all.”
It was much later. The sky overhead was glittering with stars, silver and gold and green thread woven into black velvet. Coyotes were crying plaintively in the distance, arguing over a kill. Genny had extinguished the fire-the coals were dead and gray-and everyone had retired to their tents. The occasional snore was just audible over the wind that made the taut canvas shiver and shake.
But in one tent there were shadows dancing. Dominic had angled the flashlight between his and Amari’s sleeping bags; the boys took turns twisting and contorting their hands into new shapes. Rabbits and witches and lizards. A leering face with too many teeth.
When they had exhausted their options, they talked about things that were, as Amari put it, “family private”: things that they could not mention to their friends from school. Things that most people would think were lies or make believe.
By now Dominic knew that, like him, his parents were both orphans. That his Dad’s parents had died when he was only a baby, and that Grandma Rika and Grampa Ernie had adopted him. But he had not pried for details; it was Amari who told him about the Boo Hag, the creature that had orphaned his Dad and almost killed Amari’s. How his Dad had faced down the monster and killed it with his own two hands. (He had always known his Dad was a superhero, no cape required.)
What happened to yours? Dom asked. Your first parents, I mean.
My first Mama got sick, I think, Amari said after a long pause. I never saw my first Daddy.
I don’t remember my first Dad, either, Dominic said. Mom never talked about him. I don’t even know what his name was. He plucked at a hangnail until the flap of skin ripped, then sucked furiously at the bloody cuticle for several seconds. And she got sick, too. But not sick like flu or cancer. She got sick from needles. I was six when I came home from school and found her. She was lying on the living room floor. The police took me to my aunt, but she didn’t want me, so I went to the home.
Amari looked down, afraid to meet Dom’s eyes, afraid he might See too much. It was uncomfortably hot in the tent. Scout rolled over on Amari’s other side, kicking at her sleeping bag. “Go t’ sleep,” she mumbled.
The flap zipper suddenly slid up, the sharp sound making them all jump. Amari and Dominic crab-walked backwards, Dom grabbing the flashlight in the hopes that it would serve as a club, while Scout yanked her sleeping bag over her head. For a breathless moment there was nothing but darkness beyond the opening of the tent. Then Dominic swallowed loudly, re-angled the beam of the flashlight, and revealed-
“Oh, Dani,” Dominic said shakily in relief. “Couldn’t sleep?”
“No,” the solemn girl said, slipping inside and sitting down on her knees. “It’s too loud over here. What are you talking about that’s so sad?”
Family stuff, Amari said.
“Well, you should talk about something else,” she said practically. “I’ve felt sad enough already today. All the ghosts Daddy and Unca Ben were helping.”
“Did you see the ghosts, too, Dani?” Scout asked with interest, face peeping out from her sleeping bag cocoon.
“No,” she said as if that should be obvious. “But I felt them. All cold and fuzzy and lost and sad and confused. It made me tired.”
“I heard Baba and Mama talking last night,” Scout said. “About how they were gonna keep an eye on Daddy and Uncle Pooh Bear-something about how ghosts eat energy from special people. Maybe the ghosties were trying to eat you, too, Dani.”
“I don’t think ghosts eat people,” Dominic said doubtfully.
“It’s what-ya-call-it-like a mettyfor,” Scout insisted. “People all have invisible stuff in them, right? Thoughts and dreams and soul stuff. The bits of you that are left over after you die-that’s how ghosts happen, and that’s what goes to heaven or hell. So if the ghosts are made of that invisible stuff, it makes sense that they would eat that stuff off other people. And that would be why special people are so tired after dealing with ghosts. Why Baba and Mama said they were going to make sure Daddy and Uncle Pooh Bear didn’t hurt themselves.”
“You can see ghosts, Amari,” Dani said, not a question but a statement of fact. Amari nodded hesitantly. “Do they make you tired, too?”
Only if I really Look at them, he said. I see them, but I don’t always See them. And sometimes I get scared, so I imagine a big wall to hide them. That usually works.
“That’s like what Aunt Akiko told me to do,” said Dani. “When I feel too much. Think of a big, thick wall. Or put my fingers in my ears so things aren’t so loud.”
“I’ve never met your Aunt Akiko. What’s she like?”
“Like me,” Dani said blithely. “Only she’s Japanese, too. That’s where she lives most of the time. In Japan. It’s an island with lots of mountains and people and monkeys. She comes and helps Daddy sometimes when he has a Mission. And she brings her friend Diego with her, too. Billie calls him Uncle Dee, only they aren’t married, and he’s special, too. He can move things with his brain.”
“What, like Jean Gray?” Dominic said eagerly. “Wow, that’s the superpower I’d want to have.”
“You can’t pick what kind of special you are,” Dani said, forehead wrinkling. “It’s not like in movies.”
“I know that,” Dom said, stung. “I’m just saying it would be cool, that’s all.”
“Don’t worry, Dom,” Scout said firmly. “My Mama says that in this family being normal is its own superpower. She says we’re the ‘roots’. When things get weird or scary we’re the ones that save the day. Mama saved Daddy from the Boo Hag, and your Daddy saved your Mama lots of times, and Aunt Annie saved everybody from the wolves.”
“It’s like Batman,” Dominic said. “He doesn’t have any superpowers but sometimes he’s stronger than even Superman.”
“Yeah, exactly!” Scout yawned loudly. “…Can we go back to sleep now? Daddy’s probably gonna get up real early and wanna take us fishing or something.”
“You know, most people just ship their kids off to summer camp every year,” Annie pointed out, stretching her legs and wiggling more comfortably into her foldable chair.
They were currently within spitting distance of the Grand Canyon and the sunset was absolutely breathtaking. The sinking sun had set the clouds afire, violent crimsons and explosive oranges made all the more vivid against a sky darkening to a bruised purple at the edges. After the last two days of guiding spirits through doors, the hike up to the remote spot and the prospect of a night so far from civilization that the stars would be brilliant and wild, undiluted by electric lights, felt like a well-earned reward. Robbie and Ben were already conked out in their tents, oblivious to the raw beauty of the sunset, but Charlie knew they’d both probably be up before dawn and communing with nature like the romantic sentimentalists they were.
“What summer camp could compare to this? Ghostly shenanigans and the Grand Canyon. Talk about building memories,” Charlie replied. “I’m glad you found the time to join us-feel like I haven’t see you in ages, girl. Well, no, I tell a lie: I did see you on TV last month, when they were covering that march you were leading on the Capitol.”
“I wasn’t leading it-the Women of the First Nations were,” she countered.
“And you just happen to be the face of the Women of the First Nations,” added Charlie. “My little Annie. All grown up and screaming into cameras, making rich old white men nervous as shit. I gotta admit: I teared up a bit, I was that proud.”
“We’re determined to make this a global cause,” Annie said. “This issue isn’t restricted by state lines. The way Canada’s been handling the violence epidemic against native women; the corporations forcibly evicting tribes in South America and Mexico to make way for strip mining and deforestation. There’s always been strength in numbers, and if we don’t come together to face these threats… Our cultures will only be myths and fairy tales in another hundred, two hundred years. When I think about everything we’ve already lost…”
“You ever need me to hold a picket sign or fill in a crowd, hun, you just ask me,” Charlie said. “Tell me what you need from a good ally and I’ve got your back.”
“Thanks, Charlie. You know what Dom asked me yesterday?”
“Hmm?”
“He asked if I’d teach him Tsalagi. If that was allowed, for someone not of the tribe. I warned him that it’s a tricky language for someone used to the English alphabet, and he just countered by saying so is Russian and he’s got a pretty good handle on that.” Annie shook her head and clucked her tongue. “These kids, I swear. And here I thought I was impressive with my three languages.”
“It’s cute-every time we get together he immediately kicks up a conversation with me in his latest tongue. Helluva lot of fun. I never get to pull out Japanese unless I’m talking to Akiko; it’s good to get the practice.’
“Like you need to practice,” Annie said dryly. “So what new skills have you picked up since the last time I saw you?”
“I have mastered the fine art of refrigerator repair and I’m pretty sure I could beat Bobby Fisher at chess,” Charlie said lightly. “Also I can pliee with the best of them, thanks to all of Amari’s dance classes.”
Annie snorted. “You in a ballerina tutu? Not something I’ve ever pictured before.”
“Yeah, I’m more of a Flashdance-style girl, don’t you think?”
“Mmm-hmm.”
The smell of wood smoke filled the air. Genny leaned back from the campfire she’d set up at the center of the ring of tents, sparks glittering in her hair, and laughed at something Gloria said. Scout leaped up like a frog and then fidgeted impatiently while Olivia and Alberto set to work skewering marshmallows onto long sticks. Amari and Dominic were deep in conversation, sitting at an angle that kept their hands visible in the flickering firelight, and Billie and Boomhauer were leaning against Gloria, one at each leg and each patted with fondness when they grumbled. Dani, as exhausted by recent events as her Daddy, had already retired for the night.
“I should do this more often,” Annie said dreamily.
“Sit outside and get eaten up by skeeters?” Charlie said, slapping another one.
“Yeah. Just sit and stare and think and be. I keep campaigning for my people’s rights, to keep our way of life from dying out, and then I hardly observe the old ways myself. I don’t think I realized just how far I’d drifted from the roots of everything until today. When we were climbing up the path I was so focused on where I put my feet, the rocks that might slip, the wind on my neck, the calls of the birds overhead… It felt really damn good. I need to get away from people and buildings more often than I do.”
“Cross paths with the occasional wolf?” Charlie said with a knowing look.
“If I’m lucky enough to, yeah.”
“Hear anything from the Ukraine lately?”
Annie kept her expression perfectly smooth, refusing to rise to Charlie’s prying bait. “Maybe, maybe not.”
“Aw, you’re no fun.”
“Some of us like to keep our private lives private,” Annie just said primly. “Not everyone is willing to flaunt them like a badge of honor, or however it is you see it. And someone in my position can hardly afford to be a gossipy fishmonger’s wife.”
“I am not a fishmonger’s wife.”
“No, you’re Christopher Robin’s wife and that is never not gonna be funny,” Annie retorted. “C’mon, let’s get some s’mores before Scout and Alberto hog them all.”
It was much later. The sky overhead was glittering with stars, silver and gold and green thread woven into black velvet. Coyotes were crying plaintively in the distance, arguing over a kill. Genny had extinguished the fire-the coals were dead and gray-and everyone had retired to their tents. The occasional snore was just audible over the wind that made the taut canvas shiver and shake.
But in one tent there were shadows dancing. Dominic had angled the flashlight between his and Amari’s sleeping bags; the boys took turns twisting and contorting their hands into new shapes. Rabbits and witches and lizards. A leering face with too many teeth.
When they had exhausted their options, they talked about things that were, as Amari put it, “family private”: things that they could not mention to their friends from school. Things that most people would think were lies or make believe.
By now Dominic knew that, like him, his parents were both orphans. That his Dad’s parents had died when he was only a baby, and that Grandma Rika and Grampa Ernie had adopted him. But he had not pried for details; it was Amari who told him about the Boo Hag, the creature that had orphaned his Dad and almost killed Amari’s. How his Dad had faced down the monster and killed it with his own two hands. (He had always known his Dad was a superhero, no cape required.)
What happened to yours? Dom asked. Your first parents, I mean.
My first Mama got sick, I think, Amari said after a long pause. I never saw my first Daddy.
I don’t remember my first Dad, either, Dominic said. Mom never talked about him. I don’t even know what his name was. He plucked at a hangnail until the flap of skin ripped, then sucked furiously at the bloody cuticle for several seconds. And she got sick, too. But not sick like flu or cancer. She got sick from needles. I was six when I came home from school and found her. She was lying on the living room floor. The police took me to my aunt, but she didn’t want me, so I went to the home.
Amari looked down, afraid to meet Dom’s eyes, afraid he might See too much. It was uncomfortably hot in the tent. Scout rolled over on Amari’s other side, kicking at her sleeping bag. “Go t’ sleep,” she mumbled.
The flap zipper suddenly slid up, the sharp sound making them all jump. Amari and Dominic crab-walked backwards, Dom grabbing the flashlight in the hopes that it would serve as a club, while Scout yanked her sleeping bag over her head. For a breathless moment there was nothing but darkness beyond the opening of the tent. Then Dominic swallowed loudly, re-angled the beam of the flashlight, and revealed-
“Oh, Dani,” Dominic said shakily in relief. “Couldn’t sleep?”
“No,” the solemn girl said, slipping inside and sitting down on her knees. “It’s too loud over here. What are you talking about that’s so sad?”
Family stuff, Amari said.
“Well, you should talk about something else,” she said practically. “I’ve felt sad enough already today. All the ghosts Daddy and Unca Ben were helping.”
“Did you see the ghosts, too, Dani?” Scout asked with interest, face peeping out from her sleeping bag cocoon.
“No,” she said as if that should be obvious. “But I felt them. All cold and fuzzy and lost and sad and confused. It made me tired.”
“I heard Baba and Mama talking last night,” Scout said. “About how they were gonna keep an eye on Daddy and Uncle Pooh Bear-something about how ghosts eat energy from special people. Maybe the ghosties were trying to eat you, too, Dani.”
“I don’t think ghosts eat people,” Dominic said doubtfully.
“It’s what-ya-call-it-like a mettyfor,” Scout insisted. “People all have invisible stuff in them, right? Thoughts and dreams and soul stuff. The bits of you that are left over after you die-that’s how ghosts happen, and that’s what goes to heaven or hell. So if the ghosts are made of that invisible stuff, it makes sense that they would eat that stuff off other people. And that would be why special people are so tired after dealing with ghosts. Why Baba and Mama said they were going to make sure Daddy and Uncle Pooh Bear didn’t hurt themselves.”
“You can see ghosts, Amari,” Dani said, not a question but a statement of fact. Amari nodded hesitantly. “Do they make you tired, too?”
Only if I really Look at them, he said. I see them, but I don’t always See them. And sometimes I get scared, so I imagine a big wall to hide them. That usually works.
“That’s like what Aunt Akiko told me to do,” said Dani. “When I feel too much. Think of a big, thick wall. Or put my fingers in my ears so things aren’t so loud.”
“I’ve never met your Aunt Akiko. What’s she like?”
“Like me,” Dani said blithely. “Only she’s Japanese, too. That’s where she lives most of the time. In Japan. It’s an island with lots of mountains and people and monkeys. She comes and helps Daddy sometimes when he has a Mission. And she brings her friend Diego with her, too. Billie calls him Uncle Dee, only they aren’t married, and he’s special, too. He can move things with his brain.”
“What, like Jean Gray?” Dominic said eagerly. “Wow, that’s the superpower I’d want to have.”
“You can’t pick what kind of special you are,” Dani said, forehead wrinkling. “It’s not like in movies.”
“I know that,” Dom said, stung. “I’m just saying it would be cool, that’s all.”
“Don’t worry, Dom,” Scout said firmly. “My Mama says that in this family being normal is its own superpower. She says we’re the ‘roots’. When things get weird or scary we’re the ones that save the day. Mama saved Daddy from the Boo Hag, and your Daddy saved your Mama lots of times, and Aunt Annie saved everybody from the wolves.”
“It’s like Batman,” Dominic said. “He doesn’t have any superpowers but sometimes he’s stronger than even Superman.”
“Yeah, exactly!” Scout yawned loudly. “…Can we go back to sleep now? Daddy’s probably gonna get up real early and wanna take us fishing or something.”