The Book
Hettie lay flat on her bed with her
heart pounding as shadows drifted through the bedroom. At twelve her parents
thought she was old enough to get over what they called her “irrational” fears
of the dark. So far nothing bad had happened but she wasn’t sure she could
count on that; it seemed that since her birthday a month ago they had become
denser and now she could hear whispers as they moved around her bed. Faces
occasionally loomed into focus and then disappeared before she could catch a
good look at them.
“Hettie May, wake
up! You’re going to be late for school.”
Her mother’s
frowning face came into focus above her bed. “What is going on with you, girl? Were
you up reading that book of your grandmother’s again?”
“No, Mama,” she
lied.
“Tomorrow is the
beginning of Christmas vacation, you can dawdle then.” Her mother left the room
and Hettie heard her mother’s heavy boots thump down the stairs.
She ran to the
bathroom and splashed cold water on her face, her mind on the dreams, if that’s
what they were. She reached under the bed to retrieve the leather-bound book, bringing it
close to her nose to inhale the musty aroma mixed with the spicy fragrance of her
grandmother’s perfume. She couldn’t figure out the markings that covered each
page but she was sure if she studied it long enough she would get it. When her
Gammi was around it was as if a light had been turned on inside her heart.
“Don’t ever let
anyone tell you what to do or what to think,” her grandmother told her. “No one
knows you better than yourself.
Let the seeds of thoughts grow before you share them, Hettie. They have
to be strong enough to stand up to doubting minds. You’re like me,“ her Gammi
continued, a smile lighting up her gray-green eyes. But Hettie had never found
out what her grandmother meant by that statement.
*
“Write your letter
to Santa, Hettie,” her mother instructed distractedly two days before
Christmas.
Hettie didn’t believe in Santa but it
was fun to write down what she hoped to get. But this year dolls didn’t
interest her and she had received the bike for her birthday. She sat poised, her
teeth clamped around the top of the pencil. Her grandmother’s face appeared in
her mind--the one thing she couldn’t have since Gammi had died the year before.
Before she could register the empty feeling that always accompanied the memory
of her grandmother, her hand went to the paper and made a bunch of strange
marks.
“What’s this?” her
mother asked, looking over her shoulder.
“I don’t know.”
Her mother looked
worried. “Well you better write something sensible or Santa won’t bring you
anything.”
*
A whispered voice
woke her. It was Christmas morning and her Gammi was standing next to the bed.
“You figured it out.”
“Gammi!” Hettie
hugged her hard.
“Can’t let your
mother see us,” her grandmother whispered. “You’re old enough to come with me
now.” her grandmother glanced out the bedroom window. “Twelve is the magic number.”
Hettie followed
her grandmother’s gaze into the pre-dawn light where a silver spaceship hovered
just above the trees. “What…?”
Her grandmother
smiled. “We don’t belong here. Our world is many light years away.”
Hettie had always
had a sense of not belonging. She had wondered many times if she’d been adopted,
since she looked nothing like her father or her mother with her sharp chin,
slightly slanted eyes and dark hair. Her parents were blue-eyed blondes, their
features soft and rounded. Staring out the window at the light bouncing off the
silver ship, she thought of the recent change in her parent’s behavior toward
her. And now that she thought about it, the refusal to meet her eyes, the
furtive glances exchanged between the two of them, had begun on the day she
turned twelve. Several nights they had locked her into her room as though she
might try and run away. She’d never considered this since she had nowhere to
go. She brought her attention back to her Gammi, gazing into the slanted eyes
so like her own. “Will I be able to come back?”
Her grandmother
shook her head. “I won’t force you to go Hettie, you have to decide for
yourself.”
“I want to be with
you.”
*
Hettie watched the
pink feathery trees fade as the ship climbed. The twin suns had risen now and
the light was blinding. Below her, Leptorals were coming out of their holes to
feast on the purple grasses, their chartreuse pelts shimmering in the sun. Soon
the Kooloops would be chattering, their purple beaks pecking holes in the trees
as they searched for their breakfast of grapples and sunpliks. Yes, she would
miss the creatures here as well as her parents, but it felt like this was
always meant to be. “What is it called, this place where we’re going?”
Her grandmother
turned from the controls. “It’s known as earth.”
Beautiful! Nice surprise ending.
ReplyDeletethanks, Rachel...
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