The dark issue 35, p.1
The Dark Issue 35, page 1
THE DARK
Issue 35 • April 2018
“Snake Season” by Erin Roberts
“Cutting Teeth” by Kirsty Logan
“Being an Account of The Sad Demise of The Body Horror Book Club” by Nin Harris
“The Darkest Part” by Stephen Graham Jones
Cover Art: “Coming Home” by Caro von Chaos
ISSN 2332-4392.
Edited by Silvia Moreno-Garcia and Sean Wallace.
Cover design by Garry Nurrish.
Copyright © 2018 by Prime Books.
www.thedarkmagazine.com
Snake Season
by Erin Roberts
We buried the first ones, nice and proper. It sounds foolish now, but what could we do? After all, they were still our children. I even dressed my Sarah for the occasion—decked out in her Sunday best, yellow cotton bright against the dark brown of her skin, pattern hand-stitched to cover a mismatched body. We let her rest in a small wooden box, nestled in a hole Ray dug behind the house, just below the surface. Only the best for my first baby girl. But even later, when our scrap of land held more graves than ground, I kept my daughters close, creeping through the night to dump burlap sacks into the dark water of the bayou at the end of the walk and casting swaddled bundles into the bone pits where not even gators and foxes fed. Necessity, they say, is the mother of invention.
The way of things was this: you had a child and hoped it would be unbent, unbroken. You fought through the bitterness as your baby turned into a monster, eyes bulging out of a head no bigger than an overgrown tomato, arms and legs growing long and spindly like untamed weeds in a widower’s garden. But still, you loved your little one, draped its body in rosary beads and spirit cloth, prayed that they would somehow purge the demons from a broken soul. And when it died, you wailed and mourned and took comfort in your husband’s arms, and just like that, you had another.
At first, the good folks visited you after, brought prayer books and lost bread, said Poor Marie as they held your shaking hands steady. You nodded as they told you how you needed to wear conjure beads at night, or wash yourself from the inside with holy water, or only eat white fish on Fridays. You made sure to smile as they reminded you that it happened to them once, and the conjure man took care of things, and look at them now, surrounded by a pack of perfect angels.
You never said a word about what happened in the last days, when the prayers had failed and the nights grew cold and the food stores went from low to empty. You never mentioned Sarah’s too-long arms flailing and too-big eyes bulging as you held your hand tight over her nose and mouth, or that you only got it right on the third try, when she cried out and bit your hand and in your anger you snapped her neck like a common chicken. And you never ever told a soul about the way she kept on coming back. Who could blame a little girl for missing her mother?
It was a month past Junior’s first birthday when the smell of death crept into the air, bitter and heavy with a tang of copper, like vinegar and musk. Ray said it was the lingering stink of drowned swamp rats on muddy banks and the murky water lapping against the wooden stilts beneath our porch, like any summer with too many rains. I blamed it on the conjure man’s concoctions—Healing Mud to be rubbed on Junior’s forehead when the moon was high; a Charm Bag to shove under his crib from sundown to sunup; and something he’d only call the Good Stuff, to be mixed with water fresh from the cistern and drunk twice a day. All to keep the devil away from our little boy’s body.
“I’m sick of all that mess,” I told Ray. “Never does a lick of good.” Conjure man had been coming by with oils and poultices and candles since just after Sarah came out wrong, lurking like a snake in the grass, and his juju had never made a bit of difference in any of the baby girls who’d gone twisted since. Junior was just special. Still as perfect as the day he was born, same as the new baby would be. I was carrying high again, which meant another boy, and the child inside me tumbled like a windmill. Junior had been like that, bouncing and turning as he grew, dancing along with my heart like it was a washboard beat. Even now, he stood in the wood crib shoved into the corner beside our narrow bed, pushing at the bars like he was gonna launch himself over the edge and come crawling into the kitchen calling Mama.
“Marie, please.” Ray clutched the latest conjure bag in his hands like it was made of gold instead of piss-worn leather. “Think of it as a little good luck to balance out all the bad. And conjure man says something’s gotta watch over you while I’m gone.” Of course. Ray never did know how to just say goodbye.
“How long this time?” I put my hand over his, and he squeezed tight. He’d stayed close to home ever since Junior’s birth, working day shifts and bragging about how fast his little man grew. It was good having him close by. It kept the emptiness out of the air.
“Few days grassing the rice fields over East,” he said. “Got a family to feed now. Got a son.” I smiled at that, just a bit, and Ray grinned in return, left corner of his mouth lifting higher than the right, begging to be kissed straight.
“I don’t like it when you leave.” The house was spitting distance wall to wall, but it always felt too big without him in it, and the wind howled louder against the windows as soon as he walked away.
“I know, but I got to,” he said. “Can’t rely on charity forever.” He had that deepness in his voice that meant he was done deciding. “And conjure man says this’ll keep you safe while I’m gone. So you keep it close, you hear?”
I nodded and made myself pick up the brown leather, damp with whatever foulness the conjure man had used to bind the spirits. Ray smiled again as I hung it around my neck, like everything would be okay.
“Marie?” he said, stroking the back of my hand with his thumb.
“Yes?”
“You take care of yourselves while I’m gone.” He eyed Junior in the crib, then the conjure bag, then my swollen stomach.
“Always do, Ray,” I said. “Always do.”
It was three days later that I woke from another dream of souring soup bones and swamp rat livers, to an empty bed and the high-pitched sound of a child’s laughter.
Junior.
No. This voice was higher, bubblier. Girlier. I listened for a few moments, hand cupped behind my right ear, but the giggle disappeared as quickly as it had come.
Just a nightmare, I told myself. Just your body’s way of keeping you on your toes. Junior was twice as old already as any of the babies after Sarah. Everything was fine. He wasn’t going crooked. I didn’t need help from my little girl.
The new baby seemed to agree, shifting inside me and pressing hard against my bladder. But as I rolled myself off the bed, taking my first steps towards the piss pot I’d shoved in the corner, the high-pitched laugh was there again. And then a whisper, gentle and soft against my ear.
“Mama.”
“Sarah?” I still barely knew her voice. Sarah had never spoken much. Not as she toddled shakily from room to room, long arms hanging at her sides, the only sound her fingers scraping the floorboards. Not in those last cold days before her third birthday, when even Ray had to admit that no prayer or conjure or doctor could fix her. He’d squeezed my hand then too, before leaving on another long job, talked about dwindling food in a hard winter and making hard choices and how sometimes you had to give up what you had, make way for something new.
Sarah hadn’t made a sound then, just stared out at me from the crib, like she knew what was coming. Never said a word since either, not even all the too-many times I sat counting the long days until Ray’s return from some faraway worksite, watching until my new baby’s face went twisted, letting Sarah comfort me in silence as I did what needed to be done.
“Mama.” It sounded like Sarah. Like the frightened cries that had come out of her tiny mouth as I tried over and over again to silence her at the end, wishing that she had grown straight and tall, that she could unbend herself and be the child that I deserved. A child like Junior.
I looked over to his crib, but even in the dim light of dawn I could see that it was empty, the shirt-turned-blanket that I had tucked in around him dangling useless over the crib rail.
“Junior? Sarah? Ray?” I tried to speak calmly, but my voice came out high and shaky, and only the wind outside replied. I scanned the room in the half-light, but my baby wasn’t there. Just the door, hanging open, and a flash of yellow cloth on the porch beyond. I ran the five short steps through the living room towards it, slamming through the front door and sending it swinging into the house frame so hard I almost jumped at the sound.
“Junior?” I called out again, working to keep my voice calm, trying not to focus on the stagnant brown seepage water lapping just below the wood deck. Maybe he had already crawled too far, too fast. Maybe his giggles had turned to choked gurgles in the dark water, tiny arms churning as he gasped for air and breathed in death. I knew how fast a little thing could disappear beneath the surface. I knew better than anyone.
Sarah giggled again, as if we were playing a game, her laugh echoing off to the right. I turned, and there Junior was. Safe, but only for now. He was still too close to the edge, crawling slowly towards the soup of brown water. And in front of him, standing in her yellow dress, impossibly small head lolling to the left side of her long-limbed body, Sarah, holding up her arms as if to stop him or pick him up or hold him tight.
“Junior!”
I yelled as I moved towards him, narrowing the gap between us in an instant, faster than I thought my waddling feet could possibly take me, and scooped him u p in my arms. I checked him all over, squeezing and hugging, kissing the top of his straw-coarse hair ‘til it was damp as the early morning air. Still perfect. I said a prayer, thanking all the gods whose names I could remember, and pressed his body against the conjure bag hanging from its string around my neck, even though I knew it was nothing more than filthy leather. Anything to keep my baby safe.
“Don’t you ever go outside like that again, Junior,” I said. “Scared me half to death. If it hadn’t been for Sarah . . . ”
I glanced back at the edge of the wooden porch. Sarah still stood there, tiny disfigured head drooping to the side, swollen eyes wide and small black plaits dangling, her yellow Sunday dress gleaming against the brown of her skin and the water behind her. She spread her long arms wide again like she wanted me to pick her up, but I clutched Junior to my chest instead.
Sarah let her arms fall, slamming her knuckles into the wood planks of the porch. Her bulging eyes couldn’t tell me if she was sad or happy or angry or content, and this wasn’t the time for guessing.
Sarah followed behind me as I walked inside; her steps slow and unsteady, fingernails dragging against the wooden porch and floor. The scraping stopped and started as I moved from room to room, latching the front door shut and double-checking the one behind the kitchen just in case. By the time I put Junior down and sat on the bed to watch his chest rise and fall in the rhythm of sleep, she stood beside his crib, laying her head against the wood frame to stare at him through the bars. A tiny shiver crawled up my leg and through my back, but I let it pass. Sarah had been the one who woke me, who saved Junior from disappearing into the dark brown water. Sarah had always been the one I could count on. I reached over to touch the side of her face. It was cold and clammy and just a little sticky, but I patted again, even stroked it twice with outstretched fingers. I wasn’t Ray; I’d never had the luxury to be squeamish.
“Thank you, Sarah,” I said. “For everything.”
“Mama,” she whispered back. “Mama.”
I expected Sarah to be gone by full light the way she always was, like fog after sunrise, but she stayed by the side of the crib all day, barely moving. I didn’t feel much like stirring either, but I heaved myself up to heat up some old gumbo and new rice, keeping the crib in sight while I slowly gathered pots and pans and tried not to bump my belly against the stove. Usually by mid-day, Junior would’ve started hollering to be fed and changed, but he slept sound and still, and Sarah just stared, head resting against the crib bars above his mattress. I wasn’t even sure she blinked.
“You’re going to have to leave sometime, Sarah,” I told her. Ray would be back in a few days, and he would never understand, would sprinkle holy water in every crack and crevice and have the conjure man painting the door frame haint blue to trap her soul. He would think she was what had gone wrong all those times, with all those lonely nights and broken baby girls. He wouldn’t understand that she was the only thing that had gotten me through it.
Sarah didn’t answer, but she raised one of her long arms and pointed at the front door. She backed away from the crib and towards the kitchen, her other arm still dragging against the floor. I’d only gotten my head halfway around when the knock came, loud and sharp and sudden. I stepped forward to grab Junior, soothe him if he cried, but he lay just as still as ever, breathing soft and easy.
“Ray?” I called. It was days early for him to be back, but maybe he’d left something behind. Or missed me too much to stay so long away.
“Miss Marie? Ray sent me on over to check on you.”
Even through the walls, I knew the conjure man’s voice when I heard it. His spirit cures might not have helped my babies, but any fool could tell by the whistle in his voice that he’d been touched by something from beyond. Nobody rightly knew what had happened to him, though some folks said he drowned and came back to life and others said he’d been born in the caul and had to tear his way out to take his first breath. Either way, he wasn’t somebody you turned away at the door, not even with Sarah backed all the way into the kitchen, arm still pointing, head bobbing against her chest with every unsteady step, leaving a damp chill where she brushed against me.
“Miss Marie? You in there?” I quickly wrapped my hands around Sarah’s waist and lifted, holding her at arm’s length. An achy cold spread through my hands and up my arms, but I held tight, moving her by the side of the oven where the conjure man wouldn’t be able to see. Before I turned, I put my finger up to my lips, watching one of her too-large eyes blink in what I hoped was some sort of understanding.
“I’m here—just moving slow these days,” I called out. “Be right with you.” I moved as fast as my feet could carry me, glancing over my shoulder to make sure Sarah was out of sight. All I could see was Junior in the crib, finally shifting just the tiniest bit, like it was Sarah’s leaving that set him free.
I put on my brightest smile as I unlatched the door and opened it wide. Conjure man crouched by the right side of the porch, staring out into the seepage water. It didn’t look half as treacherous as it had in the dawn light, but I still had to fight not to picture Junior slipping under the surface and drifting away.
“Sorry to keep you waiting,” I said. Conjure man stood, slowly, unbending his long skinny body and turning my way. His face was ten kinds of ordinary, but I could feel the spirit in him from where I stood.
“You locking the door now, Miss Marie?” The whistle in his voice hissed just a little.
“Junior’s almost to walking now,” I said. “Don’t want him falling in out here.” I could hear my voice getting thin, and the conjure man cocked his head like he knew there was more I wasn’t saying, but I kept my smile on.
“Ray didn’t tell me you were coming or I would’ve fixed something up.” I hoped he couldn’t smell the gumbo out by the door.
“Thought it might be a nice surprise,” he said, “Knows you get lonely here with just the baby.”
He narrowed his eyes like that wasn’t all Ray had said, a shadow of the way Ray had looked at me when he came home last and the house was empty and silent, scrubbed clean of any sign of baby, and I told him that another of my little girls died in her sleep and not that I’d had to hold the pillow down tight over her twisted face and maybe we always made monsters.
“Junior’s plenty company.” I patted my stomach a little harder than I meant to. “And this one’s practically dancing already. Got the conjure bag to keep us all safe, right?”
The conjure man nodded and stepped towards me, but I reached back and pulled the door shut. I didn’t need him going in and seeing Sarah, didn’t need him taking her away. She was the only little girl I still had.
Conjure man kept coming forward anyway, like he was going to push through me to get inside the house, but I kept one hand on the handle and my feet planted in front of the door.
“I want to check on Junior,” he said. “Ray doesn’t want things going like . . . like how they been going. You hear?”
“Junior’s asleep,” I said. “Just got him down. And I don’t want you waking him with your fussing.”
That stopped him, but I could feel him staring through me, right to where Sarah was crouched in the back. If I let him in the house, I wasn’t ever gonna see my baby girl again. Might even take Junior for good measure. That was his way. Didn’t matter how many of the crooked ones he took in and raised up; he always sent them off far from the bayou and the folks who’d birthed them. Further than I’d ever get to travel. I hadn’t let him take any of the others and wasn’t gonna let him start up now. They might be monsters, but they were my monsters. I wanted them close to home.
“I need to check on him.” The conjure man’s voice whistled as a breeze blew by, like he was calling up something from the wind. “Something in that house don’t feel right. And if it ain’t, well you know I’ve got plenty space for foundlings. Might even be safer there than here.”
“He’s fine. This just ain’t the time,” I said, words coming out fast and harsh. “I’m barely dressed as is, and the only thing wrong with the house is that it’s in no state for company. You come on back tomorrow, check on Junior then.” I smiled bright again, but it felt like my face was shaking.
The conjure man stepped closer, ‘til his stick of a body was right up against the swell of my belly, and leaned in to stare me straight in the eye. I thought he might push me over, tug me out of the way, turn the sky dark and call lightning down, but he just grabbed the conjure bag around my neck with two hands, whispered a few words I didn’t understand and jumped back like he’d heard a rattler slither by.
