Lungs and Legs

Chapter 2

The next time I open my eyes I am in a room, clear wood and white sheets around me. I stay awake only long enough to make sure I am safe, before the darkness swallows me again.
The second time the face of a woman occupies all my view. Her cheeks are wide and reddish. Her eyes are small and green and seem a little stern, but her voice is kind when she asks "Are you awake?". I nod and attempt to smile, for lack of better means of thanking her. I realize she must have taken care of me for quite a while. "How do you feel?" she asks and I hope a smile will be enough of an answer this time as well. It is not. "What's wrong with you?" she insists. "Can't you speak?". I shake my head vigorously and for a moment she looks impatient, then taken aback. "You can't speak?" she asks again, slower now. I nod. "But you understand me?". I nod again. She looks at me for a long while in silence. "I'm Berta" she says eventually. "I don't know what happened to you, but you've been mostly sleeping for the last three days. Can you stand now?". I try, and realize I cannot. The knees give in as soon as I am upright and I fall on the bed. There is once more both an impatience and a kindness in Berta's little, sharp eyes. "You'll stay here then" she declares. "Rest now". And with this she leaves the room.

***

It has been nearly a month. It has taken me a full week to be able to walk steadily again, but that does not mean I can move freely about. The pain in my limbs no longer stops me, and neither does the woman who has nursed me back to health, but crossing the village soon turned out to be a challenge. The looks themselves would have been enough: it feels as if they are weighting me to the ground, eyes on every corner following me around. But it does not stop there. There are the whispers, the muffled conversations and the not too muffled comments. There are whistles and calls. Once, a group of young boys followed me around, and when I tried to get away one of them grabbed my arm. I run, and decided from then on that the inside of Berta's house was a better place for me.
The twilight of the room where I fist awoke started to feel comforting after a while. The shapes of the furniture grew familiar and my eyes grew unaccustomed to the bright light of the outside.
But those last few days I have found myself remembering the first day after my escape, the moment when I opened my eyes as sunlight filled the forest. I recall more and more how the all-encompassing, moving green of the trees reminded me of home. I miss the colors, the way they shift constantly. I miss the sensation of the elements on my skin – water, air, at this point I could not care less. So today I decided to attempt a walk in the forest.
If I am lucky, I can be out of the village soon enough, without having to endure much of the usual attention.

I nearly make it. I can already see where the neat, fenced off space of the village gives way to the unruly woods. I walk straight, head up and eyes firmly fixed on the path ahead of me, pretending not to notice the reactions. And then, right when I am planning to turn and leave the path and find refuge under the extended fingers of leafs, I spot a group of men gathered around a table. They are between me and the line of woods. Two of them are engaged in a contest – arm-wrestling, I think it is called, a game where you try to bring your opponent's wrist to the table to prove your strength. There are screams and cheers coming from the group. One of the men seems to have won and the loser is replaced by another contestant.
I slow down, hoping they will not notice me, but of course they do. One of them points at me saying "And where is this one going?" and soon enough there is a chorus of jokes and laughs. I try to ignore it, but the man who was winning the game raises and comes towards me.
He is right in my path and the instinct to turn back and run is overwhelming. Why do humans constantly seek confrontation? This is not how things work under the sea. You can fight the current, but if you do, eventually you will lose. You need to learn to harness it, add its strength to your own. If you resist the waves, sooner or later you will get hurdled against the rocks. But there are no waves here, I tell myself, no current to follow in the world of sharp objects. Perhaps to survive on dry land you have to be the rocks, I think and keep walking. I force myself to look at the man as, step after step, he comes closer. I only stop when I can no longer advance without walking into him. His face – pink, and hairy, and laughing – now looms above me, so close I could touch it. With signs, I try to tell him I only want to get to the forest. He seems amused by this. "Come to join the game?" he asks. Again, I point to the trees behind him. "Oh, that's where you want to go!" he says, as though that was the funniest thing in the world, and the others greet this with another wave of giggles. "Tell you what," the man says, "you beat me, and I'll let you pass!". He extends his hand, as though to wrest.
This appears to be a joke, although I do not quite understand why. Does he think I will make an interesting opponent? But why would that be amusing? These legs might still be weak, but my arms are what they have always been – made for swimming. I wonder if the man simply didn't notice them under this dress? I have always been strong, even among my people. I have swam for days on end, crossed mighty currents, dived into the deepest crevasses and rose all the way to the surface. I have survived tempests that would have swallowed him whole. I wonder if the joke is that he does not stand a chance?
He is still in my path and there is simply no getting past him. All I want right now is to disappear among the trees. I want out of here and I do not see any other way, so I nod.
For a second, he looks thoroughly confused, as if he never expected me to accept, but it does not last. He grabs me by the elbow and leads me towards the table. There is still laughter all around, an ugly, wet noise coming from low in the men's throats. I am pushed into a chair and the large man sits opposite me, grinning. His hand is huge and warm to the touch, the skin of his palm rough and dry. My fingers seem tiny squeezed between his, but when the push comes I am ready for it and my hand hardly moves. For a moment his face is one of genuine shock and before he recovers I push hard and his wrist hits the table with a thump.
To my surprise this results in neither cheers, nor laughter. There is a long second of absolute silence, before one of the spectators exclaims "Look at Ian! Cheating all this time!". Now the cheerful cries come back, but they sound uncertain. I look up at the man in front of me. There is anger in his eyes, but it only lasts a moment. Then he seems to have reached some sort of a decision and his wide face erupts again in a smile. "Ah, she's tough, this one!" he declares, "Took me by surprise!". He extends his hand again and I know I would be wise to lose this time, but this body seems to come with a mind of its own and that mind appears to be guided by a fair amount of pride.
It takes three more tries for Ian to give up and let his companions have a try. By now, they have all passed through a similar progression: they hovered on the verge of anger for a while, but ruled in favor of amusement. More bystanders have gathered too. Children are urging me on with their squeals, elderly men shake their heads as I push down wrist after wrist, young women stand on tiptoe to see above the heads of those already gathered. It feels like the whole village is excitedly observing the spectacle of the mute girl arm-wrestling.
Four more men have tried and failed to beat me now. To my surprise, as the fifth one sits opposite me, I feel the corners of my mouth rising. There is a joy in using one's strength and it has been too long since I felt it.
Around that time a cry emerges from the surrounding noise: "Give the woman some beer!". Soon there is a massive glass in front of me brimming with golden liquid. The first sip tastes foul, bitter and heavy on the tongue, but this feels like a test, so I keep drinking.
Something strange happens after some more sips. The sharp edges of dry land seem to blur. The sensation resembles that of home. Objects lose their clarity, contours start to move as though seen through water. I like it. I did not even realize how tired I was of those clear-cut shapes. There is a trembling inside me, a sort of excitement that makes everything around me move faster. I am not sure how many more hands I press in mine and how many more glasses are put in front of me. But I want the world to keep shifting and floating, so I force the cold, disgusting drink down my throat. I can see I'm not the only one whose world is blurred this, because the cries are louder and everyone seems to move quicker. At some point, after another win, Ian picks me up from my chair, lifts me up high in the air and places me on the table. I am not quite sure why.
It is from this vantage point that I see Berta approaching, fast steps, arms crossed.
"What on God's green Earth is going on here?" her voice cuts through the chatter. "What have you done to that poor child? You get down here and back home right now!".
Walking turns out to be a challenge. When we do get home Berta leads me to my room and my body falls on the bed, the dizziness takes over, and I feel as if the waves were greeting me back and closing over my head.

I awake the next morning to a thumping in my skull. There seems to be a nail drawn through each of my temples. Uncertainly, I make my way to the kitchen. Berta wordlessly places a glass of milk and some bread on the table and watches me slowly force it down. When I finish, she rises and hands me the bucket used to carry water from the well.
"If you're strong enough to drink, you're strong enough to work" she declares.
It is easier said than done. The nails in my temples are still there and the legs feel limp, as though they could not quite carry my weight. As I drag the full bucket back towards home Ian's massive silhouette appears before me.
"I see she's put you to work, little arms" he says reaching out for the bucket. I grab the handle firmly and move away. "Whoa, slow there!" he exclaims "You're white like death herself! Must be a mighty hangover you've got! You're in no state to fight me today". I am not sure what a hangover is, but I am feeling quite awful, so I let him take the bucket from my hands and carry it all the way to Berta's house.