Torn Apart

Just To Watch You Go

It is more difficult than you anticipated. You are unused to absorbing memories and distinguishing who you are from who the memories belonged to. It is already difficult with the pain in our bones. Give the memories to me. We need you to think clearly, Puppet, without distraction.

I hold her little body for the first time, and she is perfect. Ten fingers, ten toes, pink fuzz on her head, a wrinkled face. She kicks and cries, but Teles will not hold her. She is weeping.

You refuse me at our peril. If you will not give them, then bury yourself and I will lead. No, I will not harm the child. The goddess would not allow it in any case. She is safe for now. Take the memories and bury yourself deeper, but be ready. We may need your quick thinking yet.

You have rarely seen the gardens, but they are the same as those few days you were welcomed here. A vast array of wildflower and consumables, each separated into its own plot. Each stalk and stem pointed skyward. Stems weighted with fruit curl down at the slightest angle. Demeter plucks a red globe of a tomato from its stem, which instantly springs upright, relieved of its burden.

You could swear the leaves tremble at her passing.

Turning, Demeter approaches and you hold your ground. Her eyes are fixed on your captive. Crouching before the child, she assesses her with those stone eyes. She extends the tomato, holding it in easy reach.

"Take this. The Cage is not often fed, perhaps you can trade it for a brief alliance. Or keep it for yourself."

Dulcie takes the tomato. You cannot see her face. If you see her face you will falter, Puppet, we will not be looking at her face. The blooms on the shackle-vines are swelling. Not long now. And yet the noose about her neck has thinned. Is it shriveling?

By the gods, Puppet. It is thinner, even looser, and not a single ingredient added or removed. It is possible to do what you strive for. You question my shock, but know, Puppet, I crafted every curse the goddess holds, and this one is the first that grew in my own soul. No force on earth should be able to shift its growth, but circumstances have never been tested like this.

Teles will not hold her, will not even touch her for a month. She would not name our daughter, so I did. I wake for her at night. Aji and Kay take her in the mornings. Lewis tends her in the afternoon when his shift is finished. Lewis showers her with attention, but I see Kay and Aji only move to help when she cries.

Focus! The goddess bids you follow. You trail behind, still dragging the child on the tips of her toes past straight-edged rows of marigold and petunia evenly spaced between complementary foxglove spears.

I'm the one that teaches her how to tie her shoes, how to make her first tray of cookies. They're too hard, but a little milk softens them right up and we laugh. Only small things are fixed so easily. Her mother speaks to her but never plays. Training Aji, she says, but Aji was never neglected in Kay's training.

Lose who you are later, Puppet! You are not her father. You stole her father's memories. Are you Aji's father too? Teles' lover? No. Who are you? What name did the child scribble all over you?

Arthur.

Keep it that way. If you must hold them, do not absorb them. Keep them separate, like a ball in your hands, so that they do not become a part of you.

You have paused too long and the goddess is looking at you. Damn your stubbornness. Cringe and wag your tails. "Such a garden," you murmur. "It has been long since I have seen such marvelous blooms."