Two Blue Circles —John K. Peck
Mother has been sewing near-constantly for weeks, digging out our old shirts and smocks and going at them with her needle. Once they’re in shape she pulls them over our heads, and their cool linen smells like mildew and winter. When we complain, she tells us to go outside and run around in them, and soon enough, she's right, the sweat and sunlight chase the smell away. Later, when it's time to come back, they ring the bells in our village and all the villages up and down the valley. Without that, we'd play half the night, never knowing when it was time for dinner, the sun still lighting up the treetops on the hills across the valley long past our bedtimes.
The day before the festival, Inia comes by and says my ma says I can go see the statue if you take me. Inia's six, and I'm eight, and though she's tiny, maybe half my size, she can still handle herself fine with brambles and bees and thrown pinecones. I take her hand, and we walk down the road to the village square, past Inia's house and old Degov's house, and the Uzov house, the ones with the little boy who doesn't come outside. Past the old stone house with no roof, where the trader pitches his tent when he comes through, then around the bend and, suddenly, the square comes into view. The sun's in our eyes, and Inia says race ya, Crableg and steals her hand back and starts to run.
I beat her to the square easy and start eyeing the statue up and down, plonked right in the muddy middle of everything, dragged from wherever they keep it the rest of the year. A cloud moves and the sun hits it and we can see it's been dusted off proper, and we raise our hands to shade our eyes. Through my squinty lids I can see how detailed it is: carved from a big chunk of the gray-black steklo from way-north where the smoking vulkany are, chipped into reasonably lifelike form: body and tail, head like a goat's on a long curved neck, eyes big and round like full moons, legs bent wrongway like a spider’s, or a crab's. Looking closer, I make out words carved into the surface. I can read a few, but can't make any sense of it. Probably the language from beyond the vulkany, which only the oldest growns still speak.
Past the statue, against the long two-story inn wall, they've built up the stage where the musicians will play on solstice night: crossbeam at the top, long strands of colored flags running downward from it, the little triangular patches hanging still in the hot breezeless day. Then Inia's tugging at my sleeve and pointing at the candy-seller's cart at the far edge of the square, and I check in my pockets for coins as she runs ahead to pick something out.
#
That night I can't fall asleep. Nights this time of year are just endless dusks, and my room's dim but not dim enough. To tire myself out I practice the song we'll sing on our hike tomorrow:
Day bright, shadows short, solstice time is here
Close your eyes and count five score and have no need to fear.
The growns sometimes chime in with a ha-hey! after each line, with all of us tromping together up the path to where the caves begin. It's childish, sure, but even us older kids don't complain about the candy they stuff us with when we get back. The song circles in my head, and eventually its da-da-dum rhythm lulls me to sleep.
#
It's even hotter than normal, and I'm sweating through my white smock by the time we get to the stone steps at the beginning of the hills. Inia's still so small each step is like climbing a little wall to her, and I walk behind helping her up the particularly tall ones. No one's singing yet, the only sounds are our feet shuffling and the whit-whit of a bird in the branches above. It's Inia's first year on the hike, and she starts to slow down as we're about halfway up.
Get yourself going or let us pass, says a voice behind, hushed but loud enough. I whip around and glare at Eebee, and she glares back but doesn't say anything. She's two years older than me and big, as big to me as I to Inia, never has a nice word for anyone. I come out with see if you even fit anymore, and turn around before she can say anything, boosting Inia up a last run of tall stairs.
The path levels out, and after we all catch our breath one of the young boys ahead starts the song. We older ones hold off a bit, as it's all a bit babyish, but it helps take your mind off the climb, and soon we're all singing the five verses full-voiced, a few of the growns even joining in. When we've reached the spot where the rock walls rise on either side, we stop walking but keep singing, until we cycle through the final verse one last time.
Spirits are high, and a few of the younger ones are chasing each other in circles around us until Eebee hisses at them. Then old Borje faces us and raises her arms, palms toward us, and we quiet down. She takes a deep breath, then closes her eyes and places her hands over them and starts the count: One! Two! Three! The youngest youngs giggle and run off right away; we half-growns keep our cool and walk away more slowly.
#
Inia and I look up at the smooth rock walls. We’re on a hidden path I’ve known for years, reached by crouching through some low, short rock caves. For a few moments I’m hopeful it’s a secretive enough spot to have lost that sourface Eebee, but soon enough I hear shuffling and cursing, and there she is, following behind us on all fours, standing slightly where the passage gets wider before emerging into the small stone-walled space. I scoot Inia along, but just as we get out into the bigger clearing—the one with the cave I'd chosen weeks ago, with the two small blue full-moons painted over the entrance, meaning it had been checked out by the growns and was safe to hide in—Eebee comes up behind me and grabs my wrist. I try to shake free, but she holds on tight, staring me down. She gives me a look I can't quite sort, says I hate your bratty voice and soft-egg parents who let you tear around town, but you’re not going in there. I try to wriggle free, but she grabs my wrist even tighter, saying why do you think they paint the circles? Inia starts crying, and Eebee grips even tighter and stares me in the eyes, and just then I twist my arm hard to the side, and she loses her grip enough for me to pull free and shove her back. I yell at Inia to get in the cave, and I run in after her, ducking down below the overhang.
Soon it's narrowed even more, much too small for Eebee's stupid cow-hips to fit through, but I can hear her yelling come back, damned idiots! We head further into the darkness, making our way over the angled boulders by the dim light seeping through from above. Eebee's voice grows fainter, the ones that hide best don’t come back, and then we can't hear her anymore at all.
Finally we're in the real dark, feeling our way along the cool mossy walls. It's my favorite thing to do, come to the caves and think. Sometimes I even go into the unmarked ones, much as they warn us against it. Such a simple rule, you'd have to be a fool to go wrong, yet every solstice someone goes missing. I hear Inia shuffling a bit ahead in the darkness, then a strange sound, sort of like something scratching against the rock. I wave my hand ahead of me to see if I can feel her, but there’s nothing there. I try to peer into the darkness, but it’s near-total and I just see things made by my eyes: small white flashes, a pair of dim blue circles. I decide to close my eyes instead, and I consider calling out to Inia but don’t, as it's nearly silent time. After the wait is done I'll find her hand in the darkness and lead us both out, but for now I make myself small like they taught us, huddling down in the pitch-dark and resting my cheek against the cool moss of the cave floor.
I close my eyes in the darkness and make my breathing as short and silent as possible, and soon the only sound is the drip-drip of water on the damp rocks, ticking out the minutes as I wait. To pass the time, I run the song through in my head, particularly the last verse we always sing loudest when we emerge from the forest back into town, parents crying like we’d been gone for years:
Day bright, shadows short, solstice time is here,
Hold your breath and close your eyes and live another year.
AUTHOR BIO:
John K. Peck’s most recent publication is "A Distant Hum" in Interzone #288. He is also a regular contributor to McSweeney's Internet Tendency and has appeared in two McSweeney’s anthologies.
