Chiton

  ***

  For the next several days, we practiced the stick dance that Wilson had taught us that first morning. There were only twelve different moves and three ways to grip the stick. By the end of the week I could perform the dance as well as any man in the entire camp.

  We also spent a lot of time running. Run up the hill. Run down the hill. Run around the hill. I never understood the point, but I was not about to call attention to myself by leaving the center of the group. We also continually practiced poking holes in a large roll of grass with the pointy end of our sticks. One day it dawned on me that the rolls of grass were laid out roughly in the shape of a male alien, as if it were sleeping on the ground. I couldn't help but think that it was not a very bright idea to go poking a sleeping giant with our sticks. It might wake up. Still, I refused to bring myself to Wilson's attention by pointing this out.

  Many of the Infancy looked up to me for some reason. For the moment, I was one of the best dancers in our company. I spent a lot of time during the day helping the others improve their form, all the while thinking, "soon, they will all be better at this than me."

  The stories of my renown had grown to the point of silliness. Any stupid thing I said in jest would be taken as law. I had to watch who I joked with. It made friendships impossible, except for Nub who actually was quite intelligent. He saw through the legend and helped me in my quest to avoid Wilson.

  Finally the itching under my armor became too urgent and I missed the morning run. It couldn't have been worse timing because that day Wilson himself came to our burrow and led the company out. When he saw my condition, he ordered me to, "Just stay put," with that same disapproving look that he always wore.

  "I'm alright," I insisted, "I'll be there in a minute," but by then my armor was almost entirely over my head and I could do nothing but roll on my back and kick. When I finally struggled out of my skin and finished eating the old shell, I wandered out into camp to find it deserted. Apparently Wilson had planned a special trip away from camp that day for everyone. It was just like him to find a way to exclude me, so I returned to the river and spent the rest of the day soaking my new armor.

  I don't know what happened that day, but after that, I never saw the original one hundred dancers that had inspired me that first day. All the members of the Infancy seemed upset when they returned and I could never get Nub to tell me what was wrong.

  I soon found I could get away by myself each evening as the cloud first began to darken. I would climb to the top of a low hill overlooking the camp and watch for her. Sometimes I saw her flying about the camp. Sometimes not. Most nights I would practice the stick dance by myself. Then one day my life changed. As I finished the stick dance I heard my name. I turned toward the voice that filled my dreams and she was sitting there watching me.

  "You have learned the forms well." She sounded pleased.

  I was too out of breath from the dance to gush my pleasure.

  "It relaxes me." I managed, leaning casually on my heavy stick.

  "Yes," she moved closer, "I know what you mean."

  She placed one claw on my stick. "I see you have found yourself a proper spear. Most of the ones I see around camp are too light."

  "I broke two before I found this one." I admitted.

  She laughed. "I broke seven in battle myself, before I took up the sword."

  I could only think how embarrassed she must have been to never have been able to use the sticks without cutting through.

  "I could show you sometime," I chanced to offer.

  "Perhaps," she said with a smile of coming possibilities.

  And she was gone. Just like that. I had to sit until my knees stopped shaking.

  The next evening I had just begun the dance when she appeared. She had brought a stout stick of her own, and at the moment in the dance when you're supposed to cross sticks with your neighbor she was there and our sticks met with a satisfying crack. My heart raced as she danced around me fast enough to play the part of each of my neighbors. I was thankful that my legs knew the steps so well, because my mind went blank. I thrilled at the crack of our sticks as they crossed again and again.

  I think we repeated the entire dance three times before she fell to the ground laughing. "Enough, enough," she giggled. "Oh, I haven't done that in years."

  My week knees forced me to the ground by her side. She lay on her back in the grass her breath coming nearly as heavily as mine. At last her laughter trickled to an end and she propped herself up on three of her elbows.

  "Thank you," she whispered. "I haven't practiced the forms since the destruction of Erowhen," and she told me a lovely story about her home. That made me homesick for my own lost home and I presumed to tell her a little about the gardens I helped to tend sometimes there. I didn't tell her the whole story of course. I wouldn't want her to know how I had only been allowed to work there a few weeks before the head gardener chased me out with a stick for over watering his favorite decorative fungus.

  While we were talking I memorized her every feature. I had never given much thought before now as to the differences between men and women of our species. She had the same basic body type as a man. The same eight legs. the same six arms. The same two clawed pincers. The same eye stalks, long nose and mouth. Yet, not the same. She had those beautiful delicate wings on her back of course, and everything else about her was somehow more pleasing to look upon. Every line of her beautifully speckled armor shell called out to me to touch, but I dare not.

  When I told her that I was glad to see she had finally learned to use her stick without breaking it, she burst into laughter and I couldn't help but join in. For several nights in a row we met the same way. Danced then talked of our previous lives. Such pleasant conversation inevitably turned sad with the mention of old friends lost, and that would send her flying away.