“Jenny Wren,” said Bryony bitterly, at what to her was an acknowledgement that they’d known each other before.
The little bird piped a high, loud note. The clone was staring at her, a half smile still stranded on his face. Suddenly Jenny left her hiding place and flew straight for his face. With a cry, he lifted his hand, but the tiny bird was already perched on the edge of his eye socket. He felt her sharp claws pricking. She squeaked, flicked her tail, and stepped in through his eye.
The clone staggered back as if he’d been struck a blow. Forgetting everything for the love of him, Bryony took two steps forward and held on to him as if she’d never let him go again.
“No,” said Gudrun in a flat tone, as if she understood that everything was about to change. The clone’s eye had turned into a dark pool that seemed to have no surface. Bryony reached up to touch his face, and as she did so, the wren flew out of his eye like a rocket, straight over her head, out of the window, and was gone. He raised his hand and looked at Bryony. . . .
And the clone remembered. In that second he made the journey from death to life once more; he became Sigurd. Jesus did it, Odin did it; but only he ever made the impossible journey twice—a third awakening. And during death the great soul of Sigurd was kept safe—in the tiny heart of a wren.
As his soul slotted into place within him, a pulse of energy left him. Gunar, Hogni, and Gudrun fell back before it, then were scooped up again toward him by a second pulse of pure love. But Bryony stepped through it and into his arms. Sigurd was love. He seemed to be clothed in light. Each of the others, unconscious of anything else, lifted a hand toward him but they didn’t dare touch.
Sigurd threw back his head and screamed in pain. Memories! Bryony, Crayley, Jenny Wren. Love! Falling in love, making love, being in love. Every second of it with all this heart. And more. His dying struggle in the lake, fighting for air while Ida beat at his face. Yes, Jenny had seen all this too and given it to him as well.
As he gazed into Bryony’s eyes, she saw it all—the light dawning, the understanding, the love, like a flash of color. She cried out, “Sigurd!” He was hers still! She smiled joyfully and reached up to take his bowed head in her arms. They were in each other’s hearts forever. But Sigurd wept—for her, for him, for everything they had missed and lost.
Sigurd remembered more; not only his memories, but the memories of the clone, lived by him as surely as if he had been there. Love! Doubleness. Love in lies, betrayal, treachery. There was Gudrun, whom he loved. And Gunar, to whom he had given a gift that no one had the right to give. He hadn’t known—but the gift had been given. What greater betrayal to yourself or another can there be than to give love away? How could such a crime ever be undone?
He held Bryony tenderly in his arms for a moment longer, then he groaned and turned away. Bryony froze. Had she made a mistake? How could there be a mistake?
“Sigurd? What is it?” Suddenly he turned and stumbled out of the room. As he went he cast a haunted glance behind him. The world was not back together at all. On the contrary, in the face of love everything had been made more crooked than ever.
Bryony took a step forward, but before she could run after him, Gudrun pushed her to one side.
“Sigurd! Sigurd! Come back!”
From where she stood, Bryony could see him through the window running like a deer across the wet grass, his form blurred by rain. Trailing behind him onto the lawn was Gudrun. She called his name but he was already jumping over the hedge at the end. She screamed, “Sigurd! Sigurd!” again and they caught a brief glimpse of his face turning to look back; then he was gone.
Soaked with rain, Gudrun stood and stared. She rubbed her face in her hands as if she couldn’t believe what she’d just seen, then turned and trudged back toward the house. As she approached the conservatory, she caught sight of Bryony’s face staring at her through the window and cast her a look of pure hatred.
Sigurd could have run for the rest of his life—he had the strength to do it. But he knew there were things that could never be left behind. After a few miles he followed a valley down to a small stream flowing through rough pasture and lay down among the watercress and fallen leaves in the muddy margins.
It was pitch-black here, away from the roads and towns, but at that moment he was aware of all life, from the microscopic animals living in the water and mud around him, to the trees shedding their leaves crowding on the slope above, to the planet itself and the vast stars themselves, bending time and space to look down on him.
He wriggled himself deeper down among the crushed plants and mud as if this was a warm bed and let the memories in.
Memories, yes! Memories are holy, Bryony had told him that. Our record of our contact with the world, the glory of our lives. He had been kept from them, but now he could give them their proper place, surround them, engulf them, make them his. Falling in love with Gudrun; dying, forgetting, fearing, losing, being weak; living out of step, out of place with the world. Every second of every hour of every day of his life as the clone, he made his.
Sigurd lay in the mud and felt the rain wash him. Around him, he could feel a thousand tiny wrigglings as little fish, water shrimps, snails, and other creatures gathered round him. A deer came to lick the salt sweat off his arm. Above, small birds gathered in the branches, all to be near him. He was the perfect one, made to love all and lead all and do everything right; but he had been tricked into betrayal, and betrayal was the one gift he didn’t have. His fears had come true after all. He wasn’t human; he never had been. He was a monster all the time—a monster of love. To be truly human you need to be able to betray. Perfection has no place in this world. He lay there, loving everything, but unable to lift a finger to stop anything, save anything, change anything—not himself, not Bryony, nothing.
Up at the Old House he could feel the people moving in their lives. To be a person—what could be more lovely? But the poisons were at work now—jealousy, frustration, rage, failure, betrayal. Nothing could be changed. The grip of fate was irresistible. Then, death. How was it possible to face this, the loss of all hope, and still remain yourself?
Sigurd sat up in his watery bed. Around him the animals started in alarm.
“Is that possible?” he whispered. “Is it possible to love death? Is it possible to love hate itself?”
And if it was, how stupid is that!
Then he went back; but first he made a prayer to all the gods—to Odin and Jesus and Allah and any one of them who might be listening. Thank you, Father, he said, but you don’t know what you do.
It rained during the whole of July, but then in the second half of August we had two weeks of sun. Yow—blazing hot! You couldn’t move. Everything was exhausting. It was the real damp heat, you know; you can’t breathe, you can’t sleep, you can’t do anything. The cats spent all day sleeping inside, the dogs were lying on their sides with their tongues hanging out panting away. So were we. Our family’s funny in the sun. Suddenly we’re walking round with our tongues out going, heh heh heh. We couldn’t help it. When the three of us got together, we looked hilarious.
Not that we were spending much time together these days. Rrrr. I don’t think we’ve spent more than a few weeks together all year. We used to be together all the time. That was before the Shit Queen came along.
Yeah. It’s this gift she has. She’s a shit machine. She turned me into shit, she turned Sigurd into shit. We used to be in love. Grrha ha ha, remember that? No, nothing happened down there in Crayley, of course it didn’t. It was entirely innocent. Then why does he turn to shit every time she looks at him? Because she has shit-ray eyes? And she’s turned Gunar into shit, he goes around looking like shit all the time, that’s shit. Our family’s shit, the country she happens to be queen of is shit. See? The Shit Queen. She’s only been here under a year, that’s all it took—one year to turn the whole world to shit.
Gunar and Hogni were out boating. Away, away, everyone wants to get away. Yow. Sigurd was away. I ha
rdly saw him. I missed him like Hel and then when he was here it was awful. Hogni spent some time with me but I wasn’t seeing much of Gunar. Things were pretty difficult between us since his wife was so obviously in love with my husband.
Rrow. It’s all Gunar’s fault in the first place. He should never have asked Sigurd to go down there in his place and Sigurd should never have agreed. Bloody Gunar—he has everything, a kingdom of his own, and is it good enough? No; he has to be Sigurd, too. So there she is trapped down there and this man turns up; she’s never even seen one before and she falls in love with him. Well—yes. What else is going to happen? She must have thought it was Christmas. And then, of course, she gets up here and lo and behold, the man suddenly has a completely different personality. Well, you have to feel sorry for her—what’s that going to do to your head? And then, oh look! Here’s another man, an utterly gorgeous, delicious man, much nicer than the one she’s got, who just happens to have the same personality as hers did when she fell in love with him in the first place.
Rrr. Pah! She’s not stupid. She knows something’s going on. I don’t blame her. It was a stupid trick to play on her, but now it’s gone wrong and here we all are suffering from Gunar’s greed and Sigurd’s naïveté. And her shit.
So, Gunar and Hogni were away having a good time leaving me in the shit on my own to cope with the Shit Queen. I’d been working—a new initiative for hospitals. Hospitals are a problem. With so many different body types you need your doctors trained in about ten ways for even the most basic treatments. But it was just so hot. I’d had it. I had a cold drink and went outside to see if it was any cooler out than in, and there was Bryony reading on the sun lounger.
Oooh, Miss Shit has come outside. We’re honored. She doesn’t work. She doesn’t do anything except sit around emanating shit waves. But, then . . .
Like I say, I do feel sorry for her. She looked so pretty, lying there with her toes bare and her dress off her shoulder, reading her book. Butter wouldn’t melt. Yow. She kept looking across at the cat lying under the plum tree, flicking his tail and watching the birds at the feeder. You get all sorts at the feeders—there was a woodpecker that summer, beautiful black and white and red thing. Yes, a beautiful day, just so swelteringly hot. I thought, She’s the one who’s been used. At least we all know what’s going on. She was trapped down there on her own all that time, all she wants is to come up here and have the same things everyone else has—ordinary things—and then when she gets here, it’s all fucked up for her.
You have to try, don’t you? So I asked her if she wanted to come for a swim.
The river’s half a mile away, it’s a job to get there on a day like this with the heat baking down on you, but it’s great when you get there. We hadn’t been down there for ages. Granddad had a dam put across the river and it makes a great swimming hole. There’s still the rope up where we used to swing as children. We should have been there, having a laugh in the river, with a picnic and a bottle of wine, instead of sitting about sweating in the sun. But the others were away, it was just her and me, and so I asked her. But I was surprised when she said yes.
“Oh, great,” I said. She always says no to everything. I thought, There, you keep trying, you get somewhere. I smiled at her. She couldn’t quite manage to smile back.
“I’ll get some swimming things,” she said, but I just laughed and shook my head.
“There’s no one there. You can keep your knickers on if you want, I won’t look.” She smiled back then. So I thought she was happy for once.
I went inside and got some towels and a bag, a couple of bottles of wine, some bits of cake and crisps and things, and we set off across the fields. It’s a pretty walk, you get nice views from the top of the hill. I tried to talk but she just nodded and smiled so I stopped bothering. It was uncomfortable, but what do you expect, we’d hardly been talking for months. Actually, it took all your breath just plodding along in the heat, so I thought, well, maybe she was happy just to be out walking and going for a swim, maybe it was just me babbling away like a big twat that was making things feel funny.
When we got there, Bryony went straight to the beachy bit— muddy bit, really, but we call it the beachy bit. She stood on the water’s edge squidging the mud between her toes. It was nice. Silly, the sort of thing you do when you’re little. I came and did the same thing. It made me laugh.
“It tickles!” I said, giggling, and she looked at me and smiled again. I was—well, I wasn’t exactly happy, but I thought for the first time in over a year that maybe it was possible to be happy. I don’t ask for much, do I? Just a smile now and then. “Come on,” I told her, “let’s get our things off.” I was getting excited—going swimming in the nuddy. Naughty girls! I went back to where it was dry and stripped off, but by the time I got down to my bra and knickers I was feeling uncomfortable again, because she was still just standing there in the mud. She was looking at me when I glanced across. She nodded across the water. “I think I saw a kingfisher,” she said. I looked up but I missed that lovely flash of blue.
“Come on,” I said.
“You go, I’m just getting my toes wet.”
I paused. I didn’t want to have nothing on anymore, not with her just standing there fully dressed. But then I thought, What the Hel, just do it, fuck her, and I took them off. I could see her glancing at me. You’d have thought even she’d have the sense not to stand there sneaking a look at my tits the way things were between us. But I tried to make light of it. I put my hands in the air and wriggled.
“Da-dah!” I said, and she laughed.
I felt so bare. I wished I had more doggy hair, like Hogni, to cover me up.
I walked down a few meters upstream to her and went slowly into the water. It was almost warm. I wanted to rush in and splash and scream but it was a bit hard with her standing there watching. I got deep enough to get my bum wet and then I just stood there wondering what to do next. And you know what she does? She turns away from the water, walks along the bank. I was thinking, At last, she’s going to strip off and get in too, but all she did was walk a few meters past me upstream. It was a bit of a drop into the water from where she was and she stood there for a second before lifting up her skirt and stepping clumsily down again into the river.
So what was wrong with the place she’d started at? It was really awkward where she was.
“Aren’t you going in?” I asked.
She didn’t look at me. She kept her face the other way.
“Maybe in a bit,” she said.
I stood there a second longer, feeling pretty cross by that time. I’d made the effort, hadn’t I?
“So, Bryony,” I said. “Why didn’t you stay down there? That bit’s all awkward.”
She turned to look straight at me and she said, “Because I didn’t care to stand in water that had gone past you.”
I didn’t think I’d heard her right at first. I said, “What?” And she repeated it, nice and clearly in case I’d been too stupid to understand.
“I don’t want to have water that touched you touch me.”
There was this terrible pause while it sank in how foul she was being. It was so deliberate, like she’d come all this way just to humiliate me. I blushed all over my body, I could feel it. You think you only blush with your face, but you don’t. I could feel my whole body blushing. I put my arm across my chest. She was watching me to see what I’d do, like I was some sort of experiment. I didn’t know what to do, it was out of the blue, I hadn’t expected it.
I turned and splashed back to the bank. Stark naked—it just made me feel so stupid, so pathetic. I’m not the world’s most gorgeous nude, I must have looked ridiculous. I was trying not to cry. I’d made an effort, hadn’t I? I’d put myself out—it wasn’t as though I wanted to go swimming with the miserable bitch. I was doing it for her, for us, and she just used it as a chance to humiliate me. I was in such a hurry to get out of the river I was slipping and stumbling. I fell over on the bank and hurt m
y foot, got covered in mud. She didn’t come to help or anything. She just stood and watched me, her nasty little face taking it all in. I pulled on my top and my skirt, and turned to look at her. She’d turned away again. She was standing there gazing out across the water as if nothing had happened.
“So you think you’re so much better than me, is that it?” I demanded. I wanted to go up and thump her one, but there was no way. She was strong, Bryony. She’d have killed me.
She cleared her throat.
“I am better than you,” she said.
“Oh, why’s that? Because you sit around all day doing nothing except sulking and pissing everyone off? Thanks, I don’t see what’s so great about being you. Your life looks pretty shit to me, lady. The only problem is, you make everyone else’s life shit, too.”
She was pretending to be calm but she’d turned red. “Maybe it is,” she said in a shaky voice, and I knew how angry she was then. “But I’m still better than you, Gudrun.” And she turned away as if that was that.
I just wanted to shout, “Fuck you!” and run away. I wish I had. It would have happened sooner or later, though. I wanted to hurt her, I suppose, and I knew how to do it, too.
“I have Sigurd, and you don’t,” I said. “That’s what this is all about, isn’t it? Gunar’s not good enough. The whole world isn’t good enough for you. It has to be every bloody thing you want and you want Sigurd. Well, you’ll never have him, darling. He’s mine. So you can sulk all you like.”
I was still fighting back the tears but I felt better after that. There, I thought, it’s out in the open now. Maybe she’ll just fuck off and leave us in peace now. I snatched at my bits and pieces that were lying in the grass. I was out of there. Let her think on that!
“Sigurd’s not half the man Gunar is,” she said. I just laughed! Who did she think she was fooling? Herself? Not me, that’s for sure. I just looked at her and shook my head. “Yeah, Gunar makes you so happy, doesn’t he?” I told her. I waved my knickers at her and stalked off. You could hear it in her voice. I’d hit the nail right on the head.