Джефф Вандермеер - The Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities

It thrilled him and made him afraid, all at once.

For three days and three nights, he journeyed thus. He spoke no words on his journey—there was no one to speak to—and although sometimes the smells of humans and woodsmoke gusted toward him, they were being replaced with the vivid smells of crushed pine needles and the clotted sap of trees.

One morning, he stopped at a river to catch his breakfast. Slowly, he waded into the water on all fours, the bright, bubbling river shockingly, joyously cold. He felt every pebble against the pads of his paws. He reached out to sweep a silvery fish into the air, where he knew he would catch it between his teeth. Just then, the wind changed directions, blowing a familiar scent to his twitching nose.

He stood and lumbered into the woods.

Charlotte was running toward him, wrapped in the fur of his mother, the cloak’s lining as bright as blood. A dirty and tear-stained bandage still covered her face.

Her eyes went wide.

For a moment, he imagined roaring up and striking her down. He imagined chewing her up, sinew and bones. He imagined being a bear and nothing more.

Then he remembered himself.

“Charlotte,” he said, his voice cracking with disuse. Three long days in the forest had almost made him lose his human speech.

She was shivering with cold. She went to him and pressed herself against him, so that, with her cloak, he didn’t know where he ended and she began.

“I’m sorry,” he said gruffly, trying not to rest his claws against her, even gently. He was apologizing for what was beneath the bandages, but also for the terrible thoughts he tried to put out of his mind. “Very, truly sorry.”

“What you are is wet,” she said, with a laugh. “And your nose is cold.”

With those words, he knew he was forgiven.

He gathered wood and Charlotte made a fire, talking the whole time. She told him about her plan to sneak out and come with him. She told him how cleverly she’d snuck out of the house with her little suitcase and waited for him by the ford in the road. But, as time passed, she realized he must have taken a different road entirely. She headed out after him, thinking she might yet catch him, but by nightfall, although she was sure she was following the right road, there was no sign of Liam.

“And such sounds the night makes!” she told him. “I was sure I was going to be eaten up by wolves. I barely slept a wink!”

Her relief was so great that she couldn’t stop talking. His happiness was so great that he was content to listen.

“But why did you come?” he asked finally.

“I can’t let you have all the adventures,” she told him. “The world is bigger than one logging town, big enough for you. And since I am so small, I figure I might be able to fit in it, too.”

He smiled big enough to show a row of white teeth.

And so, together, they journeyed south. Charlotte picked berries from bushes and Liam fished from streams and lakes without his rod, wading in and tossing gleaming trout onto the bank.

Sometimes Charlotte set traps and caught tiny birds that crunched between Liam’s teeth.

At night, Charlotte and Liam covered themselves in a blanket of leaves and curled up together, telling stories until they fell asleep.

Finally, they saw the city in the hazy distance. It seemed to be sculpted from red brick and chimney smoke. As they drew closer, they passed more and bigger houses. Motorcars whizzed by, ladies turning their scarved heads to stare at the bear and his sister.

Liam stared back, full of awe.

“We will make our fortunes here,” Charlotte said, dancing her way across the cobblestones, her scuffed boots as elegant on her as any slipper. “Here, everything is going to happen.”

They were poor, but they managed to rent a little apartment, and when Liam’s head brushed the lintel, it made them smile.

Liam got work loading boxes along the docks while Charlotte made a little money by sweeping up for a taxidermist whose office was a few streets over. He specialized in creating curiosities like fishes covered in fur, chimeras, tiny griffins, and fossilized fairies. Sometimes he let her stroke her finger carefully across a fox pelt before attaching chicken wings to the creature’s back.

Sometimes, too, they would go to the cinema, where movie villains tied bow-lipped starlets to the tracks. Liam had to sit in the back, because he was so large, but Charlotte sat with him and they shared candy corn in little funnel cups.

Liam loved the city. He was strange, but in a place that delighted in strangeness. Everywhere that Liam turned, there were odd fashions, unfamiliar foods, and stores selling things of which he never could have dreamed. And he loved his job—unloading and loading exotic things heading from and to far-off places. Occasionally, one of the boxes didn’t make it to its destination, and those nights Liam brought home a cloudy bottle of bourbon or a pound of coffee beans so strong that they woke the whole building when they were brewed. Just the scent of them was enough to make your heart race.

And, heart already racing, Liam met a girl. Her name was Rose, and the first time he saw her, she’d just broken the heel off of one dove-grey shoe. He carried her all the way to the boardinghouse where she lived. The other girls giggled when they spotted the bear lumbering up the steps, and the stern woman running the place even let him take a cup of tea in the kitchen, remarking that she’d never seen shoulders as broad or teeth as white on Rose’s other suitors.

Turned out, Rose was a seamstress. When her long hours in the factory were over, she sewed herself smart dresses, each more beautiful than the last.

By the time he got back to their apartment, Charlotte could see that Liam was in love.

All he talked about was Rose. He told Charlotte about her soft hands, the way her bright blond hair fell around her face in soft curls, the way her clothes were always stiff with starch and freshly pressed, the no-nonsense way she told him about nearly getting arrested for smoking. She and her friends had to run away from a policeman, in their stiff corsets, ducking into a sweet shop and hiding in the bathroom. According to Rose, it had been a near thing.

Rose was always getting into scrapes. She had dozens of friends, most of them male. And she always had perfume to dot behind her ears and at the pulse points of her wrists.

Charlotte didn’t like Rose, but she bit her tongue to keep from saying so. For so long it had just been Charlotte and Liam in the world, but though they had endured all other things together, love was something they must each endure alone.

“I want to marry her,” Liam said.

Charlotte just nodded as she rolled out dough for pie. Cooked all together with gravy, the bits and pieces of the week’s meals tasted just fine. She made two—a generous slice for her and the rest for Liam—then, as an afterthought, sliced a piece that he could take to Rose.

“She will be like a sister for you,” Liam said.

Charlotte nodded again. The taste of copper pennies flooded her mouth, she was biting her tongue so hard.

Sometimes, when he was with Rose, Liam wished he could open up his fur like it was a cloak and wrap it around her.

But he did what he thought was expected of him. He looked for a better job and found one—as a stonemason, lifting slabs of marble and setting them with precision. He took Rose to his apartment, where Charlotte cooked them a whole ham. He bought her a pair of gloves sewn of lace so fine he was afraid his claws would pull it. When he asked Rose to marry him, he went to one knee, although he still towered over her chair, and shut his eyes. He could not bear to see her expression.

In lieu of a ring, he had scrimped and saved to buy her a pair of diamond earrings. They sparkled in their box like tiny stars. His palm quavered with nerves.