Judy Budnitz - If I Told You Once

How foolish of me to bargain with this.

How foolish to think I could move mountains just by being a woman.

I stood looking at the girl in the mirror who held her breasts in her hands and cried. Stupid girl, I thought.

I had never seen my mother cry.

Outside the sky was crowded with clouds dark as smoke, or smoke thick as clouds.

I washed and dressed and went to the stables and stole a horse because although I may have been ignorant of men, I understood animals and knew how to win their complicity. I ached between my legs and each step the horse took sent a jolt of pain a little farther up, a little deeper in.

My brother was nowhere to be seen.

So I rode away from that ugly place.

Those three old women who used to plague my village told me a story once.

I was a child then, their ancient faces frightened me.

I did not want to listen to them. I turned my face away and pretended that I was very busy thinking of other things, the way you do sometimes. But their words bored in.

The story went like this:

There once lived in the village a girl who was so spirited, so lighthearted her feet barely touched the ground. Her mother had to sew stones into the hems of her daughter’s skirts, knot clothes irons and horseshoes into her hair to prevent a strong wind from blowing her away. But the girl was irrepressible, she could run fast as a deer and all day long she flitted through the village, her bright sharp voice spangling the air around her.

Everyone in the village knew her. As a small child she had been inquisitive, appearing unexpectedly at people’s elbows to ask them questions. She pestered the blacksmith at his anvil, dodging the sparks; she floated through the clouds of flour at the baker’s, dug through the cobbler’s greasy leather. She might show up in any house, at any time of day or night, regardless of locks or manners. She would simply be there suddenly, an extra face at the dinner table. You might see her nose pressed against your window, feel her breath on your neck as you squatted on a stool milking into the bucket between your feet.

As she grew older she became taller but lost none of her lightness. Her mother often kept her inside now to work. But when she could get away she wandered through the village as before, stopping where she pleased. The villagers were used to her now; some anticipated her questions and answered them, while others good-naturedly ignored her.

She had a vitality they could not understand. They looked at her and thought she was happy, but in a way that made no sense to them.

She took to wandering the fields and forests, singing to herself, sticking weeds and flowers alike in her hair. The villagers saw her from afar; some liked to romanticize her, saying that her singing brought birds and butterflies flocking to her, perching on her shoulders and joining their voices to hers. Others said she had a low, rough voice, couldn’t sing a note, she just wandered aimlessly, dragging a stick over the ground, shamelessly idle while everyone else gathered vegetables.

But they all agreed, later, that this was when the forest spirit first saw her.

She was walking among the trees, her light feet barely rustling the dry leaves, when she reached a clearing and came face-to-face with one of the spirits. He had yellow eyes, antlers sprouting from his forehead, thick legs ending in huge hairy hooves. He wore a white shirt and a soldier’s braid-trimmed jacket above, and nothing at all below.

He was spitting through his teeth; as the wet drops fell they pattered like rain, and where they touched the ground the grass withered and died in rust-colored patches.

The girl paused and stared.

The spirit smiled lecherously and unrolled a tongue that reached to his waist.

The girl saw that he was balding, and that his nails were bitten to the quick like a nervous child’s.

She was afraid then, for she had heard the old people in the village speaking of imps and spirits, of the forest, of the river, of stone, and of the hearth. They said young spirits were harmless, stupid; it was only the older spirits who were clever and malicious.

But this spirit did nothing, merely looked her up and down, and then trotted back into the trees. The two tiny wings that grew from his shoulder blades flapped feebly as he went.

She ran home, and thought no more about the incident, except now and then, when she seemed to feel someone watching her, or when she saw a reflection not her own in the distorting bowl of a spoon.

It was months later that she heard a beat drawing her to the woods, a regular pounding that matched her own heart. She followed the sound, gliding among the trees, and came upon a young man, his shoulders nearly as broad as two men put together. He was splitting wood, in a regular rhythm, using an ax that matched his girth.

She watched as he worked, his back and shoulders so graceful yet so heavy. She saw in him a solidity that matched her lightness, and for once she could not think of a question to ask.

She returned again and again to watch him at his work. He was so practiced in his movements that he could stare back at her, lining up the chunks and letting the ax fall without ever looking.

Watching him she felt as she did when she saw the moon clearly reflected in a pool of water, or rain dimpling the surface of a river, or a young sapling sprouting from the rot of a decaying stump. It was a sense of symmetry and completeness.

She made her feelings known, without a word.

The young man came to the village to speak with her father.

The girl’s parents were pleased with his request. They had assumed no one would want to marry their daughter; she was flighty, an indifferent worker, and they had expected her to remain a light but troublesome burden the rest of their lives. The father was happy enough with her suitor, and the two laid plans and conditions and sealed it all with a firm handshake, both men testing the other’s grip.

During the months and weeks before the wedding the girl became lighter than ever. She was not permitted to be alone with her prospective husband, so she watched him from a distance, savoring the musical sway of his body. She drifted through the woods, rose to the level of the treetops, and watched him from above. She swooped and tumbled in the sky, dove to earth and rose again, climbing the air as if it were a staircase. At night she darted batlike against a backdrop of stars, all the while humming her tuneless nothings or clucking her tongue like a falling ax.

The villagers saw her skimming the treetops and muttered: Silly girl, she’ll break her neck.

And: She should be home helping her mother.

While she flew carelessly above, trouble came to the village down below. First it was flies, thick dark clouds of them. They settled everywhere, attacking with their stinging bites, feasting on anything left uncovered, burrowing into the hides of animals to lay their eggs.

And then the yard behind the girl’s home began to collect water from an unknown source. The ground became sodden, the garden plants rotted, the earth sank. Within days the yard had become a swamp, and lugubrious black frogs had taken up residence. They moved lazily, their skins as slimy-black as oil. White clusters of their eggs made a scum on the surface.

Thick clouds lumbered in, clogging the sky. For a week day was as dark as night.

These were bad omens, and the villagers eyed each other suspiciously, wondering who was to blame.

A week before the wedding, the girl woke in the night to find her window open, a sour breeze licking at her forehead. And then she saw the close-bitten fingers on the sill, two yellow eyes glowing in the dark, and a long pink tongue unrolling and creeping along the floor.