Maggie Helwig - Girls Fall Down

‘Come down a bit further,’ said Susie. ‘We’ll see how it goes.’ She brushed snow from her arms. ‘I’d like to have you in sight, I guess,’ she added, almost apologetically.

She went down the slope ahead of him, and stumbled, clinging to a branch, onto the level area; following her, he nearly fell himself, snow down his right side. As he found his footing on the bare ground, he heard the sound of a man crying. Susie stood still. Inside the tent, the sound went on, hiccuping, empty, desolate.

She walked to the tent. ‘Derek,’ she said softly. ‘Derek. It’s Susie-Paul.’

The crying sound stuttered and died away. Susie waited, squatting down, and slowly Derek crept out of the tent, his face still wet and crumpled. Under the emaciation and dirt and age he seemed somehow young, almost childlike.

‘I’m feeling very sad,’ he whispered.

‘I can tell,’ said Susie gently.

‘I was thinking about when we were small, and Mom and Dad killed our white horse.’

Susie pinched her lips together. ‘We never had a horse, Derek.’

‘Oh yes,’ said Derek, nodding. ‘We did. It was a white horse, and it spoke to us. But they killed it. There was blood all over. You cried and cried. I tried to comfort you.’

‘Okay. Sure. Let’s just not get into this now.’

‘They cut its head off. The blood got into your hair. That’s why your hair keeps changing colour.’

Susie put a hand to her hair automatically, then shook her head. ‘Derek. We need to talk about a place you can live.’

‘I’m doing very well here.’

‘I don’t think so. It’s getting really cold. It will get colder in January. I don’t want you living in a tent.’

‘You remember that horse. I know you remember. Mom held its mouth shut while Dad cut its head off with an axe. The blood went flying.’ Tears began to roll down his face again. ‘Oh. Oh. It used to talk to us. Baby sister. It would take us away to a place where we could be safe together.’ His voice broke up into little gasping sobs. ‘You cried and cried.’

Susie covered her face with her hands. Slowly, quietly, Alex moved towards them. Derek rocked back and forth and seemed not to notice him, and he knelt in the frozen mud beside Susie and put his hand on her shoulder. She looked up, and for a second bent her head to the side so that her cheek touched his fingers.

‘Derek,’ she said, her voice steady. ‘I understand that you’re sad. My concern right now is the weather. It is too cold to be living outside.’

Derek wiped tears and mucus from his face and took several deep, shaky breaths. ‘Will you introduce me to your friend?’ he said.

Susie glanced at Alex and shrugged. ‘Derek, this is Alex Deveney. Alex, Derek Rae.’

He stretched out his hand. Alex slid off his glove and took it, and they shook briefly. Derek’s hand was trembling, and it felt wet and clammy and very cold.

‘I don’t think you can take proper care of my sister,’ he said.

‘No,’ said Alex. ‘I don’t suppose I can.’

‘I’m a grown woman, Derek. I take care of myself.’

Derek frowned. ‘But you’re still very little. You’re my baby girl.’

‘Let’s talk about this housing problem.’

‘They won’t let me come inside,’ said Derek. ‘You know that. They never let me come inside. They make me go out.’

‘Well, I’m trying to find a place that won’t make you go out.’

He shook his head. ‘They always make me go out. They tell me about the behaviour. They don’t understand my parameters.’

‘If you’d take your medication, we wouldn’t have so many problems with your parameters.’

Derek scowled and looked sideways, towards the concrete wall, twitching a bit. ‘We’ve discussed this before. I don’t need medication. I have my own self-regulatory system.’

‘Oh yeah. That’s why you’re starving to death in the snow under a bridge.’

‘Baby girl.’ Derek lifted his eyes to Susie, and crept slowly towards her, his voice suddenly dreamy, his tongue moving back and forth across his lower lip. ‘Remember when you were bitten by the snake? I saved your life. I sucked the poison from your blood.’

Susie made a small noise, and Alex put his hand back on her shoulder.

‘You were lying dead on the ground. You were so pale. You had no heartbeat. I picked you up in my arms and sucked the poison from your blood. Don’t you remember?’

‘That isn’t what happened,’ said Susie. She reached up to her shoulder and held on to Alex’s hand with her own.

‘I saved your life a hundred times. It was so hard. They kept trying to kill us, but I protected you. I will always protect you if you let me.’ He touched her knee with his hand. ‘Mom and Dad put the snake in your bedroom.’

Alex felt Susie’s nails through the back of his glove. ‘You know that it didn’t happen like that,’ she said weakly.

‘They tried to kill you so many times. Then they realized they’d have to kill me first. But I won’t let them, baby girl.’

Susie shook her head, exhaling hard.

‘The snake was five feet long and golden, and it sank its teeth into your little thin arm, your poor little arm, while you were sleeping in your innocent bed. The poison went straight to your heart and you died. You died in my arms.’

‘Derek.’ Susie pushed herself backwards decisively, and her voice was sharp and businesslike. ‘Forget the damn snake. I never died of snakebite. Let’s talk about your medication.’

Derek sat up, his legs going into a nearly convulsive twitch. ‘Susie-Paul, I don’t want to hear any more of these dangerous ideas. You know that I regulate my own fluid patterns. I had a buildup of semen this week and I dealt with it by my own measures.’

‘Oh God. Not this again.’

‘It was semen of a particularly thick and corrosive nature. Building up and expressing itself into my penis and interfering with the release of urine. It was quite urgent to find a means to discharge it.’ His hands were twining and untwining, his voice getting higher, more anxious.

‘Cut it out, Derek. Drop the subject now .’ She looked up at Alex. I’m sorry , she mouthed.

It’s okay , he mouthed back.

‘It was building up from my penis and testicles and entering my kidneys. It could have been very very hazardous. There was a leakage of semen from my penis on a regular basis.’

‘Jesus Christ, would you please shut up about this? I have a friend here.’

Derek rolled his head slowly from side to side. ‘Oh. Oh dear. It’s a problem. It’s a serious problem.’

‘Shit,’ murmured Susie, and motioned Alex away; he backed off a couple of feet, still within the circle of pale light. Derek was rocking and wringing his hands, his tongue working at one side of his mouth.

‘And they say, and they say, we can’t tolerate this, no no, we can’t tolerate this, but I never did the crime. I never did.’

‘Derek. Derek. Listen to my voice. Calm down.’

‘And you say, oh God, and oh God, but what kind of God is that? When they do these things? This is what kind of God. And why did they want to hurt you? I don’t understand, and I say, I don’t understand, but why would you hurt her, and I tried to protect you, baby, I tried and tried.’

‘Oh, please,’ said Susie. ‘Please don’t do this. Just calm down, can’t you calm down?’

‘Fucking hate, fucking hate, fucking hate this, but I never did the crime, did I, so why do I, why do I, why the hell, oh God, why do I have to live like this? ’

Susie stretched out her hand and tried to touch him, but he was a dystonic scatter of movements, unpredictable. His own hands flew up and began to claw around his eyes, saliva trailing from his lips, and she seized his wrists and pulled them fiercely down. He crashed into her lap in something like a spasm and threw his arms around her, wailing, ‘ Why don’t you stay with me? Why don’t you ever stay? ’