The clan of the petrified bat

Ellie was in zone 1 all night. She said “Who gives a fuck?” a lot.

I asked, “So, where are we going?”

Ellie said, “Who gives a fuck?”

We headed to the pond because I didn’t want to drink beer in my woods. When we got there and I unfurled a blanket I’d brought from home, I asked Ellie, “You want to sit on the blanket or just the grass?”

Ellie said, “Who gives a fuck?”

I laid the blanket out and sat down on it. I pulled out a small bag of Doritos and offered her one and she glared at me.

“What?” I asked.

“You’re always so fucking prepared.” She sat down on the blanket and added, “You and your fluorescent orange food.” I didn’t have time to say anything before she looked on the verge of tears and said, “What the hell can a six-pack of beer do for my problems? You know?” She pointed to the zipper of her jeans again.

“I don’t know. Where’d you get it, anyway?”

“Rick, remember?”

“I mean the six-pack.”

“I got that from Rick too. We were going to drink it during the star party on Monday. But now, who gives a fuck?”

“I’ll get you stuff tomorrow and they’ll be gone and you won’t have to worry about it anymore. It won’t be your problem.”

“It will always be my problem,” she said. “My problem is that I’m an idiot. My problem is that we’re all idiots. You and me and my mom and everyone I live with and everyone we know and everyone who lives on this road, in this town and in the state and the country and everyone on the planet. That’s my fucking problem.”

“Shit,” I said.

“Yeah. Shit,” she said.

Ellie kept a scowl on her face as we drank our first beers. I stayed quiet and let her hold court. I didn’t want to say anything. She talked more about how the world was full of idiots, mostly.

When we cracked open our second beers, I said, “Do you mind if I say something?”

“No.”

“I think something’s wrong with me,” I said.

“Like what?” She said it in a way that made it clear that right at that moment, even if I had leprosy or cancer, nothing was going to be worse than her case of regretful sex and crab lice, so I clammed up.

“Nothing,” I said. “I’m just being weird.”

Silence took over.

We drank some more beer, though neither of us seemed to like it all that much. I put mine down and didn’t plan on picking it up again. Then Ellie fidgeted a bit and muttered some stuff under her breath. She turned to me and said, “Someone else had to give them to him, right?”

“Yeah. Pretty much.”

“I am such a dipshit,” she said.

“You’re not a dipshit,” I said.

As we lay and looked at the stars, Ellie stirred herself into more and more crab-anger. I thought maybe she was going to get up and leave me there. I thought she was about to combust. She wasn’t herself—none of the facets of Ellie I knew. Not the silly or the sarcastic or the oddly Jasmine-like. She was just… so pissed off. I’d seen her pissed off before, sure, but not like this. This was deeper.

“I think we should drink the fucking thing,” she said.

I’d zoned out and had no idea what she was talking about, so I said, “What?”

“The petrified bat. God. Whatever you want to call that shit,” she said, pointing to the jar.

“Max Black,” I said.

“Max Black?”

“That’s what I call it. It’s a photography term. Ignore me. I think I’m getting drunk.”

Ellie held up the jar. “I’ll go first,” she said. “We’ll grow wings. It’ll be like drinking God. Hell. Maybe it’ll even give us a buzz.” She leaned over and took the last half beer—technically my beer, but it was warm and I didn’t want to drink it.

She opened the jar and smelled the contents first. “It’s just dust. It won’t even taste like anything.” Then she poured the beer over the dust and swirled the mix around until it homogenized the best it could.

She drank first—made a face like it was delicious, and then handed it to me.

I hesitated and then I drank, confidently. What did I have to lose, right? I was about to graduate from high school and had nowhere to go and nothing better to do. Why not drink the remains of a bat? Some of it spilled down the side of my neck because the jar’s mouth was so big. I swallowed it and washed it back with the last of the warm beer in my bottle.

Ellie held out her arms, palms up. “It’s like we’re part of God now, isn’t it, Glory?”

I’d only mentioned the God stuff before as a joke, but Ellie seemed to really feel it or something. I felt pretty light-headed. I figured I was a little tipsy and had too much drink-the-bat adrenaline running around my system. But sure—this feeling could pass for being God. Glory O’Brien. God. Owned an atomic bomb. Daughter of long-dead Darla O’Brien, max black.

I looked at Ellie. Ellie Heffner. God. Did not own an atomic bomb, unless you count the pubic lice treatment I was about to buy for her. Daughter of Jasmine Blue Heffner, hippie weirdo freak.

“We’re a clan now. It’s like being blood sisters, but better. Clan of the petrified bat!” Ellie slurred.

Then everything changed, only we didn’t know it yet.

I felt like I wanted to puke for about a half hour after we drank it. I’d only ever had one other beer before, so I didn’t know what it was like to be drunk. I’d never felt quite like that, though.

Ellie looked like she really believed she was God. She whispered to herself a little, like she was having a conversation with someone. Maybe the crabs. Maybe herself. Maybe she was just drunk. On God.

“Free yourself,” Ellie said. “Have the courage.”

“What?”

“Free yourself. Have the courage,” she repeated. “I don’t know. It just came to me.”

I answered, “Oh.” I didn’t know if she was saying it to me or to herself.

I thought about that. Free yourself. Have the courage. It had so many meanings. So many accusations for me.

We lay looking up at the stars for what seemed like an hour and Ellie didn’t tell me one constellation for once. She didn’t even point out Jupiter. It bothered me so much I nearly pointed it out myself.

But then I looked at it, and I saw its history and its future all at once.

I saw a huge explosion. I saw the planets and stars each take their place in the blackness. I saw the speed of light. Then darkness again—as if everything had died. It made me want to cry.

So I looked away.

I looked at Ellie and she looked frightened.

Maybe she saw what I saw.

“I should go,” I said. Just like that. I was lying there, then I was standing, waiting for her to get off my blanket. When she got up, Ellie said a hushed good-bye.

I walked home and said hi to Dad. I didn’t look at him, though. I felt like if I did, he’d see I was some sick girl who’d just drunk the remains of a mummified bat. Maybe he’d see I was God.

It was confusing.

I went to bed with all my clothes on, trying to focus on feeling normal. I did not feel normal. I felt like I was floating. Flying. Lighter and heavier at the same time.