Even After the Creature Bites Him

None of this is what I expect. I expect subtle encounters, a long evening of food and drink and storytelling, then Uncle pulling the child aside to ask a few questions, that we would never make directly known why we are here.

Instead, it seems Belek is waiting for us. There is a slowness, a deliberative quality, to the way he negotiates the world. The child moves as if he is already old.

How come they’re expecting us, says Mun.

Uncle calls over his shoulder. They have their own traditions, he says. At his words, I imagine a shaman climbing a ladder of fire up into the night.

All of us but Saran follow Uncle and Belek down a narrow path through a stand of birch trees to an ortz pitched over a spring. Belek shakes his head when Mun tries to enter. Mun shrugs and slips his earbuds in, heads back to the Machine. Inside Belek changes into a pair of shorts. I follow Little Bat’s lead as he removes his robes. Only Uncle remains clothed. There is a fire burning in a small brazier in the corner. Wooden planks are laid down so that the ortz is directly over the water.

I am too busy staring at Little Bat to notice much else, the sturdy brown walking shoes he always wears abandoned outside the teepee, his shoulders and back rife with young bruises. I cannot take my eyes off him. Not because his body is a map of injuries, the bruises like continents. No. It takes me some time to understand why I am staring, what is wrong with this picture. Then it hits me. Each of his feet is a simple oval, a lily pad. He has no toes.

Little Bat is the first in. When he slides off the plank, I am surprised that the water is up to his chest. Belek smiles. It’s deeper than it looks, he says. He turns to the brazier and grabs a ladle, scoops a spoonful of water onto the rocks, sending up clouds of hissing steam.

Very good, says Uncle. All the best things are deeper than they look.

Belek considers this. A fly lands on his shoulder. I watch it scuttle about. It’s triangular in shape, a biting fly, the kind that can draw blood and make a welt instantly appear. But the child doesn’t shoo it away. Even after the creature bites him, leaving an angry mark. Instead, he catches it in the palm of his hand. Slowly and with great gentleness, he transfers the biting insect to his other shoulder, offering his flesh a second time. My own skin starts to itch. I fight the urge to reach over and flick the creature off. Instead I watch as the thing bites him again before flying away.

Do you recognize me, asks Uncle.

The little boy looks him up and down but says nothing.

Because I do not have the discipline of this child, I lower myself into the water as other flies begin to invade the tent. I am shocked by how cold the water is, but we are on the border with Siberia. The waters must be from the snowmelt only a few hundred kilometers away.

Little Bat rises out of the spring and begins to dress. I also get out of the water. We leave the boy and Uncle alone in the tent. They spend another hour inside. Hundreds of years between them.