They say she came because she heard the singing, say she heard’t o’er the cliff on the edge of the Beeks’ field, right down under the waves. They say none of us saw her for what she were.
What they say, isn’t right, but they’ll never know’t – I saw what she were, and Alan saw what she were, and I saw the both of them and did naught to stop’t, didn’t say a word, couldn’t even whisper, wouldn’t dare. I’ve sat here outside the church now, each day of 20, watching John carve her face into the pew as they asked him to, and never said a word, not even to tell how her cheeks were a bit more round, nose a bit more sharp, lip more full. Never will to none but myself, not even save God, not even to ask for forgiveness.
Asking the empty air instead that she chose not Alan, but myself, and knowing for all of’t, I’d not be forgiven if any knew. I cannot ask God for forgiveness, cannot bear to step foot in that church, knowing myself a traitor, and knowing what I know of perhaps angels, perhaps demons. I cannot be sure, still.
But I can be sure I saw what she were the minute she showed up here, on that Sunday morning, the choir with their faces scrubbed clean and voices sweet. ’Twasn’t a soul in town that’d come to church, past ten, but sure as the sunrise, that door opened at half-past and in she came. As a girl, I’d buried myself in books and Bibles, studied the paintings of demons and angels, and never had a doubt in my mind which be which until she came to church at half-past ten that day. She’d slid in right behind me, in the very last pew. Usually, I’d be further up in the rows, but that morning we’d had the tail of a storm that knocked down one solid wall of the barn, and we’d had sheep spread out o’er our hills like a pox.
But you couldn’t have missed her coming in, not if you were as close to her as I were. Not if you knew. John and me’d spent half a morning out in the rain, but the smell of salt and sea was nowhere near to as strong on me as ’twere on her. When you’re a child, first learning to swim, and you’ve no sense of when to breathe and when not to, the water gets up in your nose and your throat, the taste of salt near to fills your veins it’s so strong, and that’s how the scent of her were.
I tried not to stare, less from courtesy than from the matter of being in church and’t being Sunday, but it were of no use. Her hair was knotted and damp, but the colour of acorns in fall, her blue eyes bright against the pale white of her skin. She was wrapped in only a blanket, and naught else, and that was hard to ignore, to be certain.
But clearer than day – or than a girl near bare in church who wore the sea instead of her best frock – was that her eyes were on young Alan the moment she came in and sat herself down. Now, Alan was hard to ignore, I confess’t. I myself have been drawn to him now and again, but he is, or he’d been, the brother of my eldest friend, and having known him since we were small, even a glance too long felt a bit strange, like staring at a brother. But he does – did – have the sweetest voice of any in the choir, the voice boys have before they get gruff, sweeter than any girl can sing. You could close your eyes when the choir sang and listen to none but Alan – his voice sailed out o’er all of the others, higher and clearer. Closer to God, I truly feel ’twas. Closer to God, even in light of all that happened, and forgive me for thinking so much as to know what God is, to speak such blasphemy, but ’tis the only way I can describe’t.
And that day, whether ’twere just his glad spirit – or whether ’twas because she came – ’twas Alan were the angel, and he sounded more lovely than any angel could have, even in dreams.
I heard her behind me weeping, quiet, like a child would weep that didn’t want none to know her sorrow. She wept as the choir finished and, when the sermon were done, Alan walked right to her and took her hand, and they stood like that for a good time.
“No!” I’d heard myself shout, not sure why, and slapped my hand to my face just as quick, humiliated I’d shouted in church.
But not a soul’d heard me. Catherine – my closest friend and Alan’s sister, as I said – and their folk all went to her, fawning ov’r her, worried for her sad state, and wrapped her up like a parcel with them before I could even catch my breath.
Did they not see? I’m not one for superstition, never have been, and anyone’ll tell you I’m a sensible girl, always have been, but she – she wasn’t one of us. She wasn’t anything I’d seen before and was everything I feared I never would see, and I wanted no one else to have her. I wanted her for my own, and I wanted for her never to have appeared all at once.
Were a handful of Sundays came and went just like that: she’d slip in late, and Alan would sing to the heavens, better and better each time, and she would weep and fill my breath with salt and sea and sorrow, and something else I cannot name for want of’t.
But one Sunday, she didn’t come. Alan didn’t come neither, and then – then – they knew. But I’d known the night before, and I wept with the rest of them, not saying a word, because though they wept out of sadness for losing Alan, I wept out of jealousy.
I wept for not having an angel’s voice and the young boy’s rosy cheeks that brought him, not myself, to her favour.
Most of all, I’d wept out of shame, feeling my own cheeks burn and turn ashen at thoughts of what I’d seen – or what I’d done, I’ll never be certain – the night before. And the shame in knowing there weren’t nothing I wouldn’t do to do’t again.
I’d gone to see Catherine, the sleep still in the corners of my eyes. Though’t were early, I’d been trying to finish some mending and had broken my last good needle, and Catherine and I had many times rapped on one another’s doors for this thing or that, neither of us being heavy sleepers.
But then I’d heard him, passing the cliff, sweet as a lark, singing high and soft. I wasn’t at all sure’t wasn’t myself daydreaming, and so I’d climbed down a bit, looking, and there he were. There he were standing on the low rocks, tide high, singing to the waves.
Singing to her.
She came out of the waves like an angel, and curled herself upon the cliff at Alan’s feet, eyes full of tears or full of salt, I well couldn’t say.
I sat still as a stone as I watched Alan halt his tune and kneel down to her, as she took his face in her hands and covered’t with her lips, and wrapped her shiny arms round him, pulling the wet clothes from his body, and oh, his eyes glittered like glass, they did.
I tried to turn my face for shame, knowing he were but a boy, but the sight of the ebbing moon o’er his skin, sleek as a selkie, and the roundness of his backside in the dim dawn light pulled my eyes to the scene and wouldn’t be letting them go. But he was little to behold in comparison to the sight of her.
’Twere as if she wasn’t of the waves, but were the waves herself. I’d swear to’t there were more than one of her, but I couldn’t say for certain; could only say her lips and arms and tail – that glittering tail of a million bright jewels! – were on him like a thousand currents, all’t once. She washed o’er his face, then the smooth swell of his boy’s chest, brushing her breasts o’er him, their buds redder than any rose I’d ever seen and there were music to’t, too. The crash of water on stone, and then his sighs, high and clear, and her pretty laughter – so loud I were sure all the town’d come running at any moment.
But they could not have heard, for none came. None came as she wrapped her mouth o’er his tall rod and suckled’t, milking the thing until cream and water ran down her chin, and I watched dazed – silently cursing myself, for no good Christian woman’d sit and watch such things – but I couldn’t move from my place, I was drawn to the scores of arms and limbs from beneath the water covering the boy.
The longer I watched, the more I felt a heat inside me that made me itch and hunger, and the more I watched, the more’t seemed that I wasn’t watching the creature – or creatures, as’t seemed there were many – moving o’er Alan, but moving o’er myself.
My nose were full of salt, but I could feel those cold arms, and sodden hair moving o’er me, a thousand mouths on my lips, my breasts, o’er my stomach and in the cavern between my legs. I could feel the coarse sting of icy spray on my face, and the crags piercing my back, but I could not move, stricken as sure as if I’d been hit by a thunderbolt.
I watched each thin finger weave in and out of every warm crevice, each snakelike tongue dart and lap hungrily and my ears were filled with the sweetest music; sighs upon sighs, as the angels do sing in Heaven so was the sound on that cliff.
I looked for Alan from behind my closed eyes, but I could not open them again, dizzy as I were, and then I felt’t upon me – a wild pulsing deep in my belly, and my own heartbeat rang loud in my ears as a drum. Lips pulled at my breasts as the mouths between my legs locked on some hidden place there, nearly drawing my breath from my lungs as’t coaxed the heat full from me. I felt I would scream from the intensity of’t, but the only cry I heard was Alan’s as I floated apart from myself, limbs light as feathers, and I shuddering like a child with the fever.
And then’t stopped, as quickly as a dream when you wake up sudden, and ’twas none but me on that cliff, silent and cold, with none but the sound of the waves.
And Alan’s voice soft beneath them, carried by laughter. And me, alone, red with shame and green with jealousy, for I was left behind.
They say she came because she heard the singing, say she heard’t o’er the cliff on the edge of the Beeks’ field, right down under the waves. They say none of us saw her for what she were, as she sat in that last pew but every Sunday, blanket o’er her legs, they say that even Alan didn’t see until ’twas too late. They say – now, they say — that surely ’twas a curse upon us, but if ’twere, then I am a heathen, for how I long for those demons again. Some few say ’twere a blessing, but if that be so, I ha’been passed o’er for heaven by the angels themselves. In any event, I cannot step into church again, knowing I be either scorned by angels, or am in thrall with devils. They say I am simply too heavy with grief about Alan. What they say ’tisn’t right, but they’ll never know’t.
They say to John to carve her face into the last pew, so as to warn others that might come that we know of them, and will not be fooled again. I say naught a thing – but watch as he carves her beautiful face, hoping they come again, and mistake’t instead for a welcome, and I spend my Sundays instead on the cliffs, learning to sing, closer to God.