It Came from the North Read online

  The next morning, I was surprised to be up before Rosa, and on my way to the toilet, I saw the hairball sneak out of Rosa’s room. While the creature was brewing coffee, I knocked cautiously on Rosa’s door, steeling myself for my roommate’s inevitable fury.

  But Rosa’s reaction wasn’t what I’d expected. She came to the door sleepy-eyed and yawning.

  “I’m so sorry,” I began. “I threw it out of my room last night and . . . ”

  “It’s okay,” Rosa said with a languid smile. “The creature’s alright, actually. You’ve just got to get to know it first.”

  The hairball slept in Rosa’s room for the next month. One day, when Rosa had a big exam, I told the hairball that I was no longer mad at it.

  “If you want, you can come back to my room,” I said. “You can even sleep next to me, if you don’t snore or smell too much.”

  Rosa didn’t speak to me for a week after that.

  My relationship with the hairball was purely platonic, until one night I dreamed that I was embracing my ex-boyfriend. When I woke up, I realized I was hugging the hairball, and it was hugging me back. That’s when I really got furious.

  I kicked the creature onto the floor and started smacking it with the racket. It seemed as if its shape gave way to each blow and that it also expanded a bit. Each time I struck it, it looked more human. I threw aside the badminton racket and started punching it with closed fists, then switched to slapping it. I ended up stroking it with my fingertips, molding it, making it smoother.

  The belly button went right there, like that. Its neck became shapely and its Adam’s apple nice and round, its shoulders wide enough. Muscular arms and legs, and of course, firm buttocks. Its hair was in dreadlocks, naturally. I molded a suitably strong chin and a good, although slightly crooked, windbreaker of a nose. The part of anatomy that I craved most at that moment, it, he, already had. That, I didn’t have to mold myself.

  That night we made love over and over again, until we fell asleep wrapped in each other’s arms, tired but satisfied.

  “Morning,” he said to me when day broke.

  The next morning, Hair and I were already making plans for our life together.

  “I see,” Rosa said when she saw us together. After a month, we found a two-room apartment for rent through an ad on the internet, and Rosa no longer had to put up with our courtship rituals. Rosa, on the other hand, found herself a nice, bisexual man through an internet dating service (yes, Rosa and I had once been an item, but not for very long).

  Hair wanted to take evening classes to get a high school diploma and after that maybe apply to a polytechnic. He was by nature interested in plumbing, but he would need an official identity, which he didn’t have. He was an industrious person, however, and didn’t want to lie around at home surfing the net or watching TV. Luckily, he was able to find a job at a construction site where they didn’t care about IDs. The construction workers soon noticed that Hair was extraordinarily talented in anything related to pipes and plumbing, and one job led to another.

  We lived comfortably in our two-room apartment until I graduated two years later. I got a part-time job that matched my degree, we got engaged, and started to plan a family. My parents—especially my mother—had disapproved of Hair for many years, even though they didn’t know his real background. But when our first child was born, and my mom saw what a good father Hair was, my whole family warmed to him.

  “Sure he smells, but you get used to it,” my 76-year-old grandaunt said about Hair. “He really has become a good man.”

  Our daughter was followed by a son, and our life followed its course like the Earth its orbit. Or, at least, that’s how I felt. One day I left work early, with the flu brewing in my throat. We now lived in a row house in a sleepy suburb, and as I walked home from the bus stop, the spring sun shone on my face through the birches. The children would be home from school in a couple of hours, so I’d have a moment to myself.

  I was wrong. As soon as I opened the door, my nose told me that Hair was already home. He was sitting on the sofa, sipping a beer.

  “Oh, you’re already here,” I said.

  “Mm. I got your message that you’d be home early. I decided to come home, too.”

  I sat next to him on the sofa. He offered me a swig from his bottle, but I turned it down because of the flu.

  “Are you seriously afraid that I’d catch something from you?” he said with a crooked smile, and continued: “We need to talk. That’s why I’m here.”

  What did he want to talk about? Was he having an affair, maybe with Rosa? He shook his head.

  “Are you happy with our life?”

  Of course I was. Wasn’t he?

  “Sometimes I feel like I want to get out to more open waters . . . the ocean or something.”

  I sighed with relief. He was just planning for us to move closer to the sea again, or buy a new boat. Why not, it was a fine idea. Maybe we could go sailing in the Mediterranean; we could leave the kids with their grandparents.

  “No, you’re not getting what I’m trying to say.”

  “Okay, then explain it to me!”

  “Look at me. What do you see when you look at me?”

  I looked at him. I saw my husband, my partner for life, my best friend, the father of my children.

  “I’m all that, yet I’m not. You only see what you want to see. Look at me for real, look at what I really am.”

  I blinked, but nothing changed. He was still the same.

  “Close your eyes and don’t move. I’m right next to you and I’m going to touch your hand. What do you feel?”

  I felt his firm skin, his familiar and gentle touch. And then—for a second—I felt a moist, hairy mass between my fingers. I opened my eyes quickly and for a moment saw what really sat beside me. Then the vision was gone, and my handsome, though strong-smelling, husband was sitting on the sofa, without slimy protrusions or hairy trunks.

  “You were able to see, weren’t you?” he asked me in a quiet voice. I nodded. That’s what he’d been all the time. Everyone, including me (but perhaps excluding my sharp-eyed grandaunt), had only wanted to see him as something else.

  “But . . . if you haven’t really changed into a man, then how were we able to have kids?”

  He didn’t answer. I thought about it. Before he came along, I had brought more than a few short-term boyfriends to the apartment I’d shared with Rosa. A couple of times the condom had broken and, of course, I had run to the shower. Hair had absorbed the sperm in the drain and copied the design. That’s how it must have happened. I didn’t want to hear the details.

  The flu made me feverish, and everything started to feel even more surreal. Maybe that was why I was able to accept the truth about my life more easily. I still started to cry, though. Hair wrapped his arms around me.

  “Hey, you’re not the only one,” Hair said. “We’re not the only ones in this situation.”

  “What do you mean?”

  I then learned that the nice old lady from next door was really a neglected compost heap. That my sister had just moved in with a vacuum dust bag. And that, worst of all, my grandfather had actually been a pile of used Bakelite and old bicycle tires.

  I held my husband tightly, because I knew it might be the last time. I still had to ask, “Couldn’t we carry on?”

  Hair gave me a bland smile, and kissed my lips quickly. Then he was apparently no longer able to resist the change that welled up from within him. His human form started to melt, transforming little by little back to its original form. In the end, I had to hurry to fetch a bucket and one of the kids’ plastic spades. I was able to scoop the slime off the sofa in time, before it left a permanent stain on the fabric.

  After that I took two painkillers, washed them down with cognac, and considered what to do next. I tried to push my feelings aside, and even thought I succeeded.

  The following Saturday, the kids and I made a trip to the seashore. I took a metal shovel from the trunk of th
e car and used it to scrape up what was left of Hair. Then I threw his remains off the pier into the sea.

  I whispered a few sentences to commemorate Hair. The kids started to complain that they were cold. I’d told them that their dad had to go abroad all of a sudden. It was the same story I’d made up when their pet hamster died. I inhaled the sea air and felt the flu leave my lungs.

  It has been three years. Last week I saw a familiar face in the newspaper’s foreign affairs section; Hair had become the new prime minister of the neighboring country. But I couldn’t care less about the news. I’ve already made myself a new dynamic spouse from telephone cords, computer cables, and old circuit boards, and I’m now expecting my third child. One day my new spouse will fall apart, too, when the inner tension created by my will starts to weaken in him. But at least this time I’ll be prepared for it.

  I have to admit that sometimes I catch myself wondering what I really am. I look at my hand and try to see what it is that I’m really made of. Before he went away, Hair said that no one, or no thing, is completely what they seem.

  So what if I’m really a human? I can see my skin, but cannot see the cells it’s made of, which ceaselessly take in nutrition and oxygen to stay alive. If I am a human, a bustling cluster of matter and energy, I’ll remain in this shape for a few decades, until I, too, disintegrate like everything else.

  Oh Hair, you taught me to look beyond the surface, but I don’t like what I see.

  The Horseshoe Nail

  Mari Saario

  Translated by Liisa Rantalaiho

  Mari Saario is an author, environmental consultant, and mother of three, who devotes her (admittedly limited) spare time to Finnish science fiction fandom. Winner of the Atorox Award in 2009, she has published around twenty short stories in Finnish fanzines and anthologies. For a few years she also served as the main editor of Spin, the oldest fanzine in Finland. In “The Horseshoe Nail,” a young girl encounters desperate travelers from another world, and is marked forever . . .

  1986

  Dad’s wondering whatever’s the trouble once again.

  They looked down the enormous hole—it was really a huge round pit. Daylight showed in the roof at one place.

  Dad wants to know who the hell has lost his keys again, and why isn’t the meal ready and waiting on the table.

  The rope hung down from the little opening high above their heads. Julian looked round at Anne. “Can you manage to climb up the rope, Anne?” he said, doubtfully.

  Mum makes a mistake and says she hasn’t seen any keys. Dad says it’s not his fault the broad is blind. Besides being ugly.

  George went up like a monkey, hand over hand, her legs twisted round the rope. She grinned down when she got to the top.

  Once again, Mum doesn’t understand and tries to explain that Dad must have laid down his keys himself somewhere last night. The first slap is more like just a push.

  Everyone was up in the air, at long last, hot and perspiring. Julian had the precious bag safely under his arm. Timmy the dog sat down panting. Then he suddenly stopped panting and pricked up his ears. “Woof,” he said warningly, and stood up. They heard voices coming near.

  The second push is harder. Mum trips at the table. A beer bottle starts rolling towards the edge and stops for a moment. Then it falls to pieces on the floor. A smell of fresh beer fills the room. Mum starts to holler. That’s the phase when you’d better leave, ‘cause next Dad’s going to start the real beating.

  Alice tries to get up slowly and move towards the front door. Dad notices her, however, and yells: where’s the gadabout thinking of going this time. Just outside, to read. The interruption is enough for Mum who rushes to clean the beer off the floor with a rag. This time it seems to be enough for Dad, too; he goes to the fridge to get a new beer. Alice takes a quick look at the time. Just half an hour to go, then the sports program will start on the TV and it’ll all be quiet again.

  Outside, on the swing, Alice opens The Five again; after this one’s over there’ll be only two more left. That’s a problem, ‘cause the library doesn’t open till Monday, and she’ll have read the books long before. Sure, the shelves at home are full of Granny’s old books, but most of those are boring or too long. Best to save The Five, she needs something to read for the evening. This one is getting to a real thrilling spot, though of course everything will turn out well in the end. It always does. The librarian has recommended the SOS-series, but Alice finds those too babyish. She is almost nine now and has known how to read since she was five years old.

  Perhaps some of the old Super Detectives from the shed, then. Mum says they are silly and dangerous. Silly, yes, but exciting, real killings and such. Through the open window she can hear Dad’s voice rising again. No use going inside. She’d have to make do with the Super Detectives.

  Dad’s cupboard in the shed is full of empty liquor bottles, old murder mysteries, and rusty car parts. Alice reaches for a couple of the magazines, careful not to knock the bottles. The clinking is just as disgusting as the smell caught in the Super Detectives. Underneath the pile there are some she hasn’t read yet. Alice grabs three and wonders where to go so as not to hear the voices from the house. The worst is to almost hear: then you imagine hearing even when you don’t want to. She doesn’t have her boots on, however, so the woods are out, and there’d be mosquitoes by the quay. But the smithy would be fine.

  The path towards the smithy has become overgrown with grass, but the fresh grass rebounds immediately after her steps. Nobody would notice anyone’s gone to the smithy. Besides, it’s too far to serve as a junk shed or Dad’s booze hide. From inside, the grey hut seems almost like Alice imagines it had been in the old times. Two unbroken windows give light; in the forge the last coals are still left and rusted tongs hang from the wall hooks. No one except Alice ever goes to the smithy, and she always tries to leave it exactly the same. The discarded tools feel sad, but as long as they stay in place, there’s something left of Granddad Frank.

  Here, in the smithy, the Granddad of the stories feels real, the master-smith whom the old people of the village remember, when Alice has asked questions. Granddad had been a go-getter, the first person to get a car and to put up electricity in several houses without any other learning than his own cleverness. He knew the old skills, too, and could hammer a cartwheel or a horseshoe as well as his own father, the former master-smith. He’d been an intelligent and kind man.

  Carefully Alice opens the squeaking door of the smithy. Actually, she sometimes misses Granddad more than any other grownup. Granddad had been in the war and got bomb slivers in his stomach, and then some kind of cancer had grown by the slivers and he had died when Dad was just a kid. And no one has touched the forge and tools since then. Now the smithy is the only quiet place for Alice to come and read Super Detectives. She shuts the door behind her and bolts it; Dad need not have access here. Alice sits on the extra anvil block under the window and opens the adventure comics. Perhaps she’ll have time for two magazines; then it will get too dark. But by then it’ll be quiet at home, too.

  The pounding shakes the whole smithy. Alice jumps up and hurts her head on the jutting window handle. There’s more banging at the door. A man shouts and Alice yelps with fear.

  “Ahoy, you, Master-smith, are you there? We are in a hurry, come on now, quickly!”

  Alice keeps silent, but the shouting and pounding only increase. From behind there’s another voice, male too, but sort of high-pitched, as if the man would prefer to sing.

  “Brother, do not break the whole smithy. It’s not the poor door that lamed your horse. Nor shall the smith be better disposed if you thrust into his smithy covered with door frames. He must have left for a moment, we just have to wait. There’s still water in that bottle. Provisions, though, those ran out yesterday, while you have been too much in a hurry to think of such dull matters. Calm down now, my man.”

  Alice hears two men and something big moving outside. Then there’s a blowing sound a
nd she realizes the big creature is a horse. The men seem to settle down just at the smithy’s corner. Alice is terrified. She cannot possibly get out unnoticed; the windows are too small to climb out that way.

  After a while of crouching, Alice calms down: no muggers would move about with a horse. There’s a stable in the nearby garrison where people may rent riding horses; the men must be tourists who have lost their way. Alice slips to the door, swallows, opens the lock, and pushes the door open.

  The man with the horse is the first to turn towards the sound and Alice is frightened again, seeing a big hand jump to a sword grip. The whole man looks like they do on TV, except dirtier and shabbier. His chin is dark and unshaven, and his skin darker than usual, too. A gypsy, Alice has time to think before the man leaps to her and seizes her arm. Alice bursts into tears; the man’s voice is so rushed and loud.

  “Lass, where’s the master-smith? Run and fetch him, and be very quick about it. Bring something to eat, too. But it’s the smith we need, wherever he’s gone. Hurry up now, snotty, go and run!”

  “There isn’t any smith,” Alice hiccups.

  “What do you mean there isn’t? This is a smithy and I know there’s a smith here, and a good one, too. The troops always use him when we pass this way. Are you daft or just contrary?”

  Terrified, Alice sees the man’s arm lift. Very soon she’ll get a slap and it’ll be a hard one. But suddenly a light-brown leather glove from behind grips the arm, and the singing voice speaks again:

  “Brother, it’s your horse and the road that has let you down, not the smithy nor this poor child. Calm down, now, sit on the tree stump there and drink some water, I’ll take care of this knotty business.”

  The big dark man stops and breathes deep. Alice sees that he’s handsome like they are on TV. The big hand lets go, and Alice swallows a sob. The man’s voice is calm again.

  “Strange times indeed, Reynard the Golden, when you have to calm me down. Porchys would scald me if he saw me acting like this. It’s just that every delay makes my bowels turn. You know yourself how tired the defenders are. But we must keep the pass.”