Fictitious

I came to live on the high Karoo two weeks ago. I stopped treatments in March; said my goodbyes; and came up here to feel the clear, cold winds  of my childhood.

She strode into my little cabin a few days after I arrived as if she had always lived there. She twisted once between my ankles and then curled her small grey body on my favourite chair in front of the heater. I had come here to be alone at the last but as the days  passed I found myself glad of her steady company.

She has spent most of her days around me, sitting quietly nearby as I write my journal on the wide veranda. Sometimes, if the pain is troubling, she lets me run my fingers through her downy fur. Each day we watch the sunset and drink in the clean night air together.

I had always known, in my heart, that I would see my grey cat again one day; but I had never imagined she would come as a friend.

I drop to my knees in front of the pit. The roll of twigs strapped to my back feels suddenly heavy. I untie it and take a moment’s rest. The day is finally here. I will Become.

I pull the twigs out and start constructing the fire. The ritual is precise, clear on the specifics. Six twigs in the middle. Six in the next layer. Six on the outside. One across the top. I add a few more rocks around the pit and start the fire. As the scraps of brush catch, I sharpen my blade on my whetstone. I test the keenness of it on my forearm, as I was taught. It is sharp enough.

I feel the warmth of the fire through my makeshift boots. I say a brief prayer to the stars and begin the ritual.
I remove the pungent fish from its wrapping and slice it open. I smear one handful of its innards across my belly and swallow the other handful. I toss the rest on to the fire.
The worms are still wriggling as I grind them into a paste on one of the rocks. I mark my legs with their remains and lick my fingers clean.
The bird’s carcass is surprisingly tough; I have to scratch off a patch of feathers before I can slice its belly open. The blood I rub across my forehead drips down and into my eyes. I blink it away as I swallow chunks of its flesh.

And now the moment of truth. Without hesitation, I plunge my hand into the fire and scoop up three glowing coals. I stare at them for a moment, my skin sizzling, then throw them down my gullet to join the rest of the sacrifice. I cry out from the pain. 

I feel the change begin, deep inside my chest. My heartbeat slows; I feel a coldness in my fingertips and toes. I feel my insides morphing, moving. I close my eyes and plunge my knife into my belly, pull it across, and let free the beast.

I don’t think I was really going to do it, I was just walking the city in the night time mists.  It was a difficult time for me; working ceaselessly; trying to cope with being newly single after so many years. When I couldn’t sleep I would walk the streets, especially down near the river.

That’s how I found myself standing on the wrong side of the railing staring down at the cold water below. It was very still and dark: the pale, ephemeral mists drifted over the cold grey surface of the river. I knew that river would close over me silently; that the freezing water would flow on towards the sea as if I had never been.

I saw the cat slip out of the shadows among the railings on the other side of the bridge. I thought she would come over to me, an old friend in a time of need to show that someone cared in the world. But she didn’t. She didn’t even look in my direction: that small grey cat just kept walking on across the bridge.

I watched her receding form for a few minutes, her grey coat less and less distinct in the mist until she was gone. Then I climbed back over the safety barrier and took myself home.

I make sure feet are firmly planted on the rock, then I close my eyes and tilt my head back, stretch my arms out from my sides. I take slow, deep, breaths. There’s not much up this high, but on the light breeze I pick up hints of moss, and some smoke from a fire burning down the valley a ways off. I like it up here. It feels more peaceful. It’s nothing to do with noise, or crowds. I think it’s the bare rock. Not smooth exactly, but rolling.

I take my bow from my back and sit down to tighten the string. I’m not even sure what material this is. I found it on the dead body of a young man some weeks ago. No major marks or cuts, but dead. Most of his things had been taken already, of course, but a few remained: the bow string, some tobacco.

I hear screeching above me: hawk. A sparrowhawk of some kind, I think. I only have three arrows left. I lost two over a cliff on my last trip. I need to be more careful. I spend a few minutes tracking it across the sky. It must be searching for one of the rodents I felt scuttering across my feet earlier. Should give me a bit longer.

I take the hawk down on the third shot. I bag it, collect my other two arrows. The rodent that it almost caught stops for a moment, looks at me, then runs off.

Finally. Finally, I am ready. It has been a long day, but I will pick up my Water and Earth, and begin the long walk to the sacred place.

It was a crazy night the second time I saw the cat. My friends don’t believe it was there, they claim it was the smoke inhalation and whiskey that night, but I saw her that night her fur ruddy red by the light of the roiling flames.

It had started in the early morning hours, two old friends drinking Jack Daniels through the summer’s night: the rest of our party were long unconscious. When we first saw the flames licking between two layers of thatch we weren’t too concerned: in less than ten minutes we knew that the building was lost and our concern was only for our friends and their property.

It was stupid to go back. All the people were accounted for and the cars had been moved out of the garage, but I had left my camera inside.  Someone told me it was too late but I had been through too much in the last hour to feel any fear.

As I darted across the living area, shielding my face from heat of the flames I saw the cat. She was standing on the staircase, preternaturally calm among the roaring licks of flame. She looked speculatively at me and then at the burning ceiling above my head.

It wasn’t what one expected in the middle of a burning building: I stopped, shook my head and peered through the shimmering air.  That’s when I noticed the rolling balls of smoky flames playing beneath the beams ahead and saw the wallpaper behind the cat ignite suddenly into a sheet of flame.

Somehow the camera seemed unimportant then; and so I walked out of that building on that day. And no-one ever believed there was a cat.

I hang my satchel on a low branch, pick a fruit from one higher up. I don’t even remember what these are called. Red, fleshy, insides. That I remember. I sink my teeth into it and the juice dribbles down my chin. Tart, but it’ll do.

I watch the dark clouds drifting over the hills a ways off in the distance. I hope the rain holds off until tomorrow. I spit the pip into my hand, hold it up, examine it. Solid, wrinkly. Peach. It’s called a peach.

I take a few steps away from the tree, kicking around the dirt, looking for a more solid patch, but mostly finding dust. I find a patch that’s thicker, and lower myself to my knees. I roll my sleeves up, stretch and bend my hands around, then plow my fingers into the soil. I dig down a few handfuls, spreading the dirt around the hole. I sift through it – nothing. The dirt is deep under my nails and my fingers are starting to bleed from the sharp flecks of stone, but I keep digging.

Here. Worms. I pluck them out, wriggling, from the dirt. I pull the plastic bag from my back pocket and drop them in, one by one, then throw a handful of dirt on them to keep them fresh.

Two parts down, one to go.

I stand very, very, still. Only my eyes are moving, watching it. My toes are going numb, but I stay very, very, still, waiting. I watch it swirling back and forth: approaching, retreating. It sees the food I’ve put down to lure it, but it also sees me. It is a cautious fish.

It. It. It. Why not he or she? I can’t tell this guppy’s gender from here, obviously, but I don’t recall people ever referring to fish as a he or a she. Maybe because it can be difficult to sex a fish. Maybe because nobody cares.

A small patch of the river darkens red as I plunge my makeshift spear down hard and fast, through the fish and into the silty bed of the river. The tip breaks, comes loose from the shaft, but it doesn’t matter: I have my fish.

I wriggle my toes and wade across to the shore. I make the required cuts, say the necessary words, then wrap the fish in canvas before throwing him into my satchel. I’ve decided it’s a boy.

Now for the other parts of the sacrifice.

I don’t remember much of my father’s funeral. I was too young to understand and upset by the traumatised adults. I don’t remember the service or the open grave. I remember Uncle Noel sobbing silently; openly. Seeing that paragon of masculinity so reduced affected me more than the tragedy itself. I have been told there was a service by our kindly family priest but I remember nothing of it.

The cat is my clearest memory. I could see it just beyond the grave in the sunny lee of a tumbled headstone. That small grey cat looked up from its grooming directly into my eyes for a long still moment.

The first shovelful of earth hitting the coffin broke me from my reverie and when I looked again the cat was gone. I wanted to go after it, to touch its sleek grey fur, but those kindly adults stopped me: they thought it better to get me away from the burial quickly, distract me with toys.

They insisted that the cat was only a stray.