© Katta
Author's Note: This and all future stories of the TYR soap will let Ike survive In The Face of Mine Enemies. He's not essential in all the stories, but the point with soaps is that stories blend into each other. The conversations in Spanish etc., are usually not very important for the stories, but if you want any translation, please contact me.
Hard work for everyone was the main reason why it took a couple of days before Buck remembered to remind Nita about the statuettes.
”Oh, right!” she said when he told her. ”We’ll ask her immediately. Come on!”
Unfortunately, Sandy said no flat.
”Oh, come on, Aleja!” Nita pleaded. ”They’re so beautiful, it’s your best work!”
”It’s also very personal!” She looked at Buck with knitted eyebrows. ”Is it just you or did you all want to see it?”
”All of us, I think”, he replied.
”Oh, marvellous! Nita, forget it. I’m not going to guide three complete
strangers through my head. What do you want me to do next? Publish my
diary?”
Nita looked interested.
”I didn’t know you had a diary!”
”I don’t.”
Blue eyes met brown. Then Nita said: ”Well, you don’t have to guide
them. I’ll show them, if you just give me the key.”
Sandy looked doubtful.
”If you show them they won’t understand anything.”
”So? It’s still your best work.”
”Nita…” Sandy complained. She turned to Buck. ”We’re talking about stuff that I made when I was extremely unhappy.”
”I’m sorry…”
Buck felt ashamed and looked at Nita to see what she meant to do.
”That’s why they’re so good”, said Nita simply.
”You just won’t give up, will you? Alright, take the stupid key! If they don’t understand it I suppose it can do no harm.”
”Are you sure about this?” Buck asked when Nita had put up the ladder to the attic and was trying to get the padlock open.
”Don’t be silly, of course I’m sure”, she said and swung the lid open. ”Who has the lamp? Thank you, Lou. Oh!” she said when she entered the attic.”It’s still quite bright in here, I’m not sure we’re going to need it. Still, if you want to look closer at something…”
She lit the lamp, and meanwhile the others got in as well. Looking around at the paintings and statuettes, they felt a bit shocked. Buck’s eyes fell on a bust of a woman transforming into a werewolf and he took a step backwards.
”That’s my favourite”, said Nita who saw what he was looking at. ”It looks so real. Not only the teeth and the fur, but the horror in her face. I mean, if you’re not prepared for it, it must be pretty scary to become a werewolf.”
”It’s awful”, said Buck in a low voice.
He hurried to turn his face away from the creature and found to his relief a painting that wasn’t too bad. It showed a square full of people, but when you looked closer you found that none of them had shadows. The only one who had a shadow was a black silhouette of a man, a shadow in himself. His shadow was almost impossible to see among all the feet, a blue, shrunken little thing with a red dot all over its bosom. He didn’t get the picture one bit, but at least it wasn’t scary.
”Take a look at this”, said Lou. She looked as if she was about to get sick. They gathered around her.
”’Venus of America’”, said Nita.
”She’s got no arms!”
”No, it’s a variant of the ’Venus de Milo’ statue. That one is broken, it has no arms.”
”But this doesn’t look broken”, objected Lou. ”It looks like someone cut them off. It’s… disgusting.”
The boys had to agree with her. It wasn’t so much the lack of arms as how pathetic she looked. She was naked, but not in an attractive sense. She crouched over her body as if she tried to hide it. By her feet there was a piece of cloth lying in disorder, and her face was turned towards it, longing to pick it up. It made them want to take the cloth and wrap it around her.
<<Poor girl>> signed Ike. He wondered why Sandy had made these things. The centaur had been pretty. This was well-made, but unpleasant. Buck stared at the statuette.
”You know, Nita, I’m beginning to see your point”, he said. ”She’s got a certain desperation that I’ve seen in… other women. Wounded women.” He silenced for a second. ”I think you’re right, Lou. Someone did that to her, it wasn’t just the clay breaking by accident.” He turned to Nita, and there was fierceness in his eyes. ”Who is she?” he demanded.
”Who she is?” Nita raised an eyebrow. ”Who’s the werewolf for that matter?
Or ’ready to burst’ over there?” She nodded towards a ball-shaped woman with hands, feet and head barely visible. ”Do you really think there’s some girl walking around in this world with no arms, and that Sandy happened to find her and decided to portrait her? It’s all from her head.”
She waved them towards the next piece of art, a painting.
”This is ’Lady Frankenstein’. She doesn’t like it much herself, and I think I agree with her. It’s basically just horror effects without feeling. And this is ’the evil eye’, and this one is ’devil’.”
They stopped at one piece at a time, looked at it, commented it and moved on. When they got to ’devil’ Ike frowned. Next to all the distortion and torment, this looked offensively ordinary. It was simply a very small statuette of a young girl whose skirt was disordered by the wind. She tried to keep her skirt down with her hands, but it still fluttered a bit. There was nothing diabolic about her.
<<Why is it called ’devil’?>> Ike asked.
Nita guessed his question and smiled.
”You don’t get it? Look closer!”
In doing so, at first he found nothing, then he saw that the girl wasn’t trying to get tidied up at all. She was covering her feet, because they were goat’s feet.
”You see it?” Nita was delighted.
He nodded.
”It’s so hard to find, isn’t it! Subtle… It’s an early one.”
Nita kept talking, but Ike hardly listened. A chill went down his spine. He recalled a nightmare he had dreamed many months ago, in which he had grown a horse’s tail. That dream would have fit right in here. Nita had said ”it’s all from her head”, but even if the shapes were make believe, the expressions weren’t. No more than his dream had been. But the alternative, that all this was real, made him lose his breath, and his lips went dry.
”Are you guys still up there?”
Carlos’ head was seen in the opening. Lou gave a cry, which made him laugh.
”Did I scare you, little one?” he asked and climbed up. He turned to Nita. ”Mr. Hamilton wants to play whist, are you game?”
”Ouh!” Nita moaned. ”I’m so bad at it! I suppose you don’t play?” she asked the riders hopefully.
”Whist?” Lou shook her head.
”I think they’re more the rough, mean poker kind of guys”, joked Carlos. Nita sighed.
”Alright, I’m game.”
As they went down, Carlos asked: ”So, how did you like the P.T. Barnum Gallery?”
”Carlos!” Sandy stood by the end of the ladder, and she certainly didn’t seem to like his comment. She waited for Nita to lock the lid and then reached out her hand. ”Can I have the key back, please?”
”That was pretty heavy stuff”, Buck said to her.
”It was among the most awful things I have seen in my life”, Lou filled in.
”Lucky you”, said Sandy dryly.
”But it was good anyway”, Lou hurried to add.
Sandy’s eyes turned to Ike almost automatically, to get his judgement. But he didn’t say what he thought of the strange exhibition. Instead, he asked: <<When did you make those things?>>
”A few years ago.” She seemed unwilling to say more.
<<And the centaur?>>
”Last spring.”
He nodded, relieved.
<<So you have come to terms with it, then?>>
It was a long shot, he didn’t even know what ”it” might be, but Sandy stared at him, startled.
”I… Yes. I guess so.”
”Aleja? Are you coming?”
Her siblings were already halfway through the room, and Sandy nodded. ”Yes… Just a minute.”
She put her hand on Ike’s arm to prevent him from leaving.
”How…”
Her eyes fell on the other riders.
”Mmm… We ought to get going”, said Buck when he saw her glance. ”Ike, you… Whenever you’re finished.”
Ike nodded and waited until they had left until he got back to Sandy. Her face was so shocked that he softly stroke her chin with his finger.
”Dont touch me!” She took a step backwards. ”How did you know? What did Nita tell you?”
<<Nothing. I don’t really know anything, except that those pictures didn’t come out of the blue.>> He stopped, uncertain of whether or not he should tell her the rest, and then decided to do so. <<In a way, you could say I recognized them. Especially the one you called ’devil’. It reminded me of a nightmare I had once. That didn’t come out of the blue either, it meant something.>>
All colour disappeared from her face.
"A nightmare?”
<<Yes. Were they nightmares, too?>>
”Some of them.” She was in pain, but curiosity took over, made her demand: ”Tell me your nightmare.”
He told her. It had been such a long time since he thought about it, but he could still feel the sweat breaking out by his nose. She turned away from him, shook her head as she breathed into the palms of her hands.
”And yet I used to think I was the only one…”
He took hold of her shoulders and turned her towards him.
<<I know what it takes to get that miserable. What happened to you?>>
”Cut it out!” Her voice was harsh, and it soon rose to yelling. ”Who do you think you are, crashing into my life and bringing up everything I want to forget? Why are you doing it? Is it just some strange way of flirting for you? I never would have let you in if I had known…”
She looked him straight in the eyes and her voice was hoarse when she said: ”Do us both a favour. Stay away from me. Go live happily ever after with that girl of yours.”
She didn’t give him any chance to answer that. Without another glance at him she turned and left.
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