Family Trees

Lorna sweeps open the curtains and gasps. Fog, opaque and oddly beautiful, has swallowed the view. Little Monroe Bay has become an island. The mist lingers in the gully below the house, wisps hiding amongst the trees, pressing in from the water. Reaching toward her.  

They’d chosen this tiny settlement, the stretched-out peninsula, for its isolation. Sea on three sides. Nobody here knew who she was; the community hadn’t put two and two together and ferreted out that their standoffish neighbours included the infamous genetic mutation woman, who could do the little bits of magic. Lorna, from the newspapers. Oh, the invasive questions that had followed each article. The hospital, keeping her captive like a prisoner, testing, trying to find the gene. Out here she stays clear of prying eyes. Mostly. She’s always fearful those wanting miracles will find her. 

The wet air congregates around her as she clumps down the garden. She picks green onions and lemons, swiping a hand through the fog. It clings. Tastes wet and slippery like tuna skin, and it sticks. 

She bolts back up to the house, sidles inside. Her tongue feels twice the size; the knot in her belly grows harder and stronger. She presses herself into a ball on the couch, stays that way. The house lies silent. Cold. 

When Adam, Daniel and Rafe come home a little early, the fog’s reached the top of the doorframes. It lurks at the windows. Lorna lights a ball of light to illuminate their entry, her flatmates, her protectors. But the light doesn’t penetrate the dense mist. She slams the door after them to keep it out, but not quick enough.

‘Is it stuck to you?’ she demands, patting Rafe’s coat, closest to her. He catches her hand and slides it along the stubble on his cheeks. Familiar. Reassuring. Warm. 

‘It’s just fog, Lorn.’ 

A game they play; she seeks reassurance; they pet her like a kitten. Laconic words, solid physical presence, teasing. Adam she’s known since she was a kid. Daniel, a student doctor at the hospital when she was there. And she met Rafe at the wharf on the day she was released. The day she’d intended to jump in and float far away. 

They hide her from the outside world, now, and she lets them. They are family. 

‘It tastes wrong. Like sulphur.’ Her stomach twists again under her layered clothes. That lump, her hidden treasure. She should tell them soon. 

‘It’ll be gone tomorrow.’ Daniel ruffles her hair. 

Or not. Her secret.

She goes to serve dinner, feeling patronised but safe. It’s like living in a bunker. Rock solid. 

 

*

 

But the fog’s determination knows no bounds. It weasels in, through every seam of the house, any door openings. Lorna takes up humming, so they know where she is. They haul blankets into the lounge and they sleep together that night, all holding hands. When she wakes, her phone’s dead, the clock frozen on 5am. 

She pulls the blankets tight around her. 

‘Never seen anything like it,’ Adam’s soft voice whispers, nearby. 

‘It’s got to be a trick.’ Daniel, low, growling. ‘Lorna will hate it if we go investigating.’ 

Correct. She doesn’t like it, and coughs, so they know she’s awake. 

When the knot in her belly had become apparent, she’d stocked the cupboards. Food. Medicine. Cloths. She couldn’t risk the hospital, not again. Or a midwife in the house. This would be her job, to make sure nobody knew, and nobody came. She would tell them—after all, it would be their baby, too. The later the better. But the malevolent fog might force their hibernation, too. 

She smiles. 

Later, she has her head in the breadbin when they make their move, for once united. 

‘Others could be hurt, or need assistance,’ Adam says. His hand snakes out and grasps her wrist. ‘We have to go find out, Lorn.’

Her cheeks feel hot, despite the clinging fog. Selfish. ‘They’ll have help. By the time you get there—’

‘Rafe will stay with you.’ The indignation trickles out of her. Rafe’s the one who can always talk her down. 

She needs them to nest. Be contained. 

The door bangs closed behind them. She waits, stock-still, for the car’s ignition to flare. It doesn’t come. 

‘We’re safe, you know that.’ Rafe’s gentle tone. His quiet presence. Her fingers stop twisting, become still. 

Adam stomps back in. ‘Won’t start. How the hell are we supposed to know what’s going on? The neighbours? Whangārei?’

Whangārei sleeps and wakes, a circadian rhythm, no expectation of war or drama, rebellion or insurrection. Just a heavy fog to them, she’s certain. And who cares? Whangārei kept her hostage, in their fortress of a hospital. 

Daniel slaps his woollen hat down on the kitchen bench. Rafe slips out, to do his own investigations. 

‘Full of rust,’ he says, when he returns. ‘Red, slippery rust. It drops off like dust if you stroke it, but the engine’s frozen.‘

Adam swears. ‘Is anything working?’

Nothing. 

 

*

 

‘No power packs, no tin openers, no cables.’ Rafe shakes the gas bottle, then tries to twist it into the stove. ‘Nope.’  

‘Bizarre,’ Daniel says into the grey. ‘Bizarre, bizarre!’

She contemplates flicking up a light ball. Those still work: what’s inside her doesn’t freeze like mechanics. But the glow did bog-all amongst the fog before, and her energy is low. Packets of dried food from the emergency kit call. She’s eaten half a bag of carrots, a cupful of sugar, some oats and a box of crackers in the last couple of hours. Her stomach growls, ominously. 

‘People must be trying to find others. Seeking answers.’

All three of them are live like cicadas, jumping, song loud and discordant. Other people, when they find them, will be worse. She shudders. 

But the harbour spreads out unseen out the window, an expanse of open nothing. No splosh of waves, no whistle, no birdsong. Entirely flat. People are coiled up in their own burrows. No need to holler down the bay. The four of them will be fine. 

She pulls her coat as far around her as she can, so the edges just overlap. 

 

*

 

The bay returns the next day, crisp white grass leading down to the treetops, then a pane of unmoving sea. Lorna wears her duvet like a shield. Gone. They’d been right to wait. The feeling of smugness sustains her through the next conversation. 

‘Everything’s been destroyed.’ Worry lines tug at Rafe’s face. ‘It’ll be the dark ages over again.’ 

She waves a hand at the shimmering mass. ‘You can’t call that the Dark Ages.’ 

They want permission. From her. She won’t give it. Why must they put themselves in danger? Those folk at the hospital, if they could take her now they would—examine her more often. Lab rat, pin cushion. To stay out of danger means to hide. But if Adam, Daniel and Rafe need go off like big men, saving folk who don’t need it, they must. 

They shrug on boots and coats. She wonders about Whangārei, whether it still exists on a global map. New Zealand could be gone entirely. Her eyes drift down to her feet. Her missing feet. When had her stomach got that far out? She wraps her dressing gown over the bulge, smothering it.  

Smoke whorls past the window. Signal fire? Daniel and Rafe fuel it, branches, cardboard, logs. She feels a little sick. 

The pantry. Comfort food. Crackers. A container of breadcrumbs. A tomato. The cocoa powder catches her eye. She tastes them all, using a wooden spoon that hasn’t rusted. Vegetables, she ought to eat vegetables. She scrabbles in the bottom drawer. Brussel sprouts? Her fingers hit a cold tube, and she yanks it out. 

A snake twists in her hands, mouth stretching to bite. 

She screams. Flings it. 

It hits the wall and slips down into the corner, tail flicking up and down. Her view fades in and out. Her belly lurches; heaves from side to side and squirms violently. It bulges as if the snake has taken up residence there. 

‘What the hell?’ Adam takes two quick steps inside, and freezes. 

‘It’s a sn—’

He chokes, his eyes bugging out. Points to her stomach. 

‘That—what—Lorna?’

 

*

 

Her fingers still shake. The snake lies on the floor, wooden, immobile. A toy. The four of them sit in a circle. Flatmate meeting. She won’t feel guilty! Adam’s face is blank. Daniel flicks a nail into his palm, over and over. Rafe positions himself as far away as he can from her, across the circle. 

Her palms are smooth, like the snake, its oily residue. 

‘How long have you known?’

‘A few months.’ They all look at her, blank-faced. ‘Maybe six.’ There, entirely truthful. 

Rafe, the forgiving one, slams a hand down. ‘This isn’t okay.’ 

Lorna’s baby. She wraps her arms around her stomach. ‘Nothing has to change. Daniel’s a doctor.’

Daniel’s arm slides around her shoulders. Carefully stays high, doesn’t risk slipping down to her waist. The four of them need nothing more, why can’t they see? He has all the knowledge to deliver a baby. Knows the health concerns. Babies have been delivered for centuries without hospitals. It’s the only way, for babies with mutations, with magic. 

‘And we’re trapped,’ Rafe says. ‘When we need a midwife, a pram, a carseat, formula, nappies.’ 

Adam runs a hand through his curly hair. His eyes have more white than normal around the pupils. ‘Well, we’ll have to go find our neighbours. People. Negotiate.’ 

Lorna can just about reach the bag of baking soda at the bottom of the pantry. She snags it, pouring out a handful to eat. Fizzy. 

‘We don’t need anything.’ Stubborn. 

Daniel stares out the window. ‘You can’t hide a baby, Lorna.’ 

But she has, until now. 

‘I won’t consent. To anything. You know I won’t. She won’t be tested.’

 

*

 

The baby’s morphed into a snake. It rolls and thrashes under the layers of her skin. Demands food. She swallows vitamins and boxes of oats, chews celery leaves and furs the inside of her mouth with cocoa powder. Oh, for the convenience of the oven. 

Fog and snake: invaders. The snake has replaced her perfect child. 

Her flatmates speak gently to her, and she loses track of who’s who. They go out a lot, seeking those things they call important. 

She slips out one afternoon, down to the beach. The bush reaches out for her. She shoves viciously at punga fronds and breaks branches, silencing her favourite tui by crashing through its habitat. 

On the shore, she wades out through the mud and uses her fingers to dig for cockles and cat’s-eyes, pushing aside the sea slugs that slither over her hands. Sand grains give way as she digs deeper. 

A long, sleek shapes brushes past her hand, and she pants, snatching her hands back. Another snake? 

 

*

 

A dinghy crosses the bay. Invaders. She grips her dressing gown. Adam and Rafe have invited them. Not neighbours, not strangers: they’re from the Heads, to discuss the situation. They bring a pumpkin as an offering. Two men. 

She doesn’t offer tea; slides the pumpkin into the back of the cupboard. 

A negotiation. The boatmen stare as if Lorna’s grown two heads on her neck. 

‘Have you a midwife?’ Daniel asks. 

If they knew that she’s gestating a snake they’d run, she thinks. Her gaze flicks around the unshaven faces. 

‘A nurse. She would come,’ one replies. ‘But not without payment.’ 

Lorna’s lip wobbles. She goes to the bathroom, stands against the door with her heart thumping. 

Something’s been decided when she returns. They’re shaking hands. Nobody’s bristling. 

Adam lays a hand absently on her shoulder. ‘I’m going with them. Wayne will bring back the midwife.’ 

Lorna freezes. No. He kisses the top of her head, and she brings his hand to the bump, forcing it against her skin. The baby kicks at the spot, and he withdraws without even the ghost of a smile. How could he have made this decision to go, as simple as a click of the fingers?

She can’t watch when they leave. She covers her eyes and listens to the splash of oars. 

The midwife arrives not long after, with Daniel and Adam. Lorna brings her some macadamias to eat, stays out of reach. 

 

*

 

She hadn’t expected pains. She knew some folk had them, and they moaned and screamed and asked for drugs, but those few like her who could create light in their hands, were usually said to go off carefully in the evening to a safe space and meditate until their offspring slip from their bodies. Dignified. 

‘Courage,’ Adam would have said. She grits her teeth and digs her fingers into the carpet, pulling at the fabric. Rafe and Daniel hover at the doorway, peeking in at her as if she would bite. Like a snake. She hopes the snake’s gone. 

The nurse is there. Lorna sees only her great stamping legs; her head’s too weary to lift. The woman’s voice drones. A great shift and twist happens inside Lorna’s body, and she curls into a ball, gripping a soft blanket between her hands, biting down hard. 

Hands unroll her. Turn her, knotted fingers digging into Lorna’s dropping bump. It lurches downward, and the pain crystallises into that region, where she’s being torn apart. Mercifully, it lasts only a short time, or so she thinks. Darkness overtakes the fog, spreads into every region of her house, the curtains still flung open. She focusses on a star, the brightest one, hanging over the harbour, towards Whangārei. It will go nowhere. Neither will she. 

 

*

 

‘I want Adam,’ she yells at the end. ‘Bring him back, bring them all back!’ 

Stretched, extended past all pain, her fibres give in and a lump slides out of her. An instant relief. Lorna’s body collapses, becomes jelly floating on darkness. The midwife snatches away the lump, wraps it in a piece of old sheet. Movements sure and deft but slow motion. Lorna boosts herself up on weak arms, until she sits slumped against the wall. 

The midwife croons to the baby, wiping away at white goop.  

‘Don’t fuss yourself, love, she’ll be with you in a moment,’ she said. 

Lorna’s gaze wobbles hazily. Her fingers twitch. That bundle is hers; she wants it. The nurse dips toward her, and Lorna catches sight of a wizened face, dark around the eyes and with hair that moves and writhes like—

‘Take it away!’ she shouts.

Snakes. Thousands of moving snakes. Her stomach churns as if they are still inside her. Her hands thrash wildly. Rafe hunches over her, murmuring in her ear. The mewling ceases, moves away, and Daniel disappears, the midwife too. 

She’d protected the baby, grown it, loved it. How had the snakes and the fog captured it? And taken Adam, too. All she wanted was to keep her folk close, her house neat and contained, with defined edges so everyone knows her limits. As it should be.  

The pumpkin, abandoned on the floor, hovers in Lorna’s view.

 

*

 

After that, they treat her as if she’s a cracked piece of china. Tentative when the two of them come near her, and often they don’t approach, only stand at the door and then retreat without entering. The midwife checks her over a few times, brisk hands assessing a job well done, pronounces her healing, but Adam doesn’t reappear. 

Why does she want him so? He forms a piece of her puzzle, the missing piece, her small set that fits together and belongs here in this house. A Polly Pocket tidied away neatly. The baby should have its place, too. But not the snake. 

A small place deep inside her aches. Daniel and Rafe soothe the baby when she cries, carry her in the night, feed her the milk powder they’ve found. She grows little and is fretful. Lorna hears her, deep in the darkness, and stuffs her fingers in her ears like a child. 

‘Lorna! Look at this!’ 

The snake-baby had grown inside her, but it isn’t hers. She closes her eyes, wondering at herself, but they speak with urgency. 

‘Open, look at her, Lorna, you need to.’ 

‘I said I didn’t want to.’

‘The baby’s fixed the spanner.’ Rafe, a thread of excitement in his voice as bright as the steel he holds. ‘Really, Lorna, look! Could it be? A different type of your light magic?’

‘The light magic’s only a tiny quirk of DNA,’ Lorna says. ‘You know this—one of those small things that show up sometime. You remember the study… my mother gave it to me.’  She swallows. If the baby has the ability to fix the world—but then she will be taken away. And she should be Lorna’s, snakes or no. Adam and Rafe and Daniel’s. The sunlight from the window makes her ears look translucent. So small. Lorna’s fingers reach out of their own volition and stroke the curves. 

The hospital can’t have her. 

‘Maybe this is another quirk,’ Daniel says. ‘Or she swallowed the fog, or maybe she was sent, sent for us, to help fix the crisis. It’s not a fluke, we tried her with the spade… where her hands touched, the metal healed.’

How selfish has Lorna been, rejecting her? Her gaze whispers over the child, wrapped tight, one fist out, curling around the spanner in an involuntary grip. The rust shrinks even as Lorna watches. Her eyes lock on Lorna’s, shining like sea glass, a hint of knowing. 

She is a child of her time. Of disaster. Of genetic mutation. 

‘We’ll take her to Whangārei,’ Rafe says.

Lorna snatches at the bundle, fingers twitching. ‘You can’t take her away. She’s mine. Give her to me.’

Daniel’s eyes widen. 

‘She has a role to play, so now you want her?’

She gathers the baby in, a chick with fluffy ears. She places her fingerpads on either side of her face. Peachy chubby cheeks. Hair that isn’t actually moving. She shifts her weight from one side to the other, and the little face crumples and the baby begins to scream. 

‘You won’t let her save us from disaster?’

Lorna lifts her shirt and lets the baby suckle. Her name is Senka. 

‘She’s mine now.’ The spanner falls to the floor, thunk.

 

*

 

Another basket of fruit arrives on the doorstep that afternoon, and with it Adam, from across the bay. Lorna, Senka clutched to her shoulder, presses her free hand to him, wondering whether he has changed allegiance. When she removes it, delicate blue bruises mar his skin. 

The pressure of her? 

She holds her daughter—their daughter, all their daughter—out to him. ‘Perhaps people could bring their rusty things to her,’ she says hesitantly.  

Under apples, the basket’s full of chokos, sixteen of them, each growing. A twirling vine sidles out of the top where the fruit had been attached to its parent, new shoots lighter green and sneaking off to the side. A thin layer of tough flesh between the shiny skin and woody stone in the centre.  

Lorna bends, and Senka’s small arm drops, her hand gripping onto a twisting vine from the basket, a smooth and sinuous moving snake. A child’s involuntary grip? Lorna rests her head against her daughter’s body, and breathes in the scent of fog.