Naming Day

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Just as the last of the guests arrived, the baby began crying. Aeryn reached for him. But before she could do more than brush the edge of his blanket, another set of hands pushed hers away.

"Let me get him, Aeryn," said Dorca, deftly picking up the baby and slinging a cloth across her shoulder in one move. She set the baby over the cloth and began rocking and patting him. "You go get yourself a plate of food. You’ve hardly eaten. You look thinner than before you became pregnant."

Aeryn watched the baby’s face turn red as he wound himself up for a good wail. "It’s just the noise," she began, wincing as a couple of neighbors’ laughter carried over the din of the festivities. Their voices hurt her head. Had Cerric invited everyone he’d ever known in his entire life? she wondered, rubbing her temples. Or had this been Dorca’s doing? Aeryn couldn’t remember how the guest list had been created, just that one microt she’d been talking about a quiet Naming Day this cycle, and the next, the invitations had gone out and it had been too late.

Aeryn reached for the baby again. "I’m not hungry, but I think he is."

"Nonsense”, said Cerric’s Aunt Gill, blocking her arms with her body. "Cerric said you fed him right before we came." She stood next to Dorca and thrust one thick finger into the baby’s palm until he clasped it, calming under Dorca’s ministrations.

Aunt Gill glanced over her shoulder. "But you’re going to waste away, dear. You know you need your strength. It’s time to put the past behind you and think about your other children."

Aeryn scowled at Aunt Gill. John had been her son, not a favorite mug she’d dropped and broke. He’d died. And the power of that filled every microt of her life. His face with the toothy smile and sky blue eyes haunted her nights. His laughter and careful observations about bugs or fish or stars haunted her days. She continuously saw glimpses of an arm or a foot, sometimes a shoulder and the back of a curly head in the garden or behind a bush or around the doorway into the kitchen. If she tried to see all of John, he disappeared as soon as she turned her head. But if she remained still, she could see a part of him. Or she could hear him off in the distance, running. He always loved to run. And so she would find herself frozen for hundreds of microts, looking out the corner of her eye and straining her ears. Glimpses were all she had left.

Aeryn massaged her temples, trying to get rid of what was turning into one of her massive headaches. She could not explain anything about John to Aunt Gill or Dorca, these women with their sturdy shoulders and strong faces and muscular forearms. Cerric’s family was full of practical folk who prided themselves on taking life’s blows in stride, of not holding onto the past. She knew they thought her odd for her trips every cycle to the barren planet. Would they think her odd for not wanting to put John behind her? Six monens had passed since his death, yet it felt like six cycles or six microts, depending on her mood. How could she explain something that had no explanation?

As Aeryn stepped away, she felt someone gently squeeze her shoulders. “How are you doing?" said Harrah, her nearest neighbor to the south. "Would you like me to get you anything?"

"No, I’m fine," said Aeryn, more sharply than she’d intended. "Really, I don’t need anything."

Harrah tucked a loose piece of gray hair behind her ear as she peered into Aeryn’s eyes. "Another headache? Why don’t you sit down and let me get you a tonic? Or maybe you should step outside?"

Aeryn forced a smile. Once Harrah made up her mind that someone needed taking care of, there was no stopping her. She'd been immensely helpful after the funeral and when the baby had been born three monens ago, but she didn't seem to know when to stop being helpful. "A glass of water would be nice," said Aeryn. "Thank you, Harrah."

Harrah smiled in relief and squirmed her thin, old body between a couple of Rhys’s young friends, disappearing into the crowd.

Aeryn made her way to an empty spot against the wall. She leaned back and sighed. The noise was growing, pressing against her, making her head throb. Why were all these people here? She recognized a field hand and his wife, the mechanic who had worked on their ground 'port, Cerric's second cousin who she'd met at her wedding or was she his first cousin? And the strangers, so many of them, milling around, eating her food, talking louder and louder.

None of them cared what name they gave the baby. None of them knew how it had to be Cerric's choice this time, of how she'd made a mistake with John, picking a name from her past that drew trouble like a beacon, much like the man who first bore that name. This child could not be tainted that way. He had to be new, clean, with no ties to a people she'd known in another life.

Aeryn craned her neck, trying to spot Cerric. He stood at the buffet table, setting out extra meat rolls from a steaming tray that she had said she’d take care of. Aeryn pushed between a couple of heavyset men who she recognized from the farmers’ enclave and sidled up to Cerric.

“I’ll do that,” she told him.

He glanced up in surprise. “No, no, it’s no trouble. You were busy with Ma. Are they watching the baby?”

She nodded and watched him finish putting out the food. “Have you chosen the name yet?”

She could feel Cerric’s body tense next to hers. “I am not making this decision on my own, I told you that.”

Aeryn closed her eyes. Naming Day and they were still arguing. Hadn’t he learned how stubborn she could be yet? Just as Aeryn was about to explain that to Cerric, a dish crashed on the other side of the room, splattering food across the floor and the legs of the nearby guests. Aeryn winced. Just as she started to head over to clean it up, she noticed Rhys appear with a rag and an extra plate to put all the waste on.

He glanced over at the two of them and shrugged, a crooked smile on his face. Aeryn nodded her thanks. She glanced at Cerric but found him staring out the window, the tray of meatrolls at an angle that threatened to drip juice across the floor. Aeryn grabbed the tray and followed his line of sight.

It was the well. Or rather, a cleared patch in the untamed field across the way. Cleared only because they’d had to cover the well again with fresh wood that wasn’t rotten. You couldn’t see the actual well from here. It was hidden from view, just as it had been on the day John had stepped on it.

Aeryn’s breath caught in the back of her throat. She hadn’t known you could see the cleared area from here. They’d moved the table to a more accessible spot for the party, so she didn’t normally stand here. But there it was. The spot where John had died.

Aeryn felt a wave of fury wash over her body. It started in her feet and traveled up through her legs, abdomen, shoulders, neck and head. It made her fingertips tingle. It made her want to tear apart the house, to hurt someone, to scream until her throat was raw. But it was the Naming Day party and John had been dead for six monens and blaming the rotten wood did not help. She knew. She’d tried that already, as well as blaming herself and Cerric and Rhys and even John himself, the goddess help her, as Zhaan used to say.

A moment later, the fury disappeared as quickly as it had come. In its place, remained a massive headache that throbbed with her pulse. Aeryn set the tray on the table. She mumbled, “I’ll be outside,” to Cerric and rushed to the door. Along the way, Harrah arrived with a glass of water, which Aeryn grabbed and took with her, mumbling a quick thank you.

Once outside, she stopped and glanced around. She needed to get away from the house to a place where she could breathe. The direction of the well was out of the question, so she headed in the opposite direction, which was straight to the transport pod.

At the pod, she ran up the steps, pushed aside the vines and climbed into the relative coolness of the dark pod with its smell of the fragrant plant Zhaan had given her so long ago. After sinking to the floor, she leaned against the wall and waited for her breathing to return to normal. Then she tore off a couple of leaves, shoved them in her mouth and chewed furiously. Almost immediately, her headache lessened. She sipped water to relieve the bitter tang of the leaves. Then she closed her eyes.

How do you celebrate the joy of a baby while mourning the death of his older brother? she wondered as she had a thousand times already. How do you look at a tiny face with its perfect nose and lips, its wiggly eyebrows and attached earlobes, with its miniature fingernails and and knees and feet, and feel anything but awe? How do you do this when guilt lays so heavy in your gut that you wonder if you’ll ever be able to stand again?

Even now, Aeryn was forgetting details about John. She remembered the way he’d stoop in the long grass, studying the lemit bugs as they built their nest, brows furrowed, head cocked the same as his namesake back on Moya. Yet she forgot the silly rhyme he’d made up about them and had been forced to ask Cerric to recite it for her. Even still, he’d only remembered part of it. So day by day, she lost a little bit more of her son as her memory betrayed her, as Cerric’s did as well.

A footstep sounded on the pod steps, and Aeryn quickly brushed away the tears that had rolled down her cheeks.

It was Rhys. He poked his head and shoulders in the door. “Mum?” he said, squinting.

“I’m right here.”

He carefully picked his way through the plants and sat down next to you. “Da was wondering where you went. Headache?”

“Yes, the leaves help.”

He glanced at her and she knew he could tell she’d been crying. “Are you all right?”

Aeryn started to nod, but changed her mind. “No, there are too many people at the party.”

“You should’ve said something to Grandma.”

Aeryn snorted. “That is much easier said than done, I’m afraid.”

Rhys nodded and smiled. “I’ll tell Da you’re okay.”

Impulsively, Aeryn grabbed his arm. “You don’t have to leave. Keep me company.”

“All right.”

Silence settled over them. Rhys tore off leaves and slowly ripped them to shreds, his brows furrowed, while Aeryn sipped her water.

“I miss him too, you know,” said Rhys suddenly, his voice unsteady.

Aeryn glanced at him in surprise. “I know you do.”

“He followed me around all the time and really knew how to bug me, but we had fun too. I was teaching him how to fish. We were going to experiment with fertilizer and welkat blooms to see how big we could grow them.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“Yeah, he was always bugging me about trying stuff like that. Sometimes I avoided him and pretended like I was busy when I really wasn’t.”

Aeryn chuckled. “His mind was always going.”

Rhys crossed his arms. “The thing is,” he said, his voice cracking. “I should’ve saved him. I should’ve been paying more attention. He ran right by me, and I knew he was going to the old field, but I didn’t care. He was always running. I never thought he might actually get hurt or anything.” Rhys started crying, his shoulders shaking. “I’m sorry, Mum. I’m sorry.”

Aeryn scooted over and put her arms around him. She hugged him tight while he cried. She pulled his head to her shoulder. “It’s all right. It’s okay.” He was as tall as his father now and sometimes she forgot he had so much of a boy still in him. She’d never imagined that he might blame himself for the accident. How long had he been carrying this around?

Finally, he sniffled and pulled his head up.

She gave him a gentle shake. “Listen to me, Rhys. There is nothing for you to be sorry about. It was an accident. Do you understand me? An accident. It was not your job to pay attention to John. If anything, your father and I should’ve found that well ages ago. But the well was here long before any of us were born. No one even remembers it being dug.”

Rhys wiped his eyes with the top of his shirt. “Then why do I feel so guilty all the time?”

“Because it’s not fair, so you look for someone or something to blame and you blame yourself. And you feel guilty that you’re alive and he isn’t. But you have to keep telling yourself that *you* did nothing wrong. You keep saying it until you believe it.”

“Okay.” He didn’t sound convinced, but she’d just have to make sure he became convinced over time.

Aeryn gave him one last squeeze and pulled herself to her feet. “We have a celebration today. Let’s go name your brother.”

She gave Rhys a hand up and together they headed back to the house.

When Aeryn stepped back inside, she found her headache returning full force. The din of conversations was louder than ever. The press of all the people. The stench of someone’s perfume. It was intolerable. She watched Rhys go in search of his friends, nodded hello to Cerric, and went upstairs. In their bedroom, she opened the chest at the foot of the bed and pulled out her old pulse pistol. Then she went back downstairs.

Aeryn made her way to the parlor, squeezing her body between groups of other bodies, all of them sweaty and too close. She climbed on a chair.

“I need to say something,” she said loudly.

No one even looked in her direction.

“Hello,” she shouted. A few neighbors glanced over. Then they began whispering to themselves, presumably about Cerric’s eccentric wife. Over everyone’s heads, Aeryn saw Dorca and Aunt Gill frowning at her. The baby was back in his cradle, which Dorca rocked with one foot. Harrah looked concerned. Cerric’s mouth hung open and he looked ready to pull her down from the chair. She shook her head at him.

Then she turned back to the crowd and tried again. “Can I have everyone’s attention, please?”

When there was almost no difference in the noise, Aeryn released the safety on her pulse pistol. “Frell this,” she muttered. Then she fired a shot into the air. The blast was louder and more satisfying than she remembered. It knocked a hole in the ceiling. Plaster and wood shards rained down on the guests. A few people screamed. Those nearest her scrambled to get away from her, though they didn’t have much room to maneuver so they just pressed the other guests against the walls.

Aeryn fingered the safety back in place and tucked the pistol in the waistband of her trousers. “I don’t mean to scare you,” she began.

“Are you crazy?” shouted a man she didn’t recognize.

Aeryn cocked an eyebrow at him. “Perhaps.” She looked out over the guests. “I wanted to thank all of you for coming. Naming Day is important and we appreciate you wanting to share it with us. But you have to go now.”

When no one moved, Aeryn reached for her pulse pistol again. “We – I -- just want family here for the actual naming. Again, thank you for coming. We’ll tell you the name tomorrow or the next day when we see you wherever we see you. But please, leave.” A few people started heading toward the door. Cerric slowly shook his head, but in a good way, as if he might be proud of her, despite the fact that he actually cared what these people thought of him. At least that much wouldn’t bother her.

Soon, everyone but Rhys, Dorca, Aunt Gill and Cerric had left. Aeryn gathered the baby in her arms and sat in the same chair she’d been standing in earlier.

“Aeryn, dear,” said Aunt Gill. “I didn’t know you were still so overwhelmed with grief. You should let us help out more.”

Aeryn started to say no, but she felt Cerric’s hand on her shoulder. “Thank you,” she said. But it wasn’t an agreement. No, not an agreement at all.

Dorca sighed heavily and pulled up a chair. “You really aren’t one of us, are you?”

“Yes, she is,” said Rhys, quick to her defense. “You’re just, um, forthright, right Mum?”

Aeryn shrugged. “This is my home, but sometimes the old ways are useful, too.”

“I suppose you could say that.” Cerric reached across her and pulled the pulse pistol out of her trousers. He set it on a shelf across the room. Then he knelt at her side. “Aeryn, I am not choosing a name by myself.”

“And I cannot help you,” she said.

The two of them stared at each other, neither giving ground.

Finally, Rhys spoke up. “John used to love hearing stories about Great Grandpa,” he said quietly. “He liked hearing about all the exploring he did.”

“He mapped out this whole region,” said Dorca, nodding. “He was well respected. His name was Callum.”

“Callum,” repeated Aeryn, trying out the name. She bent over the baby and smoothed the dark hair across his head. “How do you like Callum, little one?”

The baby blinked and wiggled his arms.

Cerric slipped his arm around her waist. “Callum is a good strong name.”

Aeryn sighed and kissed Callum on the forehead. Then she kissed him on the nose and the chin. There would be no reminders to her past with this name, no ties to another man who drew trouble to him like the air he breathed. It was a good name. John, her young lost son, would like it. And so would the other John, she realized. He would respect a name that came from the family.

“Thank you, Rhys,” she said. “We shall call him Callum.”

And so they did.


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CrystalMoon

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