Summerhill (22 page)

Zero

(Re)starting

White.
Why did the afterlife have to be white? After his fruitless trek across the frozen ocean, Summerhill would have preferred any other color.

The dog’s bones and muscles ached, which made him wonder why things like pain and discomfort would linger after death. Sitting up was a chore, and he felt self-conscious when he whimpered because of it. It took him a few seconds to realize that he still had circulation in his hands, feet, and ears, because they now stung with warmth.

The afterlife was at least not merely a plane of empty, featureless white. Summerhill was sitting up on some kind of small dais, and there were shadowy angles that gave the impression of walls and possibly also corridors that led away from his chamber. The only sounds he heard were those of his own body and the thoughts ringing about within his mind. There was no weightlessness, and he was decidedly still corporeal, as his aching body was keen to remind him.

Standing took more effort. He managed to get only partway up before he collapsed, falling a short way, his backside landing back on the dais.

“Don’t strain yourself. Your strength should return, in time.”

Summerhill turned his head quickly, and saw behind him a young woman—no, still barely just a girl, borderline prepubescent. Her features changed every time he blinked; she would be a canine creature like himself, a human girl like Katherine, and all sorts of things in between while still somehow remaining undeniably the same being.

She smiled at him. “It’s nice to see you again, Summerhill,” she said. “Unorthodox, but nice.”

Months of being snow-blind and isolated began to melt away from the edges of Summerhill’s mind, and in the thaw he recalled the foolish details of his journey through the land of mountains. His preceding memories fell into position like a mosaic, and he remembered the World of the Pale Gray Sky, his escape, and everything after.

What he didn’t quite remember, however, was this girl. “Who are you?” he asked, remaining calm and still.

“I am Shoön, the Beginning,” she said, her voice cheerful, genial. “And don’t worry about not remembering me. That’s normal.”

Summerhill looked her over again, but it was hard to place her because she kept looking different, subtly and not-so-subtly. “We’ve met before, haven’t we?”

Shoön chuckled. “I meet everybody once. It’s only very rarely that I see anyone again after that.”

There was still no sound that didn’t come from either
Shoön or from Summerhill himself. Near as Summerhill could tell, there was nothing going on here other than their conver
sation. “How did I get here?” he asked. “Did I... am I dead?”

Finally, Shoön seemed to have settled on a single appearance, at least to Summerhill’s perceptions of her: the form of a young girl, slightly human with more otherworldly features, her hair dark black and braided into twin ponytails that ran down along her back. The laugh she let out at Summerhill’s question, however, was more that of a young woman than that of a girl.

“Dead?” she repeated. “Oh, no, Summerhill, you’re very much alive. Actually, if you don’t mind my saying, you look rather a mess, and I’m guessing you feel like one, too.”

“That explains why I feel like I’ve been run over by an ocean liner,” Summerhill muttered. “So, this isn’t the afterlife, then?”

“Nothing of the sort,” Shoön assured him. “If you wanted to call this place anything, you could call it the beforelife.”

The white stung Summerhill’s eyes less, now. He could also now see (and appreciate) the more subtle hues of gray and off-white in his surroundings. “It’s warm here. I like that.”

Shoön smiled and sat down next to him. “I’m afraid you won’t be able to stay long. I tried to be as subtle as possible about pulling you back here and nursing you back to health. Hopefully you’ll feel well enough to be up and about soon.”

“Do you have any blankets or something?” Summerhill asked. “Can I lie down and take a nap?”

There was a blossoming sensation of warmth that spread all through Summerhill’s back and torso as Shoön set her hand upon his shoulder. “No, Summerhill,” she said, and now she sounded a little sad. “As I said, you’re going to have to leave soon. I’m very sorry.”

Summerhill turned to look deep into Shoön’s eyes. Something about her filled him with a heartening feeling; he might not recognize her, but he
knew
her, somehow, from somewhere. “I feel safe here,” he said. “I feel safe with you.”

She drew him into a hug, and sighed warmly as she held him. Despite being smaller than him, she didn’t feel it, and being in her arms soothed the aching he felt in his limbs. “Everyone has to move on from here,” she murmured into one of his big ears. “Everyone has to go out into the world.”

“You make it sound like I’ve already done that, though,” Summerhill said. It was with reluctance that he drew away from Shoön and her embrace.

She nodded. “And so you have,” she replied. “So very, very long ago.”

Summerhill wrinkled his brow, sniffed at the air, and stuck out the tip of his tongue. “Except time has no meaning here,” he said.

A new grin—an approving and impressed grin—appeared on Shoön’s face. “That’s exactly right. Still, I know that, to your perceptions, it was a long time ago, and you’ve come so, so far since then.”

“Why did you bring me back here? You make it sound like I’m not supposed to be here.”

“You’re not, no,” Shoön said. “By that same token, you’re not supposed to die cold and alone out in the snow.”

A chill made its way up through Summerhill’s warmed spine. “Is this some kind of destiny thing?” he asked. “Do you know how I’m fated to end up?”

“Mine is the dominion of how things begin,” Shoön said. “That being said, knowing how something begins can tell you a lot about how it’s bound to end, and your end wasn’t supposed to be back there.”

“And so you brought me back to life so that I can start over?”

Shoön flashed him a smirk. “Strictly speaking, I pulled you back here before you had a chance to die. Which, strictly speaking, I’m not supposed to do, but I couldn’t bear the thought of leaving you there for my sister to find.”

“Your sister? Who’s your sister?”

“Now, now,” Shoön said, patting Summerhill on the cheek. “You’re a smart dog. If I’m the Beginning, who would my sister be?”

Summerhill just nodded. “I see. And the reason you’re in such a hurry to get me on my way is because—”

“—if she found out I stole you from her, she’d be quite cross with me, yes.” Shoön stood up and pulled her hair back in her hands, then let it fall back down straight. “Now, what we can do, here, is just say that this is the beginning of the next chapter of your journey, so technically, that’d fall under my jurisdiction.”

“Willful misinterpretation of the rules?” Summerhill asked with a grin.

“Not
mis
interpretation,” Shoön protested. “
Selective
interpretation. Technically, it’s not cheating.” She touched Summerhill on the forehead, stroked the fur there a bit, and then asked, “Could you lie down?”

Summerhill leaned only partway back. “I thought you said I wasn’t supposed to.”

“Well, now I need to send you on your way, and I want you to be comfortable. Close your eyes and think about where you want to be.”

“I want to be back with Katherine. I feel like that’s where I’m supposed to be.”

“Then that’s just fine,” Shoön said as she gently pushed Summerhill down flat atop the dais. “You can be wherever you want to be.”

“But is that where I’m
supposed
to be? I think I met a future version of myself telling me that I needed to—”

“Close your eyes and relax,” Shoön repeated. “Don’t try to interpret fate before it happens. That never ends well for anybody.”

Summerhill started to close his eyes, but then he quickly opened them again. “Wait,” he said. “Before I go, I... You said you knew me, from the beginning.” He reached out to take her hand, squeezing it. “Can you tell me what my beginning really was?”

Shoön stroked the top of his muzzle and smiled sadly. “It’s not that simple, Summerhill,” she said, and then she leaned down and kissed him on his furry forehead.

“But, I mean, surely you can just
tell
me, right? If you were there?”

This time, Shoön cupped Summerhill’s cheek and touched her nose to his. “I already cheated once by bringing you back here,” she said with an impish grin. “I can’t just—”

“You said it wasn’t cheating!”

“Shush,” Shoön said, tapping him on the nose. “The point is that I can’t just give you the answers you’re looking for; you need to find those yourself, if they’re to mean anything.”

Summerhill swallowed, nodded, and then shut his eyes. “So I just...think about where I want to be?”

“And then let your mind go blank.” Shoön was caressing his ears and forehead, and the feeling was so relaxing and soothing. She then stopped abruptly and perked up. “Oh, how silly of me. I almost forgot to give this back to you.”

Out of thin air, she produced a small object in her palm. With a smile, she pressed it into Summerhill’s hand. “You’ve earned this.”

It was cool and smooth and round. With some trepidation, Summerhill held it up and looked at it. It was the engraved pocket watch he’d had inside the nevereef. “Where did you get this?” he asked.

Shoön took the watch from his hand and stuffed it into his shirt pocket for him. “Try not to lose it this time, okay?” She then resumed petting and stroking Summerhill on the head, and his desire to argue began to ebb and abate.

Summerhill took a few deep, quiet breaths. “Hey, Shoön?”

“Yes?”

“Thanks for saving me.” He opened his eyes back up to look at her one more time. “It means a lot to me.”

Shoön smiled, and then rested her palm flat against his forehead. “Close your eyes,” she said again. “Relax, and let the next part of your journey begin.”

Twenty-One

Stream

Summerhill slept, and again he dreamt.

The dream was clear and lucid, as clear and lucid as the stream that Summerhill saw. The sun reflected off the water’s surface, tracing the lines of the gentle current. The air was crisp, echoing only with the sound of the babbling stream.

Fallen leaves, still fresh and verdant, flowed downstream. Different parts of the current carried them at different speeds; at times, some leaves would be clumped together, only to separate for a while before the flow brought them all together again. There was a measurable semblance of tranquility to those steady movements.

Here and there, tiny silver fish would show themselves near the surface, and sometimes they would hop out into the air for a split second, as if trying to catch something. The spots where they emerged and where they landed would ripple and radiate out, temporarily disrupting the current, changing the flow of the tiny leaves for just a few seconds before the stream returned to normal.

From upstream, there came the wind, and borne on that wind was a soft, melodious humming. It wasn’t the hum of nature or the hum of the breeze through the branches, but the hum of a person, actively musical and always changing, the tune going wherever it would with no sign of building in one direction or another.

Farther downstream, there was the burbling sound of the stream going over a short drop, the water roiling gently before the stream continued, well out of sight and out of earshot.

Summerhill gazed at one of the rippling spots in the water where a fish had jumped. He felt himself growing more tired, a sign that he was waking up and pulling away from the relaxing dream.