Fish Tails Read Online Free PDF Page B

them felt comforted, almost as if they had heard a whisper, a murmur from some immense distance saying, “Coming . . . coming . . . I hear you . . .”
    I T WAS G RANDMA WHO HAD chosen the name “Needly” for the child. Even at birth she had been slim and silvery, white of skin and almost white of hair—­the “almost” indicating no tint of gold but instead an almost metallic silver. She had wide eyes that went here and there, in and out, stitching the world together, making a shape of it at an age when most babies could not even focus their sight. This one was sharp, bright and perspicacious, as Grandma told herself. She was also an anomaly, for Needly was born to Grandma’s daughter, Trudis, and Grandma had firmly intended that this disastrous daughter should never bear ­children!
    Her intention had been thwarted at every turn. Trudis had borne seven, Needly being the last. Now, in hindsight, Grandma could not regret the other six—­the two infant girls who had died, the four boy babes dropped into the world like gravel into a riverbed, losing themselves among unremarked heaps of other such gravel. Perhaps in some way they had opened the path for the seventh child, the wondrous child, Needly. Even Grandma—­who often longed for marvelous and remedial things that had small chance of happening—­even she had never dared hope for such a one as Needly.
    The child was extraordinary, and in Hench Valley being extraordinary was a death sentence. Grandma had removed the baby from Trudis’s erratic and often nonexistent care and went to considerable effort make the little one seem ordinary. Part of the effort consisted of naming the child without seeming to do so. The menfolk of Hench Valley used only ugly words for females, whether human or animal, and all females acquired their names by accretion of epithets. “Worthless” was a common valley name for a girl. “Ugly,” “Slow,” “Dirty” were others. Even if one had a treasured mare, the name would not hint at it. Glory-­on-­hooves would receive no better label than Mud. Grace-­in-­gallop would be nothing more lovely than Lump. Not that glory or grace had any place in Hench Valley. Except for Needly and Grandma and an occasional visiting cat or dog, all the valley’s occupants actually were mud or lump, whether on four legs or two.
    Grandma decided upon “Needly” at first sight of the child. The slender form, the steely pale hair and skin, those wide eyes, that pointed gaze made the name inevitable. Thereafter, Grandma had frequently sneered the word aloud, referring to the child thus, but without any apparent intention of naming her. In Needly’s case, repetition succeeded where obvious intention would have failed. The label was not euphonious. It had no connotations of grace or fortune. It had the sneer of derogation necessary for females, and therefore it could be allowed where a loving or kindly word would have been jeered into nothing. Of course, when Grandma was alone with the little girl, the word was tenderness itself. The child understood this very well, though she was still too young to speak.
    The power of names went unconsidered in Hench Valley. No one living there knew why the place was called Hench Valley. No one living there knew why the four settlements within it had the names they did: Tuckwhip; Gortles; Grief’s Barn; Bag’s Arm. Grandma thought, perhaps, that at that time, some centuries before, when love was still permitted, even expected, a father losing a woman in childbirth could possibly have named a child Grief, and that child might have built a barn. A son named Bagger or Bags could lose an arm in an accident and bury that part of him near the place he lived.
    Male children were given names: Pig-­belly, Suck-­tooth, Fat-­ass. These names were used only until the male in question caused a pregnancy.