Matriarch: Part Two

A young woman experiences a cult ritual that changes her life forever.

“Is that a teepee?” Mara asks, leaning over the dash and craning her head. The white structure tilts to the side, as if trying to hear her.

“I guess so. Maybe a wigwam. I don’t remember what they called it.” I stare at the red piping snaking around its top. My mouth dries out. Mara stops the car.

“Should we go in?” She asks, placing her hand on top of mine. I feel her pulse beating beneath the skin.

“I guess so.” I shrug, opening the door and stepping into the frigid air. The leaves snap underneath my feet. I try to push the memories out. Mommy. Mommy. Mommy. The smell of it is exactly the same: patchouli, fire smoke, cedar—and underneath it all, rot.

“Sage! You made it! Welcome home, sweetie.” Moon comes out of the darkness and greets us, wrapping her thin arms around me. Everyone aged so much. I wonder, briefly, what my mother looked like before she stopped breathing. Did she have these age spots? This sogging, thin, soft skin on her arms? A down-feather mustache lying flat across her lip?

“Hi, Moon.” I lean into her neck. Let her hands press into my spine. The familiar pattern. The familiar greeting. I am you and you are me. I tell you through the bone.

“We missed you. But we knew, you’d come back. Your mother always said you would.” She beams, all of her teeth gone on the top row.

“I’m only here for the funeral.” I remind her, pulling my sleeves over my hands. The wind shakes the trees. I realize I haven’t heard any birds.

“Hmm. Well, we’ll make the most of it, then.” She glances over at Mara, who she seems to have just noticed. “And who’s this? A friend of yours?”

“This is Mara. She’s my wife.”

“Wife.” She looks between us, assessing, frowning. “How will you have children?”

“We don’t want them.” I reach for Mara’s hand, squeezing it. I convinced her not to. I told her I couldn’t, I wouldn’t—because of this place. Because of the ways I know that you can cripple a child, without laying a finger on them.

“How can that be true?” Moon’s eyes bore into us, analyzing. She smiles again. “Ah, it isn’t.” She shakes her head. “One of you wants. The other refuses to.” She walks past us, her long braid swaying on her back. “No matter. Come now, I’ll show you where you’ll be staying. Funeral’s tomorrow.” We pull our bags out of the car and scurry after her into the woods, the leaves cracking underneath our feet as we try to keep her in our sight, her long braid disappearing and appearing between tree trunks. Each time, it makes my head hurt, as if its pulling a memory loose like a tooth. I don’t want to know. I don’t want to know, whatever it is.

Moon leads us to a wooden cabin painted periwinkle, the color so out of place in the woods that it is almost pulsing with light. She unlocks it, then places the key back in her own pocket. “Here you go, girls. Enjoy. We’ll come collect you in the morning for breakfast. Get some sleep.” She brushes past Mara and grabs my arm, wrenching me down to her level. Her mustache tickles my ear. She smells like laundry, powdered milk, and decay. “Motherhood is not a choice. It is a calling.” Her lips touch my ear as she speaks, her voice hoarse with an emotion I can’t discern. “When you hear it calling, get up.” With that, she releases me, smiling with the teeth she has left. I can’t think of a single word to say. She pats my arm. “Goodnight, Sage.” I watch her move between the trees like a phantom, her hair visible even at the edge of the tree line. When I can’t see her anymore, I pull the door shut—but I can’t lock it.

Mara and I sit in the cabin in silence. Clearly, she wants to talk to me but can’t bring herself to say anything. She fiddles with the pastry box, eventually opening it and eating one of the tarts. I watch her lips, slicked in cinnamon apple filling. I am hungry, once again, but not for anything that I can name. When she swallows the last bite, licking the sugar from the corners of her mouth, she starts to cry. I hold her, and she sobs into my chest. When she’s done, she wipes her nose with her bare arm.

“I still want a baby, Sage.” She whispers, her voice low with desire.

“I know.”

“It hurts.”

“I know.”

She brushes past me, irritated with my lack of response. She washes her face, puts on her pajamas. She gets in bed and turns out the lights while I’m still getting changed. In the darkness, she asks, “How did that woman know? About us?”

“She didn’t.” I respond, crawling under the sheets. Mara doesn’t turn towards me. When I fall asleep, it is dreamless dark. The sound comes into my mind without form. I can hear it, but can’t tell where it is. Am I still in bed? Where’s Mara? The space beside me is empty. The bed is cold. I sit up, suddenly alert. The sound escalates, from a low hum into a wide groan. I can’t make it out but it grows closer with each second. The door. The door isn’t locked. I run to it, but it’s already open. The darkness of the woods stretches before me, an eternal sea of ink without shape or form. I can feel movement in front of me, but I can’t see it. Someone is out there, rustling in the leaves. The sound hums again, something primal, desperate, dying. I turn back inside, grab my phone, and turn on the flashlight. I scan the cabin first, looking for Mara. I yell her name and it bounces back to me from the corners of the room.

I head back towards the open door and trip over something, falling into the leaves. I land sharply on my arm and cry out. I turn the light over to the step, and see that hundreds of eyeless birds have been arranged. The pattern I remember. The pattern I dread. I scramble backwards, adrenaline making my fingertips sting. I run with my light through the woods, only stopping when I get to the place where the car was. It’s gone. I can’t breathe. I am gasping for air but I can still hear them, below me, over me, around me. The groaning. The yelling. The screaming. Mommy. Mommy. Mommy. I hear them, in the woods, calling in a language I recognize.

Mara. They must have Mara. I stand there, bracing myself. I know what I have to do, for them to give her back. I know what I must become. For her. I walk into the woods, towards the sound. I smell the wood smoke. I hear their crying. I stand at the edge of it, behind the trees, willing myself to go forward. Dozens of men and women are writhing, naked and oiled, around a bonfire. They are all screaming Mommy. They are clawing their skin open. They are bleeding. They are biting each other’s limbs and hooking their fingers in each other’s eyes. I am about to put a foot into the light when I see Mara across from me, stepping into the circle. They turn towards her, their eyes wide.

“Mommy?” A man with bleeding gums and one eye asks her, tilting his head like a dog. I feel the tears on my face. I want to run out and stop this, grab her, drag her back to the car.

“Yes.” She says, blissful. They swarm her, their hands all over her perfect body. They peel off her clothes, and lower their mouths to my wife’s skin. They suck on her hair, her arms, her legs. I watch their wet gums on her breasts. They hum contentedly, their hands mimicking babies, kneading at her flesh. I sit down and sob, pressing a hand to my mouth to stifle the noise. Moon kisses Mara on the mouth like a child, her lips an open O.

“We love you Mommy.” She sings—and all of them echo. We love you mommy. We love you mommy. We love you mommy.

Mara is laughing hysterically, stroking the heads of all the people clawing at her, needing her. Her body convulses the same way mine did. They stand around her and begin to chant. They cover her in my mother’s clothes. A new matriarch. They’ll give her things I can’t. Maybe that’s for the best.

I turn back towards the car. I sit inside of it, with the doors locked, until dawn. Mara knocks on the window. She’s already pregnant, her stomach swollen. I crack the window.

“I want you to know that you can go.” She whispers, as if the others are close behind. “If you want.” She lowers her head, strokes her belly. “Or, you could stay.” She beams at me—beatific.

“Mara, I don’t think you know what you’re getting into.” I shake my head, knowing she’s already gone. She’s someone else. She’s the matriarch.

“We could do this together, Sage. It could be beautiful.” She begs, trying to fit her fingers through the crack in the window.

“I can’t. I didn’t want to. I don’t want to now.” My voice is rougher than I wanted it to be. She withdraws her hand. Steps back from the car.

“Alright. Well, I’ll miss you.” She shrugs.

“I’ll miss you too.” I mutter, starting the engine.

“Are you happy for me?” She asks, and for a second I see who she used to be—my beautiful, kind, perfect wife.

“Yes.” I sigh, and then reverse out of the driveway with blinding speed.