The Earth Creaks

Caitlín Church

The wolf is carnivore incarnate and he’s as cunning as he is          
ferocious; once he’s had a taste of flesh then nothing else will do.
– Angela Carter, “The Company of Wolves”             

But the wolf is small, it comprehends little.                                        
It goes to and fro, trailing its haunches and whimpering horribly.
– Ted Hughes, “The Howling of Wolves”                  

Photo by Tobias Bjorkli

          A wolf’s song is a murdering¹From Angela Carter’s short story “The Company of Wolves.” “The wolfsong is the sound of the rending you will suffer, in itself a murdering.” The Bloody Chamber: And Other Stories. New York: Penguin Books, 1990. wrenching you from sleep. First, one wolf then another. Answering. Listen. Howls—who can say whether of joy or agony²From Ted Hughes’ poem “The Howling of Wolves.” This poem was written not long after the suicide of his wife, Sylvia Plath. “It howls you cannot say whether out of agony or joy.” Wolfwatching. London: Faber and Faber, 1989. —rise and fall, dissolve in mid-air silence.³Ibid. “What are they dragging up and out on their long leashes of sound /That dissolve in the mid-air silence?” In remote villages farther north but not much larger than your own, wolves scouting for meat press their snouts round cottage doors. Girls there know better than to go into the forest alone. Particularly this time of year, when the solstice swings on its hinges,⁴Carter. “The malign door of the solstice still swings upon its hinges…“ stopping the sun dead in the sky, pausing the earth, making animals speak.

          But some villagers go anyway, stepping through the straggly arms of great pines into the shadows. There are riches there: wild mushrooms to pluck from tree bark, blue hares⁵A species of mountain hare that turns blue/white in winter, commonly found in Scandinavia. to trap and bag, sometimes a lone elk—stunned by an unexpected sunray—to shoot and skin. Snow drops. Trees groan. Small animals scuttle in bracken. And amongst the silvery spruce, grey wolves grow thin and cunning from want; they’ll eat what meat they can find, and now you smell of it.

          Children have been warned. Even in summertime they know better than to stray from forest paths in search of cloudberries or fleeting woodland sprites. If they should lose their way in the forest, they might be tricked into the oven of a wicked witch! Squashed beneath the feet of a terrible troll! Or snatched by a demented dwarf! But worse, far worse, mothers gently warn their daughters when tucking them into bed at night, is to be hunted by a varulv.⁶Swedish and Danish word for werewolf. In 1884, John Fulford Vicary wrote in A Danish Parsonage, “It is called the Varulv with us…a man who changes into the form of a wolf…when he wishes to change…he repeats three times, ‘I was,’ ‘I am,’ and immediately his clothes fall off, like a snake changing its skin.”
First recorded in the 16th century by the Catholic priest Olaus Magnus in Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus (History of the Northern Peoples), these werewolves not only drink a lot of beer but willingly barter their souls to rampage, according to Magnus, “with wonderful fierceness” so that “the inhabitants of that Country suffer more hurt from them, than ever they do from true naturall Wolves.” Vicary, John Fulford. A Danish Parsonage. London: Kegan Paul, Trench & Company, 1884. Lights are low, curtains drawn, bedclothes pulled taut around tiny bodies. Outside, a frigid wind presses itself up against the windowpanes, as if listening. A wolf that is not what he seems; a beast that is hairy on the inside.⁷Carter: “…she knew the worst wolves are hairy on the inside and she shivered…” Girls’ eyes widen, they try to envision what such a creature might look like but cannot.

          Some say there’s sorrow in a wolf’s howl. A profound melancholy,⁸Ibid. “There is a vast melancholy in the canticles of the wolves.” as though the creature wishes to be other than he is. Once you’ve heard it, it is difficult to un-hear. Wise women advise against such tenderness of affection; you must, they say, steel your heart against it. For nowhere in that wanton wavering is the prospect of redemption.⁹Ibid. “…for not one phrase in it hints at the possibility of redemption…”

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          It is midwinter, snowing, and almost midnight when you arrive at the isolated cottage where your husband is living alone, recuperating from both vague and specific maladies including a dizzy feeling, a sore and blistering foreskin, an unsteady heart. Often he is in pain and doctors don’t know what the trouble is. You’ve come to care for him, to bandage his sores, monitor his sleep apnea, and temper his drinking. Storm-winds buffet your car. On your passenger seat is a jute bag packed with cheeses, rosemary-baked bread rolls, black tea and jammy biscuits. He is not expecting you so he hasn’t left a light on. You wrap your coat in a thick wool shawl and pull it up over your head. You know it is unwise to be out so late this time of year, but you are strong-minded, afraid of nothing. You step out of the car and darkness swallows you.

          Outside, the wind is cruel, bitter as hemlock, cold as death. You can hear it howling far off, then rushing up the laneway. You want to run but can’t; the path to the cottage is hidden deep beneath freshly fallen snow. With each step forward your tall boots sink into it. Overhead, edging the roof of the little house, are icicles long and sharp like teeth. When you reach the threshold you duck under them and push in through the unlocked door, bringing with you a flurry of snowflakes that drop like tears onto the floor.¹⁰Ibid. “So she came in, bringing with her a flurry of snow that melted in tears on the tiles…”

          Inside it’s warm. Quiet. Light from a fire illuminates the room. On the stove, remnants of a dismembered chicken congeal in a roasting pan. Plates and glasses, two of each, are piled in the sink. Your husband has had company, someone from work probably. You’re pleased; he’s a social animal, craves the company of others, and you wish he had more friends. An empty wine bottle has slipped off the counter and rolled across the floor. You pick it up and put it back. Over by the fire he’s asleep on the old couch, belly exposed, fingers curled like a baby’s, big legs twitching fitfully, as if in flight. He does not wake when you bend to kiss him.

          For twenty years you have done this, bent to kiss your husband while he was sleeping. Regretting any harsh words that may have passed between you. You’d been quarrelling of late, about his work, about the children, about money. Sometimes you berate yourself; why do you insist on arguing with him? Not a day goes by when he does not tell you he loves you. Unexpectedly, he brings you treats: flowers, chocolates, your favorite pastry. God knows he’s more patient with the children than you are. He works hard, too, employs hundreds of people, has even been the subject of television programs and magazine pieces. And everyone—your family, your friends, his clients, his staff, even strangers—everyone adores him. So always you have taken his word that soon (soon!) you’d no longer have to worry about the heating bill ($465!) and all the rest of it. But years have passed, decades in fact, and you’re exhausted. The creditors must be paid, the children dressed for school, the roof repaired, and you’re not sure which of you is right anymore.

          In the firelight, you can see that he looks exhausted too. When was the last time you really looked at him? Look. His soft dark curls have turned grey. His shoulders are broad though; his big arms, strong; his aging body, still muscular, agile. But there are long pauses between his breaths (rank with meat and wine and tobacco) and a long time when there is no breathing at all. You retrieve the airway pressure machine from the bedroom and plug it in. He groans when you lift his head and fit the rubber mask over his mouth, but he doesn’t wake up. You cover him with a blanket, take off your shawl, your coat, and drape them near the fire to dry. Then unpack the bread and biscuits and tea, put the cheeses in the fridge, clean up the kitchen, and go to bed.

          Winter winds slip easily through the cottage’s thin walls. Rustling the curtains, tugging at the door handle, nosing under the bed, blowing snowflakes across the floor. You sleep fitfully, dreaming of a garden where you toil, on your knees, pulling weeds that grow right back again. Not since autumn have you had a good night’s rest. Not since the night your cell phone rang, and rang, and rang, and suddenly you were awake, groping in the darkness, heart pounding–Hello? Hello? Crackling. Hello? Then down the line, a voice. It’s me, he said. Don’t worry, he said. I’m okay, he said. Why would your husband be calling this late if he were okay, if you shouldn’t worry? Then, in a rush, he was telling you what had happened. On his way home from work in a different state he’d been arrested. Driving Under the Influence. He’d failed the sobriety tests. He couldn’t walk heel to toe in a straight line, couldn’t stand on one leg, couldn’t steady himself getting into and out of the police car. He denied he’d been drinking. I’m just tired, he said. My medications make me drowsy, he said. No one will listen, he said. You listened. It would cost $5,000 cash to get him released. (Not in twenty years of marriage had you had that kind of money to spare). His voice was unusually animated. He repeated himself. He slurred his words. At least two gin and tonics you thought, listening carefully. Probably three. You don’t believe him. You know I can hear you…right? It was the first thing you’d said since hello. Your husband went quiet. Then hung up. All night long you’d called the jail, every hour, checking that he was okay without his medications. By seven o’clock the next morning you’d borrowed bail money and driven to the courthouse. His hearing was quick; the judge didn’t believe him either. A tracking device was secured around his ankle before they set him free. But he couldn’t come home with you; he had to remain here, in this state, until his case was heard. So you’d borrowed more money and rented the summer cottage where tonight you sleep fitfully.

          In the morning, while making the bed, a glittery onyx earring, trapped in the sheets, impales itself in your palm. You sit down on the edge of the bed and brush a strand of hair from your forehead. The earring is small and sharp. Not yours. When you dislodge it, a pinprick of bright red blood rises from where you’ve been stabbed. You bring your palm to your lips then wonder for a moment if the tip has been poisoned, like a fairytale spindle. In another room, there is a clattering and the smell of coffee; your husband is awake.

          On your way to the kitchen you pass an open laptop, its screen flashing with images of your family. There you are on vacation, your arms draped around each other, tropical cocktails in hand, grinning; there are your two sons, when they were small and silly, wearing matching footy pajamas; and there are all four of you, dressed uncomfortably, standing in front of your parents’ Christmas tree. The same pose year after year, your sons growing taller and taller in each photo until you are small and insignificant beside them. A breath on the back of your neck startles you. Morning! Your husband says, wrapping his big arms around your waist and pulling your hips against him. Coffee or tea? He rests his chin on your shoulder and watches the slideshow too. The coffee smells good, strong; you hope it’ll clear your mind. Coffee, please, you say. Then stand waiting for the hug to end. When it doesn’t, you gently unravel yourself. In your hand you clasp the earring.

          For years your husband has taken this computer with him everywhere. He leaves it open for co-workers and customers to admire your flickering family. Women coo and men are impressed; all he ever talks about is you, they say when you’re eventually introduced. You act blasé. But secretly you are chuffed—proud of him and proud of yourself for choosing him. Must be nice, a bitter woman once said in an aside to you, a good man is hard to find. You smiled, nonplussed, then shared silly anecdotes about how difficult your husband was to live with. He snores, he spills coffee on everything, he thinks owning a Jeep means never having to shovel snow in the driveway again. Everyone laughed and you turned back to your husband whose big blue eyes were on you, whose hand was reaching for yours. It must be true, you’d thought, you are lucky; a good man is hard to find.

          Outside, the morning is unexpectedly beautiful, a vast blue sky. No clouds. Only a small cold sun glinting off the snow, making everything—the hills, the trees, the icicle-trimmed house—sparkle. You sit together at the kitchen table discussing how best to mount his legal defense: researching laws, e-mailing doctors and lawyers, making notes. But it’s difficult to concentrate. Your husband’s cell phone dings relentlessly. He taps at the screen, sometimes frowning, sometimes laughing. Just work, he says, getting up to make fresh coffee. He pours some into your favorite mug and passes it to you, slides the sugar bowl closer so you can reach it. Then takes his coffee outside to smoke a cigarette and text some more. Through the frosted kitchen window you can see him leaning on the back deck railing, cigarette dangling from his lips, smiling at his phone, steam rising up from his cup, high and white and swirling; dancing, like vapor. Occasionally he stops texting and glances up, as though he might have heard something: a baby crying, a violin being tuned?¹¹Hughes. “Then crying of a baby, in this forest of starving silences/Brings the wolves running. Tuning of a violin…” You watch; the cold doesn’t seem to bother him—he’s invigorated.

          All day, time has been sliding off kilter, slowed almost to a stop—the way it did that day the towers fell. Only now, in the eerie stillness, you find clarity. With the gentle clink of precision gears clicking into place, stray images begin to make sense. Glimpses of interactions you’d wondered about but ignored: whispered exchanges; silly work nicknames; regular customers; men and women, who, without saying a word, made it clear you were intruding. Stray laundry that did not belong to anyone in your family: a petite woman’s t-shirt, a small pink sock. Scene after scene playing on a loop in your mind, like a repeat matinee of a film you hadn’t understood the first time. The sun slips lower in the sky. When you get up from the table, you’re bewildered by how difficult it is to walk; your feet will not settle where you place them, your limbs are too loose, floating. You move slowly, carefully, as if advancing through chest-deep water (hoping he doesn’t notice). You know what the earring means.

          Night stretches out and a great howling wind rises with the moon. The little cottage trembles. In the living room, your husband has lit the fire. He opens a bottle of wine, pours you a glass. You sit tucked into a corner of the couch, wrapped in your shawl, clutching the needle-sharp earring in your hand. You’re awfully quiet, he says, coming from behind and resting large hands tenderly on your shoulders. Someone might want this back, you say, handing it to him. His eyes grow big. He takes the earring in one hand and dishevels his grey hair with the other. In the starving silence¹²Ibid. “in this forest of starving silences. . .” you wait.

          One of the first secrets your husband ever told you about himself was that he’d seen the Virgin Mary. A Marian apparition the Catholic Church calls it, a supernatural appearance of the Mother of God to a faithful person. He’d been three or four years old at the time. There’d been witnesses to his vision. The child, they’d said, was blessed. From then on you called him Saint. Weeks or months later, he’d told you that he’d seen ghosts and a banshee too, a longhaired hag, keening outside his bedroom window when he was ten, portending the imminent death of his father. His tales intrigued you. You were enamored by this handsome youth—so stylish, so amusing—captivated by his gentle voice and beguiling eyes. Fascinated by his ability to move easily between mystical worlds. You may have been a little bit frightened too. Then, knowing that fear would do you no good, you ceased to be afraid¹³Carter. “…since her fear did her no good, she ceased to be afraid.” and freely gave in to desire . . .. Tossing off your clothes. Laughing. Lying naked in his gentle arms. Resting your head on his hairy chest. Listening to his steady heartbeat. Nuzzling his warm neck. Inhaling his woodsy scent.

          But tonight you do not desire him. He is lying. Trying to gauge what you know and don’t know about his duplicity. She is not the first, this woman whose earring is now safe in his pocket. He has been ravenous. There have been so many lovers over the years it is difficult for him to keep them straight. Some who’d worked for him. Others he’d met online, met in person, or paid for. People you’d even met, knew, been introduced to.

          The room is a haze of blue cigarette smoke. You take the last one from his pack, light it and inhale; you’d forgotten how good it feels to smoke. You can barely look at him. When you do, you no longer see his beautiful face, his sweet shy smile, his forget-me-not blue eyes. You see only hunched shoulders, hairy arms, and ghost-grey tufts¹⁴Vicary. “…a man who changes into a wolf and is known by a tuft of hair between the shoulders.” sticking up around his big ears. The timbre of his voice, which once lifted your spirits, resonates deep in your bones, rattling them like a dissonant chord. It hurts. It hurts. It hurts. I’m sorry, he says. You don’t believe him; he is relieved, you can tell. You wish he would just. Stop. Talking.

          Your husband wears two wedding rings, one on each hand. One silver and one gold. One for each time you’d gotten married. The first time, by a justice of the peace in a pine-scented hemlock grove, and the second time, a year later, in the tiny ornate church where he’d been baptized. For the church wedding, you wore a princess tiara with a long lace veil, and he a dapper linen suit with two-tone brogues, his untamed curls tied back with a black silk ribbon. He was, you thought, the finest person you’d ever met: brave, polite, clever, and unassuming. There was no one you revered more than him. So you’d knelt on red velvet cushions, under a gilt dome, in front of family and friends, with heads bowed, waiting for God’s blessing. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Twice promised. Twice betrothed.

          You feel like you are going to be sick, and then you are. When you come back into the room, all you can smell is the overpowering scent of his body. No longer woodsy, but pungent, sour, rotting. He reaches out to touch your hand and you recoil; his palm is large and thick and padded with calluses. Your reaction irritates him. Something in his posture subtly shifts. I’m tired of deception, he says. He stands, stretches, and moves through the room with unusual grace in search of more cigarettes. When he returns, he lights another cigarette. Exhales. He’s on the offensive. Now when he fixes his eyes upon you they are huge! Ah, huge! Phosphorescent. Glowing with Greek fire.¹⁵Carter. “…his eyes were fixed upon her – huge eyes that now seemed to shine with a unique, interior light, eyes the size of saucers, saucers full of Greek fire, diabolic phosphorescence.” What did you expect? He growls.

          When you were a little girl your bed was so high that you had to crawl up onto it, like the princess in the story of the pea, and when no one was looking, you’d tucked small things like a marble, a sea shell, a doll’s shoe, under the mattress. Because if you could feel it when you climbed into bed that night, maybe you were a princess too! On lonely afternoons, you’d pulled the flouncy chiffon coverlet off the bed, wrapped the scratchy polyester around yourself and posed in the mirror pretending it was a ball gown, something the mice might have sewn for Cinderella. At bedtime, you’d sat propped up on your pink pillow listening while your mother read fairytales to you. And you’d believed it all, even Snow White’s startling innocence, The Beast’s frightening anger, Mr. Fox’s smooth-tongued deceit. You’d understood they were just stories, of course you did. But your heart told you they were true. You also came to understand that things were not always what they seemed. A beast might be tender, a thief might be generous, and a wish might be a curse. But you promised yourself that you would try (and fail) to be gentle like Snow White, brave like Belle, and bold like Lady Mary. Not too bold though! Not so bold your heart’s blood would run cold because you knew you’d need a warm heart so you could fall in love with a good, kind prince. Because—you’d believed—love was everything.

          What did you expect? His question steals the breath from your body. It’s as though you’ve fallen from a great height; slipped from the wide arms of the maple in your parents’ backyard where you’d been climbing to survey your world from on high. From there you could see your family’s little yellow house, your mother’s vegetable garden, the flowering crabapple tree. You’ve lost your footing and tumbled down through layers of translucent green. Hitting the ground hard. Knocking the wind out of you. You cannot breathe and you’re not in your backyard. You don’t know how or when, but you must have wandered into the shadowy woods in search of something; what was it? Never mind. You’re lost. Lost. Lost. Alone in this gloomy place and you know that you should not be here. Especially this time of year, mid-winter, when the sun barely peaks above the horizon and the night treads heavily.¹⁶From the song Swedish children sing on Lucia Day, the longest night of the year. When they dress in white and wear candles on their heads to dispel the darkness, like the mythical saint. When the malevolent door of the solstice stands wide open and all sorts of mystical creatures slink through.¹⁷Ibid. “…the door of the solstice stands wide open; let them all sink through.” All around you the woods are alive. Is that a scurrying amongst last year’s bracken? And that, the whoosh of a sharp-eyed owl descending—its feathers a breeze brushing your cheek—putting an end to it? In the dark and the cold, the forest holds its breath. Overhead, great pines, weighted with snow, groan and sway, or is it the house? The motion is making you nauseous. You stand, brush yourself off, and shivering, teeth chattering, will yourself onward. Be brave! Be bold! There must be a way back. Then, in the darkness, a shadow is looking at you, eyes glowing an unnatural green.¹⁸Ibid. “…if a wolf’s eyes reflect only moonlight, then they gleam a cold and unnatural green…”

          You’d been warned. Your mother and grandmothers taught you well; the forest is a dangerous place where there are two types of wolves—those that are what they seem, and those that are not. Never would you be fooled by a varulv’s silvery fur, his pet-like ways, his eyes that look, in certain light, almost human, almost as though he could love you. Should you see a beast sheltering in evergreen boughs to cloak his devilry, you knew to back away. Be afraid! Run! For there was nothing in the forest—nothing!—as unreasonable as a varulv, a creature not cursed by witches, nor bitten by a beast, not conceived under a full moon, nor born with the genitals of a wolf. Rather, a man who willingly barters his soul to be capable of transforming. You’d heard it whispered that even the noblest run amongst them, men of faith and men of God. This you had not believed.

          Your head hurts. In the cavernous silences, when there is nothing left to say, you can hear icy branches tapping at a windowpane in another room. Tap. Tap. Tap. You squeeze your eyes shut, but still, with your eyes closed, you can see your husband, sitting on his haunches, stoking the fire. He is slavering. His soft pink lips, turning black, stretch into a narrow grimace of bone-white pointed teeth. His pale, pale skin is peeling back from his chin. His cheeks. His forehead. It curls away in thick velum sheets, like gruesome wallpaper, from his neck, his chest, his shoulders, arms and back. And underneath, not fur. But sinewy red muscles and maggot-white tendons no longer disguised by flesh. Finally you understand; this is what a wolf that is hairy on the inside looks like.

          He cannot help it, he is panting. Pacing. His paws thump, claws clicking on the floor. You wonder if you should run, make a mad dash through snow and wind and dark, jump into your car and drive away. But disbelief has struck you stock-still and you cannot move. You keep your head down, your eyes averted. Then, without warning, it feels as though his hairy hand is plunging deep into your chest, seizing your heart, and plucking it loose. What he said echoes your mind: what did you expect? Your pain is beyond comprehension. In the cavity that once held your heart a black hole is opening. How are you still alive? You imagine your husband admiring his catch, your warm heart, thrumming in his big hand. You want to look but cannot. So you listen, stunned, while he devours your organ. When he is finished, does he delicately wipe his chin where traces of red—“the color of sacrifices, the color of menses”¹⁹Ibid. “…took off her scarlet shawl, the colour of poppies, the colour of sacrifices, the colour of her menses…” —remain? My God, how has it come about that we live like this?²⁰Hughes. “The eyes that never learn how it has come about/That they must live like this.”

          When you can move, you do. Outside, in a bright night of moon and snow, the wind is unraveling. Howling in demented gusts. Circling. Sweeping through. Stealing the hood from your head. You feel neither the cold nipping at your scarlet cheeks, nor strands of hair lashing your face. Snow has made a pillow of a nearby ridge. You are surprised how warm you feel lying against it, curled beneath the wind, cradled by freshly fallen snow. All around you the wind sounds like a multitude of wolves. Their sharp snouts pointed toward the moon, wailing as if their hearts would break.²¹Carter. “…pointing their sharp snouts to the moon and howling as if their hearts would break.” Brothers come to keep him company?²²Ibid. “Those are the voices of my brothers, darling; I love the company of wolves.” What are they dragging up and out on their long leashes of sound?²³Hughes. “What are they dragging up and out on their long leashes of sound” You wonder, wanting nothing more than to stay here until your pulse slows, until your limbs freeze, until you lie peacefully buried beneath a soft blanket of white. Far above, the night is snowing stars. Below, the earth creaks.²⁴The title of this essay is drawn from Hughes’ poem, “The night snows stars and the earth creaks”. Listen.