She was a welcome addition as far as we were concerned, but I was afraid that she’d be disappointed since she’d left so much behind. Like all of us, Elizabeth lost her family, so we all felt that with her. But she was in the middle of being educated and had been in a serious relationship when she joined us. She said no man was better than having all this time to see the world. I wanted her to like me, so I didn’t bother disagreeing.
She was absolutely sure of herself, carefree. Miaka was jubilant to have such a welcoming younger sister. We were so excited by her fresh enthusiasm, we even invited Aisling to come stay with us. She said that she would rather chew sand, asked the Ocean if she could leave, and disappeared without a goodbye.
“She needs to get laid,” Elizabeth said after Aisling left. Miaka and I looked at one another with shocked eyes and blushed. We came from an era when things like that just weren’t said. But then we both laughed at the probable truth and great impossibility behind that statement.
Elizabeth was a sign of the changing times. What I had suspected as an observer in this era was made real through the living example of our newest sister. We were glad to have a better view of the world through her eyes.
Miaka and I peppered Elizabeth with questions. She was the first woman in her family to go to college. She was looking at twenty different majors when she came into our sisterhood. She hoped this time would give her more clarity, make her focus on what she truly loved. But before she worried about any of that, she wanted to live it up. I could tell she was going to have silence issues. Elizabeth was American like me. Our common unity of the English language would make note passing easier.
Elizabeth had experimented with certain substances in college and said it was something she was going to miss since those kinds of things had no real effect on us. Beer, too; she would miss beer. I was shocked. Prohibition had been in effect when I was a teen. To see someone enjoying these things and not meeting her doom made it all seem like a silly waste of efforts.
Her family had ignored her somewhat and gave preference to her three older brothers. This seemed to be a common theme in our sisterhood: the lone daughters, either prized or ignored. She was an unexpected addition to her family, and it appeared that they ran out of steam as she grew. But this lack of attention drove her towards success. She had been hell-bent to prove to them that she could be just as successful as any boy, her brothers in particular. Elizabeth was bothered that they wouldn’t see her do it, but she was sure that time would make her flourish in anything she truly committed herself to.
“In the end,” she said, “who cares if I have an audience?”
I asked her questions about small details, wanting her to hold onto to her old life long enough to share her incredible yet common stories with us. She liked to shock people. She had already caught Miaka and me off guard a dozen times our first day together. But she would do things like spell out dirty words in a game of Scrabble with her mother and all her old friends. Really, anything to raise an eyebrow was her idea of a good time.
“I don’t understand. What’s a scrabble?” Miaka asked.
I was drawn to Elizabeth’s openness. She was blunt and funny and warm. I also envied her for her ease at relating to men. To put it delicately, she had already been with a man. A few. And she was my age! How times had changed. I wanted to ask her a thousand questions about that, but the lady I was raised to be won out in that round. Maybe down the road I could ask her, if I could ever reach half the boldness she had. There was no denying we had the time.
Miaka showed Elizabeth the ins and outs of our life, and I was free to sit back and enjoy them. Since there were three of us, I could easily disappear to be with the Ocean without them feeling neglected. It was the beginning of a new time for us. I added all the time up in my head. I had spent thirty-two years bitter, wondering if I had made the wrong decision. I’d spent nearly a year alone wallowing in my sadness and anger with the Ocean and myself. I’d spent another year truly being introduced to the Sea. And I’d spent the last eleven years peacefully existing, communing with my sisters and the Ocean. Forty-five years in all. Plus the nineteen before that. That’s a lot of life, but I was not prepared for this new era.
One of the most shocking changes was the response to our times of service. I was never sure how Aisling felt. I assumed she wasn’t bothered based on her coldness. Miaka had gotten a little better with it as the years passed but was always a little down afterwards. But Elizabeth was tough in a serious way. She wasn’t daunted by the actual act of taking lives. It’s not that she prided herself in being cruel, but she was… I don’t know, desensitized. It just didn’t faze her. Elizabeth’s personality was so influential that Miaka followed suit and began to take the whole process with a grain of salt. I was alone in my ache. The Ocean understood this part of my nature and always gave me warning, and afterwards, I would have to be alone, away from the unnatural calm of Elizabeth and Miaka.
I didn’t begrudge them this. If they could find peace in this life, I was happy for them. But I just couldn’t do that. It hurt me, cut me to the core every time. Aisling had her solitude, and Marilyn used to have her glass of wine. Miaka used to paint, and now she and Elizabeth would just watch a movie if they could or do nothing special at all. I just took it differently. So for a few days, I would retreat into my mind and build myself a world where things just didn’t have to be the way they were. I tried to keep these thoughts away from the Ocean; I didn’t want to offend Her. And, for fear of seeming weak to my sisters, I didn’t tell Miaka or Elizabeth.
After one of our times of service, I left for a few days to be on my island. The Ocean was always very giving with me, not bothered by how hard it was for me to talk to Her right after those moments. A few years after She gave me the island, She gave me a present to go along with it. Someone had either lost or thrown away a hammock, and She had found it. When it washed up on shore I bounced around like a child; I was so happy. There was a set of trees on the western coast of the island that was just perfect for it. When I arrived this time, that was the section of shore I went for.
It was late afternoon, so I just climbed into the hammock still wearing my heavy dress, and watched the sun fall away. Normal eyes can’t stare at the sun without going blind, but mine could. It was brilliant, and its radiance was a comfort to me. It mesmerized me, sinking lower and lower, until it disappeared behind the Ocean’s wide back. I was asleep immediately.
I don’t know what took my mind there, but I dreamed of the day when I became a siren myself. So many of the details are gone. Our memories are like faulty cameras, and we can never be sure if the image we’re trying to capture is actually clear at the time. But the murky moments of my humanity focused into perfect clarity, and those final seconds assaulted my mind…
The ship steering sharply, away from the sunshine and into the distant gray. Lying on the floor, trying not to get sick from the storm. In our life vests on the deck, covering my ears from the screaming. Grown men jumping off the boat, ready to die. A wall of water so huge there was no point in running, and nowhere to run to anyway.
Take a deep breath, Kahlen. Hold on tight.
Ripped from my lifejacket under the water. An unknown body hitting my legs. I was dying. I was losing my family. I was losing everything.
My eyes snapped open to the dark of the island, a light drizzle was falling over me. Though it was warm, I was convinced I was still drowning. I screamed.
Her voice came to me off the breakers, caressing my shaking body. She heard me, of course. The rain. I was sobbing, my body jerking with gasps. I stumbled out of my hammock and towards the shore. I sat down in the edge of the surf.
I had a nightmare. I’m fine.
If She was paying attention, She might have seen the source of my tears. But either way, She let me have my privacy. The memory brought up all the reasons I had to be angry with Her, but I had decided to let that go. Every person dies. Every
soul passes through the gate. I brushed it away.
A week later I returned to my sisters.
I couldn’t stay sad with Elizabeth around. She opened herself to us immediately. She was just casually comical. After our first day together, we decided we’d have to live somewhere very remote. Elizabeth was full of one-liners that caused Miaka and me to unexpectedly erupt with laughter. We couldn’t contain it, so we stayed away from the ears that those moments would harm.
She was just silly. When we were hunting for clothes, Elizabeth would intentionally make the most bizarre pairings— rain slickers with shorts, a too-small bra, and a beret— and then lounge around the house like that for days. In places big enough for it, she would organize epic games of hide and seek or tag. They may have only been children’s games, but they were endlessly entertaining for us.
I knew that Miaka, in all her grace, had been chosen as a companion for me. Sometimes, I wondered if Elizabeth was a gift for me, too— if the Ocean knew I needed a constant comedian in my life. When that thought struck me, I decided to let myself be up for most anything Elizabeth suggested. Besides, she was my sister, and she was like no one else, and I loved her.
Over the next twenty-four years, we had enough adventures to fill the lives of fifty people. With the exception of our days of singing, we became the happiest drifters in the world.
We ran with the bulls in Spain not once, not twice, but three times. It was easy enough given our talents. It also helped that it was impossible to break a bone. Afterwards men would buy us drinks to toast our bravery. I tried to get away from these attentions, but Elizabeth was a magnet for “dangerous” men. It really wasn’t an issue; we could hurt them beyond anything they could dream of doing to us. So on these three occasions, and several others, we ended up in bars. The men would try to talk to us, but we would just shake our heads and pretend we couldn’t understand a thing they said.
The most recent time, one guy tried to drug us. That didn’t work, of course, but it pissed Elizabeth off enough to “get drunk” and “accidentally” drive his car into a pole, which she easily walked away from. But it landed him in the hospital with two broken ribs. She did all this in such a way that there was nothing out of the ordinary about it. So the Ocean wasn’t even bothered when She heard that story. In fact, She was amused. She was glad we could defend ourselves. Elizabeth was clever. I never would have tried that out on my own.
That was the first time I was aware that maybe there were ways around the rules.
We rode elephants across the desert in Africa. The heat would have been unbearable in our weaker skin, but this new one made it easy. I later thanked the Ocean for this temporary body because I had seen the most beautiful sunrise and knew I would have missed it if She hadn’t chosen me. She was flattered by my gratitude.
The land itself was barren and parched, but still so beautiful. I was amazed at how little water this place needed to survive; it was heightened by the fact that I was usually at home in an abundance of water. Even here, She stretched out and provided. One day, I realized that this dry land was still dependent upon Her, and that by serving Her faithfully, this beauty existed. Usually the world we saw seemed so over indulgent, but this place found joy in its minimalism. My job was a somber one, but if this could be here because of it, I could find satisfaction in that.
We walked the Great Wall of China. This was a particularly exciting thing for us because it was so old. It seemed like it should have crumbled to bits long ago, but it was well-crafted and well-kept and it lived on and on— just like us. We admired it. It rolled with the land and was strangely beautiful, like poetry made out of stone. I thought of the resources and the hands that it took to create this beauty. We took our steps slowly, savoring the labor that held it up.
We went to dozens of weddings. When we saw a hint that one was happening, we’d hide out and start counting guests. If the number went over a hundred and fifty people, we’d scrounge up a dress and go. With that many people it was easy to get lost, and if we timed it right, we’d be able to sit away from most of the guests. We’d stick to ourselves and stand in the back at the receptions. Without meaning to, we would often end up the attracting the photographer. We ended up in tons of pictures. We laughed thinking about what couples would think when they returned from their honeymoon to see pictures of strange girls dancing at their reception, toasting to their happiness, and eating large amounts of their cake.
I wasn’t sure if it would work, but I tried to mentally log things that I enjoyed, like a particular dress or cake. I didn’t know if I would remember any of that for my own wedding one day, but it didn’t hurt to try.
Once, we stole a car! That was the joyride of a lifetime! Elizabeth knew how to drive and taught Miaka and me so we all had a turn behind the wheel. Neither of us dared to drive as fast as Elizabeth did; we didn’t want to wreck it. But Elizabeth was fearless. We’d find an open road, and she practically flew from the concrete. It was so much fun we couldn’t help laughing out loud in the isolation of the cabin. We returned the car to the exact same parking spot the very next day having washed it and filled the tank with gas. It was a beauty, and it remained completely unharmed. If we were wanted women for that crime we never knew. Nobody disappears like we do.
All of these were Elizabeth’s ideas. She was the eternal prankster. She reinvented the life we were living, making us step outside of our comfort zones every other day. Her favorite— something we ended up doing quite often— was streaking. I was so bashful about my body that I only watched the first few times, and I blushed just watching them run. I remembered my days on the island; that was a different kind of naked. It was for my personal freedom; I was no exhibitionist!
Finally, years down the road, Elizabeth and Miaka talked me into it. Still, I refused to go unless it was nighttime and we were alone. The best places for this were on the beach, which made it less frightening. Beaches were the gateway to home for me. And once I did it, I was glad I had. It was the only way of showing off the perfect bodies we were all but forbidden to share. It was hard to do it without giggling out loud, but that made it better. Each time one of our feet hit the water, the Ocean would see us and laugh in our place.
What had evaded me for decades came crashing down in abundance— joy! True happiness. I wasn’t a coward. I had no regrets. I may not have been alive, but I was living. That was all the difference. We lived our lives like children, seeking out the best and simplest of joys.
The best parts of myself came to the surface. I didn’t feel so bound up all the time. I was still sad when I had to sing, but the ache passed, and I was back to life with my sisters within days. And, no matter how crazy it seemed, I indulged in every adventure.
Elizabeth got us into a mansion once... while the owner was home. I don’t know how she did it. I felt like a thief sitting in a house while someone was obviously inside, but I supposed that was unreasonable as we lived in other peoples’ houses all the time. I tried not to let it bother me. She didn’t tell me where she got the stash from, but Elizabeth’s pockets were full of chocolates. So in the giant house, on the king-sized bed, we ate our chocolate and spoke quietly.
“Elizabeth, are you happy?” I whispered to her. Her head was by mine, and Miaka was turned around so her feet were facing upward. It was as if this whole place belonged to us.
“What kind of question is that? Isn’t it obvious I am?”
“What I mean is, how are you so happy? You had a hard time with your family, you lost a lot of things, and every year you have to lure people to their deaths, but you seem to not be bothered by it.”
She rolled her eyes. “Of course I don’t like it. But, you know, you girls weren’t living like I was. I watched a lot of TV. There are bad things happening in the world every day. Worse than what we do. And at least our singing has a purpose. Do you know how cool it is that we regularly help save the world? I tried to be an activist be
fore, and this is the closest I’ve come.”
Miaka sat up to listen closer. Elizabeth continued.
“I don’t like to kill people. But we don’t, She does. You say it all the time. And while it’s seriously heavy, I just can’t let it bring me down. I take suffering in the world seriously. I do. But if I let myself wallow in every bad thing that ever happens… that’s not much of a life, Kahlen. So I don’t worry about being sad. Instead, I spend my time making you two idiots laugh. Miaka makes me think about things and study stuff. And you, you make me feel like I could do the stupidest thing in the world, and you’d still like me how I am.
“Instead of worrying about taking, we should worry about giving. We can’t stop the take. But we can do a hell of a lot about the give.”
It was muddled up and perfectly clear. Elizabeth was complex and simple. Giving was incredibly rewarding. I lay awake that night, listening for maids or other houseguests getting too close to our room. None ever came, so while Miaka and Elizabeth slept away on the plush bed, I stayed up and planned. What could I possibly give?
That was 1990. A conversation that had lasted less than five minutes had given me incredible inspiration.
I wanted to work with children.
I told this to the Ocean who liked the idea, but thought it was too risky. I told her that I wanted to work with hearing-impaired children. I could be close to them without being too much of a hazard. I knew that there would have to be some people around who could hear, but I was used to silence now. It would be safe. I could speak in sign language and teach. Really, I was prepared to do whatever they wanted me to. I had had my years of sulking, my years of peace, and now my years of playing. I wanted to contribute now. It was still hard for me to face everything I stole from humanity, and it was time for me to give back somehow, before I forgot I had a debt to pay. Besides, I lived to love.
She couldn’t argue that. She had her doubts, but, because She favored me above the others, She consented. The Ocean dug within herself and found an identity for me to borrow. My borrowed name would be Katie Landon. I went to libraries and watched instructional videos to learn how to sign. It wasn’t a spoken language so it didn’t just come to me. I practiced with Miaka and Elizabeth who learned some as well— it turned out to be much easier than writing notes in public places. How had we not thought of this earlier?