teeth

Once upon a time, there lived a couple. They lived in a small cottage that overlooked rolling hills. A large mountain towered high in the distance. The woman stared at the mountain every evening as she wiped the dishes with a ratty tea towel, as the stars began their doleful ascent. The couple had a son, he would turn 7 that year. They lived with the man's parents, who were old, arthritic and damp. Like trees, the number of wrinkles that crinkled in their toothy grins corresponded to their ages. 

In age, so they say, a second childhood descends upon people, the resurrection of youth, a second chance. This is a gradual process. It is invisible when observed. Like a toddler outgrowing his clothes, the change is only visible, even palpable, against a timeless constant. The man's parents made pale yellow puddles that sank into the wooden flooring. Tea stains, they said. Odd smells emanated from the small room, a tiny tropical microclimate amidst the perpetual frost outside. The boy, who would turn 7 that year, enjoyed constructing quilt mountains, propped up by his grandfather's speckled legs. His grandmother scratched his smooth back in circles, undulations, waves. The gentle sea on his back, a silent, soft lullaby. He slept soundly in this humid cave. The years in their eyes blinked and twinkled. 

The family wove baskets — five generations of basket weavers, presently. The sixth played at the edge of the woods, tearing up the leaves of grass. Nearby, the couple wove the reeds and straw, with their hands playing the same rhythm that had been handed down like a gene, an heirloom stored in a small gold-plated case. The strips dance against the grain of each other with the sharp clatter and the clack of snapping into position, intermingling like dancers, or lovers feverish and nervous underneath the darkened sky, against floundering and dimming candlelight. That night, the moon glowed faintly behind deep purple clouds.

The couple conspired together: age gives wisdom but takes it away again. The man's parents no longer spoke in the language of coherence, and the gravitas of their words shrank to sounds that blended into the chirping of songbirds. The boy, who would turn 7 that year, listened underneath the layers. If he lay still enough, he thought, he would turn into a fossil just like Grandpa said. Once, in the clearing near the woods, Grandpa found the fossil of an entire dinosaur. It was small, he gestured. It fit into his palm, like a sparrow's speckled egg, only pokey and bony. It slept underneath the rock and dirt for millions, billions, of years bravely all by itself. 

The couple made the largest basket they had ever woven. They padded it with blankets piled upon blankets, as it snowed hard outside. Grey blankets, old quilts and clothes. Gently, lovingly, they scooped up the man's parents and lay them inside. They flopped on the top duvet, slowly sinking into the downy bottom layer. The boy, who would turn 7 that year, planted a small peck on each of their foreheads. Grandma used to do this too, every time she left the house holding a basket in her arm. He was proud that he learnt well. He placed a rattan lid over the basket.

It was still snowing as they pushed the basket up the hill, up the mountain. Their house became a small beige dot on a blanket of white. Pine trees greeted them as they ascended. They left the basket on the peak, and made their way down trudging through ice and snow. At home, as the fireplace blazed, the boy set his gear down and dragged out long pieces of cane. Crudely, he cut along the grain, avoiding the splinters that ricocheted across the room. The couple, with mugs of tea in their hands, wondered what he was constructing. I'm preparing for your basket, he said. It seemed tough, and I need to get started early. In mid-cough, his mother hacked out tea on the floor. It soaked in the stains, forming darkening patches where the steaming liquid splattered. Beneath the starry sky, quilt mountains trembled, and by morning, they would have sunken concave into baskets. Everywhere, blankets of snow formed hollowed-out caves.