Awful People Supporter

The voice is so quiet, and the words trail off into the hush of the beach. Soon, it becomes like they were never spoken at all. Did I dream it? Jabber wonders, working his inner jaws. 

He watches on, rapt. 

The man never sits on the beach at night. His home is further inland, and usually he becomes so tired from whatever he does in the day that he goes to it as soon as the sun falls. Men go out in the day and rest at night. It’s different from Jabber, who rests in the day and goes out at night. But lately he has been coming and going at odd times, since he wants to see the man, who, like all men, is never doing anything at the proper time. 

Except for tonight. Night is the right time to sit and watch, to be away from home. The sun is not so bright, and the air is not so hot. The sun and the air have made the man all brown on the outside. When he came here, he was pale, but now he isn’t. Jabber wonders if he himself can change colors like that. Does it hurt? He hopes so. 

The man is sitting on the sand, facing the water, with his two legs crossed in that strange, painful-looking configuration that makes them all wide on the ground, the knees bent and resting above the feet. From behind the rock, Jabber can see mostly his back and part of his side. The dim moon shines on the edge of his face. He has not brought any fire with him. But he has brought something: a stick. 

It’s longer than the man is tall and forked at the top. Parts of it are wrapped in white strips of cloth, made from the man’s ruined shirt. Jabber watched him tear them with his hands and a sharp rock. He is doing something with the stick. There is a little earthen pot next to the man’s legs, and he is dipping his fingers into it and smearing the glistening stuff inside along the length of the stick. What is it? Jabber wants to know. Many days ago, he saw the man catch a land animal and burn its corpse over the fire. Jabber likes burned meat, especially of land creatures; it tastes better than the raw stuff. So he snuck up to take some. But before he could find a good part to steal, the man came back. He had another pot with him, like the one he has now, but wider and flatter and without a top, which Jabber watched him make from the earth. He put the pot beneath the corpse on the fire, and all the water that dripped from the corpse as it burned fell into the pot. But then, once the fire was out, the stuff inside of the pot turned white! Water doesn’t turn white, so it must not have been water dripping from the corpse, after all. 

After the man finished collecting the white stuff, he burned it some more in the pot, and then he poured it through some dry grasses into another earth pot that was thinner but taller than the first one. This is the pot he has now. And now he is taking it out of the pot and putting it on the stick. 

What is in the pot? Why does it go on the stick? What is the stick, and why does the man want it? These are the things that Jabber wants to know. Now that he knows the man can talk, he wants to go up and ask. But he knows he scares men, especially when he talks. They don’t like his teeth. So, if he wants to talk to the man, he needs to catch him first. That way, he won’t be able to run away before he answers Jabber’s questions. 

“I went divin’ in the reef,” says the man. 

Jabber gasps again. His fingers tighten on the rock. 

He remembers this. It was during the day. Jabber was in his home, resting, and then from above he heard an almighty crash. When he looked up, the man was in the water. 

This frightened Jabber, because men can’t stay in water. They can’t breathe it, and they will drown. And the man had gone very deep into the water, deeper than Jabber had ever seen men go. The current swept his hair from his face, the long top part with the color like sand, and his eyes were open wide, and Jabber saw, for the first time, their color: blue like the sea from above. The man did not see Jabber, who was hidden. He dived down to the bottom of the reef and touched the sand there. He had a different stick with him. This one was sharp, with one wicked tip that had a notch in it that faced backwards. Jabber watched him use it to catch a big fish. Once he had it, he swam back to the surface. He didn’t struggle, and he didn’t die. 

Jabber was relieved. If the man had died, that would have ruined all of his plans. So, if the man had started to struggle in the water, he would have swam out and lifted him up to the surface before his lungs could pop. But Jabber didn’t want to have to do that, because… it isn’t time to approach the man yet. He’s still waiting. 

“The water’s so clear,” says the man. “I could see everything.” His hoarse voice sends shivers up Jabber’s spine. “I didn’t want to close my eyes for a second. It was incredible.” 

Jabber remembers when he couldn’t close his eyes. That was before he had the part of his body that is like a man’s. He didn’t see everything back then. Even though his eyes were never closed, he still didn’t have to look at things if he didn’t want to. 

“There were so many colors,” says the man. “So many shapes of things, all the different fish and corals… stuff I can’t even name. All movin’ around me. Like a whole ‘nother world.” 

Jabber’s breath catches. 

“I found myself wantin’ to stay there,” says the man. “I wanted to see it. I wanted to understand. I wanted to belong there, with the fish ‘n’ things. It looked wonderful.” 

Yes, thinks Jabber. Yes, yes, yes. 

“But I couldn’t,” says the man. “‘Cause I didn’t belong.”

No.

“The ocean doesn’t want me,” says the man. “I wasn’t made for it.” 

No. You are clumsy in the water, and you can’t breathe. You would die. 

The man holds the stick in his lap and sighs. 

“Imagine if men could become more than they are,” he says. 

Jabber’s heart is pumping. He crosses his arms on the rock and lays his head down on the crook of his elbow and watches. 

Stuff I can’t even name. All movin’ around me. Like a whole ‘nother world. 

The docks at midday. Voices, shouting. Men packed tighter than schools of fish, all different types and sizes. Wearing their clothes of all different colors, passing their strange things back and forth. 

I was there, thinks Jabber. I saw it. I saw the men, I saw their things. I stood on the land and they moved all around me. I touched the cloth. I ate the burned meat. I saw the symbols that make the sounds that make meaning. Like a whole ‘nother world. 

But they chased him off before he could understand it, with their guns and sharp sticks and cruel metal things, because he, too, didn’t belong. 

Now he looks at the man, and his heart beats in his chest like the impact of rocks falling, one after another. And he whispers into the wind, 

“You… know… how… I… feel.”