The Adventures of Vivian Sharpe, Vegan Superhero
by Marla Rose
Wide Awake! Books
Copyright 2012, Marla Rose
All rights reserved
Smashwords Edition
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Dedicated to true superheroes everywhere.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank John Beske, my husband, for everything. Just everything.
I would like to thank Justice Beske, my son, for inspiring me daily with his kindness, creativity, and unique vision.
I would like to thank everyone who read early drafts of Vivian Sharpe and still encouraged me: Jane Zawadowski, Lisa Joy Rosing and Oryna Hrushetsky-Schiffman.
I would like to thank Rae Sikora for being one of Vivian Sharpe's first champions and for believing in this book and for being just about the best person I know.
I would like to thank Martin Rowe for letting me know how I could do it.
I would like to thank Alexandra Jones for finding what you found and still not thinking that I’m an idiot. Your generosity is so deeply appreciated.
I would like to thank Lorraine Murray for all of her dedicated editing skills and for caring as much as she does. I cannot thank you enough, friend.
I would like to thank my Chicago community of amazing activists and friends. Thank you for all you do.
Last, thank you to every one of you who are working to build a more compassionate world. You give me hope beyond what I can express.
The Bold Awakening
The pig, a male, six-months-old and thus of age, identified as 4716, instinctively locked his legs, but was easily pushed through the chute into the building by the force of the ones behind him. Once there, he was forced into the opening of the building, then farther inside, where he was strapped by two quick, rough hands into metal cuffs that jerked him upside-down with the abruptness of a thunderclap. The sharp clanking of gears, the shrieks and the mechanical buzz of the motor pulsed in his already inflamed ears, and he twisted on the line, his body feeling like it was being pulled from his hooves, the bulk of his weight hanging below, swinging. He was moved down the assembly line, a pig in front of him and a pig behind him, and dozens more in front and behind them, all struggling against the cuffs, all in silhouettes, screaming. Steam rose from the floor and vapors from the stench burned the pig’s eyes. He caught a silhouette of a standing two-legged figure as he swung side-to-side and the pig knew that this meant he was near the end of the line. Though he didn’t know what that meant, it was at once terrifying and came as a small measure of relief.
Fewer than 100 miles away was a town called Center City, and in that town lived a 15-year-old girl named Vivian Sharpe. Vivian was a regular, normal girl, unremarkable by most measures except for the coppery red hair that set her apart. And for the fact that in May of her fifteenth year, she developed powers previously unknown to her overnight.
Vivian lived in the town where she was born, Center City, USA, the capital in the middle of a state that grows a lot of corn and wheat near the middle of the country. It was also frequently described as being “in the middle of nowhere.” Although Center City was not an urban mecca, it did occasionally bustle, usually around Pioneer Days every fall, where one could learn how to make apple cider and cornhusk dolls, and the town was the only thing approaching urbanity for hours in each direction, in that it occasionally had traffic jams, graffiti-sprayed underpasses and random groups of teenagers eating French fries out of cups in the food court of Woodcreek Mall. The town also did have an independent and dingy coffee shop where one could sip espressos (not “expressos”, the proprietor insisted) and read about the Surrealists if he or she were so inclined. Vivian did not set foot into this particular coffee shop until her fifteenth year.
Things were very quiet in this town, which the parents universally professed to love and their children, once they became teenagers at least, usually compensated with an equal measure of loathing. The main excitement Center City generated was due to its status as a state capital. If one were craving a more urban experience, she would have to go four hours away to New Dublin, a city of four million, which was originally little more than a murky wetland and prairie landscape originally settled by Irish laborers. It became a thriving metropolis over the course of a hundred years, though, and first wood, then bricks and finally concrete was stuck over the sticky, sloppy mud of New Dublin, gridding the swampland into streets with imposing skyscrapers. New Dublin was where most of Center City’s high school graduates with ambition wanted to move.
Vivian’s family was more esteemed and well known than most in town, mostly because her mother, Sally Sharpe, owned a popular beauty salon, Look Sharpe! It was considered the only place in Center City for an upscale salon treatment, and anyone who could afford it, from teenage girls who’d been scrupulously saving their babysitting earnings to Governor Driscoll’s wife, had their hair, nails and eyebrows done at Look Sharpe! Mrs. Sharpe prided herself on hiring only the most respected stylists available and kept herself knowledgeable of the latest hair trends in New York, Los Angeles and New Dublin. Sally Sharpe was the first female president of the Center City Merchant Association, and while some considered her a little blunt and aloof, many townspeople also had a lot of admiration for her confidence and style. Sally Sharpe, formerly Wheeler, was raised by a single mother, Alma Wheeler, in Center City, abandoned by her father shortly after her fifth birthday at a time when single parent households were very uncommon, so any lack of personal warmth on her part was usually attributed to that. As she grew up, Sally Sharpe rarely heard her father mentioned, except occasionally through a hushed voice as the teachers whispered at school or people gossiped a few pews behind her at church, but over time, her father receded until he virtually disappeared from the collective memory with everyone’s help. Alma Wheeler worked two jobs and died of a heart attack while mopping at the hospital when her daughter was still in college. Alma instilled in her daughter an independent spirit, one that insisted that if anything important was to get done, the only one she could trust to do it was herself.
Vivian’s father, Roosevelt Sharpe, was a respected state historian, whose work emphasized Center City and its mother county of Good Earth. He wrote heavily footnoted, dry books very few people read (tomes such as And The Earth Turned To Dust: A 19th Century Drought in Good Earth County Told Through Correspondences and From Sod to Wood: Building Materials of a Prairie Town’s Earliest Settlers) and spent a lot of time poring over old documents in the Center City Historical Society, of which he was director. Mr. Sharpe was tall and reedy, favored tweed suits and, for as long as Vivian could remember, had had prematurely silver hair, exploding in wild tufts all over his head like the clichéd absent-minded professor; her mother, a marked contrast with her smooth chestnut hair and manicured nails, had long since given up on trying to tame it.
Rounding out the family was Vivian’s little sister, Millie, who was named after an early Center City settler, Mildred Gooch, a woman famous for the moonshine she made in her bathtub and for the husband who died under strange circumstances, drowned in six inches of Mrs. Gooch’s whiskey in her notorious bathtub. Millie was six years old, nine years younger than Vivian, free-spirited and whimsical where Vivian had a more serious, cautious nature. Vivian was very grateful throughout her life that her father’s obsession with local lore didn’t influence her name, or she might have been named after Miss Hortense Doostrich, a contemporary of Mrs. Gooch, who ran a popular brothel visited by Jesse James and his gang. Instead, she was named after Vivien Leigh, her mother’s favorite actress.
Vivian maintained a 3.7 grade point average with the occasional blip in either direction, had a dozen or so people she considered friends, fewer with whom she was close. She was of medium height with grey eyes and a dimple on her left cheek that she was always rather proud of despite her vague feeling that vanity was wrong.
In her fifteenth year, just a month or two before everything happened, Vivian’s life couldn’t have been more normal. She could usually be found in bed no later than 10 o’clock each evening, reading a book or watching black-and-white episodes of The Twilight Zone or Alfred Hitchcock Presents on the little television across from her bed. Aside from Bobby Hendrickson, her endearingly clumsy paramour of three weeks in the fifth grade with the bucked teeth she adored, Vivian had never had a boyfriend, but that only fueled her naïvely romantic spirit. She liked to read about Sir Lancelot, imagining herself as Guinevere, and, when she wasn’t doing her schoolwork or helping care for her sister, Vivian wanted nothing more than to just lock herself away in her bedroom, one still filled with the comforting soft pastel yellows and pinks and the starched off-white curtains of her childhood, lying on her stomach on her soft bed, legs bent at the knees, ankles crossed, daydreaming about knights and castles and dragons and being freed from a tower. Mrs. Sharpe occasionally characterized her daughter as being “an escapist” while her father described Vivian more charitably as being “a dreamy child.” Several years ago, Vivian overheard her mother laughingly remark on a telephone conversation that all the fire in her daughter went straight to her hair, the copper-red that set her apart, and that, temperamentally, she was the opposite of the stereotype of a redhead: quiet, demure, introverted. This deeply hurt Vivian’s feelings, but she had to agree. She was happiest tucked away in her room with a book and her thoughts, quietness around her, locked away as if in a tower herself.
Everything changed one May day in 1995, when Vivian’s life was plunged into chaos and shaken like a snow globe in an earthquake, all because of a sandwich. Nothing seemed too out of the ordinary on that day, the first Saturday of the month, except that it was a beautiful day after a typically long and brutal winter. The first mild, sunny day in months, it drew people out of their homes and gave the townspeople a little uncharacteristic festiveness as they rolled down their car windows and turned up the music a little louder than was typically considered polite. That afternoon, there was a party at Vivian’s friend’s house and she ate a ham sandwich on rye bread with lettuce, American cheese, a little mustard and mayonnaise. Nothing noteworthy occurred except that Jed and Allison had an argument and broke up for the fourth or fifth time, and most people there didn’t consider that to be too noteworthy, not even Jed or Allison.
When she got home that night, Vivian felt kind of woozy and lurchy, like how she’d felt after a particularly nauseating ride on a Tilt-A-Whirl at the state fair. She took a couple of aspirin and gulped down a cup of water, falling asleep as soon as she went to bed, which was unusual for her as she’d usually have to read for an hour before she got sleepy. She had so many haunting and peculiar fragments of dreams, though, that it felt as if she weren’t sleeping at all. It was closer to being trapped in a horror movie that she couldn’t escape. There was a lot of noise in these dreams and Vivian could hear the sounds of cries and shrieks and people shouting, their voices all around her at times and distant at others. There were gates slamming shut, loud motors, the jaw-clenching sound of metal against metal, chainsaws, clanking gears, terrified shrieks. She felt chilled to the bone and alone, yet claustrophobic, clammy and surrounded all at the same time.
There was one vision, though, that stuck with Vivian and returned throughout the dream: a pair of the softest brown eyes with thick pale pink lashes curled down, unblinking, brimming with an immeasurable sadness and incomprehension that seared through her. At the same time, she recognized them as hers, even though those eyes weren’t quite human, even though she knew that her own eyes were grayish-green.
Twisting in a dream that seemed to stretch on for days, Vivian woke finally, her heart racing but her limbs leaden. Lying still and breathing hard, trying to shake off the last fleeting fragments of the dream that moments ago had held her captive, she opened her eyes, adjusting them to the darkened but familiar shapes of her bedroom. She easily identified her dresser, closet door, her desk and chair, but she also noticed something else: a large form in her chair, a kind of a lumpy mass glinting off the moonlight, something she couldn’t decipher. Sitting up, squinting at what she was sure was some trick of light – it might be a laundry bag, she reasoned – she leaned over, switching on her bedside lamp. Light flooded her room, momentarily blinding her, but as she blinked, her eyes adjusted. Now Vivian could plainly see that in front of her was a large cross-legged pale pink pig, gently levitating over her desk chair as though that were perfectly normal.
Blinking once, twice, a dozen times, Vivian stared dumbly with mouth agape as the pig smiled sweetly at her, as if waiting politely for her to speak. The most she could muster under the circumstances was a choking cough.
When it became unavoidably clear that he would have to initiate the conversation, the pig chuckled and spoke to her with a hearty, melodic voice. “Well, I’ll take that as a hello. Hello back to you, Vivian Sharpe. Nice to meet you – do you think I could call you Viv? It seems so much less formal.”
Vivian was unresponsive as the speech presented a whole new issue to process, but the pig continued, unfazed.
“Yes, I think that unless you indicate otherwise, I shall call you Viv. My name is Tolstoy. I rather like my name; it came to me very recently, but it feels quite natural. Tol-stoy. Tol-stoy. Tolstoy.”
Vivian realized that as he spoke, his mouth did not move. She heard his words inside her head as though they were her own thoughts, amplified. The pig looked at Vivian, waiting patiently for a response, and then looked around the room, as though searching for an ice-breaker. Finding none, he smiled and spoke again.
“I’m not exactly an expert yet in the art of conversation, so some guidance from you would be most appreciated if you feel so inclined. I understand that when two humans meet, you often shake hands, so perhaps we should have started that way, but it would have been an empty gesture. You wouldn’t be able to feel my hoof as I have no actual form. Maybe I’ll just float over to you so you can see me better and you won’t have to strain your eyes so much.” He glided over to where Vivian remained utterly still in her bed, immobilized not so much with fear but complete shock. Vivian stared wide-eyed at the pig, unsure of what else one should do in this situation.
“Ah, there, this is nice... Now we’re getting somewhere,” Tolstoy continued, crossing his thick legs rather daintily as he hovered over the edge of her bed, looking at her. “Oh, yes, I knew we’d be fast friends. I knew the moment I saw you, well, I said to myself – because I was the only one around – yes, that Vivian Sharpe and you are really going to get on well. I believe that you can feel this, too.”
Now sitting fully upright, Vivian nodded at him, mute though she was. As absurd as it seemed at the time, it did seem like she could accept the presence of this hovering pig. Something about him struck a familiar chord with her.
“Don’t be concerned. It’s been quite a confusing few minutes, I would imagine, so I certainly don’t mind if you don’t feel like talking much. I’ll just be sitting here – if you can call it sitting, I guess floating is more technically accurate – entertaining myself with my own thoughts, so whenever you can think of something you want to say, feel free to say it. Yesiree, any time you’re ready, here I am.” He gazed out the window, arms folded across his belly. “I’m not in a hurry.”
Vivian remained sitting upright, still blinking at him, as though if she blinked hard enough, he’d disappear, this pig with the hearty voice. Thinking of her situation, having a conversation with a pig in the middle of the night, Vivian had to let out a trickling, unexpected laugh. Tolstoy, who had begun to look a little concerned, momentarily startled at the sound of her laugh and his face lit up.
“I’m glad that you can see the humor in this, Viv. I know that my visit has been abrupt and even shocking, but you’ve been such a good sport about it. I knew you would be.”
Something about the way that he said that, and the fact that she knew somehow that she had nothing to fear, helped her ease out of her state of shock, and thoughts began shuffling back in.
“So...” Vivian spoke for the first time, her voice barely a croak, “so, you’re a pig, right?”
Most would consider this to be a not very impressive start, but Tolstoy responded as though she’d just made the most astute observation he’d ever heard.
“Oh, quite right.” Then Tolstoy paused, furrowing his brow, hoof to his head. “Well, though, now that I think about it, I’m not quite sure. It’s complex. I mean, I was once a pig biologically speaking, though my life as one was pretty narrow. Very constrained. Now I think I’m more of a...”
“Ghost? Are you a pig ghost? Oh, please, don’t say yes,” Vivian said, cupping her head in her hands.
“Ghost? Oh no, that’s not it. I’m quite certain I’m not a ghost. Definitely not. Let’s see – spirit. Yes, spirit… that feels right. I know the difference may seem like I’m quibbling, but, really, ‘ghost’ has such a negative connotation. Ghosts creep up on people but are actually sort of vaporous and inconsequential. That’s not me,” he said, stretching his front legs over his head casually. “If others not of the physical realm want to spend their days and nights wailing and rattling chains in musty old boarded up houses, that’s their business, but it’s certainly not how I choose to spend my time. Then again, I think that all of that business is mostly imaginary. I have no proof of this yet, though.”
“So you’re a pig spirit?” Vivian asked, no less confused.
“If I must be labeled, then, yes, one could say spirit. ‘Spirit’ meaning what’s left once we depart the mortal plane, as you humans say. One’s essence: the specific, unique parts that make up one’s being. Yes, that’s the closest to what I am. I’m a pig spirit.”
“Oh.”
“Or…” he started thoughtfully.
“Yes?”
“I could be thought of as simply a spirit like any other spirit.”
Vivian coughed a little. “Simply a spirit,” she repeated in a murmur.
“Yes. Or, if you want to be even more generous and expansive, I am just a manifestation of one aspect of the whole spirit we embody. Regardless, you can just call me Tolstoy and not care too much as to whether I’m a pig or a ghost or a spirit or a leprechaun.”
“But you’re not a leprechaun, right?”
“A pig leprechaun?” he said incredulously. “Whoever heard of that? No, I’m not.”
“No.”
She squinted at him in a way she hoped wasn’t impolite but seemed unavoidable. “And, how – why – are you here? I’m sorry,” Vivian said, flustered, “this has never happened to me before.”
“I’m quite sure of that, Viv. No need to apologize. This is a quite unusual situation to be sure. As to why I’m here, well, it’s really anyone’s guess. I suppose you can say that I’m here because I am needed. Yes,” he said, smiling warmly and hugging his front legs across his pink chest, “I’m quite satisfied with that answer.”
“Okay...” she said, her grasp on understanding still tentative, but deepening. “But who needs you? Do I need you?”
“Oh, yes, you need me, and I need you,” he said, gesturing toward her. “What’s more, the world needs us, together. That’s the point of this, Viv. We’re partners, you see, one without the other would be like a needle without a thread. A bicycle without wheels. It’s that we...” Tolstoy stopped abruptly, noticing the sheer bewilderment creep back onto Vivian’s face. “Well, I see that I’m getting ahead of myself again. Forgive me for this, but it’s just because I’m so hopeful, and I’ve never felt that way before.”
A flash of déjà vu washed over Vivian as he spoke his last few words, his eyes finally taking on a familiar quality she recognized with a jolt.
“You...” she found herself gasping, shaking off the last vestiges of sleep as she leaned forward and pointed at Tolstoy, “you were in my dream. In that awful dream with all the shrieking and machines...I saw you there. That was you; I know it was. I saw your eyes.”
The memory of what Vivian felt in the dream poured back into her mind, swirling around her body like a sandstorm.
“Was that you?” she whispered as Tolstoy looked away for the first time, gazing out her bedroom window with a distant look. “Was that you?”
Quite a few moments passed before Tolstoy spoke, his voice quiet now. “Yes, that was me. It could have been any of us, though. In front of me. Behind me. Everywhere I looked. There was no escape from the noise, the smell, the panic, despair. And we were all alone, struggling to survive, struggling to even breathe. So the eyes you saw could have been any of ours.”
Vivian was speechless, tears filling her eyes, stinging from the physical memory of the dream.
Tolstoy turned to look at her. “We knew we weren’t born for that life, that no one would be born for that life, but it was all we knew.”
“I don’t understand,” she sobbed, heat filling her chest, her throat.
“I know. I didn’t understand either. None of us did. Every day there’d be screaming and pushing all around me but there was nowhere to go. Most of us had pneumonia from the stench; we had swollen, aching joints from living on concrete day and night. But worse than anything was that it was unending: every moment of every day was the same degree of torture as the next until the day the men came and packed us in the truck. Then,” he said quietly, “it became terrifying.”
“But how? How could this happen?” was all she could manage, hot tears streaming down her face. “Who did this?”
“It is horrible, isn’t it,” Tolstoy said, the familiar softness filling his eyes.
“But I don’t understand!” Vivian nearly shouted, getting angry. “Who is doing this? Why are they doing it? How can they get away with it?”
Tolstoy took a deep breath and was silent for a few moments, composing himself. Calmly, he said, “Think for a moment about what you did this afternoon.”
“What?”
“What did you do earlier this afternoon before you arrived back at your home?
Vivian shrugged. “My friend had a party. A bunch of us hung out. What does that…”
“Did you eat anything?”
She nodded slowly. “Yes.”
“What did you eat?”
“I don’t know...I had a soda and a sandwich and some potato chips. Why do you ask?”
“And what kind of sandwich did you eat?”
“Well,” Vivian said, thinking, “um, roast beef. No, wait, it wasn’t roast beef…” She struggled with trying to remember.
“I believe it is called a ‘ham’ sandwich,” he said, gently.
“Oh, my gosh, yes! How did you...” she began to ask when the appalling realization washed over her, settling into a burning coal in the pit of her stomach. “Oh, my God – that – it – was you, wasn’t it?”
She looked at Tolstoy and he looked back at her with a calm, almost apologetic look upon his face. There was no need to affirm or say a word; the little hairs on Vivian’s arms stood up, poking painfully against her pajama sleeves. They stared at each other wordlessly until Vivian finally collapsed forward in a heap.
“But – I – no one told me. Oh, god, I feel sick. I feel sick,” she gasped, feeling like she was moments away from throwing up. “Oh, my god.” She darted from her room and ran to the bathroom, her hand over her mouth, making it just in time. She brushed her teeth shakily, wondering if he’d be gone now. He was still waiting for her as she’d left him, a sympathetic look on his face.
“So you’re still here,” she said as she crawled back into bed.
“I’m still here.”
“I thought maybe throwing up would…”
“Right. Nope. I’m not going anywhere.”
“This is awkward.”
The pig cocked his head at her.
Vivian tore at the stray tissue she’d grabbed, not remember when or where. “But I didn’t know a thing, Tolstoy. I – I didn’t know,” she trailed off, clenching her blanket. She couldn’t meet his eyes. “I never thought about it.”
“I know you didn’t, Viv. I don’t blame you. But now you know.”
Vivian sighed, wiping at her tears. “Oh, I wish I didn’t know, Tolstoy.” He didn’t say a word, just looked at Vivian with that same steady, calm gaze until she finally looked back at him. “I wish I’d never felt this way inside,” she moaned.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean how horrible I feel. I’ll never be able to forget this feeling. I know it.”
They sat silently for some time, the weight of everything seeming to push the air out of the room. Vivian’s bedroom, its girlish yellow walls and ruffled lampshades, suddenly felt extremely quaint and frilly, a parody of adolescent innocence.
“I know I’ll never go back to who I was,” she uttered finally, as though to herself, “I wish I could not know. I wish I could go back to before I went to sleep.”
Tolstoy sat quietly as Vivian spoke, looking at her with a tenderness that cut through her. “Do you really?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said, arms still clenched around her stomach. “No. Oh, I’m not sure. I don’t know anything, that’s one thing that’s clear to me. Who am I if I’m not who I was before I went to bed?”
“Why, you’re Vivian Sharpe.” Tolstoy said this as though it were the most obvious thing to see.
“Yes, I know that, but, no, I’m not.”
“How are you not Vivian Sharpe anymore?”
Vivian was silent as she thought. “Because I feel different.”
“How so?”
“I just don’t really recognize myself right now. I just feel so weird in my body, like I’m a stranger or something.”
“How do you mean?”
“It’s weird. I mean, it’s like there’s a giant hole blown through me. Like there used to be something in this,” she said, pointing to her chest, “that I woke up to every day, that was familiar, that was me. Sitting here, I could just as well be a complete stranger. I guess I’m just saying that I don’t feel like me anymore.”
“Who do you feel like if not yourself?” Tolstoy asked.
“I have no idea. Maybe this is what it feels like to be a new me.”
Tolstoy thought to himself and blinked at her a few times. “I think that you’re on the right track. You see, here’s my analogy: do you think a butterfly remembers what it felt like to be a caterpillar?”
Vivian considered this for a moment, forgetting once again the strangeness of the situation. “I would think that some part of her would always be a caterpillar, because that’s where she began. She’s still a caterpillar, but now she’s got wings. Then again, having wings will have to have changed her, at least her perspective.”
Tolstoy nodded. “That’s an apt analogy for you, I think. You’re Viv with wings.”
“I am?” she asked, half-tempted to look back at her shoulders. It wouldn’t have shocked Vivian if she had indeed sprouted wings with how this evening was going.
Tolstoy smiled, reading her thoughts. “Don’t worry, I’m speaking metaphorically, but, yes, I believe you do have wings. You’ll always be Vivian Sharpe because that’s your essence, but as you grow and evolve, new dimensions will be refined and unnecessary parts will be stripped away. Sort of like a sculpture being carved from a slab of marble. A work in progress, as we should all be.”
Something about Tolstoy and the way she felt around him that made Vivian feel like he was an old friend. His eyes sparkled in a way that reminded her of laughter. She found herself strangely encouraged by what he had to say, though much of it confused her. “So why did you come to me?” she asked.
“I come to you? No, Viv, we met halfway. I could only meet you because you invited me in. There was a little window inside you that must have opened a crack, even though you didn’t recognize it yourself. Some little seedling of awareness. I couldn’t come in unless you invited me – and this awareness – to float inside. As to why I’m here, well, that will come for both of us when the time is right.” Tolstoy sat for a moment, looking at Vivian, his warm eyes glistening. “Well, it’s probably been quite a night for you. How are you feeling now, Viv?”
She was silent for a moment. “Gosh, I don’t know. I feel lots of things. Scared. Angry. Kind of sick. Sad. I guess a little lost. Confused. A little excited.”
“Well,” said Tolstoy, winking at her, “that’s a good place to start. I’ll see you soon, Viv. It was so nice to meet you.”
He looked as if he wanted to hug her. She leaned away from him forcefully.
“That’s it?” Vivian asked incredulously.
“What do you mean?”
“You come in here, turn my life upside-down and leave? That’s so unfair. What am I supposed to do from here?”
An enigmatic smile crept upon his face as he began fading out in wavy thin lines, few sparks glinting around him as he faded.
“Observe,” he said peacefully, before he finally disappeared from sight.
“Observe? Observe? What am I supposed to observe? Tolstoy!” she reached into the empty space where he once floated, fingers raking through the air.
At once there was a quick knocking on her door. Her heart lifted – was it Tolstoy again, coming through the door this time?
“Vivian – it’s 2:30 in the morning...Get off the phone right now or I’m taking away your privileges,” spoke her mother’s tired, irritated voice through the door.
“I wasn’t – oh, never mind. Goodnight, mother.”
“Goodnight.”
Vivian settled down into her bed, completely spent.
“Oh, and I saw the state of your bedroom earlier today. I want that room cleaned up tomorrow morning. It looks like a pigsty in there.”
A Girl Named Wren
The morning after Tolstoy’s visit, Vivian woke questioning if it had really happened. Lying in bed, everything from the night before still quite vivid, she grasped for a suitable explanation other than the one she kept arriving at, the one that reasoned that she had simply lost her mind. How could it have been real? But Tolstoy’s visit was so shockingly authentic that even after she’d resigned with herself that she had in fact dreamed the whole thing, Vivian found herself feeling that her explanation – that this was all just a dream – was less believable than her having been visited by a pig spirit. How could her dreams, not normally very vivid, have created a being like Tolstoy, have inspired emotions she’d never felt before? Vivian remembered every word of her conversation with Tolstoy, every gesture and feeling without any loss of detail or effect, and though it was certainly unusual, it wasn’t dream-like.
In addition bringing her sanity into question, Vivian’s time with Tolstoy revealed another unexpected result the next morning. As Vivian sat down to breakfast, still in a fog from the night before, her sister Millie humming a grating song from a kid’s television show on the chair next to her, Mr. Sharpe set down what was known as his Sunday Morning Special in front of her: scrambled eggs and bacon, and two slices of toast with melting butter, staring up at her from the plate below. Vivian let out a gasp and clasped her hand to her mouth. Her throat clamped shut. Her pulse quickened. She looked at her father in horror, looked back at the plate, and let out a small shriek as she pushed out from the table and ran to her room as fast as she could, slamming the door behind her. Vivian lay on her unmade bed, curled in a ball, her heart beating fast and loud against her chest.
“Honey,” Mr. Sharpe said breathlessly moments later as he knocked quickly on her door, “are you okay? Can I come in?” Vivian could hear her mother’s voice in the background, alarmed and confused.
“All right. I’m okay. Come on in.” Vivian took in a deep breath to try to sound normal.
Mrs. Sharpe pushed past Mr. Sharpe as the door opened.
“Are you sick?” she asked as she rushed past him to Vivian, the back of her hand coming to rest on her daughter’s forehead. “I heard that the flu was going around.”
“No. I’m not sick. I just don’t feel like eating, I guess.”
Mrs. Sharpe narrowed her eyes at Vivian, the way she did when she didn’t trust what someone was telling her.
“Well, you don’t feel warm. You’d better stay in bed just to make sure, though. I don’t want to nurse this whole family through the flu. I don’t have that kind of time.”
Vivian rolled her eyes. “I’m not sick, Mom.”
Mrs. Sharpe turned over her shoulder and shot a look at her husband that made him leave the room in a hurry. Vivian’s mother excelled at that sort of thing, getting what she wanted with just a small glance or gesture.
“Shut the door, please, Roosevelt,” she said as Millie could be heard running up the steps.
As soon as the door shut behind him, Mrs. Sharpe sat down on the bed, lowered her voice, looked Vivian square in the eye and asked solemnly, in a this-is-just-between-you-and-me kind of way, “Vivian, is it that time of, you know...” her voice trailing off.
Vivian’s cheeks burned bright and hot as she looked away, “No,” she said, rather sharply. “I just don’t feel like eating this morning.”
Mrs. Sharpe continued cheerily. “Because if it is, it’s all right to tell me. That’s the sort of thing mothers and daughters can talk about. There’s nothing to be embarrassed about, you know.”
“Mom…”
“Every girl goes through this, Vivian. It’s perfectly normal. If you don’t feel well, I have some painkillers I could give you.”
“No, Mom, it’s not that, okay?” Vivian whined, sighing as she slumped down. “Can I be left alone for a while? Maybe I will go back to bed.”
Mrs. Sharpe looked at Vivian again, still unconvinced and a little suspicious, it seemed.
“Well,” she said, drawing out the word for effect, “You do look a little pale. I’ll have your father put your breakfast in the refrigerator if you want to eat it later. Okay?”
“All right, Mom,” Vivian said as sweetly as she could manage so her mother would finally leave. The thought of it made her stomach lurch again, but she kept smiling wanly, which was the best she could manage.
“And you’re sure nothing’s the matter?” Mrs. Sharpe asked as she stood.
“Yeah. I’m just tired or something. I slept funny last night.”
Mrs. Sharpe kissed Vivian’s forehead and stood to leave.
“I’m surprised you slept at all. You shouldn’t have stayed up so late on the phone. We’re going to have to nip that one in the bud, dear heart, or those phone privileges will be reconsidered.”
Vivian nodded her head dutifully, her eyes cast down. Mrs. Sharpe took a long look at her again and, finally satisfied, smoothed her skirt as she turned to leave. Vivian felt a little sick with the confirmation that she hadn’t dreamed everything.
“Get some sleep,” Mrs. Sharpe said as she shut the door behind her. Vivian didn’t eat the breakfast her father prepared that morning, or any other day. In fact, the smell or even mention of meat completely sickened her. Other things, like milk and eggs, had a similar effect; she didn’t know why for certain, but she sensed it had something to do with that night Tolstoy visited her. Just seeing someone eat an ice cream cone, something she had done just days before without a second thought, made her stomach take an unpleasant little dive.
But Vivian went on as though nothing were different, eating lots of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches while enduring the withering glances of her mother and confusion of her father, as though she were an alien with bizarre habits who had suddenly assumed the body of their daughter.
Vivian couldn’t blame them, because she felt like an alien herself. Not only did Tolstoy leave her wondering whether he’d actually visited or if she’d merely been responding to a particularly vivid dream, but Vivian had a new sense of awareness she had no idea how to live with. She worried about the squirrels who darted across the street as cars raced past. She wondered why the people couldn’t drive a little more carefully. She worried if the cats she saw on the construction site on her walk to school had anyone who cared for them or their kittens. She felt as protective as a mother bird of the nest of baby robins in the Sharpe’s backyard, something she would have scarcely even noticed days before. As abruptly as this consciousness appeared in her, it also entered completely and became second nature, penetrating all areas of her life as though it’d always been there.
On a Wednesday about a week and a half after Tolstoy’s visit, Vivian was walking down the hall to her French class when she suddenly heard the tinkling of bells amid the slamming lockers and loud voices. She recognized the sound from somewhere – from inside the school – but she couldn’t place where. The bells got more distinct and the other sounds receded into the background. She followed the sound down the steps to the first floor, to the Student Activities bulletin board, something she had never even paused at before. She stood in the busy hallway and the bells reached a crescendo, then stopped.
The Student Activities board was a messy, wide piece of cork, several layers deep with dozens of flyers, most outdated, ripped and weathered. Her eyes passed over the chess club tournament notices and the ancient school spirit days schedule until they revealed what she didn’t know she was looking for: a simple, hand-drawn yellow flyer with a cartoonish sketch of a talking ear of corn that said in flowery purple letters:
“Hey, you! Did you ever wonder why true peace eludes you? Maybe it’s because of what’s on your plate. If you’re interested in clean, healthy food and creating a compassionate lifestyle, check out the Center City High Vegetarian Club. Every Wednesday, 3:45, Room 202.”
At the bottom of the page, someone had scrawled in red marker: A.K.A., Freaky Tofu Eatin’ Hippy Sprout Club!!! Vivian smiled ruefully to herself, thinking that she’d never had tofu and she thought sprouts were disgusting. Maybe she wasn’t a real vegetarian. She found herself scribbling down the room number on the back cover of her French notebook, determined to find out if that label applied to her. She made it through the rest of her classes with butterflies darting around in her stomach.
Finally, the last bell rang and Vivian sat in the student lounge, drinking a juice as she debated whether to actually go to room 202 or not. She was absent-mindedly doodling pictures of levitating pigs in her notebook, thoughts somersaulting around in her head, when a familiar voice startled her from behind, and a cool, dry hand suddenly covered her eyes.
“So now you’re drawing pictures of floating pigs? You’re a weirdo, Viv.”
Vivian wheeled around, turning to face Kendra Brentwood, whom she’d known since they were in Brownies together in the second grade. In the years between, Kendra had evolved from a gangly, hair-sucking, freckled kid into a tall, athletic and popular girl with strawberry blonde hair. Despite their different placement in the social stratosphere of Center City High, they remained friendly, if not particularly involved in one another’s lives. Kendra grabbed the chair next to Vivian and sat down.
“Oh, this. Yeah,” Vivian said, covering the picture of Tolstoy with her hand as she flipped the cover over it, “I’m just trying to waste a little time. I’ve got somewhere to be at 3: 45.”
“Where?” Kendra asked, her eyes widening. “Are you going to try out for the pom pom squad’s open spot? You know I’m on that, right? That’s the first step to being a full-fledged cheerleader. I could probably help you get in if you don’t mess up bad or anything.”
“No, I...”
“Oh, oh, I know.” Kendra said, holding up her hand. “You’re going to try out for next year’s spirit squad. It’s probably best to start out with that anyway. That’s what I did. It’s not too late for you. That way you can learn...”
“No, Kendra. I’m not trying out for either squad.”
“Then, what?” she asked, then quickly gasped and clasped her hand around her mouth. “Oh my God, Viv, you’re not going to an after-school club, like, the computer or math club or anything like that, are you? Geeky stuff? We’re almost juniors. You’ve got to learn this, Viv or it will be too late.”
“No, Kendra, it’s not math or computer club,” Vivian said, sighing, as she turned in her chair to look at the clock. “I’m, you know, going to go to another meeting.”
“Which one?” Kendra asked, drumming her fingers on the table. “Tell me. There are only a few that are okay.”
Vivian sighed. “Kendra, I’m not sure why you care.”
“Why do you care if I care?”
“I don’t; it’s not a big deal.” Vivian turned to look at the clock.
“Then just tell me, already,” Kendra said, swiveling Vivian’s chair toward her. “Tell me.”
“Fine,” Vivian said, rolling her eyes with futility, mumbling. “It’s just a vegetarian club meeting.”
“What? Veterinarian…?”
“Vegetarian club.”
“Vegetarian? Oh my god, no, you can’t,” she said, grabbing Vivian’s arm emphatically, almost yanking her off her chair in the process. “That’s way worse than chess. No, I know something about this. Listen to me. Do you know what they do to people there?”
“No. What?”
“Well, I don’t know either,” said Kendra, “but I think it’s run by that weird girl, Wren Summer. The one who looks like she raided someone’s closet from, like, 1968. I saw her putting up flyers for it once.” She lowered her voice, eyes scanning the room. “I think she might be a witch or into voodoo or something. She creeps me out. In fact, she creeps everyone out.”
Vivian shrugged, collecting her thoughts.
“Anyway, I don’t think she has a single friend. Not even the dweebs or losers are that desperate. You don’t want to be associated with that, do you?”
Vivian thought for a moment. Wren was a girl she passed in the hall, but she’d never had a conversation with her. Wren was a rare newcomer in the Center City school system. The gossip was that she had been taught at home until she was fifteen and had to be held back a year to catch up. No one seemed to know much about her, but whispers swirled around that her parents lived in the woods somewhere and that they were communists or hippies, living off the land. Or that her father was a famous artist, but that the whole family was crazy. Wren was in Vivian’s freshman gym class one semester but managed to avoid the worst of it by arguing to Coach Shea that lacrosse and volleyball were competitive in nature, and she had an ethical and spiritual conflict with anything that pitted her against another being. The whole class all sat on the basketball court, exchanging looks and barely stifling giggles, while Coach Shea huffed and crossed her arms in front of her chest, asking Wren sarcastically what she wanted to do instead. Wren smiled serenely and said yoga with utter sincerity. Her bluff called, the gym coach couldn’t do anything but oblige, though she made certain the rest of the class knew she thought Wren was a pain, rolling her eyes whenever she looked in her direction. Still, she got what she wanted. The other girls cursed her name every time they slumped pink and sweaty back into the locker room after class while Wren rolled up her yoga mat and got ready to go on with her day. Just to herself, though, Vivian had to admit that there was something about Wren – a natural grace, a luminosity, her obvious independent streak – that she couldn’t help admiring in secrecy.
With her colorful, gauzy tops, long skirts, and dozens of rings, bracelets and anklets with bells dangling off them, Wren stood out in the monochromatic halls of Center City High. Whenever she was near, the delicate tinkling of bells and the scent of jasmine or lilac cut through the air. People inevitably snickered and stared as she passed, somehow never quite getting used to the novelty of the girl, but she always just walked by with a mysterious smile on her face, as if she was in on some private joke, gliding down the hall as though walking on a cloud, and her classmates parted like blades of grass as she passed. Another thing about Wren was that in a sea of faces that didn’t vary much beyond ivory to light pink, her skin was decidedly caramel, and she had electric spirals of springy dark hair and almond-shaped eyes. Vivian thought that she was one of the most striking people she’d ever seen in person.
“It’s no big deal, Kendra. I’m just going to check it out,” she said, trying to look nonchalant as she glanced at the clock again. “I promise not to turn into a witch on you. I’m not making any promises about voodoo, though.”
Kendra’s eyes widened, gasping before she realized it was a joke. Then embarrassed, she said, “Very funny, Viv. You shouldn’t even joke about that. It’s one thing to be a vegetarian – it’s another thing to, you know, hang out with them.”
Vivian sighed.
Kendra pressed on, undeterred. “Really Viv, you’ll thank me later. This school forgives no one, believe me.” She lowered her voice. “Think about Sue Pentecost. She was so cool – best boyfriend, perfect hair, great clothes – and then she ate lunch with that dweeb who used to eat paste in grade school. Why on earth would she do that? One stupid lunch could have been forgiven, but then she went and did it again. That second lunch ruined her. Now she’s not even cool enough to hang out with the paste-eater herself, not cool enough even for the Latin club.”
She couldn’t help but giggle at Kendra’s earnestness. She covered her mouth.
Kendra put her hand on Vivian’s shoulder. “Don’t laugh. I’m looking out for your best interests, Viv, because you’ll never have a chance to, you know, be cool if that Wren girl makes you a freak by association. You could certainly never be on the squad.”
Vivian shrugged, rolling her eyes, finally courageous. “Maybe I don’t want to be ‘on the squad’, Kendra.”
“Don’t be silly -- of course you do. Every girl does,” she said, patting Vivian’s arm and pushing back in her chair. “You know I’m just saying this because I’m nice. Gotta go, though. We’ve got to audition for the squad. Marci got kicked off because she couldn’t get herself coordinated. We gave her a good chance, but it’s still so, so sad. There are probably twenty girls trying out today. Meanwhile, Marci’s calling me all the time because she’s ready to slit her wrists. It’s exhausting,” she said dramatically, as she dashed out of the room. “Don’t forget what I said, Viv.”
Vivian watched Kendra leave, feeling strangely indifferent to another person’s opinion of her for perhaps the first time she could remember. For the first time in days, she felt unburdened and light. Instead of the gnawing uncertainty, a sense of clarity washed over her as she bounded up the stairs to room 202.
As she walked into the room, she thought at first that it was empty, and she was ready to turn and leave, but then Vivian saw Wren sitting by herself behind the teacher’s desk, looking out the window as she snapped her fingers and hummed to herself. A silver anklet with bells jingled off her bare feet as she tapped her feet on the desk. Vivian blinked, standing there, as it sank in that this was the sound she had heard earlier, the one that led her to the bulletin board.
“Hey,” Vivian said shyly, standing in the doorway, “is this the vegetarian club?”
Wren quickly turned toward her, her eyes bright and wide with surprise.
“Oh, my gosh, hi!” Wren said, jumping to her feet. “I didn’t expect anyone, but, yes, this is the vegetarian club. Wow.”
“Hi,” Vivian said, looking around the room. “So, no one else is here yet?”
“Well, so far it’s just the two of us, which is double what it’s ever been. That’s cool – in one day, the vegetarian club doubled attendance. Success! Come on in, Vivian.”
“How did you know my name?” Vivian asked nervously, remembering Wren’s reputation as the high priestess of Center City.
“It says so right there,” Wren said, nodding toward the notebook Vivian clutched to her chest. “I’ve got good eyesight.”
“Oh,” she said, looking down and laughing with relief. “Yeah, that’s me.”
“So, come on in and let’s hang out, Vivian,” Wren said warmly.
“You can just call me Viv, by the way,” she said, dropping her backpack on a desk and pulling a chair out. “Everyone does.”
Wren perched on top of the desk across from Vivian, scrutinizing her in a friendly way.
“Your hair’s so pretty.” Wren finally said.
Vivian brushed a hand through it, embarrassed by Wren’s directness. “Thanks.”
“It looks like a sunset.”
Vivian laughed a little in relief. “For a second I was afraid you were going to say that my hair looks like carrots. Carrot top. That’s what everyone said when I was little.”
“I like carrots too but what I immediately thought of was a sunset. Did you know that redheads need 20% more anesthesia to be knocked out? I read that somewhere or another. It’s because you guys are more passionate. Oh, I can see I embarrassed you.” After an awkward pause, Wren asked, “So, like, what do you want to talk about?”
“Umm, well, what do you usually do here?”
“Oh, usually I just sit at the desk and draw, but I left my sketch pad in my locker, and I can’t remember the combination somehow today.” Wren furrowed her eyebrows. “I guess I wasn’t in the mood for drawing anyway. Astrologically I’m a bit messed up right now. Retrograde,” she said, as though Vivian would certainly understand.
“Is that what you do here? Draw pictures?”
“Oh, no. Other times I write love letters.”
“Really? Does he go to school here?”
“Who?”
“Your boyfriend?”
“No, I don’t have a boyfriend. I write love letters to my husband,” Wren said, nonchalantly.
“Wait,” Vivian stammered, eyes widening. “You’re married?”
“No, silly, not yet,” Wren said, “but someday I might be. Or not. Anyway, I thought it’d be nice to write a bunch of love letters and give them to the person I might eventually marry, you know what I mean? Like completely romantic.”
“So is that what you do here?” Vivian asked, confused.
“Oh, no,” Wren said emphatically. “Sometimes I choreograph dances in my head, with music and everything. I just read a biography of Isadora Duncan so she’s been on my mind lately. So I was choreographing when you walked in, but, anyway, who cares? It’s so cool to meet another vegetarian. I thought that I was the only one.”
“I don’t get it,” Vivian said, with some frustration she couldn’t mask. “What is the point of the vegetarian club?”
“Well, I guess we get to decide that. There’s never been more than just me, and I didn’t want it to become a dictatorship. Anyway, I knew deep in my heart that some day another person would show up. This morning, actually, I was like not sure if I wanted to stay after school again just to sit here alone but then I reminded myself, ‘Wren, today may be the day.’ And look! Here you are, like magic,” Wren said, snapping her fingers. “I’ve never met another vegetarian my age in town. So, when did you become one?”
“Um, about a week and a half ago, but I’m not sure that I am one officially.”
“Oh, you didn’t get an official registration packet in the mail yet?”
“No, I...” she stammered.
Just then, Wren started giggling.
“Oh,” Vivian said, relieved and embarrassed. “You were joking about the packet, right?”
Wren nodded. “Anyway, you were saying about a week and a half ago…”
“Yeah, It just sort of happened one morning, and I didn’t really have a lot to do with it. It’s like I went to bed as a meat-eater and I woke up as a vegetarian,” she said, feeling some comfort in describing things for the first time.
“Wow, with no warning?”
“Well, there was a little something that happened. It’s complicated.”
“That’s so cool, though. You transformed overnight. Are your parents freaking out? I’ve heard that happens.”
“A little. Not too bad, but they definitely know that something’s up. They keep watching me, like I’m dangerous or something,” Vivian said, with a nervous laugh. “Did your parents do that, too?”
“Oh, no, I was raised as a vegetarian. I’ve never had any of that dead stuff. My parents would love me no matter what I decided, of course, but they’d be disappointed if I ate meat, for sure.”
“But aren’t you curious about what meat tastes like?” Vivian asked, a little stunned to meet someone who’d never eaten meat.
“Oh, goddess, no. Ick! That’s like asking someone who’s never been exposed to radiation, ‘Gee, aren’t you curious about what a nuclear meltdown feels like?’” she said, laughing at her analogy. “Um, no.”
“But your parents made you live as a vegetarian,” Vivian said. “You didn’t make that choice yourself.”
Wren’s eyes widened at this notion. “I did, Viv, and I make a choice every day as to whether I’m going to be a vegetarian. My parents can’t control me. They know that I have my own mind. I’m very independent. Every meal of every day, I get to make a choice. Isn’t that cool? This isn’t some passive thing for me. So every day I get to say, ‘Today I choose to be a vegetarian.’ You know what I mean?”
“I guess I do,” she said. This girl was making sense to her, Vivian realized with some nervousness.
“So…it’s complicated?” Wren asked.
“What is?”
“Why you became vegetarian.”
“Oh. Yeah,” she said, hesitantly. “It’s definitely weird. You’ll probably freak out. Promise you won’t.”
Wren looked a little hurt at first, then solemn. “Of course I won’t.”
Vivian thought about it for a moment. Should she tell her about Tolstoy? Worried momentarily that Wren would think she was crazy, Vivian then realized this was a girl who wrote love letters to her imaginary future husband.
“Well, the thing is, I had a… visitor,” Vivian said, looking down at her desk.
“A visitor,” Wren repeated neutrally.
“Yes. A, um, pig came and talked to me one night,” she said, trying to sound nonchalant.
“A pig,” she repeated again. Vivian thought to herself that if Wren believed she was crazy, she’d just have to go into hiding or private school or something.
“Yes,” Vivian said, avoiding Wren’s unblinking gaze. “He was a floating pig spirit. Just appeared in my room and told me his story.”
Wren smiled broadly in recognition. “Oh! You had an animal guide visit you. Gosh, you’re so lucky. I’ve heard about that sort of thing. He traveled through realms of existence to meet you.”
“Do you think?” Vivian asked, relieved.
“Of course,” Wren said with absolute conviction. “Do you know how hard that must have been? So, like, what did your pig spirit say?”
“The spirit – his name’s Tolstoy – he kind of talked to me but mostly I felt it.”
“Felt what?” Wren asked, completely wide-eyed and captivated. “This is so cool.”
“Well, I felt what he was talking about emotionally. I felt the pain and fear of him and these animals he lived with totally, like it was happening to me. I felt it in my body.”