It's getting harder and harder to do this every year. It was easy when we were in college, young, fresh, bright-eyed and bushy tailed. Coming home every summer was almost exciting, in spite of it all. It was nice to see everyone together again. We would meet up for drinks almost every night and catch up on whatever we'd been up to during the school year. We went to the beach, had barbecues, and went sailing. We slept late, woke up late, and drove around town aimlessly. We made sure none of us forgot to perform the service before the solstice. It was almost normal. And then Andy forgot.
It's hard to imagine how one could forget, but then Andy had never been the best student. He was always missing class, forgetting homework, and generally blowing everything off with an aggravating nonchalance. I'm pretty sure he barely managed to graduate, but we weren't close so I figured it was none of my business. In a class of only 30 students, I don't know anyone who would say they were “close” with Andy.
The service is easy, in theory. Once a year, right before the summer solstice ends, what was given must be returned. 18 ounces of blood is given by every child born in town who makes it to adulthood; an ounce for every year of safety and abundance. It was exciting, the first time I went down there with my dad and grandma and watched them give their ounces. Growing up, of course, I knew all about the deal we'd made, how it kept us safe and provided for us, which is why we were called to provide this service in return. It was our precious secret, and conversations always turned serious and quiet when it was brought up, which happened rarely. We all understood what had to be done. Every summer before I turned 18, the other kids and I stood as close to the edge of the cliff as we dared, watching the adults make their way down into the cave. Now, I was going down the cliff with them. And then they handed me the knife. Still, I felt proud. I was grown up. I was a man.
The summer before my final year of college, Andy never came home. The rumor was that he'd gotten kicked out of whatever school his father had managed to pay to get him into. Anyway, the solstice came and went. That following year, their yacht sank, taking his father and brother with it. The house burnt down, his grandfather was caught embezzling, and his aunt got into a really bad car crash that took one of her legs. It was a relentless string of bad luck that caught anyone related to him by blood. The following summer, the scales would not balance. It took more blood than usual before I could get it to even out. It was the same for all my classmates. We worked it out to be an additional ounce.
Two years later, Lucy overdosed after a night out partying. That was another ounce. Matt in an accident four years later. Simon from cancer just last year, a month before the solstice. So you see, it gets harder and harder every year.
I'm nearly forty, and I've never been particularly athletic. The slippery descent to the cave and back up the cliff is hard enough. I know it will get worse the older we get. But my grandmother had some suggestions. There is a way to bring the count back down, but it's a costly one. I must have a child born within the town; borne of new blood. For every child I have, my debt goes down by 3 ounces.
The summer after college, I started working for my father at his office in the city. I came home for the solstice and met Mary. She and Simon were engaged. This was my first time meeting her, though supposedly they were college sweethearts. Simon was crazy about her, of course, so I’d heard a lot about her from him. Just that past summer, he was agonizing over telling her about our town and our deal, the cave and the scales.
That summer solstice, Simon brought her to the cave with his family. All the way to the cliff, and all the way down, he explained our arrangement. Wasn’t she just saying how beautiful our little seaside town was? Didn’t she just mention how safe she felt walking outside at night? Wasn’t the produce so fresh and plentiful? Wasn’t our sea warm and inviting? I was a good distance away and even I could tell she was scared. The poor girl was shaking by the time Simon and his family made it to the cave. And then the scales, the knife, the blood. I only heard yelling, but I was told she’d tried to run, slipped, and fell onto the rocks. Her skull had cracked open. It was better that way, they said.
Even after that, other friends brought home partners. They got married and had babies. If I'd been given a choice, would I want to be born in this town? After all, only those born here are called to give blood. My mother never gave blood, and my grandfather died when I was a toddler, but as far as I know, he’d never given blood. And yet our businesses thrived like all the others in town. I had never wanted for anything in my entire life.
When I met Michelle, I knew right away we were a good fit. She was calm and quiet, a hard-worker, and pretty in an approachable kind of way. She’d just moved to the city and was a waitress at my favorite lunch spot. She never said much about where she came from or why she left. I assumed it was a bad situation, and she was content to let me.
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I brought her home and explained everything. After Mary, there was one other outsider, Oscar, who’d been engaged to a local girl a few years younger than me. He hadn’t liked what he’d heard either, and he too suffered some kind of accident. Michelle was a lot more understanding. We got married that August and our baby was born the next summer.
Now, I look down at this child and I wonder, again, if it was worth it. In her three years of life, she has only known love and security, and for fifteen more years it will be just that. And then what? When I went down to the cave this morning, she waved at me from her mother’s arms. My father said Andy had doomed my generation. There were too many deaths in too short a span of time. He suggested I have another child. As I cut myself open and poured forth my dues, I thought of her, Emily, my daughter, my baby, and how this pain was her destiny.
It’s midnight now, and the solstice is over. I have Emily in my arms, and we watch the fireworks together with her mother. Everyone is celebrating another year of abundance, but Michelle and I are the only ones silent. The smell of sulfur and barbecue mingle in the balmy air. I clasp her hand, and though she holds tight, it’s not love or affection in her eyes, but determination. The bags are packed. The gas tank is full.
It’s harder to go down the cliff-side in the dark. I don’t turn on my flashlight until I’m low enough that its beam isn’t visible. The high tide waves have splashed all over every step and handhold. I hope the cave hasn’t filled in. I don’t know if it floods at high tide because I don’t know anyone who has entered the cave at night. Outside of the service, we always avoided it.
The tide had risen up the steps, inky black and climbing higher with every wave. Every few seconds, it reflects the fireworks back at me, throwing dizzying colors. A short distance ahead, I see that the cave has flooded, but I think I can make it if I cling to the walls. The slick damp walls. I think I can wade inside and climb on the raised dais if it hasn’t flooded too much.
I step into the dark waters and when I'm waist deep I can feel my body giving in to the tides. I hold my flashlight in my mouth and use both hands to claw my way over jutting rocks into the mouth of the cave. It’s darker inside. The moon and fireworks don’t reach these waters. For a second, I slip. My bare feet go out from under me and I plunge underwater. I scrabble for a handhold and pull myself up, shaken and gasping for air around the flashlight though I was only underwater for a few seconds.
As I enter the cave, I see that the water hasn’t reached the dais. I claw against one wall of the cave, half wading half swimming to get to the raised altar. I almost slip two more times, but I make it, despite the push and suction of the waves. I climb onto the platform, and take a second on my hands and knees catching my breath. I put the flashlight down against my knee and take in the dais. It’s only a slab of rock about the length and width of a child’s cot. I can feel something watching me, waiting for my next move. The presence feels almost curious. I’ve always felt watched, in the cave.
Once I recover, I look at the golden scales in the center of the dais. It has an empty bowl on one end and a sphere attached to the other weighing it down. I’ve always wondered what, exactly, we were balancing against. I reach behind the dais, the drier side away from the water, and find the rock I knew would be there. Before I can hesitate, I lay down the scales and strike the sphere.
The harsh clang echoes in the cave but I keep at it. My jostling bounces the flashlight beam frenetically. I lose myself in the frenzy of my act until finally, it cracks open. The sphere is badly dented, but a hole has emerged, and out of it rolls something impossibly small and shriveled. It’s a dark brown little thing and I recoil. I watch as it rolls and rolls and plops into the water that has been lapping at the dais all this time. Almost immediately the ground starts to rumble, and as I try to stay on the dais and avoid the falling debris, I notice the tide going back out to sea. It recedes so fast that I can scramble off the dais and run through calf- then ankle-deep water. My back is screaming, my knees are on fire, but I half run half crawl my way up the steps and back onto the cliff. Just in time to see my grandmother standing there in shock as she takes in the receding tide.
What have you done?, she mouths to me as people panic behind her. I see picnic tables overturned, there’s fire, but the car is gone and all I can feel is relief. My grandmother plops to the ground, and I sit beside her. We watch as something implausibly large starts to rise from the sea.
Grandma said that this new god is young and kind. It only asks for a little blood, once a year. There was another small town, before ours, in a different place, that the elders sometimes talked about. It's where our founders came from. It was harder there, they said. The old god under that sea demanded death, human sacrifices. And they didn't get quite as good of a trade. They didn't get sunshine and warm days. It was a darker place, doomed to rot. Things are better now, she said.
I register the tears on my grandmother’s frightened face, but all I think about is Emily. Emily is safe, I tell myself. Then, I think about Michelle, whom I have never loved, and who will never forgive me, I’m sure. And I don’t deserve it, either. I think about Simon and Mary, who did love each other, I suppose. I even think about Andy, and whether he’d managed to escape all this. I have plenty of time to think as the incomprehensible monstrosity approaches New Innsmouth.