Wow, I'm actually having a good time talking with my sister, Dov thought. This really must be a dream!
As they continued to eat and drink and talk, he noticed something: Peez was growing younger. Before his eyes, the years flowed off her face and body while she chattered on, oblivious. He was frightened, wondering what this meant, what he could do to stop it, whether she would continue growing younger and younger indefinitely until she became toddler, infant, newborn, fetus, embryo, and then vanished altogether. He reached out as if to halt the process and saw that his own hand had grown smaller, softer, a child's hand.
Seeing him reach out to her that way, his sister jumped up happily, grabbed him by the wrist, and hauled him after her, dashing off into the meadow. In the logicless way of dreams, the grassy field transformed itself into an idyllic playground, with slides and swings and seesaws and toys strewn everywhere. The siblings ran like young fawns, spun around until they got dizzy and fell over, climbed everything in sight, played leapfrog and hopscotch and can't-catch-me, hung upside down by their knees from anything that could bear their weight. Peez's fancy dress went inside-out over her head and Dov teased her mercilessly about the color of her underpants. She dropped to the earth and when she stood up again, a water balloon had materialized in her hand. He was soaked to the skin before he could say another word. The two of them fell over laughing again.
Hello, kids, keeping busy?
The two of them looked up into Edwina's face. She was smiling down at them from the great height of adulthood. She was not only older than they were, and smarter, and taller, but in the dream she had become a veritable giantess. She bent over and scooped the two of them into the palm of her enormous hand, lifting them high into the sky so fast that Dov's cheeks burned in the rushing wind of their passage. Terrified and exhilarated, Dov and Peez clung to Edwina's fingers the way a drowning man clings to a floating log. The beautiful valley, the trees, the stream, the playground, even the clouds lay far below them. For an instant Dov wondered what would happen if he let go of his mother's hand and tried to fly.
Don't be stupid, Edwina said, reading his mind the way all mothers can. You're much too young to fly. You'll only fall.
And then: You don't see your sister trying anything as dumb as that, do you?
Her words made Dov angry, but he didn't dare let Edwina know that he was mad at her. She might let him drop through her fingers and then where would he be? Instead he glared at Peez.
Hey! What did I do? Peez implored him.
Like you don't know! Dov sneered at her, and felt tainted inside for having said that, and for not having the courage to tell Edwina straight out that she was the object of his hostility. For some reason, knowing that he'd never find the courage to confront his mother, he became even angrier at his sister and decided to make her sorry.
But how?
A glitter of gold caught his eye. Something besides the sun was shining in the sky. He looked up and saw that in Edwina's other hand she held an old-fashioned weighing device, a pair of glittering pans swinging from a balance like the Scales of Justice. The giantess brought the scales level with the hand that held her children and gave them an encouraging look.
All aboard, she said. We might as well get this started.
No! Peez shouted, throwing her arms around Dov. We won't! You can't make us!
Oh, please. Edwina rolled her eyes over the silly notions of children. You know very well that I can. Anyhow, what's wrong with a little healthy competition?
I wonder if "healthy" is the right word for this? Dov thought.
Stop it! Peez said, hugging her baby brother more closely to her. Leave us alone! We were having fun before you came along and spoiled it.
"Came along"? The giantess was amused. You silly nit, can't you see that I've been here all the time? Who do you think gave you this wonderful place without even asking if you deserved it? Who's got the power to take it all away from you in the blink of an eye? You're a very bad little girl, Peez. I don't see your brother behaving like that. He's smiling!
Dov was puzzled. He knew the giantess was lying: He wasn't smiling, and yet ... maybe he'd better do as she said. He slapped on Smile #1, the simple, sunny basic model on which his entire subsequent repertoire of artificially cheery grimaces was built. Peez saw him do it and looked betrayed.
Dov is a good child. One point for Dov, said the giantess.
Peez turned angrily on her brother. Why are you helping her? she demanded.
Dov tried to explain. Edwina was just so big, so powerful. She had the unassailable ability to control everything in their lives; didn't Peez see that? Wasn't it better to win her over rather than fight her? They were so small that they'd only lose.
He tried, but he couldn't find the words, so instead he created Smile #2 and tried to use it to win his sister's understanding. He needed it badly, that and her continued support and protection. She was stronger than he was, and smarter too, and he loved—
I love her? I love Peez?
Dov was so shocked by this realization that the smile dropped right off his face and over the edge of Edwina's huge hand. Down and down he watched it fall until it struck the ground and shattered. He clapped his hands to where his mouth had been and felt only smooth, featureless skin. A scream rose from the bottom of his soul but could not escape. It echoed inside his head, thudding against the inside of his skull, wildly searching for a way out and finding none.
Through the panic and the pain, he heard his mother's voice: Just see how good your baby brother is being, how nice and quiet. Quiet equals obedient. Why can't you be more like him? He's not angry all the time; he's cheerful. No wonder he has friends and you don't! And you never will until you become exactly like he is.
Just before his head exploded, he heard Edwina say: Two points for Dov.
The idyllic meadow of his dream world vanished. In its place was only a land of swirling mists and shadows. Dov could see nothing, but he could hear the sound of chains creaking and knew they were the ones attached to the titanic set of scales in his mother's hand. They groaned and clanked somewhere out of sight. Though the noise they made was almost deafening, somehow he could still make out a different sound as well, a softer sound, the sound of someone else's footsteps besides his own. He couldn't explain why he knew that they belonged to Peez, but he did. That too was part of the dream's insane logic.
He wished that his eyes were as clever as his ears so that he might catch sight of his sister. She didn't sound as if she were far away. He realized that he missed her, that he wouldn't mind the darkness so much if only he could make his way through it with her beside him. Together they could form a plan, find a way to help one another escape this terrible place, if only—!
But that was impossible. That wasn't playing by the rules of the competition. Edwina wouldn't like that. He didn't dare do anything that Edwina wouldn't like. He walked on alone, and in the metallic complaints of the unseen chains he heard the twin pans of Edwina's golden balances rising and falling as she watched over him and Peez, always adding or subtracting those precious points that she awarded to her children.
It doesn't really matter, Dov thought as he slogged his way through the darkness. Just a little longer and she won't be able to do that to us any more. Soon she'll be dead.
As soon as he thought them, the words knocked him off his feet. He was sitting in a puddle of slimy, ice-cold water, alone with those words: Soon she'll be dead.
And then ... what?
What will I have left? Playing her game, fighting with my sister because I was too scared to fight with my mother, scoring points off Peez because I thought it was the best way to keep Edwina on my side, that's all my life's become! That's all it is!