Angry Earth

“I am Earth,” she said.

I paused, my pen flicking gently over my note pad. Her name at the top. The date and a few notes. History of child abuse, neglect, injecting drug use. I tapped the pen on the paper, smoothing the furrow in my brow before it could form. She looked at me through her rusted curls. Defiant, practised eyes. Delusions of grandeur? I wrote. Delusions at the very least.

“What do you mean by that?” I asked. She was silent. Intense. Daring me to press my question to her.

“Do you mean the earth we all live on, or dirt?”

She smiled. Something cruel and hardened. “You called me dirt,” she said. Her eye brow flicked briefly.

“I didn’t say that. I’m just trying to understand your statement.”

She leaned back on the couch. I knew it wasn’t comfortable, but she tried to look effortless. I saw her breathing adjust to the way her torso now stretched uncomfortably over the upright back of the chair.

“Show me your notes,” she said.

“The notes are just so I can keep track of our conversations. So I don’t forget anything next week.”

“There might not be a next week,” she said, easing slowly back off the chair to rest her forearms on her knees again. “You know the earth is dying right? I’m dying and I’ll take you all with me. You all did this to me, you deserve it, you all do.”

“Are you concerned about the environment?” I asked her. I rested my pen on my lap, trying to put her at ease. I didn’t really need to keep a detailed history on this girl, she was completely unforgettable.

“I’m a natural disaster,” she grinned again. “Look at these scars,” she traced her finger-tips up her arms and over the deep tread of thickened, white tissue. “This is where they cut oil wells into me.” Her tongue flicked over her teeth, “Want to see where they fracked me?”

I stayed silent, my eyes softly on hers. “You must be angry. It wasn’t right for anyone to hurt you. It wasn’t your fault.”

“I know that,” she spat. “I’m just a series of resources aren’t I? Something to be used up, destroyed. No one cares what happens to me once they’ve had their fun.” She threw herself back against the hard couch again. The wooden feet squeaked with the force of it. Then she was back on her elbows, her hands clasped together.

“No one asked me what I wanted, and when I tried to tell them, they didn’t listen.”

“That must have made you angry. When did you first feel like that? Like no one was listening to you?”

“Around the agricultural revolution,” she cocked her head to the side. “But things started getting very abusive by the industrial revolution.”

“Those times you’ve mentioned, I think people were aiming to make the world better. Trying to cope with the increase in population. Do you agree with that?”

She stayed still, eyeing me. Like a staring contest; something juvenile and aggressive.

“They were just greedy,” she said. “They wanted more from me than I was willing to give. We had got on so well before. Back when they respected me. If they were angry they could start a bush fire. If I was angry, I could send a flood. It was a regular relationship. Everyone fights sometimes, but it has to be fair. You can’t pick away at someone like that. You can’t do it for years and then expect they won’t retaliate.”

“I’m glad you mentioned retaliation. Can you tell me about that? Can you tell me what you did to Adam?”

Her fingers twitched. Laced then unlaced in her lap. “I told them I didn’t want to talk about that.”

“I know it’s uncomfortable, but that’s why we’re here. I want to help you. I know he did some terrible, unforgivable things to you. But I need to hear your side of the story. Tell me how you met. How was your relationship in the beginning?”

“It was normal. He was nice. I suppose it was around 3000BC, if you want to keep time with a calendar like that. He just fit into my life like all the other animals did.”

“I’m sorry, do you mean other men or your pets?”

“I don’t have pets. I mean all the other animals. Horses, lizards, humming birds, echidnas.”

I inched my fingers towards the pen, careful not to disturb her. “What was he like?”

“He was a good man. Honest, respectful. He took good care of me. Even when he didn’t understand me, he tried really hard.”

“It sounds like you were in love. Would you agree with that? In the beginning?”

“He was special. He had this aspirational character though. I thought he would use it to improve himself, but he started trying to change me too. To suit him. I guess he got cocky.”

“Is that when things started to go wrong?”

“I guess you could say that.”

I risked a quick note on the pad. Dissociation?

“What are you writing about me?”

“I’m just taking a few notes as we go, so I can remember.”

“You all take notes about me,” she sneered, “only the things that make you look good ever remain.”

“I’m trying to be impartial. That’s my job. I’m going to do my best to help you.”

“You can’t do shit. You’re just one person. I appreciate the sentiment and all but do you think you’re the first person to try and do something? Your little notes don’t help me.”

“The notes are for me Anna, so I can keep track.”

“It’s always about you. It’s always about everyone except me.” Her hands made tight, white fists against the vinyl chair. Her eye reddened. Wild.

“When did Adam first hurt you?”

“When he stopped writing love poems to me and started harvesting me for whatever he wanted” dark, red lines around her eye-lids.

“What did you do to Adam, Anna? What did you do to the man who hurt you?”

“I destroyed him. Is that what you want to hear? You think I’m stupid?” She thrust an accusing finger at the one-way mirror that made up the west wall of the room. “You think I don’t know you are recording everything I say? You think I don’t know that no matter what you write in your stupid, vapid notebook that there’s nothing you -or anyone in this world- can do for me?”

“Tell me what happened Anna. What happened to Adam?”

Her eyes flashed. Hot tears irritating her eyes. “I had to stop him,” she whispered, “He was going to hurt us all.”

I held her gaze, her desperate anguish stabbing pain right through my soul. She was unforgettable. Something that brought out the love and fear in me. As much as I wanted to save her, I wanted to run from her too. Hide from her rage. Her power.

“I tried to stop him. I burned him, I drowned him, I poisoned him, I choked him. He made me sick, twisted, angry. He made me like this. He created me to destroy him.”

“Where is he now Anna,” I leaned in, my face gentle. I made a space between the two of us, drawn away from the cameras and recording equipment. A place only the two of us could inhabit, a place outside the reality of the interrogation room.

“He’s not dead yet,” she breathed. A silence scorched the room. A haunting, breathless moment.

“Because you still love him?” I asked.

Tears spilled from her jaw like a river through an ice-cave. Like a downfall in a mountain forest. Like summer rain in the desert. She was silent. Staring past me and my manufactured ‘safe-space.’ Past the concrete walls of this building. Past the skyscrapers and ghettos of this city. Out, somewhere far away, to some forgotten corner of her nature. To some part of herself that hadn’t been sullied or hurt. I saw her eyes soften as she rested there.

“Where is he Anna?” the words caught in my throat. My pen lost to the couch cushions.

“If you can still save me,” she said, unblinking, “then I will let him live.”