A new volume of succinct yet stirring stories arrives with the second season of Future Fables. Exploring how the ancient fable form may bring us replenishment, comfort and perhaps guidance for the modern day, celebrated contemporary writers weave yarns that resonate and illuminate in equal measure.

An Australian writer of Aboriginal Mununjali Yugambeh and Dutch heritage, Ellen van Neerven has won various literary prizes for their works of fiction, poetry, drama and non-fiction.

Their fable invites us to reflect on the relationship between humans and the lands we inhabit, giving us a bird’s eye view on how we can better understand our connections with the natural world.

The Eagle’s Daughters

by Ellen Van Neerven

The Eagle’s daughters remembered falling before flying.

It was a quiet cloudy day. Their mother’s warmth was over them and they had recently eaten.

The Man owned the farm below. That afternoon, he had set out on the field with his rifle and shot the nest out of the tree.

The Eagle’s daughters were just hatchlings, weeks away from supervised flying. The smaller sister had barely opened her eyes.

Early wings protruded from their backs that day, and a miracle happened, halfway during the long fall from the tall tree they lifted and began to fly. The sky was full and tremendous. Flying felt like sun and blood. Quickly their bodies began to tire. The larger sister lasted longer, yet both dropped and hit the ground hard.

They were still alive. But The Man’s had made his shot. Their mother was dead. Her bloodied and lifeless body was on the grass near them.

The Man walked over to inspect his kill, scuffing his boots in the ground.

He didn’t see the chicks, small in the tall grass. They huddled together, panting, silently crying, until the ringing in their heads stopped.

At dusk their father swooped down to move them to higher ground; another tree that looked over the valley. It was the lack of warmth on their bodies in a thin makeshift nest while their father left to hunt that let them know their mother was gone with finality.

It was not new, their father wanted them to know. Men killed eagles. He told stories of a community of eagles existing before. This valley used to be big enough for multiple pairs. Until only one. And now half of one.

Their father soon took them flying. When they had built enough stamina, he showed them the Sad Place. A pile of carcasses on the farm. Surviving would be against the odds.

A while later, their father left to hunt rabbit one morning and never came back. The daughters feared the worst, he had also succumbed to the pile.

Now young adults and almost full size, they roamed their ancestral place with their father’s training.

It was unusual for two sibling eagles to survive in a clutch. Usually only one survived, especially in dry years like these. However their intense fledgeling had created a bond in them.

Some would say unnatural. For word had spread across the range of the twin eagles and that one had a twisted heart. That there was darkness within it.
*
One of the Eagle’s daughters had taken to watching The Man’s wife’s growing belly. The Woman was rarely sighted, but each time she came out of the house in the mid-afternoon, to sweat and put clothes on the line, her stomach was a larger size.

As the eagles aged their sense of the range widened. They watched The Man’s chemicals poison the river and saw sick trees, suffering animals.

We should leave, the small sister told the big sister. Had any eagles left the perimeter of the range? Ventured to the other side?

No, the other side is another’s place. We would die there.

They were their mother’s first chicks. She and their father never got the opportunity to raise others. They defended their parents’ territory.

The small one dreamt about her mother every night. Do Eagles dream? Her feet, her cry. The way their parents used to call out to each other at dawn and dusk.

And the smaller sister would whisper on those cold nights, What do you remember of her?

Only meat. The big sister would answer.

*
As The Woman’s belly grew, the big sister got stronger. Swooping low, she was able to lift small marsupials off the ground. Wings at large, spread.

She wasn’t the only one with a secret. The smaller eagle didn’t tell the bigger one about the song over the valley.

The voice came to the smaller eagle while the big one was sleeping. Come with me, he sang. It’s beautiful over here. I will watch our chicks while you soar across many orange skies.

I will not leave my sister.
There is nothing left here for you. Soon, you will come.

One day The Man and The Woman bundled swiftly in their car and drove to the highway. They were away for several hours. It got dark and then it got dark once again.

Finally, The Man and The Woman came back in the high of the morning, holding a child wrapped in a blanket.

The big sister lifted a lamb off the ground and didn’t share.

She watched the house. The opportunities would increase as they let the baby play in the backyard.

The smaller sister became aware and uncomfortable of the big sister’s plan. One night she decided to speak up.

How could we do what they did to us? she asked.
How could we not? the big sister replied. Flesh for flesh.
This will not bring our mother closer, the small sister urged.

*
Months went by with the big sister watching the house and the smaller sister watching her and the river getting sicker. The Man set bait and the eagle’s daughters did not know if their next meal would be their last.

The smaller sister woke up with a bellyache. They had the spent the last night feeding from roo roadkill and she had a hefty share. She was tempted to snooze further when she realised her sister wasn’t nearby.
Following her hunch, the smaller sister flew to the farmhouse and took position in a nearby tree.

A bright blue dot crossed the yard. The Child had received a new beanie as a birthday present around the same time she started walking. The Man and The Woman were nowhere to be seen.

The blue dot moved further and further from the house and the smaller sister wanted to scream a warning.

She scanned the sky for their sister. There she was – mighty and powerful – flinging towards the blue dot at speed. The smaller sister dove after her.

The blue dot looked up, eyes wide. The eagle’s daughters collided – a spectacular sight – fighting mid-air. They had never fought like this. They were at each other’s throats, snarling and tearing each other to pieces.

I should have done this when we were chicks, the bigger sister said. Her talon pressed on her sister’s throat.

Before she could press down any further, a shot pierced the air and forced the eagles to scatter. The Man raced to The Child’s side, her beanie had slipped off.

At the tree the sisters met again, this time for the final time.

You wish to kill and destroy everything so I must leave, the smaller sister said.

Now completely alone, the bigger sister cried all night, her feathers shivering.

*
Years passed and the larger sister did not venture near the farmhouse. She lived off lizard, drank very little. She got old and her feathers went grey.

The Child grew up seeing an eagle-less sky. The word around the valley was that there was no more of the big birds.

It was a rainy afternoon when the eagle flew near the house again to visit The Child, who was shocked but somehow not scared. For the eagle had changed so much, brittle bones, and weak legs, and her flight was heavy. The eagle swooped down to sit on the shed and looked directly into The Child’s eyes, showed her a world. It was a dream where the land was healthy and fine, the river flowing and full of life. All this was future and inheritance.

When The Man and The Woman grew old and passed, The Child remembered what she had seen. The Child knew what would happen if she didn’t listen – the eagle’s eyes had warned her of that. The Child moved with the land and listened to its non-human inhabitants, those who belonged. The farm shut down, trees were restored. The place became an eagle haven once more, where the descendants of the sisters lived in peace and harmony.

______________________

Ellen van Neerven (they/them) is an award-winning author, editor and educator of Mununjali (Yugambeh language group) and Dutch heritage. Ellen‘s first book, Heat and Light (UQP, 2014), a novel-in-stories, was the recipient of the David Unaipon Award, the Dobbie Literary Award and the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards Indigenous Writers Prize.  Their first poetry collection Comfort Food (UQP, 2016) won the Tina Kane Emergent Award and was shortlisted for the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards Kenneth Slessor Prize. Throat (UQP, 2020) was the recipient of Book of the Year, the Kenneth Slessor Prize and the Multicultural Award at 2021 NSW Literary Awards and the inaugural Quentin Bryce Award. Personal Score: Sport, Culture, Identity (UQP, 2023), a book that weaves history, memoir, journalism and poetry, is now available.

They are the editor of three collections, including the recent Homeland Calling: Words from a New Generation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voices and Unlimited Futures with Sudanese multilingual writer Rafeif Ismail.

A new volume of succinct yet stirring stories arrives with the second season of Future Fables. Exploring how the ancient fable form may bring us replenishment, comfort and perhaps guidance for the modern day, celebrated contemporary writers weave yarns that resonate and illuminate in equal measure.

As a senior scribe at Aesop, George Walker has a deep interest in the power of words and the transformative impact of sharing stories.

In this playful, mischievous tale, an unexpected visitor causes a commotion among a scurry of squirrels.

The Seasonal Scurry

by George Walker

You could tell that winter was approaching well before the first snowflakes fell. It was in the furtive glances and the ears pricked in alertness. A knowing hush spread among the scurry, as the task ahead became as clear as the leafless branches of the trees. It was best to pretend you didn’t realise this, of course—that you had no idea that soon the ground would be coated in white and that berries would harden on the trees. (A head start was always helpful for getting the best stocked larder, after all.)

There was always a sense of playfulness to this annual tradition, however. Sometimes you would see a bushy tail bob behind a trunk, and then greet the fellow burrower with a sly question. Something like:

‘Oh, what are you up to at this time of the morning?’

And they might reply:

‘Nothing…nope…just taking in the morning air,’ their cheeks filled with nuts.

Yes, the squirreling away of one’s favoured fare was a task of artful deception and espionage, yet also one of comradery and delight. A touch of good-humoured chiding helped to balance the competitivity, as did a dash of neighbourly consideration. For example, when you discovered that a fellow competitor had merely pretended to store something to throw you off the scent, an appreciation for their wiliness most often prevailed over any feelings of annoyance.

That year, however, something felt different. A sense of suspicion had spread like frost. No one dropped each other hints about where a plentiful supply had been spotted, nor did they ensure there were a few nuts left for the next visitor.

The unease had been growing since the start of summer, when roaring machines had arrived at the edge of the wood and ripped through twisting brambles, their metal teeth gouging at the soil. Now, with the machines long gone, new structures stood silently at the edge of the wood—huge monoliths of stone surrounded by perfectly coiffured gardens. At night their faces lit up with squares of light, winking in the darkness. Many hoped that things would return to normal now that the human’s work had finished, but the houses brought a new resident that no one had foreseen.

The grey squirrel was first spotted by a young member of the scurry, who saw him running across the lawn of one of the gardens. They said he looked and moved just like them, but that he was as grey as a rain cloud.

At first the chief squirrel tutted with disapproval.

‘We’ve had enough commotion this year without such fanciful stories,’ they said, shaking their flame-red tail.

But soon there were more sightings of this unfamiliar character, and after a few days the red squirrels crowded on branches to look at how the new local feasted on nuts caged in metal cylinders, hanging from branches above the lawns, or else darted up to wooden platforms where he would scare off robins to gorge on a selection of seeds. The chief squirrel told the scurry it wasn’t natural to act in such a way—that it wasn’t safe in the gardens and that the woods would serve them just fine, as they always had. Some of the youngsters, however, looked on in awe at how easily the grey squirrel dined.

Finally, the young squirrel who had first spotted the grey-haired resident braved the climb up the fence and dropped down into the garden. She climbed up the strangely angular trunk in the centre of the lawn and crawled atop the platform which held a bounty of delicious fare. As she began to squeeze a golden peanut into her cheek, a voice made her freeze.

‘Just what do you think you are doing?’

It was the grey squirrel, who had appeared just behind her.

‘I, I…just saw this food out here and thought, well, there’s plenty to share,’ replied the youngster, stuttering.

‘Sorry, I think there’s been a little misunderstanding,’ said the grey squirrel, sternly. ‘These nuts are for me. And while I appreciate you have shown a little more courage than the rest of you sat up their staring at me, that is exactly where you should stay.’

‘But, why?’ asked the red squirrel, confused.

‘That’s just the way it is. The gardens are my domain,’ proclaimed the grey squirrel ‘And besides, it’s been so long that I’ve eaten from a branch, it would play havoc with my digestion,’ they said, pawing through the offerings.

‘You don’t eat acorns?’ asked the red squirrel.

‘Well, no, of course not. I’m acorn intolerant,’ said the grey squirrel, ‘My favoured nuts are macadamias—perhaps a Brazil—a peanut like you have there is passable, at a push.’

‘You’re acorn what?’ asked the red squirrel, trying to keep up.

‘Intolerant, dear. Which is how I’m feeling about this conversation, come to think of it,’ said the grey squirrel, rolling their eyes. ‘So, run along now. And please let your fellow red-haired fellows know to stay behind the fence, OK?’

News of the grey squirrel’s incivility soon circulated among the scurry, and any intrigue about him was now replaced by disdain. Rumours crept among the branches that he had been seen plundering hidden stashes, and had been caught hissing into the trees. A passing robin even said that they had seen him wrestle with the human’s cat—and won—but this report was never confirmed.

And so, that is how the yearly tradition of sorting one’s food stores had become wrapped up in doubt and distrust. As the snow thickened, individual efforts became even more urgent, and passing greetings were no longer shared. If the grey squirrel could act so selfishly, what would stop others doing the same?

Some weeks later in the depths of winter, a lone member of the scurry pulled themselves from the warmth of their nest to locate one of their stores. On their way, they peered over the fence at the neat snow-covered lawn. How monstrously flawless it looked—a vast expanse of nothingness. But, in fact, there was an imperfection—a stain on the blanket of white. Embedded into the snow, just below the platform where the grey squirrel came to feed, was a strange round shape, with a grey tail sticking out at an odd angle. At first the red squirrel thought of ignoring the sight (after all, they had been told time and time again that they shouldn’t worry themselves with affairs from over the fence), but their good nature got the better of them.

They returned to the lawn with the chief, the youngster and a few other members of the scurry. The chief gently butted the grey squirrel’s body with his nose as someone shielded the youngster’s eyes. He didn’t move for one, two, three seconds, and then…

‘What on earth is going on? Why are you nudging me like that?’ spluttered the grey squirrel, angry and confused.

‘You seem to have taken a fall,’ replied the chief, relieved and exasperated in equal measure.

‘A fall? Oh dear, well, I’m feeling quite alright now—no need to hang around, you can get back to nibbling on thorns or whatever it is you like doing,’ said the grey squirrel, dusting snowflakes from their fur.

‘Right. Yes. Must get back to that,’ said the chief, irritated, ‘but be careful; more snow is coming, you can’t be laid out here like that again. There are foxes. It’s time to get your stores and hide out for a little while.’

‘Yes, my stores…’ said the grey squirrel. ‘That shouldn’t take me long, they’re just…’ a look of confusion drifted across the grey squirrel’s face as they gestured across the blank expanse of the lawn. A look that was soon replaced by one of panic.

‘I have no idea where they are!’ they exclaimed.

‘What do you mean?’ asked the youngster.

‘I, I have no idea where they all are. I can’t remember. It’s gone! They’re gone! Why can’t I remember?’ asked the grey squirrel, their head darting in all directions.

‘Calm down, calm down,’ said the chief. ‘Let’s think about this calmly, shall we?’

They took the grey squirrel back to the woods, guiding him through the undergrowth. Back at the central nest, they settled him into a bed of moss and let him sleep away his pounding head.

As he slept, the scurry convened. It was a long time since they had met like this, and the atmosphere was frosty.

What if he’s just making it up?

Why should we care?

Shoulda left him to the foxes, I say.

The angry voices swirled above the chief’s appeals for quiet. Never had he seen the scurry so unruly and unforgiving. By the time the voices fell silent, the chief was too exhausted to lead the conversation, but another voice took the lead; the youngster, who had been the first to meet the grey squirrel those many weeks ago.

‘They’re all good points, everyone. All really good points,’ she said, a little nervously, ‘but are we really going to leave him with no food? Is that our way?’

The scurry looked at one another.

‘I say, maybe it’s time for a different tradition,’ she continued, feeling a little braver, ‘that we stop this game of ours. Stop the suspicious glances. The faking. The unfairness. It’s just not fun anymore. There’s enough food for everyone if we just put it all together—everyone, including him.’

The silence thickened as the crowd looked down at their paws. The chief rose to his feet once again and walked away from the nest, and soon the others started to shuffle away too. It seemed the meeting was over.

As the young squirrel let out a cheerless sigh, the chief returned, an acorn in his hand, which he threw into the centre of the ground.

‘She’s right,’ said the chief, ‘a new tradition starts now.’

No further words were said, but soon everyone was gathering their stashes and bringing them back to the main nests at the centre of the wood. Never had the woodland been so animated at this time of year. The sight was extraordinary: banquets piled high with the woodland’s finest treasures—acorns, berries, seeds and even the odd bulb.

As the final bits of food were added to the feast, the grey squirrel emerged, still a little wobbly on his feet.

‘I don’t know what to say!’ exclaimed the grey squirrel, an unfamiliar note of emotion in his voice.

‘No need to talk, just eat,’ said the chief.

‘Splendid, thank you,’ replied the squirrel obediently, ‘Now, any chance of some macadamias?’ they asked, smirking.

—-

Come spring, once the snow and ice had melted, the chief sat atop a high branch, pondering. How cold and inhospitable the wood had seemed just weeks ago—but still the green shoots had come, resilient and dependable.

He thought of the grey squirrel, the fence, the imposing houses, the way the scurry had bickered and fought, but also of how such tensions had so quickly thawed; how just one germination of kindness had grown amidst the cold. Deep-rooted. Instinctive. Enduring.

______________________

As a senior scribe at Aesop, George Walker has a deep interest in the power of words and the transformative impact of sharing stories. When he isn’t writing for Aesop’s stores, website, or amber bottles, he can be found working on the draft of a first novel, following tutelage at Faber’s ‘Writing a Novel’ course and years spent filling notebooks.

A new volume of succinct yet stirring stories arrives with the second season of Future Fables. Exploring how the ancient fable form may bring us replenishment, comfort and perhaps guidance for the modern day, celebrated contemporary writers weave yarns that resonate and illuminate in equal measure.

Based in Boulder, Colorado, Stephen Graham Jones is the author of nearly 30 novels, collections, novellas and comic books. His writing typically spans horror, crime and science fiction, and references his heritage as a Blackfoot Native American.

In this darkly comic tale, Jones urges us to accept life’s inevitabilities, even the frightening ones.

The Three Golden Nails

by Stephen Graham Jones

Three nails were standing in a crossbeam five feet up a wall in the third house on the fifth street of what was going to be a housing development someday, according to the signs on the fences and the hopes of the builders and investors. Each of the nails’ chisel points were embedded in the dry white pine of their board, but most of their golden selves were bare and exposed.

“I hope this will be a closet,” the first nail said, almost giggling with the thrill of it all. “Closets are good, closets are necessary.”

Because all the houses were, for the moment, just frames with no sheetrock or siding, there was no easy to way to tell what was going to be what.

“I hope this is a hallway,” the second nail said wistfully. “Then we can watch the family rushing up and down it before they go off into the day to their respective pursuits.”

“It doesn’t matter where we are,” the third nail said. “The hammer is coming, do you two not know that? Do you know what violence hammers do to nails?”

“My mother told me of the sweet kiss of the hammer, yes,” the first nail said.

The second added, “Supposedly you can hear it whistling down for you, and time will slow down when you hear the air parting, such that it becomes a moan, then a bellow, then a steady falling rumble, which is the bumpy sound its textured head makes right before it makes that good, good contact.”

“Exactly!” said the third nail. “The hammer comes, the hammer comes! It longs to drive us in up to our throats, silencing us forever!”

“I believe we still creak from time to time, don’t we?” the second nail asked. “Am I wrong?”

“I believe it’s the board that does the creaking?” the first nail asked, with all due hesitation.

“And don’t forget the gurgling of the pipes and the hissing and popping of the exposed wires,” the first nail added.

“It doesn’t matter!” the third nail said, twisting as much as it could, as if it wriggle up and out.

“But we can’t stay like this, can we?” the first nail asked, looking around. “All exposed and bare?”

“The rust, the rust,” the second nail added, almost afraid to give such a thing voice.

“Rust?” the third nail asked.

“The board is dry,” the first nail explained. “There’s no moisture in there, once we’re fully hammered in.”

“The board is our prison!” the third nail said, still twisting in place. “Do the two of you not realize what awaits us one of these mornings?”

“Fulfillment?” the first nail asked.

“The hammer is the end,” the third nail said.

“It is?” the second nail said, incredulous. This went against everything it had been taught. But the third nail was so certain.

“Don’t listen,” the first nail whispered to the second nail. “I’ve heard about nails like this.”

“Nails that want to survive, you mean?” the third nail asked, for its ears were very good.

“But we’re nails,” the second nail objected. “What’s the purpose of a nail, if not to be nailed into a board?”

“We hold this closet up,” the first nail added.

“Or this hallway,” the second nail agreed, satisfied with the new direction this was taking.

“Or we’re just practice?” the third nail asked both of them. “Why are we only positioned to be nailed in? Isn’t there the chance that we’re mistakes, that we’re only tapped in because someone didn’t know exactly where to place us?”

The two other nails considered this. They looked around. All the other nails they could see were just heads now, flush with their boards, their lives either complete or over, it was getting harder and harder to tell.

“He’s right,” the first nail said.

“Why are we here?” the second nail asked, wanting to shrink into itself in fear.

For long minutes, no nail said anything. Then, finally, the second nail said, “I think there must be a young builder on-site. I believe the one training him placed us here for him to nail in, to hold this hallway up.”

“Or this closet,”” the first nail said, sort of under its breath.

“Whatever it is,” the second nail said.

“What if this is the kitchen?” the third nail asked. “Kitchens are the first to get remodeled, aren’t they? In a few years’ time, we’re in a rubble heap. What purpose would that serve?”

“A kitchen is the heart of a home?” the first nail said, not very sure of itself.

“I can smell the flavors now,” the second nail said, staging a grand inhale.

“I don’t even know how to talk to the two of you,” the third nail said. “You want the hammer to come. You know we won’t be able to speak with each other like this when we’re hammered into the board, don’t you?”

Neither the first nor the second nail had considered this.

They looked to each other, less certain about things than they had been.

“But without the hammer,” the second nail asked, putting the thought together as it went, “are we even still nails anymore?”

“We’re still pointy, with these round heads,” the third nail said.

“We still have these gills at the top of our necks,” the first nail said, stretching to show them off.

“Those are to keep us in the board better!” the third nail said, its voice trying to fill the house, except there were no walls yet.

“Which holds the closet together better?” the first nail said, sort of like a question.

“Or the hallway?” the second nail added.

“It’s a bedroom,” the board rumbled, all around them. “This is the wall of the house’s biggest bedroom.”

The three nails screamed in their heads and tried to escape the holes they were tapped into.

“You’re alive?” the first nail asked.

“Are we hurting you?” the second nail asked.

“We’re all going to be hidden behind the sheetrock!” the third nail said. “We won’t be able to watch the family grow! We’ll be in the dark forever!”

“But with each other, right?” the second nail said.

“Maybe that’s why we’re so close?” the first added. “So we won’t be lonely?”

“The hammer doesn’t care if we’re lonely!” the third nail yelled. “It only wants to hammer us! That’s why it exists!”

“Wouldn’t it be sad if it didn’t get to?” the second nail asked.

“Who cares about the hammer!” the third nail said. “Aaagh! Why do I have to spend the few moments I have left with nails that are worried they might hurt the hammer’s feelings?”

“The hammer is violent,” the board rumbled. “But so was the saw, for me.”

“Do you hate the saw?” the first nail asked, hesitant to be so bold.

“It was loud and it was fast,” the board said, creaking the slightest bit.

“Would you rather still be a tree in the forest?” the second nail asked, not exactly sure how to phrase it.

“Would you rather be particles of metal in the rock underground?” the board asked back.

“I would rather not get nailed into you,” the third nail said. “No offense.”

“It’s good to be one wall of a bedroom,” the board said, reciting what it had been taught, or told, it could no longer remember.

“We can still see the closet from here, I bet,” the first nail said.

“And the family gets here through the hallway,” the second nail said.

“And when the hammer hits you, your world fills with sound and heat and pain!” the third nail screeched.

“It hurts?” the first nail asked.

“A lot?” the second asked.

“So much!” the third nail confirmed. “And then we get shut in here in the darkness forever, because nobody remodels bedrooms as deep as the walls.”

“But the family might nail other nails in,” the second nail said. “To hang pictures on the walls? Those nails could bring us news.”

“To torture us about the outside world?” the third nail said. “No thanks.”

“What would you have us do?” the first nail asked.

“Avoid the hammer!” the third nail said. “I’m beginning to think the two of you don’t have very sharp points!”

“Avoid the hammer because it hurts . . . ” the second nail said, and would have hugged itself warm it it could have.

“Avoid the hammer so we can still talk to each other . . . ” the first nail said.

“The hammer’s the worst,” the third nail said.

“It is scary,” the board confirmed. “And sometimes it drives ones like you in crooked, and has to slam you flat.”

“That happens?” the first and second nail asked as one.

“More than you think,” the board confirmed.

“I thought it was just two or three taps and done,” the first nail mumbled.

“Ideally, yes,” the third nail said. “But accidents happen all the time. And ‘tap’ is quite the charitable term. ‘Pummel’ might be more accurate. ‘Slam’ would work. ‘Strike,’ ‘drive,’ ‘batter,’ it just goes on and on. Maybe it’s a different word with every hit?”

The three nails shivered in their holes.

“If we stand very still, maybe the hammer will miss us,” the first nail said.

“And if we’re less shiny, it won’t see us,” the second added.

“And we can’t talk, either,” the third said. “The hammer might hear.”

So the three of them stood as still as they could, and didn’t speak a word, and tried to be as dull as possible, and so the hammer did end up missing them, and they got walled in.

In the darkness, the first one said, quietly, “We made it!”

The second one said back, “The hammer never came for us!”

The third nail didn’t say anything. It was wishing that it wasn’t trapped in this dusty eternity with two nails as uninteresting as these two.

“Now the hammer will never find you,” the board boomed through the darkness.

And so it didn’t. But the moisture did, and the rust, and after the second family, the three nails were twisting this way and that, trying to sink

down deeper into their holes, but their holes didn’t go any deeper, not without the hammer, so they just recycled the same questions and observations and jokes, and when a picture-hanging nail finally shoved into their space, admitting a ring of light for a brief moment, all the three nails could do was plead for it to please alert the hammer to their presence, they missed it, they needed it, but picture-hanging nails aren’t to be trusted with such missions, they only care about the precious art they hold, so the three nails just endured, and crumbled, and by the fourth family, there was nothing left to say to each other, so they didn’t.

The moral is that the hammer comes for us all, and it’s scary, yes,
but woe to those who would seek to avoid that frightening moment.

______________________

Stephen Graham Jones is the NYT bestselling author of some thirty novels and collections, and there’s some novellas and comic books in there as well. Most recent are Don’t Fear the Reaper and the ongoing Earthdivers. Up before too long are The Angel of Indian Lake and I Was a Teenage Slasher. Stephen lives and teaches in Boulder, Colorado.

A new volume of succinct yet stirring stories arrives with the second season of Future Fables. Exploring how the ancient fable form may bring us replenishment, comfort and perhaps guidance for the modern day, celebrated contemporary writers weave yarns that resonate and illuminate in equal measure.

A writer, researcher and editor, currently working toward her PhD at the University of Oslo, Regina Kanyu Wang artfully weaves together gender politics, environmental issues, and an otherworldly perspective. Following her deep interest in science fiction, this playful yet poignant tale invites us to reflect on the importance we place on the opinions of others.

A Day of Snaky

by Regina Kanyu Wang

It must be the worst day of Snaky’s life.

Early flight, traffic rush, long queue at check-in counter, and strictest control on overweight carry-on luggage.
She could not check in the bag. It was full of company devices. Her mission was to take those samples to an exhibition abroad and win customers. It was not a big exhibition. Neither was the country a promising market – it was saturated with numerous local competitors. She was sent there only because nobody wanted to travel. If she didn’t go, she would lose the job. And if she failed to achieve a single order, she would also be fired. She was used to that. Being snaky was never easy.

After taking out the empty pages of a notebook, eating up the snacks she prepared as lunch, and putting on the extra coat she brought, she was finally allowed to board. Seeing the scales on her skin and tail under her clothing, the other passengers on the plane tried their best to keep a distance from her. She tried to pretend not to notice and found her seat, curling her tail and sitting down. Being snaky was always tough.

But that was not the toughest part of the trip.

Upon arrival, Snaky got stuck in the gap between the aircraft and the jet bridge, got lost in the maze of public transportations, and got rejected at the hotel check-in due to a system mistake. When she solved all the issues and entered her room, she just wanted to rest. She took a shower, combed her scales with a brush, and looked at herself in the mirror. The human-animal fusion project had gone on for decades. But after generations of gene dilution, she still had characteristics of a snake, which she urgently wished to get rid of. She covered her face with her hands – something that differs her from the snake ancestor – and felt something unusual. She scrutinized herself carefully in the mirror and found a small piece of her skin next to the mouth peeling.

No, not now, not today. She was going to the exhibition tomorrow morning, talking with potential customers and showcasing them the products. What can be less persuading than a snake? A moulting snake.

Snaky tried to tear off the skin, but it got worse. A larger chunk split from her cheek and trembled in the air, but the rest was reluctant to shed. She felt that swelling underneath and the weakness deep inside but dared not to touch it anymore. The moulting process could last up to two weeks, but she needed to present in decent shape tomorrow.

The first thought came to mind was augmented reality. Snaky was sure that the technology had already been commercialized somewhere in this world and probably in this city, that she would be able to appear as a rabbit, a dog, or a deer with the digital filter, and that the others would be more friendly to her seeing the cute avatar instead of a snake.

She rushed down to the hotel reception and asked about the nearest electronics store. Following the reception’s instruction, she found one on the next road.

“May I help you?” The staff that welcomed her was a tiger-shaped.

“Errr yes, or no. Well, I’m not sure. I’m looking for some AR device that can…veil my appearance?” Snaky carefully considered her words.

“Sorry, Ma’am, I am not sure what you mean. Do you want to look at our latest AR glasses?” The staff responded.

“Not for me, but for others. Well, ultimately for me. OK, look, the skin around my mouth is peeling off, and I need to attend an important event tomorrow, so I want others to see me in the best shape.” Snaky said.

“Ah, I see. You must be shanghuo. The inner heat makes your body lack of water. You need to drink liangcha, the herbal tea, to rebalance your body. You don’t need AR devices. You can find a liangcha shop next door, which is my favorite one in the city.” The staff blinked and escorted her out.

The liangcha-maker was a wolf-shaped lady. She examined Snaky’s face and handed her a bottle of black liquid. “Drink this, with wild honeysuckle, chrysanthemum, and my secret recipe. It will help to calm down your inner heat and detoxicate.”

“Thanks.” Snaky took over the bottle and drank it upside down. The bitterness made her frown, but she did not complain.

“Good girl. Good medicine tastes bitter. You come here and drink my tea for three days, and the sickness will go away.”

“But I’m going to present at an exhibition tomorrow, and I’m worried that the peeling skin would scare others. You know, my snake-shape is already bad enough. I cannot solicit any business like this.”

“You are worried about your skin and appearance? You should go to a beauty salon. Across the street and turn left, you will find one opened by my friend.” The liangcha-shop owner showed her the way.

Snaky pushed the door open hesitantly. She had never stepped into a beauty salon before. She was afraid of the strange look from other customers like cats and birds.

“Welcome, welcome,” A fox-shape walked out. “What can I do for you today?”

“My skin is peeling off. I am wondering whether you can help to make it look not so…so ugly and scary.” Snaky mumbled in low voice.

“What are you talking about? You look gorgeous!” The fox exclaimed. “Let me see. There is a little peeling. I can cut it off. Easy task. Please lie down here.”

Snaky did so.

The fox caressed Snaky’s skin gently with some foam and said: “You have a beautiful skin, smooth and glossy.”

Snaky felt relaxing and some words slipped out of her mouth. “You really think so? I thought everyone was afraid of snake.”

“How could that happen? I don’t see that at all.” The fox wiped the foam with a soft cotton cloth.

“I feel that everywhere. You know, the stereotypes and cultural annotations, the Aesopian fable and the Bible.”

The fox used scissors to carefully cut off Snaky’s peeling skin little by little. “Aha, there are also bad associations with fox in my culture like hulijing, the beautiful fox monster that seduces men. But they are ancient, nothing to do with our present. If you want to talk about old times, we have the mythology as well. The goddess Nvwa and the god Fuxi are both half-snake. One created humankind and one created characters.”

“Really? I never know that.”

“How you sense the world depends on how you see yourself. There are always good things and bad things in the surrounding. What you can do is to embrace yourself and care for yourself. And then you will always feel the good.” The fox applied some products to Snaky’s skin and said, “You can sit up now. Have a look.”

Snaky rose and looked into the mirror. A shiny Snaky looked back with a peaceful and joyful smile. She felt the power that she had never felt before.

In the end, it wasn’t the worst day in her life, probably one of the best. And being snaky was not that hard at all.

______________________

Regina Kanyu Wang is a bilingual writer from Shanghai who has won multiple Xingyun Awards, the SF Comet International SF Writing Competition, and the Annual Best Works of Shanghai Writers’ Association Awards. She’s also been nominated for several Hugo Awards in 2023. Her stories can be found in Shanghai Literature, Galaxy’s Edge, Clarkesworld and more. Her essays can be found in publications such as Mithila Review, Broken Stars, and Korean Literature Now. She has published two science fiction story collections, Of Cloud and Mist 2.2 and The Seafood Restaurant in Chinese and her works have been translated into multiple languages and published around the world. She was co-editor of the 2022 collection The Way Spring Arrives and she is also a PhD fellow of the CoFUTURES project at the University of Oslo, researching Chinese science fiction from gender and environmental perspectives.

A new volume of succinct yet stirring stories arrives with the second season of Future Fables. Exploring how the ancient fable form may bring us replenishment, comfort and perhaps guidance for the modern day, celebrated contemporary writers weave yarns that resonate and illuminate in equal measure.

The work of avid photographer, South East London resident and award-winning novelist Caleb Azumah Nelson is influenced by his Ghanaian heritage, visits to local cinemas and galleries, and the playlists that soundtrack his writing. His second novel, Small Worlds, was released in May 2023.

In his Future Fable, two canine companions grow to understand the preciousness of moments spent together, despite the looming fear of being torn apart.

Forever We Shall

by Caleb Azumah Nelson

It had been like this, always: Joel and Jeff, waking up beside one another, sometime in the early hours of the morning. Perhaps, in the course of the night, one of them had rolled and twisted, a limb now lazed across the other’s coat or resting atop the snout. Either way, one of the brothers would shift, and after a few seconds of a blind stumble, a morning greeting. Outside, where, whatever the season, a dawn frost on the ground beneath their feet. All this quiet in the world before anyone else had woken, all this possibility in the approaching hours of the day.

They would be fed, as music drifted down towards them from the main house, and after this, they would make their own music as they raced out and up of their enclosed space, coming up the hills of the countryside they called home. From here, they would observe the shift in the seasons: winter’s quiet devastation, the ground grazed by snow and frost; spring’s new promise of blossom and bloom and possibility; summer’s endless days, the night barely appearing, before sunlight arrived once more; autumn’s soft tumble towards the end of the year, towards the certainty of time passing. It didn’t seem like much, but to them, it was everything.

‘I could do this forever,’ Joel would say to Jeff, watching light graze the horizon.

‘And forever we shall.’

*

A few days before Jeff’s 7th birthday, sometime towards the end of summer, he woke up alone. This had happened before, on the few occasions Joel couldn’t sleep, and he would break out through the flap while it was still barely light, taking time to pad about the green space, to contemplate, to occupy his own quiet while he waited for Jeff to wake up. But today, when Jeff emerges, Joel is nowhere to be found. He calls for his brother, once, twice but the echo of his own bark is the only response. In the uncertainty, the distance grows; the anxiety multiplies with each moment that passes.

Minutes become hours. His hope becomes despair. He half hopes Joel is playing with him, hiding in the seclusion of plain sight, at any moment, bursting out in front of him, gently ribbing and teasing, I was right in front of you, you passed me so many times, and they’ll carry on with their daily routine, with their wander across hills and plains, always something new to discover, or another way of seeing what they already know. They’ll carry on spending time together, which Jeff believes is what love is: time spent occupying the space possibility makes.

But Joel doesn’t magically appear. There’s no trace or hint of his bark. Only silence. Jeff feels like a rib has been wrenched from its cage, like he’s missing something. He eyes his breakfast in the corner of the room, but can only nudge the food around the bowl. Eventually, he decides to settle outside, on the grass, where he can watch and wait for Joel’s return.

When Joel does appear, halfway through the day, that late summer sun sitting high in the sky, it’s with a limp. Some of his beautiful brown coat has been shorn away, a little on his hind. He’s exhausted.

‘Where were you?’ Jeff demands.

‘Good to see you too, brother,’ Joel says, always smiling, always joking.

‘I thought…well I don’t know what I thought,.’ Jeff says.

‘It’s ok. I’m here now.’

‘Shall we go up the hill?’

‘If it’s ok with you, I would like to rest for a bit. I’ll be ready to run again tomorrow. But feel free to go without me.’

Jeff had never imagined life without Joel, and as this fresh possibility arrives, he doesn’t really know what to do with it. His mind spins with confusion, but he goes out all the same, running as hard he as he can, running until he is breathless. The sharpness of the pain in his rib dulls, but the small, low ache remains.

*

As the year goes on, and they slide through Autumn, towards a wet and cold winter, Joel is less and less active. He often sleeps in, and it takes a nudge on the snout from Jeff to wake him. The blind stumble that Joel blinks awake last minutes, rather than seconds, and he’s eating less too. But still, they make it out and up the hill, still, they watch for the shift in seasons, the passing of time.

‘I’m very tired today,’ Joel says. ‘Come lie beside me.’ Jeff does, twisting himself as tightly as he can into Joel’s body.

After a while, Joel says, ‘There will be a time when we won’t be able to do this anymore. When I won’t be here.’

‘I don’t know what I’ll do,’ Jeff says. ‘It’s always been like this, me and you.’

‘And it’ll be like this always. The memories won’t go. I’ll always be somewhere close.’ Joel nudges at one of Jeff’s ribs. Jeff can barely look at his brother, scared of what he’s being confronted with.

‘Everything will change.’

Joel nods. ‘It’ll feel like that time just before dawn, when the night feels endless. It will feel like the sun isn’t coming. It will probably feel like that for a long time. And then, some light will break through.’

‘But for now? We’ll do this forever.’ And by this, Joel means they’ll carry on spending time together, which they both believe is what love is: time spent occupying the space possibility makes.

‘And forever we shall.’

______________________

Caleb Azumah Nelson is a British-Ghanaian writer and photographer living in South East London. His first novel, OPEN WATER, won the Costa First Novel Award and Debut of the Year at the British Book Awards, and was a number-one Times bestseller. It was also shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize, the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year Award, Waterstones Book of the Year, and longlisted for the Gordon Burn Prize and the Desmond Elliott Prize. He was selected as a National Book Foundation ‘5 under 35’ honoree by Brit Bennett.

Our newest podcast series, Future Fables, in partnership with Aesop, offers newly imagined fables that will catalyze both conversation and contemplation. Written by some of today’s most thought-provoking authors, each of these bedtime stories for adults adopts the ancient fable form to help us navigate the complexities of modern life.

Mieko Kawakami’s Future Fable invites us to reconsider common fears, while underlining the preciousness of friendship.

It was early winter when I saw them again. It happened out of the blue, and I hadn’t seen any of them since they left. A complete surprise. How many years had it been? With the one I hadn’t seen for the longest time, it had to be forty years. But from then on, we’d all get together, sit around the table, sometimes have tea, sometimes take a walk down a mountain path, laugh, maybe lie in bed and just talk, comfort someone when she’s crying, or joke around with one another. I’d met each of them separately, at different moments in my life, and each one of them had died in her own way and in her own time. What they had in common was that they weren’t here anymore. And that, in the time we’d shared together, I’d loved each of them in my own way, as flawed as that love might have been.

The girls started appearing in my dreams all together, as a set. I say “dreams,” but where we met was far more vivid, a place that obeyed a different set of rules from what you find in the dreams that typically come to you in your sleep. Everything had a greater clarity and gravity than reality; I could really taste the food, and both the color and light around us were brilliant beyond imagination. Even after the others had gone and I’d opened my eyes, they stayed with me, leaving an impression as profound as any memory of reality. It felt as if I had truly been there with them. At the same time, when I was at the office with my coworkers, who were supposedly still among the living, they all seemed so flat and lifeless, so utterly gray, that I couldn’t even understand what they were saying.

When I was with the group, it was such a joy—as if I was part of a new community: my grandma, my mom, my editor, my classmate from middle school, my cousin, my dogs Hana and Shan. All of them appeared as I’d last seen them, and even though they belonged to different generations and species, and had lived in different places, that seemed to pose no problem at all, and we always had a wonderful time together. Yet, at the same time, there were so many things that I wanted to know, so I asked. This isn’t an easy thing to ask, but do you know you’re dead? Sure, sure we do, they said, as if they had no idea why I would even bother asking. Like you’re telling someone that a huge typhoon is going to hit this weekend, and they’re just telling you not to worry, it’s definitely going to miss us.

I don’t know how much time had passed since then, but one day I was in a little accident and died instantly. From then on, I spent all of my time with the others. Now I can tell you, with absolute certainty, death doesn’t hurt, not one bit. But, you say, what about accidents and illnesses? Well, that’s what I thought, too, but in reality those things aren’t directly related to death. There’s a clear gap—a distance—between physical pain and suffering on one hand, and death on the other, and that space through which we all pass is actually very pleasant. The pain that you feel up until then is, well, pain, so you can handle it. Anyway, at that point, I’d become a full-fledged member of the group. What’s really interesting is how, on this side, there’s no such thing as sleep. The others don’t sleep and neither do I. We’re always awake, so we started going together to visit another person I used to know so well. At first, she was truly surprised to see us show up like that—but she said she wanted us to keep coming. Then, after some time, she asked the very same question that I’d asked long ago: Do you know you’re dead? Sure, sure we do. And it really wasn’t a big deal, so there wasn’t anything else for us to say.

Eventually, we found one of the girls sleeping. It was my old classmate from middle school. She was curled up, and really did seem to be asleep. We’d all been on this side for so long that we’d forgotten what we were looking at; all we could do was look on as our hearts pounded. We felt like we were witnessing something incredible, something that could never be undone, and yet we were powerless to stop it. She was right there in front of us, but it felt like she wasn’t. And if that was true, then where was she? We formed a circle around her and found ourselves holding hands, watching over her as she slept soundly, her eyelids shut tight. She looked so peaceful, curled up and not moving. There was only the sound of her breathing. None of us could remember what sleep was, what the state of sleep was like, but as we watched her, we started to think that maybe, just maybe, it wasn’t as bad as we thought.

Translated by David Boyd

________________________

Mieko Kawakami was recently shortlisted for the International Booker Prize for her novel Heaven (2009), translated by David Boyd, who also translated this fable.

*

Aesop—the literary-leaning skin, hair and body care brand—has launched a new podcast series which asks the question, what sort of fables might its namesake—Aesop, the ancient Greek fabulist—write in 2022? Featuring compelling stories by some of the most thought-provoking authors in contemporary literature, this series of succinct yet stirring tales may help listeners navigate life’s big questions, with morals for the modern day revealed through fables of river cats, gluttonous caterpillars and ambitious rodents. The podcast is available at aesop.com and wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe, listen, and enjoy each fable as we bring you Future Fables, presented by Aesop. Episodes will be available for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Amazon Music, Pandora, Google Podcasts, Castbox, iHeartRadio, Pocket Casts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Our newest podcast series, Future Fables, in partnership with Aesop, offers newly imagined fables that will catalyze both conversation and contemplation. Written by some of today’s most thought-provoking authors, each of these bedtime stories for adults adopts the ancient fable form to help us navigate the complexities of modern life.

In Solomon’s Future Fable, we join a pack of wolves to discover the importance of community.

Black Wolf arced her snout to the sky—a last bid to whomever or whatever it was who arbited mercy at times such as these—then lay down in the woods to die. Her fur, brittle and wiry and caked with all manner, had begun to slough off in patches, so when she sunk herself one final time to the ground, her belly was skin-to-skin with the earth.

She had the thought that she should be called Naked Wolf now. Wilted Wolf. Out-of-breath Wolf. Sore Joints Wolf. Bloated Belly Wolf.

The last decade had not come to much. She was tired and without a pack. The woods were not gentle.

Black Wolf had a lover once. A sweet-natured cousin who moved with a limp, her front left leg having been mangled in some tragedy of which she refused to speak. Her name was Silver. She smelled of pine, dandelion, bug guts, deer liver, deer intestines, deer stomach, sage, rabbit cartilage and rabbit bone, brackish water from the north part of the river, goose down, old shoe leather, rubber, acorns, young sycamore leaves, wool of a dall sheep, wool of a stone sheep, fur of a mountain goat, salt, sap, and smoke from a years-ago fire.

She had a stillness to her, Silver. Preferring to watch and sniff than to move and participate.

For Black Wolf, lying down on the earth to die carried the same feeling of surrender that lying with Silver did. The world itself, land and sea and sky, is in its own way a lover, the sort that always takes you. It will lick you right up, snout to sternum to groin to paw. And if you lick it, will it not be pleased? Offering you its fruit. Its meat.

Silver had loved to be mouthed. Liked it more than being pressed into, or pressing into. Teeth in her soft neck, tongue sliding up her jowl, nose behind her ear, and she would whimper like a pup then spurt and be limp next to Black Wolf.

That was years ago now. Silver was dead, as were most things. A new earth was emerging from the rubble of the previous age, and it was clear that Black Wolf did not have a place on this new earth except as building material. Fertilizer. But then, that was all anything was in the end. Raw clay.

Everyone has its turn, and she had had hers.

Black Wolf let her eyelids flutter toward the sleep she would not awake from. Breeze tickled her nose. Leaves and twigs from the sparse remains of trees fell on top of her. Her ear quirked at the sound of a deer a half mile off, but she did not rise to move toward it.

Her throat was dry. She was no longer generating spit. Dreams from which she could not wake haunted her.

Time passed and passed, Black Wolf in that place between tortured wakefulness and tortured sleep. Rain fell. It tasted of acid. Black Wolf, unable to help it, lapped it up. It was five days later when Black Wolf smelled a spider on her nose. With some effort, Black Wolf uncaked her eyelids from the seal it had formed with her eyeballs through a glue of rheum and grit.

Had the spider come here to feast on Black Wolf’s cadaver?

“Is that any better?” Spider asked.

It was not any spider, Black Wolf realized, but the spider named Spider, identifiable by her gentle and deep voice. The two had passed each other a few times over the last couple of years and exchanged brief greetings.

The smell of sticky silk was strong on her, like she’d made a web the size of a woods, of the world, or had cocooned an elephant as prey.

“Is that any better?” Spider repeated.

Black Wolf groaned and she came to.

“Your skin was red and sore with infection, so I had Old Elk drag you to the river to wash off the pus and clean out the pocks.”

“Old Elk?” said Black Wolf, her voice crackly and weak. Black Wolf hadn’t seen that gray, hulking beauty for some time. Had wondered if she’d given herself to the dirt the way Black Wolf had planned to do. Years ago, during a big rain, Black Wolf had dug a hole big enough to shelter Old Elk, who’d been ill and not holding up well in the wet weather.

“Blue Bird collected healing leaves and laid them on your skin as medicine,” said Spider. “And I have bandaged you all over in silk, making a new fur for you from my body.” Black Wolf blinked and tried to stand, but she did not have the strength for it. She understood now what Spider had been asking when she said, is that any better?

With the cool water, the healing leaves, and the new covering made of silk webbing, Black Wolf’s skin was, indeed, better, no longer raw and inflamed, the fur, its only protector, largely gone. “I was going to die,” said Black Wolf.

“Mmm,” said Old Elk, who was nearby picking at a bush. “We didn’t wish that to be, and in this case, we could prevent that fate.”

Black Wolf hadn’t remembered liking being alive in some time, but felt warm to know she felt that way just now, to have company in the form of Old Elk and Spider and Blue Bird.

They had been here in this very woods the whole time, passersby.

“I wonder if it might be better,” said Black Wolf, still weak and tired but full of a wildness of heart she had not felt since her youth, “if we were together most of the time, instead of apart.”

“Mmm,” said Old Elk and no more.

“Mmm,” said Spider and no more.

“Mmm, said Black Wolf and no more.

How strange and wonderful it is to know the utter, undeniable truth of one’s unaloneness, to be caught, and held. It is there, it is. A net. A silver, sticky web

________________________

Rivers Solomon is an award-winning author, self-proclaimed gender malcontent and keen bird watcher, whose novel An Unkindness of Ghosts featured in the Aesop Queer Library last year. Their most recent novel Sorrowland was released in 2021.

*

Aesop—the literary-leaning skin, hair and body care brand—has launched a new podcast series which asks the question, what sort of fables might its namesake—Aesop, the ancient Greek fabulist—write in 2022? Featuring compelling stories by some of the most thought-provoking authors in contemporary literature, this series of succinct yet stirring tales may help listeners navigate life’s big questions, with morals for the modern day revealed through fables of river cats, gluttonous caterpillars and ambitious rodents. The podcast is available at aesop.com and wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe, listen, and enjoy each fable as we bring you Future Fables, presented by Aesop. Episodes will be available for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Amazon Music, Pandora, Google Podcasts, Castbox, iHeartRadio, Pocket Casts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Our newest podcast series, Future Fables, in partnership with Aesop, offers newly imagined fables that will catalyze both conversation and contemplation. Written by some of today’s most thought-provoking authors, each of these bedtime stories for adults adopts the ancient fable form to help us navigate the complexities of modern life.

Lydia Millet’s Future Fable explores the nature of change through the tale of a slightly stubborn insect.

I once knew a man who was almost a worm. But brighter and with more hairs. He also had spots and many fine feet. So he could walk, slowly but surely. Unlike a worm. In short, he was a caterpillar. Stayed close to the ground and was always eating.

The caterpillar man had many friends. Like him they were decked out in spots of color and ate a lot. They could be found on leaves and stems—each had their favorite host plants. Delicious and convenient. Sometimes many would gather on the same host. You could trace their paths by the eaten leaves, lacy and riddled with holes after they left.

This man wasn’t an intimate of mine, but he’d direct the odd remark in my direction.

He liked to boast to me. He wasn’t afraid of anything, he said.

But I perceived that, by saying it, he wanted to make it true.

For he was deathly terrified of birds. Even the shadow of a bird made him shrink up. Even the song of a bird from far away. A call, a caw, the rustling of feathers. The nest of a bird was disgusting to him. I could see it on his face.

In a nest there were eggs. And in the eggs there were more birds to come.

If a friend of his was lost, there was usually a bird behind it. He never admitted this. He didn’t say the names of birds. Whenever a friend went missing, he said it was the wind, maybe. Or rain. Or even fire. The wind and the rain were natural, he said. Also the fire. Sometimes.

Likely the wind or rain had moved his friend, said the man. It could happen easily, he assured me, without you noticing. Because you, too, were busy munching. And somewhere, he insisted, on a different plant, that missing friend was eating on. In peaceful fattening.

I changed the subject, then.

So, what do you fatten for? I asked him.

For?

Yes, why are you always fattening?

Well, to be fat, he said. Obviously.

I’d seen how it went for the others like him. As soon as they got fat enough, they spun a beautiful silk home. For a long period, they stayed inside. When they came out they were completely different.
But this man, the caterpillar man, had been fat for some time. You might say gloriously fat. As fat as any larva could ever wish to be.

But after you’re really fat, what happens then? I persisted.

You just stay fat, he said. Don’t be stupid.

I had to leave for a bit to visit a mouse woman. When I came back I couldn’t find him anywhere. Only a bird was near his plant, a wren stabbing at pebbles with his beak. Scratching the dirt impatiently. Just beetles, he grumbled. Beetles, beetles, beetles.

You didn’t eat the caterpillar man, did you? I asked. The very fat one?

I don’t know who I ate, said the wren. Really I couldn’t tell you. I won’t say they all taste the same, but one thing I can say is they all taste good.

But you haven’t seen him?

The last of them went into the white beds. Now it’s nothing but beetles.

Oh, I said. I always thought he wouldn’t go.

Some want to keep on eating, said the wren. In denial. They know the wings are a death sentence. For them the wings don’t last. Not strong like these. (With that, he spread his feathers out to demonstrate.) Once they have wings, they barely eat. It’s all about drinking. And mating.

I mean, some of them travel quite far, I said. On those delicate wings. Take the monarchs! And the painted ladies!

They fly and then they die, shrugged the wren. With some of them, it’s over in a week.

I’d almost forgotten the caterpillar man by the time he appeared in his new body. And of course, I didn’t recognize him right away. He was a lovely pale yellow, flexing his wings on a globe mallow.

Oh, you again, he said. I just got out.

You look amazing, I told him.

Enh, I looked better before, he said grumpily. I’m way too thin.

But you can fly! I said.

I miss being hungry. And then so satisfied.

And hey, you can pollinate! I said. Give back to the community!

I liked the old job better, he said. We knew where we stood, back then. These days it’s all about the flitting.

I spotted some of his friends nearby. Fluttering among the plants. Alighting.

I guess I won’t see you so often, I said. Now that the air is your dominion.

Oh, I don’t know. I’ve always been a homebody.

Watch out for the birds, though, I said. Some of them are still interested in snapping you up.

Honestly, said the butterfly man. His yellow wings shivered. I have no idea what you’re talking about.

________________________

Lydia Millet is a prolific author of over 13 books, whose collection of short stories Love in Infant Monkeys (2010) was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. Her most recent novel, Dinosaurs, was published 11 Oct 2022.

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Aesop—the literary-leaning skin, hair and body care brand—has launched a new podcast series which asks the question, what sort of fables might its namesake—Aesop, the ancient Greek fabulist—write in 2022? Featuring compelling stories by some of the most thought-provoking authors in contemporary literature, this series of succinct yet stirring tales may help listeners navigate life’s big questions, with morals for the modern day revealed through fables of river cats, gluttonous caterpillars and ambitious rodents. The podcast is available at aesop.com and wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe, listen, and enjoy each fable as we bring you Future Fables, presented by Aesop. Episodes will be available for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Amazon Music, Pandora, Google Podcasts, Castbox, iHeartRadio, Pocket Casts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Our newest podcast series, Future Fables, in partnership with Aesop, offers newly imagined fables that will catalyze both conversation and contemplation. Written by some of today’s most thought-provoking authors, each of these bedtime stories for adults adopts the ancient fable form to help us navigate the complexities of modern life.

Akwaeke Emezi’s Future Fable highlights the importance of accepting help from others.

Down in the belly of a jungle where a thousand rivers split into a thousand more, there lived a river cat with paws as big as heartbreaks and teeth as sharp as hope. He was the second of his litter, born in the rainy season when the air was heavy and wet. The first was his brother, who had even larger paws and cold yellow eyes, who roared at the world from his first breath. The third was his sister, the runt of the litter, with a delicate body and frightfully thin bones.

The river cat’s brother was always a bully. When they were cubs, he would attack their little sister, snapping his teeth into her skin as she hissed and fought. The river cat didn’t like it. He could tell it wasn’t in play, and so he would jump in, growling at his brother to back off. Sometimes his brother attacked him too, but as they grew up, the river cat became almost as big and strong as his brother, and so he continued to protect their little sister.

“You’re a fool,” his brother said. “She can’t survive in our world. It would be better if she was dead.”

The river cat didn’t listen to him. Their sister was a good hunter, small enough to fit in between the jungle’s shadows. Her prey was often smaller than theirs and so the river cat shared his kills with her to make sure she was eating enough. Their brother preferred to hunt and eat alone. He liked to torture his prey, breaking their limbs slowly and playing with them for painful hours before he finally tore out their throats.

The river cat’s sister did not approve. “We are hunters,” she said. “It does not mean we have to be cruel.”

No one else listened to her because she was small, because she could not run as fast as the others, or hunt as viciously, but the river cat did not care. He liked his sister. He would meet her by the water and they would play in the shallows, catching small fishes in their paws and teeth. The air around her always felt soft and she was easy to be around.

One day, their older brother came back from a failed hunt with a bleeding gash in his hind leg, his yellow eyes flashing with rage. He slunk into a hollow tree to lick his wound, but the next morning, he limped out to hunt again.

The river cat was worried. “When our sister was hurt, she rested by the water until she was well again. Should you not rest, too?”

His brother snarled. “She is always hurt, and she is always resting, because she is weak. I am strong. What need have I of a runt’s rest?”

And so he continued in his ways, until the wound on his leg festered and soured. When he could no longer walk, he dragged himself around. When the others tried to bring him meat since he could not hunt, he hissed at them and drove them away.

“I am strong!” he roared, even as his voice cracked. “I do not need flesh brought to me as though I were a cub! I will only eat what I kill myself!”

The moon got fat and thinned out, and the first of the litter wasted away as his leg rotted beneath him. The river cat tried to warn him of the danger.

“You will die if you continue like this,” he said. His brother snapped his teeth and it enraged the river cat. “Die if you want to die, then!” he snarled. “You are a fool.”

“I am strong,” his brother replied, his ribs pressing against his skin. “My body will overcome this.”

When his fur started falling out, their sister brought him a mouthful of fish. The older brother tried to rake her face open in return, so she left him alone.

“He has always been cruel to you,” the river cat said, confused. “Why do you try to help?”

His sister bared her sharp teeth. “I have little love for him. That does not mean I wish to see him suffer.”

And then the day came when their brother’s chest no longer rose or fell, when his eyes were dull and without life. The river cat turned away from his brother’s body and ran, grief beating in his chest. He leapt along branches and slid around tangled vines until he was by the water and his sister was in sight. When he told her what had happened, she was quiet for a long time.

“Why didn’t he accept our help?” the river cat burst out. “He was the strongest of us. He won every fight. He could have fought for himself!”

“Yes,” his sister replied, and her voice was sad. “But it is easy to hurt others. It is harder to heal yourself.”

The river cat considered her words and found they had weight. He looked at the gentle gleam of her eyes and thought about how she had chosen to remain kind even as the rest of their people called her broken, how she had never become as cruel as others had been to her.

“Come,” she said. “Take a nap with me. We are the only two left.”

They curled up next to each other in a patch of sunlight and the river cat rested his head on her sleek fur.

“I think,” he said, “perhaps you have been the strongest of us all along.”

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Multidisciplinary artist and writer Akwaeke Emezi has won a plethora of prestigious awards, and has been featured on the cover of TIME magazine as a 2021 Next Generation Leader. The moral of their story, told through the claws and roars of river cats, relates to the importance of accepting help from others.

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Aesop—the literary-leaning skin, hair and body care brand—has launched a new podcast series which asks the question, what sort of fables might its namesake—Aesop, the ancient Greek fabulist—write in 2022? Featuring compelling stories by some of the most thought-provoking authors in contemporary literature, this series of succinct yet stirring tales may help listeners navigate life’s big questions, with morals for the modern day revealed through fables of river cats, gluttonous caterpillars and ambitious rodents. The podcast is available at aesop.com and wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe, listen, and enjoy each fable as we bring you Future Fables, presented by Aesop. Episodes will be available for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Amazon Music, Pandora, Google Podcasts, Castbox, iHeartRadio, Pocket Casts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Our newest podcast series, Future Fables, in partnership with Aesop, offers newly imagined fables that will catalyze both conversation and contemplation. Written by some of today’s most thought-provoking authors, each of these bedtime stories for adults adopts the ancient fable form to help us navigate the complexities of modern life.

In a playful tale of friendship, envy and empathy, Amelia Abraham’s Future Fable features a pair of ambitious rodents.

The Rat and The Hamster

by Amelia Abraham

A rat and the hamster walked into a bar. They ordered a drink.

“This is not a joke,” the rat said to the hamster.

“I know, I’m listening,” urged the hamster, although the rat thought she could detect an eye roll.

“I feel like you don’t take my pain seriously,” the rat went on. She was down on her luck. She couldn’t pinpoint what it was exactly that had caused her low mood today – maybe it was her cycle – but it felt like everyone was against her. Like she could do nothing right.

“Have you talked to someone other than me? A professional?” said the hamster.

“You know I can’t afford that,” said the rat. The hamster was always trying to send everyone to therapy. The rat wondered if she was on commission.

“Well, it’s a bad time of year,” sighed the hamster, staring into the middle distance.

It was indeed a bad time of year, rain was beating on the windows of the bar. Out in the streets, the sewers were overflowing. Soon, the ice would come, and then food would be scarce.

The hamster had none of these problems to worry about, the rat knew. But still, the hamster complained: her owners were about to go on vacation, she was concerned that she’d be lonely. The rat scoffed and ordered another drink. They sat in silence until it arrived.

“How’s the house hunt,” said the hamster.

“I can’t catch a break,” said the rat. “Last month I had five rat babies sucking my teets dry—God love em’—and now I’m back to work and there’s nothing out there.”

She sipped her Merlot, the kind that arrives with a thin layer of dust on top. The rat believed in a meritocracy, she did, but she was starting to wonder if there was something about her – inherent to her – that was hampering her search for a new place.

Still, she didn’t want to go into all that, not with the hamster.

“I have an idea,” said the hamster.

“Go on,” said the rat, reluctantly.

“Why don’t you come and stay with me?” The hamster clarified: “Just while Tim and Chris are away.”

The rat looked into the hamster’s face, searching for a catch. The rat could feel her despair evaporating, but she was also the distrustful type. Had the hamster had one too many again? Was she just feeling giddy because it was the holidays, and regret her generosity tomorrow? Was this the hamster’s savior complex at work again? Did it matter?

“Are you—are you sure?” said the rat.

“It’s just a long weekend,” said the hamster. “Take it or leave it.” She shrugged.

That night, in her wheel, the hamster’s head span. She began to worry about having the rats come to stay. What if they ate the place empty? What if they started breeding? Worse yet, what if they brought some kind of awful pestilence with them?

The hamster was concerned that she had made a terrible mistake.

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On Thursday, after Tim and Chris left for their cruise, the hamster waited for the rat’s arrival, napping intermittently.

The rat, meanwhile, had been too nervous to sleep. She had always idealized the hamster’s lifestyle from afar, even if she hadn’t actually seen it up close and personal, given that she’d never been to Tim and Chris’s house before.

Given that, until now, she’d never been invited.

“Compare and despair,” the rat’s mother had always told her when she stroked her back before bedtime. Her mother, who raised ten offspring and lost her life protecting them.

Yet the rat couldn’t help but compare. In a way, she found the comparison helpful. It’s what drove her to always be looking for a nicer place, more food, a warmer and damper lifestyle.

The hamster was her frenemy, yes, but what was so wrong with a frenemy if it meant a little healthy competition?

The rat knocked on the hamster’s back door. She waited there, on the doorstep, hushing the kids. They bickered and gnawed, falling over one another. The rat turned to them.

“Shhh, will you,” she hissed. “And what did I say about cats?”

Still, there was no answer at the door. Puzzled, the rat ushered her family to a side door, and they let themselves in.

“Wait here, and DON’T eat anything,” the rat told the kids, leaving them in the kitchen.

She searched downstairs quickly and methodically, but the hamster was nowhere to be seen.

So, she climbed the stairs, dragging her body up step by step.

In the hallway, she could hear a noise, and prayed it wasn’t the kids downstairs breaking things, embarrassing her. She realized though, that it was emitting from a locked door down the hall.

She padded towards it, cautiously. There was no smell of cat inside the house, but she had been burned before.

When the rat reached the door at the end of the hall, she pushed it open, and with a creak, it swung backwards.

Across the expanse of linoleum flooring a pink cage sat solemnly beside the bathtub. The hamster stared out from inside of it as though frozen.

“I—” the hamster started to speak but faltered. She looked out regretfully from between the bars of the tiny cage, the small mound of food already rotting next to her in the corner.

“I—I tried to tell you not to come but –”

“But what?” said the rat gently.

“But I couldn’t get out,” said the hamster, in what was more like a whisper now.

The hamster and rat held eyes with one another then, locked in time, contemplating the other’s existence.

Until suddenly, a large crash came from downstairs—as though something had fallen, or broken.

“I should go,” said the rat, in a voice full of kindness and devoid of self-pity now.

She turned on her heel, gathered her children, and led them off into the night.

No wonder the hamster needs a therapist, she thought.

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Amelia Abraham is a journalist and the author of two books—Queer Intentions (2020) and We Can Do Better Than This (2021), an anthology which brings together 35 voices on the future of LGBTQIA+ rights. In a playful tale of friendship, envy and empathy, Abraham invites listeners to consider comparison and ponder its worth—or lack thereof.

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Aesop—the literary-leaning skin, hair and body care brand—has launched a new podcast series which asks the question, what sort of fables might its namesake—Aesop, the ancient Greek fabulist—write in 2022? Featuring compelling stories by some of the most thought-provoking authors in contemporary literature, this series of succinct yet stirring tales may help listeners navigate life’s big questions, with morals for the modern day revealed through fables of river cats, gluttonous caterpillars and ambitious rodents. The podcast is available at aesop.com and wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe, listen, and enjoy each fable as we bring you Future Fables, presented by Aesop. Episodes will be available for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Amazon Music, Pandora, Google Podcasts, Castbox, iHeartRadio, Pocket Casts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.