It was looking at her now, at her finger. Its tongue came out again, and licked what she had to think of as lips. Not so soft and mobile as human lips, but not like the skin of its face. Browner . . . a purplish brown on this one. The tongue, too, was darker than the bright pink of human tongues. It had felt stiffer, dryer, than a child’s tongue.
Now, as she watched, the creature reached into the cooler and scraped off some of the frost with its talon. It licked that off with quick little strokes of its tongue. Then it scraped up another lump, and reached toward Ofelia, holding its hand in front of her mouth.
What did it mean? Ofelia looked from the hard dark fingernail with its coating of melting frost, to the golden-brown eyes, and back. Did it expect
Courtesy overcame caution. She put out her tongue and touched it gingerly to the frost. Cold, of course. Under the frost, her tongue felt the hard, smooth surface of the nail—talon—whatever it was. Like her own nail; her tongue felt nothing disgusting, only a hard smooth surface topped with cold.
“Kuh,” the creature uttered.
“Kuh,” Ofelia agreed. Her children had liked to eat the frost in the freezer; most children did, in hot weather. She turned away, found a shallow bowl and a wooden spoon, and scraped more of the frost into the bowl. She handed it to the creature, who took it and stood there as if it had no idea what to do next. At least it couldn’t expect her to lick its fingers if they were all engaged in holding the bowl. Perhaps it didn’t even know the frost would melt into water.
Meanwhile, the cool air was chilling her feet and ankles, and the open door wasted electricity. “Don’t stand in the door,” Ofelia said, and gently nudged the creature away so that she could close it. It moved back, holding the bowl but not looking at the frost. Instead it watched her. She wished it wouldn’t. She had had enough for the moment. She poked her finger into the bowl. “Cold,” she said. “You can eat all this, if you want.”
It turned its head, then set the bowl on the table, and picked up another finger-tip of frost. She watched as its tongue came out—dark, yes, and more bristly than human tongues, and dryer—and licked at the frost. It looked at Ofelia. She sighed, and took a fingerful of frost she didn’t particularly want, just to be polite. If that’s what it had meant. It dipped another fingerful, and licked it dry, then paused. That must be what it had meant. Take turns. Did it think she was trying to poison it, or was it being polite? She had no idea. The cold felt good in her mouth, better than she remembered. She let the frost melt on her tongue, trickle down the sides of her mouth.
The last of the frost had melted before they had taken many turns. The creature dipped its finger in the water and touched it to the long protrusion she now thought of as its nose, above the mouth. Then again, to touch the lids of each eye. It pushed the bowl a little toward her. Ofelia, frowning, put her own finger in the cold water. She didn’t know what the gestures meant; she was half afraid to copy them, but she was also afraid not to copy them. What was she saying, if she touched water to her nose, to her eyelids? It would be something about smelling, something about seeing . . . but what? She put her wet finger on her nose, then on her eyelids.
The creature grunted, and walked out of the kitchen without looking back. Now what? Had she insulted it, or was it running off to tell its friends what she had done? She went to the door to see. It hopped over the fence between the lane and the garden and started down the lane. Now she could see that the high-stepping stride was mostly on the toes, with the heel knob touching down only occasionally.
Ofelia shrugged to herself. She had raised bread to eat today; she didn’t have to worry about the creatures all the time. She cut herself several slices off one loaf and ate. It was good, from the hard crust to the soft, yielding inner crumb.
Were the creatures like bread? She had touched them several times now, and she still wasn’t sure. Their skin—if it was skin—felt harder than hers, but no harder than the calluses she remembered on feet and hands. Were they soft inside? Were their muscles as soft as human muscles, or hard like their skin? Did their shape come from bones in the middle or the hard skin on the outside?
