“For every lie you tell, you grow a wooden tooth. These teeth will grow brown and rough and cracked, like the bark of an old tree. These teeth will rot and yet keep growing, like the lies you tell, until you’re an ugly little girl who never tells the truth.”
Georgia shivered at the recollection of Mother’s words, goosebumps flecking her already chilled skin. She stared at the photograph atop the mantelpiece, the fireplace beneath barren and sooty. Mother smiled back at her with slightly crooked teeth, her little brother Tommy grinning wildly because it had been his eighth birthday. He’d been so excited to turn eight in 1988 because it was his favourite number. It’s infinite, he’d say, just keeps going around and around.
Georgia smiled with her mouth closed.
For years, Georgia had never lied, in fear of turning into some tree with a human face. Until one day, when she was seven years old and lied for the first time. Her left hand had fisted in her skirt while her right thumb and forefinger repeatedly tapped together, her stomach like a deep pit someone had gorged out of her as she told Mother she hadn’t ripped one of the few photos of their absent father.
She had cried herself to sleep thinking the teeth she took such good care of were going to be taken from her. She woke the next morning to find that nothing had changed. Nothing the next day either. Or the next.
Nothing, except the burgeoning realisation that Mother might’ve been a liar too.
But that was twenty years ago. An entire lifetime, depending on who one asked. The rest of Mother’s life, at least. Now, Georgia stood in her childhood home staring at a photograph that looked like a—
Creaking upstairs followed by a few short thumps sent her heart sputtering. She knew it was Tommy sorting through drawers and boxes, but her breath hitched and grew shallow. Her gaze drifted to the stairs, and the space around her was suddenly very small, a cupboard, a cave of blankets.
Her fingers tapped silently together.
Quick footsteps above her and something was behind her. Someone was hunting for her. The air became hot and stale despite the autumnal chill, and the hairs on the back of her neck stood as her fingers grew slick.
Another step and she bolted, abandoning the photograph and retreating to the back porch where her hot breath shot out in front of her, the sky grey and the air wet. She took a shuddering breath, her heart a jagged ache against her ribs.
It’s just Tommy, she told herself. Just Tommy being a loud and clumsy oaf.
There were too many memories here. Hundreds of pinpricks of light that hurt to see and remember, and so many shadows that clawed at locked doors. Opening those doors meant remembering, and remembering meant those pinpricks were needles.
The wooded area behind the house opened before her, spindly trees like used matchsticks, the flames of their leaves now fallen and scattered across the soggy ground. Birds twittered in the distance. You could get lost out there if you really wanted to, but Georgia didn’t want to be lost, only—
“Safe,” she breathed.
She descended the porch and made her way towards the trees; her steps muted against the crushed foliage. She crossed her arms, heartbeat gently slowing as she gritted her teeth and muttered, “I don’t even know why you came. It was a bloody two-hour drive in the rain. Tommy can deal with the house. You don’t need to be here, remembering her of all people.”
But this path was familiar. Some paths always were. Small white stones led her way, creating a winding trail that guided her through the thickening trees, and she briefly wondered how they had stayed uncovered from dirt and leaves. She paused when she reached the small V-shaped valley that cut through the land like a scar, staring at the short wooden bridge that held the sides together. No water flowed, though the autumn leaves were like a mosaic of tiles.
She’d always wondered who built it and why; the gorge shallow and relatively easy to traverse that a bridge seemed unnecessary, but perhaps there had been a small river here once, in another time.
Memories flashed of a bicycle and blood. Of crying and dirt that had been rough and cracked from a harsh summer. She’d hidden beneath this bridge when Tommy had broken his arm, when Mother had carted him off to hospital and sent Grandma to look after her. Hidden there when she’d wanted to be alone, when Tommy destroyed one of her dolls, or Mother had pulled her hair like she sometimes did.
“You’ll never see it again,” she said, rubbing her arms. “One more time and you’ll never have to care again.”
She stumbled to the bottom of the incline, arms outstretched for balance as the wet leaves threatened to shift beneath her. Goosebumps prickled her neck, and she shivered as the air grew chillier, the birdsong disappearing as if a pair of hands had covered her ears.
Taking a breath, she ducked beneath the bridge and laid along the incline, her knees raised and hands laced over her stomach. The planks of wood were moss-covered, brown and green, and the scent of mildew struck her like a damp, dirty rag held over her mouth. It smelled so wet.
She looked up.
Through the gaps of the bridge’s planks, the criss-crossing of tree branches was like veins across the grey sky. Except something was off. She blinked, heart stuttering as her body froze. Through a single gap between the planks above, the sky was night and filled with stars, the moon a thin crescent. There were no trees cutting through that sky.
Her gaze darted, breath a harsh shooting fog, trying to understand how—
“The liar is back,” purred a young girl’s voice, pleased. Georgia jolted and instinctively pressed against the soggy ground as the face of a girl with thin black hair came into view through the gap. Her heart stuttered and her fingers trembled as her mind spun a million thoughts that swarmed like a nest of wasps. Buzzing static.
The light was poor, but through a gap in a bridge that didn’t reflect her own colourless sky but showed her some foreign darkness, a girl stared back with dark eyes. How? It didn’t make any sense.
“Pinpricks of light,” said the girl with an inquisitive tilt of her head. “Not foreign, but yes, darkness.”
“What?” Georgia croaked. Her heart thrummed in her throat, choking her as adrenaline trembled through her limbs. A voice in her head screamed at her to run, run, run, but who was this woman? How was any of this possible? She could simply get up and return to the house where Tommy was still blissfully sorting through drawers and boxes, but her legs felt rooted. Like she had planted herself in the soil.
“You’re a liar,” she accused, her voice eerily pleasant, as if it were a good thing. “Your first lie was sweet, and all those little ones after. White lies are like honey, sugary but nonetheless sticky. Georgia, did you draw this on the wall? No, I didn’t, I swear, please—”
Georgia flinched as her own voice was thrown at her, her vision blurring with tears as that memory punched her in the gut, nausea rolling through her stomach. She swore she felt the sting of Mother’s hand on her cheek. A sob threatened to erupt. Her left hand fisted, right thumb tap, tap, tapping against her forefinger.
The girl leaned forward, coming right up to the gap between the planks, and Georgia realised she was not young at all. Pale skin stretched with wrinkles, hair thin and spidery, and a smile that showed dark yellow-brown teeth. Georgia had to fight to keep the grimace off her face. Everything smelled of moss and dampness, like mould.
“What are you?” Georgia whispered, unable to muster any strength in her voice. Her chest tightened, lungs fighting for decent fresh air, a slow ache forming behind her eyes.
“A truth-teller,” she said, her voice now that of a croaky old woman. “You smell of such sweet lies.” The thing inhaled audibly, and Georgia’s insides recoiled at the motion, a small squeak escaping her throat. “But, oh yes, there are darker, tangier truths you hold like rotten fruit in your hand. Your first lie was such a little thing, a bit of torn paper, but your first big one was blood on concrete. You broke your little brother’s arm.”
An old defensive anger rose like a viper, overwriting the fear and adrenaline at her disturbing words. Her fingers kept tapping. “No, I didn’t! You don’t know anything!”
Its long and bony fingers curled around the edge of the plank, the nails thick and yellowed. It leaned forward, so close to the bridge’s wood that all Georgia could see was the top half of its face. If she reached out, she could’ve touched it. Could’ve felt what was on the other side of that bridge, but her arms were stiff as tree branches.
It said, “You pushed him off his bike. You pushed him and you were happy.”
“I wasn’t happy!” she shouted. Anger roiled like a child accused of lying, both fists clenching and nails digging into palms. “She beat me black and blue when she got home.” If she’d been happy—if—it hadn’t lasted long. A sob escaped her throat, the memory too much for the shabby wall she had built around it. She didn’t break her little brother’s arm. She didn’t. She bumped him—tripped—and he fell.
Georgia slapped a hand over her mouth, grief flooding as her tears rolled down her temples, eroding her like water on stone. Those shards of light that were stars blurred, turning into long silver daggers across her vision. She must have been delirious, drinking too much the night before, talking to imaginary hags through some bridge while she wept for the life she suffered.
“Truth is bitter,” the thing muttered, shaking its head and clicking its tongue.
“I loved my mother,” Georgia whispered. The thing sighed and its eyes rolled back as if she was tasting the most delicious delicacy, the claw-like fingers of her single hand tightening on the wood.
“You are glad she is dead.”
“No, I—I’m not,” she stammered, shaking her head, trying to find words, reasons, excuses. Her mind flickered back to the fireplace, to the mantelpiece, to the smiling faces behind a pane of glass. The glass was so thin, wasn’t it? A flimsy veil to hide behind. Mother had always said Georgia had Father’s damned blue eyes. Her vision swam with memories that blurred like smudged paint, while a roaring filled her ears that might’ve been her head shoved beneath blankets.
When she had hurt herself, Mother had tended her cuts. She’d plaited her hair like hers. They would sneak dessert into Georgia’s bed so Tommy wouldn’t see, and they would hide beneath the blanket, telling each other secrets like I love you. And giggling because it had felt so true.
It was true. Wasn’t it?
“The juice of rotten fruit,” said the thing, “tastes so sweet to me.”
Like spiders crawling, the fingers of its other hand curled into view as if it would slink through the three-inch space. It pulled itself forward, its eyes disappearing behind the plank of wood above to reveal its mouth, lips pale and grey. It smiled widely, exposing those rotted teeth, though they were all intact.
“For every lie she is told, she grows a wooden tooth,” it said. Georgia’s eyes widened in terror, arms trembling and her hands flinging to her sides and digging into the soft soil as if she could drag herself away. Her breathing became jagged and rough, her thoughts spiralling into a dizzying drone.
The thing clacked its teeth together in a grin, and the sound was a distinct clunk, like two blocks of wood clapping together.
Its teeth were not rotten.
They were wooden.
A drop of saliva splashed her cheek. A strangled cry escaped her as she instinctively wiped it away. It was sticky and thick. Like snot, like—
White lies are like honey.
Oh God.
A tooth fell. It plopped onto the middle of her chest.
She froze. Panic stiffened her limbs like an insect stuck in a sticky trap, the leaves clinging to her and soaking through her leggings with what she hoped was rain. There was a night sky where there should’ve been grey, stars where there should have been trees, as if she’d been lying there for days, weeks, months, years. Lies, lies, lies.
The creature laughed. “Let me get that.” And it reached its hand through. Georgia’s vision darkened around the edges. This couldn’t be happening. This isn’t happening, she told herself.
A dangling necklace of brown teeth held together with twine clacked against the bridge’s plank as it leaned forward.
Tommy’s voice from somewhere nearby met her ears as fingertips, pointed like childhood nightmares, touched her chest. “Georgia! Where are you? You’ll never guess what I found. It’s pretty gross. Mum kept all our baby teeth. Wanna see?”
Amy Lane is an Australian-based aspiring writer who graduated from Monash University in 2019 with a Bachelor of Arts, majoring in Literary Studies. She was shortlisted in the Monash University Undergraduate Prize for Creative Writing, and the Lord Mayor's Creative Writing Competition in 2022. Although many of her works explore themes such as loss, isolation, and grief, she always aims to weave threads of hope, love, and resilience throughout her works.