Endless Mother

by Erin MacNair

Three burly brothers, squished into a research submarine, found her lying in the cold muck of the North Atlantic just off a hidden beach with white sands and rising cliffs. She was rolled up like a shroud, white folds gleaming, only playing at death. She’d pulled them there with her deep longing, its pitch vibrating between urchin-scrape and angler-gasp. For eons, she’d peered upward and into the brilliant sky, desiring its hazy landscapes.

They called her Hebe in honour of the mythical Greek goddess; revered servant who patiently refilled the gods’ cups with restorative ambrosia. It was also easier to say than Turritopsis dohrnii, which didn’t exactly roll off their Scottish tongues. Hebe was an asexual being, but they preferred to think of it as “she,” a mother whose existence revolved around an endless cycle of rebirth, reproducing herself ad infinitum—she couldn’t die. Hebe held the cup of everlasting life in her flowing, iridescent jellyfish genes, a true immortal.

A few involuntary gasps escaped the men as the submarine torchlight cut through the deep black waters, casting an eerie glow over her luminous folds. They’d be rich, now! Countless monies had been spent on these scouting expeditions, funded by wealthy eccentrics who did not like the idea of freezing their heads for some later, nebulous reanimation. They needed an elixir before they were folded into the earth or scattered upon it.

Hebe was supposed to be the size of lint pickings in a pocket, but here she was, inexplicably enormous, a rare specimen the size of a round dining table large enough to seat twelve knights if they were careful not to disturb her paper-thin skin with their questing. The brothers used the retractable paddles to sift her gently from the bottom. They rose slowly, slowly to not disturb any of their unbelievable luck. They brought her to the surface under hazy pinpricks of stars, anticipating a body one could smuggle away in a teacup—they were ill-equipped to handle the many tentacles that lay folded inside her. And “Sailor Bram,” as the three friends had cheekily christened their landlubber friend, a man afeared of the sea, he wasn’t any wiser. Waiting for the payload, Sailor Bram thought he’d be spending the night craning the sub onto the truck again. He’d hoped to raise a glass to those rich dickheads who foolishly wanted to live forever.

“What’s this you’ve brought me, a big fucking carpet of goo?” Sailor Bram said, a man of few but strong words. The truck lights illuminated his three friends, clamouring into the shallows to retrieve the ethereal wreckage.

“This is Hebe, the sea goddess. Show some respect,” one said. Sailor Bram made a little gurumph noise in the direction of the radiant blob. A soft voice whispered inside his head, Heeeebeeee as if trying out the name. It could have been the wind whistling over the rocky outcropping. But there, again. A voice like a pulsing heartbeat in his ears. Brammmmmm.

He recognized the accent of his long-dead mother, how she’d say his name as she stroked his hair when he tried to fall asleep. As a wee one, Bram was wary of night monsters, but he did not feel afraid now, drugged by some thick and terrible joy. He smiled and said, “Let’s get her in, boys.”

They struggled together, grinning as one does when in the throes of love, indifferent to the rank stench of her centuries-old cells saturated with brine. The brothers worked in tandem, hand over hand, heeding the unifying chime that rang in their heads like seashells clinking together on the shore.

“Careful, careful now,” Bram said, his gruff voice full of tender concern. She could tear; she could fall apart. She could slip back into the sea like a broken yolk before she’d ever get to feel the sun.

The four climbed the high cliffs, coats soaked through with her slimy wetness, weighing them down as they stumbled on the cragged rocks, careful not to let her touch any sharp edges. They found a patch of green on the bluff, the perfect spot for a lover’s picnic. There they lay her down, tenderly unfurling her body, a twin to the full moon receding into the horizon.

I want, Hebe said. Bram felt the voice in his bones, her need a prickly heat. A thin wind travelled across her body, drying it to a paper, lifting the edges and wafting the rank scent of decay around him like a warm blanket. Hebe reached for Bram with her many tentacles, winding their way around his body, his neck, one thin limb scraping past his coiled beard and into an ear, one slipping effortlessly behind a blue eye. She would hear it all, see it all. The brothers propped Bram upright into a sitting position. Hebe whispered her stories of all the many seas she had been to. In this cold water, she’d kept all her cells, swelling, waiting. Always the sea, but never the sky. What did a cloud feel like? What did a bird speak of? She would know their truth.

The morning came to claim her, the sun’s rays pulling her skin taut. The three brothers fanned her body out like a sail, and she caught, billowing outward with a fierce display of pale, scalloped edges.

The newfound lovers rose from the cliff’s edge, dipping and climbing in the sky at the mercy of a strong southwesterly wind. Hebe affixed her one little eye on Bram. He offered her a full grin, baring his broken tooth on the left side, one Wellington boot falling into the sea far below. He paid it no heed. He’d follow her wherever she went. There is more to life than being a mother, Hebe said.

The men waved and shouted goodbyes, her spell loosening the further away she travelled into the air. They shook their heads in wonder. They’d forgotten to take a sample. They’d forgotten, even, why they’d wanted to.