The Taste of Night

The Taste of Night

Pat Cadigan

The taste of night rather than the falling temperature woke her. Nell curled up a little more and continued to doze. It would be a while before the damp chill coming up from the ground could get through the layers of heavy cardboard to penetrate the sleeping bag and blanket cocooning her. She was fully dressed and her spare clothes were in the sleeping bag, too – not much but enough to make good insulation. Sometime in the next twenty-four hours, though, she would have to visit a Laundromat because phew.

Phew was one of those things that didn’t change; well, not so far, anyway. She hoped it would stay that way. By contrast, the taste of night was one of her secret great pleasures although she still had no idea what it was supposed to mean. Now and then something almost came to her, almost. But when she reached for it either in her mind or by actually touching something, there was nothing to all.

Taste of the Night. Illustration by Elena

Sight. Hearing. Smell. Taste. Touch. ______

Memory sprang up in her mind, the feel of pale blue stretched long and tight between her hands.

The blind discover that their other senses, particularly hearing, intensify to compensate for the lack. The deaf can be sharp-eyed but also extra sensitive to vibration, which is what sound is to the rest of us.

However, those who lose their sense of smell find they have lost their sense of taste as well because the two are so close. To lose feeling is usually a symptom of a greater problem. A small number of people feel no pain but this puts them at risk for serious injury and life-threatening illnesses.

That doctor had been such a patient woman. Better yet, she had had no deep well of stored-up suspicion like every other doctor Marcus had taken her to. Nell had been able to examine what the doctor was telling her, touching it all over,, feeling the texture. Even with Marcus’s impatience splashing her like an incoming tide, she had been able to ask a question.

A sixth sense? Like telepathy or clairvoyance?

The doctor’s question had been as honest as her own and Nell did her best to make herself clear.

If there were some kind of extra sense, even a person who had it would have a hard time explaining it. Like you or me trying to explain sight to someone born blind.

Nell had agreed and asked the doctor to consider how the other five senses might try to compensate for the lack.

That was where the memory ended, leaving an aftertaste similar to night, only colder and with a bit of sour.

Nurse. “She had tried medication in the beginning because Marcus had begged her to. Anti-depressants, anti-anxiety capsules, and finally anti-psychotics – they had all tasted the same because she hadn’t been depressed, anxious, or psychotic”. 

(To read the full story: The Year’s Best Science Fiction annual collection, 2011, edited by Gardner Dozois).