Between the Storms - a story by Jennifer Hudak

The Worlds of Possibility Kickstarter reached 50% of its funding goal! Today (Monday the 8th of May, 2023) is the LAST DAY to get the early bird discount on art and print book reward levels!

To celebrate the 50% milestone, here is a new public stort. I hope you enjoy "Between the Storms" by Jennifer Hudak as much as I do! For full show notes include the text of the story and an orginal illustration by Olha Melnyk, visit: www.juliarios.com/between-the-storms-a-story-by-jennifer-hudak/

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Welcome to the OMG Julia podcast,where we discuss creative lives and processes.
I'm your host, Julia Rios,and today I have another story from World's
Possibility. This story is Between theStorms by Jennifer Hoodak, which appeared in
December twenty twenty two in the issuethat went out to the ebook subscribers,

(00:25):
and it's the first time it's becomingpublic. I'm releasing it now because we
reached fifty percent on the World's ofPossibility Kickstarter yesterday, so exciting. Today
is Monday, May eighth, andtoday is the last day for the early
bird discount, So if you're listeningto this today, you can still grab
the early bird discount, but itdoes go away as soon as the clock

(00:48):
strikes midnight in the Eastern US timezone, So act now to get that
ten dollar discount if you want it, and get some rocket Bike cat stickers.
This story is a gorgeous story.I love it a lot, and
it has an original illustration by OlaMelnick, which you can see on the
website if you click through. Italso is an example of how the anthology

(01:17):
that I'm making is going to bea little bit different from the issues I'm
not going to post every story onlinewith things like this, because I just
want to give you a taste.But in the anthology, one of the
things that I'm doing is working witha lot of stock art to make sure
that it's colorful throughout. And forthis story, I found some unique ornamental

(01:38):
break images. I'm going to goahead and put them in the online version,
which I don't normally do, andthey don't normally go into the issues
either, but they will be inthe anthology. So if you pick it
up as a physical book, whenyou're flipping through, you'll have lots of
colorful pages, and even if you'regetting the ebook, it will read a
little bit differently than the issues becausethey'll be all of these little extra decorations,

(02:04):
So I hope you enjoy them.If you're listening and you can't see
it, it's purple clouds with starsas an ornamental break, But if you'd
like to see it and you havethe ability, you can go over to
Julia Rios dot com and follow thelink in the show notes to have a
look. All right, let's getinto that story Between the Storms by Jennifer

(02:30):
Hooduc. The First Storm Always Shookthe Stars from the sky. The second
flung them back into place. Betweenthe storms, stars glittered in the lake.
Helena rowed out in her small boatand dragged her net through the water,

(02:52):
skimming up fish and stars alike.The Goddess watched Helena slip soundlessly through
the water. Normally, only childrendared to be in the lake between the
storms, and even they stayed nearthe shore where they splashed and played.
The individual children changed from year toyear, but as a group they were

(03:15):
as constant as the storms themselves,marking time as predictably as the phases of
the moon. Adults, on theother hand, tended to stay inland.
The Goddess couldn't blame them. Youhad to be careful going out on the
lake on nights like these, whenwater and sky swapped places, it would

(03:37):
be easy to forget which way wasup and which way was down. It
would be easy to lose yourself completely. Yet Helena was here, surrounded by
stars and unafraid. This was clearlynot her first time venturing out between the
storms. The Goddess realized that atsome point she had grown accustomed to Helena's

(04:02):
quiet presence. The Goddess had knownHelena since infancy, when her parents had
introduced them by dipping their baby's toesin the cool water. A lifetime had
passed since then. Now Helena wasthe oldest fisherwoman in the village and had
long since earned the right to retireher oars. Of course, the goddess

(04:27):
measured time in larger increments. Yearspassed by like ripples on the shore,
one after the other, with littleto distinguish them. But now that she
noticed Helena her net dipping down andlifting up over and over again, the
texture of the night felt different.The goddess loomed over Helena's boat a suggestion

(04:53):
in the darkness. Her toes plungeddeep into sand and silt, and her
head brushed the hea. But hervoice was kind and curious. Why are
you here, Helena, she asked. Helena gestured at the children, whose
eager voices echoed through the darkness.I'm not the only one out, the

(05:17):
goddess sighed, deeply enough to sendripples across the surface of the lake.
The rest of the villagers will beout in their boats tomorrow, after the
second storm passes. There will beplenty of fish then. Besides, you
are old enough to rest, soare you, perhaps, acknowledged the goddess.

(05:45):
But you are not here for thefish, are you. Helena skimmed
another netfull of stars out of thewater. No, I'm not why bother
gathering stars. They're as common aspebbles. I wouldn't expect you to understand,

(06:06):
said Helena quietly. You can't eatthem, nor burn them for fuel,
pressed the Goddess. They're too brittlefor building and too plentiful to signify
wealth. Only the children seemed tocare about them at all, The children
and you. Helena stowed the netunder her seat and readied her ore.

(06:33):
If you want to see, you'llhave to come to the village. The
goddess watched Helena row back to shore. She'd been the goddess of the lake
since before humans even arrived on theseshores, before the land was cleared and
the shelters built and the soil cultivatedfor crops. She'd watched generations of villagers

(06:57):
bathe and drink and fish in herwater. She celebrated their births and mourned
their passing, and knew each ofthem by name. But she'd never set
foot in the village itself. She'dnever needed to her place was in the
lake. When the villagers needed her, they came to her shores. Otherwise,

(07:21):
she served the same purpose she'd beenserving for millennia, to bring the
storms, to wipe clean the sky, and to draw and redraw the familiar
constellations. But she wondered now ifthat was truly her only purpose. She

(07:42):
wondered if she knew Helena as wellas she thought she did, if she
knew any of them really, Shewondered what they hid in their homes and
in their hearts. The goddess waiteduntil deep into the night before leaving the

(08:03):
water. She became a human sizedshadow to walk in the village, although
she needn't have bothered at this timeof night, with the second storm imminent,
the roads were nearly empty. Shehadn't walked anywhere in centuries, so
she took her time on the pathleading into the village, getting used to

(08:24):
the feeling of dry earth rather thansilt beneath her feet. How strange it
felt to gaze up at the rooftopsinstead of down. How strange to be
able to see the sky and yetnot touch it. In the full dark,
a silvery glow led the goddess toa house on the edge of the

(08:46):
village. There, just outside thehouse, Helena stood with a bucket of
clay and a basket of stars,repairing a glittering statue. What is it,
the goddess asked. Helena smoothed someclay and pressed in a line of

(09:07):
stars. Last year it was ahorse, the year before that a dragon.
This year, Helena stood back andregarded the statue. This year,
I think it's going to be afish. Perhaps this was Helena's purpose,

(09:28):
just as bringing the storms was thegoddesses, except the goddess knew that Helena
was a fisherwoman, not a sculptor. After a certain number of years,
all the village elders were allowed torelease their obligations, ingratitude for all they'd
accomplished during their human sized lives.Helena had certainly reached that point. She

(09:54):
had chosen this instead. She hadchosen to gather stars and to create beauty
between the storms. The Goddess couldsee the statue taking rough shape beneath Helena's
sure hands, the curve of atail, the suggestion of scales. To
think that no one would see itother than Helena, and now the goddess

(10:18):
herself. Why do you keep buildingit when you know the storms will destroy
it. It's never destroyed, Helenasaid, not completely, it's just reshaped.
I can't stop making the storms,the goddess said, with regret,

(10:41):
not even to preserve your work.Why not? I need to shake loose
the stars every so often to createthe possibility for new growth. Otherwise the
heavens will become cluttered, stagnant.None of us wants to be stagnant,

(11:03):
even those of us who no longerneed to fish, who are supposed to
do nothing but rest, Helena saidmeaningfully. She plunged her hand into the
basket and sifted stars through her fingers. The goddess ran her hand over the
statue. Looking at it now,she recognized the beauty in its rain crumbled

(11:26):
edges and wind gouged sides. Shesaw the way Helena's careful repairs worked with
the storm's damage, not against it, preserving its history in layer upon layer
of clay. It was nearly dawnedbefore Helena stood back and looked at her

(11:46):
work. The fish she'd created glitteredwith starlight, as if it were swimming
through the sky. There, saidHelena, it's done. The goddess sir,
called around the statue, examining itfrom every angle. It's perfect for

(12:07):
now, said Helena. It's nearlytime for the second storm, isn't it.
It is then I should be gettinginside. Helena took a step toward
her house, then turned back.She reached into her basket and pulled out
one final star. When she pressedit into the fish's tail, the whirls

(12:31):
of her thumb print remained. Whenthe goddess returned to the lake, she
swirled her fingers through the stars,murmurating on the surface. Then she dug
her toes into the earth and reachedher head up toward the heavens and brought
the second storm. She whipped thewinds into a frenzy and pushed the waters

(12:58):
over their break walls and flung thestars back into the sky. In the
village, the rain bludgeoned to thestatue, resculpting its curves and angles.
The goddess had told Helena that shecouldn't hold back the storms to save her
statue, and she meant it.She hoped Helena would see something lovely in

(13:20):
the remains. She also hoped Helenawould look at the stars the next evening,
while most of them had settled backinto their comfortable constellations. The Goddess
had reserved a scattering to draw anew picture in the sky, an old
woman holding a net glittering with stars. You'd have to squint to see it,

(13:43):
for the Goddess had not created anew constellation in millennia, but she
was pleased all the same. Slippingback into the water, she fell asleep
and dreamed about what she'd make thenext time she shook loose the stars,
when the night sky became a blankcanvas again, when she and Helena alone

(14:05):
would be awake between the storms,creating something new for themselves and for the
world that was between the storms.By Jennifer Hoodack. Jennifer Hoodac is a
speculative fiction writer fueled mostly by tea. Her work has appeared on both The

(14:31):
Locust magazine and the Siphua Recommended readinglists, and has been twice nominated for
a Pushcart Prize. Originally from Boston, she now lives with her family in
upstate New York, where she teachesyoga, knits pocket sized animals, and
misses the ocean. Find out moreabout her on her website. Jennifer Hoodac

(14:54):
writes dot com. This story isaccompanied by an original illustration by Olah Melnick.
Olah Melnick is an artist from Ukraine. The illustration and question also served
as the cover for the December issueof Worlds of Possibility. It is a
picture of an old woman in arowboat using a net to collect stars from

(15:18):
a lake at night. It's areally lovely picture, and I hope that
you'll go over to Julia Rios dotcom to take a look if you haven't
already. Thank you so much forlistening. I hope you enjoyed this story
as much as I do. Ilove that it's about the joy of making

(15:39):
creative work, and that is honestlythe whole reason why I make Worlds of
Possibility, because I love it andI want to share it with everyone.
And that's also why I want tomake it a print book. So if
you're enjoying it and you haven't alreadypledged the kickstarter and you can, please
consider doing that if you can't affordto, I totally understand, and you

(16:03):
can support by sharing that link anywhereyou can on social media or with people
who might be directly interested in supporting. Thank you so much for listening.
I started the kickstarter in May becauseit's my birthday month. It's going to
wrap up the day before my birthday, so I'm hoping to spend my birthday

(16:23):
celebrating its success, and in themeantime, I'm going to celebrate every step
along the way. This story wasreleased the fifty percent mark, and the
next release is going to be atthe seventy five percent mark. It is
a story no one has seen before. It's from the June issue, which

(16:44):
is forthcoming, and I can't waitto share it with you. So let's
get that Kickstarter up to seventy fivepercent. All right, thank you so
much for listening, and I'll catchyou next time.