Grounded

by Narrelle M. Harris

  ‘To Octavia, who is genuinely lovely,’ agreed Benedick, clinking her glass.

  They sipped, and afterwards it was as though the wine were an elixir that had changed Clementine Torres into a whole new person. She laughed and pressed the tip of her nose between her fingers. ‘This stuff tickles, doesn’t it?’

  I’d like to give her more reasons to smile, Benedick thought, unbidden. It’s like she’s got a light inside her.

  She turned to give his room another once-over and Benedick had that frisson of strangeness, a reaction to her slender, wingless back. Before he could think much about it, she was turning back to him.

  ‘You look very settled in already.’

  ‘That’s all Peri’s work. My brother. He helped me buy the apartment and set everything up while I was in the rehab hospital.’

  ‘I might have met him briefly,’ said Clementine. ‘Slim, hair dyed blue, tattoo of a dragon on the back of his neck?’

  ‘That’s Peri. He’s meant to be the blackbird of the family, but he’s too good-natured to get into much strife. I was meant to be the straight-A kid, and I went into law enforcement instead of Law School. Confused the hell out of our parents.’

  ‘Smart kids in police work are important,’ said Clementine.

  ‘True,’ Benedick agreed. ‘Not that it’s what I do anymore.’

  ‘They didn’t have a role for you? Or you didn’t want the one they had?’ Clementine asked, then shook her head. ‘Sorry. Don’t answer that. I spend so much time doing advocacy I don’t always know when to put it aside. It’s not my business.’

  Benedick smiled crookedly. ‘It’s okay. It’s the latter, by the way. I was flying corps. A desk nest in the service has no appeal for me at all. I had enough to get this place and buy some time to think about what to do now that I can’t—’

  Be what I always dreamed of being.

  Clementine nodded as though she’d heard the unspoken end of the sentence. ‘Adjusting can be hard, for everything of course, but employment options too. If you ever want help, I know people you can talk to.’

  ‘Did you?’ Benedick asked suddenly. ‘Find it hard adjusting, I mean. You don’t even have wi—’ He stopped abruptly and looked away. ‘Hell. Sorry to be rude. I just … it’s hard, like you say. I don’t know what the hell I’m doing here, or what the hell I’m going to do with my life, and most of my mates stopped visiting me when we all realised that this was as good as I was ever going to get, and they didn’t know what to say. Even Peri hardly visits. He set all this up because he feels guilty, I think, then when I come to move in, he’s got an appointment and can’t meet me and it’s all a sun-blighted mess.’ His voice thickened. ‘Ah, hell.’

  Now it was Clementine’s turn to offer tissues.

  ‘Sorry,’ he said, swiping at the sudden tears. ‘No idea where that came from.’

  ‘New surroundings, new people, a life you didn’t expect,’ said Clementine kindly. ‘Rehab helps a lot of people, but you’re not the first to move in to Avalon Towers and then think, what now? It’s okay. You’ll work it out.’

  Benedick grimaced and downed the rest of his wine in a swallow. ‘You promise?’ he said darkly.

  ‘No guarantees,’ said Clementine, ‘But most of us do.’

  ‘No guarantees? Aren’t you supposed to give me the pep talk and tell me to be a brave little soldier?’

  ‘What’s the use of that?’ she replied. ‘Pretending it isn’t hard isn’t going to help. Besides, you’ve already been a brave little soldier, Captain Benedick Sasaki.’ She said it without mockery; with an understanding and sympathy that was almost hard to bear. ‘It’s okay that you’re upset. It’s okay that it’s difficult.’

  ‘Is it okay to quit?’ That, too, was too much said, guarded as it was.

  More awkwardly, Clementine appeared to understand exactly what he meant.

  ‘I’d rather you didn’t,’ she said. ‘We’ve only just met and you seem nice. I think your cousin Octavia would be sorry, too.’

  Benedick took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. ‘She might at that. She’s been great. She’s the only one of the family that doesn’t pussyfoot around and act like there’s a miracle cure on the way. Her own wings never grew in right; after all the treatments and medical trials, my aunt and uncle spent a fortune on quack solutions thinking she’d finally get her growth spurt. She’s the one who sends me bad jokes to make me laugh, because she doesn’t think they’ll break me.’ Benedick needed another deep breath at the end of this.

  ‘I hope you’ll introduce us one day.’

  ‘She’ll only tell you terrible jokes.’

  ‘Fine. I’ll tell her bad jokes back. Here’s one. What did the raven say to the wren? Don’t be blue; I’m the one who got tarred and feathered.’

  Benedick stared at her with horror. ‘That’s awful.’

  ‘It is,’ she conceded, all seriousness, ‘What did the sun say when it made the second black swan? Damn, I burned another one.’

  Benedick snorted. ‘Octavia’s favourite is: a man goes to the cinema and sees another man with a parrot sitting next to him. The first man says, why did you bring him to the movies? and the parrot says, he liked the book.’

  Clementine yelped with laughter, then clapped her hand over her mouth to cover the ungraceful noise. Above her hand, her eyes were shining. ‘Oh, I haven’t heard that one!’ she declared with delight, ‘Octavia wins that round!’

  ‘I’ll let her know,’ grinned Benedick. ‘More wine? And how about one of these champagne truffles?’

  Wine and truffles flowed, and then Benedick dug around in his fridge to see what Peri had stocked before producing a plate of cheese and crackers, dips and vegetables and fish-stuffed olives. ‘Peri knows I can’t cook,’ Benedick confessed. ‘Never had the time to learn.’

  ‘Good to know you can live on antipasto. I thought from TV that all cops lived on microwaved frozen dinners,’ said Clementine.

  Benedick said piously, ‘Please. We don’t have a lot of time, it’s true—police rosters are generally plucked out of a hat by a vindictive and hyperactive toddler—but that’s no reason for self-abuse.’

  ‘You totally used to live on microwaved meals and burgers,’ Clementine accused.

  ‘I totally did,’ Benedick agreed. ‘But now I can’t fly, so I don’t burn up the calories.’ He hardly even let a shadow cross his eyes that time.

  He was still underweight, in fact. The muscle tone of the old flying days had wasted. His therapy was designed around making sure his back muscles remained healthy, able to support the weight of his wings and able to move so that his lungs weren’t too badly affected. Weights and a resistance harness were in the second bedroom, and he supposed he’d have to do his routine tonight before bed. Or maybe in the morning, when he felt he could face it.

  Clementine waved a carrot at him. ‘Don’t let anyone tell you groundwork is lazy work, Benedick.’

  ‘Wouldn’t dream of it, Clementine,’ he said, topping up the wine. ‘Octavia says she only chubs up in the winter anyway, because she spends so much time literally running about in the warm weather. But I used to fly a lot. I get antsy that I can’t move enough.’

  ‘Can you run?’

  Benedick shrugged. ‘I’m working on it, but the wing throws me off balance. I’ve got a harness to help keep them both netted against my back which helps, but it’s uncomfortable.’

  Clementine nodded. ‘I’ve heard that can be a problem. Still, if you like, you can come out with me tomorrow.’

  ‘Running?’

  ‘Walking.’

  ‘I can mostly manage that without falling over.’ Only mostly a joke. He’d mastered walking straight with a gimpy wing a month out of the first surgery.

  ‘I run in the winter,’ she said. ‘But the heat half kills me in summer. Without wings my body heat doesn’t regulate well and I either overheat or get dizzy spells, and there we are with the falling over. I banged my head doing that as a kid. My father swe
ars it’s why I’m so combative now. The whole world punched me in the head once and I’m still punching back.’

  Benedick thought she was only mostly joking too, come to that.

  ‘Bit above your weight class, isn’t it? The whole world?’

  ‘Maybe.’ Her smile more sharp than playful, though it was that too. ‘But have you ever seen a crow take on a hawk?’

  ‘Or a flock of jays mobbing an owl,’ nodded Benedick.

  ‘Well, I’m a one-woman mobber.’

  ‘I’ll feel very safe walking with you then.’

  ‘So you’ll come?’

  Benedick wasn’t sure he wanted to walk, but he was damned sure about spending more time with the intriguing Clementine.

  ‘Sure. I have to get to know the area anyway.’

  Oh, smooth, Benedick. Smooth as. But Clementine managed to look pleased despite being told she was just an excuse for learning the neighbourhood. Obviously it was the other way around, but Benedick wasn’t prepared to say as much.

  He wasn’t even sure he cared that it was such a flirting fail. Far as he’d come since the fall, he wasn’t anybody’s catch right now.

  Let’s just see if you can get through a walk without losing your balance and landing on your butt.

  Chapter Three

  Come the morning, resistance harness strapped around his torso and wing, weights strapped into strategic points, Benedick regretted not having done his physio routine the night before. He hadn’t cast a glance into the second bedroom and all its jumble. He couldn’t bear to look at his accumulated physio paraphernalia most days, and a few hours in Clementine’s company had made him even less inclined. Half a bottle of sparkling red wine in his system hadn’t made it any more appealing.

  Benedick’s dreams had been full of flying; then full of falling.

  He woke up in pain, with his crippled wing spasming, heart racing, arms and feet pushing uselessly against his tangled sheets as though climbing back into the air.

  Same old, same old.

  Painkillers and a hot shower helped to ease the cramps. His feeble appetite was satisfied with a little grilled fish and some black tea.

  Then he made himself put on the harness and work his wings and his back. Disinclined he may have been, and prone to more moping than his counsellor thought healthy, but Benedick wasn’t an idiot. He’d worked hard to regain his strength and his balance and he wasn’t going to throw it all away just because he’d rather curl into his nest of a bed and stay there until he could grow a shell and new-hatch, whole again. Which was never going to happen.

  For a start, humans didn’t arrive in eggs, for all their similarity to birds. In any case, once the metaphorical egg was cracked—or the literal bone—it would never be whole again. Even glued together, the fracture lines would always be there.

  He strained too hard against the harness in his anger and the overstressed muscles spasmed in protest.

  ‘Sun blister it,’ he snarled, jerking against the restraints, only making the pain worse. ‘Wind-blighted, feather-plucked, useless flapper,’ he cursed himself then stopped, shuddering, drawing heaving breaths.

  Slow, slow, slowly he eased the damaged wing down, using his hands to fold the joint away, to soothe the shivering phalanxes of his primary joints down. Once folded in their usual, listing fashion, he removed the weights and then the harness.

  Do what’s necessary; then do what’s possible.

  Benedick couldn’t bring himself to recite the rest of the affirmation. He packed the harness and weights away in their basket then took another long, hot shower. The patter of water over skin and wings soothed the cramping. He closed his eyes, hands braced flat on the wall, and let his wings droop. Water cascaded down the centre of his back, around his shoulders and underneath.

  He cried, wings and breath shuddering. When he’d sobbed out the weariness and grief, he stood braced against the wall a little longer. The heat and steam had soothed the spasms and the tension from his muscles. He breathed deeply.

  I can’t change the direction of the wind, but I can adjust my sails to always reach my destination.

  Time to try adjusting his sails again.

  ***

  Clementine Torres was waiting where she said she’d be, in the garden courtyard of Avalon Towers. She was stretching her diminutive frame using a purpose-built exercise stand for support. Weights and a water bottle stood on the ground nearby.

  Clementine waved at him but continued with her exercises. After stretches, she took up two small weights from the paved yard and raised them above her head, then down to her sides and extended them backwards as she bent forward.

  ‘For my back,’ she explained as he joined her.

  Benedick avoided the strange high-backed bench seat. He took a usual low-backed seat, the ridge rising only to his lumbar region, and pretended to ignore his drooping right wing.

  When Clementine finished with the weights she lay on her stomach on the grass for a series of bends and stretches. Then she turned onto her back and flexed her spine, extended her limbs and finally, on her side, raised herself up, balanced on forearm and feet.

  ‘Does that hurt?’ he asked, certain it must.

  Clementine blew out the air she was holding, rose, and sank into the peculiar chair with the thoracic-high back. She sagged against it. He could see now how it offered more support to someone without wings.

  ‘Not at all,’ she said. ‘It’s only a problem when I get too busy to do them for a few days. Feel it in my lungs.’ She took a deep draught of water from the bottle, then squirted water all over her flushed face.

  Benedick blew out a breath of his own and looked skyward, wishing he could fall up into the blue. He’d pay tomorrow for the exercises he’d abandoned today.

  ‘Rough morning, huh?’

  Benedick tracked a low flier, swooping low to glide over the Molonglo River.

  ‘I’m fine.’

  He could tell she knew it was a lie, but she kindly let it go.

  ‘I’ve got an hour’s walk in my schedule,’ she said. ‘If you still want to join me. I go across the park here, down the riverbank to the sculpture park and back. I bet you’ve never seen the underside of the SunField, have you?’

  ‘I never have,’ he agreed.

  ‘You might like it,’ she said. Clementine wiped her face with a towel and led the way from the Towers down to the riverbank path with an energetic stride.

  He knew what the SunField looked like from above, of course. He’d seen it from a dozen different directions and heights. Helena Napp had made a field of sunflowers from metals and woven grasses, whose mock-flower faces moved with the sun. The petals were scored to be matte under sunlight—it wouldn’t do to reflect light into the eyes of those passing overhead. Under moonlight they gleamed silver, as though frozen under frost. Benedick had loved them in rain, at sunset, through winter mist and summer haze.

  Benedick had no idea what to expect of the underside of the SunField, but he liked Clementine and the way she owned the world with her walk.

  The potential for success and happiness reside in Clementine Torres, he thought, finding hope in her confidence. Why not in me as well?

  ***

  Clementine could tell her new neighbour wasn’t in the mood for mindless chatter. His entire body drooped along with his wing and his very handsome eyes were hollow from poor sleep. She knew how that felt, her own night having been so disturbed with restless dreams and lurking dread. She’d given up at 4 am and taken to her balcony, wrapped in a fluffy blanket. Her wish upon a shooting star had been her usual one, recited since childhood in the old rhyme.

  Shooting star from archer’s bow

  Grant my wish and make it so

  On this night, please give to me

  Kindness, hope and bravery.

  She’d never wished for ‘feathers, wings and flights to be’ as her grandfather had suggested. Even as a little girl she knew there was no point in wishes that couldn’t possibly be grant
ed, after the first time the wishing failed and she’d cried for days.

  Instead she wished for the things she strived to be. Some days she failed—like yesterday with Benedick Sasaki in the hall, too preoccupied with her own griefs to notice his. Today she aimed to add to the amends she was making.

  Vetoing mindless chatter didn’t mean silence, however. As they walked, Clementine told him about some of their mutual neighbours in the Towers. Among them were several office workers, an architect, a violinist and a chess master.

  ‘You’ll probably meet them all in due course. Most of us have to do some kind of physio in the courtyard once or twice a week.’ The information appeared to depress him. ‘It’s never crowded,’ she added helpfully. ‘I’m usually on my own. I’m sure you’ll find private time, if you prefer it.’

  He gave her a sardonic sideways look. ‘Do you read everyone’s minds, or just mine?’

  ‘Everyone’s,’ she declared. ‘My mother hasn’t successfully surprised me for my birthday for eleven years now.’

  ‘What am I thinking now?’

  ‘You’re thinking, this Clementine Torres is a frightful liar.’

  ‘You’re good,’ he said warmly, laughing at last.

  ‘If art falls through, I plan to join a circus as The Amazing Clarabella. Tea leaves read, fortunes told, stars interpreted. Communing with spirits, weekends only.’

  ‘Why not the rest of the week?’

  ‘The spirits watch Edward in the Eyrie reruns during the week, of course.’

  ‘Of course.’

  They stepped into the sculpture park, under the shade cast by Helena Napp’s field of metal and tatami sunflowers. ‘Here we are. What do you think?’

  She watched as Benedick looked up into the canopy of the SunField. So few people saw this side of the work. The underside of the petals contained an enhanced image of the sky, blocked from view. Dragons flew in this doppelganger sky. Clouds formed into fantastical fishes swimming in the air. A gap opened in the blue, parted like curtains, and beyond it a star-flecked night twinkled.