Mom put her arm around me. We walked out of the building and she helped attach my bike to the rack on the top of the car. She used to take Gran and me out to ride the trails in the Poconos when I was a little girl. She’d stopped sometime after Brad left. Or Chad.
Well. Okay. After Dad.
Mom had brought home stuff to do from work. I downed some pity casserole and then went up to my room. I flopped onto my bed and texted Sophie all of the mama drama.
I need guidance, wise one, I texted.
Wait, how is your grandma?
No change. Except that part where Mom wants to put her in a home.
Wow, that sucks. But that’s because there is no change?
Yes. Will try to talk her out of it tomorrow.
I’m afraid I have no wisdom. But I believe in you, Laurel. You single-handedly convinced Shunksville Elementary to recycle plastics and to donate unused cafeteria food. You can talk your mom out of putting gran in a home, she said.
They still do that, you know. That program is alive and well. I argued that should count toward my senior project next year, but the project committee was all, “That was nearly a decade ago, blah, blah.”
Losers.
Don’t I know it, I texted.
We sent each other some hearts. Sophie was usually my go-to for ideas. I put the action into activist, generally. Sophie was the thinker. It concerned me that she couldn’t come up with any concrete proposals yet.
Later I wandered back downstairs to steal some of the potato salad that had showed up on the porch this morning.
Mom sat at the kitchen table. She looked up at me. “What you said earlier—you know I’ve always cared about your photography. Who bought you your camera?”
“You did. But, Mom,” I said. “You told me to prepare to be a barista to support myself. You made me pay for half of everything. I had IOUs on my allowance and meager Nature Center salary for months last year.”
“The life of an artist is hard. I just wanted you to be able to eat.”
“Uh-huh.”
Mom smiled at me, in spite of everything. If my brain kind of squinted and looked at life sideways, it almost seemed normal.
Almost.
FIELD JOURNAL ENTRY
MAY 10
Some days at the Nature Center stretched slowly from one hour to the next. When the unschoolers had their Science Museum day or sports day or macramé and cooking cohorts, there wasn’t too much to do. Jerry sent Risa to rearrange the deciduous trees library, and let me go out to take pictures. He’d been giving me a lot of leeway since Gran. I’m pretty sure he’d once had a thing for her, after she’d photographed several migrating black-legged kittiwakes and two purple sandpipers. Once those hit the internet, we had birders here for weeks. The donation box had been overflowing. He’d replaced the Nature Center roof with that money.
I meandered onto the woodland path, idly snapping pictures of shadow patterns. Sophie liked to use those as inspiration for her abstract phases. I walked the circuit, ending up at the pond loop. The water and its inhabitants lazed quietly, perhaps also bored without their young visitors. Fauna had a “Moment of Peace” feature at the end of each magazine. “Beauty sits still,” it always captioned pictures of boulders or sleeping goslings or placid lakes reflecting unmoving mountains. But everything I shot looked dull. Lifeless.
Comatose.
I tried to physically shake the thought out of my head. But the fact was, Gran should be here. The woods knew it. The pond knew it. Even the birds knew, a few glancing at me as they hopped from canopy to line of sight back to the heights I couldn’t reach. Gran’s realm missed her and I could feel its call brush past me like a breeze.
“Why?” I asked the universe. “Why her?”
No answer came. Try as I might, I couldn’t find any reason or rhyme to why this had to happen, not even here, where I’d always found everything I’d needed before.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered to Sarig Pond. To Jenkins Wood. To the universe. “I’m so, so sorry.”
The trees only watched, their green hanging tendrils swaying gently in the breeze. They couldn’t forgive me.
Nothing could.
FIELD JOURNAL ENTRY
MAY 11
The next morning, Sophie was babysitting, so I biked to Gran’s house before going to the Center to make up some hours. Even if I didn’t have to, it gave me somewhere to be other than alone with my thoughts. Work helped keep a girl positive, and that’s what I needed to be.
I searched around in the upstairs closet and found one of the thick, crookedly stitched afghans that I had created during my knitting phase a few years ago. It was ugly as fuck but softer than anything the hospital had. I folded it and put it on the chair in the living room. I could come back and get it on my way to the hospital. I locked the door and hopped on my bike, but then, almost like it had been waiting, a bird called.
Chirp, chirp, trill? No. Chirp, chirp—sing. Sing, little bird. How to even describe it? Maybe it was missing some part of itself, too. That was the best way to characterize the call. Chirp. Chirp. Longing.
I raised my head to the sky and searched.
“Give a girl a break, freaking feathered jerkface,” I said.
But it didn’t. It sang again from the woods. I began to pedal toward it. I took a moment to silently thank my uncle Dennis, who gave me his old mountain bike. This sucker could do Jenkins Wood trails without so much as creaking. I soared onto the path, sticks and rocks be damned. I stopped near the last tree I imagined the bird stopped at. I waited.
Chirp. Chirp. Loneliness.
“Yes.” I fist-pumped the trees. “Don’t you want some worms?” I asked it. “Eat on the forest floor, winged adversary!”
It answered farther down the path.
I followed it like that for ten minutes. Eventually the woodland path ends at Sarig Pond and a wooden boardwalk takes you out and around. I rolled to a stop at one of the outstretching docks. A plump gray bird fluttered down next to me.
“Nice brown markings,” I said to it. “Light beak. Awesome. Listen, you’d be doing me a solid if you could call right now. I’ll wait.” It stood there, regarding me with the mixture of curiosity and apathy that most birds did. I tried to imitate the birdcall I’d been following.
The bird laughed at me. With a human laugh.
“How did you do that?” I asked, astonished.
The bird chirped, back in its first language.
“Didn’t you know dark-eyed junco have vocal cords? They can talk if they want, but generally people don’t listen carefully enough,” the voice said.
I turned around to see Risa behind me.
“What?” I said to her
“That was a dark-eyed junco,” she said.
“It wasn’t the one I was looking for. And now that you say that, I got a junco for the life list years ago. But it didn’t have the brown.”
“You are coming to work at the Center on a weekend?” she said.
“Doesn’t everyone?” I said.
She chuckled. “Not that I know of.”
“You hang out with the wrong kind of people, then,” I said.
“Apparently.”
I scanned the tree line. I could make out the business of other sparrows, and some angry crows were arguing nearby. But no sounds that really mattered.
“Were you looking for something?” she asked. “You can borrow my binos if you want.”
Gran called her binoculars “binos,” too. It was a birder signal. How you knew the real birders from the people who got lost looking for the tennis courts on the other side of the pond and woods.
“I was. I don’t know what, though. Not the junco. It’s kind of a long story.”
“You are looking for a bird you couldn’t identify?” Her eyes lit up. “Cool! That never happens with you. What did it look like? Have you gotten a picture yet?”
Risa seemed a little too pleased that I couldn’t identify a bird.
“I hav
e never seen it. Only heard it. I’ve lived here my whole life and have never heard it. We think it might be a pet. My grandmother and me.”
“Can you imitate it?” Risa said.
“Uh. No,” I said.
“Try! Maybe I could help.”
What was she even doing? Did she want to get a picture of it first? But desperate times call for desperate measures. I chirped and called for a second.
It sounded more like a dying swan than anything.
“Did … uh … that sound like it?” she said.
“Um. No.” I cleared my throat and tried to make the sounds again.
Risa cocked her head at me, obviously trying to choke back a laugh.
I narrowed my eyes at her. “I told you I hadn’t heard it before.”
She shrugged, unable to hide her smirk.
“Are you working today?” I asked.
Risa looked at the ground. “Yeah. Figured it was better than being at home. It’s a nice day. Extra hours equals extra credit and whatnot.”
“Yeah, I had to make up some.” I scanned around for the mystery bird but he’d gone again.
“How’s your grandma?” she asked.
“Oh,” I said, surprised. I hadn’t thought Risa would care. “Hanging in there.”
Risa frowned. “Tell her I asked about her. I miss seeing her when I take the ElderBirds around.”
“Okay,” I said. We stood there in awkward silence for a second. I didn’t really feel like explaining the coma to her, but maybe the fact that she cared meant a lot in the moment.
“Hey, Risa—” I started.
“Oh, Jerry is here. Gotta go. Good luck with your birdcalls.” She turned and walked away quickly.
And the moment with Risa passed, like the movement of wings.
Freaking birds. Fucking people.
FIELD JOURNAL ENTRY
MAY 12
After my extra Sunday shift at the Nature Center, I mowed the lawn at Gran’s house. I filled her feeder, thinking maybe it’d attract the mystery bird. But in my heart I knew the best I was doing was helping the stealing asshole squirrels. I listlessly photographed the garden and the trees with uninspired clicks of the lens because I couldn’t think of anything else to do.
I heard a jostling inside Gran’s house. I went inside, figuring I’d find Mom. Instead there was a strange man. I must have looked totally freaked, because he spoke first.
“You must be Laurel,” he said.
“Yes?” I said like I wasn’t sure of the answer.
“Oh, hi, honey,” said Mom. She came down the stairs. “I didn’t realize you were here.”
“Taking care of the lawn,” I said. “Didn’t weed the garden, though.”
“They’ll bug your allergies,” Mom said. “This is Mr. Hughes. He’s here to look at Gran’s house.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Seeing if it needs to be freshened up a bit,” he said brightly. “It’s in great shape, Ms. Graham. Could use some paint, and maybe some new carpet. And you could consider updating the appliances, but that might not be necessary. It depends on the direction the neighborhood is going to take, after all.”
“What does that mean?” I asked.
“Depends on the city council, the school board, you know,” he said.
I looked at Mom.
Mr. Hughes chattered on about wainscoting and hardwood floors into the next room, but neither Mom nor I followed him.
“Mom!” I whispered to her. “You aren’t still seriously considering selling this place, are you? You can’t, you can’t, you can’t.”
“I’m just exploring my options.” She paused. “Hanging on to the house won’t bring her back to us, Laurel.”
“Neither will getting rid of it. We can figure out the money stuff, Mom.”
“We really can’t.”
“But…”
“I have to talk to this Realtor. He’s doing me a favor, coming out on a Sunday.”
I wanted to scream. I wanted to fly into a horrible frenzy. Mom walked away from me back toward Mr. Hughes.
“Fuck!” I said out loud to the empty room.
Short burst, one syllable. A call to indicate danger.
I went outside to her yard. I scared a squirrel off the feeder. “Is this what you want?” I asked the trees. “The house to be sold? Where are you, you freaking bird? Gran!”
Nothing.
My heart raced. I tried to breathe through the reminder that this was all my fault.
The fact was that I wanted to be a nature photograph, pristine and unmovable and lovely just the way I was. But things kept changing fast and furious and there was no lens speed quick enough to capture a pretty shot of this, if there was any beauty to be had.
I hopped on my bike then and rode hard. Away from Mom, away from Realtors and away from other uncooperative species. I spun my feet up hills and over the bridge and down the sidewalk until I found myself at the hospital. I didn’t remember the trip and looked up, surprised, when I saw the squat red brick building with the large glass windows and intimidating emergency room sliding doors I knew so well by now.
I locked my bike and went up to Gran’s room. By now I didn’t even have to see the nurse. I sat down at her bedside. If I were honest with myself, I knew in my heart that she wasn’t getting better. She was thinner, paler, and something else. Gaunt? Frail? Both, maybe. Nothing like herself.
“Gran,” I said. “Mom wants to sell your house. To the city, or something. I know that you would be totally pissed by this. That you are. But you have to wake up. You have to. You have to tell her because she won’t listen to me.”
Silence.
“I heard the bird again. I followed it. It likes the woods and pond. Of course. Risa was there. Do you remember her? The one I think messed up my chance at winning Fauna glory?”
Nothing.
“Though she has great hair. And, actually, cheekbones. I’m not going to lie.”
Not a single number on her monitors flicked up even a notch.
“Listen to this, Gran,” I said. I took a drink from my water bottle. I chirped two short notes, and whistled a long, low tune. That was better. It wasn’t exactly right, but it was close.
Gran’s thumb twitched. Her foot moved.
“Yes! See! This is what interests you. Maybe you don’t care about your house. You can come live with us, or buy it back or whatever. But the bird, am I right?”
Eyelids.
“Yes! It’s a mystery, and I know you love a good avian whodunit.”
More eyelids.
“Great! Awesome. I have an idea. I think you keep sending the bird to me. Maybe it has a message? Maybe it can tell me how to get you out of this? I will find out what the bird is for you. I find it out for you, and you wake up, okay? We will take care of you and then you’ll have this one for your life list. You can’t die. It’s not called a death list.”
I swear Gran’s head turned a little toward me.
I squealed a little. She was there. I knew it. No one believed me, which sucked. But I knew how important it was to find out the source of the call and tell her. I owed her that much. And then Mom would have to see her reaction. But I’d have to do it before they sold the house. Or … something worse.
“I’m so sorry you’re here, Gran. I know it’s all my fault. You’re here. I’ll do it,” I whispered. “I’ll find it for us. For you. Because you always wait for me, right?” I squeezed her hand and kissed her forehead. It was cool, with thin blue veins a lot closer to the surface than I remembered.
Gran twitched.
If I thought about it, Gran believed in a lot of things that some people might find irrational. Reiki. Haunted woods. Blessed ponds. Astral projection. Sometimes I made fun of it, because if I couldn’t take a picture of something, I tended not to believe in it. But what if Gran’s spirit had somehow gotten detached from her body in the accident? What if it really was a thing that a person’s soul could go somewhere else—like, say, a bird, unt
il her body was well enough to have it back? That was exactly the type of thing she would always hound me about.
Well, right after telling me to eat vegan and fight Shunksville High to get LEED certified.
She should be dead right now. The doctors all said so. But she wasn’t. And the mystery bird that appeared once was now all over the place (even if I couldn’t see it). Maybe that bird had a message from Gran. Maybe it was Gran.
It made sense as much as anything, didn’t it? I mean, why the hell not? The world is vast and weird as fuck.
As Brian Michael Warbley said, “We owe it to the universe to believe in the impossible.” And I think that was from last year’s issue with the Fauna contest winners.
It was a sign.
I had to find the bird. Photograph it. Bring it back to Gran.
And I had to do it before Mom sold the house.
This would be a challenge. But that didn’t matter. I had a mission. It would help her. I knew it would.
It had to.
FIELD JOURNAL ENTRY
MAY 13
The quest to find Gran’s messenger got off to a slow start. We were having a bit of a mouse problem at the Nature Center.
“They are a part of nature,” I argued. “We can’t kill them.”
“They are chewing through these here damn cords,” said Jerry, pointing to the computer. “I can’t afford to keep replacing them unless one of you finds me some San Clemente loggerhead shrikes and they go viral.”
“Listen,” said Risa. “I thought about this all weekend. I brought this.” She held up a bottle. “It is technically poison.”
I opened my mouth to protest.
“But it is eco-friendly. It more disorients them, shall we say.”
“Is that cruel?”
“They’ll want water. They’ll go outside to find it and get eaten by the owls or whoever, as was their likely fate anyway. But it won’t kill whoever uses them as dinner, like all that shit people use in their homes.”
I considered this. We’d lost two barn owls and one red-tailed hawk in the last year. We weren’t sure why they died. Risa found one of their bodies and I the other two on our regular trash pickup routes last fall. The unschoolers threw them a lovely celebration of life after the hawk, but all of us had felt the loss. Often no one can pinpoint why a bird dies, but poisoned rats and mice were up there with the likely causes.
The Confusion of Laurel Graham Page 5
