Half a World Away

by Cynthia Kadohata

  Nobody moved. The eagle’s eyes darted this way and that, again and again. They all sat doing nothing for about half an hour. But for some reason Jaden didn’t feel impatient. Then suddenly the eagle took off into the air, up and up.

  “She has seen something!” Kanat cried out.

  Jaden jumped up and looked forward and saw nothing. He looked behind himself and to both sides, but he didn’t see what the eagle saw. Then in the distance she began speeding unbelievably fast and downward. She swooped toward something that was almost like a bouncing dot on the horizon, and the eagle was not much more than a dot herself. It was hard to tell for sure, but then the dot seemed to make an amazing about-face and headed swiftly in the opposite direction. The eagle didn’t change directions quickly enough; the dot was gone. She didn’t come back to Kanat, just flew way above them, up and up. Kanat called out, “Meeeeeh, meeeeeh” in a voice so animal-like that Jaden could only deduce that Kanat was part animal. Then the eagle swooped down and landed on his glove. But a few minutes later she took off into the air again, rising upward.

  “She has seen another hare!” Kanat cried out. Jaden could see this one. Kanat spurred his horse into a gallop, and Sam drove forward. The eagle fell upon the hare.

  When they got to the eagle, she was pecking at a bloody hare that was somehow still alive. Jaden snapped a picture. It all struck him as simultaneously cruel and exhilarating. He liked the way she so obviously relished eating raw meat, and he related to that, but the hare was suffering. Jaden hopped out of the sidecar to get a closer look. The eagle glared at him like she wanted to scratch his face off and have it for dessert. But he didn’t take a step back, because he wanted to see her close up. As he was watching, the hare died.

  “How did she know the first hare was there?” Jaden asked Kanat.

  “Eyes of eagles take up more space than their brains. She can have sight more than two and a half kilometers away,” Kanat bragged. “She has good eyes, even for eagle.” Jaden tried to work that out in his head. Maybe somewhere between one and a half and two miles?

  Kanat spoke to the eagle in what sounded like Kazakh. Then he rehooded her and tied the rabbit carcass to the horse.

  Jaden could feel Kanat’s pride radiating out from him like spokes on a wheel. Sam was nodding appreciatively. Then Sam patted Jaden on the shoulder. “Eagle is built to be predator,” Sam said. “There is nothing else that matters to eagle when she chases hare. It is drive for prey that makes her so fast. Someday you must find out what makes you fast, do you see?”

  Fast? Jaden watched as Kanat climbed back on his horse, the eagle on his glove. There was a forked post attached to the saddle, and Kanat rested his gloved arm in the fork. It had all gone so quickly, Jaden hadn’t had time to process everything. What did Sam mean by “fast”? He didn’t know what kind of power he might have gained, though the eagle was very impressive. Even so, he felt a pang of sadness for the bloody hare.

  “It’s sad for the hare,” Jaden said.

  “Yes, sure,” Kanat answered. “A hare is very wonderful. I have much respect for prey.” He became sorrowful momentarily, and then the pride filled his face again. “Often you don’t catch something so soon. Sometimes it takes many hours. But she wanted to put on show for you. She is not as quick as some eagles, and many times she cannot catch hares because a hare has much of speed.”

  “How come you use a girl eagle?” Jaden asked.

  “The females are bigger and perhaps braver. She once took down a wolf. Many do not believe she did this, but it is true. Kanat is best eagle I ever knew.”

  The eagle was sitting peacefully on Kanat’s gloved arm. Jaden stepped closer and then closer until he was right next to her. Her feet were as long as his own feet. “The talons are very strong,” Kanat said. “The beak as well.”

  “Come now, Jaden,” said Sam. “I will get you back to your parents. Maybe you will have time to see your friend at baby house. I did not know things would go so well. I am very pleased.”

  They rode back to Kanat’s house, but this time Jaden didn’t feel like he was meditating. It was hard to meditate when you’ve just seen a giant bird swooping through the sky. It made him feel kind of wired, then sad for the hare, then wired again. They arrived at the yurt before Kanat. Jaden got up, closed his eyes, and concentrated. But he didn’t feel more powerful. “I don’t feel any extra power,” he said.

  “Maybe you will feel it, and maybe you will not. But it will be inside you, I promise you this.”

  When Kanat got home, he placed the hooded eagle on the perch in an outside enclosure. “The hood keeps them calm,” Kanat said.

  What would it be like for such a bird to be cooped up all day? “Is she happy?” Jaden asked.

  “Happy!” Kanat said. “It is my usefulness to see to it that she is happy!” To Sam, he said, “You will come in for drink? I have vodka.”

  Sam looked tempted, but then his face fell. “I have promised my wife I would never drink when I must drive, and I do not like to lie to my wife. But next time I will stay all day. Save your vodka for me.”

  “Sure, sure,” Kanat said.

  “Thank you,” Jaden said. “Great eagle.”

  “Sure, sure.”

  Jaden got into the car with Sam. As he started the car, Sam said, “Do not lie to your wife. Even if she does not find out, you will be mistaken to lie to her. Listen to me—I am teaching you well, as I promised your mother.”

  “I think she meant to teach me about eagles.”

  “The eagle may teach you herself. It is my duty to teach you about your wife. This is one lesson of today.”

  After that, Sam didn’t talk for most of the way back, during which time he drove like a madman, as usual.

  Then he asked, “Jaden, what have you thought your power will be?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “You will find something that makes you fly, and then your life will be settled. What is it you thought of the eagle?”

  “I’m not sure. She was spectacular, I guess.”

  “What is this?”

  “Spectacular. It means amazing.”

  “I have shown you an eagle’s power, and you have taught me a new word. This is good,” Sam said. He held out a fist, and Jaden bumped it with his own.

  Chapter Nineteen

  They reached the baby house during the last half hour of bonding time. Jaden felt like he’d been in a fantasy world all day, and now he was going back to reality. He felt a little dazed to be in the real world again. Dimash was across the courtyard by an old swing set. He spotted Jaden immediately and started crying out, “Kak dyela! Kak dyela!” Jaden stood, waiting and smiling. He enjoyed watching Dimash run toward him. As usual, the boy stopped himself by bumping right into Jaden’s stomach, which immediately brought Jaden back to this world. He was surprised at the lift in his heart when he saw Dimash. He was a funny little guy. Full Kazakh, no doubt—he could not have looked more Central Asian. Beautiful, except you could tell he wasn’t right. His way of running was awkward, and the way he stood, with one shoulder scrunched down, was strange. No, the future was not bright for Dimash if he didn’t learn to walk differently. Walking was important.

  Jaden knelt down in front of him. “Dimash, my man, you need to find the part of yourself inside that can save you.” That was what Dr. Wilder had said to him once. “What are your brains like in there? Can you save yourself?”

  Dimash gazed at him intently, his shoulder scrunched, his stance geeky. Jaden pulled the boy’s shoulder up until both sides were even. “Here, stand like this. Good! Now watch.” Jaden walked evenly, with a little bit of swagger. “That’s how you walk. Come on, walk to me.”

  Dimash pushed his shoulder down and walked to Jaden even geekier than usual.

  “No,” Jaden said, patiently but firmly. “When you walk, you must be cool. Then maybe nobody will bother you. B
elieve me, I’ve seen what it’s like when other kids bully someone. It’s bad, okay? I’m not trying to scare you, but I need to educate you.” He knew Dimash couldn’t understand him. But what if he could sort of understand the concept through some kind of osmosis or exchange of electrons? It was possible. “Watch carefully,” he said slowly and seriously.

  Jaden sauntered in an exaggerated fashion. Dimash was right behind him, giggling. Jaden sighed. “No, no, no. No. Nyet.”

  Dimash turned serious.

  “Yes, good! This is serious! Da!”

  Akerke suddenly called out behind them, “Jaden! You are here! You must come to the bonding. Director has said it. She is away but is coming back soon. She should not see you out here when you should be bonding.”

  Jaden glanced at her, then ruffled Dimash’s hair. “Okay, buddy, I’ll see you.” He bounded up the steps. He felt he might have gotten through to Dimash, just a little. It made him want to jump up a hundred feet!

  In the bonding room, not a single thing had changed with Ramazan. The baby’s face was blank as a clean chalkboard. Penni walked up and down the room with Ramazan in her arms, her head pressed against his face, his emotionless eyes wide open. A woman Jaden hadn’t seen before was playing the piano.

  “Back so soon? How was it?” Steve asked.

  Penni came over with the baby. “Was it fun?”

  Jaden thought that over. “It was another universe, right in the same country as Kyzylorda city.”

  “What did you learn?” Steve said.

  “Not to lie to my wife someday.”

  Penni and Steve just looked at him. “What does that have to do with eagles?” Steve said.

  “Some eagles mate for life, so that taught me, uh, how to be fast . . . or something like that. It was cool. I’m glad I went.”

  Jaden sat on the couch, trying to process his information overload. He tried to feel some kind of new power inside himself, but he still couldn’t find it. What was the point of new power if you couldn’t even feel it? He switched his mind over to the boy. Dimash had been happy to see him, and he’d been happy to see Dimash. They had bonded. This was exactly what the laws wanted kids and families to do. He wanted Dimash for a brother. But how could he make that happen?

  Penni was placing Ramazan onto the floor, and then she and Steve sat down a few steps away. “Ramazaaaaan, crawl over heeeere, honey!” Steve said in a talking-to-a-baby voice Jaden had never heard from him.

  Jaden sat on the floor next to Penni and Steve. “Mom, Ramazan is a great baby, don’t get me wrong. But I think we should adopt Dimash. Someone else may adopt Ramazan, and he’ll have a good life. He’s a baby, and you told me everyone wants the babies. But nobody but us will adopt Dimash. Doesn’t that mean the right thing to do is to adopt him?” Jaden paused, thinking, thinking. . . . Then he had it. “You’re always telling me I should be good inside. You said that’s the most important thing in the world. Wouldn’t we be better inside if we adopted Dimash?”

  Steve said, “Sometimes you need to make decisions that don’t involve taking the most noble action but rather taking the action that is the most beneficial for you. That isn’t always true, but there are decisions like that, Jaden. But I’m proud of you for what you’ve just said.”

  Jaden was trying to manipulate Penni at the moment, not Steve. So he ignored Steve.

  “Mom?” Jaden said. “Can we adopt him?”

  She stared straight ahead, at where Ramazan was now lying on his back instead of crawling toward them. She took a big breath and tilted her head at Jaden, her eyes filling with tears.

  “Oh, honey,” she said. “I don’t think he’s right for us. He’s a beautiful boy, inside and out, I think, but that doesn’t make him the child for us.”

  Penni fixated on the baby again. “Ramazan, can you crawl to your mommy and daddy?”

  Disappointment and worry washed over Jaden. He sat on the couch sideways, so he didn’t have to watch Penni and Steve bonding with Ramazan.

  When bonding finished that day, they watched TV at their apartment for a while, ate dinner at a café nearby, wandered around for half an hour, and finally went back and watched television again. It was all pretty different from seeing a man hunt with an eagle. Usually when they visited another place, Penni and Steve did touristy things, but here in Kyzylorda they had no interest in being tourists. They had a purpose, and that was to adopt a baby.

  Since there weren’t many shows in English on their cable, they ended up watching the usual women’s billiards in English, the nature channel in English, or tennis matches narrated in Russian. During commercials they talked about women’s billiards, lizards or other animals, and tennis. Lizards now seemed important, even to Jaden. It was just that you kind of glommed on to anything spoken in English, and that made the nature channel take on greater importance.

  Finally Jaden went to his room to read about electricity, but for once he wasn’t interested in it. He’d brought a great book called The Spark of Life that he’d read half of, but at the moment he just couldn’t focus. He had too much to process. So he sat at the window, trying to turn himself off. Instead his mind traveled back to the morning. If he were Kazakh, he wouldn’t mind being an eagle hunter. The experience had been kind of hypnotic, the way it brought you into the eagle’s world. But what did Sam mean about being fast? And what about finding his power?

  Penni rapped on the door—he recognized her soft knock—and then the door pushed open just a crack. “Good night, Jaden.”

  “Good night, Mom.”

  “Jaden?” He waited. “Do you like the baby?”

  “I don’t know. He doesn’t do much.”

  “I know. I don’t think he’s bonding with us. My goal is for us all to love one another before we leave Kazakhstan,” she said firmly.

  “But, Mom, don’t you like Dimash?”

  “Very much,” she said as she walked into the room.

  “I think it’s fate that we take him,” Jaden said. “It is.”

  “Oh, but, honey, I don’t believe in fate.”

  “It was fate that you adopted me!” Jaden cried out.

  “It wasn’t fate, it was chance. But any life that wouldn’t have brought you into my family is not one I would have wanted to live,” she said, her eyes flashing.

  That made Jaden feel something, but what? He didn’t know. He didn’t understand feelings so well. Click. He took a picture of himself, of his expression.

  “I don’t know if this baby is bonding,” Penni continued, sitting on the bed. “I can’t get rid of the idea that Bahytzhan was supposed to be our child.” Then she gave her head a hard shake and forced a smile. “But Ramazan, he’s a wonderful baby. I just want everything to work out. And then there’s Dimash. But, honey, it would be so difficult. . . .”

  “What?”

  “Raising Dimash.”

  “I would look out for him,” Jaden said eagerly. He stood up and took a few steps toward the bed.

  “Would you?” Penni asked. “Would you?”

  “I said it.”

  “You’ve said many things,” Penni retorted.

  “But, Mom, I mean it.”

  Steve appeared in the doorway. “Who said what?”

  “We were talking about Dimash,” Penni explained.

  “Dimash,” Steve said. “Poor little guy. Beautiful kid, but we can’t adopt Dimash.”

  Jaden pounded his fist against his forehead three times. He knew they hated it when he did that, but he couldn’t stop himself.

  Steve looked at him coolly, and even Penni didn’t react with worry like she usually did. Still, he could tell that Penni wanted to discuss all this further. But his heart abruptly went cold, and he didn’t want to talk anymore. Dr. Wilder had tried making a chart with Jaden about these occasions when his heart went cold. But then it happened so much that they didn
’t know how to chart it anymore. Dr. Wilder couldn’t find any pattern as to when it would happen.

  “Good night, you guys.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry, we’re keeping you from your, uh, musings.” Penni stood up. “Good night.”

  Chapter Twenty

  Jaden turned off the light and sat at his window to watch the shepherd. There were eleven sheep and what looked like a dog, which occasionally ran in a little circle, as if playing. Shepherds in Kazakhstan were nomads, wandering across the land. Jaden tried to imagine himself in that kind of life, and somehow it made sense to him. No Penni, no Steve, no school, no destination. He took out his phone, and from the opposite side of the room, he snapped a picture of the window.

  Then, without changing into his pajamas, he got in bed and fell into a deeply disturbed sleep where he wasn’t sure what was real and what wasn’t.

  ***

  For some reason, the toddlers didn’t seem to be on an exact schedule. Sometimes when Jaden arrived, Dimash was playing in the courtyard with the toddlers, and sometimes the courtyard was deserted. And then one day when they arrived, there was Dimash, shivering out in the rain, all by himself. He burst into tears when he saw Jaden and ran toward him, throwing his arms around Jaden and sobbing. Jaden hugged him tightly as rain washed over them. As if she were speaking from another world, he heard Penni saying, “Bring him inside, Jaden.”

  “Which building do the toddlers live in?” he asked.

  “Bring him inside this building to the director,” Steve said.

  They’d just gone inside when one of the care­takers spotted them and grabbed Dimash and yelled at Jaden as if he were somehow responsible.

  Jaden yelled back. “What was he doing outside on his own in the rain?”

  The caretaker seemed taken aback and pulled Dimash away and outside, probably to where the toddlers lived.

  The weather had grown cold so quickly. Jaden worried that the caretakers wouldn’t be bringing the toddlers outside anymore because of the weather. How would he get to see Dimash if they were inside?