Hanna Who Fell from the Sky

by Christopher Meades

  “That very night, consumed with grief, I stepped outside and saw the most glorious sight. The sky broke open and a white crack formed in the heavens above. Hanna, everything I told you in your story is true. The crack took over the sky. The villagers fell to their knees, some in fear, others in prayer. And then this little dot appeared high above. I ran to it. Hanna, I saw you fall and watched you crash into the ground. The noise that rang out was louder than anything I’d ever heard. When I finally reached the spot where you’d landed, there you were: a baby with the widest eyes I’ve ever seen—a gift from Heaven—staring back at me.”

  “No,” Hanna said. She closed her eyes tight and opened them again, as though that might change what Kara had just said, as though somehow she could go back to how things were just minutes ago. All her life, she’d wanted the story of falling from the sky to be true, for it to be more than just a family fable. But to hear her mother tell it now, to hear that Kara truly believed she fell from the heavens, was overwhelming. Hanna felt light-headed. Her hands—from her fingertips to her palms—felt numb. She felt like Kara had just taken a brush and painted over everything Hanna had ever known, everything she’d ever believed.

  Kara took Hanna’s hand and held it close. “This really happened. You have to believe me.”

  “But—” Hanna said.

  “Wait. There’s more, so much more I’ve wanted to tell you for so long,” Kara said. “One of the men wrapped you in his jacket. He brought you back to Baker’s Hamlet, where the entire village celebrated your arrival. Not a single soul slept that night. Even my mother—who was barely able to speak—insisted on seeing you from her deathbed. We were all so amazed. A few of the villagers debated what to do, whom to tell, whether to call the authorities. Everyone else was enthralled. This nice woman carried you into the village square and we all sat around looking at the miracle baby who’d fallen out of the sky.

  “Then, as the sun rose in the morning, you began to wail. And you didn’t stop. You cried like no baby had ever cried before. We tried everything we could think of to soothe you. Two women who’d been nursing their own babies tried their milk on you, only you refused their breasts. My neighbor tried rocking you and feeding you from a bottle and still nothing worked. You cried for two days straight. The sound was piercing. It was agony. Suddenly, this baby—this gift from above—didn’t seem like a gift anymore.

  “A meeting was held. People were angry. They felt deceived. No baby could wail as much as you did. No child of this world could cry so many tears. As a group, we decided to wait until morning and then take you into the city, to drive you to the nearest hospital and tell them what happened.

  “Later that evening, my mother passed away. It happened rather quickly. She had no last words, no dying declaration. One moment she was breathing and the next...she just stopped. My neighbor, a childhood friend of my mother, stood over her, rubbing my mother’s hair, singing a lullaby. That soft song pushed me past my breaking point. The tears I’d been holding back for weeks poured out of me like rain the moment I stepped out of that room.

  “I wandered the bay—weeping—unsure what I was going to do. I had no family to speak of, no place to go. I didn’t know whether to return to the city or stay in Baker’s Hamlet. I was struggling with all this when I passed the house where you were being kept. I could hear your heart-wrenching screams from outside. Through the window, I saw the woman who lived there. She looked exhausted from lack of sleep, and when she stepped out into the backyard for some fresh air, I slipped into the parlor and picked you up from your crib. I held you close and, I swear, in that instant you fell fast asleep in my arms. Oh, Hanna, I was so happy. We both stopped crying together and all I wanted to do was hold this little gift from Heaven.

  “The peace didn’t last long. Jotham—a man I barely knew, a man visiting on a stopover in Baker’s Hamlet—was the first to discover me holding you. He couldn’t believe how quietly you lay in my arms. Jotham steered me into a corner and stood over top of me. He pushed his finger against my chest and told me he was taking you away, that the villagers were a threat to you and that he knew of the only safe place to raise a child who fell from the sky. Looking back, I wonder why I didn’t run, why I didn’t stall until the villagers came to see that you’d stopped crying. I should have screamed and screamed until I couldn’t scream anymore. But Jotham was a large man, an intimidating one. He had a presence, even more so when he was young.

  “Jotham gave me a choice—go with him or stay behind and never see you again. Hanna, my mother had just died. I was overwhelmed with grief, with uncertainty. And yet, feeling your little body against mine, I knew I could never let you go. I’d discovered you, and I felt like you’d discovered me too. I couldn’t let Jotham steal you away. That evening, he and his wife Belinda ushered us out of town.

  “Before dawn’s first light, we arrived in Clearhaven. Ten days later, I joined Jotham’s family. Brother Paul arranged a quick marriage ceremony and before I knew it, I was living in this strange place with all these different rules. It was so odd being here at first, with talk about the Creator and men with three, four, often five or six wives. I didn’t think I could live here. But I made Clearhaven my home so I could always look after you. I left my mother behind without giving her a proper funeral. I left my friends in the city behind forever. I left everything behind just as I’m asking you to do now. I’m not asking—I’m begging you to run far away from here.”

  Kara stopped and looked to Hanna to say something. Only, Hanna couldn’t find the right words.

  “What is it?” Kara asked.

  “Why are you telling me all this now? I mean—why didn’t you tell me about your mother years ago? About what happened in the village, with you and Father?”

  “I couldn’t,” Kara said. “You were a child and it was my job to take care of you. How could I tell a little girl that I never gave birth to her? That she fell from the heavens while my mother lay dying? That Jotham forced me to come to Clearhaven or else lose you forever?”

  Hanna stood up straight. “But I’m not a little girl anymore.”

  “No. You’re not. You’re a young woman now and that’s why I’m telling you the truth—the whole truth—now.”

  Hanna’s thoughts stormed inside her head: images of a young Kara kneeling next to her dying mother’s bed, of Kara discovering Hanna—the crying baby who’d fallen from the sky—and holding her close, soothing her tears, the fear that must have been etched in her face when Jotham threatened to steal the baby away. She thought about Edwin and Jotham, their proud expressions as they decided Hanna’s fate in the white church; Emily hobbling through the hallway at home, unable to zip up her own jacket, let alone take care of herself; Daniel and his clay-colored eyes; those soft, crumpled dollar bills in the white envelope. Hanna imagined herself standing at a train station, without her brothers and sisters, without her mother, all alone, waiting for a locomotive to take her far away.

  It was all too much to think about, too much to consider at once.

  “Even if all this is true,” she said, “I still don’t understand why you want me to go away.”

  Kara’s voice grew calm. When she spoke, it sounded like she’d rehearsed these words in her head a hundred times. “Because you were meant for so much more than just being Edwin’s fifth wife. You were meant for great things. I’m sorry I haven’t been able to give you a chance to succeed at life. I thought I was being strong by staying here with you.” Kara struggled to keep her hands from shaking. “I know what everyone thinks about me. I see their looks of pity at church. The women here think I’m incapable of having another child. But the truth is that, all these years, I refused to let Jotham put a baby in my belly. I thought, in that way, I was empowered. But somehow, my power slipped away without me even realizing it.

  “If you stay here and marry Edwin, you will be pregnant within the year and any hope of d
oing something special with your life will be gone forever. You must know you were meant for more than this.”

  “Mother...” Hanna said.

  “That fall from the rooftop would have killed anyone else. Don’t you see? You weren’t conceived by a man and a woman. The heavens gave birth to you. You fell from the sky.” When Hanna didn’t respond, Kara held out the envelope. “Please, take this money. I know it isn’t much, but it’s all I have.”

  Hanna’s fingertips touched the envelope. “I can’t leave without you,” she said.

  “You can. You must.”

  A few scattered leaves sailed down from the trees, slow and haltingly, like snowflakes. Above, clouds had gathered. A storm was brewing. Kara was standing close, her shoulders hunched, her eyes red and swollen from crying. In the distance, Hanna saw a woman exiting the police station. Was it Makala? Another one of Brother Paul’s wives? She couldn’t tell. She only knew she didn’t want to be seen out in the open, holding an envelope full of dollar bills.

  “I don’t know what to think,” she said.

  Kara pushed the money into Hanna’s hand. She bowed her head against Hanna’s chest and then met her gaze. “You have to ask yourself, deep in your heart—what do you believe?”

  20

  At dusk, the overcast sky was dim as though someone had thrown a blanket over a lampshade. Hanna walked down the roadway with her sisters on either arm, trying her best not to think about the ceremony about to take place. Tonight, a special pre-wedding ritual would precede the regular church service, one in which she would be forced to kiss Brother Paul’s palm, to give herself over fully and completely to the Creator, ensuring she was virtuous and chaste before her wedding night.

  She tried to take comfort in her sisters’ voices, their conversation about their school day. But Hanna felt inordinately aware of her family’s eyes. She couldn’t stop thinking that one of them knew she’d kissed Daniel in the belfry, that they’d overheard her mother’s astonishing story.

  I fell from the sky. I am meant for more than this.

  They rounded the bend past the tower cathedral and Jotham stepped out of his truck to survey the family. The white church’s glow hung about him like an aura, transforming him—momentarily, at least—into a looming apparition. His face dissolved into shadows and Hanna could see why she’d been so afraid of him all these years. It wasn’t just his imposing size. It was the way his boots rattled the floor when he walked. It was the haste with which his rage surged to the surface. It was the wild, uncontrolled look in his eyes as he stormed down the hallway, belt in hand, intent on whipping one of the boys.

  He straightened his back and stared at Emily and Charliss. His eyes shifted toward Hanna and her heart sank, fearing that her father had learned about Daniel. She gripped Emily’s hand tightly.

  Then Jotham coughed, a hacking cough that started out as a single surge. It seemed to finish quickly, and then Jotham convulsed again and all of a sudden he couldn’t control it. Jotham doubled over. His back brace clasped him in place and he cried out like a wild dog. The women ran to him. Belinda struggled to lift him up, only he cried out again, hacking and coughing on his knees. Some of the children backed away, but others, including Emily, rushed over to help.

  Hanna observed them all with a peculiar detachment, like she was watching a beehive fall from a tree and turn on its side, the bees buzzing with what looked like purpose but really just zipping around, colliding into one another in a frenzy.

  If Kara were to be believed, then this man wasn’t her father. He’d had no part in creating her. He was a stranger, as alien to Hanna as any big-city interloper, as foreign as any random man on the other side of the world. Jotham was a thief who’d stolen her in the dead of night and forced Kara to come along. This life Hanna had led—the one Jotham dictated, the one Brother Paul ordained—wasn’t hers. If Kara was telling the truth, none of these people were her flesh and blood. And Hanna was meant for more than this.

  * * *

  Hanna knelt with the other women and placed her arms on the long, circular board surrounding the white church’s stage. As a child, Hanna had grown accustomed to kneeling on the padded boards in the tower cathedral’s pews. She was used to the stiffness, to the mild ache in her kneecaps, to aligning her posture in order to distribute her weight evenly. This new floorboard cut like a knife. The longer Hanna knelt, the more it felt like her legs were being split in half. For almost a year now, Hanna had had bruises on her knees, deep, round discolorations the shade of burnt leather.

  Hanna had seen women collapse in church before. She’d seen the pain become too much and the women fall to the side and drop backward. But she’d never seen one of them stand up and be forced back down. Hanna had never seen a woman in Clearhaven rise to her feet and yell “no!” at the top of her lungs.

  Emily leaned into her big sister’s ear. “They’re calling you,” she said.

  Hanna looked up. The entire congregation was watching. Brother Paul was standing on his raised platform, his robes glimmering in the white light. A dull heat wafted in waves from the vents overhead and those eyes were still on her, devouring her piece by piece. Did any of them think Hanna would be the first girl in Clearhaven to refuse to kiss Brother Paul’s palm? She doubted it. When obedience is ingrained, defiance is beyond consideration. Insubordination isn’t just sacrilege; it’s contrary to reason. These women kneeling, the boys behind them who—save a chosen few—would soon be pushed out into the world, had no reason to suspect what she was thinking, no reason to know she led a secret life.

  She stood up and steadied herself. Now was not the time for histrionics. This was a formality. Hanna approached the stage and got down on one knee. It was so quiet; Hanna could hear her sleeve brush against her dress, the sound of her knee touching the ground. She took Brother Paul’s outstretched hand. Hanna felt his dry skin and saw how, up close, it was cracked like shattered marble. She turned his hand over and pressed her lips together. Brother Paul’s flesh smelled like medicine, the sleeves of his robes like soap. Hanna felt his finely manicured fingernails, the contours of his knuckles and the slight tremble in his hand. She closed her eyes. Hanna placed her lips to his palm and kissed his dry, callused hand. No sound came from the masses, just unnerving silence as Brother Paul helped Hanna to her feet, his smile wide like a crocodile’s.

  Hanna faced the crowd. She didn’t feel any more pure or chaste than she had a moment ago. She didn’t feel absolved of her sins. If anything, her resolve hardened: that this place—this town, this church, this very room—was in direct opposition to everything she wanted, everything she held true in her heart. Yet still she walked back to her family as she was told, still her lips held the taste of Brother Paul’s salty palm.

  As she reached her kneeling place, Hanna spotted Daniel’s mother and his father’s two other wives. It was dark in their corner and Hanna could barely make out their faces. She scanned quickly, her heart fluttering. Hanna couldn’t see Daniel anywhere.

  Then one of the men shifted. His head pulled out of view and there was that disheveled mop of hair, those gentle eyes. Daniel was standing beside his father, a dark denim jacket covering his shoulders. Hanna caught his eye. They shared a glance and before she could find some way to signal him, to implore Daniel to stay after the service, Emily grabbed her hand. She knelt down and Daniel slipped out of view.

  * * *

  After the service, juice and tea were served in the auditorium. On a separate table, stacks of homemade cookies overflowed from one tray to the next. Emily stood with her sisters, gaping in astonishment at the assorted delicacies: chocolate chip, peanut butter with white sugar, caramel-striped biscuits. Children from other families were openly devouring the treats in front of them and all Emily could do was watch. Months ago, Jotham had forbidden the children from eating after church. Hanna understood his motivation. He didn’t want ot
hers to think his children needed food. That argument might have swayed her, if not for the fact that the family had dined on nothing but shallow bowls of soup and dried bread crusts last night. This morning, the twins had to share a bowl of porridge. Ahmre had eaten soup again for breakfast. The children did need these cookies.

  Jotham had taken refuge in a large leather chair in the far corner of the church. His skin still looked sallow and Belinda and Katherine were tending to him with hot tea and a facecloth. His eyes were closed and even if he could see, he was in no shape to intervene. Hanna picked up a cookie and handed it to Emily.

  “Really?” Emily said.

  “Go ahead. You deserve it,” she said. Hanna picked up six more and handed them to her sisters. The boys didn’t wait. They ran past Hanna and stuffed themselves full of snacks.

  Hanna stepped away from the table, a sense of accomplishment rushing through her veins. Before she could bask in the moment, her mother walked by, carrying lemon slices for Jotham’s tea. She mouthed a single word. “Go.” Kara held Hanna’s gaze for a moment and then kept walking.

  Hanna turned away. All afternoon, Hanna had felt an enormous weight on her shoulders. Just yesterday, she’d thought the pressure of marrying Edwin, of living in a house with his wives—that wretched woman who challenged her at every turn and the other one who never uttered a single word—was too much to bear. Now Kara wanted Hanna to believe she never came from her body, that Kara hadn’t carried Hanna for nine full months, that they never shared the same blood, the same air—that Hanna’s heart had never beat inside her.

  Kara was across the room, speaking with one of their neighbor’s wives. Hanna watched her reach up and touch her hair, the delicate movement of her hands, the gentle way Kara listened to the woman’s story. She found it hard to believe that an accident of happenstance had brought them together, that Kara not only wasn’t her mother but not a mother at all.