The World From Up Here

by Cecilia Galante

  “It’s like what birds see,” Russell sounded mesmerized. “Right, Wren? Birds?”

  “Uh-huh.” For a single, ridiculous second, I wondered if birds ever felt afraid when it came to flying. Was there ever some little runt who just didn’t have it in him the way his brothers and sisters did, who hovered fearfully at the lip of the nest, staring down at the enormous expanse below? And if there was, what did it do? How did it learn to let go one day and fly?

  “Look over this way, Wren!” Russell said.

  I peeked over the top of Russell’s head. There was the mall, or at least what I thought was the mall, with its huge conglomeration of tan buildings shoved in tightly together and enormous expanse of empty parking lots. And there, on the other side of the highway, was the Susquehanna River, no wider now than a Tootsie Roll, its sludgy blue water the color of mud. Farther ahead was someone’s cornfield, the edges of it cut sharply like a square, and to the left of it, a gigantic mountaintop, which rose up into the sky in a sea of trees.

  My heart lurched as I looked at it again. Was that Creeper Mountain? It was hard to know from all the way up here. I stared at it again, waiting, perhaps, for Witch Weatherly to appear all of a sudden at the very tip-top, her red raven perched on her shoulder, shaking her fist at us. But there was nothing to see except a slew of tall pines, which bent and swayed in the wind like feathers. And then suddenly I caught sight of it: the ever-present thread of white smoke, which twined its way up through the trees and then disappeared into the air above them. My fingers trembled against Russell’s as we passed over the top of it, and then moved on, erasing it from view.

  “Man, oh man,” Russell breathed. “Windy Sundays are one of the best things ever.” He squeezed my hand again. “Don’t you think so, Wren?”

  I didn’t answer, still clutching the edge of my little brother’s shirt as the glider tilted to one side and then turned around, leading us back home again. All I could think about was getting back down to the airport in one piece and putting my feet down on solid ground. But another little part of me was still wondering about those baby birds. Was the answer really as simple as I guessed it might be? Could it be that the only way they learned to fly was to tiptoe up to the very edge of the nest?

  And then jump?

  “Mr. Tunlaw’s supposed to be back today,” Silver said, climbing into the back of Old Betsy the next morning. “Did you pick your history topic yet?”

  It was Monday. Only four more days and then Dad would be back to take Russell and me to the Hot Spot so that he could tell us what was really going on with Momma and how she was doing. Russell and Aunt Marianne sat up front, deeply immersed in conversation. I took a bite of my breakfast: a banana smeared with peanut butter.

  “I was thinking I might do it on the Liberty Bell,” I said. This was an outright lie. I still had no idea what my history project was going to be on, nor had I given it a passing thought since Friday. Come to think of it, I hadn’t even finished my math homework last night. I was still trying to recover from the weekend, first with the phone call from Dad, then the accident with Roo, and finally the plane ride on Windy Sunday. I was lucky I was still upright.

  “Huh.” Silver’s voice sounded forced. “The Liberty Bell. That should be interesting.” She looked past me for a split second, and then leveled her eyes with mine. “What’re your friends doing their projects on?”

  “My friends?”

  “You know, those two girls you always sit with at lunch? What are they doing their history projects on?”

  She was talking about Nora and Cassie, I realized. She thought they were my friends. Which they were, I guessed. Maybe. “I don’t know what they’re doing,” I said, looking out the window.

  “You haven’t asked them?” Silver pressed.

  “No, not yet.”

  She took a bite of her granola bar and chewed thoughtfully. “Are you working with either of them on it?”

  “No,” I said. “I don’t think Mr. Tunlaw would let me work with someone from another class. Besides, I don’t really like working with anyone. I’d rather do my own thing.”

  Silver nodded, as if she understood such a thing perfectly and didn’t say any more.

  Miss Crumb’s blackboard question in English made me scowl:

  If you could take back anything you’ve ever said to anyone, what would it be?

  It wasn’t that it wasn’t a good question. It was a very good question. It was just that it made me think about something that I would have much rather not ever thought of again, something that created an actual physical pain in my stomach whenever I was reminded of it.

  For Momma’s birthday last year, Dad threw her a surprise party. Because of work, he’d missed her birthday the year before, and he wanted to make it up to her in a big way. Four of Momma’s friends were coming, and some of them were bringing their husbands, too. Dad had invited a few of his own friends just to round things out, and Grandma was supposed to arrive early that morning. Russell and I helped Dad for weeks before the big day, going with him to Party City to pick out balloons and fancy decorations, and helping him order all of Momma’s favorite dishes from Vincenzo’s, which was her favorite Italian restaurant in town. Dad put me in charge of the cake, which he was going to get from the bakery. He said I could decorate it with Momma’s favorite colored sprinkles and put all the candles on.

  Each night, for two weeks before the party, Dad would ask Russell and me if we wanted to go for a walk with him after dinner. Just in case Momma was watching, Dad and I would meander slowly down our street, acting casual and disinterested as Russell gunned on ahead on his black Hot Wheels bike. But as soon as we turned the corner, Dad would pull his hands out of his pockets and start waving them around. His eyes lit up as he talked about who else was coming to the party, or what kind of cake he’d decided to order. I skipped along next to him, trying to keep up, while Russell pedaled furiously around the corner. But the faster Dad talked, the faster he walked. I’d never seen him so excited about anything in my whole life.

  On the morning of the party, he came in to my bedroom and kissed me awake. “Tonight’s the big night.” His eyes were shining in the dark. “Everything’s all set, right? You can’t think of anything we missed?”

  I shook my head. “She’s gonna love it, Dad. You’ve worked so hard.”

  “We’ve worked so hard.” He squeezed my hand. “I couldn’t have done it without you, butterbean.”

  I nodded, my heart bursting.

  “I’ll see you tonight, all right? You know what to do. Don’t be late!”

  “I won’t,” I said. “Bye, Dad. I love you.”

  My job was to take Momma out for a walk that night and then bring her back to the house where everyone would be waiting to surprise her. I was worried about the time, so I led her to the park at the end of our street where we sat on the swings. It was dusk. The light was soft and silvery, almost as if you could put your hand inside it and pull out a little piece of cloud. Momma sat on one of the swings and drifted back and forth. She had a dreamy expression on her face, not quite sad, but not quite happy, either. Well, I thought to myself, that was about to change. By the time I led Momma back to the house, my heart was banging so loudly inside my chest it felt like someone was playing kick the can in there.

  Momma didn’t seem to notice the unusual number of cars parked out on the sidewalk, or the fact that the blinds had been drawn across the front bay window. I held on to the back of her shirt as she turned the doorknob, and was so excited by this point that I thought I might fall over.

  “SURPRISE!”

  Dad stood in the middle of everyone, holding Momma’s cake, a beautiful three-tiered double chocolate cake with buttercream frosting. There were roses on top, big as lemons, and small lattice designs on the sides. And, of course, Momma’s favorite sprinkles, a combination of blue and pink sugar stars. Dad’s face beamed over the glow of all the candles, but Momma’s face turned white. Her mouth formed a little O shape and s
omething like a scream came out of it. Still clinging to the doorknob, she sank to the floor and pressed her hand against her chest. At first I thought she was crying tears of joy. But as a few seconds went by and her cries turned to sobs, I realized that something was terribly wrong.

  Dad put the cake down and ran over, gathering her in his arms. Everything got quiet as he held Momma and rocked her back and forth. She was shaking all over. “It’s okay,” he kept saying over and over again. “It was a surprise. I’m sorry, I didn’t realize … Everything’s all right. Everything’s fine now.”

  Russell tiptoed over and stood a little ways from her. “Get up now, Momma!” he demanded. “Come on! We have cake! And food from Vinny’s!”

  Momma’s skin was too pale, and her fingertips trembled, but she got up. I watched as she dried her eyes and blew her nose and laughed with everyone about having been so frightened. Silly her. She didn’t know what had gotten into her, carrying on in such a way. Those nerves of hers! She hugged me tightly, and told me how sorry she was that she had made such a fuss. The party went on. Momma’s friends brought her beautiful presents, and everyone sang “Happy Birthday” when Dad served the cake.

  But as the night wore on, after the excitement died down, things shifted again. I could tell Dad noticed it, too. He served the food from Vincenzo’s with a big smile on his face, and ladled Grandma’s ice-cream punch from her enormous crystal bowl into each of the matching crystal cups. He even led a conga line around the dining room table after Russell turned the stereo on. But Dad’s eyes kept skittering over to Momma who kept fiddling with a loose strand of her long hair, and rubbing her blemished hands. Her face, even with all the beaming people around, would suddenly revert again into another sad, glossed-over stare, as if she was thinking about something else completely. Dad looked heartbroken.

  Later, much later, after everyone had gone home, and Momma and Dad were sitting on the couch eating another piece of cake, Momma stretched out her arms as I walked by. “Come here, sweetie, and give me one more birthday kiss.”

  “No.” I kept walking.

  Her arms dropped. I could feel her eyes on me, but I didn’t slow down.

  “Wren?” Dad asked.

  “You ruined it,” I said, turning around suddenly and looking straight at her. “You ruined the whole party.”

  Momma’s blue eyes widened. “How? Because I got scared when everyone yelled?”

  “Scared?” I turned on her. “You weren’t scared. You freaked! Crying and acting like a crazy person!” My voice was starting to rise, but I didn’t care.

  Dad stood up. “Wren Baker,” he said sternly.

  “No!” I yelled. “It’s not fair! You have no idea how much work Dad did for your party! Weeks and weeks of work! Just to make you happy! And you went and ruined it because of your stupid nerves! Why are you even like that? What’s wrong with you?”

  Momma sat there speechless, as I turned and ran from the room.

  We never spoke of that conversation again. But now, in Miss Crumb’s class, as I thought about that day, I realized I would give anything to be able to take my words back.

  Every single one of them.

  Except for a slightly pale face, on his first day back, Mr. Tunlaw looked pretty much like he always did. Short sleeves, an orange-and-green striped tie, his blue cowboy boots. A fresh box of Twinkies, already opened, lay on his desk next to a wilting plant, and a discarded wrapper sat next to it.

  “Hey, gang!” he said as we all got in our seats. “It’s good to see you! Good to be back!”

  Everyone just stared at him. I wondered if he remembered that he had taken off his pants in front of all of us and danced around the room like a maniac. Maybe getting stung by wasps caused amnesia in some people.

  Jeremy raised his hand.

  “Yes, Jeremy?”

  “Did you get stung on your butt?”

  Silver shot him a disgusted look as the rest of the class laughed, but Mr. Tunlaw just nodded and smiled. “Actually,” he said, “I got stung five times on my rear and eight times on my chest.”

  “Thirteen stings!” Dylan said. “Mr. Pringle said you’d only been stung six times!”

  “Those were just the ones they were able to see,” Mr. Tunlaw said. “It wasn’t until I stopped breathing that they realized there had been a lot more.”

  The class fell silent. It was obvious that Mr. Tunlaw had been through a terrible ordeal. Jeremy looked down at his desk. Dylan coughed once and let out a nervous laugh.

  “It’s all right, though.” Mr. Tunlaw began to walk around the room. “Everything worked out, and I’m good as new. Now let’s get back to work. I’m very excited to hear what your history projects are all about.”

  I began to spin my pencil as Mr. Tunlaw went around the room, calling on students by row. Dylan and Jeremy were going to work together on a project about the history of coal mining. Sarah Byrnes and Mandy Dunkin were teaming up on a project about the Amish people. With each topic, Mr. Tunlaw nodded and wrote something down in a notebook on top of his desk.

  “How about you, Silver?” he asked.

  “I’ve definitely decided to do mine on Witch Weatherly,” Silver said, sidling a glance in my direction.

  Heads began to shake around the room.

  “Have you talked to your parents about this?” Mr. Tunlaw asked.

  “Oh yeah.” Silver shot me a guilty look. “My mom’s fine with it.”

  Mr. Tunlaw regarded Silver with an odd expression, as if deliberating whether or not to argue with her. Finally, he shrugged. “I don’t know how safe it is, Silver, but if your mother’s given you permission, I’ll let you give it a shot. If you can get up there, and find some interesting historical facts about Sudbury from Ms. Weatherly, then you’ve got a deal. But if it’s too difficult to climb the mountain, or she refuses to talk to you, you’re going to have to change your topic. Deal?”

  “Deal,” Silver said. “Thanks, Mr. Tunlaw.”

  Deal? He was just going to let Silver try to claw her way up Creeper Mountain? Even if she got through the ridiculously thorny underbrush, there were still the pits filled with sharpened sticks and the abundance of hornet-head snakes to worry about. And what about the red raven? None of this sounded anything like a deal to me.

  “That just leaves you, Wren.” Mr. Tunlaw nodded at me.

  “Oh.” I stopped spinning my pencil and thought fast. “I was, um … I thought maybe I’d do it on the Liberty Bell.”

  “Perfect.” Mr. Tunlaw wrote it down. “All right, that’s everyone.” He closed his notebook and stood up. “Papers are due on Friday. Now let’s talk about the sources I’d like you to use, and what kinds of information you can get from the Internet.”

  I didn’t know anything about the Liberty Bell.

  And I couldn’t imagine wanting to, either.

  Standing in the middle of the lunchroom holding my tray, I tried desperately to look like I knew where I was going. Which, of course, I didn’t. Everywhere I turned, the lunch tables were full. There was one in the corner, right under the poster of LeBron James drinking a carton of milk, that looked as if it might have a few empty seats, but the band kids took up half of it. I didn’t really want to sit at the band table, especially since last week three of them had gotten into a food fight, hurling spoonfuls of mashed potatoes across the cafeteria. Silver’s table was completely filled with boys. And I couldn’t sit with Nora and Cassie. After walking away from them on Friday, I was almost one hundred percent sure we weren’t friends. I didn’t really want to sit with them anyway. They were spiteful and rude, and—

  “Wren!” Cassie was standing up at our table, waving to me. “Come sit with us!”

  I hurried over, thankful not to keep standing there like an idiot, and doubly relieved that I was not going to be seen eating alone at the other end of the band table.

  “Hey!” Nora had a bright smile plastered across her face. Blue-and-green beaded earrings cascaded from her earlobes. “How are
you, Wren?”

  “I’m okay.” I picked up my chicken soft taco and took a bite. Maybe they’d forgotten about everything. Maybe things were okay after all. “How’re you guys?”

  “We’re good!” Nora said. “You seriously should’ve come with us to that movie, though. It was amazing.”

  “Yeah,” Cassie agreed. “So scary.” She looked at me curiously. “You look different.”

  “I do?”

  “Yeah,” Cassie said. “You do. I can’t figure it out, though.”

  “Oh wait, I know,” Nora said. “It’s that Band-Aid on her head.” She leaned in closer to me. “What happened? Did you get into a fight with your new best friend?”

  My jaw froze in the middle of a chew. We weren’t still friends at all. They just wanted to make fun of me. To dig the knife in a little deeper.

  “No,” I said, getting up out of my seat. “But you and I might, if you don’t stop being so mean.”

  Wait, had I just said that? And if I had, where had it come from?

  Nora jumped out of her own seat. “Are you threatening me?”

  I walked away. Fast. It was already bad enough that I’d said what I did, but the last thing I wanted was to get into a fight in front of the whole school.

  “We don’t want you sitting here anymore!” Cassie called after me. “Like, ever!”

  “Don’t worry.” I turned around. “I was thinking the same thing.”

  I almost laughed at the expression that came over Nora’s face. But I turned back around instead and dumped my tray into the garbage. Even Roo would turn up her nose at those chicken tacos, I thought, making my way toward the cafeteria door. So I didn’t have a table to sit at during lunch anymore. I’d just go hang out in the bathroom until the bell rang.

  Silver’s table was right near the doors. She grinned when she saw me approaching, and then stood up as I kept going. “Wren, wait!”

  I paused, shifting my backpack on my shoulder as Silver hurried over to me. She was still holding a piece of chicken taco. “I was just going to come over to your table. Can you meet me in the library after the final bell? I want to show you something.”