The Bone Sparrow

by Zana Fraillon

  No one but the rats see me as I run, faster than I’ve ever run before, so fast that my brain doesn’t even notice that I could go on running and running and running forever and ever and there wouldn’t be a single fence to stop me.

  It’s not until I’ve run so far that I can hardly hear the noises of the camp that I stop, coughing up the dirt and the dust and wheezing to get more air into my burning hot lungs. I’m not in the camp anymore. For the first time ever, in my whole entire life, I am on dirt that I’ve never walked on before, breathing in air I’ve never breathed in before and looking at the world that I’ve never seen before.

  There is nothing and nobody to stop me.

  I thought it would be harder to find Jimmie. But she was right. It wasn’t hard at all. Straight up the hill to the old gum tree. There is the house, the only one with a LEGO mailbox. Just like in her photo. With an old, broken bathtub in the garden waiting to be filled with veggies, and that beautiful tree singing out to us. For a minute my brain stops, just breathing it all in.

  But then I see Jimmie. She’s just lying there, in the dirt under the window. She is so sick. Her breathing is all fast and sharp, more like hiccups than good, strong breaths, and she needs water. She is burning up even hotter than before.

  There is water inside the house. But the door is locked, and so is the window. I see the rock on the ground. It would be perfect for Towers of Rah. It’s long and flat and part of my brain is wondering if Jimmie ever played Towers of Rah before, and I’ll have to teach her someday because I reckon she’d be good at it. Just not today, is all.

  It turns out this rock is pretty good at breaking windows too. I should have moved Jimmie before I threw the rock, because now there is glass all around and I’m worried that she’ll get cut again. Jimmie didn’t even flinch though. Not even when the glass smashed and rained down on her legs.

  Now I’m in Jimmie’s house. I’ve never been in a house before. Everything is going so slowly and Raticus is just sitting on his wheel, not running, just sitting, and I need everything to be going faster.

  But even when I get the water and open the door and try to get Jimmie to drink, the water just spills out of her mouth like she’s forgotten how to swallow. I don’t know what to do.

  Then I see it. Jimmie’s phone with the words EMERGENCY ONLY written at the top. Reading those words brings back all the information from the Emergency Folder that I sucked up when I was trying to find something to read. So I do everything the information said to do. I remember to check her airways. I remember to put her in the recovery position, rolled over on her side so she can keep breathing and doesn’t swallow her tongue. I remember to call 000.

  “You have dialed emergency triple zero. Your call is being connected…please wait.”

  Don’t they know I can’t wait? That Jimmie needs help now? Then there is a voice, a real voice of a woman, and she asks if I want police, fire, or ambulance. I wonder for a second why anyone would want fire, but I say ambulance and she tells me that I will be connected to the nearest state call center.

  And now there’s another voice, and this one’s a man and he says, “Ambulance emergency, what is your exact location?”

  I can’t answer. I don’t know the exact location. All I know is that Jimmie is sick.

  “I don’t know.” I can hear the wobble in my voice. “I need an ambulance. Jimmie is sick and hot and isn’t breathing right and I don’t know the address or anything, but there isn’t anyone else here and it’s the house up the hill from the detention center. You go straight up the hill and head for the big gum tree and then you’ll see the house with a LEGO mailbox and a bathtub in the garden and a tree and—” I talk so fast that I can’t even hear the man’s voice anymore, until he says, “It’s okay, son. We have the address and an ambulance is on the way. Is she conscious? Is she breathing? I need you to roll her onto her side and keep her calm. Can you do that, son?”

  Then Jimmie starts calling. She’s calling my name. It’s no more than a whisper, but I hear it.

  The man on the phone is still talking, but Jimmie is calling. I can see angry red dots all over her and her eyes keep rolling in her head. I drop the phone and the man sounds all tiny and far away. I talk to Jimmie. I tell her I’m here, and her eyes stop on my face, for just a bit. So I keep talking.

  Her lips move and I bend down close to hear what she is saying.

  “A story,” she whispers.

  I want to tell her that stories don’t matter, that she just needs to get better, that nothing else matters, but the man said to keep her calm. And Jimmie said she wants a story. Maybe knowing about the Bone Sparrow’s luck is enough to make her better, no matter how sick she is. Maybe knowing will be enough.

  So I read her the end of the Bone Sparrow’s story. I read, but there is no tingle this time. Just empty words and an ache for something in them to help Jimmie. I put her hand on the Bone Sparrow so she can feel it and know that the luck is dripping into her. But her hand falls off, all heavy and hard.

  I keep reading. It doesn’t matter that the words aren’t a story at all anymore but are email addresses and supermarket lists and a reminder to buy red ribbons for the handlebars of a bike for a birthday. I can’t tell if Jimmie hears the words or not, but when I read the bit about the ribbons, she smiles, just the smallest bit. Her breathing has slowed down and isn’t so hiccupy. I get her to drink a bit more water, and this time she gulps at it. Even though water is still dribbling out the sides, more is going down her throat than it was before.

  Now I can hear the ambulance siren and the lights are getting closer and I know that I can’t be found here. Not by anyone. Because if they know I can get out, then they’ll stop Eli. Eli, he needs a Plan B. He always needs a Plan B.

  Jimmie’s eyes are closed and her breathing is all crooked, but she doesn’t look so scared anymore, hearing that ambulance, knowing she’ll be okay.

  I leave her then, the book resting on her chest so the doctors know that she needs it there to get better, and I squeeze her hand and run into the shadows behind the house.

  Her hand stays propped up in the air, like she’s still feeling my squeeze.

  The ambulance people work fast. They have their bags and their bed and they start on their fixing right away, the lights flashing around and around. They take the book off her chest, but they put it in her hand instead. They know.

  They pack her up into the van.

  Just as they are about to leave, another car comes and a boy jumps out of it before it is even properly stopped. He screams and calls Jimmie’s name and bangs on the side of the ambulance. When he says that he is Jonah, that he is Jimmie’s brother, what happened and is she all right?, they open the doors and let him in. Before they do I see in his hand. He has a chocolate bar for Jimmie. Just like he promised. And in the back of his car, I can see the handlebars of a bike, glinting silver and bright in the sunlight.

  When the lights from the ambulance have disappeared, I can’t properly tell if the siren I can hear is the real siren, or just the ringing in my ears, and I’ve somehow run without noticing, and I’m already halfway back to the gum tree. I keep on toward that tree, and when I get there, my legs start wobbling so much that I can’t run anymore. I let myself sit down on the hill, with my back pushing up against the smooth bark of the tree, and my whole body suddenly turns to mush. I’m shaking and crying and shivering even though I’m not cold or even sick.

  And without really meaning to, I start climbing the tree. I remember just what Queeny taught me, back when we were little, when she was telling me all about our home in Burma and the tree they had there. Telling me to take it one step at a time, to look for the next branch along and not stop until I reach the top. And I don’t stop. Not until I’m right there on the very last branch.

  Queeny was right. The air up here is sweeter and fresher than any air I’ve ever breathed. Lighter, somehow. I let my legs dangle over the edge of the branch and my arms wrap around the trunk of the tree. T
he leaves of the gum tree smell like lemon, and the bark is smooth and soft and cool on my cheek.

  From up here I can see the camp. The lights are all still on, and every so often the wind carries a snippet of something. The noise of craziness. I wish Eli hadn’t done what he did. I wish he’d just run. Even though I know he had to do it, I still wish he hadn’t. I wish it could all go back to being just the way it was before.

  I don’t want craziness. I don’t want any of it.

  I look up at the clouds moving across the sky. And something whispers in my ear that right now, right at this very minute, I’m free. I could stay here forever if I wanted to. I’m Outside. For real, and not just in my imaginings. But as soon as that whisper comes, my chest feels tighter than ever and I don’t feel free. I feel scared.

  I breathe in that air, trying to get my chest to loosen just a bit, when my nose starts to twitch and I can smell smoke. I look toward the camp again, and I see it.

  Flames and smoke eating at the sky. My body lets out a cry without me meaning to.

  I can’t stay. Not even for a bit.

  All I can think of is Maá and Queeny and Eli. What if Maá doesn’t notice the fire? What if Queeny can’t get her to move? And Eli, blocked in with no way out. What if…?

  I tell my brain to stop thinking. To just move and run. Even though my legs have never run like this before, they keep pumping and I can’t feel them anymore. I feel like I must be flying, they’re moving so fast.

  Then I’m almost back at the fences. It’s like the whole world has turned upside down and been shaken about and there is so much screaming and yelling, and the noise of the craziness is so hot and angry and loud it charges through my brain and even the questions stop.

  I stop.

  I’m frozen just watching. More and more black angry smoke clouds up from the camp, and I just want to be with Maá and Queeny and Eli, no matter if it means sizzling right up like a sausage along with them.

  Once I understand that, my legs take over again. I squeeze through the wire and run through the Space. There aren’t any rats anymore. Not a single one. I run toward the last fence, waiting for the guns. For the shooting. For the pain. My legs keep running. And the shots never come.

  People are running everywhere. Jackets with their shields and helmets and dogs and people with blood and scared on their faces. No one notices me even though all the other kids must be in the Family tents, staying there no matter what they see or hear, just like Queeny told me to.

  All the fences inside are down, pushed over and squashed up in the middle, so there’s no Family, no Ford, no Alpha. I wonder if there is Delta and Beta, or if they’re down too.

  I see the fire reach one of the gas bottles at the back of the kitchens and it explodes so big and loud that it pushes me to the ground. The dirt is in my eyes and mouth and ears and I can’t hear anything anymore, and a hot something is coming from my ears and when I touch it I see that it is blood.

  I get back through the squeezeways, and the sound of the camp is getting louder, and I almost wish for another explosion to make it all quiet again.

  There’s yelling coming closer. Feet flapping and boots thumping. I fall sideways into the shadows of a tent.

  Our corner, Jimmie’s and mine, is just in front of me, but it’s not a corner anymore, just a brick wall and some bushes and a broken-down fence, and I can smell angry and scared and crazy all mixed up together and being pushed about by the wind, which isn’t helping anything with its bumping in and out.

  And now there is someone. I know who it is just from the way he runs, with his hands straight and pumping in close against his body. I have my mouth open to call out to him. To call out to Eli. Because Eli doesn’t have scared. Eli can be Outside for real, climbing those trees and riding his bike and tasting that food, and he wouldn’t ever have to stop for anything ever again. Eli just has to use his Plan B.

  There is a crash before I can call out and I watch as the outside fences come down. Both of them. Even the perimeter fence. There is no Space now. Just people charging over the broken-down fences and getting caught up in spirals of sharpened wire when they try to jump over.

  Eli is running with them. He can jump higher than anyone. He won’t get caught on that wire. He’s Eli. But he doesn’t jump. He stops and spins on the spot so fast that he falls down into the dirt. And then he’s up and running again, but now he’s running back toward me. Back toward my corner. He’s coming for me. To take me with him. But I can’t go. Not without Maá. Not without Queeny. And I’m about to call out, to tell him no, that he has to do this on his own, when I see that Eli isn’t coming for me at all. He’s not even looking my way, and there’s a wild in his eyes that I haven’t seen before. A scared.

  Eli is running toward the bushes. And even though he’s too big to hide in them now, I can see he’s going to try anyway. Eli wasn’t running for me. He was running away. Running away from Beaver. Beaver with his one eye, who hates all of us. Beaver who is chasing him. Eli is scrabbling under those bushes now, trying to get away. Beaver has his black boots and his stick and his helmet and his shield, which he must know he doesn’t need because he throws the shield into the dirt so he can grab at Eli better. And he can, and he does, and then Beaver has Eli by the legs and pulls him out of the bushes, out of my corner. Beaver’s face is red and glowing with all the hate that is pouring out of him. And I can feel that burning all the way to where I sit, hidden by the shadows of the tent.

  And I should be.

  And I need to.

  And I don’t do anything.

  Eli fights for all he’s worth. Kicking out at Beaver and digging with his fingers under the branches of the bushes where the dirt is soft…

  Eli is looking for something. Eli won’t find that something. He can’t. Because someone else took it. Someone who thought they were doing the right thing, but it turned out to be the wrong thing, because maybe now if Eli could find what he was looking for, then he might just have a chance against Beaver.

  He might just be able to scare Beaver out of doing what he is doing.

  But Eli can’t, so he doesn’t.

  I don’t move. I don’t say anything. I don’t do anything.

  Beaver pulls Eli out and hits him with his stick. For just a moment, Eli’s eyes find mine, and…

  And…

  And Beaver keeps hitting him until Eli doesn’t move anymore. Eli doesn’t even scream anymore. Eli is very, very still and very, very quiet.

  Later I tell myself that I was about to get up. That I was about to push and scream and fight against Beaver with everything in me. That it had all just happened too quickly, is all. Later I tell myself that I was just about to help Eli, who I love as fierce as anyone.

  Later I tell myself that the only reason I didn’t was because then Harvey was there. Like he’d popped straight out of my wish to save Eli.

  Harvey is panting hard and looks at Beaver slowly wiping the blood from his stick onto his pants. Harvey is as angry as I’ve ever seen him. He reaches his hand down to Eli’s neck and feels for his heart beating. He yells at Beaver and brushes the hair on Eli’s head and rubs his hands over Eli’s body and shakes him, saying “Come on” over and over. His radio crackles. Harvey stands up and starts pushing and pulling Beaver to leave Eli, to go. Harvey starts to walk away.

  He’s going for help. He’s going to get a doctor. He’s calling for an ambulance, same as I did for Jimmie.

  Harvey calls back to Beaver to follow. And Beaver’s radio crackles as mad as Harvey’s, and for a minute it looks like Beaver is going to go. Like he’s going to follow Harvey.

  Then I see Eli’s hand move. Just a bit. A small flick of his finger, like he’s seen me and is waving. Like he’s saying hi.

  Like he’s saying help.

  And Beaver sees Eli’s hand move.

  Harvey turns back too. Harvey sees everything. He calls to Beaver, but Beaver is still watching Eli. Watching his hand.

  And then Beaver s
ees a rock.

  I can see now that rocks aren’t just good for playing Towers of Rah and Target and breaking windows to get water and phone for help. Rocks are good for terrible things too.

  When Beaver picks up that rock, I tell my eyes to shut and my ears to close, but they don’t listen.

  And then Beaver.

  And after he.

  Then Beaver walks away. He walks straight past Harvey, rubbing at that spot where his eye used to be. Harvey is frozen, looking at Eli. Then he follows Beaver.

  Harvey walks away.

  When Eli left his old country, he had to come by truck with his little brother. There were sixty-seven of them, all squished so tight in that truck that their chests ached with the pushing of their breaths.

  Even though there wasn’t nearly enough air in there for sixty-seven people, and even though they kept asking and begging and pleading the driver for more air, that driver just turned his radio right up and kept going.

  When those doors finally opened, Eli, he was the only one left breathing.

  Eli said his little brother looked like he was sleeping, all scrunched over with his bottom in the air and his legs tucked in and his feet popped out the back like he used to do when he was asleep. Eli said his mum had a photo of his little brother asleep like that from when they were on vacation one time. Eli said when he saw his little brother, just sleeping but for his bluish color and the dribble of blood coming out from his mouth, he was glad his mum had already been killed by the soldiers, because she wouldn’t have to think of his brother being dead every time someone said vacation, or beach, or even just when she saw a kid in a red T-shirt and shorts. Eli told me that his brother dying made his heart bleed so hard that the ache never went away.

  Eli was the only one left alive from that truck. I thought that meant he had something important to do.

  I just have to keep watching Eli’s hand, is all. If I watch his hand, then I don’t have to see his head. Then I don’t have to see the rock. If I watch his hand, then I can keep thinking that he is going to wave again. To let me know that he is just playing at being so still and…