Broken Wings

by L-J Baker

Letty smiled. “I mean, darling child, that when you fall in love for the first time, you will not produce something like this. You will not have the experience of sexual knowledge, desire, loss, sadness, ambivalence, disappointment, and joy that love brings. Maturity allows Flora objectivity in self-examination. And, yet, at the same time, you get the feeling of a loss of control. That she tumbled deeply in love – rushed headlong – flung herself into that loved other whom you wish to be one with. As you do that first time. She has captured that euphoric desire for oneness that an older, wiser person often dares not risk. It’s perfectly astounding.”

  Rye stared at the hanging. She was speechless that Flora could take bits of coloured wool and thread and translate her emotions into a form which others could understand. But if Letty was even halfway right in the things she saw in Flora’s weaving, that made Rye feel like shit. Small wonder Flora couldn’t bear looking at it.

  “Yes, dear child,” Letty said to Holly. “Definitely her best. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if our Flora finds herself amongst the Spindle nominees for this.”

  “Wow!” Holly said. “A Golden Spindle? Astronomical.”

  Letty turned a smile on Rye. “Hadn’t you seen it before, darling?”

  Rye ripped her gaze from the hanging. “How… how much would it cost?”

  “She’s not selling,” Letty said. “But if she were, I’d expect twenty or thirty for it. Double that if she gets a Spindle.”

  Rye had a wild idea. “Twenty pieces?”

  Letty smiled. “Thousands, darling. Thousands.”

  Rye’s idea shattered into inadequate, impoverished, way-out-of-her-class fragments. She should have known. That had been the pattern of her whole relationship with Flora Withe.

  “Pleasant as it is to discuss this,” Letty said, “especially with you, darling, I suspect this was not the reason you had for serendipitously arresting my tragic slide into ennui this morning.”

  Rye was still reeling with sticker shock. “Um. Yeah. I came about the credit note you gave me.”

  “Was it incorrect? Salvia takes care of these things for me.”

  “Um. No.” Rye dug the credit note out of her pocket. “I was wondering if I could have cash instead.”

  Letty looked surprised, but crooked a finger for Rye to follow her. Rye’s heavy shoes clumped on the wooden stairs.

  Letty produced a sheaf of banknotes from a wall safe. “There you go, darling. You really must do something to cheer our Flora. I was shocked when I saw her. The divine creature looked haggard.”

  “Oh.” Rye stuffed the notes into her pocket. She checked that Holly had not followed them up. “I… I haven’t seen Flora for a long time.”

  “Oh? Perhaps you should, darling. Perhaps you should.”

  Rye’s shoes beat a rapid tattoo down the steps.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Holly and Rye walked toward the low-rise stump where Berry, Knot Knapweed’s brother-in-law, lived. A group of people sat smoking and drinking on a broken sofa in the middle of their front lawn. Music blared from houses, carpets, and portable sound systems. Acrid smoke hazed the air from burning rubbish. Guard beetles swarmed to a fence and clicked their claws at the pedestrians. Holly and Rye walked faster.

  “You know,” Holly said, “I didn’t think any neighbourhood could make ours look good. This does.”

  “Yeah,” Rye said. “No matter how crappy you think your life is, there are plenty of people worse off.”

  Rye pounded on Berry’s door. His wife answered, with a smoke hanging from the corner of her mouth.

  “Berry!” his wife called. “It’s a skirt about the broom.”

  After she disappeared into the house, Holly smirked at Rye.

  “Skirt?” Holly said. “You?”

  Rye shrugged. “She might not be sober.”

  “Blind, more like.”

  Rye lifted a hand in mock threat. Holly giggled.

  Berry tugged the door wider and scratched his paunch. “Dye, ain’t it? Knot’s buddy.”

  “Rye. Yeah, that’s me.”

  Rye and Holly picked their way across a littered lawn and around to Berry’s shed. Holly looked less than impressed. Rye reserved judgement until she saw the broom. From the clutter, Berry produced a solid-looking model. Not new by any means, but not battered to bits.

  “Five years old,” Berry said. “Needed some major bristle work. Runs pretty good. Want a beer?”

  “No, thanks,” Rye said. “Can I take it for a test flight?”

  “Sure.” Berry offered the jar of beer to Holly. “You want?”

  “No, thank you,” Holly said. “It’s a little early in the day for me.”

  Rye gave her a sharp look. Holly smiled. Rye grinned. She ought to give the kid more credit.

  The magic made a soft rumbling noise that was a shade too loud to be called a hum, but the bristles gave off no worrying vibrations and the engine proved much more responsive in flight than Rye guessed. The broom ascended smoothly and quickly, and descended without a nasty jolt. Mindful of Holly waiting, Rye took only a short test flight.

  “Little beauty, ain’t it?” Berry said. “Not flash, like, but there’s some real nice work in it.”

  “Yeah.” Rye gave the bristles a shake for show. “Hmm. How old did you say?”

  “Five years. But there ain’t too much of it original parts now. Since you’re a buddy of Knot’s, I’ll be straight with you. Twenty-five hundred.”

  Holly’s eyes widened in disbelief.

  Rye grunted and rested the broom against the shed wall. “That’s a lot more than I was looking to pay. Eighteen?”

  “Eighteen! You shouldn’t be working with Knot on no building site. You should be behind bars for robbing honest tradesmen.”

  Rye grinned at him. Berry had the grace to laugh at his own hyperbole.

  “All right,” he said. “Twenty-two hundred. And you and me knows you’re getting a good deal.”

  “You want me to write a credit note that you can honestly pay tax on?” Rye said.

  Berry shoved a beer at her. “You wouldn’t do that to Uncle Berry.”

  “No,” Rye agreed. “But I only have two thou. Honest. Look, let me leave you my number. If you have anything for that price, I’ll come and look.”

  Berry lifted his beer jar and glugged the whole jar down. He belched loudly. “Two thou. Done.”

  Rye smiled and counted out the banknotes. Berry gave her the paperwork and transferred the ignition activation to her handprint for her.

  Rye climbed on. “Coming?”

  Holly clambered behind her. “This is one ugly broom.”

  Rye waved to Berry and flew off. Two-up, the engine lost some of its power, but it still pulled nicely. She felt confident enough to take it along the Rootway.

  “Hey!” Holly called. “This isn’t bad.”

  “Beats walking,” Rye said. “Anywhere you want to go? How about an ice cream at the Box Street Mall?”

  “Yeah!”

  Rye threaded through the traffic to the busy mall. She bought them both a bowl of ice cream. They sat outside on a bench and watched the shoppers go by.

  “I didn’t think you had any more money on you,” Holly said. “Didn’t you say that you only had two thousand?”

  “You’re not going to try to get me to believe that you still think people have to tell the absolute truth always?” Rye said. “I could’ve sworn you’d outgrown that idea years ago.”

  Holly grinned. “This is yummy. You know, that was pretty slick, the way you beat his price down. And that broom is not nearly as crappy as it looks.”

  Rye smiled and dug up another spoonful of eucalyptus and bark chip ice cream.

  “On my birthday, I’ll be old enough to fly,” Holly said. “Will you teach me?”

  Rye’s immediate reaction was to refuse. But why not? If Holly was old enough, she should be able to get around on her own. One day she’d be able to afford her own broom.

  “Sure,” Rye
said. “On the –”

  “Fey! You will?”

  “On the day you pass the theoretical flying test.”

  Holly grunted. “I knew you’d say something limping like that. Still, it won’t matter. Because I’ll study hard and pass that stupid test just like that.”

  Rye smiled.

  “Hey, isn’t that Flora?” Holly pointed with her spoon.

  Rye nearly dropped her bowl. Her heart hammered as she peered through the crowds. She did and did not want to see Flora. Haggard and pale, Ms. Elmwood had said.

  “Oh, no,” Holly said. “It’s not her.”

  Rye set aside her half-eaten ice cream. “You about ready to go shopping?”

  “No, thanks. I’ve just remembered that I’ve got something I have to do.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “Not far. I’ll be home after lunch. Okay?”

  Rye watched Holly thread her way through the crowds. Rye shrugged, dumped the bowls in the receptacle, and wandered back out to where her new broom was parked. This was definitely going to make life easier.

  The new broom laden with shopping bags made it up to the parking pad outside their apartment. It wasn’t a swift ascent, but it did get there. Rye had to swipe the key to the outside broom closet a dozen times before the long neglected lock bleeped into operation. The rusty door hinges squealed. Something scuttled out of the light. Rye patted her broom and set it in the closet.

  After putting the groceries away and taking the laundry down to a machine in the root, Rye drifted around the apartment. She idly flicked through her night class textbook. Mr. Bulrush must have terminated her enrolment by now. She had quit working at Pansy’s Fried Sandwiches, and she was sure Mr. Nuttal could be persuaded to let her change days to First and Third Nights. That way she could resume classes. But that would put her back to where she’d started from, with no free time for Holly.

  Rye sat on the sofa and opened the magazine and the book Contemporary Artists. Two pictures of Flora smiling.

  “I love you,” Rye said. “I miss you so much. It doesn’t feel like it’s getting any easier to bear. When am I going to fall out of love with you?”

  Rye double-checked that she had everything ready. Book about teens and drugs. Pen. Notepaper. She and Holly would share a beer while they ate dinner and then, all relaxed and receptive, they’d talk. Just like the book said. Except the book didn’t mention beer. Understandable, perhaps, considering it was all about substance abuse. Rye, on the other hand, felt she needed a drop of something. This wasn’t going to be easy. She had several fine lines to walk, according to the book. She didn’t want to screw it up.

  Holly was chatty and happy while they ate. She just didn’t seem to fit the profile of a teen drug user. But Rye had smelled dreamweed smoke on Holly’s top. She owed it to them both not to ignore the issue.

  “Daisy’s brother is such a seedhead,” Holly said.

  “Um.” Rye cleared her throat. “Don’t you like his friend? Moss, isn’t it?”

  Holly shrugged and stabbed a lump of dock root with her fork. “He’s okay, I guess. But not very mature.”

  “Yeah? But don’t you talk with him on the phone?”

  “Sometimes. Not much. He keeps saying he’s gonna get his own broom, but he hasn’t. He doesn’t own his own mobile. And he rubs with some burrowers. As if that would impress anyone.”

  “Burrowers?”

  “Yeah, you know. Kids who have left home and live on their own in the burrows over by Danklee Park. Near the riverbank.”

  Rye frowned. “You think that’s a good way to go?”

  “They don’t go to any limping school.” Holly stood and stacked the dirty plates in the sink. “And they ride around in their own carpets and do whatever they like.”

  “Stolen. Those sort of delinquent packs don’t work. They steal to get money and stuff.”

  “Save your breath! You needn’t give me the big social responsibility lecture. I’m not planning on becoming a burrower. Fey, you can be so back-then sometimes. You’re worse than Daisy’s relics, which is saying something.”

  “If you know those kids steal and get into shit like booze and drugs, why do you think they’re slick?”

  “I don’t! Fey.” Holly sighed and leaned back against the sink. “Moss thinks that telling people he rubs with burrowers will make them think he’s so slick. But it’s stupid.”

  “You’ve been pretty adamant about wanting to leave school. You don’t –”

  “Rye!” Holly threw her hands in the air. “I want to leave school to do something important! I’m going to be famous and fabulously wealthy. Just like Flora. I don’t want to end up in a stupid muddy hole in the ground with some losers. You are such hard work. Parents couldn’t be this bad.”

  Holly stalked away to her bedroom and turned on her music. Rye sat at the table fiddling with a pollen shaker. The book hadn’t prepared her for this development. Okay, Holly wasn’t planning on dropping out for a life of crime. But she hadn’t denied her connection to this Moss boy, either.

  Rye took a minute or two, and the last of her beer, to fortify herself before approaching Holly’s room. Holly lay on her bed reading a glossy magazine.

  “Holls?”

  Holly sighed audibly but didn’t lower her magazine. “What? Want to accuse me of selling small children to giants for snack food? And for your information, I did not steal this magazine. Mr. Cloudnut sometimes lets me have the ones with ripped pages for free.”

  “I’m not accusing you of anything.”

  “Good. Shut the door on your way out.”

  Rye sighed. “I’m sorry if I came on a bit strong. It’s just that – Um. You know. Sometimes, I worry about you. About both of us.”

  Holly dropped her magazine onto her chest to reveal a deep scowl. “What?”

  “Well.” Rye ran a hand through her hair. “You know that we have to – You and me, that is. Both of us. Not just you. We have to keep a low profile in life. Because –”

  “Because we’re fairy freaks. Yeah. What has that got to do with my life of crime and loserhood?”

  Rye steadfastly refused that bait. Keep calm, the book said. “Look, do you know what would happen if you got in trouble with the police? We’d be –”

  “I am not in trouble!”

  Rye held up her hands. “I’m not saying you are! I just want you to bear in mind that you and I could end up back in Fairyland if anything happened. If either of us got into trouble. Both of us.”

  “I know that. You’ve told me a zillion times since I was old enough to have ears.” Holly picked up her magazine. “I don’t know why you’re wasting breath on this. I haven’t done anything stupid. Have you? Well, apart from whatever fight you’ve had with Flora.”

  “What?”

  “I ought to have known that you’d get stupid and annoy the slickest person in Infinity.”

  Rye’s fists clenched. “You have no idea what –”

  “And you did it now!” Holly dropped her magazine and sat up. “How limping can you be? Just when I need Flora to write a letter supporting my scholarship applications! Maybe you do want me to drop out and become a nothing?”

  Rye’s heart beat too hard and fast. She was not calm. What had Holly guessed? How had Rye betrayed herself? The kid couldn’t know how she stuck the knife in with every mention of Flora. Rye took a deep breath and struggled for self-control.

  “Holly, my friendship with –”

  “It’s such a good thing that Flora is so slick and stylish,” Holly said. “She was utterly okay with writing a letter for me. And she gave me the most astronomical cup of tea. Wild Grape Leaf, it was. I bet we couldn’t afford it. But I will, one day. Fey, I wish I could’ve been Flora’s sister. My life would have been so scathing. Like in a magazine. Not this dump.”

  Rye was gripping the edge of the door so tightly that her hand hurt. “You’ve talked with Flora behind my back?”

  “Last I heard, you aren’t her soc
ial secretary. I went to her place today. I told you I was going to talk with her.”

  “No, you didn’t. Holly, I don’t want you –”

  “She was slick with it. Unknot! Anyone would think I committed mass murder, the way you’re going on. Didn’t you start this by giving me some big boring lecture on being Miss Goody Goody? A bit hypocritical, don’t you think? To slice into me for getting my scholarship applications together. Sometimes, I wish you’d drop into a coma then wake up twenty years from now, when I’m old enough that you won’t treat me like a baby!”

  “Maybe I’ll stop treating you like a little kid the day you stop acting like one!” Rye shouted. “I know what dreamweed smells like.”

  “Dreamweed? What –”

  “It was on your clothes, so spare me the excuses!”

  “You were snooping! Sniffing my clothes!”

  “I’m the drudge who does laundry most weeks, remember? You fuck up with drugs, and we both get busted. Do you hear me? You’re not going to get a slap on the wrist and community service. You’re going back to Fairyland! We both are. You know what that means? Do you have any idea?”

  Rye put her hands on Holly’s shoulders and prevented her rising from the side of the bed. “You’re going to sit and listen to me. You think your life is crappy now? That why you want to play around with drugs? Well, let me tell you, you get caught with that and you won’t know what’s hit you. You don’t really remember Fairyland, do you?”

  “You going to try to scare me? This is shit.”

  Rye shook her. “I’ve spent my whole life working for us! So that we can stay here. So that we can be free. So that you never have to know what it’s like back there. Maybe I did wrong not to tell you.”

  “You’re hurting me. Rye –”

  “You think you’d have liked not going to school? You wouldn’t have gone. They don’t have one on the commune farm. You do chores. You weed. You wash the floors. You fetch water. From a well. No taps. You get filthy. Anyone can tell you what to do. Your own mother would beat you with a stick. Anyone could beat you. You think you’d like that?”

  “Rye, please –”

  “You like going out? No going out. There wasn’t anywhere to go. You think you don’t get nice clothes? How would you like to wear a tunic all day every day? The same one, until it dropped into holes? You’d have to make yourself a new one. Would you like that, Holly? Would you?”