At dinner, Eleanor eats leftover soup. There are bread rolls in a basket covered with a red-and-white-checkered towel, and the butter is in a dish in front of me. Eleanor grabs a roll, cradling it in her hands. “Warm.” She pulls it apart and spreads butter on each side of the roll.
She offers me the bread basket.
The bread and the butter smell good. I don’t want to get too used to good things, but I also need to store fat for my journey ahead. I take a piece of bread, tear it, and spread a glob of butter on each half.
“You want to carve the pumpkins after we eat?” Eleanor dips the bread in the soup and takes a bite.
“I’m kind of tired.”
“Tomorrow, then.”
After we finish washing dishes, I go to my room and find my blue leggings and blue tank top. I have to dress light.
To create lift, a force has to equal or exceed gravity, which means I need to jump hard into the air. I also need my wings to be as smooth as possible to reduce drag. I don’t weigh much, but I still need to be balanced. Thrust will be the hardest. If my wings unfold, they need to be strong enough to sustain acceleration.
I wait till Eleanor checks on me, popping her head into my room and whispering, “Good night.”
“Good night,” I say. I like Eleanor. I do. She’s nice. I believe she really does care about me, even though if she had a chance, like if suddenly I died and they did an autopsy and found wings embedded under my skin and bone, she might think, What an amazing specimen. I must stuff and keep her forever. I wouldn’t even blame her for feeling this way. I’d want to keep me, too.
But I can’t let myself feel too much of anything for Eleanor. She asked me what I thought about staying with her. My answer is, my time here is now defined by how long it will take Henrietta to fly, which might not ever happen. It’s also defined by how long it will be before my wings unfold.
I tiptoe down the hallway, checking the living room. The front door is the easy exit, but it squeaks. I hear Eleanor snoring, but I don’t want to take the chance of waking her up.
The clock on the stove reads 10:16. I use the back door. Before taking a step outside, I listen to the sound. I swear she’s snoring the “Eleanor Rigby” song. Against my cheek I feel the warmth of the house, and take a deep breath of the air, which smells like bread, butter, and lavender. I close the door.
Moonlight shines on the rows of vegetables. What Eleanor created is beautiful. But beyond the garden are shadows of trees, bare branches reaching out to me, waving for me to come join them. The muscles between my shoulder blades twitch and tingle. Muscles have memory. My muscles have memory of flight.
Birds have an amazing homing sense. They can navigate their way from nesting place to nesting place even if knocked off course. The arctic tern makes the longest annual migration; it travels thousands of miles, zigzagging between Greenland and Antarctica. In its lifetime the arctic tern is known to make the journey around thirty times. That means in its lifetime it migrates one and a half million miles. That’s three trips to the moon and back.
Scientists don’t exactly know why birds can navigate so well, but they think it has something to do with having magnetite in their beaks. Some birds use landscapes to find their way, and some learn migration routes from their bird parents.
Homing is an animal’s ability to return to a place or territory after having traveled a great distance from it. In my case, there haven’t been a whole lot of places or territories I want to return to. Not yet. Within the word homing is the word home. In my file, it would also say, December has no real understanding of what a home is. She hasn’t had time to really define what it means to her. In her case, it’s understandable that she has a tendency to not want to stay in one place.
There’s a layer of fog above the field. Everything is faded, has no color, the closest the world gets to black-and-white.
In the dark, I feel goose bumps on my skin. They’re not goose bumps, I remind myself. They’re your body’s way of getting ready for wings.
I will fly.
Climbing the tree, I feel my foot slip. I slide it back, press into the branch, and steady myself. I take a deep breath to slow down my heartbeat. This time I don’t count before I jump, but right before my feet leave the branch, I wish I was back in my room, and as I’m falling I see the bread and butter sitting on Eleanor’s table, and hear her say, You can stay with me for as long as you want.
When I hit the ground, my ankle twists under my weight. I crawl, and sit against the trunk of the tree. Pain throbs in rhythm with my heart, beating slower now, a normal, human, nothing-special sound.
I limp toward the house. My ankle hurts. A lot. As I open the gate, the back door closes. Eleanor stands with her arms folded in front of her, giving me a raptor-like glare. “You can’t do that anymore, December,” she says. “You can’t sneak out. Not in my house. Not for as long as you’re with me. I will take care of you. I will be kind to you, but you can’t just take off any time you want.”
I don’t want her to notice that I’m limping, so I stand like a heron, waiting for a fish to catch. “I’m sorry.” I can’t remember the last time I was the one apologizing. Usually people say it to me. Adrian says it all the time.
“You have good balance. Why are you standing like a flamingo?”
“Thought I looked more like a blue heron.”
“Well …” Eleanor bends down to get a closer look at the ankle I’m holding up. “According to scientists they both stand on one leg for the same reason. But I don’t think you’re trying to conserve body heat right now.”
Eleanor barely touches my ankle, and it hurts. “Let’s put some ice on that.”
She leans forward and scoops her arm across my scar. I let myself lean against her. “I hurt my ankle,” I tell her, even though she’s figured that out already. What she doesn’t know is I’ve never said the words “I hurt,” either. Not to Adrian. Not to anyone.
16
Before going to school, Eleanor and I drive to the wildlife refuge, and I exercise Henrietta.
At the edge of the field there’s the spicy smell of leaves, and the ground’s covered with shades of brown and yellow.
“We’re going to take it slow today. We’ll start off with a short distance again.” Eleanor moves one of the perches out into the field.
Henrietta’s walking back and forth on my glove, acting like she did the other day. When I hold her up so she can hop on the perch, she spreads her wings and flutters to the ground.
“It’s okay,” Eleanor says, but Henrietta, hopping on the ground, looks like a broken bird.
“Go to her.” Eleanor waves her hand. “Place your glove down close to her so she can hop up. Try to get her on the perch again. You can do this, December.”
I follow Eleanor’s directions. Henrietta hops away from me, but I gently crouch close to the ground and hold out my glove until she hops onto it.
Soon as I walk out to the perch, I tell Eleanor, “I don’t think she wants to be out here.”
Eleanor, being Eleanor, says, “It’s okay. Henrietta will be okay. Be patient. Give her time.”
But I’m right. Henrietta won’t budge from the perch.
“I told you, Eleanor.” I take off my glove and give it to her. “Maybe she’ll trust somebody else.”
On the way to school, Eleanor tries to convince me that Henrietta will be fine. “She’ll come out of it. We’ll get her up and flying. Sometimes the only thing you can do is to keep trying. I know that’s not as exciting as seeing a majestic bird like Henrietta fly, but, unfortunately, that’s all we can do right now.”
Before I shut the truck door, Eleanor gives me a smile that I can tell she wants to mean everything is going to be okay and says, “Henrietta is going to fly, December.”
Eleanor is probably right, Henrietta will fly, but I’m not the right person to get her to. She doesn’t trust me after all. I’m not the one who’s going to help her.
I throw my backpack by my cl
assroom door.
At the edge of the blacktop, the Vultures are gathered in a group like they always are, pecking and tearing at Cheryllynn. I move around the basketball court and get close enough to hear what they’re saying.
“Your hair,” Jenny says. “It’s too long, don’t you think?”
“No,” Cheryllynn says, “I don’t think it’s long enough.”
“Cheryllynn?” I say. My voice is shaky. I could stop right now and turn around, but I think of Henrietta and the image of her fluttering to the ground. I can’t help her, but maybe I can at least help Cheryllynn. “You want to jump rope with me?”
Before Cheryllynn can answer, Jenny struts up to me. She holds up the pink sequin purse in front of her. “Did you forget I have this?”
“Yeah,” Cheryllynn says. “Yeah, I’ll go jump rope with you.”
She pushes past Jenny and stands shoulder to shoulder with me.
“You are not going to jump rope with her.” Jenny unzips her pink sequin purse. She opens Bird Girl, runs over by the play dome, and steps up onto the lower bars.
“Good morning, Fairview Elementary! I have something to share with you. This is December’s book. She doesn’t want anyone to read it, but I think it’s important we get to know the kind of person she is.”
Jenny starts to read. Her voice is the brightest shade of orange there is, and mixed with the orange is yelling. She wants the whole school to hear her. “My mom took me out to the orchard, so I could fly.”
The three-wattled bellbird has one of the loudest birdcalls on earth. My call is more like a crow’s, a normal, everyday caw, caw, but I make it sound as fierce as I can.
I run past the Vultures, my T-shirt flapping in the wind. Jenny stops reading. The whole playground is quiet. If they have any interest in birds, they might be trying to identify what species I am, and come to the conclusion there’s no other bird like me. Or they’re telling themselves, That’s that girl, December. She’s strange. During recess she sits under trees. Hangs out by herself.
That’s not what I care about, though. I care about protecting my story.
I hop up three rungs, pull myself through an opening, and perch my blue high-tops at the edge of the monkey bars.
“Young lady, get down off there,” a yard duty lady yells. “Young lady!”
I straddle the bars, balancing myself without using my arms. The bars are still wet, the wind strong, cold, blowing my hair back so the brown strands look like a cape, or even better, a layer of feathers.
Jenny flips through the pages. “December did fly, but she only flew from walnut tree to walnut tree. This is so weird. She thinks she can fly?”
One of the Vultures starts chanting, “Jump! Jump! Jump!” The rest of the girls follow. Matilda, wearing her brown boots, waves her arms in front of them and yells, “You guys need to stop! Be quiet!” But the Vultures don’t listen.
Jenny keeps reading. “December’s wings are …”
Before Jenny can read the rest of the sentence, Cheryllynn comes up from behind her, jumps up, and grabs the book. “That’s December’s!”
Jenny slips off the bars of the play dome, but hangs on to the book. There’s a tug-of-war between her and Cheryllynn. If the other girls help Jenny, it’ll be all over.
I have to keep their attention. I move my right foot in front of my left and start walking along the edge of the bars, this time using my arms for balance. I tuck my chin to my chest and fall forward. I flip through the air, and I’m sure I hear some of the Vultures gasp.
I miss the landing, slipping on the wood chips. There’s a little blue between the fog, and then there’s Cheryllynn, leaning over me. “If it wasn’t for the wood chips you definitely would’ve nailed the landing,” she whispers. “That was amazing. You’re rock star material.”
She offers her hand to pull me up, and I take it.
“Think this belongs to you.” Cheryllynn gives me Bird Girl. “Thanks for standing up for me.”
I cradle my story. “Thanks for getting this back. It means a lot to me.”
A yard duty lady comes up to us. “You can’t be jumping off the play equipment. I’m going to have to send you to Mrs. Vaca.” She gives me an office slip.
I don’t care if I have to go to the principal’s office. I have Bird Girl now. I look over my shoulder. Jenny and the Vultures are huddled in their group like nothing even happened.
A long time ago, when I was six years old, I used to think I’d like having a friend named “July” because July out of all the months is the opposite of December. July would wear pretty dresses and sparkly shoes and smell like bubble gum all the time.
Cheryllynn, who volunteered to come with me to the office, wears Halloween black tights, black boots, and a bright lime green jacket. She doesn’t smell like bubble gum, but she does smell like Froot Loops.
“You’re limping,” Cheryllynn says. She offers me some cereal.
I’d forgotten all about my injured ankle. Now that I remember I hurt it, I feel it throbbing. “I’ll be okay,” I tell her, and I shove Bird Girl down inside my backpack.
Mrs. Vaca is waiting for me at her office door. “December, come in.”
Cheryllynn walks in with me, and we both sit down in chairs right in front of Mrs. Vaca’s desk.
“Miss Watts, why are you here?”
“For moral support.” Cheryllynn leans forward and stares straight at her.
Principal Vaca ignores Cheryllynn and begins her lecture. “December, at Fairview Elementary we do not tolerate the kind of behavior you showed today. You can’t jump off the monkey bars. You’ll hurt yourself. I could let you off with a warning, but you also had the owl incident not too long ago. So I’m going to have to call your mom.”
“She’s not my mom.”
Mrs. Vaca looks at her computer screen, which has my student information listed. “Eleanor …”
“She’s my foster mom.”
“Well, I’m calling her.” Principal Vaca stares over at Cheryllynn. “Miss Watts, you can go back to class.”
Cheryllynn pulls her hair back in a ponytail. “Mrs. Vaca, did you ever think that maybe at her other schools doing flips off monkey bars was an okay thing to do?”
“I’m pretty sure jumping off monkey bars is not permitted at other schools.” Mrs. Vaca presses the phone to her ear.
If principals were birds, they’d be penguins. They’d live where it’s cold, and they wouldn’t be able to fly.
“Are Jenny and her friends going to get in trouble?” Cheryllynn asks. “Because they should. If they don’t, I think it’d say a lot about your character, Mrs. Vaca.”
Out of all the birds, Cheryllynn is most like a flamingo. She likes pink. She has long legs. And flamingos feed in mudflats or lagoons, so they are experts at stirring mud to find their food. I have a feeling, after watching the way the Vultures treat Cheryllynn and the way she stands up for herself, and for me, that she knows how to make her way through the mud.
“I can call your mom, too, if you’d like, Miss Watts?” Mrs. Vaca leans back in her chair. Her hair is spiked at the ends. It makes her look tough.
“Go ahead and call.” Cheryllynn starts biting her pinky nail. “She’ll tell you she can’t come get me till school’s out because she can’t get out of work. I’d just have to sit in the office all day.”
It’s quiet, which is weird in a principal’s office because principals always have something to say.
Mrs. Vaca dials Eleanor’s number, and Cheryllynn gets up without waiting for her to tell us we can leave. “Come on. Let’s wait outside.”
We sit in the two chairs we sat in before.
“Nothing ever happens to Jenny,” Cheryllynn whispers. “Her dad helped build the new cafeteria, and her mom’s always down here volunteering.”
Mrs. Vaca’s office door opens. “December, Eleanor will be here in a few minutes. Miss Watts, you may go back to class. Now, please.”
There’s a red-and-black cardboard treasure
box on the front counter. “Mrs. Franca,” Cheryllynn says, “can I have a character slip?”
Mrs. Franca, the school secretary, reaches into a drawer and slides a blue paper toward Cheryllynn. “And a pencil, please.” Cheryllynn writes my name on the slip and drops it through a slit at the top of the treasure box. “This is the Character Trait box. This month we’re supposed to write down people who showed compassion. If they draw your name, you win a prize.”
I step up to the counter, write Cheryllynn’s name on a slip, too, and drop it in the box.
When Eleanor gets here she’s probably going to be mad that I interrupted her day. It’s not the first time a foster parent has had to come pick me up at school. They usually let someone know they’re here and don’t say anything to me as we leave. At their house, I’m grounded, or I have to do chores, or they take away privileges. The bad ones yell. Maybe Eleanor will make me sit in her shed and watch her stuff a bird.
But as she walks into the office, Eleanor doesn’t look mad. She lets Mrs. Franca know she’s here to pick me up and doesn’t say a word until we get to the truck. “You had a hard day, huh?”
I tell her about the Vultures and how they treated me and Cheryllynn. I’m waiting for Eleanor to say the usual: “Well, life’s unfair. You should try to stay away from them next time, and if they try to start trouble, go tell an adult instead of trying to take care of it yourself.”
She rests both her hands on the top of the steering wheel. “You know what the most courageous bird is?”
“Of course I do. It’s a bird you wouldn’t expect.”
Eleanor smiles. “Right, because we see them pretty much every day, so we don’t notice them.”
I smile, too. I can’t help it. It’s nice to be around someone who knows about birds like I do. “It’s the crow.”
They’re fierce birds and have been known to chase bald eagles. Crows will drop stones or pine cones on predators, or even on people. They have a great memory, and they are as smart as parrots. They’ve been known to use sticks as tools, and have the ability to problem-solve.
Extraordinary Birds Page 9
