by Megan Hart
“Tell me it’s not going to get worse when she’s a teenager,” she said.
Dean laughed, but after a pause. “I hope not. Were you a pain in the ass when you were a teenager?”
“Of course not,” she said with a grin, because she knew she’d given her parents their share of her attitude. This sobered her after a moment, though. Testing curfew and wearing too much eyeliner was different than Briella’s rapidly swinging moods and backtalk. “Why don’t kids come with instruction manuals?”
“That would be too easy.” Dean stood and looked into the cage one last time. The bird didn’t move or make a sound. He tapped the wire bars for a second and got no reaction. “Hello, Onyx. Say ‘hello’.”
The raven said nothing. Marian scowled. “Don’t encourage it. It’s creepy.”
“They mimic sounds, babe. That’s all. Nothing to be creeped out about.” Dean looked at Marian. “Maybe the kid should have a pet. She’s old enough to learn how to take care of something, and it’s a good responsibility. I always had dogs growing up.”
“You know I don’t like dogs.”
“I know a dog bit you when you were small, and you’re afraid of them enough that you’ve made sure to never talk to Briella about why you don’t like them,” Dean said calmly.
“I don’t want her to be afraid of dogs,” Marian said, defending herself.
Dean nodded. “Right. But what about you?”
“I do not want a dog,” Marian said, which wasn’t really the answer to the question he’d asked, but she was going to pretend it was. “And you’re allergic to cats. Anyway, we’ve had fish. We had that hermit crab.”
It had died and fallen out of its shell, its rear end a horror of stumpy, segmented flesh with tiny flipper things that had made Marian shriek as she dumped it into the trash. Thinking of it now made her nose wrinkle. Dean laughed, but under his breath.
“I’m just saying, Marian. I know we can’t keep the bird. But we could get the kid something. It would be good for her to have something to take care of. Might make her a little less…umm…self-absorbed.”
Marian gave him a sharp glance. “Is that how you’d describe her?”
“Yes,” Dean replied evenly. “It is. She’s an only child who’s never really learned to share, first of all. She’s obviously been having some trouble making friends, or rather, keeping them. Whatever she’s going through, babe, it’s probably related somehow to that.”
“You think having a pet would change that?”
Dean shrugged.
Marian sighed and looked into the cage. “Is it really illegal to keep this?”
“Yeah, I think so. So we’ll give it a week or so to get back on its feet, or its wings, I guess. And then we can take it out back and release it. Hey, don’t worry,” Dean said when he saw her expression. “We’re not going to get in trouble.”
From upstairs came a dull thud. Marian looked at the ceiling. “What the hell is she doing up there?”
“Being pissed off because we told her she can’t keep the bird.”
She frowned. “I’ll go talk to her.”
“Kiss me first,” Dean said.
“Oh, like that’s a hardship.”
“I’ll show you something hard,” he said, “and it’s not a ship.”
Marian burst into a flutter of laughter, her heart swelling with love for the man in front of her. He’d taken on every burden she had, and in the eight years they’d been together, had never let her down, not even once. She didn’t deserve him. She thought that often. But she was really grateful to have him.
“Later,” she promised him. It was his night off, and then he had the whole weekend, too. “I’ll even do that thing you like.”
“Baby, I like all the things you do,” Dean replied with a waggle of his eyebrows and a sexy smirk that sent a rush of heat through her.
Upstairs, her mind still on the night ahead of them and how much she was looking forward to it, Marian stopped abruptly at Briella’s closed door. The kid never shut her door. She still slept with a night-light on in the bedroom and one in the hall. Marian raised a hand, then thought better of it and pressed her ear to the door for a moment to listen.
She didn’t hear anything at first. Then, the low mutter of a voice. Not Briella’s. Masculine, British, droning. She must be watching nature videos on her tablet.
Marian knocked. After a second, the male voice quieted. Briella didn’t answer, so Marian knocked again and turned the knob to let herself in.
“You’re supposed to wait until I say come in,” Briella said from her spot on the bed, where she sat cross-legged with her tablet on her lap.
Marian hesitated. “You don’t usually have your door shut. Can I come in?”
“May I,” Briella said.
Marian’s temper snapped. “You want to watch your mouth, Briella. You’re the kid. I’m the grown-up. You best remember that, if you don’t want to face the consequences.”
“But I don’t want to watch my mouth,” Briella said. “I mean, I can’t even see my own mouth!”
She burst into tears, loud and braying and hoarse. Surprised, then worried, Marian went to the bed and sat next to her. She stroked the girl’s hair, curly as Marian’s but unwashed and tangled. Marian worked her fingers through a knot at the base of Briella’s neck. It had been easier, when Briella was young, to keep her natural curls soft and well-kept, but she’d been fighting all of Marian’s attempts at grooming. The girl needed a shower in the worst way, but now wasn’t the time to tell her so. Instead, Marian hugged her daughter and stroked her messy hair off her forehead.
“Bean, what’s going on?”
“My head hurts.” Briella buried her face against Marian’s chest. She hitched with sobs. Her tablet fell to the side, sliding off the comforter so that Marian had to grab it before it could hit the floor.
“I’m sorry. I can give you something to make it feel better.” The nurse had been adamant that there was no suggestion of a concussion, but Marian was suddenly unsure if she ought to let the girl sleep.
Briella pulled away, her eyes red and wet, her nose leaking a bubble of snot. “More ice cream?”
“Not any more tonight, no. It’s bedtime.”
Briella frowned. “I want to see Onyx.”
“You can see it in the morning,” Marian said firmly.
“I want to bring him up here, with me. He’s going to get lonely. What if he needs something in the night? You’re not going to take care of him!” Briella’s voice rose almost to a shriek, hysterical and desperate.
Marian pulled Briella close again, trying to soothe her. “I take care of you, don’t I?”
“You don’t know how to take care of Onyx. You’ll probably put him out in the yard!” Briella lashed out, one small fist catching the underside of Marian’s chin.
“Dammit, Briella. Watch what you’re doing. That hurt!” Marian rubbed her tongue along her teeth. She’d clipped the tip of it and tasted the coppery flavor of blood.
“Sorry,” Briella said.
Marian shook her head. “You know what? Saying sorry only matters when you mean it, and when you don’t keep doing the same things over and over again. You’ve been getting a very bad attitude lately, and I’ve had it. I’m not going to argue with you any more about this. It stays in the den. In the cage.”
“Him. You keep calling him an it, but he’s a him!” Briella drew in a shaky breath and added in a whisper, “I’m sorry, Mama, I didn’t mean to hurt you. My mad feelings just want to come out so much.”
Marian sighed, but didn’t hug her again. “It’s okay to be mad. Or sad. But it’s not okay to hurt someone else because of it.”
“I know that.” More icy derision.
“It’s a bird, Briella. How do you even know it’s a boy bird? How can you tell?”
“I just
can,” Briella said.
Marian fell silent for a moment before grabbing a tissue from the box on Briella’s nightstand. She wiped away the snot and the tears and then took her daughter’s face in her hands to look into her eyes. Lots of people commented about the kid’s pale gray eyes, the same as her dad’s, and how striking they looked against her darker skin. Now, though, they were red-rimmed and dim from all the weeping.
“Animals are not the same as people,” Marian said.
Briella frowned. “Why not?”
“They just aren’t.” Marian had stopped going to church years before her mother was killed and never missed it. They did Christmas and Easter with a Santa and the bunny, but that was it. She didn’t want to get into a discussion about the existence, or not, of a soul. She had no idea how to even start a conversation like that.
Briella shook her head stubbornly. “Did you know that ravens are as smart as dolphins or chimpanzees? And they are almost as smart as people. Some of them are even smarter than people like, you know, retards.”
“Briella! Oh my God!” Marian recoiled, revolted and stunned. “Where did you learn that word?”
Silence.
A memory sliced her. In the beginning, Tommy’s mother had tried hard to make her golden child’s daughter her own, stomping every boundary Marian had constructed from bedtimes to snacks. That had ended when Briella was a toddler. Marian had left her with Nancy and Ed Gallagher for an evening. Briella had been prone at the time to periods of what the pediatrician had called “self-entertaining”. Singing to herself, conversations with imaginary friends, sometimes so focused she would ignore anyone who tried to interrupt her and throw tantrums, holding her breath to be left alone.
“That retard is an embarrassment.”
Marian had never forgotten the disgust in Nancy Gallagher’s voice when she’d said it. Marian had never forgiven that bitch for it, either. It had been the last time she’d asked her ex-mother-in-law to help with childcare.
“Did you hear it at school?” Marian’s lip curled, and she tasted sourness. “That’s not a nice word. We don’t use it, ever. If someone at school is using it, they shouldn’t, either.”
“You think they’re human, though, right? You’d call someone like that a him or a her, not an it.”
Marian swallowed convulsively. She drew in a breath to keep her voice calm. The kid was barely ten years old. Marian, in her recollection, had never used that word, and neither did Dean. She might be able to blame it on Tommy, but even so, Marian couldn’t excuse it by saying Briella didn’t know what it meant – she clearly did.
“People are human. No matter if they’re smart or not. Animals are not the same. I don’t want you to use that word ever again, do you understand? It’s…” Marian trailed away, uncertain what to say it was. “It’s gross.”
Briella huffed and eased away from her mother to push herself back against the satin pillowcase. “Is it because of the dog?”
“What dog?” Marian asked after a moment, carefully. Warily.
“The dog that bit you on the face and made you hate dogs. And all animals,” Briella added.
Marian kept herself from recoiling again only by clutching the comforter in one fist. She pressed her lips together. She studied her daughter’s expression, but Briella’s face was impassive, scarcely even curious.
“How did you know about that?”
“I just found out sometime.” She shrugged as though it made no difference.
It shouldn’t have. The dog attack wasn’t a secret, although Marian had kept it from Briella for the exact reason she’d told Dean. She hadn’t wanted her kid to grow up terrified of dogs the way she was. Something in the way Briella said it, though, clenched Marian’s jaw.
“I don’t hate animals, Briella.”
Briella might favor a lot of her dad’s expressions, but the look she gave her mother now came purely from Marian herself. “Yes, you do. But you shouldn’t hate all animals just because a dog bit you in the face a long time ago. And you sure as hell shouldn’t hate Onyx.”
Marian stood, unsteadily. She shifted, planting her feet firmly on the bare wooden floor. “That language is not for you.”
“Sorry,” Briella said sullenly.
“I don’t hate anything, okay? Go to bed now.”
To her surprise, Briella settled into the fluff of the pillow, turned on her side and closed her eyes. Her breathing slowed. Suspiciously, Marian peeked at her face, but the kid really seemed to be asleep. Marian waited a minute longer, to see if Briella would wake up, but she didn’t.
Downstairs, she found a glass of red wine waiting for her on the kitchen table, along with a slice of cherry pie. It had come from the basement freezer, left over from the Fourth of July. She almost burst into tears at the sight of it, but she kissed Dean instead.
“Sit,” he said.
“I have to take care of the dinner dishes—”
Dean shook his head. “I did them. Sit down. Drink the wine. Eat the pie.”
“And then what?” Marian asked as she slid into the hard-backed kitchen chair with a grin.
Dean laughed. “We’ll see what happens after that.”
“I love you,” Marian told him, serious, her voice a little rough. “How did I get so lucky?”
“No clue. But we both are.”
She sipped the wine, the rush of warmth welcome. She’d get buzzed pretty fast if she kept going that way. She eyed the pie.
“Only one piece,” she said.
Dean smiled. “That’s all that was left.”
“Share it with me.”
“You eat it, baby.”
Marian shook her head and got up to grab another fork. On the way back to the table, she paused again to kiss him. The embrace lingered this time. The flavor of his mouth mingled with the red wine, and she sighed into the kiss. Her fingers threaded his hair as Dean looked at her.
“I love you,” she said again. “It’s crazy how much, Dean, do you know that?”
His gaze became shadowed for a second, his ready smile fading as he looked concerned. “I know it. C’mere.”
He tugged her onto his lap and cradled her. Marian tucked her face against his neck, letting herself melt against him. She breathed, her eyes closed, relishing his touch.
“Briella accused me of hating animals,” she said after a bit of silence. She hesitated, then added, “And upstairs, when we were talking, she used the word ‘retards’.”
“Yowch. Why?”
“She said that I should call that bird a him, not an it, and that I’d call a…special-needs person…a him or her and not an it. Then she said I hated animals.” Marian pulled herself from the comfort of his neck to look at Dean’s face. “I want that bird gone, Dean. I don’t feel right about it. She’s already too wrapped up in it.”
“She wants to take care of it. She’s never really had a pet. And you know how she gets focused on things.” Dean shrugged. “It will fade, and by then Onyx will be ready to fly on his own, and we’ll set him free. We can see how you feel about getting a pet then. Okay?”
Marian grimaced. “You’re doing it, too. Calling it by name, like it should even have one. It’s a wild bird. Not a pet. And I don’t like it in the house. It was supposed to stay in the garage.”
She could tell by the way Dean didn’t answer that he didn’t agree with her, but he was trying not to argue. Marian puffed out a breath and leaned to snag the wineglass with her fingertips. Red liquid sloshed as she pulled it closer and sipped. Better to fill her mouth with wine than to keep ranting like a crazy person.
“It can stay until it’s better,” she said after a few sips, with Dean not saying anything. “But then it’s out.”
Chapter Six
Marian hadn’t dreamed of the dog in a long time. Maybe it was the half bottle of red wine she’d polished off,
or the sugary pie. Whatever it was, she woke, sweating, from a nightmare in which she couldn’t fight off the bite. Her stomach rolled as she sat up in bed, and she put a hand over her mouth, unsure if she was going to be sick.
Everything settled in the bathroom, where she splashed cool water on her face and the back of her neck. She hadn’t turned on the light, not wanting to wake Dean, so she couldn’t see her reflection, but she felt better once she’d sipped a handful of water from the tap. She wasn’t going to be able to sleep, though, so she pulled on a housecoat over her nakedness and headed for the kitchen.
She’d meant to make herself a mug of peppermint tea to settle her complaining stomach, but a sound from the den turned her toward that room instead. As quietly as she could, Marian crept to the doorway and looked into the room. As she’d guessed, Briella was crouched near the cage, the door open, the bird outside of it on the table.
It was singing. A low warble, an unnamed tune. Marian’s stifled an anxious, horrified giggle when the bird caught sight of her and cawed. Briella turned. She didn’t look the least bit guilty at being discovered out of bed.
“Hello, Mama.”
“Hello,” the bird said.
Marian screamed, or tried to. All that came out was a sputtered gasp as she recoiled. Her heart thundered. She shook her head to get the sound of it out of her ears.
Briella laughed. “I told you he could talk!”
Still shaking her head, Marian stepped fully into the den. “You shouldn’t be out of bed.”
“I couldn’t sleep. I came down to make sure Onyx was okay.” Briella stood and turned, holding out an arm that the bird hopped onto.
Marian’s upset stomach returned at the sight. “Put it back in the cage now.”
Briella murmured something to the bird, too low for Marian to hear it. The bird reproduced the sound, also low and incoherent. It hopped into the cage, and Briella shut the door. She turned to her mother with a smug and somehow victorious grin stretching her small mouth.
