Where Bluebirds Fly

Chapter 7



John crawls into his bed whilst I perch on the edge. He slides beneath his blankets, and looks helpless and innocent. Even in the relative safety of the Putnam house, my fears resume. My hands flutter almost as violently as Abigail’s. I sit on them so John won’t see. My mind keeps returning to the pitiful dog, and how every day seems one step closer to the noose. For everyone.

“Are you warm enough?” I try to force my face into calm.

John nods, but his color is pale, his eyes, dim.

His hope is fading. I don’t know if I can raise his spirits, my own be so melancholy.

“I am so sorry about the dog.”

He holds up his hand, shaking his head. He does not want to talk about it.

“I understand.”

Some things, no amount of talking will heal. Only time. He feels pain so acutely.

I drop my eyes to stare at my hands, thinking of the endless taunts he’s endured. Since he was old enough to walk-lope, really.

Monsters, all monsters, they are.

“Do you want me to sleep with you?”

“No. I will be fine. I will see you on the ‘morrow.”

I stand to go. His hand catches mine as I turn away.

I face him again.

“I love you, sister.”

I blink back the tears. He needs me to be strong. To believe I will make him safe.

A silly, weeping girl cannot protect him. A fierce, consuming, motherly instinct roars in my chest. Ignorant people.

It is they who are stupid. Who cannot understand his paltry words don’t match the depth of intelligence inside his head.

I seethe, thinking of their stares. Through condescending eyes. Considering him less than them. Indeed, he is so much more, than anyone I’ve ever met. I swallow my hatred, and unstick my throat. “I love you, too.”

I walk to the doorway, not seeing. Yearning for the past has me by the heart now, refusing to let me be. I turn to face him, repeating the words we’ve heard together when home was home. And our beds and minds were safe. “Till the sun doesn’t rise and the moon doesn’t shine, love.”

His responding smile finishes me. My breath stutters.

Shutting the door, I press my cheek against the wood. Both hands cover my mouth, squeezing my cheeks. My chest shakes silently. I feel the wail building—I will wake everyone.

Something snaps inside. I fear it’s my self, my sanity?

I feel detached, like my insides fight to separate my soul from the cloying, sodden pain, infecting my heart.

Blackness crouches on the edges of my sight. The halls waver, dreamlike.

Would anyone love John if I passed?

A life without love. Perpetual loneliness. Why live?

I long to be with my parents, even in death. When I was with them, I felt whole, a person deserving of love.

Every day in Salem since their death, is muted, every breath, like drowning. I shake my head. No, he needs me. What if the constables come for me?

Please, God, let someone else love him, keep him safe. Oh, please let it be so.

The loneliness; I can no longer tolerate it. And it is possible to be lonely in a crowded house, like this one.

I stare at my hands, the burns littering my fingers. They’ve become infected before. People die from such a little thing. The fear of leaving him alone, unprotected, chokes me, and I gasp.

I am whispering and pacing and I cannot stop.

“No coin. No family. So, incredibly, unforgivably different. There is no hope.”

I must leave. The need is unforgiving, and primal. Like the need to breathe. I flee, passing bedroom doors, where the quiet sounds of snores fill my ears.

A revelation hits. My writer, and the man in the corn…are the same?

Suddenly I must know.

Reaching the kitchen door, I fling it open, pelting out into the freezing night. The moon shines so bright, the whole of the barnyard is bathed in its luminescent glow. It’s like walking in another world. A black and white one.

New, white snowflakes buoy on the night air, hovering and shimmering in the moonlight before swirling down around me. The remnants of the corn, partially rotted but still standing, call me.

I feel the draw. And somewhere, music starts. Strange music, with a woman’s voice. Sad, and longing.

I listen harder. I can make out some of the words. “Lullaby…trouble…bluebirds?” I whisper.

Music, outside? How? From where? Bluebirds? Does she summon that flock?

I hear writer’s voice again. Calling me from the dark.

I’ve tried to convince myself it’s a dream. The notes. His words. That he is a beautiful angel, come to coax me from despair. But the pain in my foot, where I’d cut it in his field, now stings, as if to prod me forward.

“It is folly. I am enchanted.”

A small voice inside whispers, Then so be it.

I am running, flying toward that bridge.

No one, besides John, has looked at me that way since Maine. Since…say it.

“Since the raids.” I vault over the rotting leaves, their musty smell wrinkling my nose. “Since we put them in the ground.”

I hear the music rise in time to my footsteps. The sound is like none I’ve ever heard. Many instruments, layered upon one another, like the overlays of blankets on a bed.

My legs pump till they burn. I laugh, exhilarated by the wet kiss of the snow hitting my face. I am shivering wildly, and I don’t care.

I picture him in my mind, and it blazes with light. A light I was certain was dead. Blotted out with grave-dirt, buried forever with the love of my parents.

My boot strikes wood, and the pain in my foot sings.

I stare down in glorious triumph at the bridge.

The Bridge of Evanesce, or fade-away, I realize I’ve named it.

I grasp its railing in my shaking hands. He’s calling me—I can almost hear it. He is just beyond this bridge. My throat goes dry.

I step onto the bridge, leaving a boot print in the gathering snow.

The woman’s singing, deep and low, cuts into my heart with her longing.

I repeat the words. “A land…from a lullaby?” Yes, if the man lives anywhere, it would be in such a place.

I see the word blue in my head. The same shade as his eyes.

I reach the summit and hold my breath. Is it wrong to try and find him? I find, I don’t care.

I leap over the apex.

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