One of the vultures came down and landed near the top of the fallen tree. It had crushed the shed. The vulture hopped around, upset. My mother shone her flashlight on the ground. “Oh no,” she said. “They’d been nesting in here.”
The shed had come apart almost perfectly along the beam, and we could see inside, where they’d built their nest. My mom shone her flashlight on the knotty nest, on the eggs. They were light purple and cream colored, spotted dark.
Every egg was broken. I could see a fluff of feathers and a shimmer of slime on one of them.
“No,” Miles said. “No, no, no.”
My mom put her arms around us both and we went back inside.
Things happen fast. A car hits another car, a tree comes down, an egg breaks and a bird dies. Leaves lie on the ground gathering rain instead of lifting up in the sky and turning in the wind.
3.
The three of us waited in the kitchen for the fire department and animal rescue to show up. My mom had called them both and then made us hot chocolate. Miles took his to the front room to watch for the rescuers. “They said for us not to touch the birds,” Mom said.
I didn’t want to talk about the baby vultures. I knew there was nothing anyone could do to help them. “I’m sorry about the deck,” I said to my mom.
“I wanted to prove to myself,” Mom said, “that I could do this one thing on my own.”
I understood. The deck was something my dad would have done. Not her. She could make stuff and fix things in the house and grow plants in the garden and mow lawns, but building a deck was something new.
“I learned all these things,” she said. “How to measure and sand and saw. And it didn’t even matter.”
“It’s the stupid storm,” I said. “It would have been fine without the storm.”
But I knew, and she knew, that I was lying.
“No,” my mom said. “It wasn’t working before the storm, either.” She was crying. “It’s not working, is it?”
She’d never said that before. I didn’t know how to answer. Because it didn’t work the same without my dad and Ben. No matter how hard we tried.
Lights flashed through the front window. “The fire department’s here,” Miles said. “And some of the neighbors are coming out too.”
My mom left her mug at the table and went to the door with him.
This summer I’d been spending a lot of time on other people’s deaths. Harley’s. Lisette’s. But somehow it had helped me feel alive. Because they weren’t my deaths. The ones that were my own were too hard to face.
I heard voices outside. People had come over to help us. Flashlights flickered around, all over the backyard. I heard Leo’s dad talking, and then Leo came in through the front door. His hair stuck up everywhere from sleeping. He had on sweatpants and a T-shirt. I put my head down on the table.
Leo sat down next to me, the chair squeaking across the hardwood floor as he pulled it closer. “What’s wrong?” he asked. “Is something else wrong besides the tree?”
I didn’t do anything. Just sat there with my head down. I couldn’t even cry.
“I want to help you,” he said. He sounded like he might be crying. “I’m your friend.”
But I couldn’t tell him.
I couldn’t tell anyone.
I never, ever wanted Ben to be dead.
But sometimes I wanted him gone.
And then he was.
4.
All morning long the saws hummed, cutting the tree into small enough chunks to haul away. Animal rescue hadn’t been able to do anything about the nest. The vultures swung out in the sky and circled, their home gone, their eggs ruined. I saw the birds settle once in the trees by Leo’s house and I watched, hoping they’d stay there, but they took to the sky again not long after.
I didn’t see where they came to rest after that because I had asked my mom to take me back to the costume shop. I kept glancing over at her, at her sunglasses, the rings she still wore on her wedding finger. One diamond ring, one gold band, both from my dad. She was in the right place at the right time last night, safe inside when the tree came down.
One thing different—an extra piece of sandpaper outside when she needed it, the tree falling a bit sooner—and she would be gone. One thing different—hitting a red light instead of a green one on the way to the freeway, choosing another errand to run that day—and my dad and Ben would still be here.
It’s not right that something so big, your entire life, depends on a million tiny things.
The Costume Hall was full of assistants dressing mannequins, but I couldn’t find Meg. “She’s downstairs,” Emily said. “Will you tell her I need Juliet’s cape? Not the one from this year, the one from the production starring Hannah Crowe.”
I nodded, but I didn’t know if I’d have a chance to tell Meg anything once I’d given back the ring.