CHAPTER
fifteen

The last time I saw my mother was from the window of our apartment building. Dad had borrowed someone’s car so he could take her back to the sanitarium. He held the door for her to get in, and she looked up at the window, pressing her hand to her lips before waving at me. I called down that I loved her but never knew if she’d heard me or not.

Months later Dad sat Clara and me down to tell us that Mother had died. He never told us how, and we hadn’t asked. But he had told us that if anyone asked, we were to say that she’d died of consumption.

“No one needs to know,” my dad said. “It’s family business.”

I had suspicions of how her life had ended, but I’d never been brave enough to say the word aloud. It was a harsh word, a hissing word. The kind that gave me nightmares when I thought about it too much.

And so, I did as Dad had asked. I didn’t talk about her death around him and I didn’t ask him any questions.

In bedtime whispers, though, the two of us girls would chatter about Mother. We’d tell stories about how she’d sing us to sleep or the pictures she’d draw for us to color in. When Dad came into the room, telling us to hush up and go to sleep, we’d freeze, hoping he hadn’t heard what we’d been talking about.

It was after everything was quiet and the lights were off, when the only sounds were the creaks and crackles of the building settling and Dad snoring in the other room, that Clara became afraid. She’d fidget under the covers and take an occasional gasp of air. When she thought I was sleeping, she’d cry softly to herself.

The first few times I pretended not to hear her, not to feel her trembling beside me. On the third night after Mother died, I couldn’t bear to let her suffer like that.

“Are you all right?” I asked.

“No . . . no . . .” she whispered.

“What’s the matter?”

“I don’t know.”

The streetlamp beamed in through our window with no curtain or shade to block it. The light was enough for me to see that Clara covered her face with both hands, and I didn’t know if that was to keep me from seeing her or her from seeing me.

“I’m scared, Birdie,” she said.

“Of what?”

“I don’t know.” She spread two fingers, peeking through the gap. “Will you tell me a story?”

“Will it help?”

She nodded and lowered her hands. “The one about the girl who was afraid of the dark. Do you know that one?”

I smiled. It was one of our mother’s stories, one she’d told when Clara insisted on keeping the lamp on all night. Dad wouldn’t allow it, not even for the few minutes it would take for her to fall asleep. The story—and the removal of the window coverings—were Mother’s attempt at keeping the peace.

“Once upon a time,” I said, propping myself up on my elbow, “there was a little girl who was afraid of the dark.”

“Her name is Lily, remember?” Clara said.

I nodded. “Now, Lily was so afraid of the dark that she tried to figure out a way that she’d never have to be without the sunshine.”

I remembered how Mother had lifted her eyebrows when telling a story, the way she leaned forward, how her voice sounded warmer than usual. How it almost sounded as if she was singing.

“She noticed the birds flying in the daytime sky. They went from one tree to another, here and there, any place they wanted,” I went on. “Lily wished she could be a bird so she could fly with them. In fact, she thought, if she was a bird, she’d be able to fly all the time, following the sun to all the places it went. If she did that, she’d never have to be in the dark. Not ever.”

“Do you think that’s possible?” Clara asked.

“I don’t know. It’s just a story. It doesn’t matter if it’s possible.” I sighed before going on. “Anyway, she closed her eyes hard, turned around four times, and said, ‘I wish I could be a bird.’ Then she waited.”

The change in the girl wasn’t instant and it wasn’t easy. It took time for her nose to stretch to a pointed beak and for her hair to change to feathers. When her arms folded into wings and her body pitched forward, it hurt like nothing Lily had felt before.

“Once she was changed, she spread her wings, flapping them and jumping until she took off into the sky,” I went on. “She flew toward the sun, following it eastward.”

“But the sun goes west,” Clara corrected.

“All right.” I pulled my lips into a tight smile. “Then she followed it west.”

I told about how Lily flew around and around the world, always keeping in step with the sun so she’d never see it go down.

“The first two days were the best of her life. She loved that she was never afraid, that she was never in the dark. And she saw wonderful things like the Eiffel Tower and the Grand Canyon.” I sat up, tucking my feet under me. “But on the third day she got tired, her arms aching from never having a break from flying. On the fourth, she got sick of seeing the same things all over again. And on the fifth, she gave up. She knew she couldn’t go any farther.”

Lily found a ledge near the top of a mountain and rested there, hoping to build up her strength.

“Don’t forget about the cloud,” Clara said.

“I won’t.” I lowered my voice. “The mountain was so tall that the peak of it was inside a cloud. All Lily could see was gloomy gray. It didn’t matter what time of day it was. She couldn’t see her hand in front of her face.”

“She didn’t have hands anymore.”

“Right.” I cleared my throat.

“Was she afraid?” Clara asked.

“Very afraid. She cried, even,” I answered. “The cloud took her tears and turned them into rain that fell on the villages below. That was how much she cried.”

Lily stayed on the mountain ledge for as long as she could. But after days and days, she realized that if she stayed there, she would die. She would have to be brave and fly so she could find her way home.

“She closed her eyes tight, turned around three times, and wished that she wasn’t afraid anymore,” I said. “Then she waited.”

The girl-bird felt her tiny heart warm and her head clear. She felt stronger, more sure. When she opened her eyes, the cloud around the mountain was gone and she could see the sun, not too far away.

“A beam of the sun pointed right to the place where Lily’s family lived,” I said. “Without being afraid in the least, she spread her wings and flew back home.”

Clara scowled at me, her bottom lip pushed out into a slight pout.

“That’s not how the story ends,” she said, voice flat. “That’s not how Mama told it.”

“But her ending isn’t happy.”

“It doesn’t have to be.”

She rolled over, her back to me.

I wondered what could be so wrong with a happy ending.

Just before I went to bed, I snuck up the stairs to check on Clara and Hugo. His door was ajar, and I looked in to see him, just a little lump under the covers. His breathing was just loud enough for me to hear.

Clara’s door was shut, but I could see from the space around the frame that she had the light on.