The Boy with Blue Eyes

The obnoxious sound of the alarm clock jarred Sam out of an awesome dream. He groaned and rolled over in his bed, hitting the OFF button and enjoying the sweet silence that settled around him.  He stretched and felt his muscles lengthen.  His nerves were getting to him.  As he began getting dressed, Sam could hear glasses and plates clinking downstairs.  The dense aroma of coffee teased his senses, and he knew both his parents would be awake having breakfast downstairs.  There were boxes and crates stacked in piles around his room, and he grimaced as he stubbed his toe on one while rummaging around for a matching pair of sneakers.

“Hey kiddo! Ready for your first day?” his father greeted him with a big smile as he sat down at the kitchen table.  His father always seemed cheery, even first thing in the morning.  First thing in the morning, Sam felt anything but cheery, and he wondered how his father managed not to let life get to him.  But he didn’t say that.  Instead, he said:
                “Ready as I’ll ever be,” as he shifted his weight in the wooden chair.

                “Aww sugar, are you nervous?” his mom, ever intuitive, broke in as she sat down with a cup of coffee.

                “It’s OK to be nervous, it’s healthy!” his dad added quickly from behind a mouthful of eggs.

                “I’ll be fine,” Sam replied, grabbing a couple of toast his mom had placed on the table.

                “Just remember what we talked about, son” his dad said as he swallowed, and raised an eyebrow.  Still the smile.  Always with the smile.  Before moving to the city, his parents had sat him down and discussed what he should expect of his new school.  Sam’s family was from a small Georgia town, where there was not a large multicultural setting – and his parents preferred it that way.  His father had received a promotion at work, causing the family to move to the over-populated and decidedly mixed culture of Atlanta. 

                Both of Sam’s parents had expressed their concerns about the new city and, even more so, Sam’s new school.  They didn’t want their son hanging in ‘mixed company’ as they called it.  They feared their son would fall victim to a lower-class level of behavior, and join a gang or become hooked on dope.

                “Especially the Black folks.  Steer clear of them, if you know what’s good for you” his father warned.  Sam’s mother and father weren’t part of the Klu Klux Klan, but they definitely had their prejudices.  Apparently, when Sam was just a baby, his mother had been mugged by an African American man.  His parents had never been particularly fond of any minority class, but after that incident their racism had become more solidified than ever before.  With a deeply rooted family tree hailing from the South, Sam’s parents still had misgivings about the South’s defeat in the Civil War.  Sam glanced at his mother, noticing her forehead had concerns racing in lines across it.

                “I’ll be fine guys!” he assured his parents, scraping his chair back and getting up from the table.  “Don’t worry about me, alright?  Y’all sound like I’m going to war or something.”  Sam grabbed his backpack and stepped out of his family’s new home and into the balmy Georgia morning.  His bus stop was about three blocks from the house, and as he walked he kicked a rock in front of him.  It made satisfying skipping noises all the way to the bus stop. 

                His new school was terrifying in its own right, never mind what his folks had to say about it.  The thing was huge, filled with tons of students and faculty – none of which Sam knew.  He kept to himself for most of the day and tried his best to blend in.  The day seemed to drag on forever and when the last bell rang, Sam made a fevered dash for the busses in fear of getting on the wrong one and winding up dropped off in one of Atlanta’s less-than-safe neighborhoods.  His backpack bounced behind him as he ran, and he was so busy trying to figure out which bus was his that he ran straight into another student.

                “Ow! Hey, watch it!” Sam started at the very deep voice and very black face of the kid he ran over. 

                “I’m sorry, man.  I wasn’t looking where I was going” he said, picking his backpack up off the ground.

                “Well, maybe you should pay more attention next time” the kid replied, collecting his own books that had toppled to the ground during the collision.  Sam noticed the kid’s hair was in some kind of twists, something his hair would never be able to do.  To his own surprise, he found himself thinking that the boy’s hair looked cool and unique.  He shook his head to clear it as he noticed the boy had already turned away and was walking toward a bus.

                “Excuse me, Ma’am?” Sam pulled a piece of paper from the front pocket of his Jansport book bag.  He had gotten the bag his freshman year, and it had held up through some rough times.  He hoped the bag would last until the end of his senior year as well. 

                “Yes, how can I help you?” the teacher was staring at him expectantly, waiting for a reply.  The woman’s glasses were smudged, her hair a mess, and her stockings were falling down her chubby legs.  He wondered if she knew how she looked to other people, or if she even cared.  It certainly didn’t appear to him that she put much thought into her appearance.  Blinking, Sam unfolded the paper.

                “I’m supposed to find bus 19, the one that goes into the Buckhead area?”

                “Oh, of course, it’s right over there” the teacher pointed at the second bus in the line of yellow and black busses parked in front of the school.  Sam thanked her and tucked the note in his pocket as he made his way over to the bus.  Stepping on to a high school bus is incredibly depressing, Chris thought.  For one, if you are a senior, you are definitely old enough to drive and should probably already be doing so - or at the very least catching a ride with friends.  For another, school busses always smell weird.  They smell like a mixture of faux leather, sweat, and desperation.  Not a great combination.  Sam hated riding the bus, but because he was trying desperately to not be noticed by anyone at the school until he felt comfortable, he hopped on and found a seat near the back.  It was then he noticed the boy – the one with the twists in his hair – was sitting a few seats in front of him on the same bus. 

                Sam had not encountered many minorities in his life, aside from on the television or Internet.  He took the opportunity to get a really good look at the boy.  His skin wasn’t as dark as Sam had originally perceived, but instead had a caramel color.  His hair was definitely like other African American hair, black in color and somewhat coarse in texture – yet it looked so different and interesting in the twists.  The boy wore normal clothes: white shirt, leather bomber jacket, and some light brown Timberlands.  His style was not at all what Sam had expected.  He thought all African Americans wanted to be thugs or actually were thugs (and, according to Sam’s mom, this was all true), but this kid seemed normal, judging from appearance alone.  Sam then realized the boy was looking back at him, and he turned away, embarrassed that he’d be caught staring.  But in the split second that he had met the boy’s gaze, he had noticed something else unique about him – he had blue eyes.  Sam had never seen an African American with blue eyes before.  It was disarming, intriguing, and looked altogether intense.

                 He was thinking about the boy with the blue eyes for the rest of the evening.  He wondered what kind of music the boy liked, what kind of sports.  He thought about the boy’s eyes and if he often startled people because of their color.  When Sam went to bed that night, he prayed to God for the courage to ask the boy about his eyes.  After all, what was the harm of holding a conversation with a peer from a minority group?  It’s not like they had to be best friends.  His parents wouldn’t even have to know.

                The next day after school, Sam sat in the same spot on the bus.  He waited for the boy to get on, and when he did and found himself a seat, Sam moved closer.

                “Hey,” Sam said, sitting behind the boy.

                “Hi” the boy replied, turning to see who it was.  When he noticed it was Sam, the boy squinted.

“Oh, its you.  Did you find out that you need glasses?”

                “No…” Sam trailed off.  Obviously the boy had not forgotten about Sam running him over yesterday afternoon.  He had no idea it would be this hard.  Sam cleared his throat and tried again.

                “I’m Sam.  What’s your name?” he asked the boy. 

                “I’m Bryan,” the boy answered, his twisted hair bouncing as the bus rolled over a bump in the road.

                “Hi Bryan, it’s nice to meet you.  Speaking of eyes, yours are really wicked!  I was wondering if you get asked often about their color,” Sam kept his tone light, in the hopes that his context would not be misconstrued. 

                “Oh yeah, happens all the time” Bryan said, smiling.  It was the first time Sam caught him smiling, and it didn’t seem scary or weird at all.  Bryan seemed open and friendly.  They talked the entire bus ride back to the Buckhead neighborhood.  Sam learned that Bryan had a 3.79 average, played a running back position on the high school football team, and listened to funk and jazz a lot. 

                “Have you ever heard the band Soulive?” he asked Sam as they pulled into his neighborhood. 

                “Nah, I listen to a lot of country and rock,” Sam replied.  Bryan pulled a CD out of his backpack and gave it to Sam.

 “Bring it back by Friday, but give it a listen OK?  It’s really worth your time”

“OK.  It was nice talking with you Bryan.  And thanks!” Sam said, indicating the borrowed CD.  Sam watched as Bryan walked up his well-manicured lawn to his home that looked as inviting as his smile, and wondered how possibly his mother could dislike a boy who had as much going for him as his new potential friend did.  He listened to the CD while he did his homework that night.  It was amazing, as cool as Bryan had said it was.  As he tried to work the Pythagorean Theorem, he found himself drifting off and thinking about his parents and how they had shaped his views of reality, of people.  Sam couldn’t believe he had discredited entire groups of people because of his parent’s prejudices.  He couldn’t understand why one isolated incident had caused them so much pain and hatred toward minorities.  People were people, after all.  His mother could have just as easily been mugged by a young White male.  Her perception was skewed, and he felt betrayed because her perception as well as his father’s had impacted his ability to relax and adapt in a new environment.  Bryan knew what kinds of people he wanted to be friends with, and who he shouldn’t hang around.  And though he might occasionally choose the wrong person, the person’s color or ethnic background never had anything to do with why they were the wrong person.  It was usually about their attitude, morality, ambitions. 

                There are certain types of people who drag everyone down.  And then there are those kinds of people who always bring a smile, uplift everyone, and make tomorrow a day to look forward to.  Sam, through taking the time to get to know one person from a minority group that shattered every misconception his mother had force fed him for years, had broken his own prejudices and found himself a new friend (and a new band he liked a lot) in the process.  He looked forward to the next day of school, no longer feeling the trepidation he had felt before his first day.  He made sure to return Bryan’s CD to him the very next day, after ripping it to his Macintosh computer first.  He also made sure to talk to Bryan on a regular basis, so that his thoughts about this person being a friend would actually come true.  And they did become friends.  The two were friends through their senior year of high school and became so close by the end of the year that they decided to room together when they went off to college in the fall.  Sam knew his parents were good people with good ideas.  But he also knew that they weren’t him – and he never made the mistake of judging a person based on their appearance again.

Berevement

“No…please, god, GEORGE…NO!” Olivia cried as she watched her husband rip the little Jesus statue off the top of the headstone.  She knew what he meant to do with it.  George couldn’t hear her.  How can I make you hear me? She wondered as George kneeled in grief over the grave, crying into the autumn wind.  It was only seconds between this moment and the next, but to Olivia it felt like an eternity had passed before George got the courage to compose him self and finish his task.

            George gripped the statue and lifted it to his head.  This movement was incredibly quick but looked to Olivia as if it were in slow motion.  She cried out to her husband again as he bashed the statue into his fragile, eighty-year-old skull over and over again, with every ounce of strength he could muster at his age. 

Blood poured out of the wounds he made in his head, covering the ground around the headstone in thick, dark puddles.  He continued assaulting himself, letting nothing avert him from his task.  Even the sight and smell of his own blood couldn’t stop him now.  Getting weaker and weaker, he sank to his knees by the grave, waiting for death to take him away.

            It all started about a year ago when Olivia had gone in for a mammogram.  “We found a lump, Olivia,” the doctor told her, “We’ll have to do a biopsy to see if it is cancerous.”  She couldn’t believe it.  After all these years of not being sick or breaking a single bone, she may have breast cancer.  George was angry at first,

            “That doctor is an idiot. Seriously, Ollie, he’s a real quack. Get a second opinion!” he grumped at Olivia when she explained to him what the doctor had said. She didn’t press him further on the issue.   She figured she would wait until the biopsy results to bring up the issue again.  After all, why have a fight over nothing? she thought. Less than a week later, she got her answer.  The telephone rang,

            “Hello?”

            “Mrs. Maheu?” a woman’s thin voice echoed over the line.

            “This is she, who is this?” Olivia replied, hoping to herself that she had remembered to pay all of the bills that month.  Sometimes things would slip her mind in her old age, but she was pretty sure that she had paid all the bills.

            “This is Dr. Sculco’s office calling, your test results are in,” the woman answered her, “It appears as though you have stage three breast cancer.  Doctor estimates that you have about six months to live.”  Her words died off and the silence felt extremely loud and uncomfortable.  It was like the air had been sucked out of the room, so Olivia coughed and cleared her throat, attempting to thank the woman before she hung up the phone.

            Six months to live, she had said.  Olivia’s face paled and her head suddenly felt fuzzy.  She sank into a chair by the phone and took a deep breath, clearing her throat again.  Her dog, Bowser, trotted over to her and in a knowing way rested his head on her feet, making them warm.  How will I tell my children?  How will I explain this to George?  She thought, crying silently to herself as Bowser looked on, helpless to do anything else. 

            It took Olivia a week before she could break the news to George.  She had to figure out the exact right moment to explain to him that she was dying.  He was, after all, her love and her, well, everything for the last fifty years.  She knew he wouldn’t be able to bear the thought of losing her.  She knew exactly how she would feel if he explained to her he was dying.  She didn’t want him to go first; she actually preferred it this way.  She just hoped he would understand.

            They were sitting together in the morning, having the usual two to three cups of morning java, when Olivia finally plucked up the courage to tell him, “I’m dying, George.”  The words felt thick and unusual coming out of her mouth and they seemed to hang in the air like smoke, curling around her head and making the air stale and stagnant. 

            “Wha?” George was reading the paper and hardly heard the words issued from her mouth.  She cleared her throat.

            “I’m dying, George.  The lump they found in my breast, its stage three breast cancer.  They don’t estimate me havin’ much time left,” she looked at George and watched his face as he absorbed the news.  It darkened suddenly in anger as if a storm cloud were passing over the room.  George got up from the breakfast table, bumping the table and spilling coffee all over the tabletop.  He put on his coat, thrusting his arms through the sleeves in quick, agitated movements and grabbed his truck keys that were hanging by the door.

            “I’m goin’ out,” George spat at her as he walked out the door, leaving Olivia sitting there contemplating her own fate.  She died three months later.  Apparently, the doctors were just a little off in their estimation of exactly how much time I had left, she thought as her spirit watched the funeral.  It was a sunny May afternoon that they held her funeral, cloudless and just a little chilly.  George wept silently by her grave, his weary aged body racking with sobs, but no sound emitting from his mouth.   

            Olivia wanted to go to him, to tell him she was going to be fine.  She felt her spirit move toward him, reach out to him, and then pass through him.  She saw his face as her arm went through him.  He obviously had felt it on some unconscious level, because he shivered with goose bumps and rubbed his arms with his hands in an attempt to ward of the chill.  This was no good.  He couldn’t understand or even hear her now. 

            Six months had passed and George was still in deep mourning.  Olivia had attempted contact with him to let him know that she was alright several times, but nothing ever worked except in makeing George think he was going crazy.  She tried several tricks, opening cabinet doors and knocking, opening windows when he was sleeping to let in a breeze.  Nothing worked.  George would close the cabinets or window and go about his business.  He was never a superstitious man; they were a Catholic family and believed that when one dies they go to either hell or heaven. Olivia wondered which of these George thought she was in.  Either way, the days passed and she grew weary of trying to make her presence known.  And something was happening.

            George appeared to be deteriorating quickly.  He was growing thinner and he forgot about shaving all together.  Bowser was suffering too, as George couldn’t bear looking at him anymore.  He had been Olivia’s favorite dog, a loyal companion and one of her best friends.  It was killing her to see him wasting away like this.  Memories of the family playing Frisbee together would come rushing back when George walked the dog; a daily reminder of his dead wife.

            Every month, on the anniversary of Olivia’s death, George would visit her grave.  On this particular November day, George prepared to make his usual visit.  A short while after he left the house, Bowser began whimpering and whining.  His whining soon turned into vomiting, which lead way to convulsions, and then suddenly he stopped moving.  Olivia watched as the dog’s spirit rose out of the corpse and ascended…disappearing in a shimmer of light. My poor Bowser, she thought as she realized what must have happened.  George had poisoned the dog. At least he isn’t in pain anymore, she thought as she scanned the room for any indication of what George used to kill the dog with.  It was then she noticed the letter on the table.  It was addressed to their children.  She unfolded it and read the confused and sorrowful words of her husband as he explained to their children what it was he planned to do. 

            Olivia left the house at once, headed for her grave site.  It was a crisp fall day and the leaves were falling from the trees in bouquets of color; covering the ground in layers of orange and yellow and brown.  Springdale Cemetery was a big place but she knew exactly where George would be.  In the older half of the cemetery, next to a black stone with their last name, Maheu, carved into the stone, stood George.  Suddenly the leaves on the trees didn’t seem so bright, but instead appeared brown and withered.  The trees appeared to be grieving, with their bent trunks and crooked limbs stretching to the gray sky.

            “George,” Olivia called to him as he stood there deep in thought.  He wouldn’t turn to look at her.  “George, if you do this you won’t be with me ever again.  George, you’ll go to hell.  Please don’t do this, George.  Think of the children!  And who is going to come along and find you this way?”  she reached out to him, her hand going through his chest instead of making contact with him.  He shuddered deeply but made no sign that he could see or hear her.  He probably just thinks it’s chilly out here, she thought as she watched George to see what he would do next.

 “No…please, god, GEORGE…NO!” Olivia cried as she watched her husband rip the little Jesus statue off the top of the headstone.  She knew what he meant to do with it.  How can I make you hear me? She wondered as George kneeled in grief over the grave, crying into the autumn wind.  It was only seconds between this moment and the next, but to Olivia it felt like an eternity had passed before George got the courage to compose him self and finish his task.

            George gripped the statue and lifted it to his head.  This motion was incredibly quick but looked to her as if it were in slow motion.  She cried out to her husband again as he bashed the statue into his fragile, eighty-year-old skull over and over again, with every ounce of strength he could muster at his age.  Blood poured out of the wounds he made in his head, covering the ground around the headstone in thick, dark puddles.  He continued assaulting himself, letting nothing avert him from his task.  Even the sight and smell of his own blood couldn’t stop him now.  Getting weaker and weaker, he sank to his knees by the grave, waiting for death to take him away.

            That’s when the runner happened by.  Olivia watched as the man jogged slowly up the old cemetery road, his breath steaming from his lungs creating a grey cloud around him as he ran.  He was listening to headphones and running methodically, with an expression of focus on his face.  When he came upon George, he turned as white as a sheet.

“Hello, Sir?” He said as he looked at George’s crumpled body.  He slowed his pace and then came to a shuddering stop, reached clumsily into his pocket and dug out a cell phone.  He was shaking so badly he dropped the phone to the ground with a thud.  Bending and picking it up, he looked at George again and his mouth twisted in discontent.  With shaking fingers he dialed 9-1-1.  “Hello, emergency? Yes, there is an old man up here at Springdale Cemetery who’s losing a lot of blood….yes, that’s right….Springdale Cemetery, on Prospect Road…..ok, thank you,” he hung up and put the phone back into his pocket, turning his attention to George.  There was blood everywhere and the man appeared to Olivia as if he were too nervous to actually find out if George was alive or dead.

            She knew George was still alive because she hadn’t seen his spirit leave yet, so there was still time.  This man could have possibly saved him by happening along when he did.  The ambulance soon arrived with paramedics who strapped George into a stretcher and whisked him away to the nearest hospital.  Olivia tagged along in the ambulance.  Since she is dead, no one could see her so no one could tell her otherwise.  She wished she could hold her husband’s hand because his face was a mask of pain.  His breathing was shallow but the paramedics soon had it under control, just as they were pulling into the emergency area of the hospital. 

            After six hours of intense pain and suffering, George died.  No one else was in the room with him when he passed.  Olivia watched as his spirit rose from his body and, instead of ascending, appeared to descend and disappeared into the floor. She could hear his cries as death pulled him into hell, wretched and fearful.  She watched in grief, crying because she knew her husband was lost to her now.  Even if she could figure out some way to get into hell, there would be a slim chance of finding George there or even of being able to get back out.  Olivia sighed heavily and prepared to ascend, walking toward the light.  She could see Bowser and her Mom and Dad, among other ancestors and relatives who had long since been dead.   She walked toward them and disappeared into the light with one final, vibrating twinkle.

 

***This story is a work of fiction and does not reflect the author's views of the afterlife or theology.

 

As Sweet As Autumn Fruit

           The strawberries were grown in a field.  As they matured and ripened they grew heavy with juice and darker in their shade of red.  I can see the environment from which they sprung in my minds-eye, a happy entwining of berries nestled in a rolling meadow that smells of dew and fresh cut grass.  The light breeze carries the smells to anyone happening by the area.  The ground around the strawberry patch is warm; the strawberries sun kissed and swollen with ripeness as they near their harvest.  I imagine it as a quiet place, where the only sounds are those of nature and the occasional sound of a travelers foot steps walking through grass or up the dirt road nearby.  I can imagine small animals, a squirrel or raccoon, stopping to eat a few of the berries as they pass.  Bees drift in the air in search of pollen adding a drone to the sounds of the wind rustling the leaves of the trees and teasing the blades of grass.  Even more strawberries grow in the tilled soil there, strawberries that will one day grace the plates of others as these sitting before me.

            The apples that I have sliced come from an orchard full of apple trees.  The orchard is colorful with varying shades of apples – vibrant greens, yellows, and reds.  The smell of apples is intoxicating and evokes in anyone walking beneath the shade of the trees memories of happy times with his or her family during the fall and winter months.  Thoughts of warm cider and cinnamon-apple pies drift in and out of passerby’s consciousness, and children’s mouths water in anticipation of one of fall’s most delicious fruits.  Next to the orchard is a bustling store, filled with different foods and decoration.  Inside I can purchase fresh apple cider and apples by the bag full.  Red delicious, yellow delicious, McIntosh, and Granny Smith are separated into barrels and take up an entire room of the store.  Another room contains shelves and shelves of canned fruits, homemade jams, and caramel apples.  Behind the store is a small pumpkin patch, another fall fruit, adding more vibrant color to the orchard.  Beyond the pumpkin patch and the apple trees are more fields and a line of dark trees, stretching off into the distance.  I can hear the leaves as they crunch beneath the soles of my shoes, adding a smell of damp earth and decay to the already fragrant air. 

            The crust is done, a rectangle made up of flour, sugar, salt, and butter with deftly decorated edges.  The dough was pliable and easy to roll out and form into the pan.  I selected the plumpest strawberries and already sliced them and set them aside and I gently mix them together into the crust with some pink pearl apples and some crab apples.  I am careful as I place the fruit into the pan not to tear the crust.  The apples are coated with sugar, and they smell of autumn.  I finish filling the pie and rummage through the cabinet for honey, which I drizzle on the tart before placing it into the oven.  The oven heats the tart, causing the apples to wither and the strawberries to dry slightly.  The perfume of fall is thick in the air, causing my cat to stir and quiver his nose at the aroma.  Outside it rains, and there is a chill to the air.  I am glad for the comfort of my kitchen and the warmth coming from the stove.  As the tart cooks I wash the dishes and wipe down the counter, cleaning the mess I had made in preparation.  I retrieve a white plate from the cabinet and place upon it a brown paper napkin, readying the plate for the tart.  My cat has fallen back to sleep and is snoring lightly.  The smell of honey is thick in the air now, and I hurry to remove the tart from the oven before it is burned. 

            I let the pastry cool on the shelf before I place it on the plate I have prepared.  Outside it has stopped raining, and the sun is focused on forcing itself out from behind the ominous clouds.  I look at the pastry and think that it looks pretty to me, and brings to mind past autumns and time spent with my family.  I want to capture this moment and portray it to others to see if they feel the same way.  I take the plate and some forks and a knife to the whitewashed picnic table in the backyard.  The sun is warm, but I can still feel the coolness underneath the shade of the tree in the backyard.  I go back to the house to grab my camera and some powdered sugar.  Coming back outside I notice that the clouds are almost completely gone, and the sun is a shining star in the deep blue sky.  Arranging the utensils around the pastry plate, I listen to the urban sounds of the city around me and wish I was in one of the fields where the fruit had come from.   A motorcycle groans on the road and I think of the tranquility of the natural sounds that surround the strawberries and apples are as they mature.  This must be why they taste and smell so sweet!  I think as I snap some pictures of my pastry. 

            Settling down with some coffee and a slice of my homemade tart, I hear an ambulance in the distance. The sound seems disconnected from my reality, the reality of the pastry, and as it fades away I am left contemplating whether or not to stay in my architectural jungle.  The sounds of the city, previously comforting, had found the way to my nerves and had set them on edge.  This concrete context had me shaken and disturbed.   I longed for the scenic beauty of the country and its fields of fruit.  I knew that if given the chance I could ripen and become as sweet as the fruit from those fields.  I rose from the white washed picnic table that now seemed sad and obscene in the small urban backyard, and strode to the house to begin a new kind of preparation - this time for my departure.      

Gwendolyn and Fairfax: A Fable

Gwendolyn had just about enough.  As if it weren’t bad enough that she was the weakest, most emotional Elf in the Reds – now everyone in the village (it seemed, anyway) had turned to hear her family yelling at her about her appearance.

            “You look like a troll!” her mother proclaimed, sniffing at Gwen’s unkempt hair and tattered clothes.  “Why don’t you ever wear the nice things your sister makes for you?”  Gwen sighed and looked down at her ensemble.  She didn’t think it was so bad.  Besides, she didn’t care to wear the clothes her sister made, they were far too sparkly and fancy for her tastes.  A tear threatened to leap from her eye as she looked around at all the staring faces.  Some of the other elves her age whispered and laughed.  Before the tear could escape, Gwen turned and ran as fast as she could into the redwoods.  She wouldn’t give the entire village the satisfaction of watching her cry. 

            Deep in the woods, Gwen leaned against a tree and let loose.  She could taste and smell the salt of her tears as they streamed down her face, streaking it with dirt that had accumulated on her as she ran.  She was so wrapped up in her emotions she failed to sense at all that someone else was leaning against the same tree on the opposite side.  She slumped down, letting her limbs fall free, and her hand fell against something warm.

            “Hey! Wha-“ Gwen started, scrambling to her feet.  The warmth she felt was another hand, which Gwen discovered quickly, belonged to a freckle-faced fairy.  Gwen sucked in cold air and shivered when she glimpsed the tell-tale wings.  Elves and fairies were notoriously at odds with each other, and her mother was consistently warning her to stay away from the entirety of the race. 

            “I’m sorry, I didn’t see you there,” the fairy said, looking at the ground.  Her face, Gwen noticed, was also streaked with tears and dirt. 

            “It’s OK” Gwen replied, stepping back from the fairy slightly.  Her mother’s warnings were flooding her head – fairies are tricksters, fairies are trouble, fairies are never serious and only care to play pranks and cause mischief.  The elfin race Gwen belonged to prided themselves on their fierceness and intelligence – and had absolutely no time for fairy hi-jinks.  Gwen’s mother’s warnings filled her thoughts, and she started to turn away to find another tree to lean on.  But something stopped her.  After all, her mother spent a large amount of time yelling at her about all her ‘faults’ – maybe she was wrong about the fairies, too.  She regarded the girl shyly.

            “What’s your name?” she asked, wiping the tears from her face lest the girl think lowly of her emotions. 

            “I’m Fairfax,” the fairy replied, wiping her own face quickly with the back of her hand.  “And you are?”

            “I’m Gwendolyn,” she stated, and then after a moment added: “Are you alright?” indicating the tear-streaked face of the fairy.

            Fairfax sighed, and struggled to smile.  “Not exactly…I’ve been forced out of my village in search of Anardana.  The village ran out, and because they think of me as the weakest link, they sent me to look for it.”  She was almost in tears again as she recalled the harshness in her father’s voice when he sent her out to search for the rare spice. 
“I’ve been searching for three days and have yet to find anything.  I’m a total failure!” and with that, Fairfax’s face crumpled and her tears began flowing freely once more.

            Gwendolyn’s own face brightened as she heard what was troubling her new acquaintance. 

            “Well, I live in the Reds, just a mile or so from here – and our village is brimming with wild pomegranates!  I’m sure you could find some Anardana that would please your family there.  Would you like to come take a look?”

            Fairfax’s eyes widened and her wings fluttered, causing a cloud of glitter to surround the pair. 

“Oh, I’d just love that!”

“I know what its like to feel outcast and alone,” Gwen said, turning in the direction of her village.  “I’d be happy to help.  Come on.” 

The two crunched their way through the red woods and talked lightly with each other about their lives.  When they reached the village, Gwen’s mother nearly jumped out of her own skin at the sight of her daughter laughing with one of those kind.  

“GWENDOLYN!” she shouted.  “What are you doing with that….that…fairy!!”  Her voice couldn’t have been more contemptuous.  Fairfax turned bright red and began to inch away from her new friend.  But Gwen gently placed a hand on the fairy’s shoulder, and turned to her mother.

“Mom, I’d like you to meet Fairfax.  She lives a few miles from here, and seems to be in need of some Anardana.  Since we have so many pomegranates around the village, I thought we could help her.”

Her mother jeered, “Absolutely not!  What have I told you about their kind?  Get her out of here before she causes trouble in the village!”

“No, mom.”  Gwen stood her ground.

“What did you just say to me?”

            “I said no.  I told her I would help her, and I will.  She won’t hurt anyone here.  She is nice.  And you don’t know everything, you prejudiced troll!” she emphasized the last part, and turned defiantly from her mother toward the gardens.  “C’mon Fairfax, lets go get your Anardana.”

            Fairfax gathered enough Anardana to last her village for several months.  When she left, she was sure to thank the village elders and Gwendolyn for their help.  The village elders held their breath, anticipating a lavish prank from the fairy.  But nothing happened.  Not even so much as a rock overturned or a hair out of place after Fairfax’s visit.  And she continued to visit Gwendolyn.  After a while, the elves and fairies of the Reds grew to know and enjoy each others company from time to time.  All because of the two most outcast children of their villages – the prejudices between the two races (at least in this area) were softened, and the two girls never had to feel lonely or displaced from their societies again. 

           

The Individual, Faith, and Society: Eliz Morcome

LONDON, in the Year of Our Lord Sixteen Hundred and Twenty.

            As we approached the bustling port, the wind teased my hair and played with my fiancée’s cap, almost whisking it right off of his head.  It was always windier by the London port, and as I thought this I pulled my coat more closed with a shiver.  The port was full of color and vibrant with movement and excitement.  Even though I didn’t enjoy the water much, I thoroughly enjoyed the London port.  The smell was intoxicating, a mix of fresh produce and different spices from far-off shores, combined with the fresh salt smell of the water.  Some ships were arriving, massive beasts gliding up to the port, shading a large part of the dock with their hulking forms.  I’ve never felt comfortable aboard a ship.  My fiancée loves to sail and earns a good living traveling to and from other ports exchanging goods.  He has carried all kinds of strange cargo aboard his ship, and sometimes even brings a tasty (or beautiful) trinket back to London for me.  He has attempted to get me to travel with him on what he would call a ‘short’ journey, but simply having lunch aboard the ship has been all that I can stand of the water.  I become quite nauseated any time I am aboard such a vessel and the few times we have decided to have dinner on the ship, I couldn’t eat much.  Edward broke into my thoughts about the port and jarred my fears about his current trip.

            “Stop worrying, love” he said, gripping my hand.  “I know that face, you look as though you swallowed a thorn.”  I swallowed hard at this, and forced a smile.

            “I’m not worried,” I said, squeezing his hand a little in reassurance.  “You’ve been at sea many times since we’ve been together,” I added for good measure.  He smiled, but he seemed to know better because he leaned toward me and whispered:

            “Call us what you will, we are made such by love” (Donne, 2006, p. 608).  At this mention of one of our favorite poet’s works, I returned his smile with a genuine one of my own and replied:

            “We can die by it, if not live by love” (Donne, 2006, p. 608).  Understanding my concern, my adoring fiancée retorted,

            “And if unfit for tombs and hearse/Our legend be, it will be fit for verse” (Donne, 2006, p. 608).  With this, Edward reached around and tickled the back of my neck with his fingertips, eliciting a burst of irrepressible giggles.  We said our goodbyes, and I held back my tears long enough to bid him off.  As he boarded the ship he turned back toward the dock and waved at me, blowing me a kiss.  His ship, the Relic, was also named after a piece by Donne and was fully loaded with cargo to take to Jamaica.  Edward had promised to bring me back either some molasses or possibly some fresh bananas, if he could acquire some.  I stood on the dock until I could no longer see his ship on the horizon, and then I headed toward my family’s tavern in town.  My father, a gentleman from family money, also owned a tavern on the outskirts of west London.

            When I arrived at the tavern, my father sat outside smoking a pipe. 

            “Eliz!” he grinned, thick grey smoke puffing out of each side of his mouth.

            “Hi papa,” I greeted him with a hug.  “I just got back from the docks.”

            “Edward off safely?” my father asked, motioning for me to sit beside him on the smooth walnut bench.  I sat and told my father of our goodbye and how his ship seemed to take off alright, from what I knew of ships.  Our conversation died down and the afternoon waned, beckoning the crickets to begin their nightly symphony.  We each had a serving of vanilla ice cream, and my father sent me home in his carriage.  The entire night, I felt uneasy like I forgot to do something, or like something was wrong.  I prayed to God that night to keep Edward safe, and protected until he could make the journey home to me.  Feeling slightly better, I managed to fall into a light sleep as the wind continued blowing outside.

            The next morning I awoke early and attended church with my family.  Every Sunday we were to attend church, and we had every year for the last seventeen years.  My family is Catholic, and the Church of England services aren’t necessarily my favorite part of my religion.  Because they often are ‘middle ground’ sermons, I don’t always feel moved by them. This happened to be one such sermon, so I glanced around the crowd.  Mostly it was people of my class or higher in the front pews, with the very poor standing in the back of the room.  Everyone (except the poor, of course) was dressed nicely, and many looked as though they were fully enjoying mass.  My mind drifted, thinking of Edward and our shared love of poetry.  I had been taught by a tutor at home with my siblings, and Edward had gone through grammar school, so we were both able to read and sat many times reading together from manuscripts and journals new authors were circulating.  One of my favorites was Ben Jonson’s “Queen and Huntress.”  He writes: “Queen and huntress, chaste and fair,/Now the sun is laid to sleep,/Seated in thy silver chair” (Jonson, 2006, p. 647).  This poem always reminded me of how I would have been had I been able to be a Queen.  I would have enjoyed being a fierce huntress and protector of my people.  I thought of Edward laughing at my dreams of Royal life, and my heart tightens in my chest as though it were in a vice grip. Something’s amiss with him, I can feel it! I couldn’t help thinking as my heart pounded against my ribcage.

*                                                                      *                                                          *

LONDON – The Year of Our Lord, Sixteen Hundred and Twenty One

            Edward never did return, and now I am sitting in the London jail facing a trial for witchcraft (Mack, 2009, p. 181).  After church, I had decided to go home and lie down for a bit.  I was depressed with thoughts of Edward and all the possibilities of harm that could happen to him in Poseidon’s playground.  I had never had this sense of foreboding before over a routine journey, and was certain that this was a terrible portend.  I clothed myself in dark garments as though he had died, and lay upon my bed crying.  My mother, ever the sensitive lady, knocked upon my door and entered my room.  She stood by my chest-of-drawers, staring down at my morbid form. 

            “How fare thee, Eliz?  What vexes thee?” my mother asked, touching the mahogany chest but looking toward me the entire time. 

            “Edward isn’t coming home,” I replied to my mum, through choking sobs.

            “How can you possibly know that?  You can’t!  Only God knows what is going to happen to any of us.  You just keep praying and before you know it Edward will come home.”  That was nearly eight months ago.  Parts of the Relic had been discovered off the coast of Jamaica, but none of the crew had been found.  When my family received the letter about the wreckage, they acted very strange and withdrawn.  The next thing I knew, I was accused of witchcraft and being dragged to jail while my father hugged my mother and she cried at a pitch louder than a foghorn.  Not only was this a dreadful scene and quite embarrassing, but it was also completely unfair as I have always been a faithful Catholic and only pray to God.  It seemed, however, that my adamant rebukes that I was a pious servant of the Lord our God only made me look more guilty, and without remorse for my fiendish ways.  The jail is dreadful, and no place for a woman of my breeding.  There are rats, and many of the people in here have the death* (plague) – I fear it may kill me before the court decides I am guilty and does the same.  I have been in here nearly a week, apparently there had been a recent witch hunt and the jail is filled with people like me.  Most of them are probably innocent.  If they were actually witches, they’d probably be able to get out of confinement!  Often to pass the time, I meditate on the poetry that Edward and I used to enjoy.  George Herbert’s “The Altar” was a poem I would concentrate on for hours, as it seemed to ease my jittering nerves to repeat it: “A broken altar, Lord, thy servant rears,/Made of a heart, and cemented with tears” (Herbert, 2006, p. 660).  My trial is set for next week, and I only hope that my last thought be a happy one, filled with the conviction of my pure and unyielding faith.