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This writing was accepted for publication in the 108 page perfect-bound ISSN#/ISBN# issue/book “The False Portrait” cc&d, v281 (the March 2018 issue) Order this as a 6"x9" paperback book:  |
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Bird Island, Chapter 15: The Mainland
Patrick Fealey
Bird should be in Bird’s tree. Wawp is walking with Bird in Wawp’s coat. The lights are above them, but it is a death sky. Wawp is breathing clouds.
Wawp is following a human and a human. The human is tall and has a white head. Its mate is short and its head is big and round. Wawp and Bird and the humans move for a building with lit windows at the edge of the cars. Beyond the building is the night, the stars bright and hard in the cold, the moon high out of the east. Bird smells wood fires. A metal sheet claps in the wind against a wire fence. Bird wants to go home.
The human opens the door and Wawp and Bird and the humans go into the building. The light hurts Bird’s eyes. The floors are wide wood planks. A water bottle stands against the wall. The seats are empty. A human appears inside a small window and says, “The eleven is running late. It just pulled out of New Haven.”
“Fifteen minutes late?” the white head says.
“Fifteen minutes,” the human says.
Wawp marks his paper.
The two humans go back outside.
Wawp follows.
Behind the building, looking into the night, Bird sees four metal bands shining on the ground, silver in the moonlight.
The white-head and the mate go to a car and get in. It is a big car. It has more shine than Wawp’s car. There are two humans inside already. Wawp climbs inside. It is warm. The other two humans speak and smell like females.
“I can wait an extra 15 minutes,” the white head says. “I’ve been waiting 50 years.”
“Dad, you are going to meet your nieces!”
“I wish my brother was on that train. It’s 33 degrees right now. It’s supposed to get down to 22. It’s supposed to get down below freezing.”
Wawp says something.
“I spent the day with a news crew, down on the beach. The last time I saw my brother was in the orphanage in West Virginia in 1943. Friday, we found out he died six years ago, after a year of searching. We located his family, two girls, two boys. Stephanie and Nicole are on the train that just pulled out of New Haven.”
Wawp’s hand jerks.
The car door opens. The females make room for another human. It announces it is “Charlene, a reporter.” The white head opens its door and gets out. Wawp gets out.
Inside the building, the white head human has dark skin. It is tall and has its neck wrapped in black. New humans shine more lights on it and flash light from shiny glass boxes. The big quiet boxes light the room. It is a trick. Bird should be in Bird’s tree. “Cattle probe!” the white head says. “It’s my southern upbringing.”
The females come inside and stand with the white head and chatter about it.
“Nicole has a cardio-pulmonary problem,” a female says.
“Uncle Rob died of a massive heart attack six years ago,” the other says.
“I had a triple bypass two years ago,” the white head says.
“Nicole is the one who can’t have a baby, because of the pressure.”
“Stephanie says, ‘I can’t sleep,’” the white head says. “She hasn’t slept since Friday. She took sleeping pills. I can’t wait to see my telephone bill.”
“That bypass doesn’t make you immortal, dad.”
“I smoke, but I quit drinking.”
Bird should be in Bird’s tree.
The door opens. With the cold comes the white head’s mate with the big round head, talking, “Everybody’s asking me ‘What do you feel?’ Ask him!”
“I’m gonna go get my coffee,” the white head says.
“Talk to Charlene,” its mate says, pointing to the female with it.
Wawp is keeping Bird tired with light and loud humans. The white head is talking to the one it called Charlene. It is scratching on paper the way Wawp makes Wawp’s marks. Wawp listens. “It turns out we were both in Vietnam in ’68 and ’69, both in the Mekong Delta. Amazing. I was an Army chopper pilot and my brother was a Navy Seal. We used to fly Seals in on covert missions, drop them behind enemy lines in Cambodia and Laos. Top secret stuff, then. I probably flew him on missions and never knew it. We used to put Seals in. I might have put him in.”
Wawp and Charlene are looking at it. It stands. It looks down.
“He liked jazz, Notre Dame football. He was a big scotch drinker. This is what my nieces have told me. We have a lot in common. They told me their father had been a cop. I was a cop. Amazing.”
“What else?” the white head asks its mate. “Oh yeah, and we both had moles on our lips. I had mine removed. When Nicole got on the phone, she started crying. She told me I sounded like her father. I can remember him in the orphanage. ‘Toughie’ they called him because he bit a bully’s finger off. He was only three. His name then was mark, mark Goode, and he was the first of the family to be adopted. I was five. From what we were able to tell from orphanage records, our father was an Irish iron miner and our mother was Armenian.”
“That’s why Bill’s skin is always tan. Until we read that, we thought he was Greek.”
“In the orphanage, mark lost one of his own fingertips to a bedspring. I was able to clear that mystery up for my nieces. Their father could never remember what had happened to his finger.”
“How’d he die?”
“Massive heart attack,” the white head says.
“He’s already had one,” its mate says, looking to it.
“But I wasn’t drinking a gallon of scotch a day.”
The room crowds, boxes flash light at the human and its mate and the two females. Wawp stands, never far from the white head.
The white head moves for the door, opens it and slips outside while its mate is talking: “The girls are staying until they get done talking. With Bill, that could be Easter.” Wawp moves fast for the door and Wawp and Bird are outside in the cold and dark and Bird cannot see. Wawp is walking, carrying Bird in the wind when Bird should be at home in his tree sleeping. Wawp drinks from the bottle and puts it back. Bird can see cars and Bird and Wawp are at the big shiny car. The car is purring. This car shines under the lights. The white head is sitting in the car. It is alone. Bird sees the glow of a cigarette and smells coffee. Warm air comes into Bird’s face through the open window.
“I’m just letting the butterflies settle. I told my wife, it’s like a first date. You have to make a good first impression. I’ve talked to the girls a lot these past four days. It’s like talking to my own kids.”
Wawp’s hand and arm are moving. Then Wawp is still. The human is silent. Wawp is silent. The metal flaps against the wire fence.
“They keep asking me, ‘What do you feel?’ I don’t know.”
One of the females arrives and gets into the car with Wawp and Bird.
“I can’t believe the way this weather’s changed,” the white head says.
“Is channel 12 gonna go live from here?” the female says, bringing a box of lights from its coat. It hits the lights and puts the box to its head. “Are you watching channel 12? Because Dad’s gonna be on channel 12. We are at the train station. He is? You’re on right now, Dad!”
“I am?”
“Dad, you’re walking on the beach!”
The sound, low in the earth and rising, low and coming, something. The long silver tube comes from the north. The sound turns Bird into Wawp. Bird trembles and feels Wawp’s hand press Bird against him. Bird is safe.
“This is them!’ the female says.
“That’s not them,” the human says. “That’s coming from Boston. A fine co-pilot you would have made me.”
“It’s okay Bird. It’s just a train.” It is quiet. It is quiet. Bird looks out and the female is getting out of the car with its box of lights.
“I see you’ve got a co-pilot of your own tonight,” the white head says. “I honestly hadn’t noticed until just then.”
“Well, it’s night, it’s a pea-coat, he’s black. He’s been my co-pilot all day and he hasn’t done anything yet. He followed me to work. Then we came here. Then it got dark on him. They don’t like the dark.”
“Flying at night is a different game. For most of us.”
“Chopper pilots in Vietnam didn’t have a great life expectancy.”
“I was the youngest captain to make major at the time,” the white head says. “I got out after ten and a half years. It was a totally ridiculous, stupid waste of men. Everybody made money off it but the men . . . I want to meet my nephews, Brandon and Joel. They’re in school and were unable to come. I want my sister Barbara to come out from Kentucky. I want to find my other brother, John, if he is still alive.”
