Chapter Four: Slightly AwedWhat did I look like? I wondered, in that strange, detached way that you do when you've stopped crying, and there's no feeling left in you at all. My head tilted to look down at the puddle and up at the car windows, in the same way that my eyes would have glanced at them. I couldn't see my face from this angle. But I found that I didn't care.
I was soaking wet from the puddle I sat in, the one that had grown around me even though the rain pattered off of my field. And I was shivering from the cold, from the icy water itself and from the chill air. That, I did care about. But not enough to get me to move. I was just plain exhausted, physically and emotionally. I curled up as best as I could, my wings tight against me and my knees pressed up to my chin.
They felt so fragile, I thought, and sniffled. Everything felt so lightweight. My bones were all hollow and brittle, and I had hardly any meat on them. No wonder I was so cold, I thought, and shivered. And kept shivering.
My nostrils were running all over. I sniffled some more, and wiped at my sleeve, and tried to breathe through my beak. But I choked on something, and began coughing.
That's how pathetic I was when Amanda's SUV pulled into the alleyway.
Headlights shone on me from behind. I heard the rumble of a gas engine, and tires splashing through puddles. I tried to stand, but my legs wouldn't co-operate. I was just so worn out, and my right foot's restraints made it feel numb, like it was made of ice and the ground was slippery.
I finally managed to pull myself up by the car's side-view mirror. The whole alley was lit up by now, and the engine rumble drowned out the rain. I turned around and looked up at the SUV's silhouette, squinting at the headlights and trying to block them out with one hand.
It stopped about five feet in front of me, and I heard one of the windows roll down. “Is that you, Ian?” Amanda asked.
I tried to nod, but my neck did not want to move that way. So I just sort of bobbed my head, slowly and dejectedly.
She flipped a switch on the side of her door, and I heard all the doors unlock. “Climb in!” she called out, over the rain.
I limped to the front of the SUV, and leaned on the bumper as I went around to the passenger's side door. The handle was about at head level for me, and was plastic and slick with rain. I pulled it and opened the door, enough to get my arms inside and push the door outwards, so that I could get my wings through it. It took me a couple of tries, long enough to find out that catching your wings on something
hurts.
“Are you okay?” Amanda asked, as I stood there breathing hard and wincing.
“No,” I said, and did not look up.
I sniffled again, tried to wipe some of the water out of my face and topfeathers, then climbed into the passenger's seat and pulled the door shut. Then I belted myself in carefully, cramming the tips of my tailfeathers into the crack in between cushions and trying not to lean back too hard on my wings. Holding onto the armrest grip helped.
The seats were vinyl, and the dashboard and heads-up display were lit up with green outlines. Once I sat down and tried to remain still I found that I was shivering uncontrollably, even though the inside of the SUV was uncomfortably warm. I unzipped the front of my jacket, as hot air blew on my feet from the heater. My feet and hands felt numb as ice, while my core was burning hot.
Still shivering, I shifted around a bit to look up at Amanda, whom I realized had been watching me the whole time. It would have made me cringe a half-hour ago, but at this point I didn't know
how I felt. She was about a foot taller than me, and I found myself wondering if I shouldn't have gotten in behind the driver's seat.
Amanda seemed unwilling to meet my gaze, and looked away from me awkwardly. “Don't worry, Ian,” she said, gripping the steering wheel. “We'll get you the help that you need.”
“Sure,” I said, wrapping my arms around myself to try to warm my hands and stifle the shivering, and looked out the windshield. All I could see were the windshield wipers, splashing water across it. “Just add the bill to my college loan ... ”
She shifted the SUV into reverse, and looked over her shoulder to make sure that she didn't run into the wall as she backed out of the alley. And I just sat there shivering violently, unable to think about anything else.
Amanda pulled the SUV out onto the street, and shifted it into drive again. I reached for the armrest and held on as she turned.
After a few minutes, my shivering had started to settle down, and I had to dig for a handkerchief again. Amanda noticed what I was doing, and dug in her purse for some tissues, which I promptly used.
Waves of light washed over the inside, from streetlights and windows and signs. It didn't seem real, I thought, looking up from the tissues to look out the side window. It all seemed so far away. I wondered if I'd ever rode in a car that somebody else had driven, when I was little.
I sniffled a bit, looked for a place to put all the used tissues, then finally crammed them inside my pockets. They were still wet. But the heater was starting to dry my clothes now, along with my moist feathers. It felt glorious, and so did the soft upholstery. The engine seemed a quiet purr now, instead of a roar.
I wondered if I'd ever fallen asleep inside a car before.
My tense muscles relaxed. I leaned up against the armrest, and dozed.
* * *
I woke up when the inside light turned on. The rain had stopped, the engine had been turned off, and a chime was ringing to signal the fact that the driver's side door was open. The heater was no longer running, and a blast of cold air from the open door chilled my bare feet. I shivered, and looked up just as the door closed and the lights turned back off.
I sat there groggy for a second, my brain half-asleep and not sure what was happening. Then the door I was leaning on opened an inch, and I jumped in my seat, wide awake and looking out at the door. It opened the rest of the way, and as the light turned back on I saw Amanda standing outside, her black rain jacket over a pink sweatshirt and blue jeans.
“Come on, Ian,” she said, and I froze as she reached around me to unbuckle the seatbelt. “Let's get you inside.”
She held out her hand. I took it in one hand and the armrest in another, and stepped out of the SUV shakily, leading with my left foot so that I wouldn't slip.
It touched wet grass. There was no grass in my apartment complex's parking lot.
I looked up, and saw a wide lawn with a wooden fence about twenty feet in front of me. To one side was a winding street in a quiet suburban neighborhood, and to the other was a closed, white garage door, with a light on right above it. A dog was barking, somewhere in the distance, and a crescent moon peeked out through the clouds. “Where are we?” I asked.
“I decided to bring you to my house,” she said. “It looked like you could use some help getting back on your feet ... “ My legs wobbled, as she reached around me to shut the door. “So to speak. And if you can't stay at the hospital, I figure a doctor's house is the next best thing.”
I leaned on her arm all the way to the front door, the slippery field around my right foot parting the grass in front of it. She helped me up to the door, one brick step at a time. My left foot gripped the kitten design on the welcome mat as she reached in her purse for her keys. “Jeff should be home soon,” she said, pulling her keys out and trying to select the right one one-handed. “He can take a look at you when he gets back.”
“Thanks,” I murmured, and looked away as a sudden pang of guilt struck me. “Sorry.”
She started to put the right key in the lock, but looked down at me for a second. “Hm?”
“Thank you for helping me.” I lowered my head. “I'm sorry for that remark about the hospital bills.”
“It's alright, Ian.” She sighed, and unlocked the door. “I know what it's like.”
She pulled the door open and stepped in. The inside was hardwood, and rich wallpaper. My foot splayed out across the floor, and it felt uncomfortable to walk on. I held onto the doorknob, as Amanda hung her coat on a peg. Then I took hold of her arm again, as she shut the door.
She led me down the hallway, my gaze lingering on a grandfather clock and a glass display case of old books and miniatures. Then she took me towards the kitchen. We stopped in another room with a hardwood floor, and a faux-crystal chandelier over a table with six wooden chairs, and I realized that this was their dining room ... of course they'd need a separate room for eating in, I thought, they had a whole family here.
The living room was adjacent, and I saw books and a couple of magazines sprawled out across real leather sofas. Amanda pulled a chair out from under the table, and helped me up onto it. I looked up at her, confused, as she disappeared into the kitchen. “Wait right there,” she said.
“O-kay ... “ I heard her rummaging through a drawer.
A flash of movement caught my eye, and I tilted my head to look at it. There was a little girl in a pink nightdress, looking down at me from in between the bars on the stairway in the hall.
My wings spread a bit, and fluffed themselves out. I did that instead of smiling, without thinking about it. “Hello,” I said.
She said nothing, but a grin slowly spread over her face.
It was starting to make me feel uncomfortable. Then I heard a clatter from inside the kitchen and looked to see what had happened, and by the time I looked back the little girl was gone.
“Drat,” Amanda said, and came out holding a large pair of scissors.
“What happened?” I asked, and tried to keep my eyes on her as she came up behind me.
“I dropped something. Now hold still.” I felt a tug at my jacket, and heard the scissors cut through it. Then I felt their cold metal point on the skin in between my back feathers and held still, as they crawled all the way up my back.
My feathers stood on end. It felt like goosebumps, and was probably closer to what actual geese went through than the real thing. “What are you doing?” I asked, even though I was pretty sure I already knew.
“Your wings are stuck. Look,” she said, and tugged on the fabric beneath my left wing. “I'll find you some clothes you can wear. But first you need to clean up and dry yourself off, and for that you need to get these off.”
I felt the scissors trace across the edge of my wing, and a nervous suspicion entered my mind. “You're not going to ... “
“No, Ian, I'm just cutting them loose. You can take them off when you get to the upstairs bathroom.”
I let out a sigh of relief.
I tried to look back and see what she was doing, with these eyes that were on either side of my head, and caught a glimpse of her trying to keep my wingfeathers out of her mouth, as she knelt down behind me and worked the scissors across my back. I wasn't sure yet, but I thought she was almost done.
A tromple of footsteps sounded upstairs, and then I saw the little girl back in the stairwell, next to a boy in pajamas whom I could only assume was her brother. She pointed at me, and he just stared.
I saw him mouth the words
“No way.” She looked at him smugly, and said something I couldn't hear.
“Alright, that should do it.” The scissors cut something around the back of my neck, and I felt my clothing go loose at the same time as a draft blew across the small of my back. I instinctively pressed my wings in close, and reached around to try to hold my clothes together.
Amanda stood up and went to put the scissors away, and her children scurried up the stairs. She did not seem to notice. “Do you want to just wash up,” she asked, “or take a shower?”
The thought of the lukewarm, rust-stained water back home sent a chill running down my spine. Then I realized where I was, and imagined a big, glass-enclosed shower like at my boss' house, with metal bars and fluffy towels and everything clean and well-lit. “I'd like to shower, if you don't mind.”
The drawer rattled and clanged, as she crammed things back in and shut it. “Alright,” she said, and turned the kitchen light off as she came back out to the dining room. “That'll give me more time to adjust your clothes.” She held out her hand. “Come on, and I'll show you where to go.”
* * *
The upstairs bathroom had a tiled floor, a plush, pink shower mat, and an enormous sink and vanity with pastel soaps that were shaped like swans. After closing and locking the door I looked in the closet for towels, and figured out where to put the ones I was going to use. Then I looked up at the sink, which was about at head level but had a step-stool for children, and it occurred to me that there was something I hadn't done yet.
When I was ready I climbed up, as well as I could with my foot in a “cast,” then looked up at the mirror. What I saw startled me.
I remembered what I'd thought that I looked like, but I was not a raven. Or a crow, or a vulture, or any kind of bird that you'd think would be preying on people like me. I was some kind of songbird, of a species that I did not recognize. My whole front side, from the neck down, was white, while the top of my head and the backs of my wings were a deep, iridescent blue, of a hue so rich that it reminded me of a gem. A thick line of black ran in between the blue top and white bottom layers, from the orbs of my eyes to my beak and around the edges of my wings.
But that wasn't the startling part. What startled me was how ... lifelike, I was. There's no other way to describe it. It was not like looking at a human being, whether a fully-clothed one or no. It was more like looking at a zoo animal, of a kind that you'd only read about in books. And while you were fascinated with them, you'd never gotten to see one up close.
Because you'd only read about them, it'd never occurred to you that they move; that their claw-fingers twitch, that their wings rustle as they shift positions, that their heads tilt quickly and at odd angles when they are examining things. That their chests rise and fall rapidly with quick, nervous breaths. That their round, black eyes grow even wider when they are taken aback.
I'd seen an anthropomorph once, from across a busy street. It'd been a fox, and all that I'd caught was a glimpse of its muzzle moving with speech, and its tail swishing with mirth. But it had been real, and alive, and not twenty-five feet away from me. I'd mentioned it to my friends with deliberate casualness, when the subject had come up. Amanda had seemed impressed, and Jerome had been upset that I hadn't taken a picture.
I'd made myself remember every detail of that scene. But I had never seen an anthropomorph up close. I'd wanted to at the book signing next month, but up to that moment I'd never talked to one, or shaken its hand, or managed to brush its tail as if by accident. I'd never
been one. And while I could accept the abstract idea that I
was one now, and was starting to get used to the feel of my wings and feathers, none of that had prepared me for the shock of seeing one up close. Especially the one that I was. “This = Me” was not registering in my brain. Even though it moved, and shivered, when I did.
I don't know how long I spent in front of that mirror, stretching my wings and pulling them back, examining them from all angles. Looking up close at my beak, until I had tapped it against the glass. Trying to see into my own eyes, and wondering what I would find. But I finally got down from the sink and took a shower, and it was as luxurious as I had imagined it. I just hoped that the soaps that they had wouldn't damage my feathers, although it was a little too late by the time that I realized that.
I carefully dried all my feathers off. I was unsure at first how to reach the backs of my wings without an electric hair dryer, but I finally just wrapped a huge towel all the way around me and pressed it to them.
I was small and thin enough, even counting my wings, that it wrapped all the way around me and went almost down to my feet. Thusly garbed, I held the towel closed in front and opened the door, heading back downstairs to see if Amanda had any clothes ready for me yet.
