Fighting

"Okay, I'll let you out," Grandfather said one morning.

He held the door open for us. We stood blinking in the doorway, the sun bright in our eyes, the clouds on the street rolling up to meet us. Cale tried to scoop some up, laughing, but I just stared straight ahead. Maybe I thought that somewhere out there was something familiar, but there wasn't and this hurt me. It was like I was holding on to a rope over the edge of the world and the last string in the rope had just snapped. I fell down and down and down and heard myself calling.

I pulled my gaze away from the row of houses running up and down the street to see Cale totter outside. I looked up at Grandfather.

"Go on, Blue. But be careful and don't go too far. I'll be watching from here, you know. Why don't you hold Cale's hand, so you don't get hurt? We wouldn't want that now. Go on." He patted me on the back.

I shrugged a little and felt funny with the strange wind blowing at me. I went out and took hold of Cale's hand. We wandered up and down the street, with me always glancing back at Grandfather. He was in the doorway every time. But what if he disappeared? What would we do then?

We passed a house that looked like a person's face. The eyes were blinking shutters; the mouth was a big red door; the skin was blotchy pink-red stone.

A little boy walked out of its open mouth, closing it once he reached the outside. When he saw us standing there, he stared and said, "Hey."

Cale waved. "Hi nice to meet - you!"

My grip tightened on my brother's tiny hand. I wanted to look back just to check if Grandfather was still there, to make sure that there was a way out, but I didn't want to show my fear to the boy. I said woodenly, "Hey."

The boy swaggered. "What, you new here or something?"

"I live across the street."

"Then how come I never seen you before?"

"I help my grandfather in the shop."

"'Grandfather?' You mean your gramps? You sound like a snig. Who do you think you are?"

I didn't know what a snig was. I didn't even know what a gramps was. The boy sneered threateningly — I don't know why, I didn't do anything. Something told me I shouldn't make him mad, so I kept quiet.

"Bunnycat gotcha tongue? Huh?"

"I... Uh..."

The boy laughed. "Well, whatever. What's your names, anyway?"

"I'm Kalas," I said quickly.

Cale gurgled beside me. "Pfff... ppp. Pf. Pee. Pee. Fee. Feee!"

The boy frowned. "What?"

"Fee," I translated for him. "Kalas and Fee."

"Freaky names," the boy said. "So you know, I'm Otto. I have a little brother called Dino." He gave Fee a weird look. "Dino is six."

"Fee is three."

"Well, I'm the biggest kid in this neighborhood. Watch it, huh?"

I gulped. The kid grimaced at me again and set off down the street. Fee waved bye-bye while I trembled. I felt scared, weak. With a quick glance backwards, I realized that Grandfather wasn't in the doorway anymore. "Look, Fee," I said.

Cale looked. "Hide and Seek?" he asked.

I shook my head. The image of Otto sneering stayed in my mind. "Let's go find him." We crossed the street — it was wide like a river, I felt like an ant swimming across it — and got to our house. We got inside, and there was Grandfather sitting at the table working on some project. I felt an explosion of relief. And one of shame. Why was I so scared?

Then Grandfather seemed to notice us. "Oh, back already? How was it? Did you like Balancoire?"

Cale answered for me. "Biiiiig."

"I suppose it must have seemed that way, after being cooped up in this little house for so long. Did you find anything interesting?"

"Otto. He is my new friend." Cale nodded to himself. "New friend."

"How about you, Blue?"

"Kalas," I corrected timidly. "We met a boy called Otto. He has a little brother."

Grandfather gave me a sharp look, but went on, "Oh?"

"Yeah. He's younger than me." I stopped. "Hey, Grandfather, what's a snig?"

He frowned. "Why, a snig is a small eel."

"Do eels live in the river?"

"I've heard that they live in a place called the Celestial River... but I can't say that I've ever seen one myself."

"Oh." I fell silent. I guess Grandfather didn't know that he was looking at a snig.

That little boy, Otto, bothered me for a really long time.

It felt like forever.

Whenever I met him, I wished that the ground would come apart and a spinning hole would open up, so that I could jump through. Then I'd end up some place else and be a different me. I didn't like the me-of-right-now, and on top of that I had an endless ache in my head. Like there was an angry creature trying to escape from it, but it couldn't so it always took up clubs and beat me around the brain. I fell asleep each night with bruises on my mind.

Many nights like that passed. Soon the shadows that once seemed so foreign and scary before were fixed into in my mind. I woke up in the morning and when I stared into the mirror, I was more used to the sad face. I got used to my clothes and my shoes and Fee — I started calling him Fee because that's what he called himself, just like I hung onto Kalas — and even Grandfather. I even started understanding myself.

It wasn't very much fun though. Understanding me. For one thing, I was always scared. If a strange bird flew past my window in the night, my eyes stayed glued to my bedroom walls for hours. I watched for other shadows. I was terrified; I couldn't sleep, so I told Grandfather one day that birds were ugly things. He made me a mechanical bird then. I played with it in the doorway until I grew used to its shiny black wings.

And because of that, soon I trusted Grandfather. He was often distant, caught up in the nuts and bolts of some machine, but he always looked after me and Fee. He was never too busy for us. Whenever I got anxious, he cheered me up. Usually with some toy, like the mechanical black bird, but even that was comforting.

My fear always chewed at me, though, no matter how many toys I got. It kept gnawing and gnawing and I always felt like I was on the edge of a cliff by my fingertips and my fingers would come off at any second and down I would fall. Sometimes I wondered what was at the bottom of the cliff. Would I stand up, shake myself, and find another world?

For the time being, I had to deal with Balancoire. When looking outside one day, I ran into Otto and Dino and Primo and Ventura. And there were girls, too. They all ran together, like a pack of dogs, issuing orders to the other kids of the town. Fee and I stayed inside so they just jeered at us. But that day, all of them were standing around me and Grandfather was on the other side of town hammering. I eyed them warily.

Otto yelled in my face. "Just who are you, anyway? Who, huh? Sissy-boy!"

I squeezed my eyes shut and felt my face heat up. I clenched my fists at my side.

"C'mon, c'mon! Let's see what you're made of! I wanna see Kalas crawl! Slither slither! C'mon now!"

How can I get out of this, I thought then.

I just want to go home.

Let me go home, please.

Otto pushed me. "Hey, Kalas. You don't got respect. Fight me, show you're serious. Otherwise I want pancakes every morning on my doorstep, huh!"

Lemme go, I thought.

"Let him go," Dino whined from the sidelines. "He didn't do anything."

Yeah! I never did anything, I swear.

"But he's gotta earn him some respect. He can't just have it." Otto pushed my shoulder. "Huh!"

I began to understand that he wouldn't leave me alone until he got a fight from me. His little brother Dino wanted no violence, but he of course was too weak to stand up to his brother, and all the other kids worshipped Otto's tough attitude. I was trapped.

Almost in resignation, I lifted my fists. I really didn't want to fight. It wasn't my idea of a good time. My idea of a good time was sitting by a warm fire flipping through Grandfather's sketches. Yeah.

Otto threw a punch at me.

It was a joke. He wasn't serious yet. The punch caught my jaw but didn't hurt. I stumbled back, sort of shaken. I didn't want to get hurt, I wanted to go home.

— And another punch landed on my cheekbone. It hurt more this time — I lashed out in defense. Otto dodged easily. "Is that all you got?"

The kids were cheering but I wasn't about to cry. I swallowed my pain and swung again. The blow was weak but Otto stumbled. I sucked it up and charged to ram him down but he caught my shoulders and, swinging me to steady himself, he threw me to the ground. I fell back on the bone of my forearms. When I was down, Otto kicked me, right there in the ribs.

Stop, I grunted.

"Had enough?"

My eyes burned. I curled up and jammed my hands to my face. Please...

"What, you gonna cry? You scared, Kalas?"

No... no... I was tired of being scared... I was tired of not knowing. I didn't want to be scared. I gently put my palms on the ground to push myself up. Otto kicked them out from under me and I fell back down. Grimacing, I took a breath and tried again.

This time he was merciful and let me climb all the way up. I swayed in front of him. My body hurt. The others hooted around us. Damn you, I thought.

"Say we step it up a notch?" Otto asked, bouncing confidently on his feet. Suddenly, he stopped and jerked as two white wings grew out of his back. He flapped twice, laughed, and waited for me.

I hesitated, and not because I was scared. I knew I had wings of the heart, but I couldn't remember ever using them. Everyone had them, I thought.

There was no other choice... I knitted my brow and focused on the tender part of my shoulder blades. They began to itch and I willed my wings to come out. I twisted — it was very uncomfortable — and what felt like a bone began to poke inside my back. Suddenly light spurted from me and my wings sprouted. I flapped and nearly fell over. Only my right wing seemed to be working...

Then I heard the screams. Primo, Ventura, and the girls shrieked and pointed at me. A sense of fear grew in me. What? What is it?

"Only one wing!" they cried. "One wing!"

I whirled around to see, and immediately realized that I looked like a fluffpup chasing his own tail. I stopped and looked over my left shoulder. The fear exploded. Only one wing. One wing. How could this be?

Otto looked unfazed. "Who cares?" he said. "Fight me."

How could I fight with them staring at me? At my disgrace? They roared — I found it hard to concentrate.

Where is my other wing? I thought frantically. Does it have to do with my lost memories? Does this mean something?

I froze in dumbfounded wonder. Otto sneered at me from across the street, but then he was in front of me taking advantage of my confusion, landing a powerful kick in my gut. With a cough I flew back; as I fell my one wing beat instinctively, not helping to soften the blow but spinning me instead with a crazy, one-sided force so that I fell on my face. I could feel my cheek swell.

My heart broke.

Otto was cracking his knuckles when I got up. I was careful not to touch the scratches on my face or the bruise on my side.

I wouldn't show him my fear any longer...

I had fallen the lowest that I possibly could — amnesia, getting bullied, and now disfigurement — and I didn't think I could take it anymore...

The streams of disappointment and self-consciousness, always flowing in my head, raged and I let loose the dammed rivers and took up my fists and decided I wouldn't die because of myself, not today.

I heaved a breath and began to walk and then to run, my breath was like cyclones in my ears, louder than even the screaming voices from the sidelines. I prepared myself, delaying long enough that I could see the white of Otto's eyes. He got ready, I could see that he intended to hit me, I laughed at him.

I came face-to-face with my enemy. I straightened my arms and gripped my hands together; I ran and feinted right and then pivoted left on one foot, driving my one wing with all my might against the air, swinging myself sharply round to Otto's rear. I felt a sense of elation. I used the momentum to drive my locked fists into his spine.

He collapsed suddenly. I stumbled some, tripping over his legs, but when I came to a full stop I looked down.

He turned his eyes up to me. He mumbled something.

I could barely hear his words through the foggy feeling in my head, not to mention the wild cries from the sidelines, so I leaned closer, straining my ears—

"...You won...?"