Black Bird

Singing

       

Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.
-Y.B. Yeats

Miles of woodland is covered in mountain laurel, split by rivers and swept by waterfalls. The nights are clear and the Milky Way spills over the sky.
In the middle of these mountains sits an empty cabin. This cabin is next to a house where a family lives. You are the mother of the family. This story is about you, the cabin, a son who is not your child and a man who is not your husband.

You can barely see the little cabin from the road. It is buried under trumpet vine and juniper with an old apple tree at its side, that bears fruit every other year. The ferns and foxgloves grow in the front yard in the spring and goldenrod in the back during fall.
Since moving into your house five years ago, the cabin has been a backdrop for daydreams. Sometimes an art studio, other times a homeschool or even a little bed and breakfast. It sits and waits quietly in the summer sun, in the autumn rain and in the winter snow.

You look at the cabin now and think back to five years ago. It was easier then, everything was so idyllic. A father, a mother and a little boy finally buying a house. Next maybe a dog with a big red bow. Of course lots of parties, lots of friends, sleepovers and homework at the dinner table. Your son, Tom, was one.

By three it was clear something wasn't right.
He hadn't started speaking yet and had started flapping his hand. You could scream his name and he wouldn't even flinch, and you did.
You screamed for him to come back to be the boy you knew he was. You drove six hours for them to tell you his hearing was fine. Eight hours for them to tell you he was on the level of a nine month old. His bright blue eyes were so beautiful, but had a far away look. He felt just beyond your grasp, but you swore to reach him even if you drowned while diving to the depths for him.

He hit you so many times you flinched when he moved closer, a chipped tooth a scratched cornea and the stress aged you. The woman in the mirror who was she? Sometimes a savior other times a jailer. Maybe something in between?

Autism is a 6 letter word, so neat and clean on the page, wild and messy in the day to day.
The pamphlets they gave you made it clear they had no idea what to do. Bright and happy colors with poems about Italy and Holland. Pretending that this thing had any sort of destination, you felt like you were in free fall. Holland would be great, would they speak Tom's language there? What a joke....

They gave half answers and promised things that you knew, as you laid awake at night, weren't possible. Your life started to be framed by those ridiculously hideous puzzle pieces.

By age four the experts started flooding in. The therapists and child psychiatrists, a bright and hopeful parade that marched in an elaborate circle. Nothing changed. Some days he would draw blood and leave bruises on you. Smearing his own shit all over the house, he poured out all the dreams you had for him. Your heart bled for him, you would have given anything to take this away from him.

By age five you couldn't take him out of the house. He could over power you and run under a car. He had tried, running under cars, many times. Close friends stopped inviting you to things, playmates stopped coming. You caught his little friends making fun of him, they grew and he remained. Your heart crumbled. He is alone and you are alone. The isolation creeps in day by day.

Day by day you see the world as he sees it.
Day by day color is hightened and music seems to come from the leaves in the trees when they sway in the wind. Fairy circles, dandelion crowns and watching light ripple on a puddle. You learn how to climb into the world he inhabits. It is rich and full, a pearl in an oyster hidden in a dark cold sea. It is fairly land.

***

"Your going to be late Henry!" You yell across the house to your husband.

"I know I'm rushing"

You can smell his shaving soap lingering in the air as he darts about the house gathering files. He will be late, small town lawyers much less stress. Especially when you go hunting with the judges.

"Ok" you answer filling up your second cup of coffee. Henry has brought you the first in bed, like he always does.

"Hey take it easy today, try to get him to sit for a story." He says as he kisses you goodbye. "Behave!"
He is tying his black leather dress shoes, grey suite, green tie, and white shirt.

"I will" it's a lie.

He kisses you goodbye. Nice handsome face, deep brown eyes and dark brown hair short now. When you met Henry he had long hair, you cried all night before he cut it.

8am and you brush your hair. It is long, down to your waist. You start to climb the wall into your son's domain.
He is still asleep in his room that is locked. He roams the house otherwise. You remember finding him on a cloudless winter night alone in the woods. He was barefoot and so cold, just staring off into the trees. The stars piercing you as you picked him up, nearly frozen.
Some deodorant, some toothpaste, and you remove your wedding rings. They don't like them. You put on black leggings and a tshirt. It hardly matters as you will change into something more elaborate once you enter.

Roses, ivy, a wren takes wing, morning dove coos and the sun with its dull roar climbs into the sky. You can smell the dust of the house,
Lights flicker the grow bright.... almost there...bang like a gun.

In the mirror....
I see myself younger in an olive green dress embroidered with holly hocks and wild carrot. I braid my hair.
It's painful to be indoors.
I go out into my garden. Tom is still sleeping. Dew is on the grass, it shimmers like jewels. The garden is full of bird song and butterflies. I can hear whispers. It's the faeries.
"Where is Tom?"
I always ask them, leaves rustling, they run. It's as if someone has turned up the saturation of all the colors. The red roses almost flicker, like flames their color is so bright. The sun drops look like miniature stars and the phlox like clouds of purple, pink and white glowing. You can see the tiny harnesses on the birds where the fae ride and a snail pulls an intricate acorn carriage along the marigolds. They are still fairly shy of you, and hate it when you ask about Tom.

They are old legends, the changling, a human child switched with a faerie child. This child often ill tempered and sickly unaware of the ways of men. It sounded so much like what what's happening right now, I know Tom is there, he is out there somewhere. Henry laughed when I told him the story, so I didn't tell him I believed it. How pathetic, I could see his eyes if he knew. The shadow of disappointment clouding his view of me. This boy by my side I loved him, but he belonged to another world. If I could have them both somehow....
A trade sometimes with the fae it is possible to trade back their child for yours. That's how this all started. I built little fairy houses and left them trinkets and raw white eggs. Soon these things started disappearing. I started to climb over the wall. One day I saw a mushroom circle and a robins egg in the center. Thud, I could feel a thud as I landed on the other side of Tom's wall. It was working, well sort of...

The fairies run when I ask about Tom only the
soft hum of bees is left in the air. Zinnias and cosmos sway in the breeze. The cabin sits next door, just beyond my wire fence. It's porch does not sag with this new sight. The cabin calls me, I know there could be a little place for me there. A hiding place to create a new life.

A scream, Tom is awake.