Broken Wings 02 Midnight Flight (34 page)

Just kidding. I'm jealous as always.
Sometimes, often I should say, if I hear a thumping sound, maybe just the bass on a speaker in

some guy's car, I think,. about Natani. I laugh to myself remembering the looks on your faces
when he told us his animal stories or spoke in his mystical way. The truth is I miss him and wish that someday I can go back to see him.

The only thing is, just like you two, I imagine, thoughts about returning to that place make me shudder as well.

I wonder about Mindy There doesn't seem to be any way to find out about her. For all we know
_;
she might still be locked up in some clinic. Maybe she's too far gone to be cured, ever. I hope not. You ever think about her?

And of course, I think a great deal about Gia, how she kept so much of herself hidden from us, disguised in imaginary people and events. When I think about it, my parents essentially gave me away, too
_;
and I rate my uncle and aunt about the same in the horror factor as Dr. Foreman. You'd have to meet my aunt to see what I mean. The big difference was that my daddy really hoped to have me back.

Well, I guess I'll have to tell you. I've met someone nice. I'm talking about a boy. His name's Ralston Marks. He's on the football team. Actually, he's the quarterback. Teal, don't start bragging about your boyfriends.

Ralston is unlike any boy I have ever been with. He's polite, religious, but not overly so, and he's a very good student. He looks to be a shoo-in for scholarships to important colleges. I don't know why he warns to be with me all the time, but be still my pitter-patter heart, he does. He says I'm one of the most mature girls for our age he's known.

I guess how I am now is a result of what we all went through. Everything other girls are doing seems to be so silly to me lately. I hate just hanging around malls anymore, and when I hear them gossiping in school, I really do think of Natani's chickens clucking. That's how Ralston first saw me, sitting there with this goofy smile on my face. He asked me what was so funny, and I told him and he laughed and we haven't stopped talking and being with each other since.

I should tell you that my foster parents are truly very nice people. My foster mother's name is Coco. She's French Canadian. Her parents emigrated there (How do you like the big word?) from a place called Cap Ferrat in southern France where they
were in the service industry, a nice
^-
way to say butlers and maids. She met Andre in Quebec and they were married in Canada, then came to America and settled in Atlanta because of a business connection Andre had.

They now own a big department store
_;
and Coco is the clothes buyer.
So here's the best news of all, yours truly models clothes at the store on Sundays, the new fashions from Europe. It was Coco's idea, I almost refused to do it because I remembered Dr. Foreman telling me I could be a model and she would arrange for that if I was just a good little Foreman girl. Why should we stop ourselves from doing things we like just because Dr. Foreman mentioned them, however?
I might actually continue doing this on a professional basis. A woman who runs a modeling agency stopped in last week. She said she had heard about me and she wants me to come see her. Coco approves. I really love her. She's so up and happy all the time and her and Andre's three children all like me, too.
All this happiness
_.
frightens me. I keep thinking someone from my past is going to appear on the doorstep and have reasons why I can't continue. Do you have any of those sorts of fears? When will they stop?
Last week, at Andre and Coco's insistence, I
^-
went to the cemetery and visited my daddy's and mama's graves. It didn't seem real to me. I had to keep rereading their names to convince myself that this was where they really were now.
Is there really any way to make peace with your past? I was tempted to crawl into one of Natani's shells, to avoid the tombstones, but I didn't. I couldn't.
And he was right, I couldn't stand there and say good-bye.
I knew I would be back many times and I would tell them good things.
And maybe someday even bring my own children along.
When I think of all this, I realize what it is we've achieved. Again, ironically, what we have achieved is something Dr. Foreman said we didn't have, a future.
We have a future, don't we?
We can hope, and most of all, we can dream.
Write me if you can, if you want, if it doesn't bring back too many painful memories.
I don't ever, ever want to be the cause of someone's painful memories again.
Love,
Phoebe bird
.
Dear Phoebe,
You won't believe this, but I have been after my big-shot brother to use his connections to find out where you are. He promised he would and bragged how easily he could do that. He knew this one in government and that one, and until your letter arrived yesterday, he has been able to find out zilch. That's a new word for your expanding vocabulary.
I am writing you this letter from my dorm. No, I'm not living at home. My parents, after many intense discussions, decided to put me into this Hew prep school. I hate to say it, but its a very good school, and like you, I am doing well in my academic work, and again like you, I haven't been in any serious trouble. Maybe a little trouble. I was almost caught our after curfew, but, and I know you won't believe it, I wasn't doing anything terribly exciting. I wasn't out meeting a boy or carrying on with some other girls or smoking. I was just walking and lost track of the time.
I do a lot of walking alone and thinking. Everyone thinks I'm weird, but I don't care.
My mother has visited me a number of times, more than I expected she would actually. She usually spends the entire visitation talking about her new charity events and planned vacations. She'll interrupt herself to tell me about some fashions she thinks are nice and elegant for me, and then she goes on to talk about some rich people I never knew and couldn't care less about knowing. But I have a new tolerance, for her and I smile and look like I'm listening, and you know what, she's starting to talk more to me and look at me. It as if by not showing her how much I hate what she is, she will start to change. The last time ire spoke, in fact, she talked about just her and me going someplace together and getting to know each other better. She wants to take me to places she enjoyed when she was my age. Once, I would make fun of the idea, but now I've decided I would do it.
I guess what I'm saying is nothing can change quickly, and most might not ever change, but its learning how to live with that realization that makes happiness possible. Otherwise, I return to what I was, always angry, always frustrated, always selfdestructive.
Surprised at my self-analysis?
I have this psych course and I'm learning more about myself than I wanted to learn. I've even come to understand things about Dr. Foreman, although I battle back the memories.
It like trying to keep air bubbles from rising in a glass or something
I'm jealous of you, Phoebe. I haven't met anyone like your Ralston yet. We have these mixers with an all-boys prep school, but it all too artificial for me. I love spontaneity and I daydream about meeting Mr. Right on some street corner or in a store or in the park anywhere except a prearranged mixer approved by both schools.
Am I hopeless?
Maybe not. You know how sometimes you can feel something is really going to happen if you're just patient and you keep yourself up and happy? That's how I feel about Mr. Right. He's out there. We're going to meet.
Not that boys are all I think about anymore. I'm not going into modeling, but I have been told by my English teacher that I have more, that's the way he puts it, a flare-- for writing. He says I capture people and events so well, I should think about working, in film So, I'm enrolling in a film study course next semester. It involves writing scripts. When I'm big and
_.
famous and important,I'll cast you in a
movie.
I wish my life now was all and only what I described. I still have bad nights, Phoebe. I see snakes. I see the buddies in the fire. I hear the screams. I'm getting better, but it's all not buried deeply enough. It will be someday. Won't it?
I miss the both of you. All my new friends are afraid of me or are obvious about how much they'd like me to like them. I need you too. I need to be reminded I'm not a big shot.
So, here's what I've decided. I'm getting my mother to ask my father to sponsor a trip for both you and Robin for my birthday. You'll both come to
my
big, rich house and we'll sleep on the floor and go to the bathroom outside, and plant a garden and take ice-cold showers.
Just kidding We'll have a big, fat time Will you come? Please. Bring Ralston if have to. I just think we need to look at each other's ugly face again just so we know we are really here, we really matter.I'll work out the details.
Love, Teal
.
Dear Losers,
I photocopied this letter so I
^-
would only have to write y'al1 once. I did it at my mother's agent's office. I don't call her Mother darling anymore. She went ahead and wrote a song called 'Mother Darling.
^-
She really did and it was a big hit in the county music world.
The good thing is she left the creep she was with shortly after I had been sent to Dr. Foreman's School, Then, she got a lucky break when a really big agent heard her singing and he helped her develop her style, got her a great backup group of musicians, and began to find her some important bookings. She has two recordings on the charts as we speak
Now here's the news. One day I was practicing with her just for the fun of it and her agent heard us singing together and decided we should do a song. We worked on it together. We really had never done anything like that together before, but she liked my suggestions.
I know y'all are going; to think it's corny but here it is. It's called "Mama, Let Me Be Me":
.
Well. I've been growing up and I've been doing all you say.
I've learned all my schooling and I've worked hard every day,
You laid out directions and made me follow in your way.
But. Mama, oh. dear Mama, let me be myself today.
Let me be myself
Let me look a different way,
Let me find a voice that's me.
Let me try to be the woman I was always meant to be.
Say good-bye to your baby,
Say hello to someone new,
And maybe then. dear Mama.
You'll see I'm really you.

We do the chorus again and were adding, more verses. The agent likes it You've got to hear it with music, but I think you get the idea. Phoebe, you wipe off that smirk. I remember how you made fun of country music, but I also know in your heart of hearts, you liked it.

I'm hoping to bring a copy of the taping when I see you two at Teal's party.
Now as to boyfriends. I do have someone I'm sweet on. He's a guitar player, the younger brother of a more famous country guitar player, and his name is not Willie or Boone, Phoebe, His name happens to be Thomas, and not Tom either. He likes Thomas, Thomas Caton. His great-granddaddy fought in the Civil War and not for the Yankees.
Mama said if I marry him,I'llbe living On the road or in trailers or whatever, but then I asked her where she's living and she laughed
I thought you didn't want to be me, she said.
I guess she doesn't know I do in many ways. Maybe she's learning that and that's why we're closer than ever.
Yesterday, I was thinking, when we crossed that desert together and survived,
we
crossed a lot more than just sand and rocks.
We crossed from one world to another. Maybe someday
I'll
be able to write
a
song about it and sing it, with Mama or not. Then I'll know it's finally all put away. There are lots of ways to
bury
pain, but in
my
business,
you
make it work for
you.
Don't I sound sophisticated for a country'
girl?
Stop laughing, Teal. Teal, Phoebe, many,
many
times I've muttered your names like a prayer.
Can't wait to see y'all.
Love, Robin
On a summer day Robin and
I
were flown into the Albany. New York, airport and Teal met us at the Gate. We were all too excited to wait for the others to stop talking,
"Wait," Robin cried. "Y'all just got to learn how to take turns. Where's those manners
I
heard y'all bragging about?"
We laughed and hugged and hurried out to get in the stretch limousine. Teal made it clear we were going to be spoiled and we were to be impressed no matter what or her mother would leave the country.
We couldn't act enough of each other and I thought we would talk ourselves hoarse.
Finally, we were all quiet. Our smiles rested on our faces like tired birds lighting on a branch, and we stared ahead and the limousine continued to sail over the highway.
It really didn't matter where we were going.
We were there already. We were there the moment we all met. Together again.
Later. Rabin sang her song and we locked it forever in our hearts along with all the promises we knew now we would fulfill to each other as well as to ourselves,