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I go now to settle in a place where there is always happiness.
But how can I be happy when my soul still needs to fly?
We have always had a curious connection to birds in my family.My grandfather was even called the Birdman of Havana because he kept pigeons. He named them after family members long since gone. I spent my childhood believing the birds were actually these people, simply transformed. I remember the musty, sweet scent of them. I remember the bloom of dust on their wings. My favorite was the one named after my mother. When my grandfather died, my brother set the birds free and I hated seeing them fly away. I did not want them to leave me, as nearly everyone I had ever loved had left me. But my brother said we were free like them now, and we left to cross the straits that very night.
I know he loved me, my brother, but he was always in control and his idea of freedom meant he had it all and I had none. He promised me great things in America. He promised everything. As I lay in the boat that night, I remember several birds followed us, silhouetted like ghosts against the velvet night, and I reached my hand up as if I could touch them. I lost sight of them in the storm.
The storm.
It felt like being born again, the rush of water, the struggle to breathe. When it was over, I was left clinging to the overturned boat. The water and the horizon blended into one entity, and I felt suspended. My brother was gone, and I remember calling for him until I had no voice left. At some point I felt, but could not see, a bird land next to me. I knew at once it was my brother, assuring my safe passage as he had promised.
I was glad for his presence, at first. But even in death he tried to control me. He did not like that I did not stay in Miami, as he had wanted. He did not like when I moved to Charleston. He did not like what I did to make money. And he did not like when I met Zoey’s father, Alrick.
But I was not taken advantage of by Alrick, despite the fact thatI was only a teenager and he was much older when we met. I knew exactly what I was doing.
Alrick was more insistent than most, that I see only him, that I do nothing but wait for him. He bought me the beautiful Dellawisp condo and I fell in love with this island. I would walk and walk and walk and just see. I had pretty clothes, and could buy a strawberry pastry whenever I felt like it. I imagined I looked like an American movie star. I said goodbye to my brother on Mallow Island. I set him free and finally became the person birthed by that storm.
Iwas in control.
The moment I knew I was pregnant, I understood that between my love and Alrick’s money, this baby would have everything. I knew he did not want a child, so she would bemine.I waited months before I told Alrick. I said I did not know how far along I was, that I was irregular and often missed my periods. He wanted to be mad at me, but knew he could not. I stroked his chest and told him it would be all right. I purred to him that we were practical, if nothing else, and that this child would not make me different, and it would not make him different. We will get married, I told him, and put my finger to his lips when he started to protest. Our child will be legitimate. And if things do not work out, then we will separate. It was simple. I convinced him that nothing would change. Nothing at all.
But, of course, it did. Two months after we married at the courthouse, his partners voted to sell their business. I did not know what he did specifically, just that it involved imports and large, noisy ships that came to dock in Charleston. I did not know when he was away from me on Mallow Island that he went home, to his family home, somewhere in the great middle of America. Zoey was only three months old when Alrick took us to his Tulsa to live, because he had no more reason to stay in Charleston now that he did not work. His businesswas gone, sold, and there was money, money, money, always money, but not happiness, because he did not have anything to do. He did not look at me the same way. I was annoying and childish to him now. And so very out of place in his Tulsa. I often left for weeks at a time with Zoey. We went back to Mallow Island and stayed at the Dellawisp, where I had been so happy. But I always returned to him. If having me as a wife was embarrassing to him among his Midwestern family, having me disappear with his child was even more so. We argued and I would scratch his face with my red fingernails. I demanded a divorce several times. He always said no, because he did not want to part with his beloved money. It was only after he met the snotty woman with the young children of her own that he finally agreed. I challenged him with everything, because I wanted as much as possible for Zoey.
But I died just after the divorce was final.
Alrick hated that. He hated that the settlement money went into a trust for Zoey and not back to him.
Oh, my precious Zoey. My gift to the world.
I never wanted for her to be left with him, and certainly not with that judgmental woman he married, the woman who thought her own children could do no wrong, who made Alrick love them, but who resented that anything from his previous marriage was still in that house. I often knocked over her tiaras and pageant trophies in her glamorous closet, once even breaking a perfume bottle, just to vex her.
I had to stay with Zoey, just as my brother stayed with me.
But just as I let go of my brother to follow my own path, Zoey is now letting go of me.
I see her happy and hopeful and settled, butIam feeling restless. I wonder if this is how my brother felt. I am spending more and more time with the dellawisps in their trees. I did not like them at first, but now their energy excites me. I feel alive again when I am with them.Some of the younger ones want to fly away to new adventures, and if this happens, I know I will go with them. Zoey does not need me and this saddens me. But I do not want to leave this world yet.
I am like that song my grandfather used to sing.
My soul still needs to fly.
