people who pity me | zori

[goat]

It’s hard to be outside. Birdie has barely gone past her yard in weeks— it feels like an invisible barrier has been placed at the edges, making her hands shake and her throat close at the idea of straying away from safety. The only time she left was to get her stitches removed at the hospital. She had watched the doctor pull out every thread and tried not to imagine the wound reopening. The cool, clinical walls made her feel like she was strapped back in the emergency room bed, like she couldn’t breathe, like she was going through it all over again. Walking alone in the sunshine feels better than that, at least.

She’d forced herself into real clothes and pushed past the line where the grass met the sidewalk because she owes a phone call to a friend, and Pierre’s the only person she knows with a phone that could place a call to another district. Her arms are covered with a thin silk shawl, the flower pattern hiding her scars and the fabric sheer enough to not make her overheat, but she still feels like everyone’s eyes are on her, staring her down like they know what she’s done. It’s self-centered to think this way, she knows this. She knows that the entire world isn’t obsessed with her. It’s hard to think she isn’t being silently criticized for everything when that’s the way she grew up. Even her family’s unspoken thoughts were deafening.

The summer sun fades into shade as she ascends the steps of the justice building. She welcomes the rush of air conditioning, a luxury she wishes she could afford in her own home, and follows the signs to the mayor’s office. There are a few people hustling around the building— interns, Keepers— but nobody who would stop and bother her. She is the mayor’s sister, technically, but they’ve been estranged long before he took office. It’s probably easier for the average Eight citizen to recognize their mother than her.

The thought sends a chill down her spine. She can think of no one less deserving of public notoriety than her mother.

She’s let into Pierre’s office and nestles herself into a big chair in the corner of the room with the phone in her hand. The cushions are soft, and she makes a satisfied noise as she sinks into them. She unfurls the scrap of paper with the phone number on it and punches it into the dial pad. As the line begins to ring, there’s a fluttering in her stomach. A reminder of the strange little human she’s supposed to be taking care of.

She smiles to herself, softly.

The line rings, and rings, and then there’s a click on the other side.

“Vasco?” She presses the phone closer. “It’s Birdie. I have so much to tell you.”

[marguerite harvard d2a (zori)]

V A S C O

I know a place we can run (yeah)
Where everyone gonna
lay down their weapon
(Lay down their weapon)
Don't you be afraid of
love and affection

Emma convinced me to take a break from my work.

I’d spent the last few days headlong into a backlog of complaints from districters ranging from peacekeeper force to faulty irrigation lines. Last night I’d fallen asleep at the kitchen table, headfirst onto the hardwood so that when I woke, ink had smudged right across my forehead. When I’d been scrubbing my face with soap and water at the bathroom sink, I’d seen the dark circles collecting under my eyes. Gray had started to creep up my temples and through the hair on top of my head. Gone were the days of being mistaken for one of the younger Izar boys. Not that I minded, just seeing the lines starting to collect, you couldn’t help thinking about the passage of time.

The next morning with Yani’s hand in mine, we both set out for the river dressed in our bathing suits. Emma had packed a lunch for us, along with a little checkered blanket for sitting out on the shoreline. She’d told me that Emmanuel would join us for a spell, since he’d been busy with all the rows of corn he and his wife were tasked with. The boy took after Emma, I think, focused on the right amount of water, the pH of the soil, all the little measurements to build the best crop. Hardly left time for coming to call or popping in for dinner like he’d used to do. At least Sofía didn’t mind filling up our house with her laughter now and again, still young and free enough to find time to humor her father.

Yani tossed her sunglasses out on the blanket and strolled right into the river without a second thought. Each passing day seemed to press her courage, I half expected her to say by September that she wanted to set up a little house all on her own. I watched her swim out to the deeper part of the dark water before dunking down and kicking her legs. She plunged to the bottom of the river (with me watching closely the first few minutes to make sure she surfaced again) before splashing up with a collection of rocks in her hands.

“Papá!” Emmanuel’s voice carried out from the top of the hill. I turned on my side and gave a wave to have him join me. He’d gotten Emma’s dark eyes, the same smile, too. From a single look you could see his head turning a mile a minute, even when he thought he wasn’t showing much of anything at all. “Me alegro de verte.”

I put a hand flat on the blanket and steadied myself, my knees tight and careful of my balance. He put a hand in mine, and helped to bring me to my feet. I smiled, looking up at him, at how the sun shown on the man in front of me.

I wrapped both arms around him in a hug and patted him on the back until both of us began to laugh.

Yani had us playing a call and response game in the deeper part of the river, first me with my eyes closed calling out to where they might be. We floated to watch the empty blue sky above us, and took in the warm sun hanging overhead at noon.

While Yani collected old beetle carcasses along the shoreline, Emmanuel and I dripped dry next to the picnic basket. He and I opened some beers and gave a little toast. It almost felt for a moment as though the last year wasn’t sitting at the back of my mind. Almost.

Emmanuel stared at his drink for a second, inspecting the little aluminum can like his life depended on it.

“Ehm… papá, hay algo que quiero decirte…” I set my drink down and turned to Emmanuel. I tried not to let my stomach sink, or tense at the sight of how serious he’d become. “Es… que… pues, Camila?” He took a breath. “Ella está embarazada…”

***

The office gleamed that afternoon, brilliant in the glow of the sun peering from the windows. I’d been taking a rag to dust all the grime from my desk, humming along as I wiped away. I tossed a set of papers from my desk that I’d been too anxious to throw away (as much as I knew they were already out of date, but could never let go of anything). Today felt fresh, even as the heat of the afternoon had me dripping sweat from my temples. Every step was lighter, so much that even the ring of the phone didn’t send a chill down my spine.

‘Vasco… it’s Birdie. I have so much to tell you.’

“Miss Birdie! Wonderful! Oh, how are you doing?” I stepped along the side of the long wooden desk and threw myself back into the cushy leather chair. After a spin in a circle, I threw both my feet up on the tabletop. Months had passed and there’d been a letter between both of us, enough that I'd prayed a few mornings for Birdie.

“This is such a pleasant surprise. I hope you don’t find this rude, but I’m so glad it’s you that’s calling and not just Pierre.” Vasco gave a little laugh. “What do you have to tell me! Go on, I’m all ears.”

elegant

[goat]

“Miss Birdie! Wonderful! Oh, how are you doing?”

Vasco’s voice echoes through the receiver, bright as sunshine and fresh citrus. Birdie tries not to flush when he calls her Miss— it’s so formal, a level of respect she isn’t used to receiving. They’re friends, on equal footing, he doesn’t have to be this nice to her, but he is, for some reason she can’t discern. Maybe it’s just been a while since she’s had a friend. She’d been friendly with her coworkers at the tailor’s shop, but not friendly enough, and those relationships had dissolved with her firing a few years back. This is new ground for her, she doesn’t think she can be faulted for the shaky foundation.

“What do you have to tell me! Go on, I’m all ears.”

She winces at how happy he sounds over the phone. There is a part of her brain that’s telling her to lie, to pretend that everything’s okay, as to not sour his mood. She shouldn’t burden anyone, make anyone else deal with her shit. That isn’t fair.

He asked, she reminds herself. He wants to know how she is, genuinely, because he’s her friend, and friends care about each other. She sucks in a deep breath. “I don’t know where to start,” she admits, because it really is a long story. The months have been stretched full of so many things, good and bad and disastrous and near fatal. “I guess I should tell you first that I’m pregnant. I wasn’t really planning on it, obviously, but… I’m okay with it now. More or less.” She pauses. “I mean, I kind of have to be, right? I don’t want this kid coming into a world where she’s already hated. I feel like that’s what happened to me, and look how I turned out.”

She laughs a little at her joke, bitter and self-deprecating, but not bad enough to warrant any worry. She hopes so, at least.

“Leland and I are back together. We have been for a while. I told him he could either stay and help me with this baby, or I couldn’t ever speak to him again.” She brings a hand to her mouth and chews on a fingernail. “That was probably bad of me to say, right? I guess it doesn’t matter. He made his choice, and we’ve been… we’ve been good. Really good.”

It feels weird to say it out loud, like she’s gone and cursed it somehow, but she knows she shouldn’t think like that. Things are allowed to be good for her. If he wanted to leave, he would have left a long time ago. He was still here. He was staying.

“I uh, I was in the hospital recently. I— hm.” She can’t get the words past her lips. “Nevermind. It doesn’t matter. What matters is that I don’t know how many people know I was there. I just wanted you to hear it from me, at least, instead of some person I barely know. Or my mother.”

At the mention of her mother, Birdie feels a chill crawl up her spine. She‘s going to have to talk to her eventually— clear the air, discuss some things neither one of them want to talk about. They’re both adults, surely it won’t go that poorly, or as poorly as it has in the past. Or, maybe it will, and Birdie will swear off trying to mend things with her family ever again.

She supposes she’ll have to find out.

“Anyway, enough about me. How are you doing? How’s Eleven?”

[marguerite harvard d2a (zori)]

V A S C O

I know a place we can run (yeah)
Where everyone gonna
lay down their weapon
(Lay down their weapon)
Don't you be afraid of
love and affection

I tried to place the feeling as I waited for Birdie to speak. Sort of like getting a letter in the mail, a giddiness flushed through my cheeks. Not because of getting to pick up the phone for a conversation other than about business, but because she’d taken the act of thinking of me. Enough that she wanted to tell me something in her own voice, and to hear mine straight away, too. You start to treasure that as the years pass, the tender relations that last only a little while. You never know who might slip from your life, and what memories you’ll have to hold onto. Remember a voice through a phone could light up a whole evening, even if the rest were lost.

’I guess I should tell you I’m pregnant…'

Birdie spoke casually, words dripping through the receiver with every breath. A pulled my feet off the desk and leaned forward in the chair, hand over my mouth to cover the broadening smile as though there were someone else in that’d see, as there were a reason to be ashamed. Lately I’d felt as though when I were too happy it was a selfish thing. I had to keep reminding myself that an expression of joy was a protest on its own; we were conditioned to the bittersweet as though we were always to live with a long shadow cast over our shoulders.

Birdie deserved this bright spot of news, to hold onto this happiness and never let go. She spoke of this being unplanned but I’m staring at a photo of Raquel, Emmanuel, and Sofía all together, distracted by memories of when they were young enough to hold in my arms.

I had the moment of doubt when Emma had told me she was pregnant the first time. I couldn’t say it was so much unplanned as… unexpected, I suppose. Talks of a rhythm and cycles of the moon for an eighteen year-old-boy didn’t stop the nights between sheets chasing after one another. Those days when we’d had two pennies to our name but enough love to sow through the wee hours of the morning. You can’t feed a child on love. A person can grow only as much as their roots would let them.

What if we weren’t ready? Or our lives weren’t enough for her? Or that sixteen years later we had everything we’d wanted, and had to give her back to the stars once again?

Static crackles over the receiver and Birdie gets to Leland. Back together, she barrels through, the same man who’d downed me the bar. The one who’d had the same doubts and cracked under the weight. A man who’d taken her trust and spent it so that all he’d left to offer was IOUs and excuses.

I turned the black cord connecting the phone between my fingers. What to say? I thought of Elias and how he took more than he’d ever gave each day of his life. No one deserved a man that would make them feel as though their life was a shadow on the wall, ready to be blotted out as soon as he turned off the light.

But life was never black and white. Humans are complicated, messy with hearts ready to be melted down and born again. We’d never get to a new beginning if we believed a man couldn’t change his heart. It was perhaps what separated us from despair: believing that change could come to even those who’d hurt us the most. It was part of being an adult, I supposed. Learning to forgive with grace while keeping your heart whole.

‘…we’ve been good. Really good.’

I’d be lying if I didn’t have a sense of relief hearing her say it. Birdie had only ever been honest, maybe to a fault.

‘I uh, I was in the hospital recently…’

I curled the phone cord again and felt a tickle at the back of my throat. She wanted me to know first before I’d heard from anyone. I smiled.

“Oh me?” I let out a chuckle, still processing all the details she’d spilled out. I thought about Emmanuel and the news of his child. She didn’t need me stealing her thunder, not now. There’d be time enough to share with her the news.

This was about Birdie.

“A few more gray hairs. Folks asking me if I’m going to stand for election again. A few trips to talk to mayors about how we could be doing better…” I turned around in my chair to lean back, then facing my reflection in the window.

“I want to talk about you, Miss Birdie.” Gentle, I reminded myself. “It’s so lovely to hear your news. I’m honored you would tell me. I miss you very much, my friend. I wish I could be at your door tomorrow; I’d have a whole basket of baby clothes and toys for you and Mr. Leland.”

The greatest pleasure always came from giving my friends what they needed, whether it all the little material things I could spare, or just an ear for listening.

“Know what you say always matters to me,” My voice was quiet as I spoke. “You know I’ve no one to tell, I – well, I’m sorry to hear that you were in the hospital.”

Brave of her to tell me, or even want to.

“I miss you,” I said in the dimming light of my office. I wished it were simple enough to board a train to eight to see her again. “I haven’t had quite the night out since I’ve been back home, I’m afraid.”

elegant

[goat]

Vasco speaks a bit about his life, what he’s been up to— mostly mayoral duties, it seems. She’d forgotten the election was coming up. The fact that all of that is going on and Pierre still came to see her after her attempt, it makes her feel strange. She wants to remind herself that it isn’t strange to be loved, to be cared for, but it’s a hard thing to do with her own voice, and even if someone else told her, she isn’t sure she would believe them anyway. She makes a mental note to remember to vote for her brother whenever election day rolls around. If she were eligible to vote in Eleven, she’d vote for Vasco a thousand times over. She doesn’t know if there’s anyone more capable to take care of the District than him.

He pivots the conversation back to her, congratulating her on her pregnancy. She smiles, even though he can’t see it, murmuring a thank you. She still isn’t used to being congratulated on something like this. When she was pregnant the first time, with Damaris, it was something to be ashamed about, something to cover up with cardigans and dodge questions about when she got too big to hide. This time, she had hidden again, wanting to keep her family’s judging eyes off of her. The only person she had gotten to tell was Leland, everyone else had found out through some inane stream of gossip. She likes being able to tell someone, for them to hear the news from her own mouth, and for them to be happy for her, even if it had come about purely accidental.

“I miss you,” he says, and she thinks that she isn’t used to being missed. “I haven’t had quite the night out since I’ve been back home, I’m afraid.”

She laughs. “I’m sure you could get any sad woman at a bar to show you her tits. Just make sure she asks your wife first because, uh, I still feel really bad about it.” She doesn’t imagine that Emma is the type of woman to hold a grudge against her husband, especially because of a misunderstanding, but Birdie knows she’s deserving of whatever vitriol she directs her way. She was the one who fucked up, misunderstanding tones and signals because she was so desperate to be wanted by somebody who was kind to her. She’s glad their relationship is stable— any sort of crack in the foundation would have made her a homewrecker, and she isn’t sure how she’d live with that.

Her mind wanders back to what he’d said earlier in the conversation, apologizing for her time spent in the hospital. She didn’t like the unsteadiness of his voice, how he’d lowered it, it churned a weird pit in her stomach. “You don’t have to be sorry, it was… it was my fault. I don’t really think I deserve any sympathy for it. I just wanted you to know.” She chews on the inside of her cheek, feeling that familiar sense of dread crawling up her spine. He wouldn’t feel bad for me if he knew what I did. “You know how my mother gossips. It’s all she has. I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s gone and called up everyone I’ve ever spoken to.”

Outside, a steady wind blows. Birdie watches a tree branch shift in the breeze and tap against the office window. There’s a small part of her that’s envious of anyone who can enjoy this day, or any summer day, envious of the people who can lay out in the sun with their skin exposed, hang around on the shore of a lake, free from care or responsibility. What an easy way to live. She was barely able to live that simply as a teenager, too concerned with begging for the attention she couldn’t get from her family. This isn’t anything she should concern herself with right now, she knows this, but she can’t help the way her mind races.

“I actually wanted to ask you something, if that’s okay?” She looks away from the window, to the phone dial pad, to her lap, hidden by her growing stomach. “Leland and I want to get married, but we don’t want to do it here. I’m sure you can understand why. There’s just too much here, with our families and everything. We want to go somewhere where people don’t know us. Um, what I’m getting at is, how would you feel about a couple visitors?”

[marguerite harvard d2a (zori)]

V A S C O

I know a place we can run (yeah)
Where everyone gonna
lay down their weapon
(Lay down their weapon)
Don't you be afraid of
love and affection

When I’d gone to eight, it’d been for the purpose of convincing a man I’d never met to trust in an idea. A big show of one, where his district, my own, and a few others would come together and push for a better tomorrow. To finally bring together a chorus of voices that showed we weren’t afraid of the consequences, that nothing could hurt worse than what we’d already been put through.

But on a trip to a place with gray buildings and gray skies, it’d been Birdie Hope that opened my eyes. And not because she’d decided to get half-undressed in the living room.

I let out a laugh at her mention of the night we’d met in a dark little bar and drank too much. Played at being young again, like the gray hairs scattering the sides of my temples hadn’t been growing for some time. She’d opened her heart to me at the end of the bar, telling me of her daughter. The tenderness of the wound raw and open to be judged, or exposed, because we lived in a world that taught us we were stronger for pushing through. She’d been brave enough to show me her pain, and I’d decided to show her mine. I wanted her to know that I might not have had an answer to mending her heart, but that I’d sit to listen to her, and tell her how darkness had hung around me, too.

“She took it far better than I expected, I’ll say,” I twisted a finger around the black cord connecting to the receiver. My stomach had been in knots telling Emma the whole scene: walking home with Birdie, talking about life, coming into her living room and laying on the couch. The fact she’d started to undress and I’d had to tell her, you’re very pretty, but I’m married, and the scene of it all. Emma had raised an eyebrow and I don’t know if I’d ever had my stomach turn so much so quickly. She’d burst into laughter at the story. Not at Birdie, but that she knew I’d never do a thing to threaten what we had, not so long as I lived. “I wouldn’t trouble yourself over it.”

Between the gray city skyline or under a hot sun out in these fields, there were people yearning for a connection. Something bigger than ourselves, to prove that the misery and grief we were forced to endure wasn’t all this world had given to us. That people like Birdie, or me, we deserved to have a hand reach out from across this divide to show there was someone who did care. Even if we came from such different places, the differences couldn’t make up for all that brought us together.

We may have lost our daughters, and darkness may have met us both, but we’d fought to discover we could come out through to the other side. And that feeling of taking a breath past that veil hit my lungs to ignite a better truth. We’d faced generations of grief but they did not define us; the system we’d been trampled under taught our sons and daughters they were responsible for their failures. It was up to us to change it.

‘You don’t have to be sorry, it was… it was my fault. I don’t really think I deserve any sympathy for it. I just wanted you to know.’

“Well,” I scratched at the old wooden desk in front of me. My voice is quiet as I whisper through the receiver. “I just like knowing my friends are doing okay.” I didn’t know her well enough to press harder, and she felt as though that wouldn’t have gone far with her if I had. Better to leave it open for when she wanted to tell me, if ever. There’d always be time, so long as I made space for her.

‘I actually wanted to ask you something, if that’s okay?’

Here was a curiosity. Birdie Hope was full of surprises. I wonder what she must have been like as a teenager. She would’ve fit right in during a botellón, I bet.

‘Leland and I want to get married, but we don’t want to do it here. I’m sure you can understand why. There’s just too much here, with our families and everything. We want to go somewhere where people don’t know us. Um, what I’m getting at is, how would you feel about a couple visitors?’

“Miss Birdie!” I squawked into the receiver. Grinning from ear to ear, I leaned forward and felt my heart start to race. A wedding? Here in Eleven! To Leland? But a wedding. And she trusted me? I already could imagine the old barn been gussied up for their arrival, with candles across the loft, soft little light bulbs strung along the rafters, tables for guests, and an arbor wrapped in all the wildflowers we could gather. I hardly had space to think about how she’d be marrying the man that’d blackened my eye, but – her happiness was the most important.

And there was going to be a wedding!

“Oh my goodness, congratulations, I’m so… happy for you both! Of course, of course,” I waved my free hand beside me as though I was conjuring up the vision I’d had in my head, “We would be honored to have you here. We’ll find a place for you both – Marisol probably could stay with us and you all there – oh you’ll be able to meet Yani!”

She’d be able to meet the whole family, eighty some of us, just a small affair, a nice little barbecue to welcome them.

“I’ve always been a bit, well, superstitious, I guess. But this is the second bit of good news I’ve gotten today. I guess I’m bound to get a third.” I could feel the strain on my cheeks as kept smiling. “How soon were you all thinking? I only ask, because, well, my son’s told me he and his wife are expecting. Can you believe it? I’ll be a grandfather soon.”

elegant