The first night, he slept through the whole thing. When he woke he was cold. The window was open. His sheets were on the floor. Miles got up to shut the window and when he returned to his bed, he noticed the feather on his pillow. It was a deep, dark violet, the color of the atmosphere, where the sky ends and outer begins.

“I think we have a new neighbor,” he had told his mother when she came upstairs to wish him goodnight. She was wearing her old worn nightgown and she sat at the side of his bed playing with the curls of his hair. He felt his shoulders tense. It always irritated him when she did that, made him feel like under that touch he shriveled back into a child.

“What do you mean,” she had asked.

“I was playing in a tree today and I could see into the neighbor’s yard, the house behind ours, with the tall grass.”

“Miles, you really shouldn’t be climbing trees. You know what Dr. McAllister said about overexerting yourself.”

“I wasn’t overexerting myself Mom. I didn’t even really climb it. There’s like a ladder there. Its not a big deal.”

“Alright. I just want you to be careful is all.”

“I was. I’m not stupid. That’s not even the point. I was just wondering if you knew anything about the people that live in that house.”

“The one just behind ours? I’m pretty sure its just one older man who lives there.”

She pressed her palms against her eyes, a motion she often made whenever she was trying to think. She said it helped her to see better. “Now that you mention it, I remember seeing an ambulance over there a few weeks ago. To be honest I thought the guy had croaked.”

“Mom!”

“Well,” she laughed, “he’s a really old guy. He doesn’t even really leave the house. One of the women in town picks things up for him I think. Can you imagine being trapped up in that house all day. I bet he orders in a lot of Chinese food, what do you think?”

“I don’t know Mom. I was just wondering because I saw a girl there, someone around my age I mean.”

“A girl?”

“Never mind.” He brushed away her hand, which had begun to stroke his head again.

“Don’t get all excited Miles. I don’t know about any girls living there. Maybe he has someone living with him to help him out now. You could ask her, you know.”

“Ok.”

“Did you introduce yourself at least?”

“Kind of.”

“It would be nice. If you don’t recognize her from school, then I’m sure she’s not from around here. She’d appreciate a friend her age I bet. Was she cute?”

“Goodnight Mom.”

“If you’re not careful you’ll be my age before you have a girlfriend.”

He laughed, “Go Away.”

“Alright, alright. I can see when I’m no longer wanted. Sweet dreams Miles.” She kissed him on the forehead and carefully closed the door behind her. As he fell asleep, the image of the girl turning her face to where he had been watching her from his tree fort seemed to be projected against his ceiling.

“Are you sick or something?” she had asked.

He had been watching her pace back and forth through the high grass, caged within her own element. Her hair caught the sun in the way that some things catch fire by accident. He watched her striped in tree shadow and tiger light, turn slowly, breathe deeply, push a way through the tall stalks of unmowed grass, watched tiny bugs fling themselves in all directions but hers.

Then he had coughed and wheezed and couldn’t stop. His throat had burned. She looked up and saw him in the tree staring down at her. She regarded him as one might a strange bird. Her eyes were almost violet, almost the color of the atmosphere. His face burned and her eyes locked with his, until he felt himself falling out of time.

Then, from a darkened window where he had only before seen shadowy motion, a voice had called her and she said, “I’ll be right there,” with the same bite that she had spoken to him.

“Yes.” He had replied. “I’m sick.” Then, “No, no, not sick like that.” But it was too late, she had already returned to her lair.

 

The second day it rained and he kept his window shut. When he got home from school he went inside immediately. He was restless. He had been planning to say something to her this time. To introduce himself. He would figure out her language. They would become friends.

Instead he shuffled around the house until his father came home. Then they watched TV.

“What do you want to watch?” he asked Miles.

“I don’t care,” Miles said. So they watched a game show that involved contestants piecing together disparate bits of information as fast as they could while wearing strange shaped hats.

Before bed, Miles took the feather, which he had left on his pillow, and hid it in his drawer before his mom came up to say good night.

In the morning, he found water had dripped all over the carpet by the window. On his bed was another feather, the same as the one before.

Later that day, his mother gave him a plate of cookies to bring over.

“I’m not bringing these over,” he told her.

“What’s the big deal? You bring them over, you ring the doorbell, you say hi, my name is Miles, nice to meet you, maybe you ask where she’s from, that’s it.”

“I’m not doing it.”

“Don’t be a big baby.”

And so he stood at her door, a plate of cookies in his hand. He cleared his throat, then knocked. As he waited, everything seemed to be louder, birdsong was like siren in his ear. But there was no sound from inside. He knocked again, louder this time. Then he heard it, footsteps, very slowly, but definitely creeping forward. Then the door opened, creaking as though it had never been opened before.

One yellow eye stared out from the partially opened door. “What do you want?” coughed a man’s voice.

“Oh, excuse me,” said Miles, his rehearsed words scattering into the shadowy corners of his mind where he couldn’t find them. “I was just, I mean, I wanted to meet, I mean introduce—”

“Get the hell off my property,” the man rasped in a slow whisper.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to, I’ll just—”

“Did you know I could break your neck in a second?”

“What?”

“You heard me.”

Miles opened his mouth but no sound came out. A fly flew in, then flew out.

“Grandpa, what are you doing? Go back to bed.”

The man began to laugh.

“Go back to bed, if you’re feeling well enough to walk around then I’ll tell my dad and go home. Go.”

The yellow eye withdrew and the door opened. Miles could see the figure of an old man in flannel pants and an undershirt shuffling away, still laughing as he went. Standing at the door in front of him was a girl with violet eyes.

“Hi,” said Miles.

“Sorry about that. Whatever he said, don’t listen. It’s probably not true.”

“Oh,” said Miles. “Well I just wanted to say, hi because I live right behind here and just wanted to introduce myself because my name is Miles and I live right behind here and I never saw you before so I thought I’d introduce myself.” Miles felt sweat cover his whole body. His tongue felt like a hammer.

“Nice to meet you Miles. Can I have one?” she asked, taking a cookie off of the plate he was holding.

“You can have all them,” he said quickly.

“No, no that’s fine.”

“But they’re for you.”

“I just wanted one.”

“Just one?” he repeated. “What about your grandpa?”

“He doesn’t eat. He’s really old.”

“Oh.”

“That’s why I’m here. I chew his food for him and then spit it into his mouth. It’s easier for him to digest that way.”

“Really?”

“Maybe. Anyway, I’m Lainey.”

He looked into her eyes and thought about the two feathers now hidden at the bottom of his sock drawer, like two soft, dirty secrets.

“Are you a bird?” she asked.

Miles nearly dropped the plate of cookies. “What?”

“I thought you might be. I love bird watching, don’t you?”

“No. Yes. Sometimes?” Miles held the plate awkwardly out in front of him, only touching it with the tips of his fingers as though he wanted to be as far away from it as possible.

“You’re kind of a creep-o you know. You can’t just spy on people in the privacy of their own backyards.”

“I wasn’t.”

Lainey took another cookie from the top of the pile. “Do you have anything else to say in your defense?”

“No.”

They stood staring at one another.

“Alright, I’m going to go inside now.” She began to shut the door, “Oh and I wouldn’t step on that mat if I were you. My grandpa puts dead birds under there. At least that’s what he tells me, but I think he just thinks its funny.” Then she shut the door and Miles was left with a mostly full plate of cookies in his hand. He looked down. He was standing on the welcome mat. He stepped backwards off of it and nearly tripped backwards down the stairs.

On the third morning there was another feather. There seemed to be a space hollowed out beside him in the bed, an indent in the comforter, warm, as though someone had been sleeping beside him. Of course, he could have just rolled over in his sleep. It was getting too warm for heavy blankets anyway. But how could he have rolled over on top of the blanket when he was sleeping under it, he wondered. The window was open and he couldn’t remember if he had closed it or not.

 

The strange thing about the little strip of woods between their houses was that it seemed to be caught out of time. Even now, in late spring, the ground was littered with dead leaves as though it were deep into fall. The whole town must have been like this at one point, Miles thought. He dropped leaves in the thin stream that ran quietly through a gap in the low stone wall. He folded his leaf boats so that they could shoot through to the other side without being caught. A bird sang two notes, one high and one low, again and again, as though trying to remember the melody of a song it had heard a long time ago, repeating it, again and again, so as not to lose that one final scrap of melody.

He sent one leaf down the stream; it hit a small stick, swirled, and got caught at the entrance of stone. Miles got up from where he crouched and dislodged the small leaf, righting its hull, pointing its stern, and sending it on its way. But again it became caught. It was too big to fit through. Miles folded it in half and tried again, but as it sailed, it began to unfold, half of the leaf rising perpendicular into the air as if trying to rise out of the water, trying to fly. He grabbed a stick and forced it through the wall, wedging it into the resisting gap. When it came out the other end, only little bits and pieces remained, hardly enough evidence to recall the leafy form it had once taken.

When he tried to pull the stick out, he found that it stuck. He pulled harder, and a whole section of the wall toppled over. He looked around nervously. Of course, nobody had seen. It was after he put down the stick and went to replace the rock that had fallen, that he found, in a spot that had been hidden before, a layer of thin dark dust like ash. And in the ash, bits of paper. Bits of newspaper maybe. He picked one up. They were not papers at all, but small photographs, yellowed and without color. Some were the size of his palm, others as small as postage stamps. They were of a different place, a different time. One showed a storefront window, a sign in a language he did not recognize, tall wedding cakes hidden behind the sun-reflecting gleam of the glass. Another was of a woman in a white dress, with ends like frosting. She held gray flowers and her face was turned away from the camera, her teeth were yellowed. One of the very small ones seemed to be of a boat, but its size and age made it difficult to tell.

Later that night, Miles and his mother sat at the dinner table. His father was much later than usual. The table was set and the food was on the table and they sat staring at it as though it were meant only for looking. Like a live photograph. He thought of telling her about what he had found in the woods. Then he decided not to.

“You can eat,” his mom said. But Miles didn’t eat. He liked the idea of food meant only for looking at. He also liked to smell it, to imagine what it would taste like, to play tricks with his mind, to smell chicken and then imagine it tasting like carrots.

When he came home, his father apologized and then went into the bedroom to change. They could hear the sound of the sink running for a long time, the plash of his hands diverting the stream of water. Then he sat down and they ate.

That night, Miles’s mother didn’t come upstairs to say goodnight. Miles sat in bed with his knees pulled up to his chin. He didn’t want to fall asleep. He played games with himself, trying to see how long he could go without blinking. The more he did this, the more he saw flecks of light bobbing and shooting around his room. When they landed on the back of his hands they felt like nothing. He got up and stumbled across the room to check to make sure the window was shut. It was. The house was quiet now; the rough mutterings had long since ceased. His head began to topple from side to side. His eyes refused to stay open. He got up again, went over to the window, opened it carefully, then got back into bed, pulling the blanket up to his chin. He could hear now the soft purr of night. He would not sleep. He would not sleep. Was that a violet motion outside the window? Was that tapping just the trees? He lay perfectly still. He would not sleep.

 

Miles was ripped from a deep sleep. It felt as if his body were pushed up against another body. His felt himself clench and unclench like a machine. His body was no longer his own. He panicked, gasped. An animal clawing and pecking at the inside of his throat, stung like smoke. Stop, he thought. But his body continued to pulsate. His abdomen quivered, constricted, pushing all of the air out of him. He squeezed his eyes shut. It felt as though some deep part of him were being extricated, breaking loose, pushing everything else out of the way, like a new tooth, bare and white, his body teething down against it. Shhhh, he heard a voice say. Softness stroked his brow, his cheek his ear. Shhhh, something purred. Through his closed eyelids a light flared and then ebbed.

Then, slowly, he relaxed, his body uncoiled, the coughing stopped. He did not feel small, but he did not feel like himself either. He opened his eyes and found himself alone in bed, cover and pillows splashed onto the floor. He got up to put it with the others and took off his underwear, which was wet, and put on a new pair. On his floor, beside his pillow was a small dead bird. He lifted it uneasily, using a pair of socks from his drawer as gloves. He brought it to the open window and let it tumble out his hands and into the air. Outside the sky floated upwards like bubbles of pink and blue. There was smoke rising from the forest. He shut the window and got back into bed.

 

When Miles slept through his alarm that morning, his mother did not wake him. He went downstairs, but the house was empty, so he poured himself a glass of orange juice and drank it slowly. The thin red needle of the clock on the wall made itself known. He imagined that years had passed and he was a grown man, and this was his house. It was quiet, but suddenly quiet things seemed loud. It was as if no more people were left on earth. He lay on the couch and flipped through the TV channels, stopping on a documentary about scientists doing research on exotic animals. Miles thought he would like to do something like that. He watched them tranquilize a tiger, watched it bow onto its knees, then fall. He wondered what it would think, when it woke again, about being tied down and surrounded by those curious scientists. Perhaps it would wake up forgetting everything that had come before. The world would start again at the beginning until the animal unraveled its stripes, read the traces of the time before.

Later, he walked to his tree fort, hoping to catch sight of Lainey. As he approached, he saw hundreds of birds crimped and winking in the trees. The sun was setting. He climbed up and saw that someone had left birdseed all over the platform. He saw nothing move through the black shuttered windows.

When his mother came home he was sitting on the couch in the living room. “I didn’t feel good,” he told her.

Her heard the jingle of her car keys as she placed them on the counter. The thud of her big black pocketbook. “You don’t have a fever,” she said, placing the back of her hand against his forehead like one might do a child.

“I couldn’t stop coughing last night,” he said.

“I’ll call Dr. McAllister. We’ll set up another appointment for you.” He didn’t get off of the couch but he could hear the notes of the telephone dial, the one sided conversation, the scratching of pen leaving a trace against a pad of paper. “Just in time,” she told him after she hung up the phone. “They were on their way out.” Then she went to change out of her work clothes and take a shower.

The doorbell rang. Miles stayed where he was. Probably the mailman, just dropping off a package, he thought. It rang again. He padded barefoot across the floor and opened the door.

It was Lainey. She was holding a plate of cookies. “Hey,” she said.

“Hey.”

“Do you want a cookie?”

“Sure,” said Miles, reaching out to take one without stepping out of the doorway.

“I was making cookies for myself and then I figured I should probably see if you wanted to have some.”

“Thanks.” As he brought the cookie to his mouth he remembered that dinner would be soon.

“Well try it.”

He took a bite. Felt it move down his throat and into his stomach like a knot of guilt. He knew he shouldn’t be eating cookies right before dinner. He felt the little bite of cookie expanding inside him until he was full.

“Good?”

“Yeah,” he said.

“Yours were really good. I don’t know any boys that bake.”

“Thanks. I mean, I didn’t bake them. My mom did.”

“Too bad. That would have been cool. By the way you have something on your face.”

Miles brushed the side of his face.

“No, no. Other side. No. Let me.” She touched his face, then laughed. “Sorry.”

“Miles,” his mom called from inside.

“I’ll be right there,” he said.

“Sorry, you can go if you want,” said Lainey. She brushed her hair out of her eyes, fitting it behind her ear.

“No, no its fine. It’s just my mom,” he laughed.

She stepped forward, towards him and whispered, “Do you mind if I come inside?”

“Oh yeah, sure, sure,” said Miles stepping backwards over himself. “Come on in.”

“I’m going to shut the door behind me, is that ok? Sorry, weird thing.”

“Go ahead.”

She shut the door. “I was just wondering, like, if you knew of anything cool to do around here. I start to go kind of crazy when I spend too much time by myself. Or, you know, with a crazy old person. I swear if I have to listen to one more of his stories I swear I’m going to crack.”

“I don’t know,” said Miles. “There’s a movie theater in town. And bowling alley too. Like that?”

“Not really. See the problem is I have to stay around here in case my Grandpa needs me for something. I’m really not supposed to leave much at all. My dad would kill me.”

“That sucks.”

“What do you do around here? Besides, you know, spy on me in the lawn?”

“I wasn’t spying on you. I swear.”

“Well then what were you doing?”

“Just hanging out.”

“We could do that.”

“Do what?”

“Hang out, we could hang out sometime if you want.”

“Oh yeah.” Miles, needing to do something with his hands, took another bite of the cookie.

“Do you want to?”

“Sure. I mean, that would be great.”

“Cool.”

“I mean, I can’t right now. I’m sick.”

“You are?” she raised an eyebrow.

“Yeah. I don’t know. And it’s almost dinner time.”

“Oh, ok.”

“But like, definitely a different time.”

“Miles, who are you—” his mother came into the room, her hair wrapped up in a towel. “OH HI.” She said to Lainey. “I thought Miles was talking to himself again. He does that sometimes.” She laughed. “Just kidding.” She held out a hand to Lainey, “You must be the girl Miles was telling me about.”

Lainey smiled.

“Is that your grandfather who lives in the house behind ours?”

“Yeah, it is?”

“How is he feeling?”

“Oh he’s doing alright, thanks.”

Miles’s mother smiled. Miles looked at her, then at Lainey, but said nothing.

“Anyway I should probably go.”

“Oh well it was so nice to meet you. If you ever need any help over at your place just let Miles know. And feel free to stop by whenever you’d like.” She smiled and then went back into her bedroom. They could hear the blow drier turn on.

“Your mom’s a laugh,” Lainey said.

“I guess.”

“Do you mind if I go out your back door instead?” She asked. “Sorry.”

“Sure.” Miles led her through the house. When they passed the stairway she stopped.

“Is your room up there?” she asked him.

“Yes,” he said.

“I thought so,” she said.

Then he showed her out the back. He watched her walk away until she was completely hidden in the trees. Then he watched a while longer until it was too dark to see.

That night when Miles’s father came home he asked Miles how he was feeling.

“Much better.” Miles said.

“Like a new man,” his father laughed. “That’s what I like to hear.” After dinner they played cards until bedtime. Miles won a few hands.

“You don’t have to check on me tonight,” he told his mom.

“Are you sure honey?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said.

In bed, he lay on his back. He soared. His life was changing. Things were new. He thought about Lainey. He closed his eyes. The sooner he fell asleep, the sooner he could wake up. It was true.

In the morning there were no birds. He checked his drawer. The feathers were gone. He started getting his stuff together for school. The quicker I go to school, the quicker I can come home, he thought. It was true.