Sorry, Wrong Afterlife
by Susan Whiting Kemp
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Table of Contents parts: 1, 2, 3 |
part 2
He pressed his palms against his temples, as if to squash his head flat. “I can’t take this anymore!”
I used my calming voice, which had never worked on my kids but I hoped would work on Morris. “You’re feeling bad now, but it’ll pass.”
His eyes looked off into a distance we couldn’t actually see from there, not with all the foliage in the way. “I can’t take the stink anymore. My stink. Bird stink. This stinking place stinks and I’m not going to stinking stay here one more stinking minute!”
Since my calming voice had failed, I held my palms out. This also never worked with my kids. “We’ll come up with a way out. It’s okay.”
“We’ve got to do something, anything.” His eyes were so wide I could see the whites above his irises. “I’m going to jump.” He shot back up to the edge of the nest.
I scrambled after him, grabbing him around the waist. “No, Morris, not smart! Stop!”
“I’m going over!”
“Let’s talk about this!”
“Nothing to talk about!”
“Don’t do it!”
“Doing it!”
We continued in this manner, Morris pushing on my shoulder and head, our volume growing until we were screaming at each other. My consonants slurred, making my words lose meaning, but he wasn’t listening anyway.
Below us, Dakota’s squawk also got louder, seeming to increase the noise level exponentially.
The more we struggled and the louder it got, the more agitated I became. I felt myself sliding toward my own trigger point. I, too, wanted to take action. A ball of heat grew in my forehead, expanded in my skull, and then flowed down through my torso. By the time the heat reached my extremities, I feared I would join him in taking the leap.
A harpy eagle arrived — not Lancelot, it was twice his size — and landed on the nest edge. Morris and I clutched each other, panting, staring at the huge beast.
“The female,” whispered Morris. “I name you Cordelia!”
Cordelia settled into the nest, snuggling against Dakota, but not feeding her, so Dakota kept up the noise. Light shone through the leaves, speckling her back.
“Cordelia, take us away from here!” Morris scrambled onto the bird’s back.
A sense of doom overtook me. I imagined the bird launching itself into the air, Morris slipping off and landing on the ground far below, breaking every bone in his body in two or three places. And then what if, as he feared, Hell was below? My good friend would be lost forever.
“Morris, no!” Climbing onto Cordelia, I tugged at Morris, but he had too strong a hold on her feathers.
Cordelia shifted to one side, then the other, seeming surprised by the sudden weight. I had to grab hold of her feathers to keep from falling. She stepped upward to the edge of the nest. I could feel the strength of her body underneath me. She was about to take off with both of us aboard, and I could do nothing about it.
Cordelia lifted into the air, leaving my stomach in the nest, or so it felt. Her powerful wings beat the air. I was nearly mad with terror. I had a good grip on her feathers, but what if they pulled loose? What if she shook me off?
Morris shouted, right next to my ear. His next shout sounded farther away. I turned my head as much as I dared. He was no longer next to me. He’d fallen off! His wail dwindled as Cordelia bore me away.
Desperately I looked for landmarks, so if I ever returned I could try to find Morris, but the powerful beat of Cordelia’s wings made it impossible to see more than just glimpses of trees and sky until Cordelia stopped beating her wings, floating on a slipstream or whatever birds do. I had a better look at the treetops, and... wait, what was that? A face. A comically wide face with sensitive eyes and a winsome smile.
A sloth. Even just briefly looking into his eyes, I felt heartened. I seemed to connect with the creature. We were two beings without wings, lost in a sea of trees, searching for the meaning of it all. I name you Darby, I said, but not out loud. Unlike Morris, I’d never felt comfortable talking to myself. I hoped Cordelia would land, so that I could descend from her and commune with Darby. I had visions of me and my sloth companion traveling among the trees — slowly, of course — as fast friends. Not a replacement for Morris, but a close second.
Cordelia didn’t land. She dove. Straight for Darby. There was a flurry of wings, then jerking and ripping and slicing and jolting and a lifting of the head and the swallowing of sloth shreds.
I sobbed. Tears and snot ran over my face. I wiped it on Cordelia; fluff stuck to my face.
When Cordelia was done, she lifted off again and turned around. I hoped we were returning to the nest. If we did, I planned to continue building the ladder, bullet ants or no. I was going to find Morris no matter what it took.
We did return to the nest, and to my surprise Morris was in it.
“Thank God you’re back,” said Morris. He told me how he’d landed on the nest, breaking his leg on impact, then asked, “What happened to your face?”
I wiped the bird fluff and the remaining snot and tears from my face and set to work fashioning him a splint from branches and vines.
We wouldn’t be going anywhere soon. For now, my focus was on making Morris comfortable. I needed to design him a bed.
I fell back on the essential: function would drive form. Anatomy would dictate architecture. Precision would produce perfection.
Using pitch and sticks I built a platform bed, conforming it to the curve of the nest. I wove clever vine spirals into the headboard to represent the twists and turns of our hopes and worries. For the footboard, I fashioned an optical illusion of two faces or a vase, depending on which way you looked at it, to help distract Morris from his pain. I wove a mattress from leaves, stuffing it with meticulously cleaned bird down.
I needed something comfortable to sit in, so I fashioned a chair frame that was cube shaped, except at the base, where it sloped to fit the nest. I criss-crossed thin yet strong vines from point to point in geometric patterns to form a seat.
“Wow,” said Morris. “That blows my mind. It’s like 3-D string art.”
“Limited materials force creative solutions,” I said, repeating one of my design mantras as I wove an overhang to keep us dry.
* * *
While Morris’s leg healed, Dakota grew. One day she flew from the nest. We didn’t see Lancelot or Cordelia after that. Weeks went by with no food and only rainwater. Though we couldn’t die from hunger, we still suffered from it. Morris created the occasional poem:
If God judges on a bell curve
He must wait
till all are dead.If God judges on a bell curve
then even the saintly
may not be good enough.What is the mean? The standard deviation?
How many will burn?
We wait in limbo
to find out
if God judges on a bell curve.
Finally, Morris’s leg was healed enough to get around, but we sat on the edge of the nest, undecided about our course of action. “We’ve got to choose,” I said. “Climb from treetop to treetop, or brave the bullet ants. I don’t see any other options.”
“Hello!” said a voice. “Do I hear people?”
Morris and I jumped, startled. A man burst through the leaves. He reminded me of a skinny roller-derby skater I once knew. He laughed a little hysterically as he made his way toward us. “You can call me Ike.”
“I’m Leo and that’s Morris,” I said. “Where did you come from? Where are all the people?”
“I haven’t seen any here,” said Ike. He was a bit twitchy, his shoulder, then the corner of his mouth. Maybe that was what happened when you were around birds for too long, you started to act like them.
“How long have you been here?” I asked.
“Seems like forever,” said Ike.
“Have you been down to the ground?” asked Morris. “Do you know what’s there?”
“Dirt. Ferns. Mice,” mused Ike. “And more dirt. Yeah, lots of dirt.”
“So no fire and brimstone?” asked Morris
“Of course not,” said Ike. “If there was fire, the trees would burn.”
Morris tilted his head, saying defensively, “We don’t know how things work in the afterlife.”
“It seems to be a lot like life, only” — Ike fished for words — “magnified and distilled.”
“What about beyond the trees?” I asked.
“The trees go on for a long ways. I don’t think we’ll escape them without some kind of transportation.”
Disappointment bore down on me like the weighted blanket Lily got me for my birthday. As welcome as a new face was, Ike hadn’t brought us a way out.
We descended to the nest, where Ike exclaimed over the furniture I’d made. His praise warmed me, but wasn’t enough to get me out of my funk.
“I’ve got three kids,” I told Ike. “Matilda’s fifth birthday has come and gone. She really wanted a party with all her friends. I didn’t get to throw her one.” Sadly, I smoothed a six-foot-long, black-and-white striped harpy feather.
“I miss my dad,” said Morris. “Who’s going to watch Masterpiece Theater with him now that I’m gone?”
“I miss my dog,” said Ike, sorrow making his mouth droop.
“What’s its name?” asked Morris.
Ike paused, as if we would think it silly. “Chaos.”
Morris chuckled. “So when you’re calling him in the yard, the neighbors think you’re crazy.” Morris illustrated. “‘Chaos! Chaos! Come!’ Hilarious. What kind of dog?”
“Big.” Ike pointed at feather I was stroking. “I wish I could grow feathers like those.”
I nodded. “The striations are beautiful.”
Ike seemed a little put off by my answer. “Not to look good. To be able to fly.” Taking the feather from me, he held it up to his outstretched arm.
The sight put an idea in my head. But could it really work? Sticks. Feathers. Pitch. “You don’t have to grow feathers,” I said. “We can make wings!”
“Brilliant!” Ike laughed, a cackle that became a guffaw that trailed off into a sigh.
I scrambled around the nest, gathering light yet sturdy sticks. Using leaves to collect bits of pitch, I began gluing the sticks together into a framework.
Morris sounded incredulous. “You’re going to try to fly? You’ll fall and break every bone in your body.”
“Not if we build the wings right,” I said.
“You’re a person, not a bird,” said Morris. “Don’t you know the story of Icarus?”
I made a noise of exasperation.
“Ah, Icarus,” said Ike, as if the story was close to his heart. “He flew too close to the sun, and the wax he built his wings with melted. And he fell and so forth and so on. But that’s not our situation, is it, Leo?”
I was vindicated. Ike agreed with me! I pointed to the furniture I’d made using pitch. “You see how well this pitch has held up. It won’t melt. And we’re not going close to the sun, which is, I don’t know, millions of miles away. Let’s all make wings. We’ll all fly together.”
“Yes, oh yes! Let’s do that!” Ike hopped around the nest, plucking out sticks and feathers.
“I just got healed,” said Morris. “I could fall. I don’t want to go through all that pain again.”
“We can’t stay,” I said gently. “There’s nothing for us here. We have to make the effort, even if we fail. If we don’t try, we’ll never get out. Somehow, some way, we have to go to the human afterlife so that we’ll be there when our families get there.”
Morris’s mouth worked. He dropped his arms and nodded slowly. “Okay. Let’s build one set of wings and see how it works.”
We worked together for hours, gathering pitch, sticking feathers onto the framework, tying on vines. When we were done, we stood back and admired our work. With my design ability, Morris’s artistry, and Ike’s enthusiasm, we’d made a strong and beautiful set of wings.
“It’s a masterpiece,” said Ike, which thrilled my heart.
“They look like angel wings.” Morris’s tone was breathy with awe.
They helped me tie them on, criss-crossing vines across my chest until the wings felt secure. I slipped my arms into the wing brackets and gave a practice liftoff. It worked so well I nearly bumped my head on the branch above. I swooped off the tree, then back, stumbling on landing but feeling like I could get the hang of it.
We built another pair for Morris and strapped him in. He, too, learned quickly. “I’m flying!” he cried. “I can’t believe how strong I am in the afterlife!”
When it was time for us to make wings for Ike, he balked, “Good luck to you both, but I’m not going after all.” He put on a brave face, but his shoulders slumped. I could tell he was crushed.
“What’s wrong?” asked Morris. “Are you afraid of heights?”
Ike didn’t answer, which seemed to confirm it. “I don’t understand,” I said. “You seem fine up here.”
“I thought so too. But while we were building these... No, I can’t do it. There’s no way around it. Unless...”
“Unless what?” asked Morris.
Ike turned away. “No, I can’t ask you to do that.”
“I know what you were going to say,” I said excitedly. “One of us carries you, and you wear a blindfold. I can do it. I’m much stronger than I was in life.”
Ike shook his head. “What if I panic and tear off the blindfold?”
“We’ll tie your hands,” said Morris.
Ike recoiled, looking truly fearful. “I have Merinthophobia.”
I looked at Morris. He knew lots of words and was able to explain. “Fear of being tied up.”
I pressed my lips together, perplexed. I looked around the nest, hoping an idea would pop into my head. My eyes lit on the mattress I’d woven. That was it! “We’ll weave a basket and carry you,” I said. “That way there’s no chance of you seeing anything that would make you panic, and you won’t be tied up.”
Ike protested weakly. I took him by the shoulders and looked right into his eyes. His irises were a purple-green, with a depth to them that surprised me. They had a certain kaleidoscopic beauty; I could have watched them for days. Another odd afterlife effect, I supposed. I blinked away the distraction of them, saying firmly, “We’re not leaving you behind.”
* * *
Ike didn’t seem heavy at all in a basket tied to my back. We flew above the trees. I was surprised by a pang of sadness at leaving the nest, almost as if I were a chick leaving my home. But that was soon replaced by exhilaration. We were flying, actually flying!
Hours later I was dispirited. Below us were only trees, above us only bunches of white clouds. The basket now seemed as heavy as a bag of bowling balls. I was tired, but pushed on anyway.
“The forest goes on forever,” said Morris.
A sunbeam broke through the clouds. The sky looked like a painting. For a moment, I forgot myself and my heart lifted.
“Look at that!” called Morris gleefully.
“What do you see?” asked Ike.
“There’s an opening in the sky,” I said. “It’s big. And square.”
“Go there!” urged Ike.
“Okay but, after that, we need a break,” I said. “My arms are getting tired.”
The opening was farther than I thought, and I almost insisted on turning back, but was too excited about what I saw. I described it all to Ike. “A ledge made of glass, strong glass by the looks of it, because people are standing on it! People! They’re wearing steel armor and feathered helmets. Men and women, twice as large as humans, like ancient Romans. Iron helmets. Sentries I think.” When we got closer, they assembled into rows, placing bows on arrows.
“They don’t look happy to see us,” I said. “They’ve got weapons.”
“If they’re not pointing them at you, then you’re safe,” said Ike.
“How would you know that?” I asked.
“Just a feeling,” said Ike.
“Retreat!” shouted Morris.
“Too tired.” I landed on the ledge. I held my winged arms up, fatigued as they were, to show I was unarmed. Morris landed beside me with a thunk.
One of the sentries seemed to be the leader, with the others looking to her for instruction.
“I name you Thumbtack,” whispered Morris. “She looks like she eats them for breakfast.”
Morris never explained his naming, so I was distracted, and therefore not as terrified as I might have been by Thumbtack’s fierce expression.
“Why are you here?” Her voice was deep and sonorous, reminding me of a cello.
“We were in the wrong Heaven,” I said.
“What’s Heaven?” she asked.
Morris and I exchanged looks. “The opposite of Hell,” I answered.
“What’s Hell?“
“Never mind,” I said, “The important thing is that the place we came from is the wrong one. Meant for birds.”
“You’re birds,” she said, pointing to our wings. “Go back.”
“No, we’re people,” I said, pulling my arms out of the straps. “We made these wings. We need to be with our own kind.”
Copyright © 2023 by Susan Whiting Kemp
