fawn

fawn

  By Nash Summers

  Ancel,

  People talk about how beautiful trees are in autumn. Arrays of oranges, yellows, and reds float from the branches and flutter down into their bouquets on the ground. Colors so vivid, they make the world look dull in comparison to their oversaturation.

  I’ve always wondered why no one talks about the beauty in winter. Or summer. Or all the tiny mixtures of seasons in between.

  Winter brings the crystals of frost to the blades of grass that are just beginning to change color. The air becomes cold, and just for a few magical moments, you can puff out a lung full of air and see the icy color of your own breath.

  Summer is full of being. Life isn’t a big enough word for summer because summer brings everything with it when it comes. It brings big storm clouds to drown out the sunlight, and so many shades of green, I couldn’t hope to count them in my lifetime if I started now and never did a single other thing.

  And then there are those times in between.

  Those are the times that take the crisp arc of winter and let it dance with the fresh grass of the spring. Or the times when the summer lakes start allowing the gentle ease of coolness on top of their waters. Or the times when the wind blows freely through the long stalks of grass and cattails, and twirls around the fields like it’s thinking of starting a hurricane.

  You? You’re all those special times in between.

  You’re those frozen moments that everyone forgets to breathe during. You’re what I reach out for, but just can’t seem to touch. You’re those hours of silence that pull themselves longer and longer until there’s nothing left of them but a faint memory of a Once Upon a Time.

  But don’t worry— I won’t forget you like you’ve forgotten me.

  I can’t stop fawning over your ghost.

  Rust

  Before

  As I walked through the tall fields of grass and weeds that surrounded me, I stared up into the clouds and daydreamed about Heaven. The afternoon sky was that pure, crisp blue that only seemed to exist in forgotten places or books with Happily Ever Afters. Wind blew through the tall stalks of grass, brushing them as easily as a musician runs their fingers over piano keys. Bright rays of sunlight shone down on my face, warming my cheeks like a kiss from a lover. And the smell— that fresh, robust smell of wheat stalks and lilacs wafted through the air easily like a calm fog.

  Everything sang together harmoniously like it always did. It breathed its own life and existed like it had been there since the beginning of time.

  I was in Heaven.

  Heaven was a small town. So small, in fact, that I figured no one outside of Heaven even knew we existed. But that didn’t matter, because to me, nothing existed outside of Heaven.

  It was one of those warm communities where everybody knew each other’s name, and no one locked their doors at night. When we had town functions, the entire town showed up, and if someone was missing, everyone else would know why. In a town as small as Heaven, everybody knew everybody.

  We had one traffic light in the center of town, and when it had been installed a few years back, it was big news. It was in the Heaven Herald and everything. We had two schools, but they were separated by grades. There was one shop for everything down on Main Street— a flower shop, a bakery, a toy store. No two shops ever opened that sold the same thing, and why would they? We had everything we needed here.

  The houses were all small and unique— each painted its own color with customized front porches that someone’s grandpa made, and driveways that flowed straight onto the road without even a curb. If someone new moved into town, everybody talked about it like a movie star was moving in next door. And then everyone would get together and make pies, casseroles, fruit baskets, and bring them to the house of the new member of our small community.

  A field mouse skittered past my foot and ran off toward my house in the distance, snapping me out of my daydream. My mother didn’t like it when I lingered in the field after school. She always said that I should come home right after school to eat and do my homework, and then I could spend the remainder of my evening chasing field mice and hooting back at the owls that hid in the grass. But what my mom didn’t understand was the pull that the field had on me. I loved the smell of the grass and the weeds, the familiar warmth of the sun and the moonlight, the paths in the dirt I’d been carving out with my feet since I was young.

  I continued weaving through the grass, much like I’d done many times before, but something was different this time. I stopped and looked around.

  In the distance, on the other end of the field, was a boy.

  And for some reason, just at the sight of him, my heart sped up.

  I had no idea who he was, which was peculiar, because I knew every other kid around my age in Heaven. But I definitely didn’t know him.

  His hair that swept low over his forehead was black like the color of the burnt coal in the fireplace back home. He was walking through the grass just as I had been, but his head hung much lower. The boy had to be older than me, if only by a year.

  Who was he? A new kid in town, maybe?

  I couldn’t help but stand there and stare at him, completely starstruck by seeing someone like him walking through the same field I was, as though it were the most natural thing in the world. Because it wasn’t— natural that is. I knew every part of this field inside and out, and I knew every person who set foot in it. I knew every pebble, every blade of grass, every twig covered in dirt.

  But I did not know him.

  And then, just when I thought my heart couldn’t possibly beat any harder, he turned his head and looked at me.

  I must have been hit by a stray baseball from Timothy and his little brother swinging a bat and tossing a ball in the field. Or I was having one of those freak accidents where my body suddenly burst into unexplainable flame.

  It had to be otherworldly, because when that boy with the raven-black hair and the crystal-blue eyes looked at me, Heaven wasn’t heaven anymore.

  Eventually, as though realizing I couldn’t look away, he turned his head to look back down at the gravel and dirt in front of him, and kept walking.

  I stood there and stared at the back of his head until he slinked through the wooden fence that enclosed the line of houses on the opposite end of the field from mine. After that, I kept watching the cracked, light-brown fence, waiting, hoping, that he’d come back out through the latched gate.

  I must’ve been out there staring at that fence for a long time, because before I knew it, my mother walked up next to me and asked me what I was doing. The afternoon glow had faded away, and the evening sky was taking its place. Air that brushed against my skin had gone from warm to cool, and my feet were beginning to ache.

  But still I mourned that the gate had not reopened, and I’d not had one more look at the unfamiliar boy.

  My mother slid my schoolbag off my shoulders, and took my smaller hand in hers. She began walking back to the fence that lined our yard, but I couldn’t stop turning my head to stare at the gate where the other boy went.

  “Rust,” she said, “what are you doing out here still?”

  “I think I might’ve seen a miracle, Mom,” I replied.

  “Oh? And what kind of miracle is that?”

  “A boy.”

  She stopped short and turned toward me. There was a look written all over her face that I would learn later in life was concern. It was concern for her strange, red-haired son who was made fun of by the other kids because of his constant daydreaming and fascination with things other people decided were odd. It was concern for her son who had just seen a miracle in another boy.

  But the look was fleeting, and soon it was replaced by a look I knew very well: love. She knelt down on the dirt and grass in her lovely navy dr
ess, and wrapped her arms around me tightly.

  “Then you should be thankful, Rust,” she said, “because miracles are special, and not everyone is lucky enough to see one.”

  I smiled into her long, strawberry-blonde hair. “I must be lucky. I’ve never seen anyone like him.”

  We walked hand in hand through the back gate of our yard and made our way in through the back door of the house. Not that I had a lot of knowledge of houses, but I’d always loved our house. It was a modest size, but big enough for my mom, dad, and me. The outside was painted bright yellow that my dad hated at first, but grew to love as the years passed. My mother said it reminded her of sunflowers, and anything that reminded her of something so beautiful had to be a good choice.

  My mother had always been like that— positive, sunny— and I think some of her good nature was given to me. My dad always said that I got all of my good qualities from my mom, and my not-so-good qualities from my dad. I was okay with that, since I didn’t think that my dad had a single bad quality of note. He was kind, and soft-spoken, and treated my mom like she was the sun that hung high in the sky.

  My dad came up to my mother and I when we walked in through the back door. When he took my schoolbag from my mother, he said, “Jeez, Rust, what are you carrying in here, rocks?”

  “Yes,” I replied excitedly as I kicked off my shoes.

  He threw his head back and laughed. “I should’ve known better than to ask.”

  Together we trailed up the few steps into the kitchen. My dad set my book bag down on the kitchen table, and I, taking a chair right next to him, began rummaging through my schoolbag.

  I pulled out a few rocks, each of different sizes and shapes. Next came the twigs and pieces of bark I’d collected. I set them all down on the table and sat back, proudly, hoping my parents would see the beauty in the things I’d found.

  My dad picked up a rock, and I watched in pure glee as his lips twisted up at the corners. He turned the rock in his hand.

  “Did you draw a deer skull on this rock, Rust?” he asked me.

  “Yes,” I replied. “And a bunch of bird feathers on the big piece of bark. Do you like them?”

  “Of course I do, kiddo,” he said as he ruffled up my hair.

  The first time I’d shown interest in the skulls, bones, and feathers that I saw at my dad’s shop, my mom was upset. She and my dad argued with each other quietly when they thought I was asleep. She told him that it wasn’t right for a boy my age to have an interest in things like that. I didn’t understand why, though. I loved animals. I was just interested in what made them work.

  My dad was the town butcher, and ever since I was young, I’d constantly hung around the butcher shop with my dad, watching, learning. My mom once asked me if I got upset watching what happens to animals after they die. I thought about it long and hard, but I told her that no, I wasn’t, because it was just another part of the life cycle. I understood that all living things died, and that once I was dead, I hoped there was some way I could help people even then.

  Still, it had worried my mom, so she insisted I spend less time at my dad’s butcher shop, and more time playing with other kids my age. It wouldn’t have been a problem if other kids my age wanted to be around me.

  I think other kids found me unsettling. I was fascinated by things that they found peculiar, and I was bored by things they found fun. I wasn’t interested in sports, or video games, or playing with toys. I wanted to sit in the silence and wait, listening, hoping that the silence would reach out to me and whisper. I wanted to collect feathers and sticks, and glue them together to make artful gifts for my mom to put up on the fireplace mantle. I wanted to learn about life through experience, by having it run through my blood and letting it wrap itself around me.

  My dad sat down in the chair next to mine and put his hand on my shoulder.

  “How was your day at school, Rust? Were the other kids nice to you?” he asked.

  Ignoring his question, I replied, “I saw a new boy in the field behind our house. He had hair black like the onyx rock you gave me last year.”

  “Is that right? I wonder who he might be. We don’t have too many people who move all the way out here to Heaven.”

  “I think him and his father just moved in this past weekend,” my mom said. “There’s a new boy enrolled in some of my classes. I think he might be your stranger in the field, Rust. He seems like a nice boy, but quiet.”

  “Do you know his name?” I asked hopefully.

  She smiled down at me. “Ancel, I believe he said.”

  “Ancel.” I whispered his name like it was a feather I was trying to hold only with the sound of my voice.

  My mom and dad left the room to talk, but I remained sitting there in the chair thinking of the raven-haired boy whose name would always be on the tip of my tongue.