the Bees the Birds and a God

My field was bees and flowers and tall grasses. The wind let out its sigh; grasses and flowers swayed, the bees swaying too. They didn't seem to mind. They didn't pay attention to much besides the flowers. I paid attention to the bees and their flowers.

My hand was holding a cup, and the cup was sweating. It was too hot for the ice in it to stay long. It resisted, only to become dew on the outside of the glass. I let the droplets go, watching them soak into the dirt. They seemed determined to go someplace else. Once they left, I felt too alone. My feet were bare. The grass was pale yellow from long being under the sun and scratched my feet, which I didn’t mind at all.

"Good luck, bees," I told them. Then I let the rest of my water spill, soaking into thirsty ground. When I got home, my mother told me my feet were filthy and to wash them in the sink before she put dinner on the table. She'd made meatloaf, a side of mashed potatoes. Heinz was set on the table. There would be lemon cake for dessert, and then I would go to bed.

"I don't care if you sleep or not. Just go upstairs," my parents told me. Instead of sleep I would count the tiles on the ceiling and pretend that God was talking to me.

"You're not real," I told him.

"Then what do you think I am?" he asked me in my own voice.

"I don't know," I'd think. And God would hold his tongue. So I would go back to counting ceiling tiles. No matter how many times I counted, I never could remember the number. By the time I woke up, I’d forget.

God didn't talk to me every night, so sometimes I forgot about him too. Sometimes instead of talking to God, when he wasn't around, I practiced my kissing on my pillow. I needed the practice because I'd never done it. Kissing seemed like a holy thing, although my mother didn't think so.

"Can I shave my legs?" The question surprised her.

"Why?"

"I want to. Everyone else does."

You're too young." She didn't think it was appropriate. I didn't need to shave if no one was going to be touching my legs—which they wouldn't be, I promised her. It didn't make a difference. Smooth legs were for touching, which wasn't allowed. My parents didn't know I practiced kissing at night when they sent me upstairs. They didn't know I talked to God.

It was still summer today, so the field was tall and untamed. Next to it was a playground, and next to that was my school. All the parents had just spent years fundraising to tear down the old metal playground that burned your hands and legs when it was too hot. The plastic replacement was too bright, too childish. I missed the old one because my brother had used it when it was his school too. The old one had been for big kids.

No one was there now, but during school we played capture the flag every day. It was a little war, fought by two sides of 10-year-olds. We were as strategic as we knew how. They never let me go barefoot during it, though. War was an inappropriate time for bare feet. The teachers knew more about it than we did, so I accepted their judgement and command. When summer ended, they came and cut down the grass to make room for us. Without the grass, the flower, the bees would have no business here anymore.

On the first day of school, my mother walked me down the street to the crosswalk and watched me go inside, watched as I was swallowed up. When we later were sent home, frothing out of the big green double doors in a steady flow of frenzy and relief, I was left to get home by myself. I skipped my legs, making sure to jump over the sidewalk cracks and leaving myself panting and out of breath as I turned to run up the driveway.

There was a key on a shelf in the back of the garage next to oil and paint cans, near wrenches and a pile of rags. I found the key by standing on the tips of my feet, using it to unlock the back door and let myself in. Backpack discarded on the kitchen floor, shoes kicked off, I brought myself upstairs to strip myself out of the first day of school outfit, the unyielding khaki skort and blouse that had been chosen in the store for me by a saleswoman and my mother.

But inside my room was a little brown bird, perched tightly on a plain wooden cross hung over my doorframe by my parents as penitent decoration.

"Are you God?" I asked. She didn't answer except to open her wings and fly, throwing her tiny body against the glass window in search of a way out.