Shredding Daisies (Chapter One)

Shredding Daisies

Chapter One: The Boy’s Orders

Johnny sings. I hadn’t known it before, but last night I heard him. It was late and I knew I shouldn’t have been up and I heard his voice faintly through my bedroom wall. He used to play his guitar at these hours of the night, and hearing his thoughts come through melodies of the mouth instead of strings caught me off guard. My brother had just gotten back from New York and for quite a while I had lived my life without hearing his fingers plucking me to sleep. It was nice, though, to have him gone from home, because in some way it had been the readying for him to leave us forever. Johnny was going to college up in New York and with only a few more weeks left of summer, Momma was in hysterics.

And I was pretty sure, as I sat at my window, listening to him, that my dad would be in hysterics too if he heard Johnny singing. It was apparent that my brother would go to college to study in business not music. Daddy wanted him to take over the bank once he, as he called it, became “gray”, which was odd, because for the past thirteen years of my life all I’d ever seen Daddy in was gray. Yet, nevertheless, there I sat hearing Johnny quietly sing himself to sleep in the early morning. Of course I wasn’t awake because Johnny’s singing had woken me, but because I had had a dream; and like most of my other frequent dreams I had been in the forest.

And I say the forest because that’s exactly where these dreams were – in the forest just to the side of our house. In fact I can trace the silhouette of the trees from my bedroom window; I can wake in the early morning to see young fawn just edging from the hedge. My feet have treaded over that cool soil in paths that I can walk blindfolded, and my nose has become so familiar with that crisp air that I can taste the pine needles in my restless sleep. While dreaming, though, everything that I’ve known so well about the trees, their roots, and their leaves becomes a little hazy, becomes almost blurred. All that I want and feel I know is The Boy. I call him this because he gives me no other name to call him by, no matter how persistent my asking is.

He never leaves, The Boy, he’s always in my forest in my dreams, waiting for me. I don’t understand why he waits for me, why I’m such a fuss that he finds his own ways to invade my sleeping thoughts at night. I do know that I’m glad he’s there, quiet and still and waiting. The Boy never speaks and maybe he can’t, but I speak to The Boy because I know he hears and I know he listens. He knows so much more about me and almost without him having to tell me, I know he knows of many things I do not. I’m almost positive The Boy is older than me, wiser, and stronger than me; but he is not intimidating. His eyes are dark but they are soft and if I ever had the chance to touch him I know his skin would be cool and calming like drifting water.

And it is in these dreams that The Boy resides. Mysterious dreams, they are too, for I cannot tell you how long I have had them or if they occur every night. Maybe I have always had them; maybe I’ve always known The Boy. I do know that I don’t want them to go away and that I often find myself thinking of The Boy and wondering what he would say to me. I imagine he would talk of the sky and how he wishes to touch the stars. I imagine his voice moves with the intensity of wriggling earth worms when he is excited. And I imagine most of all, that his mouth moves gently when he tells me, and only me, his most treasured secrets. Perhaps I’ll never hear his voice in my ear, but if I ever do I hope that is not in a dream; I hope that we would find ourselves face to face in the woods outside my window, our hearts loud but our voices quiet. Sometimes I write these hopeful wishes down, because my older sister, Nicole, once told me people’s true selves belong on paper.

She wants to be a novelist, Nicole does, and even though I know I could never write as well as her, I do try. I write about orphaned children and their pet cats, and I write about pirates and their longing to have a bride, and sometimes when it’s late and I can hear Johnny singing/playing his guitar I write about The Boy. I write about the trees that surround me, my open window, and myself finally talking to my dream sovereign. And then I hide these writings under my broken floor board that I convinced Daddy didn’t bother me and I never let on that my family walks all over my dreams day in and day out.

Johnny was apprehensively picking at his guitar strings now, his pretty voice still quiet yet solid. I stood abruptly from my box seat at the fogged window and crossed creaking floors to my dimly-lit desk. Slowly I pulled a thin sheet of paper from one of the wooden drawers and began writing about the dream that I had woken from just minutes ago.



Ella Nowells crept out her bedroom window as quietly as she possibly could. Her bare feet were stained and damp from the wet, green grass by time she reached the edge of the dark wood. She was not afraid. She had gone this path many times –



I could hardly see what my hands were writing. I lit my mother’s old gas lamp and smiled as the light spread across my desk and hands.



She had gone this path many times and knew where it led. Ella carefully pulled fallen limbs from her path as her feet made the steps they had pronounced many other musty nights. Once she passed the dark veil of the forest edge her heart began to pound, adrenaline rushing through every inch of her body. The full moon above shed enough light for her eyes to be content on the leering, looming trees ahead. Something inside Ella’s chest and mind kept her walking straight with a force and knowing that what lay ahead would be no threat. She was going to meet The Boy and he would be -



“Ella,” a soft knock came to my bedroom door. I gasped and scurried to hide my papers away. Quickly I pulled out my Bible from my nightstand and grasped in my hands. “Ella, it’s Jonathon.” And my brother slowly creaked the door open to expose his familiar face and expressions. Johnny was very similar to Daddy, in both voice and stature, but mainly in the expressions he made. You always knew their true feelings, my Dad’s and Johnny’s; their face could never hide anything. So neither of them spent much time lying to Momma.

I relaxed and set the Bible on my desk in front of me. “Oh, John, I thought you were Daddy,” I scolded him and he smiled, seating himself on my bed.

“Nah,” he said then became serious. “Do you know what time it is?”

I smirked at him. “Do you?”

He smiled again and eased himself onto my pillow, closing his eyes.

“How was New York?”

“Why, you asked me the same thing yesterday when I came home, Eleanor.” His eyes still closed and lips still curled.

“I know, I know, but I asked you in front of Daddy. What was it really like? Now, I know you didn’t spend your time touring historic scenery and the campus.”

“Nah, I sure didn’t.”

And I knew that was all I’d get out of him. But that was enough for me, as long as I knew I had been right. I set my mind wondering on other things as he lay, breathing in my bed. “How’d you know I was awake?”

He finally let one eye pop open and wonder onto my oil lamp. “That lamp nearly lit up the whole hallway. Didn’t Momma tell you not to play with her old lamp?”

I frowned.

“A blanket,” Johnny said, peeking up at me. “Stuff a blanket in the crack of the door and the floor and you can shine that light all night.”

I grinned at him. I knew he’d meant to rhyme. “You went and saw a band, didn’t you, Johnny? I bet you went to a show.”

“I did.” He admitted and sat up quickly. “You know, musicians in New York never went to college. They make enough to live off of their talent. Isn’t that something?” And in the light of my lamp I saw the expression he made most when talking about music. It was the expression where he tried to pass it off like what he was talking about was no big thing, but deep inside him it was the biggest. Daddy made this face when Momma asked him about money, or when Nicole or I got hurt in some way. I stood, sat on my bed next to him, and gave him a hug. We both knew he could never take the chance with money, a college education, or with Daddy. We knew it.

“That is something,” was all I could say.

“So…Nicole still seeing Bathis?” It was an odd way to break the silence, but it did the job.

“Yes. Did you know she told me she loves him,” I murmured. It’s not that we hated Stewart Bathis; it’s just that we hated his rich, snotty family’s slimly, stinky guts. I’d even heard Momma use the words “hate” and “Bathis” in the same sentence before, and she didn’t do that often, only about Daddy’s smoking.

“Montague and Capulet all over again, I’m sayin’,” Johnny said this mainly to himself. “But,” and he created a very animated sigh at this pause,” maybe she really does love him, you know?”

I frowned at him. “Johnny, they’ve been best friends since they were both old enough to talk; so, don’t make it sound like it’s impossible for them to love one another even at their age.”

He grinned at me, “Well, listen to you. I leave for a month and when I come back you’re speaking wise.”

I shrugged as indifferently as I could manage and as I stood from him and sat back at my desk, back turned, I sighed, “A month isn’t so long.”

“Ah, but a year is. Two and three years are. Huh?”

He couldn’t see, but I rolled my eyes. The day of his acceptance letter Jonathon had not let down his long leave, chiefly around me. It pained me to know my older brother would be leaving soon and I think all Johnny really wanted was for me to admit that. I wouldn’t though. Not until the minute he was gone and we both knew this.

“Nicole won’t miss me much either,” he said playfully as I pretended to be reading.

“Nicole will not miss you at all,” I assured him and he laughed. Then my Johnny, the one that had protected me and cheered me up for so many years, did something that I loved. He stood and kissed my forehead.

“One thing is for sure,” he said to me. “I will miss you.”

“And Nicole?” I asked him, pleased to hear he’d miss me, but not pleased enough.

He made a confused expression, “Who?”

Finally, I laughed and seeing this Johnny left my room telling me to “get to bed”. It was always his mission – to make me laugh – and once he’d succeeded he could go on with his day or night alone and contented. I didn’t stay up much longer, I’d lost my thought to write and so I folded what I had written neatly enough so that it could rest inside the pages of my Bible without being speculated upon. Then with tired eyes and heavy feet I let myself “get to bed” knowing that in sleep I would find The Boy just where I’d last left him.



I was running. My feet were as quick as my beating heart. The Boy was chasing me, his head back and laughing. Above us the sun’s light was being torn into pieces by lazy branches and saturated leaves. The world as we passed it spun – it was as if we were seeing everything from a still place on a rowdy carousel – and soon we both stopped, plopping in a grassy clearing and gasping in clean air.

“What’s your name?” I asked him between broken gasps.

He did not answer. I looked at him, my heart already sinking.

“Did you not hear me?”

The Boy lay on his back, eyes closed; taking in air like it was an intoxicating perfume.

“Hey,” I shoved him gently on the shoulder. His eyes opened and he immediately raised himself and sat Indian style in front of me. His expression was pleasant and his eyes had a puppy-like quality about them. “I asked what your name was.”

The Boy frowned at me and shook his head. His golden and shaggy hair swung in his eyes gracefully.

“I’m never going to get you to speak, am I?” I stared him down with exhausted yet desperate eyes.

He sighed as he stood, rising above me like an ancient tree. I let myself get to my feet as well and he took my hand and pressed a single blade of grass in it. Not understanding the strange and sudden motion, I shook my head as he did this. He closed my fingers around the green blade rather forcefully and I knew this meant to keep it. The Boy smiled at me and we walked together for the longest time, saying nothing.



“Ella….” Someone was sitting at the end of my bed, I could feel their weight tilt my sleeping body to the side. “Ella, you want to go to town with me?” It was Johnny. My eyes squinted themselves as I adjusted my body to the morning light pouring into my room. Unable to speak yet, I nodded glumly.

“Alright. Well, hurry up and get dressed then.” He stood from my bed and my body leveled itself on my mattress again.

“Uhmm,” I called to him and he stopped at my door. “Is Nicole coming?”

“Nah, you know she’s still asleep.” He gave a little laugh and closed my door, leaving.

“Yeah,” I swallowed as I got out of bed, stretching. “So was I.”

It was almost instinct for me to immediately trot to my window. Whenever I woke from my dreams I always had a feeling that if I looked out at the forest I would see the Boy treading back into the trees, having just left my thoughts. Of course, he never was, but I always checked. I brushed then braided my dark hair and made sure my outfit was appropriate enough for “going to town”, according to Momma’s standards, anyway. After making my bed I made my way into the kitchen where everyone (except for Nicole) was enjoying breakfast as well as the newspaper and other little conversations.

“Ah, Eleanor,” Daddy peeked at me from behind his newspaper which featured front page stories of a man and his fat award-winning pig, a missing child, and new local road construction. “Morning, child.” Daddy was always calling me child. I had asked him once and he told me it was because my eyes were young and so was my heart. I didn’t know what that meant, except possibly that I was last born. I seated myself on the opposite end of the table by Johnny who was completely engrossed by his plate of eggs and a tall glass of milk. He gave me a quick look, gulped from his glass, and then turned back at me with a white, milky moustache. I smiled at him.

“Are eggs alright?” Momma was over the stove, her hair up and her smile and apron on. “Ella?”

I looked over at her as Johnny wiped his mouth after Daddy cleared his throat rather loudly. “Oh, yes, Momma. May I have orange juice as well, please?” She nodded at me, shaking her head at Johnny.

“Eleanor, while your mother is doing that, will you go and wake your sister, please?” He had made his way into the funnies because they lay on the table detached from the newspaper. Daddy never had the time or the patience, he said, for “funnies”.

“Yes sir,” I murmured and walked up the stairs absent-mindedly. “Nicole,” I called as I reached the landing. I knocked on her door lightly and when I heard nothing I let myself in. There was no room in the house like my sisters. It smelled of ink and gorgeously scented perfumes all at the same time. Her closet door was always opened, exposing her colorful and fashionable clothing that seemed to matter so little to me. Momma told her time and time again to make her bed and yet she never did, but her desk was always spotless -I think she had her writing somewhere safe, just like I did. Her room stood as everything the house didn’t which was order, minimalism, and black and white. I had expected to find Nicole in her bed, her curvy body and thick hair spread out and twisted over her floral sheets, but instead I found her in front of her mirror, staring into her reflection.

“Nicole…?”

She didn’t even turn to look at me. She seemed upset or maybe fascinated by her appearance.

“My eyes are green today,” she mumbled. I relaxed a little. This was typical Nicole – always “dramatic” as Momma called it, Daddy called it, “immature”.

“Yeah?” Even though I wasn’t all too interested; she crossed the room to me, pulling back the skin above and below her right eye, as if this would help me see better. “Oh. Uh-huh. I see.”

“You know what that means, don’t you?”

I shook my head at her and she crossed her arms and shrugged. “I think it means my soul is changing. I think it means that today is going to be a little bit different than most days. It’s Gods way of telling me something is different, something has changed. I can feel it, too.”

I nodded.

“Dad sent you.” She said bluntly, her previous serene and vacant mood shoved out of the way.

“Yeah, Johnny and I are going to town. You wanna come?”

She shook her head. “Nah, that’s fine. Tell them I’ll be down in a few.”

“Stewart is coming over today?”

She smiled at me. “Your trying to guess why I won’t go to town. No, he’s not, but Cindy is coming over. You were close, I’ll give you that. So anyway, I’ll be down in a few.”

“Alright. Well, Johnny and I will probably be gone by then, so bye.”

“See ya, Eleanor Michelle.”

“Goodbye, Elizabeth Nicole.” And I closed the door on her rueful smile.





Johnny listened to rock ‘n’ roll in his beat-up truck. I didn’t mind it, and we drove steadily from our country home with the windows down and the radio blaring in conversational silence. That was one thing I love about Johnny, you didn’t feel like you had to work at talking with or to him. Any silence with him was comfortable and gladly taken.

“So aren’t you going to ask me why we’re going to town?” Johnny asked, glancing at me from behind the steering wheel. He turned the radio down, and I imagined how cool he must have looked to girls his age in his sunglasses and denim jeans.

I shrugged. “I guess any reason is good enough to get out of the house for a few hours.”

He nodded slowly, like what I’d said was very wise and worth a patient mull over.

“But…why are we going?”

Johnny laughed his loud laugh and made me smile. “There’s the curious Ella speaking. But, um, we’re going because I need to pick up some books for school.”

“Huh. Adventurous,” I murmured sarcastically and he nodded, agreeing with me. We made it off dirt roads ten minutes ago and now, in the near distance you could see buildings coming into view. All lined up across from each other like trees in an orchard. Johnny slowed the speed of the car so that we coasted through the tiny, parked-car-ridden street. Walking along sidewalks I stared at girls older than I in pale dresses and older men and women strolling, hand in hand. If it had been Momma driving – which she never did – she would have scowled me for “staring” and being “rude”. What I did was not considering staring I thought, it was a light look at people I’d probably never know past a decent, “Hello, how are you”. I think staring provided a sense of judgment or envy, which I felt neither as I “stared” at these friendly strangers from the car window. We parked in front of the library and Johnny took the time to stride all the way around his truck to open the door for me.

“Ma’am,” he said in his fake English accent. I smiled up at him, squinting through the bright sunlight that shone on his dark hair, making it seem almost golden. Guys who loved New York, wore sunglasses, and wanted to be musicians when they grew up had excellent fake English accents. He grabbed my hand and I hoped out of the car as daintily as I could. “Daintily” was Momma’s favorite word.

“Thank you,” I told Johnny in the best English accent I could manage, even though it was not so good, Johnny smiled approvingly anyway.

“Was there anywhere you wanted to go in particular?” Johnny asked as we stepped onto the sidewalk. “’Cause if you want to go off and look around I won’t tell Mom and Dad if you won’t.”

I grinned at him. Never had I walked through town without being as near to my parents shadow as possible. Somewhere, ever so slightly, I could hear the sound of a leash tearing in two. “Can I just walk around?” I asked him. There wasn’t much else, as far as stores went, that interested me in town.

“Sure. But just around on the sidewalk. Yeah?”

I nodded and he left into the library looking very tall and almost as old as my father to me. I immediately began down the sidewalk passed shining parked cars and reflecting shop windows. I’ll admit it wasn’t all too interesting – seeing the town alone was as much the same as it was with my parents.

“Miss Nowells?”

I glanced up from the cracks I was counting in the sidewalk and saw my school teacher, Mrs. Gnarbs. She had hair the color of rust and skin as spotted as a rotting pear. I hated Mrs. Gnarbs a little less than I hated Math Time, which she always made sound so cheery. To be honest, that’s a lot of the reason I didn’t like Mrs. Gnarbs, because she tried to make everything sound so nice when it really wasn’t. I was almost positive that if George Totterson, a boy who sat behind me and always breathed through his mouth, fell over and died one day during her class she would simply say, “Oh, looks like George’s time is up, children. Turn to page six-hundred and sixty six.” I also hated her because I was always spelling her name wrong. I spelled it, Garbs, and each time she checked my papers she would write with her little red pencil a tiny and very cheery ‘n’ between the ‘G’ and ‘a’. Her hand writing looked so simple and neat to my forced and messy letters that I almost felt like she was gloating. Mrs. Gnarbs, in fact, was a fan of gloating in some way. She would always use very cheesy words like “wonderful”, “glorious”, and “fantastic”, in her sentences, just to spice them up. I hated that. And there she stood, greeting me, and I knew I had to swallow hard and greet her right back.

“Hi, Mrs. Gnarbs,” I did my best to smile and apparently did enough to please her smiling face into an even bigger, phony grin. Sometimes I imagined what Mrs. Gnarbs would look like without a smile plastered onto her clean face, but it was hard.

“Well, it’s so nice to see you. Yes… How’s your summer been?”

I shrugged at her, my smile vanished. “Alright I guess.”

She nodded like what I had said was very interesting. “Hmm, how ‘bout that. Yes.”

Ah, and there it was. Another reason I wasn’t so found of Mrs. Gnarbs was because she was always saying, “Hmm,” and “Yes,” in almost all her sentences.

She suddenly looked rather confused and looked around as if she was just remembering something. “Where are your parents, dear?”

“Oh, I’m here with my older brother, Johnny.” I informed her, faintly pointing behind me. “He’s in the library picking up books for college.”

“Ah, I see. Well, that’s nice. Hmm, well, then.”

This was the part that adults ended the conversation. Normally Daddy would shake their hand and say, “Have a nice day,” and Momma would say “It was a pleasure speaking to you again.”

I smiled at Mrs. Gnarbs and said, “Well, I’ll see you in school.”

“Oh, yes, mm-hmm. Keep up your reading and have a wonderful summer, Miss Nowells.”

“You too,” I called and we went our separate ways. I sighed in relief once I reached a corner and hid behind it almost childishly; but the woman was horrible and there was no changing my mind there. I sat down on the sidewalk as lady-like as I could manage and rested in the shade the cold brick building provided me. I hadn’t been sitting long before a door a ways down the building busted open. Two boys around Johnny’s age come out of the building already rummaging and lighting their cigarettes, they were talking loudly to each other. I’ll admit, I jumped a little at the sudden sound and movement but I didn’t make a sound as I stood and edged back around the corner carefully. From where I stood I heard their conversation clearly.

“Nah, I haven’t yet - tryin’ to think of a way to break it to my mom. My old man already knows, of course, and he doesn’t mind none.”

“Yeah, well, not that you should hurry none but it’s not a big deal, you know? I mean, I don’t have a mom to ‘break’ it to, but….”

“Not a big deal?”

“Exactly.”

“I might as well do it today. I mean, hell, I can see the place right from where I’m standin’.” And as they both chuckled I turned my head to see what they were talking about. It was the old grocery store which had recently been replaced with another down the street. I didn’t see anything about it that made sense to their words- just an old run down building with colorful posters some of the windows. You could see in from where I stood and I guessed the boys could too because just as my eyes were taking in a man at a desk and another man leaning over the desk, one said:

“Hey, who is that signing up right now? You know him?”

“Huh, who the hell is that? Nope, sure don’t know him.”

Silence. I recognized the man leaning over the desk, the one “signing up right now”, was Stewart Bathis. I frowned in confusion to understand.

“He doesn’t look much for the war, does he?” One finally said and instantly I understood, instantly my frown became much deeper.

A laugh and then, “Nah, sure doesn’t. Maybe they’ll find some dumb reason during his physical to turn him down.”

“Yeah, he’s probably some sort of faggot, anyway.”

“Huh, probably.”

And I heard them stomp out their cigarettes and proceed back through the door. As hard as it was, I slowly peeled my eyes from Stewart, smiling and shaking hands with the man who was letting him sign his life away, and proceeded back to the library already knowing I would not tell Johnny.







The forest was not how it normally was in my dreams. The trees were darker, less leaves hung to their crooked, stretching branches and there was a thin layer of spooky fog at my and the Boy’s ankles. Even the Boy was different – his eyes were even darker than usual and his skin pale and slimy looking – and I was frightened by him. I stood by a tree as I watched the Boy pace before me, his eyebrows furrowed and his mouth tight. I, of course, had asked him what was wrong but he wouldn’t send me a glance or any sign that he even knew I existed in this world with him. Biting my lip out of frustration, I grasped onto the tree beside me for something to lean on and then immediately screeched and proceeded to jump back in surprise. The bark had cut my palms and fingers like it was created of razorblade and broken glass. The Boy stopped his pacing and grabbed my aching hands, he stared at me with bewildered eyes. He ran his hands over the blood that was surfacing itself in wonder and amazement.

“It’s okay,” I told him, pulling my hands away from him because, to be honest, he was hurting me. “I’ll be fine. It’s just blood.”

He shook his head at me and pointed at my bleeding hands, then shrugged.

“You don’t know what blood is?” I held my hands up to him. “Haven’t you ever been hurt?”

The Boy shook his head vigorously at me, as if I was missing something completely. His golden fingertips reached themselves awkwardly down his body as he bent to touch the grass. He once again grabbed one of my hands and shook it in my face. For once, the Boy seemed as frustrated with his inability to speak as I always had been; his mouth tilted sideways and his expression was defeated. Then, before I could say anything else, he came up as close as he could to me and whispered in my ear:

“Tell her.”

I gaped at him as he grinned at me, and suddenly the forest was returning to its normal self. The trees bark was as soft as velvet and the fog at my feet slowly evaporated until I could see the sun on the Boy’s golden skin again. I felt the blood oozing out of my skin rapidly pull itself back into me with a strange and tickling sensation. I raised my hands to see them perfectly healed, as if nothing had ever happened. A loud knocking sound echoed through the forest and its trees quivered, as did the Boy, until finally I saw only blackness.



Someone was knocking on my door and telling me to wake up, it was Sunday. I let my eyes wonder open and stare blankly at my ceiling for a moment, letting sleep roll out and off of my body. The sun wasn’t even up yet I could tell as I stared vaguely out my window until I bolted up in bed, remembering my dream. I almost squealed, grinning, as I jumped out of bed and ran to my window. There was nothing there – yet again my hopeless dream of the Boy being real was shot down. Daddy was knocking on my door again and so I called to him, telling him I was up and getting dressed. Of course I was not “up”; I was sitting at my box seat staring down at my feet and imagining fog slinking around them. My mouth twitched into a small smile until I remembered why I was so happy. The Boy had spoken! And yet he had not told me anything as beautiful as I imagined he would, instead he had given me advice. “Tell her”. Tell Nicole. I didn’t want to mention what I had seen Stewart doing yesterday afternoon, but if the Boy told me to… I would. Suddenly I felt very sick, my stomach was a raging sea inside my body that wanted violently to get out. I ran to the bathroom, past Momma and Johnny, and proceeded to throw up.

“Eleanor!” Momma gasped in her lovely voice and I could hear my brother’s strong footsteps follow hers to my side. Johnny took one look at the mess I’d left in the toilet and then walked, at a pace, out of the bathroom to find Daddy. “Honey, did you eat something….Are you running any fever?” Her right motherly hand was covering my sweating brow, as her left was busy grazing through my long hair.

“I don’t know. It was very sudden.” I answered as I flushed the toilet, breathing heavily and trying not to cry. I was always crying when I vomited, always. When my mother said nothing in return I finally gave her a glance just in time to see her pulling out what looked like a piece of grass from a strand of my hair.

“Ella, have you been going out into that forest at night? You’ve probably gotten yourself sick from the cold out there! I can’t believe after all the-”

I cut her off by grabbing the blade of grass from her and staring at it like it was the hand of God. Before Momma would have enough right to become mad at me for “not listening” I turned back to her and shook my head.

“No, no. I haven’t, I promise. It’s really not that, Momma. My illness is very much a random happening than an actual build-up of anything else.”

She believed me, and after Daddy came and squatted next to me, feeling my head and putting his hands on my chest, they all left for church except for Nicole who had volunteered to stay and watch me. Daddy didn’t want Johnny to because apparently there would be successful business men and potential future references at the service that Johnny just “had” to meet. It was perfect, and if I didn’t know better myself I would have said I’d faked sick just to get my alone time with Nicole. That wasn’t the case, however, because I laid myself back into bed where my stomach continued to gurgle while Nicole cooked some soup in the kitchen. It was in my bed that thoughts invaded my mind. Was this the blade of grass the Boy had given me the other night? The one he’d made me keep all through my dream even though it had seemed silly? If so, was that why he’d acted to strange last night; tugging on my hands and motioning towards the grass? I didn’t understand, if this was the case, what the logic was in me keeping a piece of grass? And then of course there was the practical side in me that told me there was no mystery to be solved. The side that assured me that the grass was a coincidence, because the Boy was just in my dreams and wasn’t capable of competing with anything in reality, even so much as puzzle-bits of plants.

I had the grass pinched between my thumb and index finger as I dragged it up and down my palm, with vacant and thoughtful eyes. The feeling against my skin alongside the coziness of my warm bed and Nicole’s soft humming from the kitchen slowly drifted me to sleep. When I was finally woken up Nicole was walking into my room with a tray of mouth-watering-potential-soup. Without being asked to, I sat up smiling at her vaguely.

“Feeling better?”

I nodded, positioning my pillows, until I suddenly stopped. I looked at my hands to find them empty, leaping out of bed I pulled back the covers, my eyes searching for green when all they saw was white.

“Don’t touch anything,” I warned Nicole.

My sister stared at me as she placed the tray on my desk gently. “What is it?” She whispered as if the situation caused for my most hated library custom. I didn’t answer her, I didn’t even so much as glance for her. I was on my knees gazing under my bed and at the floor around it, like an anxious pirate for his lost horizon. I felt like crying, like being angry and sad and overwhelmed all at the same time. What was making me feel this way? It was only a torn shred of grass. But I knew. I knew it was more, deep inside the thought I couldn’t shake was that I’d lost the only gift, the only proof I’d ever had of the Boy. I was furious at myself for being so careless. It should have been locked up, kept beneath the floor boards along with my writing where only my eyes could touch it.

“Ella, if you don’t answer me….You’re scaring me. What’s wrong?”

Sighing deeply, I stood and turned to my older sister. Her thick hair wasn’t hanging itself around her gentle face, but pulled back, and her face was flushed from cooking my soup. I shook my head at her and sat on my bed, my jaw clenched and eyes veiled. I didn’t know where to begin, or if anything running through my mind even deserved a verbal beginning. Then at the very moment I opened my mouth to speak, so did Nicole, and from her lips escaped a horrified yelp. She leaped from one side of my room to the other, her hands flailing above her head. For a second I thought she was attempting to fly but was unable to laugh at the scene.

“Get it off, get it off, get it off!” She recited and I was at a loss of replies or what to do. Nicole stopped and without moving her tensed body an inch she looked to her left and then her right. “Where is it? Did you see it? Where did it go?”

“Nicole, I didn’t see anything!” I exclaimed, shaking my head, a bit dazed. Her eyes became wide and she quickly threw her index finger to her lips, shushing me. Then slowly, so slowly that I became a bit bored, she pointed to the end of my bed. I turned just as slowly to see….What did I see?

“What is it,” I whispered, still not understanding.

She shook her head something fierce at me, “It’s a spider! A green spider! Have you ever seen a green spider? Oh my lord!” She clasped her chest, dramatically and closed her eyes.

“Green….”I murmured to myself, staring back at the tiny thing at the end of my bed. With creeping and cautious movements it took me what seemed years to situate myself close enough to the “spider” to evaluate it.

“Kill it,” Nicole advised me, handing me her shoe without hesitation.

“Not on my bed….” I told her, swiping her shoe away from me. I kneeled ever so slightly so I could be eye level with my bed, and as I heard Nicole whisper warnings of “careful”, and “not too close”, I was finally able to conclude that my sister was not insane. It was a spider – it was a green spider. A green spider that interestingly had the exact shade and texture of grass. With trembling fingers, I reached up to touch the little thing but it twitched and jumped further from me with impressive speed.

“Hello, little spider….” I whispered and reached yet again in want to touch it. A bit wiser now, though, I simply let my hand rest on the edge of my bed, palm toward the sky and waited. “Nicole,” I called her over and she reluctantly came, kneeling at my side. “It’s not going to hurt you. Look….It looks like an origami spider.”

Nicole grinned, a happy notion, although her eyes were dead and worried. “You’re right. It’s like someone folded up green paper…. ‘An origami spider’, that’s good.”

We both stared as the tiny thing seemed to be getting courage to trust my waiting and anxious hand. “No…not green paper. Grass….Nicole, it’s grass.”

“What do you mean, ‘it’s grass’?” No way can a spider be grass. Are you and Johnny at a joke? Is it tied to a fishing line somewhere or-”

“Shh!” I snapped at her as the spider finally made it to my hand. It didn’t bite me; it just rested there staring up at Nicole and me with no eyes and eight legs. We both sat silently, studying the creature with both awe and incredulousness. After awhile, Nicole asked to hold the origami spider and I let her as we watched, fascinated, as he ran up and down her arm harmlessly. We were giggling as it tickled her, when Nicole suddenly stopped and stared intently on my ear.

“What?” I asked, immediately raising my fingers to where her eyes were piercing.

“Well, it’s just…” she put the spider on my bed so she could move more freely and touched my ear. “Your ear looks swollen and red. Like, something bit it. Does it hurt?”

I shook my head, frowning at her, feeling my ear again. “I don’t feel a thing.” We both turned our heads to look at origami spider and it just stared back, almost innocently. “I guess….Huh, I don’t know.”

Nicole’s frown became deeper as she let the spider wander around on the palm of her hand, she stared down at the tiny green creature, vaguely. I knew this was it, this was my chance to tell her, before the family arrived back home.

“Um, Nicole,” immediately the skin around my face became warmer and my heart pounded in my chest as I realized what I was about to do. “I have something to tell you. Something, I’ve been neglecting to…well, mention.” My beautiful sister let her eyes linger on my face, nodding, then back down to the spider. It was apparent she couldn’t see that what I was about to say was important, possibly life-changing.

“You see, when I went to town the other day with Johnny, I…. I saw something that might, well, will unsettle you.” Then I had a hook in her cheek, she stared at me with a worried expression. I floundered at that point, pierced by her blue eyes.

My sister touched my hand lightly and said, “Ella, whatever it is, just tell me. Tell me anything.”

“Right,” I took a deep breath. “Well, I heard these two boys talking and then I saw through the window….” This wasn’t making sense to her, she furrowed her brows. “I saw Stewart signing up for - I saw him shaking hands with this guy and then the two boys were like-” I sighed loudly, my lips trembled.

Nicole was standing now, the spider resting on her shoulder quietly, as if it too could understand the suspense of the moment. “You saw Stewart signing up for what, Ella?” Her voice was cold her face a frozen expression of indifference and at the same time knowing.

“He’s joined, Nicole.” I took the time to gulp and stand so she wasn’t as intimidating. “Stewart’s joined the army.”



The spider at her shoulder leaped into the air then proceeded to fall to the floor, not as a spider any longer, but as a blade of grass. Slowly it floated down Nicole’s long body, almost in slow motion, and by time it reached the wooden floors we heard our family come in through the front door singing cheerfully a gospel song from the service. Nicole was crying when Momma came into my room to check on me and at that moment it hadn’t mattered if I’d still been sick, everyone was holding Nicole, watching her, and caring for her as best they could. I faded into a corner, my blade of grass in hand. I’d done what the Boy had told me to do.