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T h e  W a y  o f  D r e a m s : T h e  O r p h a n

The feathery guide

 

 

The following morning, Lara woke up hungry again, but cheerful and relaxed. She found John in the kitchen, preparing breakfast for her. She ate again too much and again had a bellyache afterwards. John just mirthfully jested at her rueful complaints, boiling water for digestive tea. He chatted to her about the new arrangements for her stay with him. In the following days, they got her clothes and shoes, while John was occasionally disappearing from the house bringing back papers and preparing some documents. One day he entered the house and cheered to her: “Congratulations! You are now Lara Gilmore, a former orphan.”

Lara smiled from ear to ear without a word, feeling a strange sensation in her belly.

“It’s called ‘happiness,’” said John glancing at her from aside.

“Is it? Am I?” she wondered by herself, but just grumbled benevolently at John.

 

John continued to tell her stories every night. During the days, Lara learnt the new routine of cleanliness and neatness in the house, as well as house chores John assigned to her. She learnt to sleep in a real bed as well. Growing accustomed to his quiet voice, she began to look forward to her nightly sessions. Sometimes the stories were told entirely by John, and sometimes he would ask her to invent their characters, parts or sequences. However, it was not all stars and stories for Lara. As the summer progressed, she was soon to find out how demanding the old man was. Much to her surprise, she was made to go to school.

“What does it have to do with stealing? You promised!” she exclaimed thoroughly disappointed and ready to leave the house for good.

“Do you think you can steal successfully from people who are smarter than you?” he responded with a devilish twinkle in his eye.

“What do you mean ‘smarter than me’?” she went against him spitefully. “They do not teach us anything smart or real at school.”

“’Real’? What is ‘real’ for you?” asked John in an interested tone.

“I mean… street life, stealing, how to manage...”

“That is ‘real’ for you so long as you like the street, and stealing food, and just surviving day by day to be your whole life until you die, the only and the biggest thing you ever want to have and to master. Is this enough for you? Because, you can learn only that too. I had in mind greater deeds. Masterful thievery.”

Lara, confused, did not respond. The orphanage and the street were the only real worlds she had ever known. The street was better than the orphanage; that was what she wanted, the better out of life.

“Lara, you can limit yourself to the street, but you can want much more,” he gently dropped his voice. “You can want everything.”

Could she? Did she? Lara wondered. “But I am just an orphan… and I steal,” she suddenly blasted furiously. “They don’t like me at school! We had classes at the orphanage, I hated them.”

“Did they hate you?” John guessed that ‘they’ meant school kids rather than classes or teachers.

Lara nodded, all tense like a little cornered animal.

“First,” calmed her John, “you are not quite an orphan. Your parents might be dead or far away, but they are still with you… in your mind and dreams,” he added to her  pained scowl. “Next, you will go to a new school where no one knows you. Let me remind you that we made an agreement: I am to teach you to become the best thief in the world, but you must learn what I ask you to. School is a must for good thieves. So long as you follow our agreement, you can live here, but you can break our agreement freely and leave any time you like. Now I am your guardian, if you want to accept me as such. If you stay, I shan’t ask you for anything more but to talk with me and learn with me, knowing that I am not your uncle, your father, grandfather, or anyone whom you must obey.  If you leave, you are on your own and there will be no consequences from your stay with me. You are free to choose, and this is your choice now. Will you stay or will you leave back to the street?”

Lara looked at him darkly. “I don’t believe you. I can’t have ‘everything!?’ And you promised to make me a good thief, not to go to school!”

John paused for a moment darting with his eyes in the air above her head. “If the bird with shining eyes and colourful feathers advised you whether to stay with me and go to school, or go back to the street, would you listen to it? Would you trust the bird?”

“I would,” answered Lara spitefully, “but it is not here.”

John smiled and relaxed. “Alright then. Let’s see what the bird has to say about this…” He paused and then his voice turned into mild and distant tapping of raindrops in a quiet night. I’ll ask you close your eyes for a moment…”

Lara shut her eyes without thinking.

“You can relax your body. Place your feet in a position where they can feel at ease. Let your arms in your lap hang freely. Feel how they are relaxing.”

John waited until he saw her little feet move apart, and her hands open up in her lap, fingers relaxing one by one.

“Now, imagine, just like you imagine fairy tales, imagine that the bird with shining eyes and colourful feathers is here in the room.” John waited until her eyes started moving behind her closed eyelids, and a slight smile curved her lips. “If the bird was here in this room, where exactly would it stand? Show me with your hand. And keep your eyes closed for a while.”

Lara slowly pointed her finger at her right shoulder.

“Is it as beautiful as you remember it from your dream? Describe to me what you see,” continuedJohn slowly.

“More beautiful… looking at me with those eyes… dark, very dark. It’s looking at me,” Lara’s voice also dropped down and became slower.

“Good. Now, look at its feet. Do you see them?”

“Yes, they are plain claws, just like chicken’s,” laughed Lara.

“And what about its wings, can you see them?”

“Pretty. Each feather a different colour... each changes... Must be soft to touch.”

“Good. Now for the tail. Can you see the bird’s tail?”

“Yes, but it’s much longer than I thought,” exclaimed Lara opening her eyes. “John, it’s all green, dark green, and I can’t see where it ends. It melts there, far behind.”

“Close your eyes again, Lara” asked her John gently, “and look well at the bird with dark shining eyes… with claws like chicken’s… with feathers, each different, and each changing its colour… and with a dark green tail melting somewhere in the space behind…”

He waited until Lara slid back into the image of the bird. “And now, if the bird had a voice, what sort of voice would that be: a deep voice, or a tiny voice?”

“It’d be neither deep nor tiny; sort of mellow, in the middle.”

“And if the bird could speak with that mellow, ‘in the middle’ voice, would it speak quickly or slowly?”

“Slowly. But it can’t speak, it’s just a bird,” said Lara quickly and moved her hands.

“That’s what you think, but what does the bird think? Keep your eyes shut for a moment.” Lara’s body relaxed again. John went on: “And now, just say ‘Hello, bird’…”He waited. “If the bird could speak, what would she slowly answer in that mellow, ‘in the middle’ kind of voice?”

Lara raised her eyebrows. “Hello,” she said disbelievingly. Her eyebrows arched even further.

“What did the bird answer?”

“It said, ‘Hello, Lara,” answered Lara concernedly.

“Good. Now ask it: ‘Dear bird, would you like to help me?’ Repeat after me.”

“Alright. Dear bird, would you like to help me?”

“What happens?” asked John.

 “It says, ‘Yes,’” exclaimed Lara disturbed.

“Wonderful,” John seemed to be having fun. “So, the beautiful bird would like to help you… Look at the dark shining eyes of the bird. In your mind, show it the choice you have now; on one hand,” John slightly touched Lara’s left palm without startling her, “show it the street, with the orphanage in the background… and on the other hand,” he touched her right palm, “show it John’s home, with the school in the background. When you see clearly your hands and what is on them, ask the bird to advise you which one you should choose.”

A minute passed. Finally Lara spoke: “The bird says, when it looks at the left hand, that it hates worms. It says ‘Brrrr.’ It’ll fly away if we go to the street; worried about the worms. I don’t want it to worry!”

“And what about the other hand?”

Another minute passed. Lara started blinking behind her closed eyelids. “The bird opens her chest and somehow the house with you inside and the bird melt together.”

“Good. Do you like this melting together?”

“Yes, it likes it and I like it.”

“Ask it to tell you about school. Ask it what you asked me before, why learn all those stupid things they teach at schools.”

Lara suddenly beamed up. “The bird opened up her wings. Now, the feathers open up in small shells, and every shell is little picture. She says that I must open shells, and make pictures inside them, and this is all I will do at school. Open shells and make pictures. And the pictures stay with me.” Lara breathed deeply with mouth slightly open, raising her face toward her right shoulder.

“Enjoy the sight of pictures opening from the shells, in the feathers of the bird. Take a look at each feather and wait until it opens up. Take your time, and tell me when you finish,” said John gently.

He sat quietly beside her watching the girl’s blissful expression without any movement and waited. Time passed. Lara opened her eyes and looked at John. Her eyes were gleaming with light. She looked straight into his eyes without blinking.

“Are you satisfied now?” asked John mildly.

She nodded her head.

“And maybe you can also thank the bird for what it showed to you, right?”

Lara shut her eyes gladly and said sincerely: “Thank you, dear bird… The bird smiles, but now it tells me that it’s time to fly away.”

“Yes. Ask it if it will come back.”

“Yes, it says it will, if I ask it to come back.”

“That is good. So you can always rely on its advice when you are not sure what to do, right?”

“The bird says, ‘Right,’” answered Lara emphatically.

“Good. Now tell the bird goodbye... watch it fly away, and you can come back to this room any time you want.”

After a while, Lara opened her eyes, still beaming with light. She did not feel like talking.

“So, to repeat my earlier question. Will you go back to the street and the orphanage, or will you stay here with me and go to school? Think, you are not choosing just for today, or for tomorrow and next week, but for many years that will come. And you will have to work a lot in them,” John spoke seriously, “What do you want?”

“I’m staying here, John,” responded Lara with a firm, quiet voice, looking again into his eyes without blinking. “Thanks. For the bird and for everything.”

 

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