Wheeling Gull Isle September

The fog was dispelling, the world was expanding and his family was no longer endless at sea. For long hours he sat upon a scrubby bluff with deep-set eyes staring out at the silhouette of mainland. In a trance he wonders about the kind who live there. The others- what they know, what they desire, and why they live at all? Do they hide in burrows among their great villages, looking to steal the island souls that should come out to them? Are they like the creatures of the sea, with fins and gills and scales? Do they have words and breath and tears?

The water is receding as the last warmth of summer wanes. Soon a bridge will form connecting their island with all that lay beyond.

ana was sick and ava did not know what to do.

the adults crowded around her, speaking in hushed voices. ava was urged to play. to go somewhere else, that ana would be okay and to stop fretting. to go play with her other siblings, to go find this or that. these small errands kept her busy and out from underfoot.

god was invoked. god did not answer.

besides herself, ava went to the beach to find psalm. if nothing else in this world, psalm's presence could sometimes soothe the girl. the turtle was indifferent to her. the turtle was a sea-strider, and came ashore in her tiny world to eat. the turtle was a symbol of another world -- an eye into another world.

instead of psalm, ava found judah. judah's gaze was transfixed across the narrow swath of ocean-water. what did he see there? what did he think?

ava stilled but did not approach. she cast her gaze across the choppy waves and wondered if the mainland had their own psalms and gods and anas -- and if they did, what were they like?

A break in the wind brings Ava to his nose. He runs his chin over one shoulder to spy the girl some distance away, bloodmark too-bright in the ambient daylight. Tempestuous at best was his relationship with the cubs. Some broad disconnect resides between their minds. But the prospect of a new other suffuses, the one he knew would come to steal his family away.

“Are you going there, Ava?” Is his first ask. “I’m not.” He’s decided this firmly.

“You can stay here with me. We can fish and learn to swim together and look at the stars and we won’t need anybody else.”

are you going there, ava? 

she shook her head in a solemn no. the mainland held no corner in her heart; besides, if she felt a stranger in the harbor, would it not be the same across the blue divide?

she came to a stop behind judah. the shore of the mainland was distant, salt and sea spray spreading in a haze above the pines which speared the distant tree line. what good would come of leaving here?

He shuts his eyes, the mainland disappears. When he opens them it’s Ava at his hocks, her dark fur tipped with sea fog, a film over his own snout too.

“You can be like Mommy and I’ll be like Daddy. You can talk to God and I’ll talk to... fish,” he shrugs. “We’ll hunt in the tidepools and build a fort on the port side. We’ll need driftwood and lots of reeds, for bedding!”

They’d construct a hopeful little world together, he decides, where absence can’t reach. Just them, God, and the sea.

“Oh- and don’t tell Mal.”

judah’s eyes fell shut; his soul in some other unreachable realm. her heart bladed by thorns as he spoke of a world that would never be; a world that would never come to fruition with ava within it.

for how could she speak to God, if she could not speak? how could she walk in His light, when he designed her as shadow? her gaze fell to the ground, collecting images of minutiae there: a thin stem of grass. thousands of tiny sand granules. an ant’s antenna waving against the wind.

don’t tell mal. her features darkened as she studied her feet. there was an edge to mal that unsettled her. she was Other, deaf to His grace - but malakai was fashioned in His make, and that fashion was a weapon.

despite her own conflict, she sensed a feeling of deep unrest in judah. she pressed her nose to him carefully, in the manner ana often did to her to reassure her.

it will all be okay.

wouldn’t it?

He’s caught off guard. Her touch is rarely given, it’s something he understands she’s particular about. His younger siblings have boundaries that the older ones don’t. He stiffens beneath even something so light as the press of her nose, because he understands the importance of it. She must really need him in that moment, before he realizes he must really need her, too.

He leans his own muzzle lightly against her cheek, thinking she must only be upset about her inability to speak and failing to take notice of the turmoil going on all around their island home.

“Did you know Mommy says God speaks to you in another voice? You don’t need to say anything out loud. You can just think it, and he’ll hear you! Look, I’ll try,” He closes his eyes and falls to silence.

Dear God,
Please help my baby sister.
Please listen to her,
even if it’s only the thoughts in her head.
She’s very quiet, but that doesn’t mean she has nothing to say.
Thank you for your abundant care. Amen.

He open his eyes, turning back to his sister. “Do you wanna try a prayer, Ava?”

their touch is fleeting — but the impression everlasting. a new emotion branded itself within the folds of her heart for judah — perhaps the only harbourling to show a moment of vulnerability towards the darklings. 

as he pulled away he spoke of mom, of god’s voice, and of prayer. ava felt a wretch in god’s eyes, but she knew god was important to her family — perhaps she could change the fact she was born outside of god’s light, if she did everything mom and judah said. 

her eyes sparked with doeful interest. as he bent his head in silent prayer her mind wandered; she would have been touched to know his words. 

ava amara tried her own hand at silent invocation:
dear God above i cannot hear;
bless mummy and daddy, bless the animals, bless psalm —
i hope she eats as many flowers as her heart desires 
bless my siblings, and Judah too
the only one to see light in me where darkness prevails
may we all do right and good and no harm befall us,
Amen

when she looked up Judah’s eyes were upon her. she smiled, though felt her words sank like a stone on an otherwise faceless and immovable sea. 

would He hear?

As always she is silent, but he knows beneath her softly closed lids that her mind weaves a song for God. Her brother wont hear it, but he does listen to the sea and the sky and how the mouth of the wind brings forth a strong whispering answer.

“He hears you! He hears you!” The breeze stirs through the threads of their coats. It might have been the natural churn of the breakwaves; it might have been God speaking in another voice.

“You know, I even think sometimes saying it to only you is just as important!” He reveals to Ava. At least, he thinks so. It helps remind him what he wants to be: good! And for Ava, he wants to be a good brother. Preferably the best one ever! But if it was only just a good one, well, that's ok too.

an unmistakable sound filled their little world. ava listened as the wind coursed through her -- a powerful song as old as the sky, and yet she still felt alone when it faded.

she opened one eye, and then the other. judah was excited - he'd heard it too. somehow that made it more real to ava, who still felt after all this time He did not wish to share His light with her.

she exhaled softly, managing a small smile. judah was kinder to her than the others - perhaps He favored judah because of how sweet he was. she looked to judah expectantly -- what now?

God heard. He and Ava were the evidence that morning, and he knew they would be in those days to follow. He used to turn to crying when came the fear, a guaranteed disruption to draw circles of attention from his parents and older siblings. He no longer needs tears. Now, as they sit along the shore, he can feel the peaceful invisible kingdom, not unlike the sands of Sweetharbor, who’s wind is always blowing in the direction of home.

It is to be never alone.
Maybe one day this can be his lesson for Ava, the thing he is meant to teach her. 

For now he reels backwards and beckons her with a bark, dread allayed and excitement renewed in their future plans.

that brief melancholy passed — like the wind it soared up past her and blew away. 

judah reeled with a bark, that timeless invitation of play. 

later she would cherish this moment as one of the last times she felt close to happy — that fleeting thing more fickle than the wind. 

for now sweetharbor burgeoned with the sound of child’s laughter and rays of brilliant sunshine along a blissful beach.