FirstLineFiction beta

from Contest #5

           A boy with a parrot on his shoulder was walking along the railway tracks. He seemed deep in thought, and I was struck by him, or perhaps his stunning macaw companion and I wondered what he was doing here, walking through a trash dump by an abandoned railway station. Where he was going? He didn’t look much like someone with a destination in mind, more like someone with a mind that destination would welcome. He wore an old sweatshirt that may have been dark brown a few years ago, but was now a dark and dirty grayish color.  His jeans were ripping out at the knee and fraying under the soles his worn out converse sneakers. A lock of sandy brown hair fell in his face; it must have tickled his nose because he stopped for a moment and brushed it away. His hands were dirty and care worn, he had the calluses of a  guitar player and they left trails in the dust on his face as he moved the hair. The Macaw bobbed its head and rocked up and down on the boys’ shoulder while it made a fast rippling noise, like a zip tie being pulled through, and cocked its head to the side, sticking its thick tongue out.  The boy smiled and reached up to stroke the creature gently. My curiosity got the best of me.

            “Hi” I said as I slowly took a few steps toward the boy, he looked at me with wide eyes that sparkled, they were intelligent and friendly but wary, and they were a shocking shade of electric green.  He raised his hand slowly from his side and waved, still stroking the bird with the other, he didn’t speak.  I took a few steps closer to him and stopped, just on the other side of the railroad tracks.

            “That’s a beautiful bird” I said, “How did you come by it?”

            “He found me” the boy whispered in reply. He smiled lovingly at it.

            “Found you?” I asked

            “Yeah, he just swooped down out of the sky and landed on my shoulder. About three weeks ago, he likes my shoulder.” He smiled again. His voice was pure, like satin, and full of innocence. I wondered how old he was, surely no older than sixteen.  I was completely taken in by him, intrigued.

            “You look like you’ve been walking for awhile. Are you hungry?”

            “Sure.” He sounded pleased and his eyes sparkled. He looked around at the ground and sat cross legged, looking up at me expectantly. I suddenly felt very awkward. I fidgeted with my purse and felt my cheeks get hot as I blushed. 

            ”I don’t have any food with me.” I told him “There is a café just over the road, about a block from here. I thought I could buy you lunch there. The food is very good, it’s worth the walk” the words poured out of my mouth thickly, full of embarrassment.  His face fell, and he stood up.

            “Oh” was all he said, he looked uncomfortable now and he sighed heavily, his eyes looked into mine with longing and sadness.

            “I’m so sorry” I whispered. I didn’t know why, but something about him made me feel like I should apologize, like I had been unforgivably rude. It was bewildering to be around this boy.

            “It’s ok.” He said, the cheer returning to his voice and his face, like my apology was enough to sustain him. He smiled winningly at me for a long moment. I watched as that smile slowly dissolved into the thoughtful expression I first seen on him.  The silence stretched between us, a chasm of nothing, reminding me how far I was from knowing him. I shifted my weight onto my heels and rocked forward nervously. As my toes came down onto the dry earth he took a step forward along the tracks, turning his back to me, he took another. He was leaving. My mind panicked. I felt my heart pounding furiously in my chest, my skin tightened around my mouth and eyes and my throat went dry. I stretched my hand toward him, brushing his sweat shirt with my fingertips.

            “Wait!” I breathed; my throat was so dry, that it sounded small. I was surprised when he turned and looked curiously at me.

            “Yes?”

            “Did you want to get some lunch?” I asked him again. I felt foolish as the words came out, like I was asking the wrong question, missing something that was obvious. I blushed again.

            “I stay on the tracks” he said simply, and he indicated the railroad tracks beneath his feet with a sweeping gesture.

            “But, I know you have a story to tell.” I insisted

            “No” he paused for a moment and smiled “You do.” Then he waved casually to me and turned, whistling a song I have never heard before and will never forget, and began to walk away again.

            “What’s your name?” I called out to his slowly retreating back

            “Marshall.” He called back “What’s yours?” he stopped again and turned, looking at me again with that expectant expression.

            “Michaela” I said “Michaela Jones.”

            “Now we know each other, Michaela Jones. Now we’re friends. So don’t forget me.” He said this gravely, but with a smile. Then he was gone.

 

            I stood for moment, staring unseeingly at the fading amusement part sign. I could hear my husband crunching through the debris of the old junk yard. I shook myself a little, then reached out and stroked the fading paint.

            “Yes” I said to it “We are friends, Marshall, and I promise to never forget.”

            “What was that?” My husband Jay called to me, I could hear the labor in his voice and I knew we’d be hauling home more junk than we would ever use, but I couldn’t help but smile jubilantly as I turned to answer him.

            “I want this sign for my office!” I called back and laughed. He came lumbering over a pile of old video tapes, arms full of trinkets that he probably thought were worth hundreds or thousands of dollars on-line.  He stopped for moment and stared at me as I giggled quietly, he must have thought I was quite mad.

            “Really?” he asked, incredulously. “You want this sign? Of all the things out here that you could possibly find interesting, this fading old advertisement is what you settle on?

I nodded my head, still laughing. I smiled sweetly at the love of my life while he tried to convince himself that I had not simply gone mad.

            “Well, alright.” He sighed and then picked up the backpack I had been carrying, but had dropped at my feet. He stuffed it full of his treasures and then slung it gently over his shoulder as he regarded one last time before hoisting the sign and headed for the jeep.

 

         We hung the sign above my small office window at home. I loved that window, all my adventures happened there. I could sit for hours staring out it at worlds that no one else could ever visit, unless of course I wrote them down. It was almost a year after I hung that sign and I hadn't produced a single novel or decent short story. My publisher was breathing down my neck and I was close to ten thousand dollars in credit card debt. My husband had taken a second job to try to help make a dent in our bills so it had been two months since I had been able to actually talk to him for more than twenty minutes. My office, which had always been a haven for me, was now a torture chamber, a place of slow deterioration. I blamed Marshall. After all I hadn't written since I brought him here, it had to be his fault. I stood outside my office door and glared at the faded boy in the sign. Hot tears of anger and frustration began to fall down my face and I sank to the floor. I think I cried for at least an hour, lost in my despair and disappointment. When I finally did look up again, it was Marshall I saw. That peeling, painted, smiling face. It was like he was mocking me and I lost it. I screamed and the sound that came from my gut was rumbling and high pitched as I stomped into the room and took the sign off the wall.

    "THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT!!!!" I yelled at the sign and then I stood in silence for a moment as my emotions roiled inside my head. I decided to get rid of Marshall then, not quite consciously, but not really subconsciously either. I knew this couldn't wait, it had to be done immeadiately, I had to save my career. I had to save my marriage and my credit. So this boy, this SIGN, had to go. I nodded once to myself, sharply and turned on my heel hauling the sign with me to the driveway. We hadn't been driving the jeep because my compact got better mileage and we wanted to save the money. I didn't care, I threw the sign in the back and climbed in with purpose. It was only a fifteen minute drive to the junkyard and what I was doing was an act of heroism.

    By the time I reached the "Railway Salvage Yard" I was a bit calmer. I parked in the dirt lot and took a deep breath, looking around. I hadn't been back here since the day I had met Marshall.

  "I stay on the tracks" he had said.

  "Well, back on the tracks you go." I said to no one as I got out of the jeep. I picked up the sign that I had befriended and drug it threw the dirt, back to the spot where I had found it so long ago. There was a pile of tires there now. I dropped Marshall on the ground and moved the tires one by one out of my way. Then I picked up the sign and put Marshall back where he belonged, just beside the railway tracks. I dusted my hands off on my jeans and turned to leave. I didn't feel accomplished or heroic as I turned my back on that boy, that sign. Instead, I just felt heavy.

   "Micheala?" It was his voice. I knew it, and I trembled. I turned slowly to face him and he was there. Not a sign at all, but a boy, his hair was a little longer, and his Macaw had lost a feather or two, but it was him. I felt the tears start again, slow tears, the kind that fall one by one from each eye, like they were being directed. He was smiling at me.

  "Did you tell your story?" he asked me.

  "No." I told him, my voice shaking. "I don't have any more stories to tell."

  "Oh." he said, and his face fell "I thought you were my friend, Michaela."

  "I thought I was too. I haven't written since I met you. So, I can't be your friend anymore, Marshall." I was too distraught to apologize for my actions, but I could tell he knew I was.

  "You have my story."

  "Your story? You said you didn't have a story."

  "No, I said I didn't have one to tell. You are the teller, you are the story maker. I'm just me, I just see things, I go places, wherever the tracks take me. My bird friend and I." and the bird dipped and cawed at me.

  "What?" I asked, stunned.

  "Do you want to hear where I've been, Michaela? I haven't had a friend to talk to in so long. Not one who can talk back anyway. Don't you want to know? Don't you want to tell my story?" His eyes were pleading with me, begging me to be his friend, to hear him out. I was planning to leave him here forever, to abandon him. After everything I had felt that day, I couldn't refuse him this request.

  "Of course I do, Marshall." I whispered.

  He smiled and clapped his hands and then he began to speak. He told me about the sad people of a city not to far along the tracks from here who had no colors in their world and how he had helped them. He told me about a week he spend alone in the plains expanse, and how he learned to hunt and build for himself. He told me how he fell in love with a girl that couldn't come with him, and how sad he was because he knew he could never stay. He told me so many stories, full of adventure and love and heartache, heroism, depression and always the will to go on. I sat there with him until the sun had gone down, listening to his stories. I thanked him when he finished, and then he vanished. I took him back to the jeep with me and all the way back home. I hung him back on the wall in my office, and then, I wrote them all down. All of his stories. I wrote until I fell asleep at my desk.

    That was almost three years ago.  I smiled to myself as I recalled those first encounters with Marshall and his Macaw and shook my head a bit to loosen up my curls as I came back to the present  in the dressing room.  I never would have guessed that he would lead me here. I was suddenly very nervous. I looked at the red dress I was wearing, knowing it was the latest and most popular style, and my Jay did say I look amazing in it. Of course, he is my husband, and therefore biased on the subject of how I look. I still wished I had gone with something more comfortable, or at least something I had worn before.  My matte black pumps didn’t seem like such a good choice now either. Oh well, too late now.

            “Just breathe” I whispered to myself. Then I heard the music, my cue to go on stage, to face the lights and the cameras. I could hear the host telling the audience that I was here. Telling them why I was there, and below it all, I could hear my heart pounding. I closed my eyes, and I saw him again, smiling serenely.

            “Hello, friend” he said. “It’s been a while. Are you alright?”

            “Fine.” I answered “Just a little nervous. They all want to know about you, what you are going to do next. What should I tell them?”

            “Tell them how we met.”

            I opened my eyes and I knew then, that it would all be ok.  I would walk onto that stage, greet the host and the audience, and take their questions in stride. I was Michaela Jones, after all, author of one the most beloved series of all time”The Wanderings of Marshall and his Macaw”. Devoured by children and adults alike, my books about Marshall were my legacy, they were my mark on the world. At least that is what I would say, to them.  Or, perhaps instead, I would take Marshalls advice and tell them how we met. I would tell them how it all started, and let him make his mark on the world through me. After all, it was his story. Wasn’t it? Of course it was.

 

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