The Sound of His Wings

by Michael Bledsoe

---

In the earpiece I heard her phone ringing for the seventh time. I knew she was going to be mad, but I had to tell someone, and she was the closest to a best friend I had. I also knew she would not call the men in the white coats.

Then the eighth ring broke in the middle and a female voice that sounded more dead than alive answered with a vague hello. Well, sleep does that to some people.

"Hi, Ann. Watcha doing?"

Somehow, I could not resist that line. I knew that it combined with my cheery alert voice would really wake her up.

"What do you think I was doing at three o'clock in the morning, Jason? Taking a lunch break? Really I think you're trying to drive me as crazy as you are." She said in a voice that was loud enough to deafen.

I was prepared for this, so through the onslaught I held the receiver about a foot from my ear and still heard her with perfect clarity.

"What," she finished, "do you want at this time of the night?"

"Actually, it's morning, as you said earlier, and who said I wanted anything?" I answered calmly. Static filled silence stabbed back at me from her end of the line, so I waited.

"Okay, Jason. Say what you're going to say. I know you want me to talk too," she said resignedly, "but I've got to work tomorrow, even if you don't and I need my sleep."

I was crushed.

"Ann, you spoil everything."

"Good! Now get on with it. I know you won't rest until I listen. So tell me, then I can get some sleep."

I sat in silence. Maybe I should have waited until tomorrow. Maybe I...

"Jason, are you there?" Her voice cut through my thoughts with it's suddenness.

"Um...yeah. Ann, go back to sleep. I said. Feeling very wary all at once. "It wasn't all that important. I'll tell you about it later."

I hung up the phone and wandered toward the bedroom. Maybe I really did need some sleep. I had been up more than twenty hours already.

Then the phone rang. I had expected it, and I went slowly back to answer it. "Yes, Ann." I said, knowing it had to be her. Who else would call at three-fifteen, on a weekday morning?

"Okay, Jason, okay," she said quickly. "I'm sorry. Tell me please. I apologize. And you know I can't sleep until you tell me what you called for." She sounded awake now, and her apology made me feel a little better.

"Well, since you insist, I'll tell you," I said. She didn't even try to cover her groan. "You know how I like to walk in the woods when I'm trying to write and can't get inspired?"

She muttered in an affirmative way.

"Tonight there was a full moon," I continued, hoping to build the suspense of my story, "but the clouds seemed to be hiding most of the stars. Well, I came out from under some trees, and just happened to look up. The clouds broke then. I saw it, it was just flying across in front of the moon..." I trailed off, trying to think of the best possible description.

"What was it, Jason?" asked Ann, her curiosity piqued "A rare bird...some new kind of jet? What?"

"You know," I struggled with the words, "it looked the most like Pegasus, but, oddly enough, it had a silvery horn, like a unicorn. It's wings and hooves seemed to be made of silver, pure silver." My voice had faded with the awe in which I held the creature. "It looked to be about the size of a horse. Just think of the wingspread it would have to have," I said in a voice that was barely audible.

There was a shocked quiet on her end of the line.

"Jason, go right to bed. I'll be right over as soon as I can get dressed." Ann said quickly.

"What?" I asked the dial tone. She was already gone

I was in the kitchen, making tea, when she let herself in. I stepped out of the kitchen right into her arms.

"I told you to be in bed," she said reprovingly as she disentangled herself.

When she had freed herself, she held her hand to my forehead and, kept it there a second or two.

"I was thirsty." I said, feeling like a child. I tried to kiss her as the kettle started to whistle, but she ducked me. I went back to the kitchen.

"You've got a fever," she said from behind me with a voice full of worry and concern.

"No, I've just got a higher than normal temperature. As long as I can remember I've had a temperature that's been about three tenths of a degree above the average.

"Come on, Ann, I'm not sick. Just calm down. I'll tell you the story again. I really believe I saw what I told you about."

"Show it to me."

"I can't. It was gone almost before I saw it. Anyway, that was over an hour ago, out by the swamp."

"Jason, are you picking at me again?" She sounded tired, so I guided her over to a bar stool, and she sank down onto it.

"No, 11m not picking, I feel terribly serious. Just look at my pants, they prove that I went to the swamp."

Ann glanced at my mud stained jeans and sighed.

"That does not prove that you aren’t picking. It just proves you went walking in the swamp."

"But I did see it." I pleaded.

Ann sagged a little as she sat and closed her eyes. She just couldn't get used to the kind of hours I kept. I crept up to her and tickled her. The barstool had put her at just the right height. She screamed and jumped away. I tried to look innocent as she glared defiantly at me.

"You were lonely, and made up that silly story to lure me here, didn't you?"

I shook my head. I could tell she didn't know what to think now.

I shook my head again at my own thoughts. It was hard for even me to believe, and I was the one who had seen it. Well, that's the way it goes, if it's going to go; mind and all.

This sunset was the most beautiful in the world, truly magnificent. I was glad that this was the night we had picked to wait for the "whatever." I've never been able to name things. Friends and other people name my poems and stories for me, so I waited for Ann to come up with a name, but as yet, she still hadn't seen the "beast."

"Beast" what a horrid way to describe the perfect symmetry and beauty I had seen, no not seen, experienced. Yes, beast was a lousy word. And, usually I, the writer, was supposed to be able to express myself well with words. At least that's what I'd been told countless times over the years. It is funny how editors never seemed to agree with these people. At times it can be really depressing.

"Jason, for your sake, I hope we see this thing tonight. When do you think it will come around?"

Ann squirmed around trying to find a comfortably dry spot on the rug we had brought as she said this. I had found the driest spot in the area that had an unobstructed view of the sky and still it was pretty damp.

"First off, I don't know if we will see it at all," I said. "Second, I saw it the first night about one-thirty in the morning and it's only seven p.m. now. I think we have a short while, at least."

"Then why, for heaven's sake, did we have to come out here so blamed early?" she asked, her exasperation chilling her words.

I was ready for that question and pounced for the kill.

"How would you like to find a dry spot in this swamp after dark, without a light?" I asked with smug glee. "A light might scare the thing off. Right?"

"Dammit, you're always so logical in your planning," she said as I put my arms around her. It was a little chilly after dark, even in late spring.

"Somehow, I never saw myself as logical. I always thought I was an everyday, emotional poet," I paused "hmm...you learn something new everyday."

She hit me, and it hurt. I had a feeling it would be an interesting evening.

Three hours passed easily. Ann lay against my side and dozed. I was once again alone with my thoughts. I wondered if I had really seen anything. It might have been a large bird, after all I had been very tired, and it had been very late. But my eyes had never played tricks like that on me before.

Ann stirred at my side and my mind turned to thoughts of us. We hadn't been together like this for a long time. With her job and school, she'd very little free time. School and a part time copy-writing job for the local paper seemed to have eaten away all my time. I hardly had time for my poetry and music, much less late nights with a girl, even a very special girl. Our youth seemed to be leaving us behind. In the night air I felt much older than only twenty-three. Time was marching onward. In the seven years of trying, I'd only two pieces published. Both were in little circulated magazines, and I had not had a single poem published.

Such depressing thoughts soon tired me and then, before I knew it, I too was asleep.

I jerked awake and looked at my watch. It was already two forty-seven. My abrupt movement awoke Ann, who looked around, startled.

"What time is it?" she asked, trying to suppress a yawn.

"Late," I muttered and started to get up, but I suddenly changed my mind. Ann felt my body go rigid and quickly looked up.

Across the night sky he streaked, his head thrown back proudly. It seemed that he was no more than twenty meters above the ground. I saw with unmistakable clarity the rippling of powerful muscles under the pure white coat. His pristine mane danced playfully in the wind. His silvered wings majestically beat time across the sky. He was a silhouette of magic against the sky-filling moon, a beautiful thing of fantasy, on the very wings of night. I glanced to my left at Ann and simultaneously the creature's eyes fell upon her. Their eyes locked for a second and she seemed to tremble almost imperceptibly. Then he turned and with a great leap upward climbed toward the clouds. As he entered the mists of the skies, two mere landlocked humans with muddy shoes stared in awe at the last glitterinqs from the bright silver that made up his hooves and horn.

As quickly as he had come he was gone.

The silence that encompassed the swamp was almost thick enough to see as I falteringly pierced it.

"Ann...you...saw it...it was there...wasn't it?"

I was shaking, though I'm not sure why, and Ann was speechless. There was a faraway look in her eyes as I gathered our things.

"Jace, I'm sorry, really sorry," Ann said shortly after we returned to my house.

"What?" I asked uncomprehendingly. We had said nothing during the brief stumbling journey through the swamp to my house.

"I didn't believe you. I couldn't believe you. What sane person could? But I saw it, and even now I still can't believe it." She said. She was crying, but now I was angry.

"You couldn't believe me," I said, trying to keep a reasonable tone "You were the only one I trusted, the only person I thought I could tell." I sputtered out. Somehow it wasn't worth the trouble of a fight.

"Try to understand, you've said crazy things before, trying to get us together for a while, like we used to do. It just seemed like another one of your tricks.

"I'm sorry." She said, then she tried to turn from me, but I held her.

"You're not sorry, and you never have been, or we still wouldn't be together," I said coolly. Then my words warmed as I continued, "To tell you the truth I wasn't really sure that I had seen it until I knew you had seen it too. I'm glad you did too, because I was beginning to doubt my grasp of reality. I was beginning to wonder if, finally, all the synapses in my brain had become cross-wired."

I made my "totally insane face" and she smiled and ran her fingers through my beard, then she looked up at me with her sly little look, and I knew once again why I liked her so much.

"You're crazy enough for me as it is," she said, "any more and they would have to put us both away."

"Agreed."

It was nearing five o'clock, but neither of us really cared.

Pegasus, the winged horse of Greek mythology, sprung from the blood of Medusa as Persues beheaded her. Springs rose where Pegasus' hooves struck the Earth, Hippocrene, on Mt. Helicon, was the most famous. Pegasus' soaring flight was often interpreted as an allegory of the soul's immortality in late antiquity; it has been regarded as a symbol of poetic inspiration in more," Ann said, reading aloud. Then she closed the encyclopedia and replaced it on shelf. "Maybe that's why you've been writing so many poems lately. Look, what about this one?"

    0' beautiful creature
    True king of the sky
    The moon is your lover
    The stars for you cry
    The sound of your wings
    So gentle and free
    And down from below you
    The sigh of the sea

"King of the sky! I think that would make a good name for that one, but doesn't it need to be finished?"

I looked up from the encyclopedia I had been reading and murmured a vague "yes," into my beard. She looked hurt because I hadn't been really listening to her, but I had things on my mind. It seemed that the company that had despoiled the woods, creating the man-made swamp, was back at work. They were tearing more of the woods down and putting in another subdivision. Soon the forest that I had once roamed in freely as a small boy would only be a memory in a man. It was not much more than that now, and still men destroyed it and then, channeled their waste into the open wound. Sometimes all the waste and needless destruction would almost make me cry.

"Ann, it says here under unicorn; a fabulous animal, resembling a horse or kid, with a single horn on it's forehead. It has a white body the size of a horse, a purple head, blue eyes, and on it's forehead a cubit long horn colored red at the base."

"Doesn't sound much like what we saw," Ann interrupted.

"I agree. Now can I finish?" I asked, and paused, "Thank you. Those who drink from its horn are protected from stomach disorders, epilepsy, and poison. Other customs that legend relates of the unicorn include it's purifying of poisoned waters with it's horn so that other animals may drink."

Suddenly, I knew I wanted a look around at the man-made hell of a swamp. Ann had already risen and was putting on her shoes, when I said, "Why don't we take a walk in the woods?"

"My thoughts exactly." she answered.

There he stood, regarding us, not more than five meters away, looking around his silvery horn. Suddenly my mind flashed on a famous legend involving the unicorn. It was to have been able to kill an elephant with a single thrust of its horn, and then to support the weight of the entire body above it's head. I, personally, could not verify the fact, but I was sure he would have proven a very fatal opponent for me. That was not what I could call a comforting thought. I was afraid he would not enjoy being disturbed by two human meddlers, and I wondered if he would believe that we were responsible for this mess of a stagnant swamp. Well, at least he had not charged us immediately. Somehow he seemed nice, friendly, and even somehow intelligent. Maybe he would let bygones be bygones. I hoped so.

With a glint in his eyes more akin to a smile than I had seen on any other animal, the creature returned to his task of purifying the dirty green water. It was magical to watch him concentrate on the scummy water and lightly touch it with his silvery horn. When his horn left the water a few moments later, all that was left was a clear pool.

Ann sighed and eased down against a tree. I couldn’t move and stood stiff, as if frozen in place. Maybe that’s what they mean by being paralyzed by fear, and let me tell you, almost two feet of sharp and shiny horn aimed at your body will give you fear, it doesn’t matter if the wielder is friendly or not.

After about fifteen minutes I relaxed a little and sat down next to Ann. I was shaking again. She put her arm around me.

"He's beautiful," Ashe whispered.

"Uhn, yeah," I tell you I was filled with brilliant conversation.

"Jason, we should have brought a camera. This is something that should be shared with everyone."

"You're right. It should be shared, but people would just think we were doing publicity for a new Ray Harryhausen film. Either that or they would put us away."

She looked at me with her "you popped the balloon" look. I looked back at the creature. He seemed finished with what he was doing and looked back at us with his big blue eyes. Once again his expression seemed to be a smile. Then he lifted politely into the heavens and was soon out of sight.

"You know, I think he liked us."

"Uhn, yeah."

We started on our journey home.

Time passed and Ann and I spent more and more of it in the woods where the Pegasus/unicorn carried out its singular efforts to end man’s interference with nature. Soon it became apparent to me that this small battle was being won.

Ann and I never figured out where he stayed when he was not actually in the woods. It seemed to me as if he was coming from and going to somewhere very far away, if not from a different time entirely.

He allowed us to come and watch him; he even seemed to invite our presence. He even let Ann touch him once, but I could never bring myself to try.

He lay at my feet, his eyes squinting periodically in pain. I looked out over the beauty he had restored to this section of forest, but I couldn't face him. I was sick.

"He's in pain. Can't you do something?" Ann cried and her tears mixed with his blood as she held his head in her lap. Why had this happened? Who had caused all this pain? I hoped that whoever it was would suffer at least as much as this creature was now suffering.

The joint of his wing was shattered, torn, ruined and beyond repair. The gaping hole in his chest was almost impossible to look at. Through exposed ribs pulped internal organs showed. A rifled shot leaves only damage. There was only one thing left to do, and I didn’t think I could do it.

I could do for him and I didn't know if I could do it. I looked down and his blue eyes fixed mine. I knew, somehow. He wanted me to finish his suffering and give him release. I could not but I had to. This suffering could go on for hours.

With fingers that seemed to belong to someone other than myself, I picked up a fallen limb. It felt heavy and solid. I felt only numb.

"Ann, get behind me," I commanded in a bloodless voice, as white and colorless as my face.

She eased his head down off her lap and kissed his nose. He seemed to smile one last time and closed his eyes. Ann staggered over to lean against a tree, put her hands over her face and sobbed soundlessly.

Seemingly the limb, on its own, swung itself to hit at the base of that intelligent skull. There was a jarring crunch and my arms went limp. I checked to see if that one blow had done its job. It hadn’t, so I had to swing again. The limb shattered and fell from my unfeeling hands.

Then the ground came up to meet me.

Ann was rocking me in her lap, crying, and saying, "It’s alright, it’s all over, it’s all over."

"No, it’s not over," I said, as rubber legs picked me up, and dead hands wiped wet eyes. "We still have a funeral to attend."

It took seven hours for the two of us to dig a hole big enough by kerosene lamplight. It took both of us, using a tree that I had hacked down with my shovel, to move the body into the hole, which was rapidly filling with water. I lost track of the time it took to cover the hole and tamp it down. I hauled a couple of loads of rocks and mixed them with the loose soil.

The cross that I erected had printed on it in neat letters "King of the Sky." I somehow thought it appropriate. I had used model paint for the lettering. Then Ann and I stumbled back to my house. Ann collapsed on the living room floor and was consumed in a merciful slumber, but I couldn't sleep yet. I staggered to the dining room table where I did all my writing. I was like a man possessed. I had to write four short lines:

    And all I would give
    Would that it could be
    That I could be you
    And you...now...me.

It was finished, and so was I. I collapsed with my head on my freshly written words.

Neither of us stirred until late the next day. So after two months things returned to the way they had been. Everything, that is, except our lives.

In the middle of the fourth ring I heard her voice answer with a tired, but awake hello.

"Ann, I got a check today. They liked the story. They want me to send them more. They also want to know if I have any more poems. I'm rich. Let's go eat some steak."

I heard her laugh from the other end of the line, "Sure, when?"

"As soon as I can pick you up," I said.

"Good enough. I'll be ready," she said. "G'bye, I love you."

"Love you too. Good bye," I said as I smiled and hung up. I walked to the back door of my house and looked at the green of life where only brown had once colored the woods. Memories floated just beyond my eyes. I looked at the check and felt like crying.

In the woods, in what had once been a stagnant swamp, by a pure pool, a new type of flower grew in a place where a beautiful creature of the sky had its blood spilled.

I tore up the check and walked slowly to the car. I knew Ann would understand. I knew she knew.

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