Light Boxes (6 page)

Is Bianca Lowe down there, said Clemens.

Who is Bianca Lowe, the smallest child said.

Bianca Lowe, said Clemens. Are you stupid. Sorry. I didn't mean that. She is a little girl with kites painted on her hands and arms. Her body was found on the riverbank. Sometimes her ghost walks around. I believe she may still be alive, since all of you seem to be. Clemens rocked from side to side. He tried to recognize a face.

The smallest child carefully turned around and asked the other children if they had seen a Bianca Lowe. A child at the bottom of the tunnel checked a scroll of parchment and called back that no such child was listed.

Here, said the smallest child, take this.

The square of parchment fit in the center of Clemens's palm like a pebble. It was tied with blue ribbon. On the blue ribbon in tiny gold letters it read, FINAL WAR PLAN AGAINST FEBRUARY.

Thank you, said Clemens. When he looked back down the tunnel, all the children were sliding into the flickering darkness swallowed up by lantern light.

 

FEBRUARY WAS SO WORRIED ABOUT
Thaddeus he didn't see the people in town open their squares of parchment and read the final War Plan against him. Some people danced. Others cried. The War Plan spread through the town and into the trees, where the birds flapped their wings and thought they could fly again. The priests huddled, shook their heads and waited for an order from their Creator.

Caldor Clemens was one of the people who cried. Caldor told the members of the War Effort that he would leave early the next morning to find Thaddeus. After they began the first steps of the children's War Plan, they would follow Caldor's path of dead bees through the woods. Then they would all meet and head back into town, together.

But when do we ready the balloon, said one of the members of the War Effort, this particular man an original member of the Solution, who wore a purple bird mask.

I wasn't aware of a balloon, said Clemens.

So you don't have a drawing of a balloon flying in the sky on your parchment paper.

No, said Clemens. I don't.

Clemens studied all the parchment the War Effort had collected. Each was the same except for one that showed a balloon flying in the air. The parchment smelled of honey and smoke.

I don't know, said Clemens. Maybe that's the future or some shit.

People in town think I'm a ghost, but I'm not. Even when I scream out: I'M NOT A GHOST I'M A REAL LIFE LITTLE GIRL WHO ISN'T DEAD. And: I JUMPED FROM A HOLE IN THE SKY WHERE FEBRUARY LIVES, the townsfolk still ignore the real me. They eat apples and clear the snow from the wagon wheels with iron bars. Things like, The smell of mint water filled the air, are said about me when I come around. Things like, Bianca's ghost began appearing in town, are written. Even my father thinks I'm a ghost. Do you think I'm a ghost. No, you don't think I'm a ghost. You're one of the good ones. You are kind and compassionate and filled with happiness. You walk through the season of February without a care in the world, maybe a shiver, only a passing complaint about the grayness of the sky that will soon give way to the flowers you planted around the mailbox.

I came to a clearing where it was colder than anywhere else. There was a pile of chopped firewood and a small log cabin that had moss growth on the door and windows. I took out the knife the blacksmiths had given me. I slowly approached the front door. The wind blew at an incredible speed and the holes in my scarf made my neck blister. I reminded myself of all the terrible things February had done to me and the town. I calculated in my head that it was the 859th day of February, and enough is enough, and God save me I will slit the throat of February if it leads to warmer seasons.

At the front door, I felt a wave of heat enter my body. I smelled honey and smoke. I thought of Bianca and her empty bedroom, the mound of snow with teeth. I heard a woman's voice. I waited to hear the voice of February. I imagined the depth of his voice, the endless dark, lush layers.

Thaddeus, come in from out there, it's freezing, said the woman's voice through the door. Don't you know it's the middle of February. I have a pot of tea on the stove and a fire going. It's like June 17th in here.

In the distance I heard wolves and saw priests running behind birch trees, and I think I heard the War Scream of Caldor Clemens. I lost control of myself. I took my shirt off and pulled my pants down. I let my entire body collapse against the front door, letting the warmth settle into my bones, the moss scratch at my eyes.

Years ago when we experienced the season known as spring, my father woke me late in the night to show me the sun. He carried me to the top of the hill and told me to look toward the horizon where the pine trees stood. My father wiped the snow from my lashes, and there it was, a little marble of light behind the treetops.

That's the sun, my father said, and with any luck it will melt this snow so we can have summer.

I imagined that the birds flew and carried a lantern and placed it there in the treetops, because that's exactly what it looked like to me.

It looks like a lantern, I said.

My father smiled, then kissed me on the forehead. He promised it wouldn't be far away like that forever but would grow massive in the sky and warm my face.

Will it really do that.

Yes, Bianca, really, he said.

After seeing the sun, he carried me home and tucked me back in my bed and told me to sleep. But I couldn't. I spent the rest of the night and morning staring out the window, trying to see the lantern in the treetops carried there by birds. What everyone else called the sun.

Caldor Clemens was hanged by his neck inside a hollow oak tree. His flesh had been torn open, and birds had made nests inside his stomach, chest, and neck. Other animals—bears, deer, a fox—had also been hanged, draped from tree branches by neon-blue string coiled around their necks. The mouth of Clemens had been ripped open. His bottom lip was at his chin and his top lip where his hair started. His mouth was filled with snow. A few teeth poked through.

We found the body of Caldor Clemens shortly after following him into the woods. We had completed the first steps of the children's War Plan, which was to put piles of dry brush throughout the town, and then we followed the trail of dead bees, just as Caldor had instructed. The War Effort has survived floods and moss and endless snowfall culminating in endless sadness. But the death of Clemens twisted our hearts in a different direction.

We found the spot where his body was, the tall, skinny trees bent in the middle and the ground rippled—the way I remembered waves looked breaking on the shore. War Effort Member Number Seventeen gripped my hand. The other members scanned the sky for two holes. When we came upon the death scene, two War Effort members sped off in opposite directions. Those who remained started to jog, smiling and complimenting each other.

I opened the door to February's house and saw a girl with long black hair sitting at a desk. She was smiling and said, Please come in and take a seat. I declined. I asked her where February was. She said he had gone out to collect firewood and berries. The inside of the home was furnished in a way I had never seen before. Lamps and tables and chairs designed from another world. I noticed a fire burning low against the wall and columns of worn books stacked to the ceiling.

Who are you, I said.

I'm his wife, she said.

February has taken my wife and daughter and is destroying the town, I said.

I'm sorry. We, too, feel an overwhelming sadness. We, too, cry more than we laugh.

The girl stood up and walked over to me at the front door. She smelled of honey and smoke and when she got close enough images of cornstalks and birds and muddy salamanders crawled from my eyes. I felt dizzy. I grabbed her shoulders so I wouldn't fall. My body boiled to a blistering heat. Sweat poured out of me like lead.

There, there, Thaddeus, she said, embracing me with arms that reminded me of Selah. Don't worry about February. You can't control February.

My legs turned to mud. My knees hit the ground. My arms were around her waist now. Honey and smoke, honey and smoke, honey and smoke . . .

It was blurry. Then everything went black.

When I woke, I was sweating. I was sitting on the floor near the front door and the girl who smelled of honey and smoke was sitting at the desk, writing something on parchment paper.

Oh, you shouldn't see me writing this, she said. Just pretend you didn't see me writing this.

As I started to leave, I heard a man's voice and turned around to see, but it was only the girl who smelled of honey and smoke waving from the desk. When I stepped outside I took a deep breath and my lungs filled with warm air. The soil was soft and worms twitched in puddles. Birds flew from branch to branch. Flowers were sprouting up around the oak trees where squirrels fed. The sound of owls was so deafening you'd think something was wrong.

Thaddeus was walking in our direction, waving his arms, whistling. A yellow bird mask next to me commented that Thaddeus was wearing a shirt without sleeves and pants torn at the knees.

A tactic against February, I reminded him.

We have lost the tips of our fingers and our toes are black inside our boots. Our beards are brittle with ice, our skin hard and red and cold.

He's going to freeze to death, said the War Effort member.

When we came upon Thaddeus, he laughed and gave each of us a great big embrace, patting us on the backs and kissing our faces. His arms had black spots where February had attacked, and his legs had ice for skin. When he placed his arms around me he felt like a thousand pounds.

Victory is ours, he said.

You killed February, we asked.

No, said Thaddeus. But look around. I didn't look around. I didn't need to. I didn't have to see the trees burdened with snow, the skies stuffed gray. Instead I stared at Thaddeus as the snow fell on his bare arms.

What, said Thaddeus. Why is everyone looking at me like that.

Thaddeus talked of spring like it was blossoming around him. Where we saw snow and felt cold air, he saw crop fields and shielded his eyes from the sun with his hand.

Here, I said, handing Thaddeus a stack of papers detailing the children's war against February.

He read each page. He told us that if he had known that children were living underground with this kind of War Plan, February would have ended on the tenth day. Thaddeus then threw the papers into a pile of snow left yellow from a war member.

Call it off, he said.

The war members looked at each other until I retrieved the parchment papers and tried explaining to Thaddeus that February was still continuing, that the last week had been the worst yet.

Complete nonsense, said Thaddeus. We should get back to town and begin the spring harvest. Tell the underground children to come up and be children.

One War Effort member whispered into another's ear until it circled to the end, where I stood and heard, Go to the Professor for help. I nodded back around the circle to each member. We nodded. Thaddeus laughed.

Thaddeus Lowe believes that the current season is spring. On more than one occasion, he left my home to pick vegetables, which he pretended to cook over the fire I normally use to boil potatoes. To see this behavior from Thaddeus breaks my heart and I can only conclude that this is the cruelest of tricks from February.

Thaddeus laughed uncontrollably when I put the light box on. He slapped it off my head, knocking me from my chair and onto the floor.

Thaddeus asked several times why I was wearing a sweater and scarf.

Thaddeus laughed and shook his head each time I explained to him that it was February, that it had been February for nearly nine hundred days.

Thaddeus doesn't know who I am. He is oblivious to his surroundings.

I believe he has been poisoned, or spelled, or hypnotized by someone. It is difficult for me even to write this, for at this moment Thaddeus is standing outside without a shirt, commenting on the sun. In fact, it is a blizzard.

Thaddeus asked me twice if the children's war has been called off. I told him that yes, I believe it has been.

I also told him about my rearranging of the paper that fell from the sky, but he cartwheeled away in the snow.

The only people I was able to convince that I wasn't a ghost were the underground children. When I told them that the body found near the river was a fake, they said they already knew that. They said they knew the many tricks of February.

The children had developed an intricate maze of tunnels beneath the town, illuminated by hanging lanterns. At each junction there were little wooden signs with an arrow pointing up that said what part of town, what store, or what house was directly above you. I found my home and climbed up and shifted a floorboard to one side. My father was there talking about flying a balloon again. He was having an entire conversation with himself about how sweet the air tasted at a specific height. He described wind gusts by waving his arms through the air from side to side. He described the balloon ascending into the sky by stretching his arms to the ceiling and making a noise with his lips that sounded like the flame.

Before I went back down into the tunnel, the floorboard I had shifted to one side made a creaking noise. My father looked. He ran to me. He said I shouldn't be living underground. He didn't recognize me. I told him I was his daughter and I wasn't a ghost. He told me to call off my war and instead spend the next day swimming in the river where the water was like warm silk on skin. I told him that didn't make any sense.