The Legend of Safehaven

by R. A. Comunale

  “Ahlan wa sahlan wa marhaba ila baitina ya Faisal.”

  Welcome to our home, Faisal.

  Freddie was next, but he stood awkwardly, unsure what to say. Then he blurted out, as the boy’s hands touched his face, “I’m going to teach you how to play baseball! And maybe you, me, and Tio Eddie can work the radios together, too.”

  They moved up a few steps, and Galen placed Faisal’s hands on Tonio’s face.

  “You’re going to stay with me, Faisal.”

  And then, to everyone’s surprise, Tonio blurted out, “And someday, I’m going to make you see again!”

  Nancy looked at Faisal, smaller than Tonio. A ragdoll, patchwork child, she thought.

  How can such things happen?

  She stepped forward, as Galen approached the top of the stairs. Edison stood right beside her. Already, his mind was in motion, realizing that this boy’s life was now sound and touch.

  Shouldn’t be too difficult to put sound emitters of different frequencies around the house to guide him.

  He thought of Freddie’s comment about baseball.

  Easy enough to put a sounder in one of those, too.

  Nancy knelt down, and once again Galen guided the boy’s hands to her face. Edison also squatted and stared at those artificial eyes—stuffed-toy fabrications no matter how cosmetically real they looked. He made another mental note to ask Galen about nerve implants and electronic eye feasibility.

  “Faisal, this is Tia Nancy.”

  “Hello, Faisal,” she said, her voice quivering. “We are pleased to have you in our home.”

  She was glad that the boy lowered his hands just as her tears began to flow.

  “And this is Tio Edison.”

  “I’m glad to meet you, Faisal,” he said, taking the boy’s right hand in his and shaking it.

  “Faisal, you can call me Tio Galen if you like. It will be time for lunch soon. Your guardians will stay with us for lunch, then we’ll get you settled down. We hope you will like living on the mountain.”

  “Come sit next to me, Faisal,” Tonio said, as he followed Galen’s lead in guiding the young boy by his left elbow into the dining room. He placed the boy’s hand on the back of the chair he was to sit on and helped him pull it away from the table. He waited until his new roommate had seated himself before sitting next to him.

  “In front of you are your knife, fork, and spoon, Fai. Feel their location.”

  Galen noted Tonio’s immediately familiar manner with the boy and felt pleased.

  As the meal progressed, Faisal began to relax. It was difficult not to. He smelled the rich scents of simple food, the smooth, cool taste of fresh milk, and finally the rich sweetness of Nancy’s brownies. What had become the habitual tightness in his neck eased, and his jaw muscles gave up their near-constant, clenching tension. Hesitantly, in the direction he had last heard Nancy’s voice, he turned and stammered, “Thank you.”

  Edison raised his hands and started to clap slowly, then faster as the others joined in.

  “Faisal, we’re going to come here every day, until you feel ready to come with us to your new home. We’ll be back tomorrow.”

  Diana and Lachlan each hugged the boy, who ran his fingers over their faces then raised his hand in a tentative effort at goodbye. Lachlan helped his wife, whose eyes had filled with tears, into the car. The adults and children gathered in front of the house and waved, as the cruiser rolled slowly down the driveway.

  He felt Freddie take his left elbow and heard him as they started to move.

  “Come on, Fai. I’m going to give you a guided tour of the house and the neat stuff we have here. Carm and Tonio are coming, too.”

  The three former orphans took their new charge on a word-and-touch tour of the house. They reached Tonio’s room last, where an extra bed and dresser had been placed.

  Tonio led Faisal to the bed. Sitting on the smooth, cotton sheets and soft quilt suddenly made him very tired.

  “May I rest now?”

  Carmelita and Freddie left him with Tonio.

  He was running, running with his little dog, Fez, back through the dusty streets of his hometown. It was early morning, and the sun had not yet begun to heat the sandy dirt of the roads and raise the shimmering light waves that cooked the earth like his father’s big ovens.

  He smelled the yeasty scents of the flat breads and the sweet honey cakes his father and mother would make daily for the townspeople, and he ran. He ran in circles of play, Fez dancing a four-legged jig around him. He ran, and his mind conjured up the music he would play for his parents. He ran, and the notes danced in his head. And then the sky exploded in unbearable brightness, and he screamed and screamed and screamed.

  Nancy sat on the bed and held him in her arms, rocking him back and forth.

  “We’re here, little one. We’re here.”

  The early, Sunday morning sky was cloudless blue. Galen knocked gently on the door to the boys’ room. Tonio, pajama clad, opened the door quietly, and Galen stepped in. He saw the boy everyone now called Fai curled up on the bed but not asleep.

  “I hear you, Tio Galen.”

  “Fai, today is a special day of the week for us. There is a place here on the mountain that your new friends and I call our Garden of Remembrance. Every Sunday we visit that place. Would you like to come with us?”

  He put on the new clothes they had bought him: the blue jeans and polo shirt and comfortable shoes Tonio called “sneakers.” He followed Tonio on his own now, the sounds of the house and the feel of the wall giving him direction to the breakfast table. Then Tonio took his left elbow, as Carmelita and Freddie met the three adults at the top of the steps. They all walked down together.

  Faisal smelled the morning dew and the aroma of trees, grass, and flowers—so different from the scented oils of his hometown. The air felt cool on his face, and he seemed to float with the little band, as they walked down the mountain. The trees parted, and a grassy clearing filled with scents of seasonal flora overwhelmed the boy. Tonio took his hand and helped him move it over the various flowers and shrubs, while the peeps of sparrows and the rawkish calls of bluejays filled his ears.

  Galen spoke in quiet tones.

  “Fai, this is our Garden of Remembrance. It is a garden of flowers, birds, and memories—memories of those whom we all have loved and who are no longer with us. Tio Edison, Tia Nancy, Carmelita, Freddie, and Tonio … and myself … each hold precious thoughts here. We celebrate the goodness of those we remember, and we mourn their passing. Now, we would like you to bring your memories here.”

  Nancy and Edison held hands, thinking of the baby daughter they never had the chance to raise. They looked at the children and blessed the Fates for bringing them three to care for so late in life.

  Carmelita, Federico, and Antonio thought of the storm-tossed raft, each straining to recall the faces of their parents, who had sacrificed themselves so their children could live in freedom.

  Galen stared ahead, seeing in the flowers the faces of Leni, Cathy, and June, and those of his friends now gone.

  Faisal heard music in the light breezes and the caressing touches of warmth from a sun he could no longer see. He cleared his throat and began to speak.

  “Al dumuu tamlau al ayun wal qualbu maqbuthin bil alam wal ahzan.”

  Galen translated for the group.

  “The eyes shed tears and the heart is grieved…”

  Faisal hesitated, his voice quavering with emotion.

  Then he heard Galen’s voice, and he joined in the prayer the prophet Mohammed spoke upon the death of his own son:

  Walaakin soafa la neshtaki aw naqula illa ma yurthi Allahu Taala.

  “But we will not say anything except which pleases our Lord.”

  Inna Lillah wa inna Ilaihi rajaun.

  “We came from Allah and we will go to Him.”

  Two voices, one boy, one man, echoed across the mountain.

  A few months passed. Faisal had grown an inch since arriving at
Safehaven. Nancy had lengthened his jeans and trousers to match his new height. He now knew the house well and could walk unguided to each of the rooms and workshops, running his fingers over the radio equipment and shop tools, in which Edison took such delight.

  He sometimes sat in the kitchen, listening to Nancy and Carmelita talking what Freddie called “girltalk,” as they mixed ingredients for Nancy’s baked delights. Once he had knocked on the door of Galen’s room on a dare from the other children, who giggled when the bear of a man appeared.

  Galen saw the boy standing expectantly and noticed the other three watching from a safe distance in the hallway. He remembered the days during his internship and residency, when the nurses and hospital staff would play tricks on him. But now, with age and circumstance changed, he growled only to delight the pranksters.

  “Fai, I understand that you are a musician. Would you like to try my electric piano?”

  He left the door open, allowing Faisal to follow the sound of his voice and footsteps. He removed the dust cover from the full-keyboard, Yamaha electric, pressed the on switch, and touched a note.

  The boy moved toward the sound but then hesitated, his sightless eyes pleading.

  “May I try it?”

  Galen pulled out the piano bench, guided Faisal’s hands to it, and then stepped back, as the boy sat and touched the keys.

  “Is there a forte pedal, Tio Galen?”

  Galen placed the boy’s foot on the pedal control for loudness.

  The three children stood in the doorway, watching as Faisal tested the keys. Then, quickly, the room filled with the sounds of Bach’s “Toccata and Fugue” in D Minor. Soon Nancy and Edison joined the audience, marveling at the boy’s fingers moving like centipedes across the keyboard, his body swaying in time, his voice humming along. As he finished, there was a second of silence, then six pairs of hands clapped loudly, and his mind flashed back to that yeast-scented night, and he sobbed, tearless and in silence.

  “Tia Nancy, remember how you used to read to us when we were kids?”

  Nancy smiled at the beautiful, fifteen-year-old girl who was no longer a child.

  “Yes, Carm, it was one of the things your tios and I loved to do—reading, playing the parts in the story, and watching the three of you jump and laugh, as you joined in. Why do you ask?”

  “Well, Freddie, Tonio, and I were thinking maybe Fai might like that—hearing stories, I mean. Could you ask the tios?”

  The children sat through dinner with unusual anticipation. They knew normally this would be the time for suggestions, thoughts, complaints, or whatever, but tonight would be different. They ate silently, commenting only on Nancy’s custard dessert.

  When the table had been cleared, Galen rose as if to leave but then retrieved a book from the top of the bookcase and sat back down.

  “It’s been a long time since we had a story hour. I came across one of my favorites while straightening up the bookcase today. Does anyone remember ‘The Jungle Book’ by Rudyard Kipling?”

  “Faisal, have you heard of this story?”

  The boy shook his head. His story books had consisted of tales about the great Caliphs and the beautiful girls they rescued from evil doers.

  “No, Tio Galen. Can you tell me what it is about?”

  “We’ll do better than that, Fai,” Edison joined in. “We’ll let you meet the characters. We’ll all play parts in the story. Afterwards, you can tell us who did the best job.”

  At first, he didn’t know how to react. He had been told that Americans did strange things for fun, and this sounded strange. But there was a man in his village—an “old one,” a teller of legends. Maybe it would be like that.

  They moved from the table to the big, woven rug in the center of the living room and formed a circle around Nancy, now seated in her favorite rocking chair. She took the book from Galen and said, “We’ll start with one of the stories. It’s about a little boy—a boy named Mowgli—who was raised by wolves and who grew to manhood as the protector of the jungle creatures. I’ll read the narrator’s part, and as the passages describe each of the characters, I’ll pass the book around, so that each of you…”

  She stopped, suddenly realizing that Faisal could not participate.

  “Fai, ” Galen said, “we’ll read you the story tonight, but soon, if you wish, I will get some books that you can use to read stories to us.”

  Nancy silently sighed in relief then began the first chapter:

  It was seven o ’ clock of a very warm evening in the Seeonee hills when Father Wolf woke up from his day ’ s rest, scratched himself, yawned, and spread out his paws one after the other to get rid of the sleepy feeling in their tips.

  As they took turns reading the parts, Faisal created mental images of Mowgli and the Seeonee, the wolves who fed him and cared for him; of Father Wolf and Raksha, the Mother Wolf; as well as Bagheera, the black panther who vouched for him, and Baloo, the wise old bear. He marveled at Kaa, the great python, and cheered as Mowgli defeated Shere Khan, the tiger. He remembered his little dog, Fez, as Mowgli adventured with Akela and Grey Brother, the great wolves of the pack.

  Then, the written words ended and the voices stilled, he heard the wise old bear call out to him.

  “You are Mowgli.”

  Another weekend and the children released their energies as would any prisoners released from captivity. They jumped off the bus and ran up the mountain driveway, cutting across the field to the old blind and the den where their friends lived.

  “Athena! Zeus! Mercury!” Freddie called out then waited, as the pack leaders followed by the young ones slowly moved toward them.

  Tonio, busily petting the young ones, called to his brother and sister.

  “Why don’t we bring Fai down here?”

  Carmelita sternly reminded her brother that they had no way of knowing how the pack would respond to a stranger, no matter how friendly the animals had become to them.

  “I’ll ask Tio Galen tonight and see what he thinks,” he replied, and then the siblings headed home, as luminous-green, lupine eyes followed the uphill journey of the two-legged ones.

  He heard his roommate coming down the hall. Tio Edison and Tio Nancy had told him he would be attending the same school as his friends, as soon as he fully recuperated. The older folks kept him busy during the school week, but he missed the company of the other children, his new friends.

  He heard Tonio open the door, and then he smelled something. It was a dog! No, not quite, something doglike but outside, wild. He remembered the feral dogs outside his village and the warnings his elders would give him and all the other young ones.

  “Tonio, have you been with dogs at school today?”

  The boy laughed but said nothing.

  He heard Tonio’s quiet breathing punctuated by an occasional snore. He rose from his bed—he needed no light. His pajama-clad feet cast no sound, as he carefully opened the bedroom door and, led by his ears, slipped down the hallway to the living room. He felt his way to the large picture window overlooking the mountain vista. He pressed his right ear against the glass and listened. Faintly, from a distance, he heard the triple-toned cry of the Moonsingers.

  “Tio Galen, your piano, it is electric?”

  “Yes, Fai, and it can make many sounds, not just piano. Would you like to try it again?”

  “Oh, yes, Tio!”

  He sat at the console, as the old man guided his fingers over the buttons that would switch the digitally created sounds into different instruments. Faisal’s fingers pressed each key as he sampled the sounds of oboe, flute, horn, organ, bass, and more, and as the notal tones swirled in his brain, his fingers carried them forward to the keyboard.

  Galen listened in amazement, as the swirling sounds conjured up the boy’s native land: blowing sands, the five calls to prayer from the muezzin in the minarets, the movement of people in the bazaars, and the ever-shimmering heat.

  Nancy and Edison once again stood in the doorway. As the
adults listened, the music shifted effortlessly to cool breezes, birds, mountain forests, water, and air, reaching a crescendo in the startling, elemental, harmonic howl of the wolves.

  Sightless glass eyes pierced them, as the boy turned and asked quietly, “Where are they?”

  The band of seven moved slowly down the mountain path, Tonio guiding Faisal. The forest sounds played counterpoint to their footsteps, the crunching leaves serving as tympani to the birds and crickets.

  They reached the observation blind, and the boy’s nose twitched, its alar wings expanding to take in the multitude of forest smells: decaying leaves, and tree and plant scents blending with the feral.

  “Zeus! Mercury! Athena! Come out,” Freddie called. Faisal’s sensitized ears picked up the quiet padding of the four-legged ones.

  They came in threes, moving slowly toward the pack that was of them and not of them. Now their moist, black nostrils took in the scent of a new, two-legged one. They stopped. The three oldest sat, as their three successors moved forward, green eyes watching, ears on point.

  Faisal took three steps and dropped to his knees. He extended his arms slowly, performing the ancient prayers he had been taught. He had no prayer rug, but Allah would grant the forest floor that honor. He bowed his upper body the ritual four times, then placed his hands on his thighs and waited.

  The young alpha male walked forward first, inhaled deeply of the boy’s scent, then touched its muzzle to Faisal’s right hand. The two others followed in turn, then they returned to sit by the three seniors. From the remainder of the pack, a young, medium-sized, dark-gray male approached slowly, tail at half-mast. It went down on all fours and slowly inched forward. Its muzzle touched both hands, then it stared upward into the sightless eyes and whimpered.

  Faisal reached out gently, placed his hands behind the beast’s head, and whispered, “Akela.”

  CHAPTER 4