Rebecca & Heart

by Deanna K. Klingel

  But, my own mind is buzzing. What does this latest board meeting mean for Rebecca?

  Rebecca doesn’t want to be touched or have her hair combed. And, oh, you should hear the commotion! Dressing her or combing her hair is so much work the mistress and the staff usually avoid Rebecca altogether. Her tangled hair goes uncombed and her dirty pinafore is the same every day. But, it sounds like that’s about to change.

  “Rebecca, come here,” the mistress calls.

  Rebecca freezes. Her fingers squeeze the peas. Every muscle tenses. She stares at the screen door where I’m hanging, but I don’t think she’s looking at me. She isn’t looking at anything.

  The mistress shoves the screen door open, grabs Rebecca by the arm, and drags her into the kitchen. The peas scatter and roll down the steps.

  “Now there, see what you’ve done, girl? So wasteful, tsk tsk. Watch yourself and come along with me now. We’ve got to show that parson what a trial you’re getting to be to me. We’re going to show you in a better light, according to his reverendship. Now, sit you down,” she orders.

  Her shrill voice vibrates the air around me, and my body trembles in the vibration. Rebecca’s hands are over her ears. I try to pull my wings over mine. Rebecca rocks to and fro. My body trembles in the turbulent air waves.

  The head mistress fights Rebecca to get the braids in place. Mistress brushes, Rebecca throws the hairbrush. Mistress parts the hair; Rebecca tangles it with her fingers. Mistress fusses, Rebecca howls. It’s an upsetting struggle for both of them. I feel like a referee at a rugby match flitting back and forth between them. Finally, in exhaustion and frustration, the mistress surrenders, leaving Rebecca alone. But, Rebecca does look a tad more presentable, I have to agree with the parson. She yanks her braids then pounds the floor.

  The next morning when Rebecca shows up for class, her hair is combed and braided. I think the head mistress remembers what the parson warned: she’ll be with you forever. I see the head mistress rubbing her hands together with something close to glee at the way Rebecca has turned out this morning. She even wears a clean and starched pinafore.

  “So, I hope this is our lucky day,” the mistress says as all the girls leave for school. Rebecca is the last to walk out the door. The mistress gives her a little push.

  “Hurry up, you’ll be late again,” she shouts angrily.

  I could have told her, if I could just speak, that Rebecca is never late for class. It’s the other girls, the ones who gather by the door to gossip and laugh at the more unfortunate girls, who are always the last ones in to class. The shy obedient girls go directly to their seats, and Rebecca follows after them. She’s always in her seat when the noisy girls walk past her deliberately making noise, pulling her hair, or needlessly touching her, just to upset her.

  “What you countin’ today, Ugly Bug?” one of them whispers in her ear and tugs her braid.

  Ugly Bug? Who are they calling an ugly bug? I take issue with that comment! I buzz a zig-zag flight pattern around that sassy little head. Ugly Bug, indeed!

  Rebecca growls and grabs her braids. She holds them tight and shakes her head rapidly. The next girl down the aisle deliberately pushes Rebecca’s red cardigan off her chair and onto the floor. Rebecca groans.

  “Take your seats please, young ladies,” Teacher says.

  “Make ‘er stop that noise, will ya’ ma’am?” one girl asks. The others snicker and look at Rebecca. They make faces at her, which she doesn’t see, as she looks only at the floor.

  “Does she have to make humming noises all the time?” another asks.

  “We must practice tolerance,” replies Teacher. “We all have little habits that others find annoying, don’t we now?”

  “Yes, Miss Cullen,” they reply innocently.

  My body pulses up and down on the edge of Rebecca’s desk. These girls fill my air space with angry vibrations. They could learn some things from Rebecca, who finds fault with no one.

  Visitor’s Day Tea one time a month is always a day of high vibration here. I always attend. I happen to be partial to scones and tea. But Rebecca has never been invited before. The mistress instructs her staff to have Rebecca in a clean pinafore after class today. Mistress has heroically taken care of Rebecca’s hair herself. Today Rebecca will be seen. I’ve heard the mistress grumbling to herself, pacing in her office.

  “We’ll show that board of directors. No one will be interested in this odd one, in spite of our efforts. They’ll see. Odd is odd, clean pinafore or not.”

  In class, I hang again on the window sill in the warm spring sunshine. The sun warms the apple blossoms. The scent drifts over Rebecca’s seat. She cocks her head to the side and breathes in the scent. It’s much better than factory smoke. The teacher thinks so, too.

  “Good morning, girls. Isn’t this the most wonderful spring morning? It makes me feel so merry. Thousands of fragrant blossoms are blowing on the breeze.”

  “Twenty-six,” Rebecca interrupts.

  Surprised, I whirl in a three-sixty and nearly fall off the sill.

  “Rebecca?” the surprised teacher says. “What did you say?”

  “Twenty-six.”

  “Twenty-six? Twenty-six…something?” teacher probes.

  “Twenty-six.” Rebecca speaks to the floor. The other girls snicker and snort.

  “Well, uh, yes, well, class, please take out your readers and we’ll begin,” the flustered teacher says. But, she keeps her eyes on Rebecca.

  I crawl up the window to survey and make a plan. I begin to plan vengeance on the rude girls. Should I buzz them, or walk on their lunches? Sit on the page they are reading, perhaps, or tickle their noses when they recite? Walk across the backs of their dirty necks? Now that’s annoying! But first, I want to know, twenty-six whats?

  The teacher doesn’t know what to make of Rebecca. Rebecca has rarely, if ever, spoken in class. “Twenty-six” sounds like a purely random statement. But I know it’s not. Somehow, I think the teacher has figured out that it isn’t random, too. It means something to Rebecca. But what?

  After class, Rebecca sits swaying with her hands over her ears waiting for the classroom to empty. The young teacher sits down at the vacated desk next to Rebecca. She looks down at the floor and says nothing, just as Rebecca is doing. I move up the wall for a better angle. When the room is quiet and Rebecca stops swaying, the teacher speaks to the floor.

  I see what she’s doing. She’s trying to enter into Rebecca’s secret world, to be like her, to understand her. I’m abuzz with joy.

  “Twenty-six,” Teacher says softly.

  “Twenty-six,” replies Rebecca. She gets up and walks toward me by the open window. The breeze blows and the branch of blossoms rubs against the brick building giving off a delightful fragrance. When the breeze stops, the teacher looks up and sees Rebecca standing off to the side of the window facing her, but looking down. Directly in front of the teacher is the view Rebecca has from her desk. Teacher sees the beautiful branch like a painting, framed by the window.

  “Twenty-six.” Rebecca picks up her cardigan and walks out of the classroom.

  “Twenty-six…twenty-six, twenty-six…oh!” Teacher runs to the window. “One, two, three…fourteen, fifteen…twenty-five, twenty- six. Not thousands of blossoms, twenty-six blossoms! Oh, Rebecca.”

  I hang around a little while and from my vantage on the wall, I study the teacher’s notes. What is it that makes Rebecca different? Makes her special? How can I teach her?

  She’s never disruptive unless someone touches her. Occasionally the girls pinch or touch her to get a reaction and put the class in an uproar, but most of the time they just ignore her or laugh at her.

  She does a lot of unusual things, but I think in Rebecca’s world, none of it is random. It all makes sense to her. What I have to figure out is how to enter Rebecca’s world.

  She knows without counting there are twenty-six blossoms on that branch. In many ways, the girl seems brilliant. She’s exceptionally cleve
r in mathematics. I must figure out a way to reach her to teach her.

  I flit a happy zig-zag out of the room. How wonderful, someone cares about Rebecca. Someone wants to understand her and try to reach her. Other than me, I mean. I’m just a…you know, fly-on-the-wall.

  Chapter 3

  The Creature

  I take a short nap on the wall in the warm sunshine, oversleep, and nearly miss the afternoon tea. I buzz in at the last possible moment. Thank goodness there are still some scones left on the platter, soaking in the cream’s liquid.

  All the orphans gather in the parlor to have tea with the visitors. The girls are combed and cleaned, and expected to demonstrate their social skills pouring the tea, serving the clotted cream and scones and being gracious hostesses, as they’d been taught.

  Some of the visitors are patrons and sponsors who give money to the orphanage for the care of the girls. They come to see their money being put to good use. Some come to adopt a girl or two. The girls all hope today will be their turn.

  This is the first time Rebecca has ever been invited to tea. The head mistress sits her down at a far tea table, apart from all the other tables. She sits alone.

  “Be quiet,” Mistress tells her, and hurries off.

  Rebecca yanks the ribbons out of her braids. She can see them in her peripheral vision and they annoy her. I can understand that. Pollen in my peripheral vision has that same effect on me. She presses the ribbons out on the table side by side with her fingers.

  “Two.”

  I watch her stare at the rug and lose herself in the design of concentric circles. She sways almost imperceptibly, but to Rebecca her movements are the same as the circles. Around and around she sways fitting into the circles just fine. She begins to count the circles.

  Just then a lady wearing white gloves and a large hat sits down at the table where Rebecca is sitting intently studying the carpet. The woman seems captivated by the quiet girl, sitting alone, swaying in circles. She spots me on the wall and gives me a look of disdain. I get that a lot. I fly to the other side of the table and rest on top of her hat, out of her sight.

  Rebecca’s fingers are busily shelling imaginary peas in her lap. It looks like she’s playing a piano.

  “I’ll bet you’re talented – as a pianist, I mean,” the lady says. “How old are you? Have you been playing piano long? What’s your name?”

  Rebecca by now has the pattern of the carpet divided into equal sets with hundreds of circles identified and she doesn’t appreciate the woman’s voice distracting her. She puts her hands over her ears, concentrating harder, moving deeper into the carpet pattern, her mind moving farther away from the tea table. She begins to hum softly, isolating herself from the stranger’s voice.

  The stranger puts her gloved hand across her mouth and studies Rebecca. Rebecca ignores her.

  When the tea party is over the girls return to their rooms, put on their work pinafores, and go to their chores.

  Two of the girls whose cots are close to Rebecca’s, close in on her, one on each side. They grin mischievously.

  “So did this young lady enjoy her first-ever tea?” one says in a sarcastic baby voice. When their arms touch, Rebecca stops moving, looks at the floor and growls. She pounds her ears with her hands. The two girls erupt in laughter and move on. One yanks Rebecca’s braid as she passes by.

  I walk lightly on her wrist in what I know will be a fruitless attempt to comfort her. But, Rebecca suddenly is quiet, and stares at me. She stretches her arm before her. She blows on my wings. I fly to the wall. She is calm. I don’t know what to think!

  Rebecca puts on her cardigan, takes her basket of peas from the kitchen and goes to the back step to shell peas. Here she’s away from the kitchen confusion, the clanging pots and pans, outside where she prefers to be, surrounded by the shelter of the hedges, away from hurtful people.

  Shelling peas is her favorite chore. Sitting on the back step, alone, head down, she shells a bushel of peas every afternoon. She rolls the peas between her fingers and counts them over and over. They eat the peas for supper. I believe she likes that she’s being useful. Everyone does, don’t you agree?

  It’s just another day, like every other day, really. But I remember this day like it happened only yesterday. I’m exercising on the screen door, marching up and down, watching Rebecca.

  Rebecca sits on her step shelling peas when she accidentally drops a pod. We see a black furry paw reach out of the bushes and pull in the pea pod. I buzz over to the hedge for a better look. Rebecca’s intrigued and stares. So do I. If this is a hedgehog, it’s the biggest hedgehog in the world.

  She drops another one, not by accident, this time. She watches and waits. Before too long, the black furry paw stretches out for the pod. It’s too far away. The paw can’t reach it. The creature crawls out on its hairy belly until it reaches the pod. He snatches it up and quickly scoots a backward retreat to the hedge.

  The next day Rebecca drops a few peas in a straight line from the bush to her step. Soon the furry paw reaches out and gathers the first pea. A second furry paw gathers in the next pea. The creature crawls out on his belly. We see a black shiny nose, followed by a skinny, dirty creature with long, shaggy hair. He eats the peas and finds himself face to foot with Rebecca. Rebecca, of course, says nothing. I stay where I am. This isn’t a hedgehog.

  I recognize the creature from the garbage dump. He and I go way back. But Rebecca hasn't seen him before. She keeps her head down and continues shelling her peas. She peeks at the creature from the corners of her eyes, avoiding direct eye contact. The creature pretends to look at the ground, avoiding eye contact, also. But he is watching her. She appears safe, but he’s wary. She’s watching him. He’s not coming close enough to touch her. That’s good.

  When she finishes shelling her peas, Rebecca, who doesn’t like others to make sudden moves toward her, stretches her hand slowly out to the creature. He sniffs the back of her hand. She turns it over slowly, and the creature sniffs it again. She opens her hand and offers him the peas she holds in her hand. He snatches them quickly and disappears into the bushes.

  Every day the creature comes to Rebecca’s hand to eat the few peas she saves for him. She holds her hand quietly and the creature hears her hand speak of gentle kindness and friendship. He comes at the same time every day. He too, likes every day to be the same with no changes or surprises. He and Rebecca seem to be alike in several ways.

  The creature eats his peas, Rebecca motions for him to sit in front of her. He looks at her hands. He hears her hand say, ‘sit.’ And he sits.

  She lines peas in a straight line. Little circles in a straight line are her favorite design, after all. The creature admires her presentation, and he licks his lips in appreciation.

  After the creature learns to sit in front of her, Rebecca reaches out her hand and touches him lightly on the shoulder. Perhaps she’s curious what his hair feels like. I drop down briefly onto the creature’s back. I’m also curious. His hair is just like hers, dirty, stringy, and matted. He backs away a little, but Rebecca is still, so he returns. She touches his shoulder again. He feels her hand say ‘I like you.’ Rebecca feels his shoulder say, ‘I trust you.’ My little heart vibrates like it’s Valentine’s Day all covered in chocolate and jelly. Rebecca has a friend.

  The creature comes to our steps every day. He sits, eats peas from her hand, and lies down at her feet. His tail thumps happily against the step until she returns to the kitchen. Then he pads silently back to the hedges.

  Did I mention I’ve known this creature for a long time? He probably doesn’t remember too much of his puppy life. But I remember when he was tumbling around the garbage dump with his mother and the other pups. Their mother didn’t have enough milk for them so someone in the litter was always hungry, whining, and crying. Sometimes it was him.

  I remember the day the humans came and picked up the pups. One by one the puppies disappeared. When the last pup was left, he was put on the farm
wagon and given a ride to the woods beyond the farm. At the edge of the woods the puppy was tossed off. The wagon drove off without him. For two days and two nights he waited by the road for the man in the wagon to come back.

  The mother of the pups had been the guardian for a herd of cattle on the farm; the pups’ father was the half-collie, half-shepherd on a nearby farm. This young creature had gotten his thick, hairy coat from his mother, her intuitiveness and her quiet, patient watchfulness. From his father he’d inherited confidence, intelligence, and an excellent nose. With these gifts alone, the little creature walked into the woods, and, amazingly, survived.

  He put his gifts to good use and managed to escape bobcats, boys with sling shots, mean men with large boots and loud guns, horses, and vehicles, hunger, and cold. He learned to read the body language of every human in this end of London. He learned to tell evil from good by their unique smells and movements. His nose knew where to find the best garbage dumps and occasionally something fresher, which is how I got to know him.

  He wandered alone all his life, and believed he was a loner. Some orphaned creatures run in packs, but he’s a pack of one. I believe he’s been searching for something, maybe a pack of his own. He searched his way through the industrial park and into the hedges surrounding Somewhere Else. Here it is that he meets the small, quiet human, a pack of one, who seems to want him around. She feeds him strange little balls of food. They trust each other, and they keep each other company. From where I sit, I think a friendship is born. It is Rebecca’s first friend. Not counting me.

  One afternoon the creature shows up to find that Rebecca isn’t here. Sad and lonely, he returns to the bushes. After dark, he feeds himself from the garbage dump behind the building with only a fly for company. He sleeps in the bushes.