The Day the Angels Fell

by Shawn Smucker

  The Tree of Life.

  Someone had removed it from the log, brought it here, and planted it in a shallow hole. The green had faded a bit, and the flowers weren’t so much white as they were ivory, a sickly version of off-white. The Tree was dying, that was easy to see. I felt the old darkness rise inside me.

  “Who brought that here?” Abra asked, awe in her voice.

  I didn’t know what to say. We sat there in silence. I was relieved that Abra hadn’t taken the Tree, and I was frustrated with myself for not believing her. What was happening to me that I was so suspicious of my best friend?

  Yet, as I saw the plant right there in front of me, both my disbelief and my determination grew. On one hand, I found it even more difficult to believe that this small plant could somehow snatch my mother from the strong jaws of death. It was so tiny, so fragile. On the other hand, there it was—it just kept coming back to me. I thought that must mean something.

  “We should leave it here,” I said.

  So we did. It looked too fragile to move again anyway, so I leaned the yellow tulips with the bloodred streaks over it, keeping it mostly out of sight. I took a deep breath and stood up. I set the stone bowl up on my mother’s headstone, and I walked away.

  I left Abra and the cemetery, drifting away from the rock cliff with the cave in it. I could feel Abra watching me. I could hear the river rushing out there somewhere in the trees. It was a never-ending sound, the sound of life. The roaring it made as it spilled into the valley and swept toward Deen was the sound of thousands of years of history, moving, carrying me away. I heard Abra walking along behind me, but I didn’t say anything to her. I needed a minute to think.

  There were three large granite crypts between the cemetery and the river, and I wondered why they were there, planted by themselves like some kind of strange orchard. I thought people had used crypts down there in case the creek overflowed its banks, to keep the bodies up out of the floodwaters, but I didn’t know for sure.

  I noticed that one of the crypts was covered in writing, a thin cursive script that stretched along the roof of the grave.

  In Grateful Remembrance of Josephine M. Jinn

  Going down each side of the crypt were the dates of her birth and death.

  “Seventy years old,” Abra said, and I was surprised to hear her voice. I hadn’t realized she had trailed along behind me. “I wonder if she was related to Mr. Jinn?”

  There was a small metal plate attached to the pillar, and there were words etched into the plate, faded words no longer legible.

  I looked over at Abra. She stared at me.

  “I don’t think we should give the bowl to Mr. Jinn,” she said.

  “Not Mr. Tennin either,” I said.

  “I don’t know,” she said quietly. “I think I trust Mr. Tennin.”

  I didn’t trust anyone. I realized I resisted choosing sides, resisted choosing between Tennin and Jinn, because I was the only person I could trust. I was on my own side now, getting as far as I could with the help of anyone who would aid me.

  For a moment we stood there in the heat, and the river, still hidden off in the trees, sounded so appealing. I wished the summer had turned out differently. I wished we were boating in that river, floating down behind the church and winding our way toward town. I wished that when we finished swimming we could go back to my house, and as we went through the screen door we’d smell the chocolate chip cookies my mom was baking.

  I wished. Instead we were sweating in a silent graveyard on a sweltering day, trying to figure out what to do with a stone bowl.

  We walked back to my mother’s grave, and I picked up the bowl again. It was heavy, but it didn’t seem as heavy as when I had first lifted it, as if my arms were getting used to it. Or perhaps it was getting used to me.

  “Are you ready to put it in the cave?” Abra asked.

  As far as locations went, I thought it was a good idea. It was past Mr. Jinn’s house in a direction no one ever traveled. As long as he didn’t see us coming or going, he would never suspect that we had hidden it there.

  I carried the bowl to the small cave, only fifty yards away through the trees, where the cliffs came down from the mountains. Some of the rocks were wet and slippery from recent rains, making it hard going. At one point I got caught up in a few trees and we had to climb up a short outcropping of rock, so I had to pass the bowl to Abra. I imagined her dropping it on purpose, the bowl shattering against the rocks. I imagined her laughing at my sorrow. But she didn’t drop it. She handled it as carefully as I did.

  We arrived at the cave, and you could see the muddy river from there, moving fast with all the rainwater. The cliff was a huge piece of rock, nearly as big as a house, and it reached out toward the river. The cave was at the base of the cliff, about three feet high and two feet wide, and it was dark, like an empty spot where an eye used to be. I pushed the bowl in along the ground, and the weight of it made a divot, a short, hollowed-out path.

  “One down,” I said. “Two to go.”

  That evening after dinner I walked into the barn with my father and Mr. Tennin. The three of us stacked hay bales and cleaned out the barn. At one point my dad went down to the lower level for something, and Mr. Tennin and I were left alone, picking up the loose hay with our pitchforks and throwing it down through the hole in the floor.

  “I found it,” I said quietly. “I found the first item. The stone.”

  He kept working as if I hadn’t said anything, and when he spoke he barely moved his mouth, as if someone was watching us.

  “Good,” he said. “Good. Now you have to find water.”

  “What kind of water?” I whispered.

  “It’s not water. It’s blood. Innocent blood.”

  “What?” I pictured some kind of terrible sacrifice. An animal dying on an altar. A high priest raising a stone knife.

  “It doesn’t have to be much,” he said. “Only a drop. Place a drop of innocent blood in the middle of the stone bowl, directly under the Tree.” He stopped and looked at me. “Have you found it yet?”

  “No,” I said. The word came so quickly from my mouth that I didn’t realize what I was saying. I lied before I knew I was lying.

  He stared at me for a moment. He threw another forkful of hay down the hole, and it vanished into the dark lower level. A cloud of hay dust came whooshing back up and settled all around us.

  “Remember your promise to me,” he said, not looking at me as he plunged his pitchfork into the pile of straw, “because I won’t forget.”

  The kindness in his voice was still there, but it was edged with force, and I knew he wouldn’t forget. Not ever.

  28

  “INNOCENT BLOOD?” Abra asked, sounding nervous.

  The whole long Friday afternoon stretched in front of me, chore free. It had always been something my mother insisted on. My father could have me working hard on the farm all week, but on Friday afternoon I got a break. I was free. No work, no responsibilities. “Just time to be a kid,” she had said, messing up my hair and giving my dad those pretend pleading eyes.

  “What does Mr. Tennin mean by innocent blood?” Abra asked.

  “Innocent blood,” I said, as if the two words explained themselves.

  The two of us sat there in the lightning tree, one week after my mother had died. The tree itself was definitely dying. Its leaves were still there but were dry and brittle. Some of the branches that had been nearer to the lightning strike were charred, and those leaves were brown.

  We sat in the flat area where the cat had been hiding, the palm of the tree’s hand, the place I had been standing when my mother pulled herself up and told me to run inside. It might seem strange, but as I sat there with Abra on that Friday afternoon, it was the first time I realized how close I had come to death. I imagined the valley without me, Mom and Dad standing in the kitchen doing the dishes, my mom crying. My dad looked the same in my vision as he did in reality—tired and sad.

  I wondered what Ab
ra would be doing on that day if I had died in the tree. Would she be at her house, remembering me? Or would life already have gone on, seven days later? Time passes and people leave, and those of us who are left eventually move on in one way or another. Maybe that’s the saddest part of death, the knowledge that when we die, we will eventually be forgotten.

  The sky was low and gray and looked like rain, or at least a shower or two. But it wasn’t stormy, and I didn’t expect any lightning or thunder.

  “Maybe he knows someone named Innocent and we have to get her blood,” Abra said. “You know. Innocent blood.”

  “Do you know anyone named Innocent?” I asked her, shaking my head.

  “I was kidding,” she said. A breeze came through the lightning tree just for a moment, and all those dry leaves rustled against each other, a strange sort of shushing sound that made me eager for fall. Abra’s blonde hair blew up around her face and she pushed it away. Her blue eyes looked silver in the light.

  “So what’s the most innocent blood we know about?” I asked.

  “You’re not touching my little brother,” she said quietly.

  “I wasn’t even thinking about him,” I said, which was completely untrue. Her baby brother was the first person who came to mind when I thought about innocent blood.

  “What about your lamb?” she asked.

  I didn’t know if that would be good enough. I shrugged. “That might work. Mr. Tennin didn’t say it had to be a person.”

  I thought back over the seven days since Friday when the lightning struck, and I wished none of it had happened.

  “Well, should we go try?” I asked her.

  “Sure,” she said, but she didn’t sound committed to it, and the more I thought about it, the less sure I became.

  I reached my foot down for the ladder and climbed to the grass. Abra came scrambling down after me, and the two of us walked into the barn, back through the shadowy aisles, past the chickens, and into the farthest corner.

  Something sprang from the dirty windowsill that let in filtered light, and I jumped. But it was just Icarus running away from us. I wondered where he was sleeping, what he was eating. I didn’t have the heart to chase him, though.

  We got to the pen at the back of the barn, and the lamb looked up at us, its little tail wagging back and forth. I think it thought I was there to give it a bottle.

  “So,” Abra said, “how do you get blood out of a lamb?”

  The whole proposition had seemed so simple. All we needed was one tiny drop of lamb’s blood. But there in the barn with the white lamb staring up at us, well, Abra’s question was valid. How would we get blood out of the lamb? I didn’t want to hurt it.

  “What will we use?” I asked. I looked around. There was a shovel, a broom, and a pitchfork leaning against the wall, back in the shadows. I thought I could find a screwdriver if I looked hard enough. I’d have to go back inside for a knife, but if I saw my dad along the way, who knows what he would say. How would I explain why I was carrying a kitchen knife to the barn?

  Abra reached around behind her and pulled out the small sword. I didn’t even know she had it with her.

  “We could try this,” she said.

  It made me jealous, seeing her with that blade. I wanted to be the one to hold it, to be the one with a weapon. I had found it—I should be the one possessing it, protecting us. But there she was, holding it, not being burned by it.

  “Can I see it?” I asked.

  “Okay.”

  I reached for it, and she grabbed it by the bottom of the blade, pointing the handle toward me. But as soon as I touched it, it burned me, and I dropped it. The sound it made as it hit the cement walkway was deep and heavy, as if it weighed ten times what it actually did. Abra reached down for it, and based on the sound it had made, I didn’t expect she’d be able to pick it up. But she lifted it as if nothing had changed.

  “I guess you’d better keep it for now,” I said, rubbing my hands together, trying to get the burn out.

  She held it in front of her and stared at the blade as if looking for hidden stories in its reflection. For a moment she didn’t look like herself. She looked like some visiting angel, preparing to protect the entire world from an enormous evil. I was scared of her in that moment, and I felt small. I was scared of what she could do.

  “Should we try?” she asked.

  I moved toward the pen and the lamb came to the bars, trying to stick its head through. I stroked its soft wool. It felt like a great betrayal, what we were about to do.

  “Where should I . . . you know?” Abra asked.

  I wasn’t sure. Lambs are all soft and white, but their legs and hooves are bony and hard, their skulls miniature boulders.

  “Maybe on the leg?” I said. “There’s not a lot of flesh. Maybe it would just feel like it was banging its shin on something.”

  She got down on her knees beside me.

  “Wait!” I said. “What will we put it in?” We didn’t have any containers with us, nothing for keeping the blood.

  “Maybe if we get it on the blade, we can carry it to the bowl and scrape it in.”

  “Okay.”

  She reached the blade through the bars. Where it almost touched my arm, I could feel its heat.

  “Watch it,” I said. “That’s hot.”

  I wondered if it would feel hot to the lamb, but when she propped the blade up against the lamb’s leg, it didn’t move. It didn’t even seem to notice. It moved closer to me, and I held it tight so it wouldn’t jump away.

  “Go ahead,” I said. “Go.”

  She grimaced and slid the blade slowly along the lamb’s leg.

  Blood poured out.

  “Whoa!” I shouted. “What are you doing?”

  She screamed and there was fear in her voice, and horror. She inched backward, away from the lamb, and her eyes opened up wide and alarmed.

  “I didn’t try it,” she kept saying over and over. “I didn’t try it. It’s just so sharp.”

  The lamb jumped away from us and ran to the back of the pen. It huddled there in the shadows, quivering, and I could see its leg was bleeding badly.

  “We have to do something,” I said.

  Abra stared at the blade. It was wet with blood.

  “Keep that flat,” I said. “Don’t let it run off.”

  She placed the sword on the floor and helped me climb over the bars into the pen. I took off one of my boots, then took off my sock and put my boot back on.

  I crawled in close to the lamb, through the hay, talking to it all the time. “It’s okay, little guy. You’re going to be fine.”

  Its ears were limp on the side of its head. Its eyes were jumpy.

  “Wow, it’s really bleeding,” I said.

  Abra couldn’t keep her own cries quiet anymore. She sobbed right there in the barn. I remember her sobs, and now I know they were the cries of someone who has lost their innocence in one way or another, the cries of someone who has realized not only that there is pain in the world but also that they can cause it, that they will cause it. We all will.

  I tried to wrap my sock around the lamb’s wound. Abra had cut it on the back of its hoof, right where its heel would have been if it had one. It reminded me of my dream and how Mr. Jinn had chased me up the tree, burning or slicing my foot. For a moment I felt that same panic of trying to climb faster than him, of looking for that next branch. But that was just a dream.

  I focused on the lamb. I kept trying to tie the sock on, but the crazy animal jumped and ran away from me.

  “Come here, you.” I reached for the lamb, but it kept running. “Abra, I need you to hold it still. I can’t hold it and tie the sock at the same time.”

  By now my own hands were covered in blood and straw and dust. Abra came over the bars and got down there in the dirt with me, wiping the tears from her eyes and sniffing loudly.

  “Here you go, little lamb,” she whispered, and the lamb calmed. She walked toward it and got down on her knees. �
�It’s okay.” She reached out her hands. It walked slowly to her, and she held it tight. She put her face on its back, and I could tell she was crying into its wool.

  I crawled over to where they were. “Hold tight. Here goes.”

  I reached down and wrapped the sock around the still-bleeding cut. The lamb trembled, but Abra held it tight. I tied the sock in a tight knot and hoped it would stay.

  “We’ll have to clean it up later.” I hoped my dad wouldn’t see the state of the poor lamb. That would be a hard one to explain.

  Abra nodded quietly, wiping her eyes again. We both climbed out of the pen and she picked up the small sword, always holding it flat. The blood sat in a straight line, one long run. And that’s how we walked all the way from the barn, through the woods, and to the cave—carefully, eyes always on the lamb’s blood.

  “You’ll have to put the drop in the bowl,” I said. “I can’t hold the knife. It’ll burn my hand off.”

  She nodded, and she went inside and didn’t seem scared, not at all. When she came out she looked somber, as if she had just come from another funeral.

  “It’s done.” She bent down and wiped the blade on the grass, cleaning off the rest of the blood.

  “Was there enough to go into the bowl?”

  Her face crinkled up and she started to cry again, I guess at the thought of all the blood she had let out of the lamb. She nodded, leaned the hilt up against the rock, and put her face in her hands. I walked over and put my hand on her shoulder. We both took a deep breath.

  “Only one thing left to find.” I hoped that was the worst of it.

  But Abra went back to a small patch of grass in the forest just beyond the cemetery, and she kept wiping the bloody blade on the green blades, as if removing every last stain would somehow mean she hadn’t cut the lamb. A clean sword would somehow mean that none of this had happened.

  I watched her, and I wished there was something I could clean that would take away what had happened to my mom. I stared into the cave. It looked like a wound, and the darkness that seeped out was an infection, the same one I had inside me, the same one driving me forward, propelling me to do anything to bring her back.