Lost Birds

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Lost Birds Page 15

by Putrius, Birute


  I felt Ona loosen her grip as the lake grass slowly swirled around me. Suddenly I realized that I could just disappear from my own life. There would be no more Irene Matas. It was amazingly quiet. I had always heard how when you’re about to die, your life flashes before you like a speeded-up movie, but at that moment, the Chicago Sun-Times newspaper appeared before me. I saw the date and the headlines, and I watched it open page by page in slow motion like an old movie. Each page turned, as if I had all the time in the world, until it stopped at a page toward the back of the newspaper—the obituary page. In no hurry, I scanned it, reading snatches of lives, until I found a small box on the lower right-hand side, and I read the small headline: “Young Girl Drowns in Lake in Michigan.” I slowly read my obituary—my whole short life—before I blacked out.

  The next thing I knew, I was being dragged out of the lake by Al. Bits of green waterweed still clung to my arms and hair. Suddenly I could hear the noise and the din around me again. Al flipped me over on my stomach like a dead fish and began to push on my back. I coughed and coughed, sick with overwhelming nausea. I sat shivering with deep cold, covered in mud, lake weeds and grasses still curled around my arms. Ona sat next to me crying, her thighs scratched bloody. She was covered in grasses and mud too. We both looked like Creatures from the Black Lagoon.

  “I’m sorry, Irene. I didn’t mean it. I just panicked. I’ve never been out that far before.” Ona was crying, and the tears were making clear pathways on her muddy face. Next to me, Vida and Milda were both crying too. Dizzy and nauseated, I finally threw up the muddy water I had swallowed, and I was too sick to even feel embarrassed. All I wanted to do was sleep, even though my eyes hurt from the water and the gritty mud. Daina covered me up with some towels and told me to rest.

  I must have fallen asleep until the nurse came to examine me. “You’re a very lucky girl,” she told me. “You’re going to be all right. You just need to rest for a day or two.”

  Vida told me that they had rescued Ona but that no one had seen me because of the muddy water. “Al was the only one who knew you were there, so he jumped in to look for you.”

  I looked over at Al and tried to smile.

  He said, “You were on the very bottom of the lake. I couldn’t even see you, Irene, but I could feel your hair and pulled you up. You were still alive, thank God.”

  I was still alive. It seemed strange to have come so close to dying. All I could think of was how sad my mom would have been. Somehow my mind couldn’t take it in, but my body was grateful to be breathing. Though I had read my obituary, I was still alive.

  The whole camp seemed to be gathered around me, looking at this girl who had been snatched from the muddy lake bottom, snatched from clammy death, brought back to life right here in front of them. Better than a campfire skit.

  Daina held onto me and told me I was going to be just fine. When she draped a towel around my shoulders, I pleaded, “Please don’t tell my mother about this.”

  “I can’t do that, Irene. I have to tell your parents.”

  “Oh, please, my mother’s sick. I don’t want her to worry.”

  “It’s not up to me, Irene, but I’ll see what I can do.” Daina looked concerned as she patted my arm.

  Vida and Milda were both wiping away tears.

  Soon Daina blew the whistle three times, and we all got up to return to camp. We paired up by twos and walked up the dusty slope. The mud on Ona had dried and caked with flecks of fool’s gold that still glittered in the sunlight. As the campers helped me climb over the rail fence, an Amish family drove by in a horse and buggy and a young girl in a bonnet pointed to Ona and me, as if we were subhuman. She stared until the buggy disappeared over the hill. Strange how I no longer felt self-conscious. I was caked with mud but didn’t care.

  Turning to take a last look at Miner’s Lake, I saw the sun still gleaming on its surface, but no matter how brightly it shimmered, I knew there was a darkness underneath. It was the same darkness that was underneath everything. I now knew what it was. It had almost taken my life. As I walked back to camp that afternoon, I felt that no matter what else I did in life, I would never forget the taste of cold mud from the bottom of Miner’s Lake.

  For the next two days, Ona never left my side and couldn’t seem to do enough for me. Apologizing over and over, she made a pest of herself, but I still had a hard stone of anger in me. Everyone came to visit me and brought me candy and cookies from their packages from home. At first, I couldn’t eat any of it, but by the second day I was starting to nibble at a Mars bar that Vida gave me.

  The next morning, Vida brought me a letter from my mother. I stared at it, afraid to open it. In the letter my mother said the operation had been a success and that she was feeling much better and was even getting out of bed a bit. The doctor told her she would be back to normal soon. She told me to have fun at camp and not get into any trouble. I was so relieved at this news that I started to cry. When Vida asked me what was wrong, I answered, “Nothing, my mother’s better.”

  “Well, that’s great, so why are you crying?”

  “I thought she was going to die.”

  “Why?”

  I wiped my tears on my sleeve. “I kept thinking about your mother, Vida. How she seemed fine and then all of a sudden, she was sick and died. How did you stand it?”

  Vida didn’t say anything for a few moments. “It was the worst time of my life. I never felt so alone.”

  “I’m so sorry, Vida. Your mother was so much fun. I wish it hadn’t happened.”

  Vida smiled wanly. “Me too.”

  That night I finally felt good enough to go to the campfire. I sat with Ona, Vida, and Milda as usual. The bonfire was just beginning to burn in the dark night. The cicadas pulsed in rhythm, and a quiet wind rustled the tall oak trees. Al came over and squeezed in next to me. I was so glad to have him near.

  “Hey, you look a hell of a lot better than the last time I saw you, Irene.” He laughed a little. “For a moment, I thought you were going to be the sacrifice the Indians said happened every year in the lake.”

  I winced. “I forgot about that legend. That’s really creepy, you know.”

  “How are you feeling?”

  “Much better.” I smiled, realizing I no longer felt as clumsy and oafish with Al. “Listen, I never got to thank you for saving my life. Thank you so much, Al.” My chin trembled as I said this, feeling bound to Al forever for his gift of life.

  Now it was Al’s turn to look uncomfortable. “It wasn’t such a big thing, Irene. Anybody would have done it.” He cleared his throat and glanced down at his hands.

  “But nobody else did. It was you, and I’ll never forget it, Al.” I took his hand and squeezed it, and he smiled and squeezed back.

  We sat there for a long time, watching the leaping flames of the bonfire light up the velvet night. Suddenly, a huge burst of sparks rocketed from the fire, sending bright arcs into the star-filled night, as the whole camp seemed to let out a collective sigh of awe.

  Southside Miracles

  Irene Matas, 1961

  This school year was not turning out as I had hoped. Here I was, sitting in the principal’s office for the sixty-millionth time, listening to Sister Devota give me the business as I slouched down into the green vinyl chair, trying to disappear. Twirling a strand of hair around my finger, I wondered what was happening to me. I was changing and it wasn’t for the better.

  “Sit up straight, Irene. I just called your mother and told her I’m sending you home.”

  Aw hell, I thought as I left the school, dread knotting my stomach all the way home. My goose was cooked. I’d be grounded till Judgment Day. When I got home, I opened the back door ever so slowly and carefully, hoping to sneak into my room without running into my mother. But there she was, waiting for me. “I’ll teach you to shoot the priest,” she screeched, quivering with anger, wearing
a black sheath and slippers. When she got the call from the nun, she had been getting ready for her weekly appointment at Silvia’s House of Beauty. I swallowed hard and hung my head, staring at my black shoes, hoping to look contrite, when suddenly my mother took off her house slipper and whacked me on the back. I was so startled, I almost burst out laughing.

  “But Mama, he didn’t even feel it,” I squealed, trying to shield myself from the slipper blows.

  “Sister told me he was dripping wet,” yelled my mother.

  “Yeah, but he had on way too many clothes during Mass. He didn’t even feel the squirt gun.”

  “I’ll show you to shoot the priest,” she said, smacking me on the butt with her slipper.

  Quickly running to my bedroom, I locked the door, leaving her slapping it with the slipper. It seemed to me that my mother had been more easygoing before her hysterectomy. Afterward, she became short-tempered.

  “Open this door. What are people going to say? You’re becoming an American hooligan,” my mother yelled from behind the door. “Chicago is no place to raise a girl. It’s a city for gangsters.”

  I rolled my eyes, able to repeat the text by heart.

  “And you—a priest shooter,” my mother continued. “For Christ’s sake, your uncle was a priest, and the other one was a partisan who lived in an underground bunker in the woods for three years. One day, God willing, we’ll return to Lithuania, but how will you ever fit in?”

  “Leave her be,” said my father, who always quoted Maironis poems about the storms of youth when I got into trouble. Whenever my father intervened, it was a huge relief. For some reason, he seemed to understand my turbulent nature, often saying it reminded him of my mother when she was young, though I couldn’t imagine her ever getting into trouble. My mother seemed to be often sad and disappointed in life in America, in perpetual mourning for her lost life in Lithuania.

  Flopping on my bed, I stared at my James Dean poster, thinking I was never going back to Lithuania no matter how many relatives were still there, no matter how many Russians left the country. Lithuania sounded positively medieval to me, so Soviet Bloc. They probably didn’t have TV or washing machines. Nope, Chicago suited me just fine.

  That night I dreamt that I was hiding in a deep forest where uniformed nuns and priests hunted me. When I woke in the dark, I got dressed and tiptoed out of the house, going down the street to see my friend Connie O’ Conner. I threw some pebbles at her window, but no one answered. I whispered Connie’s name a few times and threw some more pebbles until I finally saw her face.

  “Irene, what are you doing here?” Connie’s pale face was like the moon, her frizzy hair flattened by sleep on one side.

  “Come on, get dressed,” I said in a loud whisper. “We’re going to the carnival.”

  “The carnival! Are you crazy? It’s the middle of the night.”

  “Come on, Connie, it’ll be fun. We’ll be the only ones there. It’ll be so cool.”

  “All right, all right, hold your horses.”

  Three o’clock in the morning and not a soul in sight except Magda, who sat on her front porch in her nightgown staring at the stars.

  “Hi, Magda,” I said. “Don’t tell anyone you saw us, OK?” She nodded. I had watched and worried over Magda for years, always admiring the way Al looked out for his damaged sister.

  Connie and I walked through the night streets, past the run-down Sinclair station, the Amber Tavern, Silvia’s House of Beauty, and the dark schoolyard, until we reached the deserted carnival in a large empty lot. The carnival looked so sad at night without its garish lights and loud music. The booths were boarded up, and the Ferris wheel seats swayed and creaked in the wind. A trailer at the back of the lot had a light on, and some insomniac was listening to Roy Orbison on the radio. We walked the sawdust-strewn dirt humming “Only the Lonely.” It was quiet and eerie enough to put us in the mood for moony thoughts of the future. We climbed on the Tilt-A-Whirl and watched the few lights that were still on in our neighborhood.

  I sighed heavily. “I’d like to go somewhere where nobody knows me. Maybe run away with James Dean and spend years riding on his motorcycle.”

  “Yeah, that might be a little difficult since he’s dead,” Connie snorted. “But I’d like to do the same thing with Al Vitkus.”

  I swallowed hard. Al had always been my secret love.

  “Al told me I look like Sandra Dee.” Connie smiled. “Isn’t that cool?”

  “Not even,” I snorted. “With your frizzy red hair? That’s a good one.” Why hadn’t Al told me I looked like Sandra Dee? At least I was blond. My mother always told me I was born with a thirty-year-old face that I would eventually grow into.

  I started walking around the carnival, and soon Connie caught up with me. “Hey, Irene, I’ve been meaning to thank you for not telling Sister Devota about my water gun.”

  “Yeah, sure, nobody ever thinks Saint Connie could ever do anything wrong.”

  “Aw, come on, Irene, don’t start that again. It was no use both of us getting into trouble.”

  “But how come it’s always me, Connie? You do the same things, but you never get blamed for anything. It’s always me. Well no more, you hear me, Connie?”

  The next day, I decided it was time for a change. It seemed like everywhere I went, people saw trouble coming. The whole next week I was as quiet as Milda Gudauskas. Sister Devota didn’t call me into the office, and I was even doing my schoolwork. Nobody could believe the change in me. By the end of the week, everyone seemed to be watching me and wondering what was up.

  “I bet you’re faking,” said Ona.

  “Am not!” I answered.

  “I bet your mother gave you hell,” said Al.

  I coughed and looked away.

  “Maybe you’ve changed,” said Milda.

  “Yes, I have,” I vowed, putting my hand on my heart.

  “We’ll see,” said Vida.

  By the end of the week, I was feeling itchy, afraid that my friends were right. I really wanted to be good, but it was so boring. That afternoon Al stopped me in the schoolyard.

  “Everybody says you’ve become scared, Irene.” He raised his eyebrows in challenge.

  “Shut up, I have not.” Why did I have a crush on this guy?

  “Oh, yeah, well, prove it then,” said Al, smiling.

  I looked at his full lips—pillow lips, not like those skinny lizard lips some boys had. I looked at his blue eyes, and my heart took a leap, but I wasn’t going to let him see my attraction. “I don’t have to prove anything to you,” I said defiantly. “I can do anything I like.”

  “Well, I dare you to light a cigarette in the confessional,” said Al, a slow teasing grin spreading.

  “What? You must be nuts!” Why did I think he was cool?

  “Last week, I saw you smoking at Country Maids,” he continued his teasing. “Don’t tell me you’ve become a chicken?”

  “Oh, yeah, well, I’ll be there after school if you will.” As soon as I said it, I knew that trouble was getting ready to head my way, but I just couldn’t bear it if Al thought I wasn’t cool.

  “Hey, wait a minute, I was just joking,” he said, suddenly concerned.

  “Oh, now look who’s chickening out.” I turned and walked away, leaving Al looking uneasy.

  After school, Connie and I waited around the schoolyard until everybody went home, and then we snuck into the church. I had blackmailed the unwilling Connie into coming along. We found Al waiting for us in one of the pews. He tried to talk me out of the prank, but I was determined to show him I could take his dare. The empty church seemed dark and spooky. We all squeezed into the confessional box, and I lit a cigarette. Before long, we started coughing as smoke filled the tiny space.

  “I’m getting out of here. I can’t breathe,” said Connie.

  “I think I hear som
eone; hide the cigarette,” said Al.

  “Oh, no, I’ll get expelled,” I said in a panic, throwing the cigarette out the little window.

  “Be quiet, maybe they won’t find us,” said Connie.

  We sat huddled until the noise stopped.

  “My foot fell asleep. Do you think they’re gone?” asked Al.

  “I smell smoke,” said Connie.

  I pulled the curtain aside and saw an open hymnal smoldering.

  “Oh my God, the church is burning,” I said. “Get some water.” As I scrambled for the baptismal font, Al ran to get the holy water, and Connie ran home. I ran back, flinging water hysterically in the direction of the smoke, managing to miss the smoldering hymnal altogether and splashing the wall instead. A less hysterical Al threw water at the hymnal, and I heard the hiss of fire being doused.

  “Dump this in the trash, while I clean up this water,” I said.

  As I was frantically looking around for something to wipe up the mess, I noticed a huge weepy stain spreading over the wall where I had thrown the water. Taking off my half-slip, I tried to mop it up when I heard steps. My head whipped around just in time to see Sister Devota coming in the door.

  “Who’s that?” asked the nun. “What’s going on here?”

  I quickly put on my wet slip and was desperately looking for a hiding place, but when I realized I was cornered, I dropped to my knees, raising my hands. “Miracle...a miracle...it’s the Virgin Mary.”

 

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