“C’mon then, follow me!”
Mitzy sprang off the branch and flitted through the trees at an incredible speed. Greshmere was barely able to keep up and for a moment thought she was going to lose him before they got to wherever they were going.
A couple of minutes later, she swooped down and lit on top of an old hollow log lying on the forest floor. Greshmere landed beside her and looked around, but didn’t see any others. Mitzy suddenly chirped repeatedly in a variety of notes, like a song. She sang this song twice and then stopped to listen for a response. Within seconds, they heard a chorus of chirps from what seemed like a dozen birds. The combined notes and tones sounded like a mini symphony.
Suddenly birds came flying in from all directions. First there was a wren, then a cardinal, a robin, another goldfinch, two bluebirds and lastly a sparrow. The first one to speak was the cardinal.
“Who have we here, Mitzy?”
“This is Greshmere, guys. I just ran into him out by the telephone pole path.”
“Nice meetin’ ya, Greshmere,” the cardinal said. “I’m Skeez.”
“Nice to meet you, Skeez.”
“And I’m Bloomy,” said the wren. “To my right here is Draizy,” she said, indicating the sparrow.
“And this is the crazy one, Spanner,” Mitzy said, nudging the male goldfinch.
“She’s the crazy one!” Spanner said, jumping back. “Mitzy’s a hippie!”
They all chirped in unison.
“Whatever, Spanner. Anyway, we call these bluebird guys Frick and Frack. And the robin redbreast, we call Aggie,” said Mitzy.
Greshmere waited for one of them to speak but they only chirped.
“Uh, nice to meet you,” he said.
“Frick, Frack, and Aggie are all regular birds, Greshmere, so they can’t speak to us. But they really like playing with us and are quick on their feet when it comes to figuring things out, aren’t they, Bloomy?”
“For sure. Watch this!” Bloomy said. She approached one of the bluebirds, Frick he assumed, and lightly tapped him with her beak then suddenly flew up into one of the nearby trees. Frick in turn flew over and pecked Aggie, who in turn flew up and tried to catch Bloomy who had flown to another tree. Aggie swooped over to Bloomy in a flash and pecked her.
Bloomy said from above, “See, they can play tag just like pros!”
“That’s cool,” Greshmere said.
The fact that the human/birds were interacting with real birds surprised him. It seemed crazy and at the same time fascinating. Greshmere had already learned a lot of new things in the few minutes since meeting Mitzy. He had also noticed that all of them had young voices, the boys and girls alike, and he now felt like an awkward adult in their youthful presence.
“Well, let’s not just sit around,” Mitzy said. “Let’s show Greshmere how to have some fun!”
The rest of the birds chirped noisily and took off in a flock toward the treetops. Greshmere followed along, wondering what was going to happen next.
With Spanner and Mitzy in the lead, the entire flock flew to an altitude of a couple hundred feet and maintained a parallel course with the hilltop. Suddenly Spanner shot up like a rocket above the rest.
Mitzy drew beside Greshmere and said, “Keep a close eye on Spanner. He’s gonna drop an acorn and the idea is for somebody to catch it in his beak before it touches the ground. Whoever catches it gets to drop it for the others in the same way. Whoever makes the most catches out of ten drops is the winner. You got it?”
Greshmere replied, “Got it!”
At that moment he saw a small nut fall from the sky toward the flock. He slowed down and attempted to fly up to catch it before any of the others but he was too late. Draizy beat him to it.
“Gonna have to be quicker than that, Gresh!” Draizy cried.
The sparrow increased altitude while Spanner came down and flew beside Mitzy again. “Nice try,” he said to Greshmere. “Maybe next time!”
Draizy was now about fifty feet above them. Suddenly Greshmere saw the acorn shoot behind Draizy as the crafty sparrow used one of his feet to hurl the nut backwards. The flock put on the brakes all at once and nearly ran into each other, turning sharply around and chirping up a storm in the process. Mitzy was the first to double back and snag the acorn in her beak.
“Aha, nailed it!”
Now it was Mitzy’s turn. She shot up and purposely positioned herself directly above Greshmere. He watched from below as she glanced down at him and let the acorn fall. It came down no more than an inch from his beak. He snagged it.
“Yea! Your turn now, Greshmere!” Mitzy cried.
Greshmere was elated as he broke away from the flock and passed Mitzy on her way back down. “Thanks for the easy target,” he said.
She simply winked an eye and joined the others.
For the next twenty minutes, they played the game until Spanner became the official winner with four catches. Greshmere had never had so much fun in his brief heavenly existence, and had to admit to himself that he’d felt like a kid the whole time.
“Let’s go home,” Mitzy said. “Greshmere would probably like to see the place.”
On cue, the flock turned around and started heading back toward the area where Greshmere had met Mitzy. About half way there, they flew to the left in a diagonal path toward the interior of the hilltop. Soon afterwards, Greshmere followed them down a ravine to where a huge face of rock jutted out from the hillside. They landed on a smooth bed of sandstone directly below the overhanging rock. There were several other birds standing there, milling around.
“Hi, Harpy!” Mitzy said to a cardinal who was waiting expectantly for the flock to land.
“Hi, Mitzy—did you all meet somebody new?” Harpy said.
“Yeah, this is Greshmere.”
“Welcome, Greshmere. I’m Mitzy’s Doo-Key”
“Er, nice meeting you,” Greshmere said. He looked at Mitzy questioningly, not sure what a Doo-Key was.
“Let’s go up there, Greshmere. I’ll show you around,” Mitzy said.
Greshmere nodded as Mitzy flitted toward a huge crack that ran vertically up the wall of rock and was about a foot wide.
“Be careful, it gets kinda dark but just for a little bit,” Mitzy said, looking over back at him over her shoulder.
Greshmere followed the goldfinch into the rock chasm and it immediately became pitch dark. His eyes quickly adjusted as he spotted light up ahead with Mitzy silhouetted against it. Seconds later, they came out onto a huge rock slab that he hadn’t noticed earlier. Then he realized that the slab was part of a cave that wasn’t visible from the outside. It was cool and well lit inside by several natural skylights formed by holes in the ceiling that apparently ran all the way up to the top of the hill.
The place was enormous.
“Welcome to our abode,” Mitzy said.
“Wow, this is really cool.”
“Stays this same temperature the year round. It goes back that way for at least a mile,” she added, nodding toward the dark interior.
“How many live here?” Greshmere asked.
“Probably a few dozen or so. It’s really kinda hard to tell because the place is so big and there are two other entrances.”
“You said earlier that you’ve been in Ohio twenty-some years. Where were you before you came here?”
“First I was in a little village in Mexico but only for a few weeks. Then I traveled northward and kept staying in different places. I finally settled here.”
Greshmere tried to imagine such a young girl more or less flitting around aimlessly all over the country by herself. It must have been difficult, he thought.
“Weren’t you scared? I mean, no offense, but you seem a bit young to be doing all of that traveling all by yourself.”
She chirped. “Oh, I wasn’t by myself! I was with my Doo-key, Harpy!”
“Oh, I see. Uh, so what is a Doo-Key? That’s a new term for me—I’ve only been around for a few days, remember.”
“A Doo-Key is sort of like a parent. When a child dies and comes to heaven, a Doo-Key greets him or her right from the get-go, explaining what this place is all about and to help guide them through life, so to speak. Man, I could never have made it if it wasn’t for her!”
So that’s how it works, Greshmere thought. “Is it the same for infants?”
“Yep, there are a couple of babies in this place right now. They are so cute! Spanner was a baby, in fact. I’ve watched him grow up.”
Greshmere wondered about this. “How old does a baby get then? I mean, do babies eventually grow to be adults?”
“Young adults, adolescents like myself. That’s about it. I asked Harpy a long time ago if I would ever become ‘an old bird’ like her. After cracking up in laughter, she explained that kids that come to heaven stay kids forever.”
“I guess my next question is how long do the Doo-Keys stay with the children? I mean, you say you’ve been here for forty-some years. Is Harpy still your parental figure?”
“Of course! It’s just like it is on earth. Parents are there for their ‘kids’ for life, or at least for as long as they live. In this case, Harpy will be my Doo-Key forever! That is, if we really are gonna be here forever.”
“So all of the other kids—your friends—all have Doo-Keys living here with them?”
“Yep, every one of them. Except of course for Frick, Frack and Aggie. They have pretty much been pushed out of the nest by their parents. But that’s the natural way of things for them.”
“I’ve been wondering about that. What’s it like having real birds as your friends? How did it ever happen, for that matter?”
“It just sorta happened. Because we all live together here, it’s inevitable that we’re gonna be seeing the ‘locals’ from time to time. So for as long as I’ve known, everybody has sort of hung out with the other animals. It’s really cool! They are a lot smarter than most who don’t know better would give them credit for. And they are so perfect! They just do their thing and don’t bother anybody else. Unlike humans, I might add.”
“But what happens when they, uh, pass away? Isn’t that hard on you?”
“It is. Really hard. I get sad every time one of them dies. But I learned a long time ago not to be sad for too long, because I know that they will be coming back here, or some place like this, somewhere else. That makes it a lot easier. So tell me about yourself, Greshmere! Where have you come from and what brings you here?”
“I came from New York. At first I was on Long Island and then my Who-Key took me to the City. Although I enjoyed it there, something sort of told me to leave and come to Ohio. It was a vision I had, actually.”
“Are you trying to rediscover yourself?”
“Well, yeah. As a matter of fact I am. What made you think I was?
“Because I’ve only met one other person who ever had a vision. And that person was trying to rediscover himself, too.”
“Was he successful?”
“Don’t know. It was quite a while ago before I came here, so I never saw him again. What was this vision you had, if you don’t mind telling me?”
“I don’t mind. In fact, I was sort of hoping you could help me out. The vision was simply a view of the General Grant Bridge from somewhere pretty far away and high up. That’s why I came up here. This area looked like it could possibly be where the vision originated.”
“Well, I only know one place around here that has a clear, unobstructed view of the bridge. A while back, the humans that run the forest cut down trees from the hillside so people could see all the way down to the river. They added a little clearing and a parking lot. They call it the Point.”
“Then that must be it! Is there any way you could take me there?”
“Sure, no problem. It’s only about a mile away from here. I’ll have to tell Harpy, though. She still likes to know what I’m up to whenever I leave.”
“She’s just being a caring parent, right?”
“Yeah, she is. Well, let’s get going!”
“I’m right behind you,” Greshmere said.
He followed Mitzy back through the crack to the outside and they stopped long enough to tell Harpy where they were going. Then the two headed up toward the hilltop.
As he drew up alongside Mitzy, Greshmere felt excitement building up inside. He was almost certain that he was about to find the source of his vision, yet he didn’t know why it was so strong. He suddenly realized that if it was indeed the right place, he wasn’t sure where he was to go from there, or what he was to do.
He could only hope he was about to find out.
They flew past a telephone pole path to an area where the hill began decreasing in elevation. Below them, Greshmere could see one of the paved forest roads winding down along the hillside. They flew over the valley to another hill that was a bit higher than the other one and followed it for quite a distance. Suddenly, Mitzy began slowing down as they approached a clearing cut out of the hillside. Greshmere spotted a tree lined grassy area with a dirt road running around its perimeter. When he looked out through the clearing and saw the General Grant Bridge crossing the Ohio River in the distance, Greshmere knew that he had arrived at the right place.
They landed on an old wooden railroad tie sitting near the edge of the grassy area. Nearby was an ash-laden fire pit where countless campfires had been started through the years. The moment he felt the rough-hewn wood touch his feet and looked past the fire pit to the scene below, Greshmere felt an intense sense of déjà vu. He had been here before. In another life. As a human being. It was indisputable.
But what does it mean? he thought. He didn’t know, other than the obvious implications. Since this view seemed so utterly familiar, it suggested that he must have lived somewhere around here at some time in his life.
But what good is that? He was no closer to knowing who he was than he was before.
“Is this the right place?” Mitzy asked from beside him.
“Yeah, definitely,” he replied.
“So what are you thinking?”
“That it doesn’t help much. That although I’ve been here before, I have no idea why I was here or who I used to be. I’m really bummed, Mitzy.”
“Hey, don’t be so bummed out! Maybe it will still come to you. We just got here! You just need to cool it for a while and see if something comes up that jars your memory.”
“Thanks, but I’m not feeling very optimistic. I mean, there isn’t much to this place other than this view, a fire pit and a forest road. Oh, and the little parking area over there. I’m just not getting any vibes at all, other than the definite feeling that I used to spend a lot of time up here, staring out at that bridge.”
“You give up too easy. I’ll leave you alone for a few minutes so you can get your thoughts together, okay?”
“Yeah, I guess. Thanks, Mitzy.”
Mitzy hopped off the beam and strutted across the grassy clearing to the other side. She had been at this place several times before and knew that there wasn’t much happening beyond it. The forest road wound down to the highway and there were no other landmarks or places of note for several miles.
She flew up and landed in one of the half dozen trees growing along the grassy area to look around. When she saw Greshmere still staring out at the scene, she felt sorry for him. He looked so disappointed. She wanted so much to do something to cheer him up.
She flew back down and began searching for anything that might help jar his memory. Maybe there was a plaque or a sign around here somewhere. She walked around for a few minutes, scouring the area. Near the base of the old oak tree, she looked up and thought she saw something carved into its trunk. She backed up a few feet so she could view it more straight on. She noted that it must have been carved quite a while ago, judging by how much the bark had grown around the letters. She peeled her eyes and read the inscription: Daniel K. luvs Megan S.
Greshmere needs to see this, she thought.
Excitedly, Mitzy fl
ew over to Greshmere and said, “Come and take a look at this!”
“What is it?”
“You’ll see when you get there. C’mon!”
Mitzy flew over to the tree and landed a couple of yards from the trunk. When Greshmere joined her, she stared up at the carved names.
“Look at that!”
Greshmere read the inscription. “So what?”
“So what? That could have been your name: Daniel K! And Megan S. could have been your girlfriend!” she exclaimed.
“A bit far-fetched, don’t you think? I mean, I hate to burst your bubble, but just because that name is carved into this tree doesn’t mean it was my name. The odds are too much against it, taking into account that there are obviously a lot of visitors to this place. Sorry, Mitzy, but I’m having trouble sharing your enthusiasm.”
“Well, there’s still a chance that it was your name! Remember, Greshmere. This is heaven, the place where miracles happen! You can’t say for sure that it wasn’t your name, now can you?”
“Well, of course not. It’s just that it’s very unlikely, that’s all.”
“Can you think of any way to find out if it was, either way? I mean, you could do some research, couldn’t you? There are computers and stuff that could help, right?”
“Yes, of course there are ways to research things. But that is a long shot, too. For example, we have absolutely no idea how long ago this was carved into the tree. Could be anywhere from a year to twenty years ago! And even if we did, trying to figure out these people’s last names would be next to impossible!”
“Well, I think you should give it a shot. What have you got to lose, Greshmere?”
“Nothing. That much I am sure of. I guess I could go into town and see what I can find out.”
“There ya go! You may not regret it!”
“I just wish I had half of your enthusiasm, Mitzy. And I want you to know that I appreciate your attempts to get me motivated. Really.”
“Oh, it’s nothing, Greshmere. I just know how much this means to you and I want you to be successful. I can’t imagine wanting to do what you’re trying to do, but I bet it’s frustrating.”
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