Reincarnation

The next morning my parents ordered the doctor to the house. After checking me over several times, and asking plenty of pointless questions, he stated I was fine. I was just glad to watch him leave. I never got along with doctors. My mother and father lingered in my room, picking up dirty clothes and pressing their hands against my face. They seemed confused that I was not sick. I wanted to tell them about my real mother, but I knew they wouldn’t understand. Finally, they left the dirty clothes in a pile by the door, and started downstairs. I slid out of bed and trudged after them as they disappeared into the kitchen.

“Can I miss school tomorrow?” I asked, sitting down on a seat and noticing my brother had followed us. He climbed onto the seat next to me. I frowned at him, but he simply blinked at my and turned his attention to the table, tracing the patterns on the wood.

“No. You already missed it today, honey,” my father said, fishing through the refrigerator as Mother started the dishes.

“Can I miss school tomorrow?” It repeated.

This time Mother sighed, shaking her head as she spoke. “You don’t go to school, dear.”

“Can I go outside?” I cut in, growing annoyed with the conversation. Father looked at Mother with a peculiar face. He seemed to be waiting for my mother’s reply even more tensely than I was.

“Don’t you dare leave the yard,” my mother finally warned me after a silent second, and I took it as a yes. I started off the seat, and It slid gently off his and followed.

Outside I found a nice dry rock and sat down, elbows on knees and with my chin in my hands. I stared into the woods, waiting patiently. I was so sure my real mother would come and get me.

It sat down next to the rock, not seeming to mind the cold, almost frozen, mud. He glanced at me, and then turned and also stared into the forest.

We sat like that for several minutes. Being as young as I was, I soon grew bored. But with It right next to me, I dared not act like I was apathetic. I simply diverted my attention to the occasional chirps of birds. Since it was nearing winter, the animals were scarcer, and the wind had an exceptional chill to it.

It finally spoke as I was pulling my jacket tighter around myself. “What are we looking for?” he asked.

“We’re not looking, we’re waiting,” I said, my tone edged with bitterness. She shouldn’t be keeping me waiting.

“Oh.” Silence. And then, “What are we waiting for?”

“Not what; who.” I scowled, feeling his eyes on me and glad he saw my annoyance with him.

“Oh,” he said again. I tapped my fingers against my knee. The woods were as still and ugly as ever. The trees were naked, besides a few straggler leaves who clung onto the branches even after death. I could see far into the woods, and I strained my eyes, but I knew she wasn’t there. I would spot her from even a mile away.

“Who are we waiting for?”

“None of your business.” I sniffed importantly, sticking my nose up. When I felt his eyes off of me, I glanced at him. He hadn’t taken his jacket, foolishly, and he was rubbing his bare arms. I could see the fine hairs on them, all standing up above the goosebumps. His nose and cheeks were red, and it made him look ugly, raw almost. He reminded me of a puppet.

“Puppit,” I whispered. And I did believe it was spelt exactly so, for I had no sense of spelling at that age.

I stood up in what I thought was a majestic air. “Come, Puppit, we’re going back into the house.”

He glanced at me, but didn’t protest his new name, nor did he question it. He simply got up off the ground and followed, attempting to remove some mud from his bottom.

Once inside, I stripped off my jacket, leaving it in a crumpled heap on the tile floor. Puppit went to defrost himself besides the fire, sitting down by our mother’s feet. I paused outside the living room, glancing in at them, then, deciding them not worth my time, I flounced into the kitchen to bother my father.

I went through the rest of the week in a daze. Every time I got home from school, I dropped off my backpack, and went to wait outside, by the side of the woods. I always managed about half an hour, before giving up and going inside. If it wasn’t for the memory of my “real” mother, I wouldn’t have lasted even that long.

After that week, however, I gave up. I felt the disappointment stabbing at my gut, but I was easily distracted from it. My real mother was soon forgotten, left to drift in the pool of vague memories.

One night, several weeks later, I woke up to the moon shining through my window, a small crescent shape in the vast, black sky. I blinked, then slowly sighed. I did not want to get up to pull the blinds shut- for several reasons. The floor was cold…and there was someone watching me.

“What, Puppit?” I snarled softly.

“Can we go down?” he asked. I rubbed my eyes as he climbed into my bed. I didn’t have to say anything for him to know my answer. He curled up against my side and I listened to our breathing. His was heavy and regular; mine was light and slow.

Eventually my eyes adjusted to the shadows. The blue moonlight falling into the middle of my bed grew and took over the entire room. I stared at my door, and then my window, waiting.

Though we were tired, neither of us fell asleep. As soon as the first ray of light fell into place of the moonlight, I slid out of bed. Puppit followed, and we tip-toed out of the room and down the stairs.

There, lying under an evergreen tree, were the perfectly wrapped boxes. Multicolored ribbons and bows dotted the tops of the piles.

We dove into the presents without any respect for our sleeping parents. Sure enough, half way through the rampage, our parents trudged downstairs. As usual, they left us to our ripping, tearing, and exclaiming, and groaned their way into the kitchen for some coffee.

Another two hours had us all sitting around the table, stretching and picking at the crumbs on our plates in a desperate attempt to keep the delicious taste in our mouths. I glanced into my cup. The apple juice was gone.

“Can I please have your apple juice, Tod?” I asked, my voice light and pleading. But he wasn’t stupid. He knew it was an order. Reluctantly, he pushed the cup towards me.

“It’s ‘may I’, Kathira,” Father said gruffly, and Mother smacked him.

“Oh, she’ll learn correct English later,” she laughed happily, “Katie, thank your brother!” But I was already drinking the sweet tasting cider, and my mother said nothing else. Christmas always made her happy, and less likely to scold me.

The rest of the day was spent stumbling around in the cold snow, coming inside once for a cup of hot chocolate and letting our hands and feet thaw out. But I was soon dragging Puppit outside again.

In the middle of our play I looked up, shielding my eyes against the glare of the sun. It was getting lower. Puppit, who had been bundling together a pile of snow balls, also stopped and followed my gaze, squinting.

“Come,” I commanded, and started stomping through the snow. Puppit dropped the ball he was shaping and followed, gingerly stepping into my foot prints to avoid having to break through the top of the snow himself.

We had an ivy fence against the side of our house, and over the years I had perfected climbing it. I knew exactly which spots to avoid, and which ridges supported my weight. But I never before tried climbing up in the winter, when it was covered with ice and snow.

I stared up at it for a long time, then cautiously gripped one ledge. I was conscious of Puppit behind me, watching me. I placed my foot on another ledge, pushing my weight down on it. When it didn’t give away, I raised my other hand, my other foot.

Once I was half way up the fence, I felt it shudder just slightly. I knew Puppit was following. I smiled to myself and continued. At the top, I dared not look down. Instead I dug my elbows against the roof and climbed up.

It was like entering a new world. The snow on the ground was brown and turning to slosh from our trampling. But the snow on the roof was perfectly white, new, and clean. It held an almost confident aura, as if it was sure of itself. As if it knew no one would come to destroy it. But it was wrong. As I thought this, the corners of my mouth lifted into a satisfied smirk. Soon it would be just as trampled as the snow below it.

I turned around, watching as Puppit’s head popped up above the side of the roof. Clumsily, he put his arms straight out on the snow, wiggling and trying to pull himself up. At first I watched with an amused smile, knowing he wasn’t going to prevail using that tactic. And then his eyes widened, and the snow beneath his limbs slid towards him, bringing his arms with it.

I wasn’t even sure what was happening. Some instinct inside of me must have known, however, because I dove towards him. I managed to grab his arm, having to use both my hands to get a good hold of the slippery jacket. I dug my heels into the snow and started to pull him up.

And then the sky was swirling upwards. My bottom hit the very edge of the roof, and pain jolted my tail bone. Before I could open my mouth to howl in pain, I was sliding off. There was a second when time seemed to stand still, and both me and Puppit were staring at each other, wide-eyed and open mouthed.

And then we slammed into the ground.

The wind was knocked out of my lungs, and all my senses seemed to have been left up in the air. I could see nothing, hear nothing, feel nothing. I was shrouded in darkness.
I’m not sure how long I stayed like that. But then my body urged me for air, and I sucked in sharply. My side screamed in protest, making me groan.

I saw a pinpoint of light in the middle of the darkness, and it slowly grew until I was staring straight up at the sky. I slowly inhaled again, and then again, making sure my lungs worked properly. Then I cautiously sat up and coughed.

I wasn’t holding on to Puppit any more. I must have let go of him on the way down. I glanced around slowly. He was lying in the snow a few paces from the spot I landed, and his back was to me.

Crawling on hands and knees, I trampled through the snow towards him. “Puppit,” I croaked, “Puppit.” He moaned softly, and I sighed in relief. Once I was besides him, I sat back on my heels and touched his arm gently.

“It hurts. It hurts,” he whispered, and I could hear the agony flooding his voice.

“What hurts?” I asked. I listened to him breath in shakily.

“My arm,” he finally said.

I sat there for several minutes, inhaling and exhaling slowly, trying to get over the shock of what had just happened. Finally I stood up, swallowing to try and clear my dry throat.

“I’ll go get Mommy,” I whispered. I wasn’t sure whether he heard me or not, but I was already plowing through the snow. I somehow managed to get through the front door and into the living room, even though my legs felt like jelly.

“M-M-Mo…” I stammered once inside. And then my sight blurred, and I started bawling.

“What! What is it, Katie?” I heard my parents hurrying towards me, and my father’s arms wrapped around me. “Where’s Tod?” My mother brushed the hair from my face, and then, without waiting for me to reply, bolted out the door.

My father lifted me up, and I clung onto him lightly, something strange un-burying itself from the shock inside me. Something new.

Anxiety for another. Concern. Never before had I felt something like it, and yet I could immediately put a name to it.

It wasn’t something that I could easily push down; I couldn’t tame it, as I had tamed all the other emotions I did not fancy. It fogged my mind, forcing itself onto me. My pulse raced faster, the blood pounding in my ears, and I cried out involuntarily. Then everything went black.