The Language of Sparrows (3 page)

“In seventeen syllables if you like, yes.” Mr. Prodan stood. “I have not had my breakfast. Do you wish for a true Romanian breakfast?”

He led her to his backyard, where they sat in patio chairs. They drank black-as-night Turkish coffee and ate jam-filled crepes that tasted like butter and homegrown strawberries.

“Were you a professor in Romania, Mr. Prodan?”

He looked out at the trees. “When I was a young man, I taught mathematics at a gymnasium. What you in America call high school. But for many years, the only people I spoke with were my colleagues in prison, and it was not maths we talked of. When I returned to society, my desire for teaching had vanished, and I worked in a bakery in Bucharest.” He moved his fingers away from him in a cutting motion.

Prison? But he didn’t give her the chance to ask any more questions. He stood, dumping the coffee grounds onto the vegetable garden that sloped away from the back door.

What she really wanted to know was if it was in prison his hands had been scarred. She wanted to know because she could see the memory—whatever it was—in the iciness of his eyes. But here he was standing in the sunlight with her.

They looked away from each other. She couldn’t ask about his story yet. She knew it was a story she would have to earn the right to hear. If she became his friend, if she came for more visits like this one, in time he might trust her enough to tell her how his hands had been damaged and how he had come to live in this house only a few blocks from her apartment.

Chapter Five

As the days passed, April fell into the routine of her new position. One Monday, she found the gallery’s clean light shining down on a man in an Armani shirt and Italian shoes. With his arms crossed, he considered a floor-to-ceiling arrangement of African masks in polished ebony. April had seen similar work, but never anything this size.

He turned to her. “It’s dramatic. I’ll give it that.”

She gave him her most winsome smile. “It
is
bold, isn’t it?”

A subtle exchange of words was all it was. Boldness for drama, but the difference would mean something to this man whose demeanor spoke of money and position. She took him on a tour of the boutique, all the while asking him about himself. By the time they were done, he was imagining parties at his house with people gathered around the piece hanging in his two-story entryway, admiring his genius.

He held his hands out in surrender. “You’ve sold me. Where do I sign?”

After he left, April paced the boutique, the idea forming itself in her mind. There was so much space in the gallery, and so many of the items on display were big. Boldness sold well. The glazed vase that reached her waist, the Irish drum that took up its own wall, the life-sized painting of a woman sprawled in her sleep—they all said, “Notice me.”

April made one stop on the way home. She arrived at the apartment with sacks of supplies and a plan. Inside, she practically skipped to Sierra’s door but found only an empty room. Standing at the door, she stared at the perfectly made bed. She’d counted on getting started this afternoon. Sierra knew all too well that she couldn’t wander around this neighborhood, but it was early yet. April wouldn’t start worrying.

In the dining area she pushed the table into a corner and laid ceramic tiles across the floor. Putting them in order, she imagined them on the wall in a staggered arrangement of creams and Mexican reds and oranges.

When Sierra came in, she was rosy-faced with exertion. She looked bright and active, so like an ordinary teenager that April didn’t have the heart to criticize her for not coming straight home from school.

“Hi, beautiful.” April waved at the ceramics on the floor. “I’ve got a project for us.” Sierra held back, eyeing the tiles.

April relayed how the Chinese silk had given her the idea. “If you can decorate your house with Chinese characters, why not Greek and Hebrew? You’ve got the know-how.”

Sierra leaned against the door. “I don’t know anything about painting.”

April held up one of the blocks. “But you know how to form the letters. Think of it as an experiment.”

Sierra’s eyes narrowed. “Sure.”

She passed April and went into her room. She’d be back. The project was too good for her to ignore.

In a minute, Sierra came and sat on the couch. She slung her arm over the back and inspected the squares.

April placed one of them against the wall. “I was thinking maybe a Bible verse. Rather than the running down feel of the Chinese characters, we’d have the Greek script running right and the Hebrew script running left. It would give the wall a feel of motion.”

Sierra’s eyes flickered with interest.

“What verse would you pick if you were going to do it?” April wanted Sierra to envision herself doing this.

Sierra closed her eyes. It only took a second. “‘Deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls; all your waves and breakers have swept over me.’” She looked so peaceful as she quoted the words. “Psalm 42,” she said, opening her eyes.

April held her breath a few seconds too long. She’d thought “The Lord is my Shepherd” or even “God said ‘Let there be light.’” Of course it would be something more original with Sierra. April didn’t remember hearing that verse before. It sounded too much like the words of a drowning man, maybe even a man who
wanted
to drown. She gazed at the blank wall, imagining it covered in calligraphy. If those verses got Sierra into the project, she’d cover every wall in Sierra’s psalm.

“All right,” April said, a little too brightly. “Let’s get to work then.”

All evening, April mixed paints and cleaned brushes as Sierra hunched over the tiles, moving brushes in meticulous strokes. The rounded strokes of Hebrew and the angular strokes of Greek filled the arrangement. When Sierra finished each square, April added a decorative flourish as a border.

“You’re a natural.”

Sierra didn’t respond, but her eyes shone all the same. Writing columns of Hebrew and Greek on a notepad was one thing, but seeing her words painted across the tiles must be another. This was art.

April brought in the toolbox. “Here, you want to help me with a hammer and the nails?”

When they were done pounding in the nails, Sierra stretched her back, obviously stiff. April picked up the first tile. “You can relax, honey. I’ll hang them up.”

She hung the tiles, leaving only one gap in the center where she planned on painting a centerpiece on the largest tile. Something with loose modern lines to accentuate the theme of the verse. That would have to wait until another day, though. It was late.

When she was done hanging the pieces, she looked back at Sierra, whose face had gone too still. April pulled back to the couch to see the wall through Sierra’s eyes. The letters slanted so that the Greek flowed right and the Hebrew flowed left in a stream. The lines floated away from each other, which gave the wall a modern-art look. The trim added an effect. She didn’t understand why Sierra was looking at the tiles that way. Once April added in the centerpiece, it would be gorgeous.

“Sweetie?”

“I can’t look at that.” And with no explanation, Sierra left and locked herself in her room.

April sank onto the couch, looking at the letters like a code she could break, a code to her daughter’s heart. As she leaned back, taking in the wall, her newfound hope withered. Gary loomed out of the letters. Hebrew and Greek, art and poetry, love of God and a psalm of despair—his legacy filled the room.

She had a sudden urge to tear the thing down. Instead, April went into the hall, touching her fingers to Sierra’s closed door. April prayed a meek little blessing through the white wood, something quiet enough for only God to hear.
Bless my little girl, heart and soul and mind.

Friday afternoon, April stood, taking in their masterpiece. The thing April liked least about her job was the varied hours. The commissions were too promising to turn down, but it bothered her leaving Sierra alone on Saturdays and, too often, past supper on weekdays, especially in this neighborhood.

She wondered what to do about the tiles. Should she take them down before Sierra got home from school? They added color and life to the apartment in a way she hadn’t thought possible. She couldn’t tear them down. It wasn’t just Gary’s legacy on the wall; it was Sierra’s. April wanted her daughter to see her own passion and skill, large and beautiful, staring out at her every day.

The truth was, the tiles brought out something long forgotten in April, too. A sudden yearning took April to her boxes, packed away in the closet. Gary had given her a camera the year before he died. It was a peace offering, an apology, many things, but never a real invitation to use the thing, and so the camera had ended up in the box.

She found the Nikon buried under a package of unopened art pencils and scrapbook pages still in their plastic sheaths. It was a box of might-have-beens. She sat up straight, pulling the box into her lap, refusing the dark thought. It could be a box of yet-to-bes.

After slipping new batteries in, she carried the camera outside. The sun was too bright to capture anything today. Everything would look yellow and washed out even with massive photoshopping. Still, she zoomed around, focusing on this and that. The weeping willow poured its branches into the center of the courtyard. A napping cat lay under the steps. The old April came to life, a flutter of excitement making itself known in her hands.

She switched angles. Ricky Salinas, the owner of their complex, lifted his eyes as he strode to the office and waved at her. Behind him, a little boy swung on the swing set. Her camera froze on the boy in the screen, on his grubby little face.

The boy couldn’t be older than five, but already he had a hard set to his mouth. His eyes were wide, not in wonder, but with wariness. His mother pushed the swing, but her face was guarded, too, as if she were waiting for the next blow. It was images like these that had caused her to pack her camera away.

April lowered the camera, looking at its black lines.

She’d first met Gary with a camera in her hands. Her camera had met his gray eyes, deep as the sea, and she’d thought,
As if everywhere he looks there’s a mystery to be plumbed.

She’d kept shooting a record of their life—Gary working at his desk, Gary holding their baby daughter, Gary asleep. She recorded him, because it’s who she was and what she did. The camera didn’t miss a thing. Not the hollows under his eyes or the growing hollowness within them.

In real life you could tune things out. The lens, though, found the true story, like it or not.

One day she’d knelt to capture his hand scribbling notes madly on a writing pad—an artistic image, she’d thought at the time. It had been the last straw. Gary knocked the camera out of her hands. Then he stared at the camera lying on the floor, his eyes big and remorseful.

With his eyes still on the camera, he said, “Just how much of my pitiful life do you need for your albums?”

The lens had been cracked, but he was right. It was about that time the same hollows appeared under Sierra’s eyes. She was a few months shy of twelve then. So April gave the camera away and never looked back, not even when Gary replaced it with a camera that cost a month’s salary.

April pointed the camera up, capturing a white-hot sky. She pointed it down and found the weeping willow. Despite its sad name, it was a beautiful tree, providing shade with its long drooping branches. She focused, clicked, and went back inside.

Pausing at the box, she considered, but finally tucked the camera back inside. A tightness coiled itself in her chest and she took a deep breath. The last few days had been entirely too bleak since her art project had gone awry. It was possible for a little bit of disappointment to build into despair and then into something too big to fight. April was an expert on the process, and because of Gary, also an expert in living positively. The first rule of living in the light was to spend time in the light. And the next was that if you wanted to be a person with energy, you had to act as if you already had it.

In minutes she was dressed for a run and driving to the park. But even on the verge of October, it was still too hot for anything but a lazy jog. The shade from the huge oaks gave cool, green light though.

Pace by pace, her chest lightened and the day moved back into the good column. There was a whole life full of yet-to-bes. She was already thinking of new ways to live large and bright. For Sierra and for herself.

Chapter Six

On the way home from school, Carlos pulled into step beside her. “Hey Sierra with the brown eyes.”

Why was he always calling her that? Brown eyes were nothing special.

“I’ve got some things to do at your place today. Maybe we could walk there together.”

Sierra nodded and kept moving.

“You’re gonna say something to me one of these days.” He flashed her a smile that said he was used to getting what he wanted.

She sped up her steps, but he matched her stride easily.

“No, really,” he said. “You’ll talk to me. And hey, maybe you’ll even smile at me like you smiled for that old guy.”

They crossed the street and Sierra headed down the sidewalk. She wouldn’t blurt something out this time. Anything she said would only double his effort.

When they entered the courtyard, she made a straight line to her apartment, but he kept pace with her. She clung to the railing, and he started up the steps with her.

She stopped. “Bye, Carlos.”

“I’m a gentleman, you know. I always walk a lady to her door.”

“Not necessary.”

“Sure it is.” He kept by her side until they were at her door.

“Bye,” Sierra said again, with more force this time.

“I could come in for a while.”

“I don’t think so. My mom’s at work.” She studied her fingernails. He winced. He actually looked hurt for a few seconds. Who knew? Maybe he was. It couldn’t be easy taking rejection from a bottom-feeder like her, even for a bet with his friends.

“Some other time then.”

All afternoon, Sierra sat in her room with a pen raised over her paper.
“Write your heart out,”
Mr. Foster said.
“Put Sierra Wright into these poems,”
Mr. Prodan said. There were no words that could live up to the requirement they’d given her. She shoved the paper aside.

When the afternoon began to dim, she couldn’t stand it anymore and began walking down the steps, out the gate. Once Sierra turned into his neighborhood, with its quiet houses and clean sidewalks, it seemed safer than ever, much safer than her run-down street covered in gang graffiti. The trees took the edge off the heat of the day. She knew Mom wouldn’t like her walking past their street, and she knew what she would say about visiting a man who’d spent time in prison, but Mr. Prodan wasn’t a criminal.

Romanian prisons hadn’t been like American prisons. Sierra knew a thing or two about Eastern Europe from her books. Secret police spied on regular people. The communists didn’t arrest people for murdering and stealing but for being brave enough to speak about their ideas. And Mr. Prodan had lots of ideas.

As she turned the corner onto the street, Sierra came to a halt. A pickup truck sat in Mr. Prodan’s driveway, and a man stood at his door.

She stood still, debating with herself. Under the shade of the old oaks, Mr. Prodan’s grass was trim and neat. The man was probably only selling something. She began walking again, taking steps slow as creek mud. Mr. Prodan came to the door, his hands folded in front of him. The man handed Mr. Prodan a small package. They nodded, and then the younger one turned back to his truck.

Mr. Foster? What was he doing at Mr. Prodan’s? It was odd, really odd. Mr. Foster backed out of the drive and drove by her. He slowed his truck and looked straight at her as he passed, then kept his truck idling at the stop sign. Sierra took a long steadying breath and shoved her hands into her pockets.

Mr. Prodan was about to step back into his house, but when he saw her, he came out to meet her. “My student has been writing haikus?”

She shook her head.

“Mr. Prodan,” she said, trailing behind as he turned back into the house. “Why was that man at your door?” She nodded her head in the direction of the street outside.

He stopped with his back to her, just outside the library. “It is not important.”

“Well, I guess it’s none of my business.”

“That is correct.”

“It’s only I know Mr. Foster, and I wondered. It was kind of weird, both of you helping me with the haikus. That’s all.”

Mr. Prodan turned to face her. “Haikus? What has the man you saw to do with your haikus?”

“Mr. Foster’s the teacher who told me I needed to put my heart into the poems.”

“Ah,” he said. He blinked. He balled up his hands and then turned pale. She could actually see the color fade from his face.

She sat down next to the bookshelf and waited. The silence echoed. Finally, she said, “Is there something wrong, Mr. Prodan?”

“I’m sure he is a fine teacher. He is my son.” His voice was way too quiet.

Sierra went cold. She didn’t know why. Mr. Prodan was
her
special friend. There was nothing so terrible about Mr. Prodan having a son, but she didn’t like her two worlds colliding. Maybe that was all.

She looked at Mr. Prodan, who would not meet her eyes. She rubbed her hands on her jeans.

No, it was more than her two worlds meeting. His skin going all white, his glance turning away from her—it was just bizarre.

She waited for an explanation, but he said nothing else. At last Sierra said a quiet good-bye. “I’ll see you soon, Mr. Prodan.”

He waved her out the door, as if he were shooing her out. What else was there to do but go home?

Days passed. Mr. Foster didn’t ask Sierra about her poems. Not only that, but when she saw him in the hall, he turned back into his classroom. Sierra trudged down the stairs outside his classroom, feeling the emptiness inside her widen into a gulf.

Thursday night she had just drifted to sleep when she woke with a start. She should have thought of it long before. She sat up and rubbed her eyes, looking at the yellow light that seeped through the curtains. The room seemed all wrong in the jaundiced light. Everything seemed wrong. How could Mr. Foster be Luca Prodan’s son? He didn’t have Mr. Prodan’s name. He wasn’t even Romanian.

She hardly slept that night. She had crazy dreams about Mr. Foster being a KGB agent and Mr. Prodan being marched through a frozen wilderness with a group of prisoners. She would wake up and nod off, only to have a new thought charge through her. Why wouldn’t a son use his father’s name? And what kind of father didn’t want to talk about his own son?