A Prompting - 1. Prompt 303

The Remarkable Unremembered Boy

By R.L. Hunter

“How did you get into my room?”

Tom stood in his doorway, waiting for an answer to his question. A figure was sitting in shadow on the swivel chair placed in front of his computer desk. In fact, that entire end of his room was in shadow, and Tom just now realized it and how strange that was, considering he had flipped the switch for the overhead light.

“Do you remember when we met?” The figure asked. He, it was definitely a he, and his voice had a light, musical quality about it. Tom thought he heard birds singing in the background.

“What do you want?” asked Tom. He reached for the door jamb to steady himself. “Who are you?”

A hand with long delicate fingers reached from the shadows to point at the bed. Tom looked to where the finger was pointing to find a beautifully painted wooden bird. The paint was so fine, it almost looked like a real feathered bird.

“Please. Pick it up.”

***

“Mom,” Tommy whined his mother’s name, “why did we have to move way out here in the country?”

“For the hundredth time, Tommy, we aren’t moving to the country. We’re here because your grand aunt died and we have to settle her estate.”

“But who was she?” Tommy whined again.

This got Tommy a long lecture as to who, and the why, and the furthermore, of the situation. And then he got shuffled outside to… Go and play.

Once outside, Tommy skipped his way along the garden paths that his grand aunt had so carefully arranged and maintained. It was a great pleasure of hers, gardening, and she spent as much time as her old bones would allow doing it. Tommy, of course, didn’t appreciate the intricacies of color and height, or the play of texture among the leaves, or the buds and blossoms. But he did appreciate the bees. Soon it was a game of running and dodging, and ducking and sliding, in order to slip down the paths without running into any of the bees. This lasted until he came upon a wall with a wooden gate in it. A gate that Tommy nearly ran into, before he skidded to a stop.

“Whoa!” cried Tommy. “Cool.”

Indeed the gate was cool. The face of it was covered with carved ivy, the vines twisting and turning, and right in the middle was a small birds nest, and next to it was a small bird, painted in the most beautiful colors. Tommy reached out to touch it, and the bird peeped, and the gate swung outward to open. Tommy stuck his head through the gate and looked about and stepped through.

“Hello,” he heard. Tommy’s head darted here and there, and then back through the gate entry behind him, but he found no one. That is, until the gate swung shut, and there stood a boy just about Tommy’s height and just about his age.

“Hi, my name is Tommy. What’s yours?”

“My name is Na’oom,” said the little boy.

“How come your ears are pointy, Na’oom?” asked Tommy.

“Always have been. Why are yours round?”

“Same I guess.” Tommy shrugged. “Do you want to play?”

“Sure, I know the best places,” said Na’oom. He reached out and grabbed Tommy’s hand, and tugged. “Come on, let’s go.”

The boys ran across and through a field of wild-flowers as tall as their heads. Na’oom pulled Tommy along by his hand, looking back occasionally to smile and laugh. At the end of the field they rushed to a stop, and Tommy saw the biggest trees in front of him, rising up, up, up into the sky. Bigger than the redwoods he saw on his summer vacation last year. Na’oom put a finger to his lips in a shushing motion, hunkered down and motioned for Tommy to follow him. This was a game Tommy liked, and he scuffled along quietly behind his new friend up to the rough, dark brown bark of the nearest tree. Motioning for Tommy to look, Na’oom moved aside and Tommy looked through a blackberry bramble with ripe, purple black fruit, bigger than his thumb. On the other side of the bramble was a pool, and drinking from it, the strangest deer that he had ever seen. It was small, and its antlers spiraled out of its head in sharp curves that twisted back on themselves, over and again, only to end in sharp spikes of silver. Suddenly, the deer pulled its head back, its ears twitched and its mouth opened in a yawn wider than Tommy’s head, and filled with sharp teeth. Just then, right at the corner of Tommy’s eye, a piece of the tree’s bark looked at him. It blinked and Tommy drew back. The bark detached itself from the tree and he could see legs, tiny feet, a body and the head belonging to the eyes. It appeared to be some kind of lizard, which looked exactly like bark. The creature arched its back, took one last look at Tommy, and with a clicking noise, launched itself to sail through the air and landed on another tree. Tommy fell back to land on his butt in surprise. Na’oom rolled over on to his side and laughed and laughed.

“That was crazy,” said Tommy aloud. This caused a loud trumpeting to come from the other side of the blackberry bramble, he had forgotten about the deer.

“Run!” yelled Na’oom. The boys took off and were soon happily lost among the woods.

The day was spent in exploring and Na’oom showed Tommy the many interesting things of the woods. They ate when they felt hungry, and napped throughout the day, and talked. Tommy told his new friend why he was visiting. Na’oom said that his grand aunt must have been very old indeed to have died. He encouraged Tommy to stay and play with him as long as forever, and off they went to have fun, and to learn the ins and outs of the woods.

Tommy woke with a start, he heard someone crying. Na’oom was asleep, beside him still, where they lay in the tall grass at the edge of the woods. The crying continued and then someone called his name. Tommy recognized the voice and it was his mother. He shook his new, beloved friend.

“Na’oom, wake up! My mom’s crying!”

“Yes, I can hear her,” Na’oom said sleepily.

“I have to go, Na’oom. I have to go find her. Come on, help me!” cried Tommy.

Tommy grabbed his friends hand and dragged him from their nest of grass to run, hand in hand, toward the sound of Tommy’s mother’s cries. They reached the gate and Na’oom pulled back.

“I cannot pass the gate, Tommy. I am not allowed yet, and I am not strong enough,” said Na’oom.

“What do you mean, Na’oom? Come with me, I have to go…my mom needs me.”

“Listen to me, Tommy. I cannot go with you, it is against the rules.” Na’oom reached out to the gate and plucked the painted bird from its perch in the ivy. He cupped his hands around it and spoke one word, “Remember.”

“Here, Tommy, don’t lose it.” Na’oom put the bird safely in Tommy’s hand and closed his fingers around it tightly. “If you keep it close, you will always remember me, and you can come back.”

“I will and I’ll see you soon,” said Tommy. He waved to his friend and then ran pell-mell through the flowers as direct as he could, ignoring the garden paths. Concentrating on his mother’s voice and running, Tommy didn’t realize when it happened, that the pretty bird flew out of his hand to land amongst the flowers in the garden.

***

Tom landed on the bed heavily, still holding the beautiful painted bird in his hand, he had remembered.

“I was gone for over a year. My parents, the police and neighbors, searched and searched for me. There weren’t any clues as to what happened to me, my face was on milk cartons. My mother came back to grieve, every couple of months, and she was there that day I heard her cry.” Tom turned toward the shadows. “Do you have any notion of what happened? An eight year old boy goes missing for fourteen months and comes back looking the same, wearing the same clothes, a little dirty from playing, and he has this fantastical story of playing in the woods with his new friend.

“The gate was gone. There wasn’t any woods, just some scrub trees at the back of the lot. Nothing to convince them of anything. They were glad to have me back, my parents, but no one believed me. Everyone thought I was traumatized somehow and that my mind had made everything up. And I forgot, I lost the bird and I forgot. All of it, gone after a time. I went on to live my life and now this.”

“I am sorry Tommy. I did not know how different that boys like you were at the time. I enjoyed our day so much. It was long before I could cross the gate and find the token I gave you. It was even more difficult to find you.”

“So it is you, I wasn’t sure. Why come after so long, Na’oom? What do you hope will happen?” asked Tom. “It’s been nearly thirty years.”

“I have missed you, Tommy.”

A hand with long delicate fingers reached out from the shadows, palm side up and waiting.

“I have come to see if you want to join me again. Maybe, as long as forever this time?”