She closes the cover of the notebook before her, sets it atop the others. She will take these stories with her the only way she can: she strikes a match and sets the stack aflame.
And then, because she has just one more moment, because they are on their way but not here yet, she begins to tell one last story. An apology, a love letter. A story she has never written down because she knows it by heart. She closes her eyes and begins to speak.
Bird. Why did I tell you so many stories? Because I wanted the world to make sense to you. I wanted to make sense of the world, for you. I wanted the world to make sense.
When you were born, your father wanted you to have my name. Miu: a seedling. He liked that idea, you as our little sprout. But I chose his: Gardner. One who makes things grow. I wanted you to be not only the grown, but the grower. To have power over your own life, turning your energy toward what’s to come, leaning into the light.
Except some people have another story for your name. Gar: a weapon. Dyn: an alarm. Gardner, the one who hears the warning call and comes bearing arms. A warrior, shielding what’s behind, protecting what’s dear. I didn’t know that then. But now, I’m happy you have both in you. A caregiver, tending the future; a fighter, defending what’s already here.
There are so many more stories I wish I could tell you. You’ll have to ask others—your father, your friends. Kind strangers you will meet someday. Everyone who remembers.
But in the end every story I want to tell you is the same. Once upon a time, there was a boy. Once upon a time there was a mother. Once upon a time, there was a boy, and his mother loved him very much.
When does she stop speaking? When are you ever done with the story of someone you love? You turn the most precious of your memories over and over, wearing their edges smooth, warming them again with your heat. You touch the curves and hollows of every detail you have, memorizing them, reciting them once more though you already know them in your bones. Who ever thinks, recalling the face of the one they loved who is gone: yes, I looked at you enough, I loved you enough, we had enough time, any of this was enough?
She raises the laptop above her head and smashes it to the floor, and behind her she hears the door open.
When Bird and Sadie wake it is sunrise. At first neither of them remembers where they are, and then it comes back to them in a rush: the cabin. The project. Outside the trees are like long straight arrows pointing at the sky. They are certain Margaret’s plan has been a success, certain that she will have changed everything, certain that when she and the Duchess arrive they will be whisked back to a city completely transformed, a world set on its axis again.
Only no one comes. They finish their cereal and sit side by side on the cabin steps, waiting. An overcast day with heavy air, dampening the sound around them like a thick quilt. Now and then they swear they hear something—the crunch of tires on gravel, or the grumble of an engine approaching. But still no one comes.
They’ll be here soon, Sadie says, confident. I bet there’s just traffic. They’re coming.
There is no telephone in the cabin, no computer, no internet. Nothing to tether them to the outside world. It is at this point that Bird and Sadie realize they only have the faintest sense of where they are; on the trip up, they’d stopped paying attention to the road signs the farther they got from the city. It hadn’t mattered then, but they think of the forty-seven acres between them and the nearest person. How would you find another person, in such a space? Far off above the trees, the clouds gray and darken.
What if no one ever comes back, Bird says. In the silence they both consider this. They could live here, for a time; it is warm and sheltered; the bag of food the Duchess has left could last a few days, maybe longer. And then?
Maybe we could find a neighbor, and use their phone, Sadie says.
But both of them know this is impossible. Which direction would they head in, and how would they find another house, and once they got there, who would they call, anyway? They try to imagine: they could follow the long gravel driveway all the way back out to the road, and then follow the road. It must lead somewhere: either back to the city, or farther away from it, but it would take them to people. And then? They pause here, stalled, unsure what follows. Whoever found them will surely call the authorities and they will be taken away, and not together. There’s a sudden rustling and rattling, and both of them tighten in anticipation, but there is no one there, no movement; it’s just the wind, picking up, throttling the trees. Branches whip and thrash in the air. He had never known the forest could be so noisy, or so wild.