Read Online Heart of the World by Linda Barnes - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Linda Barnes
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giveaways at the age ofeight. Probably a line of girls at her locker each morning, begging to borrow the latest fragrance.
A pink sweatshirt on a hook, a brief tie-dyed tee beneath it, stuff sheâd have worn in early fall when it was still warm. A plastic bag held gym clothes, navy shorts and a white shirt, wrinkled and smelly.
The hall lighting was dim. I got a flashlight from my backpack, took every item out of the lower part of the locker and placed it on the floor for further inspection, fighting against the rising conviction that there was nothing to find, that I was wasting my time, that sheâd been snatched randomly off the street. I unrolled a pair of socks and shook them out. I unfolded pages of lined three-hole paper to discover rough drafts of homework assignments, reassembled a sheet that had been ripped to pieces to find a âDâ on a quiz for act 2, scene 2 of Julius Caesar . Used spiral notebooks, broken pens. Where was her backpack? If she was using it as a suitcase, Iâd have expected to find her textbooks abandoned somewhere. They werenât at my house. They werenât at the Water-town house. They werenât here.
I aimed the flashlight beam into the back corner of the locker floor, then the rear of the high shelf behind the row of perfume vials. Something was jammed in the back corner, an envelope, maybe. I didnât want to knock over all the scent bottles, so I took each container out, one by one, placing them on the floor in a rickety row. A few more scraps of paper, scrunched exams, discarded attempts at essays. I reached into the corner recess, touched cloth, and withdrew a small drawstring bag made of rough brown felt.
It was maybe three inches by four, with a thin brown cord gathered tightly at the top, and pinked edges. The bottom of the pouch felt lumpy. I tugged at the top edges to spread the cord, held the sack in my right hand, and spilled the contents into my left. Something tumbled out, wrapped tightly in white tissue paper.
Pills, I thought, powder, but the shape was stiff and unyielding. I put my back to a neighboring locker, bent my knees, and slid to the floor, catching the pouch in my lap while my hands fumbled with the tissue.
Ornamental, some kind of jewelry, a pin, maybe, but noâI turned it over with careful fingertipsâthere was no clasp on the back of the small gold shape. It was an odd shape, whimsical, unusual.
It was gold, or gold-colored, but not the kind of gold usually seen in jewelry. More of a red-gold, an assertive gold. Not much shine to it, but depth. For its size, it felt heavy. It was the form of a man or, possibly, the more I gazed at it, a bird. The tiny body had two rows of raised ornamental ridges. The outspread arms, or wings, were arched. The head was triangular and a beak-like nose protruded beneath bulbous eyes. The areas that werenât raised were smooth. The figure was symmetrical, but not perfectly so, as though it had been made by hand, possibly hammered. The back side looked less finished than the front, the beak-like nose a hollow void.
Face up, the protruding eyes looked blind. The face belonged to something not quite human and not quite animal. I was still peering at it, running my fingers over the metal when Roz interrupted with news that, with the janitor safely drinking coffee at a nearby store counter, sheâd raised Aurelia on the phone: the gossip thing hadnât panned out, what now?
I displayed the little birdman.
âHey, cool.â She whistled softly and held out a scarlet-taloned hand. I was reluctant to part with the figure, but she didnât seem to sense my hesitation, and grabbed it eagerly. Staring at it closely, nose to beak, she traced the ornamental ridges with a fingertip. âLooks pre-Columbian. Not Mayan, though. Definitely not Mayan.â
Roz calls herself a post-punk artist, and from the acrylic oddities she paints, you canât really tell she's educated in the
A pink sweatshirt on a hook, a brief tie-dyed tee beneath it, stuff sheâd have worn in early fall when it was still warm. A plastic bag held gym clothes, navy shorts and a white shirt, wrinkled and smelly.
The hall lighting was dim. I got a flashlight from my backpack, took every item out of the lower part of the locker and placed it on the floor for further inspection, fighting against the rising conviction that there was nothing to find, that I was wasting my time, that sheâd been snatched randomly off the street. I unrolled a pair of socks and shook them out. I unfolded pages of lined three-hole paper to discover rough drafts of homework assignments, reassembled a sheet that had been ripped to pieces to find a âDâ on a quiz for act 2, scene 2 of Julius Caesar . Used spiral notebooks, broken pens. Where was her backpack? If she was using it as a suitcase, Iâd have expected to find her textbooks abandoned somewhere. They werenât at my house. They werenât at the Water-town house. They werenât here.
I aimed the flashlight beam into the back corner of the locker floor, then the rear of the high shelf behind the row of perfume vials. Something was jammed in the back corner, an envelope, maybe. I didnât want to knock over all the scent bottles, so I took each container out, one by one, placing them on the floor in a rickety row. A few more scraps of paper, scrunched exams, discarded attempts at essays. I reached into the corner recess, touched cloth, and withdrew a small drawstring bag made of rough brown felt.
It was maybe three inches by four, with a thin brown cord gathered tightly at the top, and pinked edges. The bottom of the pouch felt lumpy. I tugged at the top edges to spread the cord, held the sack in my right hand, and spilled the contents into my left. Something tumbled out, wrapped tightly in white tissue paper.
Pills, I thought, powder, but the shape was stiff and unyielding. I put my back to a neighboring locker, bent my knees, and slid to the floor, catching the pouch in my lap while my hands fumbled with the tissue.
Ornamental, some kind of jewelry, a pin, maybe, but noâI turned it over with careful fingertipsâthere was no clasp on the back of the small gold shape. It was an odd shape, whimsical, unusual.
It was gold, or gold-colored, but not the kind of gold usually seen in jewelry. More of a red-gold, an assertive gold. Not much shine to it, but depth. For its size, it felt heavy. It was the form of a man or, possibly, the more I gazed at it, a bird. The tiny body had two rows of raised ornamental ridges. The outspread arms, or wings, were arched. The head was triangular and a beak-like nose protruded beneath bulbous eyes. The areas that werenât raised were smooth. The figure was symmetrical, but not perfectly so, as though it had been made by hand, possibly hammered. The back side looked less finished than the front, the beak-like nose a hollow void.
Face up, the protruding eyes looked blind. The face belonged to something not quite human and not quite animal. I was still peering at it, running my fingers over the metal when Roz interrupted with news that, with the janitor safely drinking coffee at a nearby store counter, sheâd raised Aurelia on the phone: the gossip thing hadnât panned out, what now?
I displayed the little birdman.
âHey, cool.â She whistled softly and held out a scarlet-taloned hand. I was reluctant to part with the figure, but she didnât seem to sense my hesitation, and grabbed it eagerly. Staring at it closely, nose to beak, she traced the ornamental ridges with a fingertip. âLooks pre-Columbian. Not Mayan, though. Definitely not Mayan.â
Roz calls herself a post-punk artist, and from the acrylic oddities she paints, you canât really tell she's educated in the
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