It was a quiet springtime day at the E shaped house on the cliff. The leaves were just beginning to uncurl from their buds, the sky cloudless and blue. On that secluded mountaintop, the laughter of six little children could be heard ringing through the crisp, dewy air. A man, Jeb, sat sitting on the back steps, holding a very little girl, Angel, and watching a toddler, who had earned himself the name of Gasman, pull the grass from the lawn. The others, four-year-old Nudge, Max, the oldest, who was eight, and Iggy and Fang, both seven, ran and played in the yard, climbing trees, playing tag, and learning to fly, stretching their wings through the holes cut in their t-shirts with the kitchen scissors.
Max had always been a 'leader'…or more simply put, bossy. She always dictated what games they would play, what 'base' was in tag, and who was 'it' for hide and seek, and at times, she appeared to really intimidate the other, younger children, but today, thus far, anyway, they all seemed to be getting along rather well. Max was swinging on the tire Jeb had tied to a tree limb that overhung the yard. Nudge was playing with her baby-doll in the grass, picking flowers and putting them in the doll's wavy hair. Fang had Iggy by the hand, guiding his friend around the expansive yard, stopping occasionally to let Iggy catch his bearings or to smell the flowers or feel the gnarled, cracked bark of an ancient tree. Iggy had recently had his vision taken from him, and was still learning how to cope and how to take in the world around himself without his sight. Jeb was very grateful to Fang for helping Iggy along, for, even though he willingly took the children out of their less-than-perfect situation, he couldn't take care of the two babies and a blind child. He felt horrid to even think it, but he knew Iggy was going to struggle, and he couldn't take care of him on his own.
Max jumped from the tire swing, opening her downy wings just for a moment in the air before landing and running over to Fang and Iggy. Jeb smiled rather meekly to himself, wondering what she was going to say to them.
Iggy had once been very talkative and happy, always smiling and laughing and making jokes, but after losing his sight not even a week ago, he had changed. He had become quiet and introverted and lonely, and Jeb wasn't sure what to do; though Iggy was taking his new lifestyle very badly, Max was also a bit confused about what had happened. She didn't seem to grasp that Iggy wasn't the same as he had been before, not yet, anyway. Max was a smart little girl, but she did expect everyone to understand what she meant and to do what she said, and when Iggy couldn't physically or mentally grasp her wants, she would get frustrated. Because of this, Jeb watched carefully when Max tapped Fang on the shoulder and pointed to the small swing set Jeb had built for them. The three children headed towards the structure about twenty yards from the house. Iggy held Fang's hand, walking about an arm's length behind him, as Fang followed Max, who shortly began to break into a run. Fang followed shortly, speeding up considerably, but without warning to Iggy, who tried his best to run on such short notice, but wound up with his face in the grass, dirt in his mouth.
Fang stopped immediately when Iggy's hand slid out of his. Max continued running, only stopping when she had reached the swing set. She was puzzled when she turned around and Fang wasn't behind her, and sighed, exasperated, before walking back halfway across the property to where Fang was tending Iggy, who was now in tears, on the ground.
"What happened?" Max asked, kneeling down beside Fang, the knees of her jeans green from the grass.
"Iggy fell." Fang explained. Iggy howled, partially hurt physically, but also extremely frustrated. Fang grabbed his wrists and hauled the little strawberry blonde upright to a sitting position where he continued to cry, his sightless, glassy eyes pouring tears that stung his raw cheeks. Young, emerald grass shoots sprouted from his orange hair, and dirt clung to his pale nose.
"How come you fell, Iggy?" Max asked, not meaning to be insensitive, her wavy blonde hair hanging over her shoulder as she looked down at Iggy, who was slouched over, weeping into his hands. He said nothing, which made Max a bit miffed. "Iggy how come you fell down?" she asked again, a bit more intense this time. Iggy began sniffling, his breathing sped up, simply sobbing. "Ig-gy!" Max sang. Wanting an answer.
"Max he can't see." Fang said suddenly. Fang was relatively quiet. He was a quiet individual who preferred to stay out of confrontation, but Iggy was obviously unable to speak for himself at the moment. Max was a bit taken aback.
"Yes I know." She said, putting a hand on Iggy's shoulder. "Iggy are you okay? Did Fang run to fast is that why you fell, huh?" he shook his head, his thin, shaggy hair sticking to his forehead, which was cradled in his hands.
"can't see." He mumbled, in between broken breaths. Max just looked down, feeling sorry for prodding so. She took Iggy's hand, allowing Fang to take the other, and together they stood him up. Iggy just stood limply, his head hanging low, his hair in his face. Fang, who was considerably bigger than Iggy, picked him up on his back and walked Iggy back to the house, walking up the stairs beside Jeb, who had watched the events unfold. Max followed them, jumping up the stairs to hold the door for the boys.
Fang dropped Iggy off on the sofa, where he continued to sob, and Max covered him with his favorite blanket she had retrieved from his and Fang's shared bedroom. This had happened almost every day: Iggy became severely depressed, and Max and Fang did their best to cheer him up, followed by Jeb when all else failed. They always brought him to the sofa in front of the wall of windows overlooking the vista. Even though he couldn't see it, the sunlight hit his face and created a calming, soothing sensation that Iggy so greatly valued.
"Don't be sad, Ig." Fang said, squatting beside the sofa, his hand rubbing Iggy's head, picking out the grass that stuck there. "We'll help you out, don't worry." Iggy continued to cry quietly, rubbing his eyes as if to wipe the blindness away, obviously to no avail.
"Want me to put the TV on?" Max asked, grabbing the long black remote control from the back of the sofa, flipping on the television and sitting in the arm chair just beside the couch. She giggled shortly, chuckling at one of the Disney character's faces, the laughter of an unseen audience accompanying Max's own laughing. "Fang did you see that?!" she laughed, pointing to the screen, kicking her feet, the remote in her hands. Fang said nothing, and Iggy howled in agony.
"I want to see it!" I yelled, choking out the words, his voice raspy from crying. He coughed as Fang sat beside him on the sofa, letting Iggy put his face on his shoulder. He wrapped his strong but slender arms around his sniffling friend, rubbing the red-head's back. Max flipped off the TV, frowning and feeling very awkward. She wasn't very good at sympathy, and though she tried hard, she always seemed to make matters worse, especially when it came to Iggy. Iggy was a puzzlement to her since he had gone blind, and she wasn't really sure what to do with him anymore. He was moody and hard to understand to everyone, not just her. Everyone but Fang.
Iggy was completely and totally introverted with Fang being the one and only exception. Fang was the only one Iggy would respond to. Even Jeb couldn't get through to him when Iggy was really indignant.
"I..I'll leave, okay?" Max said, standing up and putting the remote back on the back of the sofa, deciding it best to withdraw herself from the situation. She walked back outside, closing the door quietly, leaving Fang and Iggy alone on the couch in a puddle of sunlight.
Fang held Iggy close, letting him cry. He needed to let it all out of his system, all of the pain and anguish he had lived through. Fang was the very last one to see him before the white coats sedated him. He was the last to see the fear in Iggy's face, his bright eyes full of horror, but gleaming with life, with the job of sight. And Fang was the last person Iggy ever saw. That was why Iggy was so open to Fang: he knew exactly what Fang looked like, what he smelled like, how his footsteps sounded. Fang was his eyes. He had to trust him.
Fang always felt guilty about what had happened to Iggy, feeling like it was his fault. Iggy wasn't one to struggle with the white coats. He had decided that it was best to just let them do what they wanted and not put up a fight. Either way they were going to torture you, so you might as well make things go faster and cause yourself less pain and anticipation of the inevitable. Fang, on the other hand, always fought back. Nobody got near his cage without leather gloves and long sleeves, for Fang would bite and kick and scream. That day Iggy's sight was taken, they had gone to Fang's cage first. A young woman, one of the newer scientists, had been told to fetch any one of the avian children (any of them except 30445, who was Max, of course) to have their eyes enhanced: an experiment to see if the procedure was effective enough to be used on their real project: Max.
She obviously didn't know what she was doing, and opened Fang's cage without a second thought. He bolted, then kicked and howled and bit and scratched at her until she released him and locked him up again. She moved directly onto the next cage, which happened to hold the more subdued Iggy, who was subsequently taken in to surgery, looking back at Fang with tear filled eyes for the last time.
Fang always thought that, had he cooperated just that one time, he could have saved Iggy a lifetime of hardships. He would have taken Iggy's place any day, seeing how torn apart his best friend was. Fang would have coped…or maybe he wouldn't have even gone blind. What if there had been some discrepancy in Iggy to begin with that made the experiment go horribly wrong? What if it would have worked on Fang? The thought made him sick to his stomach, that he could be at fault for Iggy's suffering.
After a while, Iggy's crying subsided and he lay still, his head rested against Fang's stomach, Fang sitting sideways on the couch, his legs on either side of Iggy's body. He scratched Iggy's head, his thin hair yielding to Fang's long fingers, feeling Iggy's chest rise and fall against his own body. He brushed the sticky reddish hair off of Iggy's sweaty forehead, continued pulling out straggling bits of grass as he combed his fingers through Iggy's hair.
"I love you, Fang." Iggy said suddenly, almost too quietly to hear.
"I love you too, Iggy."