i live my life in growing orbits
What one notices is the coming of spring, not winter's passing. Small things, first: the gentleness of the air on a sunny morning, or the stirring of new leaves, or how the earth, no longer frost-hardened, yields just enough for one's shoes to make their mark. It has been weeks since the last snowfall, and light, tentative showers soon soften the ground. The walk to the Renmei temple grows easier, less of a struggle against the cold, and each afternoon Rakka looks out for other signs: the first flowers, the first swallow returning from over the walls.
It is only inside the walls that one does not feel the stirrings of new life. There it is as quiet and cold as ever, dark except for the glow of a lantern and of the walls. Yet by now the stillness is almost comfortable. Rakka has grown into the job, even if the suit remains a little too big for her, and the days there pass easily. She listens out for the sound of voices and the ripples that come and go across the river. She finds Reki's name, the tag thick with flakes of light, and spends the week carefully tweezing each shining leaf off. It is delicate, precise work, not unlike cleaning dirt from a pair of wings. She wonders whose halo will be forged from these.
Outside the walls time moves on, as it must. In Old Home the cocoons are growing, forcing their way through even tile and mortar with their feeble strength.
To reach the town centre from the outskirts one has to walk down one of the long white-paved roads that lead there, the spokes of a wheel. Rakka meets Hyohko on the way, one afternoon in mid-spring. The wind ruffles his hair as he grins awkwardly in greeting and falls into step with her.
"Some of us were talking 'bout helping out at Old Home. With the kids, y'know? Can't have you lot doing all the work."
"That sounds nice," Rakka says. "I'll ask the others- I'm sure they'd love it, and the housemother won't mind! I think."
"Mm." His wings twitch, and he shoves his hands a little deeper into his pockets. "Would be good to have a look around, after so long."
It takes a while and several more steps before Rakka understands. "Ah- you can come into the south district now, Hyohko?"
"Yeah. Ever since... yeah."
There's a pause that might have been awkward; but spring is here, so in response to Hyohko's apologetic half-grimace, Rakka merely shakes her head and smiles. It is enough. Hyohko still has the habit of holding his wings half-folded and close to his body, as if they have been kept cramped and hidden for too long, but now he shakes them out briskly like a shrug or a throwaway laugh and says, "You want to get some soup?"
So they do. Rakka introduces Hyohko, who nods his head sheepishly and reaches for his cap before remembering that he no longer wears it. The cafe owner laughs, and gives them half a loaf of bread to share with their meal.
Sunset is nearing by the time they are done. "Remember to ask Nemu about it," Hyohko calls out as he leaves. Rakka waves. In the late afternoon sun, Hyohko's halo is a ring of flame.
She watches him walk away until he turns the corner and is out of sight. The air is gentle on her lungs, making it tempting to linger. The clock tower chimes the hour, sonorous and calm, and she waits for the final peal to fade into silence before turning towards home. It is best if she returns before sundown; the others might need some help before dinner, after all, and during the preparation she can tell them about what the Haibane of Abandoned Factory proposed.
"Hey!"
Rakka turns, surprised, to see the clothes seller beckoning to her from the doorway of his shop.
"I've got something for you, though I don't know if you want it."
'It' turns out to be a little crow, not nearly a fledgling, nestled in the folds of some old scarf on the shop counter. Its eyes are the deep blue of a young animal's, but its gaze is sharp and cool as it regards Rakka, beak lifted almost imperiously.
"Found him on the step this morning," the clothes seller says, as Rakka peers down at it. "Waited for a while and didn't see his parents, but I had to get him out of the way before the customers started coming. The little guy's not hurt, but he looks kind of young to be out on his own, and I couldn't find a nest. He's had it rough today, too - the customers won't leave him alone, heh. So I thought, you know, if you'd like to take care of him or something..."
The crow caws, beats its wings haltingly. Rakka blinks, then smiles. "I'll try."
The clothes seller laughs, half-embarrassed. "Thanks. You're a great help. He's not quite the same as a pair of boots or a knitted hat, I know- hang on, I'll just get rid of this scarf and give you something to carry him in. Here, if you'd just hold him for a while-"
He picks the young crow up and hands it over. Rakka takes it from him, carefully. There is something familiar about the feel of soft warm feathers against her hands.
On the road back to Old Home, the crow makes no sound. Rakka looks down at it every few minutes, as it rests in the small cardboard box the clothes seller gave her. Now and then it rouses itself, stands, hobbles a little with one outstretched wing, but eventually settles back down. This is another of those days that make Rakka feel like singing, though she still does not know what songs she has.
The crow meets with a mixed reception. The Young Feathers go wild, of course, clamouring to see it, their own wings beating the air in excitement. She lets them touch it, at first, carefully and just with the tips of their fingers - for the safety of both parties - but has to stop them when the crow nips hungrily at the proffered fingers.
"Crows are a menace," Kana says darkly, as one Young Feather backs away in newfound fear of the hostile, ragged little crow. "You're gonna feed it and bring it up so it can raid our garbage, Rakka?"
The crow begins to caw, as if in indignation, and despite herself Rakka has to raise her voice above its dissonant cry: "I couldn't just leave it, Kana..."
"Like I said- you shouldn't spoil them, they'll become tame. What're you gonna do with a tame crow?"
"I'm not going to keep it," Rakka says. The thought is new, voiced for the first time in the face of Kana's disapproval. but it seems the right choice. "I'll let it fly away once it can."
"But Rakka-"
"I think it's fitting."
Nemu's voice is warm, soothing. Even the crow falls silent. Kana turns to look at her, but Nemu is looking at Rakka instead, a certain gentleness in her tone as she adds, "That's what we Haibane do, isn't it? Take things in."
Rakka bids farewell to the Washi before she leaves from work each day; not because that is part of her job or duty or obligation, but merely because she wants to do so. Sometimes the Washi will exchange some pleasantries, ask after the others at Old Home or offer a remark about the weather. Most times they both remain silent, but though Rakka has never seen behind that mask, she thinks perhaps that he is smiling.
On one occasion the Washi is speaking with some Toga when Rakka approaches. She stops a polite distance away - the bells on her wings chime softly as she does, but the Toga take no notice - and waits. It is a lively yet silent exchange, and as she watches their hands move she thinks of that ancient book in the library, the characters set in stone. Strange how those heavy carvings translate into this: fingers moving with incongruous grace, bending and fluttering, an echo of a fledgling's uncertain wingbeats. The worn hands of the Washi seem young again, speaking in a voice younger than his true one. Rakka would not be able to keep up even if she knew the language, and she does not. All she has is a handful of the signs: k, sharp and brittle like a snapped twig, the cloud-softness of vowels, the tentative tongue-curl of r, searching for a sound to complete it.
The Toga leave without looking at her, moving slowly off through the temple garden and away. She waits a little longer, approaches, makes the greeting gesture. The Washi turns slowly to face her. "You seem curious, Haibane Rakka."
She hesitates, unsure which wing to twitch. A passing breeze tosses the trinkets that dangle from the Washi's false wings, with a sound as soft as the rustling of down.
"I cannot teach you the language," says the old Washi. "And you would not want to have to learn it."
Rakka knows he is right about both things. It's okay, she wants to say. I do not wish to learn it. She enjoys watching the language being spoken, that's all: the rhythm of those gestures like words through the walls of one's cocoon, no less soothing for being unintelligible.
The young crow's box rests on Rakka's desk, next to an empty lighter and a few fading bell-nuts and the family of frog figurines. It is not without company. The Young Feathers have found Rakka's room, and for the past fortnight they have been coming by to catch a glimpse of the newcomer. Things are particularly busy after mealtimes, and an especially large throng comes by after dinner one evening, unsatisfied by the lack of dessert and looking for distraction. The crow caws sharply at their arrival, to the excitement of the Young Feathers, who laugh and point and try to mimic its call.
One of the Young Feathers tugs on Rakka's sleeve. "What's its name?"
The crow looks up at Rakka with wild bright eyes, head cocked at an angle. It flares its wings, beats them once, twice, with a vigour it did not have a week ago.
"I don't know," she says. The Young Feathers murmur amongst themselves.
"Doesn't it need one?" persists the questioner.
Does it? The crow will not be here much longer. Its movements have grown certain, confident. Lately it has been making fluttering forays around Rakka's room, so that she returns to see it perched on the windowsill, or the back of her chair. Rakka keeps her windows open. When the crow is grown it will be as anonymous as its brothers, and in time Rakka will stop trying to spot it among the flock that vexes Kana so, or among the straggling groups in town. That is how things will go, Rakka thinks, as she looks down at the crow. It snaps its little beak at her, open, closed; not in affection.
Rakka smiles. "I think it'll be fine."