Foreword
The little girl, blond curls falling loosely over her shoulders, tugged off her shoes and touched her feet to the green grass. She traced circles in the ground with her small toe, and watched a grass hopper jump by. She found her way off the cool concrete of the back porch steps and to a solitary swing, swaying lightly in the morning breeze. She ran her hand over the cold wrought-iron seat, not yet warmed from the sun, and sat, watching the yard around her.
The lot was at the corner of the town, and had a small fenced garden and little glen of trees. Weeds grew up around the earth; the un-kept grass contrasting sharply with the neat and tidy yards of the neighbors. The building behind the girl was old and crumbling, the siding sagging like wrinkles in a grandmother's cheek. The chipped paint on the sign above the front door read "Orphanage For Girls."
From a second-story window, several curious heads peeked out at the girl in the garden below. With their faces against the glass, the girls murmured about their visitor. "Wonder who she is..." An older girl said. "Do we have a new friend?" Asked a little one.
Below, the girl was listening to a different conversation, happening just inside the back door. A heavy-set woman with a kind face and flushed cheeks, her hair pulled back into a loose braid, tied an apron around her waist as she spoke to another.
"I'm sure we will have enough for the month, Mrs. Klaus. Donations have been very generous of late." The woman said. The voice belonged to Mrs. Walker, an older woman with graying hair and a kind heart.
"That's good. Very good." Another voice responded. This woman's tone was colder, harsher, even as the pair continued to talk about finances. The girl let the words run together in her ears, drowning out the sounds of the conversation with the mesmerizing movement of the grass. The harder she listened, the more it seemed to be speaking to her. The wind ruffled her hair.
She became suddenly aware of the lowered voices from the porch.
"...A terrible tragedy." The woman said in a hushed tone. "Both parents presumed dead..."
"An accident?" Inquired the other voice, hidden in the shadows of the orphanage.
"No, I'm afraid not. It was much, much worse..."
The girl squeezed her eyes shut. A single tear slid down her pink cheek. The wind picked up all around her, carrying off the voices, and seemingly shielding her fragile body. Raindrops began to lightly pound the ground around her. Then, from somewhere in the tall grass, came another voice:
"Don't cry, child."
To her surprise, the words were coming from below her. She scanned the blades of grass, and gasped when she saw a tiny black-capped chickadee staring up at her. She couldn't believe what she was seeing, until it opened its little beak, and spoke again.
"Everything will be okay." Suddenly, it fluttered up onto her knee. Awestruck, she sat motionless on the swing, the cold of the seat slowly spreading through the thin material of her skirt. "These are dark times, but light will come."
The bird twittered in the breeze, singing a soft, sweet song, like a long lost lullaby. For the first time in many days, a smile crossed her lips, and she reached out and slid her small hand down the bird's back, her eyes drying. In the sky, the gray clouds began to disappear and the last raindrop fell with a faint ping.
The woman in the door gasped, and sailed towards her, the half tied strings of her apron flailing in the wind. "Good heavens, girl! Don't pet the birds!" The woman pulled the little girl up by her waist and dragged her towards the porch.
She waved to the chickadee, who had flown to the top of the swing, ignoring the woman's anxious mumbling from over her shoulder. As she was pulled through the porch door, the girl watched the chickadee do the most curious thing, even more curious tweeting in a British accent:
It winked.
