47. NINEAH
NINEAH
EIGHT MONTHS LATER
“ARE YOU READY?”
Sweating in my socks, my fingers tingling, I glanced around the room for the nearest trash can in case I needed to throw up. A gentle hand on my shoulder distracted me. “Nineah, breathe. This is just an open house. Remember that.”
I nodded at Kirah, the agency director who’d come highly recommended by Zajre, but it was a lie. No other places I’d visited had stricter rules nor a more stringent vetting process. It would be stupid of me to take a first impression for granted.
Smoothing the blue maxi skirt I’d thought was conservative and seasonally appropriate with my favorite Dior Mary Janes for luck, I couldn’t help but wonder now if I was too overdressed.
“You look lovely,” Kirah said, smiling. “The hard part is over so stop fretting so much. This is supposed to be a casual opportunity for you to learn more about us. Not for you to feel like a bug under a microscope.”
Sucking in a deep inhale, I let it out. Then repeated the action twice more. When my nerves had finally calmed (ish), I unclenched my hands from where I’d asphyxiated my brochure and nodded at Kirah.
Without missing a beat, she led me out of the foyer where I’d checked in with a volunteer, but froze upon sticking the paper name tag to my chest.
At that moment, hundreds of irrational fears flooded in all at once. Which was insane. For years, I’d helped manage a company of men with more lethal experience than every human being in this building combined. So why was I suddenly so fearful of a children’s spring art exhibition?
Around me, cubicles had been set up to display everything from science projects to life-size sculptures.
Children in traditional wear of different cultures sold treats and gave history speeches.
It was such a market of overstimulation and saturated color, my head spun.
Deciding to find the quietest, least crowded place to get my bearings, I walked deeper into the school, turning a corner down a hall of small lockers.
Doors decorated in flowers and animals made of construction paper were propped open while teachers inside, spoke with parents.
I wandered down the halls, away from the excitement until I’d nearly gotten lost and had to circle back.
I was going to do just that when I came upon a corner wall of framed portraits. The white backdrop, thick frames, and spotlights that sub-headed the paintings intentionally showcased the art as though it were being presented at a real gallery.
Every medium from oil to acrylic was on display, but what had stopped me in my tracks was the massive, almost mural-like painting in the center.
Admittedly, everything I knew about art could’ve fit inside a dime bag, but a hyper-realistic rendering of an owl perched on a tree was so lifelike, I could’ve reached out and touched it.
“Incredible,” I whispered to myself.
“It’s a Barred Owl.”
I tore my gaze from the massive portrait to the voice that’d come from my left. Standing off to the side, arms hugged around her small body, a young girl with warm, brown skin, hair in a poofy ponytail, wearing a worn pink cardigan watched the portrait. I hadn’t even heard her approach me.
“Did you know they have no sense of smell?” she asked.
“I did not,” I said, truthfully. The only owl I’d ever heard of was the one I ran screaming from when I’d come across it by accident during basic training.
“The barred owl, also classified by their Latin name Strix Varia, are common to the Connecticut area. Their plumage helps them blend in with the woods and they see very well at night, making it the most ideal time to hunt.”
I smiled. “He’s beautiful.”
“She,” the girl corrected. “Her name is Lucky.”
“Forgive me. Lucky is very beautiful,” I amended. “Did you paint her?”
She nodded very seriously. “The eyes aren’t quite right. She’s even more majestic in person.”
I turned away from the portrait to look at the girl, but she immediately evaded eye contact.
“So Lucky is a real bird?” I asked.
“Of course she is real,” the girl scoffed. “How else would I have been able to paint her if I’d never seen her before?”
“You could’ve seen her in a book,” I pointed out.
There was an extended silence. Then she sighed. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “When I talk about Lucky, no one believes me. They say I’m making her up, but I swear I’m not. We all saw her at the zoo last year, every one of us, but I’m the only one who remembers her.”
I frowned. “Last year?”
She nodded.
“And you haven’t visited Lucky since?”
She shook her head so sadly, my heart ached for her, despite her obsession with such a terrifying creature. “I wanted to go back, but Mrs. Weenan said we only visit the zoo once a year and when we went back last month, Lucky was gone and a different species replaced her.”
I returned my attention to the portrait with new eyes.
Knowing the girl had painted the bird from memory after having seen a Barred Owl exactly once, I had to admit I was impressed with the attention to detail.
It was one thing to paint from reference.
It was another to capture the likeness of someone you knew.
Even if that someone was a massive flying animal with eyes that bored into your soul.
“What’s your name?” I asked the girl.
Hesitating before answering, the girl still had yet to make eye contact with me. “Why?”
“Well, I have to know who to place my bid with for this piece.”
The girl frowned. “Bid?”
“You seem pretty emotionally invested. I can’t imagine you’d part with it so readily. Not for anything less than top dollar.”
The little artist frowned. As if forgetting herself, she straightened her back and finally faced me head on.
That was when I saw what she’d been trying so diligently to hide.
From above her right eye, around the outside of it, and halfway down her cheek, curved a dark, reddish birthmark with a few dark red spots on the bridge of her nose.
It was such a unique mark, I couldn’t say I’d seen anything like it before, but I felt a small pang in my chest as I speculated why she’d felt the need to conceal it.
Our eyes met and immediately, she averted her gaze to her feet. “Um, it’s not for sale.”
“Fair,” I relented. “But maybe you’d let me take a photograph and then I could possibly ask around about Lucky? See if anything comes of it?”
The girl’s head snapped up and her brown eyes were nearly as wide as the owl’s in the portrait. “Really?”
No.
More than likely I’d be breaking several ethical and legal boundaries tonight when I hacked a bunch of conservatory databases and tracked bird transfers out of the Virginia Zoo over the last year, but she didn’t need to know that.
Selfishly, I negotiated a trade with a little painter. “On one condition.”
She looked at me so expectantly that I knew. Like something locking into place, like a resoluteness settling into my bones, I knew I was meant to be here tonight.
“Tell me your most favorite candy in the whole world.”
***
IT’D TAKEN ME one hour and two calls to find Lucky, but I did.
She’d been transferred from The Virginia Zoo last August to Rock Creek Park in D.C.
where she was now living with two other Barred Owls.
One donation to the National Park Foundation later, and I was now the proud sponsor of one Lucky Mae, who I’d been given the pleasure of choosing a middle name for.
I also now had my very own photograph of the majestic, yet frightening bird.
After the open house, I’d learned from Kirah that the little girl I’d spoken with was Miracle Mae Dixson.
A fourth grader in the gifted program at Harriet Academy who’d been in the foster system since she was two.
When I’d inquired about adoption, Kirah had warned me that they wouldn’t so much as accept an application before a formal supervised meeting and a discussion with Miracle, herself.
Also that it might be wise to meet with more children before deciding, so as not to get her hopes up.
I’d told her that I would follow all necessary protocol but I’d made up my mind.
I didn’t want to see any other children.
The serious seven-year-old who was in love with a bird named Lucky was my daughter. I knew it as well as I knew I was only ever going to love one man, but since that dream had died with the woman who went into the water, I was up at two in the morning, researching wild birds.
Because surely, I could have new dreams.