Published 6:30, Jul. 26, 2024
Clarissa did as she was told. Her mom had ordered her not to move. Not to let the bird move either. Clarissa didn’t think it was possible to do both things at once. What if the bird panicked? What if it started flying into the walls and cabinets, searching for a fresh portal to the outside world? How was she supposed to stop it then? Clarissa’s only idea had been to stand like she was now: arms out, knees bent, ready to catch the bird or swat it down if it did take flight.
“Clarissa!”
The bird, though, remained calm. It was as if an invisible cage had sprung up around it after it crashed through the kitchen window. It hopped mechanically from foot to foot, wings puttering like a toy engine. But it barely moved more than a centimetre from its landing spot on the island.
Clarissa brought her arms down and moved closer to the island, careful to avoid the broken glass on the floor. The bird was small. A sparrow, maybe. That’s what she’d heard her parents call other small brown birds. But she was only guessing. The only birds Clarissa could clearly recognize were the cardinals that sometimes stopped to rest on the electrical wires outside her house.
She extended her arm over the edge of the island. No shock of electricity came. No feeling of cold metal wire. When her fingers grazed the bird’s wings, she drew back. But the bird didn’t flinch.
“Clarissa! Is it still there?”
Her mom ran back into the room holding a large blanket in both hands. “Keep watching it,” she said, holding the blanket up a few feet in front of her.
“Mom, I don’t think . . .”
“Shh, Clarissa. You’ll freak it out.”
Clarissa’s mom inched forward. The bird stopped hopping. It lowered its tail and lifted its head straight up in the air. It looked to Clarissa like the picture of the Buddha she had seen at school. Her teacher, Ms. Thompson, had explained that people once believed in a person called the Buddha who stopped suffering completely after reaching something called enlightenment. One second, this person was sitting, legs crossed, under a tree, the next—
Clarissa looked up. Her mom was beside the island. The bird still hadn’t moved. The blanket parachuted down. A few steps would’ve been enough for the bird to escape. But instead, it remained motionless, resigned to its fate.
“OK, now be careful,” Clarissa’s mom said.
Clarissa stayed where she was. Her mom lunged forward and scooped the bird up in the blanket.
“Get the door, get the door!”
Clarissa ran to the front before she could be told to hurry up. Her mom came running after her. She placed the bird outside, lifted the blanket, shook it out, and ran back into the house, slamming the door behind her. She clutched the blanket to her chest, standing with her back against the entrance, like she was trying to stop someone from breaking in.
Outside, the bird took two steps on the lawn. It turned to face the house. Its eyes, cavernous and black, looked right at Clarissa through the window. For a second, the landscape trembled. The window disappeared, and the house, lawn, trees, and roads vanished, leaving only Clarissa, the bird, and an empty earth that stretched straight to the horizon. Clarissa blinked hard. When her vision came back into focus, the bird had flown into the neighbour’s maple tree. Right after that, it was gone.
Clarissa’s mom was panting. “Is the bird OK?” she asked.
Clarissa nodded. Her mom started nodding too. “That was crazy,” she said as she stepped forward from the door and folded the blanket. Clarissa wanted to agree but her voice had left her.
Her mom stopped nodding and began shaking her head. “I can’t believe that happened.” And then, quickly as ever, she returned to normal. “You’re going to be late for school.”
Clarissa grabbed her bag reluctantly and stepped outside. The heat was unusual. The sun was even faintly visible in the sky. It was a new sensation: the back of her neck so warm with sweat. For a moment, Clarissa became desperate to go back in the house. But she couldn’t think of what she would say to her mom. So she pressed forward instead, counting the steps toward school.
By dinner, Clarissa’s dad had put up a piece of plywood to cover the hole in the kitchen window. The floor was covered in bent nails. At some point he had decided the job was good enough, Clarissa thought, or the best that he could do.
Clarissa sat next to her brother at the table. He had his leg halfway off the chair already, eager to escape. When their mom served the reheated shepherd’s pie, he dove in face first.
“Dan,” Clarissa’s mom pleaded, “at least breathe between bites.”
Dan looked up, annoyed. He silently finished what was in his mouth and pressed his fork down on his potatoes. Everyone else went back to their plates.
“I saw a cool thing at school today,” Clarissa said.
“Oh yeah?” her dad answered. He didn’t ask for more details. His eyes stayed on his food. Clarissa could see his legs fidgeting under the table.
“Yeah, something from the Trove,” Clarissa said. “Did they ever teach you two about that?”
Clarissa’s dad shoved a forkful of meat and potatoes into his mouth before answering. “You mean all that stuff they found in that underground hatch?”
“Yeah.”
“They’re teaching you about that?” Clarissa’s dad asked. He turned to Clarissa’s mom and rolled his eyes.
Clarissa looked over for support as well, but her mom glanced away from them both. “What did the teacher show you, Clarissa?” she asked while reaching for the salad.
“Just pictures of what’s in there,” Clarissa said. “The highlights, I guess. Today it was a statue. This huge headless guy on a horse. He’s charging forward or maybe flying. Ms. Thompson said it might be a god.”
Clarissa’s dad scraped his knife and fork loudly across the plate as he picked up the last bits of pie.
“It’s pretty wild,” Clarissa said. “That this is all we have from before. Ms. Thompson was saying we can’t really know what these objects mean or what people thought about them. That’s why people study them so closely.”
“It’s just junk, Clarissa,” her dad said. “Random junk that some people decided to keep in the basement. It doesn’t mean anything.”
“I think what your dad means,” Clarissa’s mom said, firmly, “is that maybe, since we lost so much in the past, we should feel lucky for what we have. Maybe that’s the lesson here.”
Clarissa started to say something, but her mom cut her off by sliding her chair back. She grabbed the empty plates from the table and hummed while carrying them to the kitchen. Clarissa quietly finished her dinner. Her brother had snuck upstairs. Her dad was flicking through his phone, his glasses hanging off the tip of his nose. Clarissa went to ask another question, then thought twice. Outside, the light in the sky was beginning to dim. It was almost time for bed.
Later that night, Clarissa looked up the Trove on her phone. Through the wall, she could hear her brother rapidly clicking his keyboard and mouse. They were both supposed to be sleeping.
Clarissa had been worried the parental controls would stop her from opening the website. But the page, plain and filled with text, loaded quickly. For the erudition of all humankind, and to preserve the memory of the little we know of what came before, this trove of documents is provided in full, and free of charge.
Scrolling down, Clarissa scanned the list of links. Close to the top was “Ancient Buddha.” There were also pictures of books, cutlery, and statues. The more Clarissa saw, the less special the site seemed. Maybe her dad was right, she thought. Caring about this stuff was pointless.
One link further down grabbed her attention, though. “Diary of an 11-Year-Old Girl.” Clarissa........