Strange Birds

Ripped away, staggering, Corinne gasped, put her hand to her face…no, not this time…

“Marius,” she breathed. A mournful whisper that went nowhere, nothing more than vapor.

Aching disappointment…she was somewhere else again. Somewhere tropical, the air drenched with the scent of night blooming flowers, the salt tang of the ocean.

No, he wasn’t here. He wasn’t here…here…where was here?

Here was on the ocean. Fan palms, strong offshore breeze rattling through the fronds. She stood at the foot of a series of stairs, between two houses that bloomed with light, glass, stone, angled roofs. A beach, the booming echo of surf against rocks to the west.

And there was a woman. Now this was different –the first time she had encountered a woman. She was gowned in blue, motionless, gazing out at the ocean.

Taking a deep breath, trying to put aside that wrenching loss, she started across the beach, her sandals sinking into the cool wet sand.

The woman didn’t seem to notice her; her gaze remained fixed towards the west. “Um.... hello?” Corinne began cautiously. “Do you know me?”

No response. Long seconds passed. Water moving under their feet, the long rough sigh of waves on sand. “No,” she finally answered. “But I’m dreaming…you could be anybody.”

Her dream?! Deeply confused, Corinne objected, “I thought this was my dream.”

She glanced away from the woman…had those trees been there a few seconds ago? She didn’t remember seeing them when she walked down here.

“Maybe it is,” the woman replied. “It’s beautiful here, so it doesn’t really matter.”

A huge wave crashed against a rock, sending a fine spray of water into the air. “Do you live here?” The woman looked at her and shook her head. “No," came the soft reply. "I don’t live on the ground.”

Shaken, Corinne pressed, “Do you mind if I take a look inside the house? I’m searching for something.”

Instead of responding, the woman glanced away in confusion.
A long pause, then the woman sighed and looked back at Corinne. Light sparkled off very pale gray, almost silver eyes. Silver snakebite pierced a full bottom lip. “I already went in,” she said at last. “No one is there.”

“And it is the strangest thing," she mused aloud, looking off towards the ocean. "The rooms don’t move. They always move in dreams. When you leave one room and try to go back, it isn’t there. But these rooms don’t move.”

Right…

The woman sounded like a lunatic, she thought, but who knows? At this point, the lunacy might be my own...."Good, that’s good to know. Thanks for sharing that.” Hesitating a moment, Corinne added, “Do you happen to know anything about a letter or a key or a box?”

The woman started walking out into the water. Over her shoulder she replied, “I think the letter is in a box. I dreamed it was…but maybe not in your dream.”

And if she thought she was in the Twilight Zone before…this was completely crazy.

Corinne started up toward the house, and immediately ran into a line of plastic flamingos and some sort of bizarre sign that warned “bird crossing”. She was certain there hadn’t been any pink plastic birds or any sign on the beach before. Trees she might have missed, but not this.

“Morpheus,” she muttered. “What are you playing with this time?”

Frustrated, Corinne kicked at one of the birds, which swayed a bit but didn’t fall over. Terminator flamingos…figures…

This was the dumbest thing so far. It made vampires look normal.

She marched up the wooden stairs, walked down the covered deck, and looked through a lighted window into a kitchen.

Gabe. Despite herself, Corinne felt a flood of relief.

That woman had said no one was there, but then maybe he hadn’t been there before, or maybe she couldn’t tell the difference between a man and a pink plastic bird.

He looked up at her and smiled. Her breath caught as she gazed into those same beautiful steel blue eyes she remembered so vividly.

She was standing in the kitchen of a little beach house, staring at a table set for one.

Gabe told her in a deep amused voice, “You said you weren’t hungry.”

He put the plate down on the table and sat down, chair legs scraping against the bare wood. The man positively gleamed. It was definitely Gabe.

She waited a few moments. He was still smiling at her. "Alright, what’s up with the woman in the water?” Corinne demanded.

His expression changed, tightened. Rising from the chair, those cool eyes narrowed.
“What woman? There’s a woman out there?” His tone of voice, on edge.

Gabe turned and stared out towards the beach. Corinne insisted, “It’s hard to miss her. She’s wearing some kind of evening gown out in the water...she said no one was in here.” He hesitated a moment, then started out the door.

When he didn’t respond, she followed him out to the deck. “There’s no one here now, Cori,” he assured her, although he sounded uneasy. “It must have been someone who wandered over here from one of the places next door.”

She watched him watching the beach, the wind ruffling his thick black hair. “Gabe,” Corinne asked quietly, “is there a box here, something like a music box?”

“A couple of them,” he said. “They’re in the other pavilion.”

They walked through the doors over a small deck, same white, sand blasted boards, into a second building -- pavilions accurately described the place. “Well, that’s it,” Gabe said, looking at a wicker side table. “That’s one of them.”

“And this,” he said, moving a few feet, “is the other one. Three of them on this table, Cori. Take your pick.”

He was so casual about it. “Gabe, are they yours?”

“Mine?” He took a step back. “Come on, Cori…since when would I have music boxes?”

“So I can open them?”

“Break them, take them, do whatever you want.”

He eased over to the rug and in one smooth movement sat down on the floor, aiming those eyes at her. “Be careful though, girl….I don’t know what’s in them.”

Her heart pounding, Corinne glanced from one set of boxes to the other. Pick the one on the right, no the one on the left….

Gabe finally spoke up from his seat behind her on the floor. “If you don’t open one of them, I will. Make up your mind.”

The one on the left…she pulled Dunstan’s key out of her pocket and carefully unlocked the box.

Not one letter, but many, old and new, some spotted with age, one damaged with water, paper stuck together so what looked like one letter might be many. In her haste, Corinne dropped them, tried to grab them, no, they're old, be careful, don't tear them!

She looked at each one carefully but could not read any of them. At least one of them appeared to be written in the Cyrillic alphabet. “What the – “

The door blew open suddenly, and a cold wind rushed through the room. Corinne shivered, looking up from the papers on the floor.

Gabe was gone. And standing in front of her with a particularly gloomy expression -- Morpheus. Angel? Demon? Something else altogether?

He put one foot firmly on top of the scattered letters.

“There’s been a technical…difficulty. It would be best to leave these things where they lie.”

As cooly as that, as if he was describing a software failure. And why had she never noticed that before….he was wearing a key around his neck. “Morpheus,” Corinne demanded, “do you have the key?”

The room darkened around him, light flaring, sparkling. “That, my love, is the wrong question…”


Tagging...Cherie! Ok, the newest member gets to take whack at it!

And I want to thank Gayl for the boxes, her patience, and her encouragement. And Lenore for editing this crazy thing! It reads so much better!