When the Wren Calls
By Vanessa Butler
Of course, he’d be born on a Sunday. A day I use to believe in now holds weight heavier than my swollen belly. The June morning started slowly as the humid heat, among the Pineywoods, rose across the field like spirits searching for heaven. Deep Texas has many ghosts, and I know them well.
The high grasses in the front yard whispered like the gossips in my school hallways. I heard she had sex with every guy on the football team. Well, I heard she did it with a college boy. I never blamed them for not having imaginations that wouldn’t go dark enough to even scratch the truth.
My stomach started squeezing in on itself before Momma and Daddy left for church. Forcing my breath to quicken. I noticed her shoot me a glance through the mirror by the front door. For a moment, I imagined the mother within her setting aside her red lipstick and saying, I’m here.
Instead, she pursed her lips and walked out to the car muttering something about being a Pastor’s wife, and what would they think if she was late? And Daddy, Pastor Wyatt Reed, spent his time delivering a prophecy to every numb believer in a fifty-mile radius, for a price of course. His solution to the problem growing inside me was to avoid it. I guess our mistakes are easier to forget that way.
Sixteen and alone in that tiny white house is where my body opened forever.
I headed for bathroom during the next contraction, and it started to pull me under. Under what, I couldn’t tell you, but it felt like swimming in Jell-O. The pressure in my body made my knees buckle, and my hands gripped at the slick waterproof walls. A crab in a bucket, desperate for a way out.
You did this to yourself, I could hear Momma say. Like the consequences of my sin meant love had to be withheld. But then again, she only loved hard. Said it would make me ready for the real world. All it made me do was search for love in all the wrong places. Making my heart feel like an attic. The discarded part of a home where everyone dumped their junk. What do I know?
Mother knows best.
The edges of my vision fade into a dim haziness. The baby is coming now on this cracked and yellow-stained linoleum floor. Waves of intensity, laced with sweet drops of rest. A final rush of adrenaline, and my mind reels into a frenzied oblivion. Yet, there is a strange comfort in the way death holds your hand when you give birth. It sits near you like a companion, a reminder of how close we tread between life and death as girls. Maybe that’s why they try to silence us and make us feel small. There is nothing small about the universe, with all its stars and planets.
A flash of sting and I’m back in my body. There is no way to know how long I’ve been in this tiny room except the sun had set and rose again at least once. Where is everyone? Momma and Daddy were only supposed to go to the morning service and back.
Something scratched and sniffed on the other side of the half-opened door. A round fox squirrel peaks her head around and sits up on her hind legs, exposing her warm caramel belly as if to say, what are you doing in my house?
She was right. This wasn’t my home. A few weeks ago, while walking home from school, I found this abandoned house. I remember now, telling myself how I would have you here, away from the house the Devil got to a long time ago. The feeling of isolation was thick and impossible to ignore.
Still, wave after wave washed over me, layering on top of one another like a tsunami and I surrendered. Your scream blended with mine and I pulled you, slick like a rainbow trout, to my chest.
Alexander. I rub your name on you like a healing salve. A wren sitting on a branch outside the broken window sings her happy song with confidence. I know she’s calling to me, the way a
soul knows when it’s being spoken to. Your baby bird mouth searches for my milk. You are safe here. I try not to think of how even the best of moms can only promise this for so long before the world presents all its dangers.
His sleepy fingers curl around my thumb as a tear lands on his cheek. An anointment between mother and son. This life is cruel, the way it gives a child to a child. I’m so sorry, I whispered down to him. I grab my backpack from off the toilet and pull out a pen and paper.
As I write my note, I study his face, his lips moving in a rhythmic suckling motion.
My sweet boy,
My body will forever ache for you, to hold you, to know you.
I love you.
Still bleeding, I head for the fire station.
Vanessa Butler, born in San Diego, California, now resides in London, where she continues to nurture both her academic and creative ambitions. She earned a degree in Molecular Biology from the University of California, Santa Cruz, and later completed a Masters in Public Health at the University of East London. Vanessa’s academic journey has deepened her understanding of the interconnectedness of science, health, and society. These themes often feature prominently in her fiction and poetry, where she explores both nature’s beauty and the challenges we face in public health.
Outside of writing, Vanessa enjoys crocheting, illustrating, and spending quality time with her two-year-old son. She believes in the power of creativity to inspire and provoke thought, and is eager to bring her skills to an environment where both her scientific background and artistic passions can flourish.
