The Whispering (Part 3)

Issue #34 Keith’s SciFi Musings Sunday, December 2, 2023

shh, fa walum nay…

I don’t know how it is for most folks. Probably different for each of us, I would imagine. But I remember.

I remember.

I told my mother about it once, after she brought me home from school that time when the teacher found me passed out in the playground, but with my eyes and mouth wide open. After leading the kids into the classroom following recess, in single file like she always did with her at the head of the line, she noticed my desk was empty. Knowing Miss Baines and how she was, she was probably really upset and thought I was pulling some sort of prank. Because I was kinda known for pranks, mostly because I didn’t like Miss Baines at all and felt it was my responsibility to cause her as much frustration as I could. I can imagine her sternly instructing my classmates not to move as they giggled while she stormed back out of the classroom toward the playground to give me yet another stern reprimand, emphasizing what a problem child I was.

But then she saw me there on the empty expanse of yard. A six-year-old Black kid, the only Black kid in the school, lying sprawled on his back, staring at the sky. I remember hearing someone say as I gradually came back to myself that I was unresponsive when Miss Baines was shaking me and then hollering my name before scooping me up and running me into the school infirmary before calling my mother. And I know probably calling my mother was the last thing she ever wanted to do because my mother detested Miss Baines more than I did. Something about her being racist, although I didn’t know what that was at the time when I heard her say it. When I asked what that meant she just shook her head and wouldn’t answer, but her eyes told me it wasn’t anything good.

As she drove me home that day (Mom had insisted to Miss Baines and the school nurse that I needed to return home where I would be safe because obviously, a Black child wasn’t safe in a school like this and how could Miss Baines have possibly left me all alone on a playground because no way would that have happened if it had been a white child and

shh fa walum nayyyyy…)

Mom almost crashed the car before she managed to turn onto a small side street and park. We were almost home.

“Where did you hear that, Jonas?”

I stared out the front windshield, feeling my heart starting to beat faster.

“Jonas!”

“I heard it on the playground. It was whispering. But the first time I heard it was inside of you.”

Mom didn’t say anything for a long time. We both just stared out the windshield, listening to the car engine run.

“You heard it too? When I was pregnant with you?”

I nodded.

“What does it mean?” I asked.

She shook her head.

“I don’t know, baby. I don’t know. Whatever it is, I think it was speaking to you.”

What Jonas heard that particular morning sounded like bits and pieces of words that hadn’t been born yet; a flurry of letters in search of mates, trying to complete a puzzle without directions.

“shh, fa walum nay…”

“shhhhh faaa wayyyy…”

And then he smiled, cautiously at first, but then fully. He raised his arms into the air, then watched eagerly as they transformed into huge multi-colored wings.

“I’m coming,” he said.