The Springborn

CALDER

MARCH 8, 1886

EVENING

W hen dinner ends, Yonaz and the others leave the dining room and make their way to their bedrooms or the parlor. I linger beside the table as Sabella piles dirty plates onto a wooden tray. She blushes under my gaze but keeps working.

“If you’re going to stay, you could collect the bowls,” she says.

“Of course,” I say. “But first…” I round the table and tug at the puffy cotton cap she wears to hide the small antlers that have pushed up from her skull since daybreak. “It was slipping.”

My fingers barely graze the top of her head, but color rises on her cheekbones. She says, “Thank you,” but the words are directed to the dish she’s holding.

“Did I offend you?” I ask.

“No,” she says to a butter knife.

“Good. Grand.” I did not expect her former awkwardness with me to return, but here it is, staining her face and making her fumble with the spoons and forks.

“You’re certain? We’re still friends?”

Now she looks at me with those big eyes of hers and melts my insides. “Well,” she says, making the word longer than it has a natural right to be. “Maybe I’m not so certain anymore. About being friends, that is.”

If she weren’t smiling, I might panic. My heart gallops like a wild pony. “You mean…?”

She sets the last plate onto the tray. “I cannot make any promises, but…I think I want to possibly, maybe consider being more than friends.”

At this, I take her by the arms and spin her around the room in a clumsy, joyful dance. She laughs. From the kitchen, Cleona calls out, “What in the world is going on in there? I’d like to finish the washing up before midnight, if you could be bothered to bring the dishes.”

We stop spinning. Sabella holds onto my shirtsleeves. If I were bolder and braver, I might lean forward and kiss her smiling mouth. I want to. I almost do. But she releases me, steps backward, and returns to her task. She’s glowing from within, I swear.

“I’ll be right there,” she says to Cleona.

Breathless from the dance, I help her carry the dishes to the kitchen. I’ve been following her for years, but darn if I wouldn’t follow her anywhere, to the very ends of the earth.