Green Angel by Alice Hoffman Page A

until our loss mirrored each others. I used the ice needle, the one that caused the greatest pain. I watched to see if Diamond flinched, but he never once did. I etched half a rose, half a wing, half a thorn, half a leaf. When I was done, Diamond took off his black hood so I could see what the fire had done to him. Then I understood why pain meant nothing to him anymore. I could see why half was enough for him. One side of his face was perfect, my Diamond. The other half was charred and discolored. I kissed both sides. They were one and the same to me. I could feel the season changing. It was growing warmer every day. I felt it as though I were a leaf that was greening, a vine that was growing toward the sun. One day the sparrows rose high in the sky, then settled in the treetops. I forced myself not to call them back to me. I knew they were meant to fly. Soon after the hawk disappeared from my porch. I would see him sometimes, his wingspan nearly blocking out the sun. He peered down from above, but I didn't whistle for him. I didn't wave so that he would light on my arm. I didn't insist that he eat grain from my hand. I knew that hawks had to hunt. All the same, I considered putting a collar and a leash on Ghost. I knew she was next. I could tell by the way she stared into the woods. One morning when the air was especially fresh and Diamond was watering the garden, I left Onion inside the new fence Diamond had built. I felt the leaves, the vines, the warming air. I went out walking with Ghost. We went past the oldest trees, past the piles of stones, to the deepest part of the woods. Even I who knew these woods so well could have lost my way here, but the white dog knew where to go. We both knew what she needed to do. In the treetops there were the hundred birds who had come to eat birdseed from my garden. There were the sparrows who had knitted a fishing net from my own black hair. There was the hawk whose wmgspan could block out the sun. I knelt down beside the white dog. I could feel her trembling. That's how badly she wanted to run. She had slept on my sister's bed with me. She had dreamed right alongside me. She had led me to places I never would have gone if I hadn't followed her. She looked up at me, and I called her Ghost one last time. Then I let her go. Not long after that, Heather Jones disappeared. She was not at the place where she usually slept, beneath the bridge. When I left out food and clothes for her, no one collected the packages. When I looked for her footsteps in the mud, they weren't there. I went down to the forgetting shack to search for her. It was early morning, and most of the people there were still asleep. Their feet were bloody from dancing all night. Their hair was threaded with brambles. I found two girls I might have recognized if they hadn't been so filthy and so drunk. They were settling down to sleep, but they nodded when I asked about Heather. She was gone, it was true. No one had seen her for days. There were those who wondered what had happened to her, but they were too tired to look for her, too busy forgetting. Some people said she had drifted into the fire as she danced one dark night. She had tripped, she had fallen, she had turned into smoke. When I looked in the fire they always kept burning, there were bits of blue among the ashes. When I left the forgetting shack, I went to visit my neighbor. My nail-studded boots hurt my feet, my leather jacket slowed me down, but at last I reached the old woman's house. I thought about Heather Jones. I thought about how it was impossible to forget, no matter how hard anyone might try. I knocked on the door, and the old woman was waiting for me. She had made a soup out of well-water and nettles. It was thin and lukewarm, but the taste was just what I needed, bitter on my tongue. Tell me your name, my neighbor said. I could see the girl my neighbor had once been reflected in her eyes, in the way she held her hands, in the way she laughed at me