Well Wished by Franny Billingsley

Author:Franny Billingsley
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 2001-07-15T00:00:00+00:00

"I’ll sing tonight."

"But Catty," said Mr. Winter, "you’re always saying you can’t sing."

"But it was Miss D’Estuffier who said it first," said Nuria. "Maybe she’s wrong."

"A crown for the singer," said Garvey, producing a black metal circlet with tiny candle holders all around. Nuria felt it sigh onto her head.

"But I want to wear the crown!" Catty pulled off her hat and fluffed her hair as though she’d forgotten that no hat could subdue it for very long. Thousands of individual strands sprang into the air, illuminated by the torchlight like so many copper wires. Catty looked at her fingers as though surprised by a new texture.

"What beautiful titian hair!" said Nuria, intending to be sarcastic but finding she meant it, as though Catty actually owned that hair and might be complimented on it.

It was frightening how easy it was to give her hair away to Catty. She must never forget what was Catty and what was her.

"Nuria!" she whispered, baptizing herself with her own powerful name. "I am Nuria, and Catty will never be me."

There came a whoosh of flame and a sudden brightening as Father Michael threw an armful of pine onto the fire. "O, come all ye faithful," he called, both to catch the crowd’s attention and to announce the first song. He blew into his pitch pipe to find the pitch that would most harmoniously serve the crowd’s many voices.

O, come all ye faithful,

Joyful and triumphant.

Nuria made her mind and body into a dark, still well and sunk deep into herself, searching for her old voice inside this new skin. Her eyes stayed open, but she didn’t see Father Michael urging the parishioners on toward Bethlehem. She saw instead a vast, deep darkness for which she had no map, no guide, to help her find her way. She sat patiently in the wheelchair, under her crown, its candles as yet unlit, exploring this uncharted territory. There, in the stillness, she heard a note. Its vibrations shivered down her spine. She echoed it softly and knew she’d found a place where she could start to sing.

The crowd’s voice was ragged, staggering through the beginning of the song, but it began to come together as it neared Bethlehem.

O, come ye,

O, come ye,

To Be-eth-le-hem.

But after Bethlehem came the high note, and the crowd hesitated, each person making a different decision on whether to come in on the lower octave, whether to drop out altogether, or whether to sing it boldly and hang the consequences. But Nuria’s voice had always liked high places, and this is where she joined in.

Come and behold him,

Born the king of angels;

O, come let us adore him.

Mr. Winter’s hand on her shoulder stiffened. "Listen to you!"

"Ssh!" said Nuria. She didn’t mean to be rude, but she was concentrating fiercely, casting gossamer spider lines, hoping they’d stick to bits of her true self; and as they sang "Silent Night," then "The First Noel," she began to weave the real Nuria, the old Nuria, into this new body.

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