The Hummingbird War Read online

  “Diane, are you in love with him?” she asked. She cocked her head slightly as if she already knew the answer and was watching me writhe in my discomfort from her seat in the audience, and I was just saying my lines.

  “I don’t know. I thought I would always love Bobby, and now I doubt my feelings every minute of every day. And if I can’t be sure of how I feel about Matthew, I can’t do anything about our relationship. I could never hurt him.”

  “Okay, Diane. Don’t worry…about anything right now. Take a couple of days to think it through. Sometimes the best answers take time to rise to the surface. As for Matthew, if you really love someone you’ll find it in your heart to do the right thing. You’re learning to let people back into your life again, the ones who deserve to be there. Just like I’m learning to do. We’ll get through this together.”

  *****

  When I saw the note about the reservations next to the phone the next day, I realized I’d forgotten to call the airlines — a second time. Matthew walked into the office and dropped his briefcase on his desk. “Good morning, Diane.”

  “Matthew, I have to tell you something. I’ve made a decision about the house.” Say it before I change my mind, I thought.

  “Before you say anything, take this.” He handed me a letter-sized envelope.

  “What is it?” I asked, looking at the envelope as if I could tell what was inside by staring at it. Maybe it was a flyer for the financial aid office to find a new assistant to take my place since I’d pretty much told him yesterday I had no choice but to leave.

  He waved his hand at it impatiently. “Open it. It’s for you.”

  I carefully tore the sealed flap apart and pulled out a check. It was a personal check from Matthew made out to me, and I had to look at the amount twice before I realized it was for ten thousand dollars.

  “Don’t even think of telling me you can’t take the money,” he said. “You can pay me back by working here for as long as I need you.”

  I put the check on top of my desk. If I held it too long, I might believe it would be all right for me to take such a gift. “No, Matthew. I can’t accept this. I mean, who has this kind of money to loan to someone who, well, someone who just works for them?”

  “You aren’t someone who just works for me. I care about what happens to you and you need the money. You need it more than I do. But there is a catch.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I don’t want to hear you talk about quitting school or this job ever again.”

  “What? That sounds, well, like some fairy tale.”

  “Okay, here’s the rest of the story. When you finish school and have a job and can afford it, you can pay back the loan. Let’s say, ten years.”

  “I’m pretty sure I could pay you back in ten years, but that’s a lot of time for the interest to build up. How much will I owe at the end of ten years?” I tried to click off some numbers in my head, coming up with an estimation of what interest and all those things I didn’t understand would end up costing.

  “Ten thousand dollars,” he said.

  I had to stop and consider what he was offering. On one hand, he was giving me the solution to my problem. If I got a second job during the summer or if I got one of the scholarships I’d applied for, maybe in a few years I could pay him back. On the other hand, I didn’t want to be indebted to him after the sparks that raced through me whenever he looked at me a bit too long or like the time he had touched me. I couldn’t let the money influence how I behaved with him. In thinking about it, I bit my lip so hard I suddenly felt my teeth about to break the skin. “Ouch!”

  “What’s wrong?” he asked.

  “Nothing. I don’t know what to do.”

  “There’s nothing to think about. I’m lending you this money. Take it and don’t talk anymore about quitting. Get to work and make those reservations you forgot about. I understand you had other things on your mind. Before you know it, it’ll be August, and we’ve got a ton of work to do.”

  I must have stood there for the longest time, thinking about every question I could imagine and searching for an answer to each one. I picked up the check and gently folded it in half. “What if I told you I’d decided to not leave here, and I was going to give up the house?” I asked.

  He looked at me with no hint of what he was thinking. “Take the money. Don’t leave school and don’t give up that house. You don’t have to choose between two things you love.”

  I felt at a loss for words, but they tumbled out from somewhere before I could catch them. “I swear I’ll pay you back as soon as I can. I’ll make up an agreement you can sign. I can’t just let you give me the money with nothing in writing. And, by the way, I’m more thankful than you could ever know.” I wanted to walk over to him and throw my arms around him, but instead I sat down at my desk and picked up the paper with the dates for our trip and dialed the airline. The phone shook in my hands.

  “Me, too,” he said.

  “What?” I asked, as I waited for someone to answer on the other end of the line.

  “I’m glad I could be here to help you. That’s all.”

  I didn’t know if I was imagining it or not, but I was sure he’d said the same thing to me before.

  I went home that afternoon and called Mr. Hayes and told him I’d send the money the next day. He sounded surprised at my news. I don’t think they ever expected to hear from me again. He said they’d have the necessary papers drawn up, and the house was mine. I told him it was ours — mine and Bobby’s. He didn’t seem to understand, but I didn’t think I owed him an explanation so I left it at that.

  Sometime after midnight I woke up from a fitful sleep. I heard Amy’s soft breathing across the room. Someone was in the bathroom running water in the sink. It must have been Nancy home from a date. I thought maybe the sound of the running water had woken me until my thoughts gelled, and I sat up in my bed.

  “How did he know I needed ten thousand dollars?”

  Through the darkness I could picture his face as he handed me the envelope. Was he playing me for the young and naive fool I was, or could I be losing my mind? I’d already told Bobby’s parents they’d get the money, and I couldn’t back out now, but a determination rose up in me; I was going to find out who Matthew Bluestone was and what he wanted. My only fear was that I might find out along the way what I wanted, and I didn’t know what would happen when our hopes and dreams met head on.

  Chapter Eight

  If I kept to my budget, I’d be able to pay Matthew back twenty-five dollars each month until I graduated. And after graduation, if I could get a job that paid enough, I could increase the payments to a hundred dollars a month. Even at that rate, I’d still be paying back the loan when I turned thirty. And in the meantime, I swore I’d wait until the right time to ask him how he came up with the amount of ten thousand he’d written on that check. Patience, Diane.

  Except for the weeds making their way towards the roof of my house on the island, the cost of filling the birdfeeders there and in my Seattle backyard, the pressure of final exams, and my debt to Matthew, everything was fine. As a matter of fact, everything was wonderful. Matthew depended on my help more each day, I was on the Dean’s List, the Useless Bay house was mine, and summer was just around the corner. If I could have whistled, I would have. I might have even called myself lucky.

  Lilly and I met at least once a week for lunch at our favorite diner. She looked better than I’d ever seen her, fixing her hair in an intricate French twist one week, wearing little gold earrings the next. I wanted her to be completely recovered, wholly functional, but I didn’t want her to stop going to the meetings where I could see her any day I showed up. I was as content as I could be. We’d planned a special lunch at a nice restaurant to celebrate the end of the semester, but there was one more thing on my list of assignments for the school year. I had to visit a bird sanctuary for my final ornithology paper, which was based on my study of local species. My research was done, and
all I had left was the actual walk through the woods to make my bird count. I had to leave work early to get in the walk before dark.

  “See you tomorrow, Matthew,” I said, as I threw the cover over my typewriter.

  “Where did you say you were going?”

  “The Nisqually Bird Sanctuary. It’s south of Olympia. I have a map in the car.”

  “Don’t get lost,” he said, before burying his nose in his work again.

  I grabbed my backpack and headed out the door. “Huh,” I answered, as if I needed him to tell me not to get lost. I felt more capable than ever, handling more responsibilities than anyone I knew. I was doing better in school than I dreamed I would.

  It was around the tenth time I’d tried to start the Volvo, only to hear the whine of an uncooperative engine, when Matthew came down the front steps. I rested my head on the steering wheel and tried to recall if the final paper about the trek through the Nisqually Preserve was fifty or sixty percent of my total grade.

  “Did this old piece of junk finally die?” he asked. He stood on the sidewalk with his hands in his pockets, the breeze blowing his tie across his chest.

  “Don’t call it that. It’s gotten me this far, and I’m not going to give up on it now. I don’t know what’s wrong, but I don’t think I can fix it with my sheer will,” I said. I wanted to bang my head against the steering wheel in my frustration, but that wouldn’t solve my problem. I was running out of time. Maybe running out of luck.

  “Starter motor,” he said. “Let’s get the thing towed to the closest gas station. You can go tomorrow.”

  “I can’t. I have today to go to the bird sanctuary, put my information together with my research tonight, and type it up tomorrow and hand it in with my final exam on Friday.” My voice had risen to the level of shouting. “I’m sorry Matthew. I didn’t mean to take it out on you.” I knew better than to think my plans would always work out. I’d walked the tightrope of an overly-strict schedule for too long, had asked for too much, and this was one of the consequences: I’d used up all that precious luck, pressed it into a hard, little ball that was rolling away from me.

  “I’ll take you,” he said.

  “No, you’ve done too much for me already. I can’t let you bail me out of this, too.” I gripped the steering wheel. I couldn’t let him know how much I wanted him to take me, how nice it would be to spend some time away from the office with him.

  “I’m not bailing you out of anything. A bird-watching hike with a student of ornithology would be very educational for me.” He tried to pretend he was serious, but I saw a smile building in his eyes and about to break through.

  “I’ll call around and see if I can borrow a car. Maybe my father will drive down and take me.”

  “Don’t be crazy, Diane. If your father could even get here, it would take hours. Why not just accept my offer? If anything happens with this class, you’ll be too distracted to work, and we have a lot to finish up before the convention. And I don’t want you to flunk out of school. I’m counting on getting my money back.” He flashed his perfect, eager smile. “Take my offer. Don’t you think we could both use a break for a few hours?”

  I didn’t know if he thought driving me to finish my assignment would get my mind back on our work or if he really wanted to help me, but I had no choice. I had figured the whole thing would take me maybe four hours to do the route I’d planned along the river and back. I had to find and identify at least twenty-five species. If my father could drive me, we wouldn’t get there until late afternoon, and I’d never be able to finish my assignment before dark.

  “Okay, but I’ll pay you for gas and buy you dinner,” I said.

  “If I’m going to profit like that, then I insist,” he said. “I’ll change my clothes, lock up the office, and we’ll be on the road in ten minutes.”

  “You mean you’ve been waiting for me to buy you dinner?”

  “No, gas for my car.” He turned and climbed the stairs back to the office.

  I slid down, hid behind the steering wheel, and smiled until it hurt.

  *****

  I had to admit driving down the freeway in Matthew’s Mercedes was much better than rattling along in the Volvo, wondering if I would make it there and back. At least my car had refused to start in front of the office, instead of breaking down in some lonely parking lot miles from the nearest pay phone.

  By the time we were on the path along the Nisqually River, it was after two o’clock. I stopped when I heard a high-pitched yank, yank in the trees and raised my binoculars. “There’s my first sighting,” I said, and opened my notebook to make an entry. I rustled through my backpack, pulled out my Instamatic camera, and aimed where the small grey and rust bird clung to the trunk of an oak. It looked at us, showing its striped face.

  “What kind of bird is that?” Matthew asked, looking in the direction where I pointed the camera.

  “A red-breasted nuthatch,” I said. “They’re small tree-climbing…”

  “I’d forgotten about them. We had nuthatches where I grew up. Hung out with chickadees some of the time, but they were pretty solitary.” He looked at me as I stared at him. “If I remember correctly,” he added sheepishly, as if he knew he’d stepped on my expert toes.

  “You remember just fine. You took the words out of my mouth.” I walked along determined to sight a more elusive, lesser-known bird. What would it look like if he could name all the birds I could? Before long, I saw a quick movement in the bushes and focused my binoculars on the thick, low foliage. “It’s a ruby-crowned kinglet. A male. That’s two down and twenty-three to go.” I pointed at the dogwood where the tiny, olive-drab bird with the red spot on its head flitted upward from branch to branch, moving away from us. I pulled out the camera again.

  “You probably recognized that one, too. How do you know so much about birds?”

  “I don’t really. My mother used to feed the birds. Back when we lived in Virginia she had a couple of bird feeders. She taught me the names of the ones who came to feed.”

  “You lived in Virginia?”

  “Among other places. You think you’ll really be able to see the birds in those pictures? You need a better camera to photograph something that small.”

  I looked at the poor excuse for a camera in my hand, its finish battered and dented over the years. “Sorry, but it’s all I have. And now that I owe someone a bundle of money, I doubt I’ll be able to buy a new camera before I’m, say, thirty.”

  Before I could ask him about Virginia and other things I longed to know about, a familiar buzzing came close to my ear. I looked up at the little bird hovering above my head, just out of reach. “It’s an Anna’s. I think she followed me from home to tell me I’ve been neglecting her,” I said.

  Matthew looked up, too. “A hummingbird. They’re fascinating.”

  “Yes, they are.”

  “How does something so small have such a defiant attitude?” he asked. “Look, she wants to pick a fight with us.”

  The Anna’s swooped close to us, clicked her warning, and soared into the sky, becoming just a small speck until she disappeared altogether. “My favorite birds,” I said. “Well, I love chickadees and Stellar’s Jays, too, but the Anna’s live such fierce lives. They’ll try to take on crows. Some hummingbirds build their nests near hawks to keep predators away. I respect them for going up against the odds of nature and surviving.”

  “I understand that sentiment,” he said. He was looking at me, maybe thinking I had something in common with the little birds. Or maybe he did.

  We kept walking, but I wanted to sit him down on one of the big mossy logs along the path and ask him everything I could think of: Where were you born? Did your father ever take you on a camping trip in the backyard? Did your mother die, like mine had, before you ever had a chance to know her? Instead, we walked quietly along the river’s edge, seeking birds on the wing, among the branches of the dense pines, and plying the waters of the river. I used up most of my 36-print
roll of film. I’d accomplished more than I needed to for the class, so I slipped the little camera into my pocket with a smug grin of satisfaction.

  Darkness finally began to cast shadows too long to debate. With Matthew’s help, I’d counted thirty different birds. As we walked back towards the parking lot, I thought it might be a good time for us to talk.

  “Matthew, how did you know how much…?”

  Then I heard a slow, mournful whistling cry come from the direction of the river and stopped in my tracks. “Oh my God, I think there’s a loon down there,” I whispered and pointed towards the riverbank. I dropped my backpack on the path and parted the thick, spiky branches of a Douglas fir. I walked as carefully and silently as I could towards the river, Matthew following close behind. When I saw the black and white checkered back on the bird and its yellow bill, my eyes grew wide, like a child coming upon a coveted Christmas present. It made the trouble of the day worthwhile to spot such a beautiful and solitary bird. If I could just get a snapshot of the elusive loon, it would be the icing on my project.

  I slipped my hand into my pocket and brought the camera up to my eye in slow motion. I centered the loon in the camera’s sights and clicked the little lever just as the bird took off in a panic, its wings clumsily slapping the river, its two wide feet beating a comic exit from the perceived danger and splattering water across the air. The sound of its eerily prehistoric screeching sent me off-balance, and I grabbed what I thought was a branch, caught Matthew’s arm instead. I let go of my camera, sending it into the air like a clay pigeon at a skeet shoot. It arced overhead and landed with a modest plunk in the middle of the river. We both lost our footing on the long, wet leaves of the deer ferns and skidded down the steep bank. My feet flew out from underneath me, and we fell into the shocking, cold water of the brown river.