Lyric the Greenwing

Serendipity129

Lyric the Greenwing

“Are you here for a checkup?” the fairy called Woodwhistle drones.

“Yeah, I just arrived last week,” I tell her.

“Another greenwing, eh?” the fairy dressed in patchwork leaves peers through her big round glasses at me, but her curious squint borders on scrutinizing. It makes me feel terribly vulnerable, like the gust of wind from yesterday.

What would’ve happened to me if I’d not come down? Could I have been blown away? Where would I go? Would I plummet into the sea, that infinite pool of glass they warned me to never enter alone? Would my wings resist the ocean’s spray or be soaked through before the angry waves pulled me under?

All this I wonder while the fairy ambles around me, taking measures with a ribbon and citing me with a stick, like the art fairies do in the studio with their pencils. She asks me to open my wings as wide as I can, marveling at the distance between the sharp tips.

“Amazing! Especially for someone who just arrived,” her voice softens to a chirp. “And to whom can I attribute these impressive one-eighty millimeters to?” she readies her huge feather to scribble down more numbers on her leaf.

“Well, I don’t know, yet.” I look down at my toes. I’m starting to wish it wasn’t so important, the whole name thing.

“That’s normal with you greenies. You’re an art talent. How ‘bout I give you a placeholder name, sweetie?”

My shoulders relax, and I breathe, “That would be great, actually.”

Woodwhistle hands me a strange device with three leaves coiled up in it. I can turn the rolls, and names appear on the side facing up. I poke at them, rotating through the names for a while. There are options for second, even third names. I choose the one with the prettiest shape.

“Lyric?” the fairy sings. “Lyric is such a sweet name. It fits your face, don’t ya think?”

“I think so. Lyric.” Like the words in a song. I so loved the songs that the performing talents weaved last night over flickering fires on the beach. They conveyed them like the soaring breezes of the wind talents or made them sprout up like the garden fairies do with the flowers. I wonder if the songs live inside me like theirs do.

When I leave the cozy office inside the home tree, the name flexes my tongue roundly, like the rolling leaves I chose it from. It’s beautiful, a reflection of expert craftsmanship and musical passion. But it ends so abruptly, like a false crescendo. That word I learned from Peggi, one of the nice composing talents in the music hall.

Everyone is so nice to me, although I just got here.

Woodwhistle’s comforting voice rings in my mind: “You get to change it as many times as you like, so don’t hesitate to come back as many times as you need until you settle on the one that fits you!”

I won’t come back until I find the name that feels right.

I pick my feet up from the ground, still amazed at how my wings can take me anywhere. They’re green still, just like they call me, but when I fly, they turn into a pair of rainbows on my back and make a cool breeze like water vapor. I hover above the grass as I remember the way to the theater.

That place almost felt as serene as my home. I can hardly wait to stretch out on the stage and lay against the hard wood, feeling the warm shell lamps on me again, but I hear raised voices echoing from inside the leafy dome. I hide behind the doorway and peek inside to find a group of fairies in pillowy white clothes stained by bright colors of paint, jubilantly clapping their hands, watching the others bound across the stage with their arms spread as if catching the wind beneath them. Even without flying, they weigh nothing as they draw sparkling trails of pixie dust through the air, and the sun illuminates the grains as they trickle into tangled, graceful webs of light.

My feet move on their own to creep up for a closer look. The bigger the stage and the fairies get, the more their energy sizzles into my very skin. I walk on my toes, entranced in the sways of their bodies, the whirling colors of their costumes, and the balances shifting until there is nothing but air beneath them.

The wide-set gaze of a pretty pink fairy captures me in my place, with a grin just as broad.

“Hey!” she laughs, turning the attention of a few others to me.

“Hey, it’s our greenwing!” a fairy with thick, wooly locks cheers.

The pretty pink one captures me so well that she lifts me onto the big round stage with merely her eyes. I put my bag down on the wooden floor and follow the pull of her gaze and body.

I almost fall into it, but I catch myself and begin the dance with her. Happy voices welcome me into the rhythm, which swills back and forth in my body. The pink fairy’s hand leaves mine, but her lead courses through me like a river. The music of the woodwind and the beat engulf me. My feet won’t stop moving. My arms outstretch for balance, magic dust cradles me where I might fail.

I’m moving into bliss.

We all began the dance together, passing the energy between us, now one sparrowman holds it all. We surround him in a clapping circle, a covering him in a rhythm that will rupture my ears. By just watching him, I can still feel the addicting strain on my muscles with every bend and flex. A fairy whips their flowing blue skirt with grace, then a smaller one who wears barely anything but brown leaves tight around her torso stomps and curls her fingers into fists, dancing hard like a rock. The lanky sparrowman with the thick locks tumbles into the circle and tucks into himself, whirling on the ground like a leaf falling from the sky. Amazing!

It’s my turn. The other fairies give me space, and for an instant, I’m all alone. But my legs carry me into twirls all their own, like something foreign possessing me. When my fingers find my hair and I melt up from the floor with ease, I realize how this has waited to get out from the moment I popped that bubble of pixie dust. I am a seed of rhythm, and my dance is the blossom that grows from within.

This is where I belong, I dare to think. I’m breathless, I’m hot. The noise and the eyes on me make my cheeks and ears heat up, but I love it. Showing everyone how I move, how I make the music with my body.

The tension that keeps me floating relaxes as the circle closes around me. The cheers come back; some pat my back or ruffle my hair, but most clap, including the pale, graceful fairy with the blue dress.

“That was great!” she drifts up to me and holds both my hands. Soon, one of hers is cool on my neck. “What do you call yourself?” she peers down at me through white eyelashes.

“For now…” I choke out against the rhythm in my throat and the burning in my chest. “Call me Lyric.”

“Welcome, Lyric!” she says.

“Welcome, Lyric!” everybody answers.

What a pleasure it is to be known. It feels so good to be with them, for them to smile on me and to smile back.

The music melts away. A few remain in the theater, a few flit away with their friends, but the pretty pink one with the sleepy eyes remains by my side. The one who saw me first.

“Hey, Lyric!” she says. “You were on fire today!”

“Ohh,” I shield my grin and the heat on my cheeks that ache from bulging. “That felt awesome!”

She giggles her sweet song again. “I hope you come dance with us again, Jimin. You’re a natural talent!”

“But I thought those were just the garden fairies. And the ones who bend the water and talk to the animals.

“Eeheehee!” she giggles again, her reddish-purple ribbons bouncing around her.

“See ya later, Dayblossom!” the sparrowman with the wooly locks waves down to the fairy next to me and buzzes off after the others.

“See ya!” she calls after him as the trail of his flight breezes over us.

“Your name is Dayblossom?” I ask.

“Mmhm!”

“That’s really pretty. I wish I’d thought of it first.”

She giggles again and invites me to walk with her. Outside the theater is a wooden bulletin covered in leaves tacked there with sap and thorns.

“You should stick with us. If you really love dancing, you’ll probably love performing just as much.”

“It made me really nervous, but that all went away when I started moving!” I exclaim, the glee paining my cheeks.

“Look here,” Dayblossom points to a papery sheet in the center of the leafy clutter of words. A beautiful painting of the tall white fairy and the strong tan one who wore barely anything crossing dances over the night sky, illuminated by orange light from below, is pinned to the center of the board.

I read their names, “Treacle and Tawny Glow…”

“We’re all performing talent fairies, but they’re the most famous ones.”

The words come out before I can think of them. “I want to be famous too.” The words came out as sure as flying does. They must be true.

“You will, I think.” Dayblossom says, tucking her hands behind her. Her rosy glow must have quieted, since I finally realize her brown leaf pants that bell weightlessly around her ankles. “If you keep coming to see us, you can practice with us for our next festival show, then you can dance in front of all of Fairy Island.”

That sounds terrifying! I recall how it felt coming out of the bubble of pixie dust when I awakened for the first time. It seemed like fewer eyes watched me before I reached out to pop it. But they seemed so happy to see me, maybe they will be happy again.

“I’ve got somewhere to be,” Dayblossom hovers into the sky when I notice the slightest bit of fuzz on her wide, shimmering wings. “Can’t wait to see you blossom with us, Lyric.”

But she had been so nice to me. To notice me first.

“Wait!” I reach out to her.

She turns back, a deep smile still on her purple lips. She lands in the soft dirt with only the sound of her magic wings.

“Yes?”

“I wanna give you this.” I reach into my bag and grab hold of it. “This is the last of my friendship bread. I got it when I first arrived. You should have it.”

“Oh, that’s alright,” Dayblossom looks taken aback when I hold it out to her. “I shouldn’t take that bit of your special day away from you.” Even with her hands in front of her, her voice has a hint of laughter in it.

“You’re someone…” My breath falters a little. “Someone who made it more special. I wanna give back to you for that.”

Her eyelashes look wet. Whatever shock was in her face, she blinks it back. Quietly, she takes the delicate, spiced bread in her hands and flutters up.

“You’re too sweet. Lyric.” Seeing her fly away is like watching a dove in flight. I wonder if I’ll ever see her again.

Lyric. She says it to me like it’s a taunt. No, that’s just the way my mind says it. Lyric. I don’t know any Lyric, or at least not yet.

She’s right. Maybe I shouldn’t have given that away. It was made for me. Suddenly, I feel an ache in my chest. I turn and look up at the poster of Treacle and Tawny Glow, the shining experts of dance who welcomed me today. The slippery salve of desire glazing my heart does nothing to the discomfort spreading down my arms and hips. I want to show Chella, Amethyst, Jasper, Dayblossom, and all of Fairy Island my love through dance, like them. But to be famous, fairies have to know your name. I don’t have one of those.

I wander around most days, marvelling at a new shade of flower or another bug that crosses my path. I wonder if every fairy who has a welcome to me in their mouth loves their name. Whether they chose it, whether it chose them. I wonder if anyone just settled on the one they picked from a roll of words on leaves.

I shiver into the ball I’ve curled into on a steady branch of the pixie dust tree, gazing into the night sky. This is the black canvas of stars that I, or that Lyric, will be painted against.

“Beg your pardon,” comes a deep voice from the faint glow of the golden pool of dust behind me.

Her wings are like the butterflies that soar overhead during the day. Well, they don’t really soar. They glide more clumsily than we fairies do. They make it look so difficult and heavy.

“You mind if I sit here too?” the fairy asks, looking part of the darkness in her raiment of deep blue petals, silky black tresses whipping in the wind coming coldly from the sea.

“No, not at all.” I scoot over to make room for her and her big stack of paper. I watch as she tucks in, drawing tally marks and doodles. “What’re you drawing?” I venture to ask.

“Star-counting.” the fairy says. “The name’s Karma. Karma Fields.”
“Pleased to meet you,” I answer. “I’m…well, Lyric. For now.”

“For now?” she chortles. “Not sure?”

“Not yet,” I fix my eyes on the moon, a silvery dash on the sky with her sparkling friends. Yes, Karma Fields must be named for the moon and her field of stars.

“I bet you knew your name right away.” I mumble, but she heard me.

“Just about,” the fairy answers, glancing into the faint glow again. “I took to star-counting naturally too. Not to brag or anything. You’re a greenwing, right?”

“Mm.”

Greenwing. Lyric. They all talk to me like they know who I am. Why is it that everyone on this island knows who I am except me? What do they know that I don’t?

I look to the sky again as if it holds the answer. The crescent moon speaks to me in a whisper only I can hear. If only I knew what she was saying. It’s like a song I’ve never heard before tonight, the lyrics to which I cannot anticipate before they pass.

Lyric. Even the ocean taunts me.

“You know, greenie,” Karma says. “The moon doesn’t always look like that.”
“It doesn’t?” I avert my eyes from the majestic silver to her.

“Nope,” she smiles, marking another tally in her journal. “Every night, she changes shape, shrinking, or expanding, like the ocean.”

“I hadn’t noticed.” I get out, trying to remember the moon from last night. Perhaps the difference is too small to see. I try harder to understand, to read her lips curved like a milky white smile. She is beautiful, as beautiful as I can know, for now, for I can’t see all of her. She is fragmented like me.

As if reading my mind, Karma replies, “This is a waxing crescent. Luckily for you, she portends that you will grow with time, just like her.”

“What do you mean…?”

“What I mean is, greenie–”

She won’t even use the name I picked from the roll.

“--you’ll know in time. Just be patient.”

I close my eyes like I have been for days now. Going through words I like. None of them are me.

The moon whispers slow down. I can hear her voice on the waves that crash before they can swallow our island whole. She is saying one word over and over with her immense power.

Jimin.

Jimin.

“Jimin…” The word prods my lips and fills my mouth with sweetness greater than that of the bread the art fairies baked for me. It caresses my teeth and tongue more gently than the name the office fairy gave me. “Jimin.” I taste it again. “Jimin.”

“What was that?” Karma warbles.

“Jimin.” I stand up.

“Jimin?”

“My name!” I say louder. “I know my name!” It feels so good that my eyes become ticklish, then my cheeks. There’s hot water coming out of them. “I know my name! It’s Jimin!”

“Aw, you’re even more sentimental than I thought,” Karma whips her black locks over her shoulder.

“Thank you!” I hear my wings buzzing behind me as I throw my arms around her. She utters a “Hey!” before I zip into the sky and embrace myself. I’m lighter than air, but stronger than the gales of the night that threaten to blow me away. I want to scream it and shout to the world. “I’m Jimin! I am Jimin!”

-The End-

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