Who Sings For Thee?
A genuine praying-to-the-moon type of witch.
“Listen closely.”
“The hell you talking about?”
“The wind through the wheat,” said James. “If you really listen—and I mean really stop for a second and focus—you can hear words.” James walked out into the field, the lower half of his body disappearing beneath the grain. He liked how the stalks felt against his bare arms, like a cat’s whiskers on his skin. In the distance, white sheets rippled from a clothesline near a farmhouse. He breathed in the warm air through his nose.
“I don’t hear anything,” said Dalia. “Wait—I do hear something!” She put her hand to her ear and gazed out into the field. “I hear a load of shit.” She laughed and looked back toward the freeway; trucks and cars of varying colors and sizes sped down the interstate.
“You hear my brother is getting married?” said Dalia.
“Yep,” said James, walking deeper into the field. The golden wheat undulated before him like a sheet of yellow silk. “To Marcy, right?”
“Yes, Marcy. I told him he better get her tested first. He didn’t like that! Locked me out of the house for over an hour until my dad got home. Do you know what my dad said?”
“That you talk too much and never listen?”
“No, he said I need to move out as soon as I graduate next year.” Dalia watched the back of her friend’s head for a reaction, but when none came, she ran her hand through her hair and continued, “Well, I told him that maybe I will—you know? Maybe I’ll move to New York….or to San Francisco—maybe I’ll live in Prague!”
“Come over here,” said James.
“I don’t want to get ticks.”
“They won’t get you. I’ll tell them you’re with me.” James walked further into the field and yelled, “Hey, ticks! Dalia is with me! And she tastes like crap!”
Dalia rolled her eyes but followed James into the field.
“I’m still unclear why you don’t like Marcy,” said James. “She seems nice enough—maybe a little weird, but so are you.”
Dalia stopped and glared at James. “I may be weird, but she’s a witch. She’s got a pentagram tattoo! She’s a genuine praying-to-the-moon type of witch. They say she—”
“Who’s they?” James interrupted.
“Everyone. Can I finish?”
“Go on, then.”
Dalia continued, “They say she comes out here at night, to this field.”
“And what does she do out here in the middle of the night?”
Dalia stood beside James, checking her body for ticks. “Talks to the wheat about having sex with the devil or something. Maybe she strips down to her skivvies and hunts mice—I don’t know what witches do in a wheat field.”
“Let’s ask the wheat,” said James.
Dalia stepped back and looked at James askance.
James continued, “You scared?”
“No, it’s just dumb. If the wheat could speak, we’d hear it scream when the combine came around.”
James stepped forward and yelled out, “Hello, wheat! Tell us what the witch does in your…um…in you!”
“This is—”
“Shhh. Just listen.”
Dalia rolled her eyes. She watched the field dance and waited for James to be done with his silly game.
James turned around, expecting to see an expression of cynicism on his friend’s face, but what he saw instead was a look of confusion.
“What’s wrong?” asked James.
“I heard voices. I heard…I heard words.”
“I get it. This is silly to you, but can you just play along?”
“No. It’s true. It…they told me what Marcy does.”
James walked back and stood face-to-face with his friend. There was a lull in the traffic, and the only sound was the wind through the wheat. “What does she do?” he asked, waiting for the punchline.
“She sings.”
“She sings,” James repeated. He wasn’t sure if his friend was messing with him, but he played along. “What does she sing?”
Dalia opened her mouth to speak, but then her eyes widened. She looked behind her at the freeway, where a new stream of vehicles tore across the horizon.
“What?” James asked.
“She sings their song.”
“Whose song?”
Dalia turned and started walking toward the interstate.
“Dalia?” James called after her. “Dalia, what’s going on?”
And then she was sprinting toward the traffic.
James wasn’t sure what was happening, but it didn’t feel right. He ran after her, wading through the ocean of gold. He was shocked at how the wheat seemed to bow to his friend as she ran through it, but it stood tall and firm for him as if it were blocking his path intentionally. Dalia was running faster than James had ever seen her run. So fast that by the time he was out of the wheat and onto the dirt shoulder of the freeway, she was too far ahead of him to stop her. She ran into the middle of the southbound lane, her scrawny arms in front of her to stop the traffic.
James screamed for her to get out of the road—cars and trucks whizzed by, swerving and honking, until the traffic came to a halt. The smell of burnt rubber and exhaust filled the air.
James ran out into the street. Men and women were yelling at Dalia, but his friend paid no attention to them. She stared down the heat-rippled freeway.
“Jesus Christ, Dalia—what was that? What are you staring at?” said James.
“Wait.”
After a moment, a small child toddled out from the wheat and into the southbound lane of the interstate, where just moments before, traffic had been barreling down the asphalt without care or clue.
A woman cried out from beyond the wheat where the white sheets on the clothesline seemed to flap frantically in response. Her cry became more and more panicked as she came through the field and into the road, snatching up her child, crying, and thanking God for sparing him.
That evening, in the golden, moonlit field, Marcy and Dalia sang in chorus with the crickets to the wheat, and the wheat listened.
Thank you for reading, Who Sings For Thee.
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a happy ending?!! if I didn’t like this so much, I would consider it a betrayal. really beautiful all the way through.
This is mesmerizing! Felt like I could hear the wheat rustle as I read the story. So cool.