There, at the other end of the seat, is a figure silhouetted against a tinted window, turning as he enters. Then Bird, backpack slung over his shoulder, darts through the back garden and out the fence and slips into the car at the curb. She pulls him close, kisses him on the temple, just where the pulse beats under the skin. Just inside the back door, Margaret hesitates. In the morning, at ten o’clock precisely, the Duchess arrives in her long sleek car, driving herself this time. I knew you’d figure it out, she says, as they make their way down the darkened hall. She is speaking quickly, uncharacteristically chatty, words tripping over each other as they fall from her mouth, but she can’t help it. The soles of his sneakers scuffing the floor as he drags his feet. The hallway is narrow and behind her Bird’s footsteps slow as he picks his way between unfamiliar walls. She can see him thinking, already: What is this place? He doesn’t trust her, she can see that already: the way he lingers by the door, not meeting her eyes. A lean, cool face, a skeptical face, a hard set to his mouth, a squaring of the jaw she can’t quite place. The last scrapings of baby fat nearly gone from his face. His kindergarten teacher, fuming: He won’t answer when I call him. Bird is not a name, they’d said, his name is Noah. An inquisitive chirp, a self that curled up at the edges. Something that did not belong on earth, a small quick thing. The word that, when he said it, felt like him. We named you Noah after your father’s father, his mother told him once. On the outside, his name-Bird-and because of this he knows it is from his mother. No return address, only a New York, NY postmark, six days old. But eventually it had been deemed harmless and sent on its way. It had caused confusion at the post office, the clerk unfolding the paper inside, studying it, passing it up to his supervisor, then the boss. Slit and resealed with a sticker, of course, as all their letters are: Inspected for your safety-PACT. It’s a story about the power-and limitations-of art to create change, the lessons and legacies we pass on to our children, and how any of us can survive a broken world with our hearts intact. Our Missing Hearts is an old story made new, of the ways supposedly civilized communities can ignore the most searing injustice.
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