The Harp

Fiction by Vitora

The beaten dirt path was littered with the skeletal remains of last autumn’s foliage, like the bodies of small creatures that had died trying to flee some great catastrophe. Overhead, the wind caressed the newly forming spring leaves, promising them in a hollow, reedy voice of the glorious summer to come.

This beauty was lost on Justin.

Letting the leash swing loosely from his hand, the boy stared straight ahead, caring not where his feet took him, allowing the panting black dog to lead him to an undetermined destination. He moved on, his face set in stone, trying not to remember the scornful faces, the jeering words, the hate-filled eyes.

A simple mistake. It was just a mistake, and they made me feel like I just failed my preschool class. Now a scowl darkened his features. Just a mistake.

Tears of rage began to fill his brown eyes, but he swiftly blinked these away to trace clean paths down his grubby cheeks. I just don’t fit. Why? I can’t say—but I know I don’t.

Music—gentle and soft and sweet but unlike the wind’s thin voice—drifted to his ears. Justin registered it, accepted it as part of the springtime woods. But it grew louder, more insistent now, and the black dog paused to flick an ear and cock her head curiously to the side. The boy joined her grudgingly when he could not drag her forward.

The melody was joyful, but a hint of sadness—perhaps longing—was tucked away, nearly hidden, in its corners. Justin stopped, fascinated, letting the music wash over him.

Now his feet moved of their own accord, drawing him forward, pulling him towards the music. The dog whimpered as the collar tightened against her neck, and then jumped forward to slacken the lead, bounding ahead of her master.

As he walked, the boy began to hum along with the melody as if he knew the music. Opening his mouth, he sang now, his voice rising and falling in perfect harmony with the harp’s delicate notes.

I don’t know this music, he thought.

Yet…

Grandfather?

The old man’s face flickered into his mind, but vanished just as swiftly. Justin shook his head, trying to bring back the memories that danced away from the fingers of his mind, just out of reach.

Leading him through the quiet stillness of the woods, the music grew faster, more urgent now. The boy was reminded of childhood games of Hot and Cold as he turned sideways to slide through the narrow path created by two short trees.

Justin was suddenly thinking of the events of the day, of the scorn he had endured at the hands of his classmates, of the hatred that emanated from his teachers when he failed at anything, no matter how small. A frown crossed his face; he was stronger than that, he was better than any of them could know.

But in what way?

At his side, the dog whined, shoving its wet nose into his palm, resisting the pull of the leash. He ignored her and pressed on, letting the harp music obliterate his thoughts of ridicule.

You are a bard, Justin, a bard…like those of the olden days…

Grandfather’s face and words came back to him in a flash, and the boy nearly stumbled backwards from the mental impact. Could that be my place, my position in life?

Water lapped at his shoes, soaking his toes through the thin socks, and he started out of his thoughts. Glancing around, he found himself standing next to a quietly bubbling stream. The dog stiffened against his leg, pointing with her entire body towards the place from which the music flowed.

There it was: the harp, the instrument of angels, long immortalized in paintings and prose—and the object that Grandfather had emphasized in his legends of the woods. It stood on a smooth rock, just above the surface of the water, and as it was strummed by invisible fingers, ripples swelled out from beneath the stone.

So it’s true, he thought, eyes wide in what would have been disbelief had he not been standing before it. It’s really true. There is a harp. Grandfather’s stories were true.

And as he watched the notes disturb the brook’s surface, he felt words bubble up inside him and threaten to spill over, words that fit flawlessly with the harp’s melodic song.

He opened his mouth and sang, knowing as the first sound left him that this was what he was meant to do, meant to be.