Flock (The Ravenhood)

“There is a legend about a bird which sings just once in its life, more sweetly than any other creature on the face of the earth. From the moment it leaves the nest it searches for a thorn tree, and does not rest until it has found one. Then, singing among the savage branches, it impales itself upon the longest, sharpest spine. And, dying, it rises above its own agony to outcarol the lark and the nightingale. One superlative song, existence the price. But the whole world stills to listen, and God in His heaven smiles. For the best is only bought at the cost of great pain… Or so says the legend.”

—Colleen McCullough, The Thorn Birds

I GREW UP SICK.

Let me clarify. I grew up believing that real love stories include a martyr or demand great sacrifice to be worthy.

My favorite books, love songs, movies, the ones that resonated with me, have kept me grieving long after I turned the last page, the notes faded out, or the credits rolled.

Because of that, I believed it, because I made myself believe it, and I bred the most masochistic of romantic hearts, which resulted in my illness.

When I lived this story, my own twisted fairy tale, it was unbeknownst to me at the time because I was young and naïve. I gave into temptation and fed that beating beast, which grew thirstier with every slash, every strike, every blow.

That’s the novelty of fiction versus reality. You can’t re-live your own love story because, by the time you’ve realized you’re living it, it’s over. At least that was the case for me.

All these years later, I’m convinced I willed my story into existence due to my illness.

And all were punished.

That’s why I’m here, to feed, to grieve, and maybe to cure my sickness. It’s here that it started and it’s here where I have to end it.

It’s a ghost town, this place that haunts me, this place that made me. A few weeks shy of my nineteenth birthday, my mother had sent me to take up residence with my father, a man I’d previously only spent a few summers with when I was much younger. Upon my arrival, I’d quickly learned that his stance hadn’t changed on his biological obligation, and he doled out the same rules as he had when I was small—to rarely be seen and never heard. I was to uphold myself to the strictest of morals and excel in school while executing his standard of living.

In the months that followed, a prisoner of his kingdom, I naturally did the opposite, ruining myself, and further tarnishing his name.

Back then, I had zero regrets, at least when it came to my father until I was forced to deal with the aftermath.

Now at twenty-six, I’m still living in it.

It’s clear to me that I’ll never outgrow Triple Falls or outlive the time I spent there. After years of fighting it, this is the conclusion I’ve drawn. I’m a different person now, but I was before I left too. When everything happened, I was determined I’d never return. But the infuriating truth I’ve discovered is that I’ll never be able to move on. It’s the reason I’m back. To make peace with my fate.

I can no longer disregard the greedy demand of the vessel beating in my chest or the nagging of my subconscious. I’ll never be a woman capable of letting go, of leaving the past where it belongs, no matter how much I want to.

Navigating my way through the winding roads, I roll down my window, welcoming the cold. I need to numb. Since I hit the highway, my mind has been reeling with memories I’ve desperately tried to suppress during waking hours since I fled.

It’s my dreams that refuse to set me free, my dreams that keep the war raging in my head, the loss shredding my heart, forcing me to re-live the hardest parts, over and over in an agonizing loop.

For years, I’ve tried to convince myself that life exists after love.

And maybe it does, for others, but life hasn’t been so kind to me.

I’m done pretending I didn’t leave the largest part of me between these hills and valleys, between the sea of trees that hold my secrets.

Even with the cold whip of the wind on my face, I can still feel the warmth of the sun on my skin. I can still sense his frame blocking out the light, feel the prickling of surety the first time he touched me, and the goosebumps that touch left in his wake.

I can still feel them all, my boys of summer.

All of us are to blame for what happened—all of us serving our sentences. We were careless and reckless, thinking our youth made us indestructible, exempt from our sins, and it cost us.

Snow drifts toward my windshield in a lazy fall, dusting the trees and covering the surrounding ground as I exit the highway. The crunch of my tires in the gravel has my heart pounding in my throat as my hands start to shake. I sweep the endless evergreens lining the road while trying to convince myself that facing my past head-on is the first step in confronting what’s plagued me for years. All I have left is dwelling within the prison I’ve built. It’s the truth I’m determined to face that’s the most definite, the most crippling.

Most consider knowing all-consuming love a blessing, but I consider it a curse. A curse I’ll never be able to lift. I’ll never know love again as I did here all those years ago. And I don’t want to. I can’t. I’m still sick with it.

There is no question in my mind that for me, it was love.

What other pull could be so strong? What other feeling could addict me to the point of insanity? Of doing the things I did and living with these memories within this ghost story.

Even when I’d sensed the danger, I gave in.

I didn’t heed a single warning. I went in a willing captive. I let love rule and ruin me. I played my part, eyes wide open, tempting fate until it delivered.