Ivy of Our Hearts

One

The crow arrived one midsummer evening and had visited me every night since then.

Perched in an oak tree outside my bedroom, it studied me—eyes of the deepest gloom—as I flung the window open to let in the nighttime air. The scent of sweet alyssum rode upon the tepid breeze, and I stuck my neck out farther to breathe it all in, without a second thought about my nightly guest.

Crows were inquisitive creatures, but I'd already gone a full year without telling anyone my secret and didn't intend to let it intimidate me, even if it might've understood, better than anyone, how it felt to be lovesick.

"Watch me all you want," I said, stretching my arms across the windowsill. "I'm as sealed as a locket."

It didn't flinch at my words, opening its beak in a kind of incredulous expression. Crows were the souls of the unrequited, according to Granny Farewell. "Never stare too long. They might mistake you for their long, lost love," she'd warned, brittle-voiced and brandishing her finger, knotty like the root of an ancient willow.

It was as silly as all the stories we told in Clearwater, but I yanked the curtain across the window to conceal myself. Not even Granny Farewell knew about the boy who called my name every night.

Once I'd responded, drowsy from sleep, yes, here I am.

On nights like this I wondered if he was out there. Watching. Waiting for me to join him in the dark of the woods.

Even then, there weren't, neither had there ever been, such a thing as phantoms or ghouls of the night. This wasn't arguable, even now, but in Clearwater the legends told a different story, that the woods behind my house were haunted by a ghost with a ravenousness for teenage girls. For a century, we'd been kept inside after dark, fearing the monster would take us and do with us unspeakable things.

But Margaret and I would prove them all wrong, that the phantom of Clearwater wasn't real. And the voice that called to me at night was simply a trick of the wind.

A trick of the heart and mind.

Secretly, I longed for us to be wrong. To think I might have a secret admirer. To think he was always watching even when I was most unaware. It thrilled me that someone out there wanted me more than any boy in school had ever cared to admit.

I snuck from my room at ten, halting in the shadows only once when Dad coughed, and Mom whispered for him to roll over. My parents slept like bats, sneaking out was easier than it should have been, but my heart had no mercy.

Hurry, Ivy, it seemed to say with its tireless beating. Hurry, Margaret's waiting.

Pressing my shoulder to the wall, and holding my breath, I crept down the stairs to the back door. To the path that ran behind my house to the woods. I made sure to avoid the floorboards that would squeak under my weight.

Just once, I thought I heard Mom call to me.

Ivy, where are you going?

I paused at the door, clutching the doorknob so tightly my hand ached, but nothing except the wind made a sound, whistling through an open window.

I pushed the door open and slipped out into the night.

Up above, there wasn't one star. It was as if the sky itself held its breath for me.

It was as if it knew I'd need the darkness.