“Push him off!”
“Push him off!” The voices rose behind me. I turned and saw a dense crowd—more people than the village square had ever held except on assembly days.
I had been shoved onto the low wall at the roof’s edge. From there I could see beyond the compound for the first time: another building exactly like ours across the gap, and farther off, a river green even in winter. I didn’t dare look down. Everyone knew I was afraid of heights. That was why I was up there.
Behind me the noise continued. No one sang today, no one called out to passersby; every face was turned toward me. They wanted me to jump. Was it my fault?
I turned my head and found my mother. She too was crouched on the wall, not looking at me, her eyes dry.
She must have used up her tears the night before. It started when the leader sent someone to our house with the news. The argument between my parents had finally broken open. My father shouted until his voice cracked: “This is your fault! You spoiled him! Look at him—this old, and he still doesn’t have the most basic skill. He has no right to call himself one of us!” When the shouting was over, he walked straight over and slapped me. I stumbled back a few steps, then managed to stay upright.
After dark he went to see the leader. My mother stayed in the corner, weeping as if she, not I, would be taken out and executed the next day. I didn’t understand. It was because of me. Why blame her? And why was she so broken?
Fog began to rise. The mountains, the river, the building opposite—all faded until I could no longer make them out. The roof looked like a quiet sea. I almost stopped hearing the crowd. Somewhere far off, a fisherman on that sea began to sing. I had never left the village. I had never seen the ocean. Everything I knew about the world outside came from a strong young man in our village. He had become the child every parent praised before he was three, because his wings were powerful, and whenever he took off, they beat with a sound like something solid.
The leader jumped up onto the wall and narrowed his eyes. “I spoke to your father yesterday. If you don’t want to die like this, you can run. But everyone here knows what you are: a useless thing that doesn’t even dare to flap his wings hard. Just like those enormous two-legged monsters.” He turned, beat his wings once, and the crowd gradually hushed. Then he cleared his throat, the way leaders of every size do before a speech.
“Today we gather here, with all of you as witnesses, to put to death this creature who will not even try to fly. We do this to protect the honor of our village.”
Another stir ran through the crowd. They began chattering again. A gray-templed old man said with open pride, “When I was his age, I was already flying circles inside the rooms of those giant two-legged monsters!”
Everyone turned to him and gasped. He patted his chest and launched into the story: “That day I flew from here to their windowsill. Those huge monsters were sitting in rows, holding paper, scribbling away—not noisy at all, not like they usually are, those chirping monsters! One of them saw me and made a face. Ridiculous! Then? Then I went from here—yes, right where he’s standing—dove like a Valkyrie, shot into the room, and elegantly shit on the monster’s paper. Then I turned one hundred and eighty degrees and flew back!”
The crowd gasped again, wave after wave of admiration, as if this were not my execution but a celebration for him. Still, it had to be said: provoking those enormous monsters took courage.
Ding! “Half the exam time has passed!”
I came back to myself. Most of the students in the classroom had their heads down over their papers. How irritating. It felt as if so much time had gone by, and only half the exam was over? I looked at the math paper and scratch paper on the desk in front of me. I hadn’t written a single word. Of course not. Math was too difficult. Why did middle school students have to learn something so complicated?
I looked out the window. Many birds were still gathered on the roof opposite, and one of them was shouting at the top of its voice, nodding as it shouted. I wanted to write this story down, on the blank scratch paper, or even on the answer sheet. What did math being hard have to do with me?
But I couldn’t. I was the invigilator.