Kalila by Rosemary Nixon Read Free Book Online

woman has thrown for her dog. That poster in your study: Things You Can Learn From A Dog: Allow the experience of fresh air and wind on your face to be pure ecstasy. Take naps and stretch before rising. If you want what’s buried, dig until you find it . A fish jumps. A bald eagle swoops from nowhere, skims the water, snatches, and glides up a tree branch to feast. The sun climbs the sky. Because we circle the sun, it shows us all its faces. Skipper crashes out of tangled bush and grasses. Unlike the moon, which, circling, shows us the same side. Maggie says you hide parts of yourself from her. You don’t, no more than you hide them from yourself. Depression twists down your esophagus like a funnel cloud. You turn abruptly, head back, the wind a whistle in your ears. You bend into its force, crunching and slushing the wet and brittle leaves that scatter in your path while the dog tears through them, skidding in wet decay.
    At the van, Skipper whines in anticipation while you hunt for your keys, impatient for life’s next experience, no matter what it brings. You give his coat an affectionate ruffle and he leaps inside, heads for his mat, paws and paws it, turns four times in a circle, and, satisfied, slumps down. You check your pant legs. Not that dirty. You drive to the hospital, leave Skipper snoring, ride the elevator, scrub your hands, slip into the yellow gown, seat yourself by the baby.

    Once upon a time a small glass castle sat high on a windy hill. The castle lodged a little princess, and its walls and ceiling winked and caught the light. The castle and the countryside around stayed lit up night and day, and whenever the little princess wished, she could gaze out her glass walls to what lay on all sides. Dotting the countryside were other tiny glass castles, each with a little prince or princess lodged inside. But like all glass slippers and glass hills in fairy tales, each glass castle was under a spell: each little prince and princess held captive inside the tiny castles unless the Great Sorcerer decided to set them free.
    Few escaped to live outside their castle walls. Day after day the little princess languished alone in her glass castle, high on the windy hill. If visitors came, it was to prod or stare or wave or shout Hello outside the castle fortress. Each castle had two small round portholes that opened to the outside, and from time to time a curious visitor would push a hand through, but this happened so rarely that when it did, the little princess recoiled from the touch.
    Imagine the princess’s loneliness for no human, only food and drink appeared inside her castle walls. She awoke each day to stare wistfully across the landscape …
    Kalila’s eyes stay closed. The Little Prince is sprawled where someone left it, on the shelf under a neighbouring isolette. You pick up the book, press your face against one armhole, flip through its pages:
    At sunrise, the sand is the colour of honey … What brought me, then, this sense of grief?
    â€¦ But I, alas, do not know how to see sheep through the walls of boxes .

Spinal tap; lumbar puncture: a procedure in which a hollow needle is inserted in the lower part of the spinal canal to withdraw cerebrospinal fluid. To diagnose and investigate disorders of the brain and the spinal cord.
    Infusion: slow introduction of a substance into a vein.
    I lug my dictionary and think of Brodie’s hands, which are always travelling, caressing a science book’s cover, meandering through his hair, tracing an onion’s paper skin. 6:05 p.m.. Brodie stays at school to plan his lessons, mark his labs, comes home in darkness, gulps down his supper. Fingers clenching, unclenching on his knee.
    Were the kids good, Brodie?
    Fine.
    Even his jaw works; the core of his emotion resting in a cheekbone. So small a movement. As if a blizzard blew between us and snatched away our words. He starts the car, drives to the hospital, hearts running on empty we sit