The Wish Collector
Page 6

By a drop of her blood being brought to the light.
Staring at her wish, she suddenly felt foolish, not because she was making the wish, but because her own personal sadness seemed . . . small. Not unimportant—Clara believed all pain mattered—but hers was a part of the natural order of things, wasn’t it?
She released a loud breath. "How silly and selfish you must think we all are," she muttered, crumpling the paper in her fist and shutting her eyes. "Coming here to make our own wishes when you've been waiting decades for your own to be granted. When the life you led held more heartache than we’ll ever know."
Clara hesitated for a moment, considering, before she un-crumpled the paper and removed a pen from the purse slung over her shoulder. She tore off the wish she had written, stuffing the small piece of torn paper in her pocket and then wrote a different wish. After folding the paper back up, she slipped it through one of the thin cracks.
She started to turn away and then impulsively turned back, peeking through the slit in the stone. Movement made her blink, and she startled slightly, drawing back and inhaling a quick breath.
Cautiously, she moved forward again, peeking through the crack once more. This time she saw nothing. She couldn't even make out a house beyond, as the gaps in the rock were so small and narrow. She could only discern a hint of green. Of course, looking up told her that massive oak trees beyond the wall, would most likely shield the house from view anyhow.
What did I see? She waited . . . for what she didn't know, when she swore she heard the sound of paper crinkling. She stepped closer again, placing her fingertips against the wall. "Hello?" She didn't know why, but she had a vague notion that whatever or whomever was on the other side of the wall stilled, just as she did.
When she received no answer, she turned, unsure of what to do, sliding down the wall until her spine was pressed against it, her head leaned back, listening. She sensed that someone was on the other side, waiting, listening as well.
She closed her eyes and after several minutes, she heard faint rustling again. If she hadn't been pressed right against the wall, she’d have thought it was a bird in some distant tree, flapping its wings for takeoff and lifting through the branches. She pressed her cheek against the stone, her ear right over the ancient, cracked, and porous mortar, and she heard . . . breathing. Her eyes widened and her heart quickened. There was no ghost on the other side, but a flesh-and-blood human.
"I hear you breathing."
The breathing suddenly halted, and Clara waited a second, two. "I didn't mean that you should stop."
After another moment, a loud whoosh of breath could be heard. Clara blinked.
"Who are you?" she asked, not knowing if she expected an answer or not.
For a long moment there was no response, and she was about to try again when a masculine voice finally said, "My name's Jonah. What's yours?"
Surprise gripped Clara. There was a man sitting on the other side of the wall, his back pressed to the same place as hers, only a layer of stone separating them. For a second her own name eluded her. "Uh, Clara."
"Clara," he repeated. A whispered caress. She had no idea who he was, but she liked the way her name sounded in his voice, the way his tongue rolled over the r.
"Who are you?"
He sighed, a weary sound, and there was another long pause. "I'm not sure I know."
Clara frowned, not understanding his meaning. "Do you . . . live here?"
"Yes." The word sounded farther away as if he'd turned his head, and she pressed her ear harder against the stone, picturing a faceless man gazing into the distance. When he spoke again, it was closer, as if he'd turned his head to the wall again.
"I . . . I was told no one lived here."
"Told?"
Clara blushed and then shook her head at herself. The man couldn't even see her. "The locals like to talk about Windisle. I . . . asked around about it."
"And you came to make a wish."
"Yes. I . . . wait, did you read my wish?" Was that the sound of the crinkling paper she'd heard?
He chuckled softly, a rusty sound as if he didn’t use it much. "It was tossed onto my property."
"I guess you're right." She paused. "So it's you . . . you read all the wishes."
"I don't read them all. I just collect them."
"You collect them," she repeated slowly. "So I guess you're the wish collector, then?"
He paused. "The wish collector. I guess I am."
"And what do you do with them?"
"I'm not sure you want to know."
She released a breath on a smile. "You grant them, of course, right?"
"I throw them away."
Clara inhaled quickly. “That's awful."
"What should I do? Leave them on the lawn to turn into mush in the rain? To blow all over the property?"
“I don't know. Throwing them away just seems . . . it seems . . . well, sacrilegious. A sin."
"Sacrilegious. That is serious. The problem is, Clara, I don't know if that sin trumps all the ones I've already committed."
She wasn't sure what to say to that, so she remained silent.
"What do you think I should do with them? Mount each one in its own special frame and hang them on my wall? The Gallery of False Hope, I'd call it."
"You're being sarcastic," she said, hearing the indignity in her own voice. "About people's personal wishes—their hopes and their dreams. Their sorrows."
“And yet you didn't make a wish for yourself.” Clara heard the rustling of paper as if he was unfolding her wish once more. Reading it.
"That was private."
"It was given to me. It landed right at my feet." There was the hint of amusement in his tone and Clara stiffened, letting out a small, angry huff.
He chuckled again and despite herself, Clara liked the sound of his laughter. It was rusty, yes, but it was also deep and rich.
"Well," she said, standing and brushing her hands off. "I have to go. I can see that making wishes at this particular wall is pointless."
Clara knew he stood too, as she could hear rustling on the other side and his voice came from above her own when he spoke. He was taller than she was. "Wait. I'm sorry. I was just teasing you. Please . . ."
He stopped speaking and she found herself leaning toward the wall. The way he’d uttered the word . . . the blatant loneliness she’d heard in his tone caused her heart to squeeze tightly. For a moment, he’d sounded desperate that she not leave. "What?" she asked softly, her mouth over one of the paper-thin cracks.
“Nothing.”
Clara paused, placing her hands against the rock. “I suppose . . . living here, you know a lot about the plantation. The history.”
“Yes.”
“Would you be willing to share some? If I came back?”
“Came back?”
“Sundays are my day off . . .”
"I, uh, that’s usually when I do my wish pillaging as a matter of fact. For some reason, not many people show up on Sundays. Maybe that's the day they make their wishes in church.”
"Wish pillaging." She laughed softly and swore she heard his lips part in a smile, but of course, she couldn't be entirely sure. “So if I were to come up with an idea of some other way to deal with the wishes besides just tossing them out, maybe you’d be open to suggestions? And in return, you could tell me a little more about Windisle?”
“Maybe.”
“Then I’ll see you Sunday.”
When he spoke this time, there was no mistaking the smile in his voice. "Same time?"
Clara slipped her cell phone from her purse and glanced at it. "Six o'clock?"
"Yes." There was something in his voice she wasn't sure how to classify . . . hope? Excitement? Nervousness? Perhaps even bewilderment. But at what? Her heart beat steadily, a warm feeling pressing against her chest. She was delighted that she now had a personal connection to Windisle through the mysterious man on the other side of the wall.
"See you next week."