Flight of a Starling. Lisa Heathfield

stretch out across my back.

      I never look in the mirror in my costume – I once told Rita that the reflection of the fallen angel would step out and stick to her forever and I made myself believe it too.

      I run across the muddy ground and up the wooden steps of Lil’s van. Inside, it’s almost dark. She’s sitting behind her table in her little wicker chair, the end of her cigarette glowing a pinprick of colour.

      ‘Lucky I wasn’t Tricks,’ I say. ‘Finding you smoking when customers are about to come in.’

      ‘What customers?’ The smoke twists and bends into the deep lines of her skin.

      ‘He’d sooner set you alight than see you smoking in front of them,’ I say.

      She flicks ash into the bowl of water before her, her laugh collapsing into a cough that gets stuck in her closed mouth. When she opens her lips, it’s to spit phlegm into her handkerchief, which she tucks into her sleeve.

      ‘You wouldn’t tell though, would you, little Laura?’

      ‘What’s it worth?’ I laugh and she swats at me with a hand spotted with rings. I click the lamp on by her feet and a small light shivers up towards her face, leaving her eyes as hollow holes.

      ‘Get the customers in, girl. Let’s get the lova rolling and grow rich enough to live like queens.’

      Outside, the sky is thick with clouds, but my eyes sting slightly in the daylight. We’re next to the entrance of the big top and I beckon to strangers with my long fingernails dipped in colour. There are droplets of fear in their eyes, before they look away and I want to tell them that I’m nothing like this really, that if they looked carefully, they’d see just me.

      I’m spreading my wings high above me in an arc, watching the feathers mingling with the beads, when I hear people speaking.

      ‘It is one of them,’ a voice says. I turn and it’s two of the boys from the fountain. Dean and Will. They come right up close.

      ‘You look different,’ Dean says to me, making my heart quick.

      ‘You don’t,’ I say and I smile back at him, even though our angels are meant to keep a face blank of everything.

      ‘What’s this then?’ Will points his thumb to the closed van behind us.

      ‘It’s your destiny,’ I say and they both laugh.

      ‘A fortune teller?’ Will asks.

      ‘More than that.’ I look steady into Dean’s eyes.

      ‘What do we have to do then?’ he asks.

      ‘You’re not going in?’ Will pokes his arm.

      ‘Why not?’ Dean says. ‘It’s always good to know what the future has in store.’

      ‘It’ll be a load of nonsense.’

      Dean ignores him. ‘How much is it?’

      ‘Three of your finest gold coins.’

      ‘Three pounds!’ Will says.

      ‘I’ll meet you here,’ Dean tells him.

      Within my angel costume, I can watch as he puts his hands into his jeans and pulls out some money.

      ‘Suit yourself,’ Will says. ‘I’ll just be a no-mates, while you waste your money.’

      I lead Dean up the steps, open the door and we go inside.

      Lil sits motionless.

      ‘Is there anyone there?’ she asks. Dean looks at me, a half smile on his lips. I have to look away.

      ‘She’s blind,’ I tell him, but for the first time ever I don’t like the lie. ‘She feels the future with her soul.’ I’ve said the words a hundred times before.

      ‘Right,’ Dean says.

      ‘A boy,’ Lil says, her voice lower than before, a whisper in her lamplight.

      She holds out her hands, palms up. Dean only looks at me.

      ‘I can’t touch your money,’ I tell him. ‘You need to give it to her.’ He steps forwards hesitantly and I hear the sound of his coins settling on to her skin and dropping into a pocket lost in her skirt.

      He’s awkward as she holds his hand. In her other, she takes mine. I look away from Dean again. He’s made everything feel different and now we’re linked, almost touching.

      ‘Your angel will choose a number,’ Lil says.

      ‘Six,’ I reply.

      Lil stares deep at him with her cave-like eyes and counts out the cards on to the table. As always, it’s the picture of an angel’s wing. Dean studies it so earnestly that I want to tell him that none of this is true.

      ‘There are obstacles in your path, but you have hidden wings that will help you,’ she says, as Dean nods solemnly. ‘But worry is weighing you down.’ Lil looks at nothing. ‘Am I right?’

      ‘Um. Kind of,’ Dean says.

      ‘I feel there is light, though,’ Lil says, her voice hazy. ‘Yes, there is light.’

      Dean looks at me. ‘Three pounds,’ he mouths, but he doesn’t seem angry.

      I take his hand before Lil can stop me. She’s meant to be blind, so she can’t pretend she can suddenly see. There is a painted door at the back of her van and I lead him through. Inside, it’s no bigger than a cupboard and it’s completely dark. Any outside sounds are muffled into almost silence.

      ‘What are we doing here?’ Dean asks. He has the remnants of a laugh in his voice, but it’s unsteady.

      ‘Are you scared?’ I ask, the angel dropping from me.

      ‘No.’ His voice is so close to me, sitting just on my skin as he speaks.

      ‘I want to know what frightens you.’

      The air has never felt like this. If I move, I think it might burn me.

      ‘What frightens me?’

      ‘Yes,’ I whisper.

      ‘Is this in the old woman’s script?’

      I wonder if he hears my heart beating.

      ‘Name three things.’

      ‘OK,’ he says. ‘Cotton wool.’

      ‘Cotton wool?’

      ‘I don’t like the way it sounds when I touch it.’ I can tell he’s smiling, his words tipping up.

      ‘Lo?’ It’s Lil’s voice, drifting urgent through the door.

      ‘A bigger fear than that,’ I tell him.

      There’s a pause, where the darkness swells tight between us.

      ‘I’m frightened that something will happen to my mum.’

      I struggle to find an answer.

      ‘Nothing will happen to her,’ I say, as if I know, as if I really can read Lil’s cards.

      ‘How are you so sure?’ he asks.

      ‘I just am. She won’t die before her time.’

      I move slightly and I think the feathers of my wings brush against him.

      ‘Lo.’ Lil sounds angry now. ‘His time is up.’

      ‘The third thing you’re scared of ?’ I ask quickly.

      I can feel him pause.

      ‘You,’ he says.

      ‘Me?’

      ‘Yes.’

      The door opens and dim light