He drew the smoke into his mouth, rolling it around on his tongue before exhaling. He put the pack and the red plastic lighter into his jacket pocket and pulled the cigarette from his mouth. The air was cold enough that the smoke from his lips could have simply been breath. He replaced the cigarette, inhaling as he moved the lighter to the pocket on the other side - to balance things out.

It wasn’t as if he was expected back inside the little grey house he leaned against. It wasn’t even Christmas; just a proxy, a few days earlier, so all the grown-up children could work it into their schedules.

So far, it had gone like any other O’Byrne family gathering. His older brother, happily married, had asked, as his brother always did, if he had met the one yet. His father had mentioned a job opening at a bank downtown: “This artistic stuff you do is all well and good, but someday you’ll have to get a real job.” His sister managed to spend nearly the entire time on the couch necking with the guy she had brought; there was a new one each Christmas. His mother simply pretended everything was perfect and pleasant. Ignore the family problems, and they go away.

He heard laughter inside. His brother’s wife had attempted to get a game of Pictionary going, and it sounded like it had already started. He drew in another mouthful of smoke: he wasn’t going back in yet.

He began to walk around the house. The snow had not developed into a full blanket over the ground, but what little there was made crunching noises under his shoes. His eyes were on the neighbor’s house - grey, like this and every other house on the street - and then on the field in the backyard. It was wild and overgrown; his father had always meant to turn it into something nice: maybe a garden or a playground for his future grandchildren. It was never more than an intention. Now it would cost much more to clear out the trees that had begun to grow in.

Dropping the cigarette, he smudged it into the frozen ground as he drew another from his pocket. He knew his father would never make anything out of the yard. He knew his father would never stop talking about what it would be when he got around to it.

He sighed and kicked one shoe into the other, knocking off bits of snow. He coughed, a time-wasting cough: he didn’t want to go back in. Maybe he could just get in his car and drive the two hours to his apartment, right now, without saying goodbye; but some sense of filial duty kept him. Morose, he began to make his way around the rest of the house. His eyes were back on the field, and he almost tripped over the lady sitting on the back porch stairs.

“What the hell?” But he choked on the last word as he saw her eyes, filled with tears. They met his with sadness and something he couldn’t describe - perhaps surprise, perhaps fear, perhaps offense at his tone or words. He felt immediately small, as if he had been caught swearing by his parents when he was ten, and he knew he should have been more polite. “I’m sorry.” He threw down his cigarette and set his shoe on top of it. “Who are you?” A second too late he added: “Please?”

But her eyes were no longer connecting with his. They were on the ground; they were closed, tears leaking through and running down her face. All of a sudden he noticed her appearance. Shock must have made him miss the thin white gown she wore, frilly at her wrists and embroidered in pale thread at her neck. It reminded him of a nightgown his last girlfriend had loved; but while hers had looked silly and pretentious, the lady before him looked as if she belonged in the gown. He felt that, however appropriate it looked on her, she must be cold; and he began to take off his coat to offer it to her.

She spoke without looking up, her voice shivering as she continued to cry: “I am not cold.” And for the first time he noticed that the folds of her gown did not shift when the wind blew the branches of the tree beside her. For some reason, he wasn’t bothered by that.

“Do you live here? Why are you crying?”

Her eyes met his once more - had he realized they were so green? - as she spoke for the second time. “Do you not know who I am?” He was aware of a desire to brush away the tears on her face, and an instant later realized she would see that as being far too forward.

“I’m afraid not.” He felt the emptiness of his words, but could think of nothing better.

“It is a sad day when a son of Clann O’Byrne does not know a woman of the faeries.”

At least that was what his mind told him he heard. But when he whispered “woman of the faeries” to himself, it sounded like “bahn she.” What surprised him more than that was the fact that he didn’t question the use of the word “faerie,” as he was sure any adult would. All he said out loud was: “Is that why you cry?”

But her head was down and she was sobbing, almost wailing, and he was silent, knowing he shouldn’t interrupt or try to comfort her. He watched without feeling self-conscious. He could not look away, and his mind did not prattle to him. The wind blew harder, but it still did not touch the lady.

He didn’t know whether it was hours or moments later - it seemed like both - but then her sobs were lessening, and she was drying her face with long, auburn hair; her hair had failed to register in his mind before. Still, he was silent.

Her stance shifted: he caught a glimpse of a pale foot wrapped in some type of sandal. But it was covered again as she stood, her gown smoothing around her. She must have been shorter than he was and perfectly shaped, but when her eyes connected with his, he forgot to note her form. “I cry because one in this house will soon die, and only his image shall remain with you; and even that will speed to dust.”

Swallowing, he forced his hand not to shoot to the pack of cigarettes in his pocket. Who? The question formed in his eyes, but his tongue would not give voice.

Her gaze was at once sympathetic and serene. He felt once more that he was looking at someone much older than him, a person more parent or mentor than anything. “I cannot say whom.” The voice that had quavered with sobs a few minutes ago had a firm, timeless sound, as if it were not even the lady that spoke. “It is not for you to know.”

“But… why tell me at all?”

“Because that is what I am here to do. I am simply to give you a glimpse.”

“It’s my father, isn’t it.”

She did not acknowledge his half-question. “Have you not been told the tales of your ancestors? Be thankful you are even visited. Many are not so fortunate.”

“I don’t understand.”

She walked behind him before she spoke again - if such fluid movements could even be named walking. “The faeries of many clans have ceased to render their services. Our ways do not matter to many.”

“But why you? And why me?” His eyes tried to follow her as she continued walking, but he didn’t turn.

“You, because you do not banish me from your mind.” She was in front of him now, her eyes clean of any trace of tears. “And I am here because I have been called to tell you.”

He began to ask another question, but realized he didn’t know what to say. He only saw her eyes as if the rest of her did not exist; and when he next blinked, her eyes were gone.

Knowing he would see no trace of her, he still looked right and left, peering across the field. He sat down, then, on the steps she had been sitting on. He rested his elbows on his knees and watched the wind move the brittle grass in the field.

Pulling out a cigarette from the middle of the pack in his pocket, he put it to his lips and savored its solid feel. He pulled out his lighter from the other pocket - but a moment later threw the cigarette down and replaced the lighter. Standing up and crossing his arms, he wondered if he should go back in. That’s the way it would be in a movie, he thought: He’d go back in and they’d all play Pictionary together, just like in a Hallmark commercial; so cliché. They’d all laugh and drink their beer, and that night, perhaps, someone would die. Maybe on the way home, in a car accident. Maybe later on, someone would have a heart attack in his bed before the sun rose.

He walked and waited for some new thought to come, something that would tell him what he should do; he didn’t want to go inside. It wasn’t as if they needed him for the game - Pictionary wasn’t his strong point. He’d simply spoil it for the rest of them.

What did the lady mean by soon? Tonight? Next week? Before the next Christmas gathering? He rounded the last corner of the house, and he could see the door, white against the surrounding grey paint. Black letters stood starkly in the center: “O’Byrne.”

Damn the cliché. He opened the door and walked inside.

***
Tim Eaton lives in the great Northeast and edits Chasing Hats. He is not Irish.