Cliffs

Cliffs

'A bear's been here,' he said, pointing to the torn pine, but even at eight I knew enough to suspect my brother of having snuck up here, sometime before I woke, and using his hatchet. Still, I kept a watchful eye as we climbed slowly, the path growing steeper among the trees, up to the cliffs, the sandstone terraces, the vultures' apartment house.

I would watch them from my wood-framed window, the little bedroom at the back of the farmhouse, leaning out to see them rise, soar from the rock ledges, into the summer sky. You couldn't really see their nests from the top of the cliffs, though, even if one were foolish enough – or had a negligent brother – to edge out to the edge and look over.

No doubt it wasn't as far down as I remember but it would have broken my eight-year old neck, all the same. The vultures would surely have approved.

Stephen Brooke ©2008

appeared in the “Retellings” collection

Some might note that this setting is quite similar to that of the farm in my novel 'These Remembered Hills.' Based on the same real place.