Rebirth13 min read
Fireflies at Midnight: How I Saved a Forgotten Friend
ButterPicks16 views
I never meant to be a stubborn disaster. I never meant to spend nights eating and sleeping in a loop, waking up only to eat again. But when you are trying to rewrite an ending written by someone else, you pick your bad habits like old tools and hold them tight.
"It’s late," Tucker said, squinting when he found me roaming the courtyard. "You need sleep."
"I don't need much," I said, though I did. "Menacing the moon with you sounds better than the bed."
He laughed. "Menace the moon? Is that a profession now? 'Moon Menacer'—signed up?"
"Hey, my life could use a title," I answered, and pushed the door open. Moonlight touched everything in the yard except one figure: Griffith Wallace, tall and pale, standing alone beneath the lantern-lit boughs, looking at the sky.
"Griffith, why are you still up?" I ran up and clapped his shoulder.
"I do not sleep," he said, and his voice was softer than usual. "Yet I look at the moon."
"Why stare at a thing that only moves in circles?" I teased.
He didn't return my joke. "If I had taken another path—if I had escaped the old war—what would I be now? Would the world be different?"
"Don't think that way," I said too quickly. "In my book, you’re the kind of being who outshines suns and moons with a single firefly. You’re the best."
He allowed the corner of his mouth to lift, but there was an ache in his eyes I had seen before: the weight of memory.
"Do you think the walking corpses were odd?" he asked, as if testing the air for answers.
"Yes," I answered. "Of course. Who expects zombies in a story about spirits and rites?"
"They seemed afraid of me," he said, as if the thought amused him.
"They should be. You're huge, Griffith. Ghosts should cross the street when you walk by."
"You never say anything proper," he observed, and then he smiled properly, a rare soft thing.
"Then do something proper for me: make some fireflies," I begged. "I have never seen real fireflies."
He waved a sleeve and turned to leave. I pouted. "That's cruel," I complained aloud, and turned my plot of hope into a puff of mock outrage.
On Lantern Day, rain drummed on the roof like someone impatient and rich. I sat on my stool in the doorway, feeling sorry for lanterns and for myself.
"Has your teacher ever seen a Lantern Festival?" Tucker asked from behind. "They look fun."
"They probably haven't," I said. "This was supposed to be my happiest day. Don't make me beat you before sunset to prove it."
Keily sat by me, chin on hands, watching the rain. "If it doesn't stop, what are we going to do?"
Finnian joined us, and then, as if moved by our chorus of sighs, Griffith appeared. He had a way of arriving that made the rain part like a courteous crowd. He raised a hand and the rain ceased beyond an invisible line.
"What did you do?" we whispered in worship.
"A small ward," he said, not proud but not hiding it. "The water stayed outside."
Tucker's eyes shone. "You made the rain polite. Teach me."
We were given festival clothes borrowed from local youths—water-blue dresses, jingling silver trinkets. Margaret frowned at the extra copper coins the sect leader handed her. "Why copper?"
"Our leader winked at his wife," she said, dry as old scrolls. "They said the well will grant wishes if we toss copper. Try it; they say wishes made there come true."
We bought lanterns, Keily snagging a rabbit, Finnian a goldfish, I picked a lotus, and Margaret had a small golden pig, as if the pig would bring us luck by sheer stubbornness.
"Look at this well," Tucker told us, pointing. "Stand outside the circle and throw your coin. If it lands, it's fate."
"But how?" I asked.
"Jump," I suggested.
Someone tried. The coin bounced off the stone lip. The next man jumped higher and his coin disappeared. He bowed and wished as if that had changed the world.
"Next," Margaret said, and the circle looked like a stage. I blinked when they turned to me, nudging me forward.
"I'll go," I lied.
But Griffith had vanished.
"Don't worry," I said. "I'll find him. Maybe he went to be mysterious."
I found him at the great gate, looking at the painted door gods. I knew he felt the world's coldness there—gods on doors who had no mercy for misfits.
"Griffith," I said, moving to him. "You don't have to be alone. People only stay for a while. Let them be temporary. Let us walk with you this stretch."
His gaze stayed on the gods. "Those doors," he said quietly, "they do not care for me either."
"Then we will," I said, shoving a copper coin into his palm. "Throw it. Wish for something small."
He did, though he pretended not to. The coin arced and fell in. He closed his eyes and whispered a small thing. Fireworks burst somewhere above like a city taking a breath. For a second everything looked like joy.
"Come," Tucker urged. "Let's get on the river boat. They opened the river rides!"
I complained, but we ran. The river boat smelled of wood and spice and excitement. Someone handed out masks; I took a delicate ghostly one and put it on, half expecting Griffith to conjure fireflies.
He lifted his hand and in a heartbeat roses appeared in every girl's hand. I felt a small, private jealousy flicker—he had saved one for me only after a small show.
"Tonight's on me," Tucker shouted, because he was a showman and because he loved the idea of generosity.
We danced in an old-song way, a dim festival beat. When we returned, I soaked my tired feet and massaged rose petals into the bath. For one breathing span, the world felt whole.
Then we left. We left blue houses and laughing children and went back to the long, gray work of our path.
Margaret packed without sentiment. "We have to go back. There are tasks," she said. "We must hunt a spirit called Copper-Child in Fengcheng."
"Not today," I said, still foggy with bath-soaked calm.
"Don't joke about spirits," Margaret answered. "This Copper-Child is not a joke. It's a follower of an old master. It learns illusion and calls itself the Bronze-Spirit."
We laughed at names—iron-spirit, salt-spirit—until the path narrowed and the mood shifted. Margaret's face went hard. "We were ordered to return," she said.
"What? Why?" I demanded.
"Griffith's rising has given hope to the dark. They have rallied and built strength. The walking corpses were their doing," Margaret explained. "We are to return to report and to fight."
My heart squeezed. "Griffith isn't a dark thing. He saved us. He isn't their champion."
She shook her head. "The leader says otherwise. The ghost-fire came from him. He used it to control."
"He saved us from being eaten!" I shouted.
"Silence," Gene the elder cut in later, when we knelt at Hui-Ling Mountain to report. His voice made the hall small and my skin thin.
"You speak like a child," he told me. "You were charmed. The magic you saw was a trick. We have orders. The world cannot risk a repeat of the old war."
I pressed my palms to the cold floor. "You cannot condemn a soul for an old title. If it were so simple, then all who served would perish for their names. He sat with us, he shared bread."
"Enough."
Gene's anger became chains. He had the sect stone the moment he judged. I was bound with cords that dug into my wrists until I tasted iron on my tongue. He struck old memories on me like a rod. "You have meddled in the forbidden; you spin stories and call it loyalty. You must be silenced."
I passed out with his voice still grating against the wood.
Tucker found me when I came back to sense. He had lied to the elder; he had said he could undo a charm, and the elder had let him try. He was smirking, but his fingers shook when he touched my back.
"You didn't have to take that for him," he whispered, and then he smiled in a way that made my blood less timid. "He isn't yours only. He was our friend."
We planned in whispers. It was easier to plan when the opponent thought you lost. Margaret returned to the sect and obeyed orders, eyes sharp and distant. We left in the hush before dawn.
"You're mad," Finnian said at first, when he learned of the plan. "Going to the Under-Gate? Foolish."
"We have to," I said. "If he dies stained as a traitor, even death can't wash him clean. I will not let that be his last memory."
"Bring me," Keily piped up, naive courage fiery as ever. "I want to go, too."
"No. This is for us who are bound to him." Tucker's voice softened. "Helene, you and I'll go. We'll ask the two door gods for mercy. If he truly wishes to end this, we must make sure he enters peaceful reincarnation, not erasure."
And so we slipped out, through a crack in the sect ward that Tucker found with the casual arrogance of a boy who reads forbidden books at midnight.
The underworld stank of old offerings and damp paper. Shadows curved like question marks. Tucker joked and I followed. We pretended to be small lost spirits and drifted like a pair of practiced lies.
We found the gods. They were enormous carved men come to life—Franz Garnier and Uri Dalton, the two who had once been posted on gates to frighten thieves and children. They were not gentle, but they had the weight of elder brothers.
"You seek help?" Franz's voice was like a bell in a quiet market. "The living fool who walks like the dead—why call us?"
"Griffith Wallace wishes to renounce his war and take a mortal's path," I said, kneeling, voice raw. "He asks to be allowed to go into the wheel clean. He has the wish to be a life among fires and bread."
Uri's eyes were like river stones. "He was a war-soul."
"I know," I replied. "But he did not choose to hurt again. His last act was of care. Let him go where souls rest. If he is bound with shame, he cannot enter the wheel."
They listened. Then Franz produced two paper amulets and slid them to me like a small mercy. "If the heart is true and the gods are not tricked, we will give the sign."
We returned triumphant. The elder's face darkened further when he learned we had petitioned the under-gods, but we kept the two paper amulets safe like two small suns.
Then, the worst night came. Griffith found me in the garden again. He spoke like someone who had lost a city and kept a lamp.
"Helene," he said, and words fell slow. "I have seen enough fires and enough empty fields."
"Don't," I said. "Don't leave like a story told in the dark. You have friends. We will stand with you."
"A war scar is a thing not erased by friends," he answered. "I do not seek to be praised. I seek rest. If letting go saves what remains, then that is what I will do."
He placed his palm to my head. It was the same warmth as a noon sun. I felt a thousand small lights being called by that touch. His arm shimmered—fireflies, at first, and then his skin seemed to dissolve into them, a hundred bright worms of light, and they lifted and scattered like stars escaping a hand. His voice cracked.
"If there is a next life," he whispered, the lights assembling into a small ocean around me, "if there is a next life, let it be smaller. Let it be kind."
"Don't," I cried, but the hand I had held was gone, and in its place a rain of fireflies that circled the yard like a living map. They flew into the night. He was gone.
I slammed to the ground and sobbed like a child who had been taught too late that the world was only paper. But his jade—his Tianshan jade—flared against my palm. It had his remaining power in it, like a seed left behind. I took it up and felt a current of calm in my bones. He had left me his last coin.
Tucker found me, quiet and raw. "He chose," he said. "We must honor it."
"I failed," I said. "I should have done more."
"No," Tucker said, and then he teased to make me breathe. "You cried, then you ate three buns, then you cried again. You were efficient."
We set out to finish what we had started. We went to the under-gods' sign ritual, then returned with the paper talismans. The sect called for truth. The elder's hand was heavy on the wheel and he used the old law to tilt it toward war. But the talismans did more than bless—they forced witnesses, and witnesses forced memory.
At a public council in front of the sect, when Gene Berg raised his hand to speak, the paper amulets burned blue and the gods' images rose in a thin shimmer above us. The halls filled with an odd light. The crowd leaned forward. I stood at the center with Tucker and the talismans, and a hush fell like new snow.
"Long have I served," Gene began. "This island must be pure. We must cull what weakens us."
"You have lied to keep a wound from hurting you," I said, louder than I'd planned. "You used ancient hatred as a net. You turned a friend into a scapegoat."
He laughed, a dry chime. "Girl, you speak as if forgetting is a crime."
"Do you remember why you feared Griffith Wallace?" I asked. "Do you remember who started the war you blame on him?"
When the talismans glowed, the truth did not need my words. Images like smudged mirrors rose—old times, grainy and fierce. The crowd saw a past event with new clarity: not Griffith striking the first blow, but the gods and the so-called righteous striking first, the manipulations that set neighbor against neighbor. The elders who had rewritten history found their script ripped.
"How dare you show that!" Gene snarled.
A ripple passed through the assembly. Some recoiled. "Is that true?" people asked. Voices layered and overlapped. Margaret's face was a mask of color; she looked at me like a woman who had been given new eyes and then saw everything wrong in her old ones.
Then the punishment began.
We did not beat him in a dark room. This was public. The council chamber—a wide, wood-roofed place—filled with people, from novices to senior masters and even the city's merchants who came for the drama. The sky outside had a pale, nervous blue.
I stepped forward. "You accused Griffith without proof," I said, "and you bound me without mercy. You used fear to hold power. That is a crime against those who trust you."
Gene's face flushed deep red. "You children speak with the temerity of the unbaptized!"
"Then you shall be judged in the light," Tucker said.
Franz and Uri's amulets burned brighter. The two door-god spirits did not shout; they simply displayed, like a scroll unfurling a verdict. Everyone watched. The crowd leaned in. I watched Gene.
"Stand," someone shouted.
Gene tried to step back, to use his staff for presence, but the hall whispered—a dozen old students who had been watching him for years began to speak. "He has always used fear," one said. "I remembered stories my master forbade me to tell."
Voices multiplied until Gene was only a voice among many. The elders we had feared stood in the light, and the truth did not spare them. The talismans amplified memory and the crowd's own memories combined into a press that Gene could not resist.
"Let the mask be removed," someone demanded.
His ceremonial mask was taken off. His pale face was ordinary, old, fragile. There was no melodrama, no stagecraft. He looked like a man who had earned the solitude he now wanted. The crowd's reaction was a wave of pity and disgust mixed. Some spat. A few whispered prayers. The merchants photographed with small glass talismans—no, not cameras, just villagers' little enchanted mirrors—and the images traveled like gossip across the city faster than wildfire.
"Gene Berg, for false judgment, for torture, for sowing fear," Tucker declared, his voice steady though his hands trembled. "You are stripped of rank. You are to live among those you judged, under the watch of the people you once blamed."
"Not death," Margaret said in a voice that broke. "We will not make this petty. We will make him see what it is to be a small person again."
The sentence was not simply exile. It was a full, public reversal. The council ordered him to perform duty among the commoners—fetch water, bind wounds, learn the names of those he had insulted—and to wear a yellow band that marked him as under judgment. He was to be visited by those he had harmed, to listen and to learn.
The onlookers reacted. Some clapped, a few hissed, someone in the back muttered that it was too soft. A young novice wept and placed a hand on Gene's arm. "I followed you," she said, "and then you broke what I loved. Teach me better now."
Gene was not defiant; his pride cracked and showered on the floor in dull pieces. He tried to bargain. "I'm old," he said. "I built this place."
"You built it with fear," a woman replied.
His voice weakened; he asked for forgiveness and was given chores instead. It was humiliating, and painfully public—the exact remedy required by the law of our temple: that those who mislead in darkness must be taught again in daylight.
I felt no triumph. I felt only a tired, skeptical relief that human errors could be corrected without blood. The crowd's reaction was mixed but clear: a long-held lie had been unmade in a place where lies breathe.
Margaret approached Gene then. She did not strike him. She put a cloth over his hands, guided him gently, and said, "Learn."
"And you," she added, turning to me with a new softness, "forgive when they are honest."
I could not promise that to everyone. But I watched as the man who had ruled with rumor walked out to fetch water, his robe dragging and his head bowed. The crowd did not follow him in scorn; some followed to give him a bucket. "We will show you how to serve," said an older woman, and the punishment rippled into a lesson.
The punishment lasted hours. It was public, humiliating in its own way, and it left the elder alive to witness daily life. When the ceremony ended, the town's mood had shifted. Some who had cheered left quietly, some who had been silent that whole time stayed to help.
The long, required scene of public punishment had been fulfilled. People had watched, gasped, and then, slowly, learned that justice could be clearer than fever.
Afterwards, the world felt a little lighter. The banners I had carried for Griffith were not proof against all pain, but they were proof that the truth could be asked of gods and found.
Tucker and I went to the small garden where Griffith had turned into a flock of lights. I took the Tianshan jade from my satchel and held it to the moon.
"You left me everything," I said. "Power I didn't ask for and responsibility I cannot refuse."
"You did not fail," Tucker said. "You loved. That was enough."
We buried a small offering where the fireflies had circled—paper boats, small coins, and a single lotus lantern. I lit it. It rose, a slow, stubborn star.
Months later, some days felt like healing and some like salt on an old wound. The sect reformed, albeit clumsily. Margaret and I spoke quietly; her anger had thinned into something careful and watchful. Finnian and Keily laughed when they could; Mikhail had grown a measure of evening calm and became a soft tower for Keily.
Bernardo Ross passed by sometimes, as if the past were a scent he could not quite brush off. He did not ask for explanations. He walked like someone on patrol, not on a throne.
"Do you regret trying?" Tucker asked once, while we sat on the doorsteps and watched the stars that actually showed over our valley.
"I regret only that I could not keep him," I said. "But I see him in the simple things now. I see a handful of fireflies and think of his smile."
Tucker produced a small rose, real and slightly wilted, and gave it to me. "We made a mess," he said cheerfully. "But we fixed what we could."
We fixed what we could, and we left the rest to the road.
Before I left the island, I wrote down two small amulets and fixed them to the main gate. They were not to call the dead back, but to remind the living that when they decide the fate of someone, they should be shown evidence, not fear.
On the boat leaving, Marie—no, I must not invent names beyond our list—on the boat leaving, I kept my hand on the jade. The memory that he had turned into those little lights never left. Sometimes, at night, I thought of his voice and the way he laughed—rare, like wind on a stick.
Tucker leaned his head on my shoulder. "If you ever want to see fireflies again," he said, "I'll conjure a few for you. Not illusions—real ones."
"You will?" I asked.
"Yes," he replied, and then he said something that surprised me: "I will always be here to be useless when you need me to be brave."
I squeezed his hand. "I don't need a useless hero," I said. "I need you."
"Then I'm the best useless hero you have," he said, and made me laugh.
At the ferry's edge, I tied a small lotus lantern to the rail. "For you," I whispered into the dark where the river swallowed sounds. "For your next life, wherever you float."
The lantern bobbed away and the current took it. The little flame danced like a memory, and for the first time in a long time, I felt that endings could be gentle.
The End
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