This is an excerpt from ECHOES OF A WILD GIRL’S DRUM which will be released July 2026. It is also an answer from Soryelle to Maikel’s letter. Material is copyrighted.

 I took something from you.

It was a long time ago, back when I “spied” on you. You were practicing on the log but instead of using a spear, you balanced two small stones on your hands, on your knuckles. As you walked the log, you practiced rolling the stone from one knuckle to the other. At first, I didn’t understand what the point was, but then you got frustrated when either you or the stone kept falling. You couldn’t walk the log and balance the stone.

 Not at first.

But you’ve never given up on anything.

You practiced the log—with the spear and with the stones—until you mastered it. When you found me, you said you searched for me for years. When I was nervous and scared of going into the market, you wouldn’t give up. You asked, teased, coaxed and kissed your way to a yes because you knew I wanted to go. You knew I wanted to feel what it was like to be a real person.

Anyway, you didn’t give up and, when you mastered walking and balancing, you palmed one stone and dropped the other. It landed in the dirt beside the log and, as soon as you were out of sight, I ran for it. The stone was oval shaped, but it wasn’t completely smooth. The top edge of it was dented a little.

I used it every day.

When I would go to the log, it was the stone I put between my own knuckles. It was much too large for my hand, which made balancing it easy. Sometimes I pretended you did that on purpose: dropped the larger of the two stones as a gift for me. Whether you did or not, I don’t know but, until then, there weren’t fairy beds or huts. They didn’t prop up against the trunks of trees to act as doorways into perfect hiding spaces.

I pretended the dent in the stone was the door opening and I placed that stone against the trunk of a large fig tree in a very specific spot. One my eyes could find when the world was too scary and I needed to hide but couldn’t move. All I had to do was find your stone and walk through the door into the trees. It was your stone, but I took it and then I started gathering lots of stones and we—you, me and Salu—built whole fairy villages.

It was something wonderful you gave.

You asked me to hear you—wherever you are, Soryelle, hear me.

I heard you.

 Words. I’ve heard them all my life. Words like filthy, monster, bile. Words are like smoke. Some choke. Some vanish before they touch you. You said, “Why didn’t I just tell her she was beautiful?” and I was confused. I didn’t understand because you made sure, you made very, very sure, I knew what you saw. Maikel, your kiss wasn’t just made of tamarind; it was made of magic.

 Once, I stood at the waterfall and caught my reflection. The girl I saw looking back at me… she was clean, and I did not recognize her. Wasn’t I dirty? Didn’t I own shame? Wasn’t my very blood poisoned? Not when you held me. When you held me, there was a warmth, a… oh, I don’t know… a truth that made me feel something more than beautiful. You made me feel seen. You told me I tasted like sugarcane, Maikel. What is beautiful if it’s not sweet?

And you talked about that one moment when, after our night in the grass, you caught me rubbing my wrists. Wrists you held. No one has ever held me. Not like that. Not with his whole heart. Maybe you don’t remember, but I remember every word you said that night and one of them was, “Closer.”

You wanted closer to me.

To me.

You have seen every mark on my body. You never even asked me what happened to my lip. You never said, Why is your lip crooked like that?  And when you saw the marks, you still wanted closer.

Are you listening to me?

Who looks at someone whose body is torn and broken and then says, I want all of you or come closer to me?  

People have tried to put so much distance between themselves and me—my whole life. Everyone except you. Every time you said, “Come ‘mere,” you said beautiful. Every time you chuckled, shook your head and said in that teasing voice of yours, “Your eyes…”, you said beautiful.

And then—on that last day.

I didn’t see you running toward me but I heard you screaming my name. When you knocked me to the ground and dropped your entire body on top of mine, it meant the flames ate your flesh, too. Even then, even when you were looking at a woman whose skin peeled and who probably didn’t even look like a person, you pulled me into your arms and held me so close I felt seen.

I could hear your heartbeat, Maikel.

What is beautiful if it’s not being that close to you?

I heard you. Loud and clear. Every day you were with me.

You asked, what is love?

My mother loved me, yes. She told me to close my eyes while she burned, so that the image I carried of her wouldn’t be of her on fire. She wanted to protect me from that.

You covered me with your entire body to stop the flames. Your hands, your chest, your skin took burns that were meant for me.

And then, when the fire was out, you held me. And you did something else. You whispered, tap boom tap; tap boom boom tap. The beat that no one else knew; the beat we made up in the glade; the beat that says, you are not alone because I am here.

Ruvan offered to have people bury me so that you didn’t have to. He offered to have the women of the village wash me. And you said, No. And then you stood up and you carried me into Kavaru. You washed the burns away and then you dug a hole that’s too large for me because you didn’t want anything confining my movement again.

What is all of that if not protection?

And what is protection if not love?

You said, I adore you, Soryelle and then, when I was gone, you screamed I love you and you screamed it because you wanted to make sure that, wherever I was, I could hear you.

I heard you. Loud and clear. Every day you were with me.

You don’t think you can do life without me.

And I ache to touch your face again.

I’m back to doing what I did when we were little and you thought I was dead: I’m spying on you. Every day. All day. I see the white button from my dress and how you’ve not let it leave your palm. I’m the only one who knows which tree your stone lies against and so I have your stone. I’m talking in circles, jumping from one thing to the next, just like Salu, but you said spirals lead us home.

You are my home.

Listen to me.

In the middle of the night, I’ve seen you when you sit up gasping for breath, beating your chest with the button closed in your fist to keep from screaming. I know what that is. I recognize it. I used to do the same thing. And I can’t take those bad dreams away; I can’t wrap my arms around your neck like you asked me to. But I am closer than you think. 

tap boom tap; tap boom boom tap.