Excerpt: Canary Days

I put my ear to my mother’s chest as she was singing.
“Was there and echo?” she asked when she had finished. Her voice was small after the song.
“No,” I said.
“It feels like there should be,” she said. “It feels like a cave. Oooh, ooooooooooh…”
I thought that I could hear it this time, like the wind blowing through a tunnel. I closed my eyes and heard drip-dripping water. But it was only her heart beating. “It’s still working,” I said.
“I can hardly believe it,” she said. “It’s good to know it goes on, however it does it…”
I curled up beside her on the sofa and fell asleep. It was easier to sleep than to cook dinner, and I was hungry, and she would not be ready to get up for another hour or two. Also, it was comfortable to feel that she was warm and breathing. The canary started singing, he always did when anyone else sang, no matter how or why, and always the same song.