Shibboleth

Carefully, neatly, with all the weight of his penmanship Domnick wrote: lightness. He lay the page out on the sunburned concrete, minutely aware of the heat that burned away at his fingertips. Tilting his head on one side he makes a diagonal fold at the top with surgical precision, licking his lips in concentration. He repeats the step on the opposite side and folds the page in half. Gingerly, Domnick folds back the wings. In his imagination he hears the tortured cry of paper as he bends it to his will, followed by dazzled awe as it realizes it has wings.

Domnick holds his newly forged origami airplane lightly between two fingertips and stands tiptoe on iron piping, fighting to keep his balance. He raises his wings to the sky waiting for the wind to pick up. Soon enough, it whips his hair to a frenzy and he lets go of the plane, an offering to his gods. Of words. Of wind. Of sweat.

The wind carries his sacrifice far from the fourteenth floor rooftop.

Through the slats Angel watched as the yellow lined paper took flight, off to the heart of the city. She wondered at his private Shibboleth, this act that identifies the rest of the world as outsiders to him.