Wee Bird

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A few mornings ago, I woke to hear rain pelting the outside world and little bird chirps. This is the story that burbled out from that moment.

Dawn crept toward Wee Bird’s lake and forest home. With a sturdy leg, and one weakened an age during an encounter with Bully Bird, he gripped a leafless tree branch. His feathers lifted and fluffed to the chill morning air. Clouds, as broodingly gray as Wee Bird’s mood, taunted him from high above. The lake’s surface woke, glazing with diminutive ripples. 

A raindrop, large and heavy, splattered on Wee Bird’s head. Sheesh, he peeped. Another, and then another. It figures, he groused. Wee Bird shuffled to his right. Logical, it seemed. Yet another, this a monstrous globule, nearly toppled him from his perch.

Wee Bird bent low, pulled his wings over his chest, and tucked his head low. Splat. A direct hit. This couldn’t last, he thought. Splat.

A chirp was emitted from high on Wee Bird’s left. The feathers above his eyes furrowed. He lifted his head, twisted his neck, and peered out from under his wing. Chirp. Then Wee Bird spied an old robin’s nest, one from last season. Bedraggled and mossy, now glistening wet in the low light, the nest clung to a fork in the branches above. Chirp.

Splat, another devilish mugging. Wee Bird pressed his wings back, lifted his head, and sidled to his left. His perch grew larger as he scuffled toward the nest. If nothing else, he would shelter under it, quit this onslaught from the heavens. Chirp.

By now, rain fell all around, the largest drops saved for him. He let go with a chain of bird curses. The tree, its lichen-coated limbs slick with the stuff sent from above to ruin yet another of his days, swayed on a breeze rising from the lake. The lake’s once delicate ripples doubled in size, then trebled. Platinum clouds churned low, pushed their might amongst the forest, blocking out the rest of Wee Bird’s world. Chirp.

Dreading it, he clawed with one foot, testing before releasing the grip of the other, and scaled toward the tree’s center and higher into its naked branches.

Gusts of sodden wind lifted his wing tips, ruffled his downy layers. Wee Bird trudged on. He neared the fork with the nest and eyed its surroundings, looking for shelter, a dry place to wait out nature’s offensive.

The worst of the winds now at his back, Wee Bird slogged onward. He clung with his talons, witnessing them rip through an outer layer of bark as the storm’s might tried its best to dislodge him. If not for that grip, if not for the sharpness of his talons, he would leave his forever-home and never see this place, his lake, ever again. Would that be so bad? he wondered.

The distance was closing, that old nest calling him on, taunting. Chirp.

With a cautious glance back and down, Wee Bird now saw long, frothy waves on the lake. A new blast of wind pushed his little head around, his eyes landing again on his goal. Grip, release, grip, release. Forward, he plodded. A new roar of wind barreled toward his tree. Aghast, Wee Bird watched as a long flight-feather, one he had preened since he was a baby chick, got ripped away by this explosive gale. Indignation gave way to anger, then fear. Chirp.

He took on a new stratagem. Hunker down when the beasts roared his way, hold with both sets of claws, then move on during the relative quiet between. This could work, he thought. Onward and upward. 

Closing in on his target and spotting a dry place in the notch just below the robin’s nest, Wee Bird now saw it the challenge ahead. Could he discover a workable tactic? Would it mean clinging like night-fliers, hanging upside down as he made his final approach. Upside down? How embarrassing, he thought.

Wishing he had more feet, at least one other set of beautiful talons, he eased around a large branch. Here, Wee Bird had a modicum of protection from the winds. But if he hoped to find security below the old nest, he had to progress in that humiliating night-flier fashion. He glanced around once, seeking other day-fliers. None. He made his move. Digging deep with his claws, he swung out and turned over, then trod forward, upward, toward sanctuary.

Rounding this branch, a raging gust caught his left wing, yanked hard, ripping the claws of his right foot from the slippery tree bark. 

Why not let go? he thought. Just give it up. Could it be as bad as his lonely life, a life ignored by his peers? A life tarnished by Bully Bird and his sidekicks? Could it be so bad? If this keeps up, he thought. If it keeps it up, then he would know exactly what to do.

Wee Bird curled into his remaining purchase, gathered himself, and regained a grip with the wayward foot. Another gust roared across the forest, bore down on him. But he, still hanging un-birdlike, hung shielded this time. 

When the worst had passed, Wee Bird made one last push, hoping to find the relatively dry perch he had seen before. It was close; he knew.

Directly below the nest now, Wee Bird waited for a quiet spell, then went for the nest with all the energy he had left. He came around the branch, found the fork, righted himself, and crouched into a notch roofed by the old nest. Rain dribbled from the nest’s perimeter. But Wee Bird was now out of the worst of nature’s blitzkrieg. He hunkered down, ruffled his feathers.

A chirp. This time very close by. 

Wee Bird’s head swiveled. And there she was. Her gray plumage was sleek and dry, her minute, greenish eyes gleaming with delight at his appearance. 

Wee Bird, mindful of the low headroom, eased downwards a skosh, stretched his frame tall, laid his feathers flat, turned, and smiled at her with his eyes. Chirp, she said. Chirp, he said.

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