Of a Feather

by Dayna Lorentz

  I fly up to my sleeping perch and give myself a bit of a groom. My feathers are more ruffled than normal, what with all the flying OUT IN THE WILD LIKE A REAL OWL.

  I can’t keep from hooting softly about it. What a day, WHAT A DAY!

  “You’re a half dud of a hatchling,” Red squawks. She’s giving me the Hawk Eye from her perch.

  “Shut your beak,” I hoot. “I am an owl who can hunt in the woods.”

  “So what are you doing back here?”

  I am on the brink of becoming completely fluffed. “I live here.”

  “No!” she screeches, flapping and footing her perch. “You live out there. You are a wild bird.”

  That’s it. Fluffed, I am. “OBVIOUSLY!”

  “So I ask again, what are you doing back in here?”

  My feathers are all out of sorts. I’m practically buzzing with all the hoots I’m holding in. “As I just chirped,” I say, beak clamped shut to keep from screeching uncontrollably, “I. Live. Here.”

  “You are most definitely a half dud.” Red flaps out of the opening and into another part of her nest.

  That’s it. “YOU BEAK-IN-YOUR-BUTT BIRD! I am absolutely sick of you calling me hatchling or half dud or anything! I am a great horned owl, and if anything, you should call me MISTER-OWL-SIR-PLEASE-DON’T-EAT-ME!”

  Red flits back onto the perch near the opening. “Oh, should I? Come and get me, HATCHLING.”

  I launch at the opening in the wall, hitting the long, straight branches that cover it and screeching and flapping and putting on quite a terrifying show. I swoop back to my perch. Red is no longer in the opening.

  That should shut her beak.

  She swoops back to where she’d been, completely unscathed, not a feather out of place. “Huh,” she tweets. “Not a very successful attack.”

  Every feather on my body fluffs out. “If those branches weren’t there,” I snap.

  “Exactly!” she screeches. “That’s the entire point. Those branches aren’t there out in the wild. There are no webs of branches. There’s just you and your talons and your wings and the world. And you came back here. You chose to close yourself inside this nest.”

  Ah, now I’m getting my foot around her point. Which forces me to listen to the tiny hoots inside, the ones that told me to come back to this place, the ones that whispered how the woods are full of dangers. The woods are hungry for young owls with no real hunting skills. The woods are cold and unforgiving and snap down like a claw when an owl least expects it. How much better to live in a safe, warm nest with nice furless creatures who give good rubbings and feed me all the mice I can swallow.

  And yet this nest is also a trap. This web is not one I can open with my own talons.

  “Why haven’t you left?” I hoot to Red after a while.

  Red turns away from me, runs her beak over a feather. “I can’t leave,” she chirps. “I’ve never lived in the wild. I was hatched in a nest like this one and taken from my mother as a chick. The only mother I’ve ever known is the one you call Gray Tail.” She turns back to me. “I tried once. I flew far on a hunt, soaring beyond her whistle. Spent a night out in the wild. It rained, and I got soaked on a branch. I flew under the eaves of a human nest and was attacked by a cat. It tore my wing feathers, taking a few primaries in its claws. I scrambled into the sky, flapping any which way to escape the pain. Then I was lost, and scared, and cold, and helpless. But my partner, Gray Tail, found me, crouched in a thicket of evergreens. She brought me back here. I’ve never tried to fly free again.

  “But you,” she screeches. “You’ve lived out there. Your parents showed you how to live in the wild. It may be easier to live in this nest, but it’s not the real life of a bird. I failed because I never had a chance. But you. You’re choosing to fail.

  “Don’t choose to be a dud like me.”

  She flaps up to her sleeping perch. I tuck a foot under my breast feathers and hunker down to think. Is living with the Brown Frizz choosing to fail? Is this life really a failure? And if I leave, will the Brown Frizz be all right?

  Of course the Brown Frizz will be fine. Furless creatures are not dependent on birds. Furless creatures help hurt birds . . . hurt animals of all kinds . . . help them and then set them free.

  Great Beak, was that what had the Brown Frizz all fluffed tonight? That I didn’t fly away? Was today not a test but the end of everything? Was I supposed to fly off?

  Wait—does that mean the furless creatures think I’m healed? I stretch my wings. There’s no pain, no tightness. I am healed. And I can hunt—I caught two voles, all on my own, out in the wild.

  I’m here because I’m afraid. But I have nothing to fear.

  I am a great horned owl.

  Master of the night forest.

  Don’t worry, Brown Frizz. I understand now. I’m sorry I misunderstood your grumbles. But you furless creatures are so confusing, what with all the very appealing nuzzling.

  I am ready, Brown Frizz.

  A coyote howls and its warning carries through the trees. Danger, it says.

  I scrunch down inside my feathers.

  Perhaps I am not yet quite completely and absolutely ready.

  Maybe tomorrow.

  Yes, tomorrow.

  Or the next day.

  25

  Reenie

  Sunday morning, I can barely eat my pancakes, even though Aunt Bea went all out and made the amazing ones with raspberries and buckwheat. Rufus is already hooting out in the yard, and every cell in my body wants to run out there and snuggle him and fly together. To have him soar to me and hit my fist, a part of me stretched far and brought near.

  But that’s for me. Those are things I need. And what I really have to do now is think about what Rufus needs. What’s best for him.

  “Did I make a bad batch?” Aunt Bea asks, sitting beside me with her plate.

  “No,” I say, shoving my forkful through the puddle of syrup.

  “Well, eat, then.” She shoves a big bite into her mouth. “We have work to do.”

  I force myself to eat.

  Aunt Bea takes breakfast out to Rufus and Red, while I stay inside to do dishes. She found a rat in a Havahart trap in the basement, and every inch of me wants to watch Rufus hunt it, but that’s rule number one going forward: no more human contact. As I scrub each dish, I wonder if he’s looking for me. I worry he’s sad I’m not there, cheering him on. And then I force myself to remember he’s a wild bird, and even if he does wish I was there, he needs to get over me. He needs to move on.

  Each time I tell myself this, I feel like I’m running my heart over a cheese grater.

  After the dishes are done, I throw on work clothes and head for the empty aviaries. Aunt Bea has opened the sides of two that stand near each other. Inside, she’s arranging sections of wall. She explains that they can be set together to make a larger flight pen.

  “There are preset holes in the grass,” she says, lifting a section.

  We work together in silence, our only accompaniment Red’s and Rufus’s screeching and twittering and the bang-bang-bang of Aunt Bea’s mallet as she pounds down the sections and fastens them together. It takes us until the sun is high over the trees to get the walls up.

  Aunt Bea wipes her forehead with her sleeve. “Next, we have to lay these sections across the roof and tie them down, but I need a break before lugging those up there.”

  Inside, over lemonade, Aunt Bea tells me her plans. “We’ll move him to the flight pen this evening,” she explains. “I’ll do the moving. You prepare the food for their dinner. I’m going to get some live rats in town for Rufus to hunt. He’s getting hungrier by the day. If we don’t get him rehabilitated, he’ll eat all the rodents for a mile in any direction!”

  “Can’t I release one rat?” I ask.

  “We have to break the bond he’s formed with you,” she says, and then, glancing at me, she softens her voice. “You have to help him find his own way.”

  I like that idea: that I�
��m still helping, only different helping. That my giving him the space to trust himself is a job.

  I nod, and she nods back, smiling.

  After lemonade, Aunt Bea and I get in the truck. We head to the pet store and pick out four rats. As we drive home, I peer into their box.

  “Don’t get friendly with the food,” Aunt Bea warns.

  I put the box between my feet, forgetting the shiny eyes, the twitching whiskers. “I won’t.”

  “Sometimes you have to make hard choices,” Aunt Bea says, negotiating the truck out of Rutland. “These rats didn’t start out this morning thinking they were dinner for a hungry owl. They have as much right to their lives as any creature. But now here they are, because I made a choice, not one I’m particularly happy about, but a choice that had to be made. We made a promise to that owl, and these rats are part of that promise.”

  “I know,” I say, not listening to the little squeaks coming from between my feet.

  When we get home, we find Jaxon and his dad parked in our driveway. Jaxon slides out of his seat as we pull in and park. Aunt Bea rolls the window down.

  “I recalled you mentioning needing to set up the flight pen,” says Warden Doucet, now not in his uniform but jeans and a T-shirt. “My son here thought you might like some help.”

  Aunt Bea nods. “We could use it.”

  I get out of the truck and hug the box of rats to my chest.

  Jaxon comes over to me. “Reenie, I . . . ”

  A part of me wants to scream at him. To throw the rats in his face and have them scratch him to ribbons.

  Then I notice his eyes are red and shiny with tears.

  “I was worried about . . . the owl, about Rufus.” He kicks a rock at his dad’s truck. “I didn’t mean to get your aunt in trouble.”

  I remember what Aunt Bea said, that it was how upset Jaxon was that made his dad decide not to cite her. That he really was worried about me and about Rufus. Maybe this is another part of being friends: Stopping a friend from doing something dangerous, even if they are set on it. Caring enough not to want them to get hurt. I guess Jaxon made a hard choice too.

  “It’s okay,” I say.

  “I’m sorry,” he says.

  I smile. “Want to help me find a place for Rufus’s dinner?” I hold out the box.

  He half smiles back. “Sure.”

  It takes the four of us all afternoon to fasten on the roof of the flight pen. Jaxon and his dad leave—their visitation ends at 5:00 p.m. Aunt Bea and I finish tying everything off around sunset and are just climbing down when Rufus starts screeching for dinner.

  “He’s going to love it,” I say, sitting on the grass and admiring our new construction. The flight pen is almost as long as the whole yard. Its walls are made of offset boards, which allow a little air through but don’t let the bird see outside the pen. Only the roof is open between the two aviaries at the ends, the plastic-coated wire mesh allowing the bird a clear view of the sky. Aunt Bea is setting perches at different places inside, and there are branches and ropes strung between the walls.

  “Hopefully, he won’t love it too much,” Aunt Bea says, coming out the door of the far aviary. “Hopefully, that view of the stars will make him hungry for freedom.”

  I sit in the kitchen, allegedly working on my hunting project—I posted my section this morning; Jamie added extensive comments—but actually squinting out into the darkness to catch a glimpse of Rufus moving into the aviary, of Aunt Bea releasing the rats.

  I’m having trouble with my new job: helping Rufus find his own way. I mean, there’s just so much we don’t know. What if he’s imprinted on humans? What if he tries to nest on someone’s porch and they hit him with a broom? What if . . . what if . . .

  When Aunt Bea comes inside, I’ve worried myself into knots.

  “What if it doesn’t work?” I ask her the second she’s in the door.

  Aunt Bea slides off her work boots. “He’s going to be fine.”

  “But why not keep him?” I ask, reminding her that this is an option. “That way he’s guaranteed to be safe.”

  Aunt Bea quirks her face like I’m blubbering gibberish. “That’s no life for an owl. An owl needs adventure, needs to stretch his wings. And what about having his own family? Shouldn’t he have a chance at that?”

  I nod my head, but everything in my body is screaming, No! “It’s too risky. I mean, what if he gets too friendly with people?”

  Aunt Bea nods. “It’s a risk,” she says. “But isn’t it a risk worth taking for the chance to live free?” She lays the remains of Rufus’s anklets and jesses on the pages of my book. Then she places a piece of paper with a phone number beside them. “Your mother called. The apartment is ready. She’s planning on moving in tomorrow.”

  It’s too much. Losing Rufus, and now this? The tears drop down and smear the ink.

  “Call her,” Aunt Bea says gently. “Take the risk. Tell her how you feel. I’ll be here when you’re done.” She squeezes my shoulder and places the phone next to the book.

  I stare at the paper. Calling isn’t the risk. Speaking is. To say what I want—what if it causes Mom to relapse? What if . . . what if . . .

  No. I have to do this. Look at Jamie and her parents—living apart in the same house. I don’t want that. I want what Jaxon has—I want honesty. I want to have a voice.

  Mom answers on the second ring. “Reenie? Hi!”

  “Mom?” My voice cracks and then it just rushes out of me. “I don’t want to live in Rutland.”

  “What?” Her tone changes. “Honey, this place is great. And you can go to your old school.”

  “I don’t want to go to my old school. I want to stay at Otter Creek.”

  I hear Mom breathing on the other end of the line. “Reens, I know it’s been hard this past month—”

  “But it hasn’t,” I interrupt. “Mom, I like it here. I have friends.”

  Mom is silent. Did I push too far? No—I had to say it. She has to know. I don’t want to keep hiding myself from her.

  “Please, Mom,” I say.

  “Okay,” she says.

  “Okay?” I echo, surprised.

  “Yes, okay,” she says. She’s not crying. She sounds . . . like a mom.

  “Really?” I ask.

  “Yes, really. I want this to be our home. I guess I should have checked with you before, but I got so excited, Randi’s been so nice—I want you to be as excited as I am about our home. We’re partners, right? The two musketeers?”

  Inside, this wire coiled around my heart loosens. I hadn’t even known it was there. “The two somethings,” I manage.

  “But two, together,” she says. “I’ll call Randi. We’ll start searching.”

  “Thank you,” I say. My smile shines through my words.

  “Don’t thank me yet. I have no idea if there’re any available apartments in that district.”

  “Thanks for trying,” I say.

  “I’ll try anything for you, Reens.”

  We chat for a little longer, and when we hang up, I say, “I love you,” and it’s different. It doesn’t feel like a burden, my loving her, but a gift.

  Aunt Bea and I eat dinner, Aunt Bea reading some magazine and me working on a math work sheet. After, we do the dishes and sit in the living room, reading, the silence interrupted every once in a while by a car rumbling past on the road. And then, as if telling me it’s time for bed, Rufus hoots his good-night greeting.

  Then far off, like an echo, only not, another owl answers.

  “Did you hear that?” I ask.

  Aunt Bea nods without looking up. “That’s what I’m talking about,” she says. “Rufus deserves to live with friends of his own kind.”

  We both sit, silent, waiting to hear if the two owls get their hoot on, but the night remains quiet. Another car rolls by. I decide to head to bed. But just as my eyes are closing, I swear I hear the owls hoot again, first Rufus, then the other.

  26

  Rufus

>   I cannot believe my ears. It’s First. She’s answering my hoots. She’s coming.

  Pellets!

  It’s not that I don’t appreciate a visit, but First, well—after our last hoot, I don’t think she’s going to be terribly understanding about my partnership with the Brown Frizz. Especially since I am currently ensnared under this web that is awfully exposed in the skyward direction and makes me look disturbingly like prey caught in a trap. Further, given the obscene amount of rat I’ve just swallowed, any activity beyond perching in the corner and trying not to burst seems ill-advised. Battle, even in defense of my life, appears impossible.

  “Second!” First screeches, closer now.

  “Red!” I hoot. “I feel I should warn you that my sister is coming and she’s possibly going to attempt to eat me. Any advice is appreciated.”

  Red doesn’t answer. She’s been quiet ever since our last chat about going wild.

  “Seriously!” I call. “Check the walls on your nest. I can’t guarantee she won’t attack you as well.”

  Red is silent. Her heartbeat is slow and quiet.

  Before I can hoot again, something crashes onto the roof of my new nest.

  “Second!” booms First, stomping along the stiff web covering the wide-open part of my nest. “What kind of vine is this? I can’t rip it open. You live under here? This is no place for an owl!”

  “Go away!” I hoot from under the roof of the north end of my nest. “You can’t eat me in here.”

  “Eat you?” First flaps up and lands above me with a bang. “Why would I eat you? Great Beak, you’re not still fluffed about my dropping you in the nest beak-first last time? You seemed to have survived . . . well, lived. Get over it.

  “I’m here about Mother.”

  My gizzard goes cold. “Mother?” I swoop down to a stump situated under the web.

  First stays on her new perch on the roof and looks down at me. “Great Beak, you’re just like her.” Her ear tufts lift straight up. “You’re trapped under there, aren’t you? Did you get trapped? Why bother even hooting back—of course you got trapped.”