Birdy

by William Wharton

  When I come home, they seem all right and I give them another feeding. I’m sure somebody is feeding them. The fathers can’t remember all the birds, and one of them is father to these birds anyway.

  That night in the dream, I’m afraid for what will happen, but everything goes all right. Perta’s nest is fine and there’s no sign of a cat. The nest we have is too high up in the tree for a cat to see. I talk to Perta and try to tell her about the danger of cats, but she’s never seen one and can’t know what I mean. I almost want to move our nest back into the cage. I wonder what would happen if I climbed up into the tree in the daytime as boy and moved the nest. Would Perta abandon it in the dream? Would it stay in the same place? It’s too big a risk. I feel confident that if I’m careful nothing will happen. The dream doesn’t have everything happen that happens in the day. The nest of the little yellow bird isn’t even in my dream.

  It’s a week later and I’m feeling it’s all going to pass over, when, in the dream, I see the same cat climbing our tree. I’m perched just above and behind our nest where Perta is sitting. That day our babies have started standing on the edge of the nest. It’s what had to come about. The babies were too young before; now they’re old enough. It can happen.

  Perta still hasn’t seen the cat. Our first nest of babies for this year, all four of them, are off flying with their older brothers down where we used to have the pigeon coop in the tree. There’s nothing I can think to do. I wait and watch the cat. I see him very clearly. He has one ear partly torn off, a ragged dogear of a cat’s ear. I can see all the details of this cat. I didn’t know I’d seen him so well. I was so busy thinking and doing things I didn’t notice myself seeing the cat.

  What I must do is break the dream. I have to wake up. I need to become Birdy the boy and somehow work it out with this cat in daytime life. I can’t. I can’t make myself move out of the dream. I’m on the wrong side of the door; the key is in the other side. It’s like when you wake up and you’re not sure you can move your body and you’re afraid to try. I can’t make myself try. The bird in me is too strong. The bird doesn’t know it can make it all stop by going away. The bird is too afraid of the cat to get any distance. The bird has to stay and protect Perta and the babies. It won’t believe the other thing, the other existence. Yet the boy knows a canary cannot fight a cat.

  I give in. I wait and watch as the cat scratches his way up the tree. Everything of my body wants to fly away. My bird-boy brain has to stay. I try to think out how the dream will happen. Must Perta be killed? If she sees the cat, will she fly at him or fly away?

  I hop down to the nest.

  ‘Look, Perta, why don’t you take a little fly for yourself. I’ll sit the nest.’

  Perta looks at me. She’s tired but she doesn’t want to leave. She senses my fear; it’s impossible to lie to her. I’m thinking maybe if she’s out of the dream I can wake up. I say again that I want her to take a rest; I want a chance to be with the young ones alone.

  Perta knows something is peculiar, but she eases herself off the nest. The young ones are disturbed and make feed-me noises. I get on the nest and they settle down.

  ‘Go on, Perta. Take a fly. The young ones are in the woods. Go see what they’re doing. They’re flying around by the ruined house in the tree. You know where that is. It’ll do you good.’

  Perta looks at me once more, then flies off. She doesn’t see the cat. She isn’t looking for it. The cat is pressed against the trunk of the tree. He’s already half way up. I’m sure he heard the babies peeping, but that doesn’t matter now. At least Perta is away. Now if I can only control the dream; stop it from happening. I try once more to concentrate, stop the dream, but I’m still too much inside it. I tell all the babies to stay down deep in the nest. It’s a hot day; the nest is tight and smelly. They don’t want to. It’s almost time for them to fly out; they want to sit or stand on the edge of the nest, stretch their wings. I make them stay down.

  Now, I leave the nest myself. I fly to a higher part of the tree. The cat doesn’t see me. He’s concentrating in that maniac cat way on the nest. He’s already tasting the feathers and blood.

  My only chance is to scare him somehow or hurt him. I think of getting my father to help me but my father is never in the dream. I think of trying to get myself to help. I can see me in the aviary across the yard, but that’s impossible too. I never pay any attention to myself as bird. I must do it alone. The only chance is to hurt the cat. I must somehow get to his eyes by diving down directly from above without making noise.

  The cat has climbed higher into the tree: I fly out and hover in the air. I’m afraid. The bird in me is panicked by the cat. I think if I fly into my bedroom to a place I haven’t been as a bird, a place where I am as boy, that the dream might end. I know there isn’t enough time for that.

  I start my dive. I dive between the branches and come fast down onto the cat’s head. I drive my beak straight toward his eye. The eye, yellow-green, black-slitted, concentrated on my babies. Then, I’m falling, my wings won’t work; I have no breath; I hurt. The cat has swept me out of the air with a quick stroke of his paw. I hit the ground and cannot move. My eyes are open, but I’m paralyzed. I’m lying on my side and looking up into the tree. I close my eyes again and try to make the dream stop. I open my eyes; I’m still there on the ground. The cat is looking down at me from the tree. Now he’s distracted from the nest.

  I struggle to get my legs under me but nothing moves. The cat is turning his head over his shoulder and back down the tree. He scrambles and slips, then jumps the final few feet from the tree to the ground. I’m still there. The cat stands still watching me. I don’t move; I can’t. The cat is crouched ready to pounce. I look into his eyes, I try to make him see the boy in me, not just the bird. The slits in his eyes are opening and closing. His eyes are crossed in concentration. He is rocking his head slowly back and forth in anticipation. I try to hold him, stop him with my eyes. I try again to break the dream. I feel I can do it if I close my eyes. I know if I close my eyes the cat will pounce. I close my eyes and then, as before the dream ends, I hear a sound and the cat screams.

  I wake in bed shaking and sweating. My heart is pounding. I can scarcely walk to the bathroom for a drink of water. One side of my body is numb and sore. I look in the mirror but there’s nothing, no redness, no cut. I’m pale and my hair is matted with sweat.

  I go back to my bedroom and get out another pair of pajamas. I hang the first pair over the radiator to dry. I’m so sore I can hardly get them on. I fall back into bed and stare at the ceiling. I don’t know if I should go to sleep again. I’m tired but I’m afraid of the dream. Is it still possible to sleep without dreaming? If I dream again, what will be happening? I make my mind go over what’s happening in the dream; try to make it come out right.

  The cat was screaming. Why? Was it just the scream before he pounced on me and began ripping me to pieces? If I go into the dream, will I be dead? If I’m dead in the dream, will the dream be ended? If I’m dead in the dream, will I die as a boy?

  I feel I’m almost dead lying in bed. I know I could die very easily. It’s only a matter of not trying. I can’t stop myself and I go to sleep.

  I come into the dream with my eyes closed. I’m still there, not dead. I open my eyes and the cat is leaping and jumping in a circle. He’s screaming and there’s blood. One eye is closed and leaking fluid. The cat runs off with a final yowling scream. I look, and on the ground beside me is Perta!

  – Jesus! Now Birdy’s crying. What the hell can be the matter? What’s he crying about? Maybe everything. If he can cry, let him. It’s not so easy to do even when you want to.

  I close my eyes again. I want to end the dream. I must end it. The babies are alone; Perta is dead. I know she is dead not only from the way she is lying but because it is still my dream. I close my eyes and concentrate on ending the dream. Finally, it slides from under me, the dream stops and I stay asleep. I know that sleeping without dreaming is bei
ng dead.

  When I awake in the morning I can’t move. I’m surprised to find myself alive. I don’t want to cry out, I don’t want to move. My mind has lost control of my body. I feel totally separate. I watch as my mother comes in, talks to me, gets mad, then looks at me, shouts at me, and runs out of the room. I feel in another place.

  I’m watching all the things as if I’m watching the birds through binoculars. I watch the doctor. I watch them taking me to the hospital. I open or close my eyes according to how much I want to see. I feel that I’ll never sleep again, never dream again, never move again. I don’t care too much. All I can do is watch; I’m enjoying watching. They lift my legs in the air. They lift my arms. They ask me questions. I don’t answer. I don’t want to answer. I’m not sure I can answer. Even my voice isn’t mine anymore. I’m between me and something else. Then I do sleep. It is the same kind of dead sleep.

  It’s as if there is no tie between before I go into that sleep and when I wake up. I wake up in the hospital. I’m hungry. I eat and I can move. I’m back with people. Perhaps the dream is gone forever. I don’t know how I feel about this. I’m like a small child; all there is, is me, feeding me, looking at things around, smelling things, tasting things, hearing things. I move my hand and watch it. It is all new.

  Three days later, they take me out of the hospital and I go home. I stay another week in my bed just enjoying being me. My father says he’s taking care of the birds. He tells me how many new birds he’s put into the breeding cages and what nests have been laid with how many eggs. I don’t care. All that is finished. I’m frightened; I don’t want to go back. He asks me what I’m going to do about the free-flying birds. He wants to lock them in the cage. He says he’s counted at least fifteen young males singing in the trees and there’re probably twice that many. That’s more than three hundred dollars flying around in the trees. I don’t want to talk about it.

  It’s the third day after I’ve started school when it starts again. I have all kinds of final examinations coming up and I can’t get myself to study for them. I’m enjoying riding my bicycle and watching people. I’ve never looked at people much before. They’re as interesting as birds if you really look. I go to a track meet and I’m all caught up watching people run, jump, throw things. Al wins the discus with a throw of a hundred and seventy-two feet. I have my binoculars with me and I can see all that’s happening with close eyes.

  It might be the watching with the binoculars that brings it back. In my sleep that night, I wake in the dream. I’m still on the ground under the tree. I get onto my feet. I stretch my wings. I hop over to Perta. She is dead. Her neck is broken the way the little yellow female’s was; there’s nothing I can do. I do not know I’m in the dream. I am completely bird. I have no arms with which to lift her from the ground. Still, I’m not bird enough to accept Echen and leave her there. I want to move her, to take her to some place where the cat won’t be able to eat her. I look around; the cat is not in the yard. I can’t leave Perta on the ground like that. I fly up into the tree to see our babies. They’re scrunched down in the nest, frightened. I feed them and tell them I’ll be back. I’m feeling stretched out. I’m confused about time. I fly back to Perta.

  Then I see me coming out of the aviary. I’m walking across the yard toward me. I stand there on the ground as bird and wait. I know there is a new hole in the dream. I can feel the mixing of the waves of two places, like an undertow. Two places are pulling at once.

  I do not see me. This is as usual. Then I lean down and pick up Perta. There is great unhappiness on my face. It is the unhappiness of a boy; birds’ faces show nothing. I pick up Perta and walk back towards the aviary. I fly painfully after me to the edge of the aviary roof. I watch myself come back out again with a small spoon and a matchbox. It’s one of the kitchen matchboxes in which I keep the eggs. I put Perta carefully into the box and close it. I dig a hole in the back of the aviary beside the wall and bury the box. I go back into the aviary.

  I hop from the top of the aviary and stand by Perta’s grave. I’m glad she’s safe from the cat. I know I must go to my babies but I don’t want to leave Perta.

  Then I see myself come out of the aviary again. I have a popsicle stick with me. I push the stick into the ground over the space where the matchbox is buried. I hop close and read the writing.

  MY WIFE, PERTA.

  I wake up.

  That next day at school I know all the things that have to happen. I’m not too frightened by the strange way the real world has to follow the dream. I’m sorry for Perta and I think of locking her into the flight cage but then her baby birds would starve. I could put those babies under other birds but this whole thing is something that has to happen. If it doesn’t happen as it must, then my Perta will never be really dead, I can never be free as a boy again.

  After school I’m working in the aviary when I hear the cat scream. I walk across the yard and over under the tree. She’s there exactly in the spot where I look for her. I look, but know I cannot see myself. I pick Perta up and her neck is broken. There is no other mark on her body.

  I carry her across the yard to the aviary and do the things I’m supposed to do. I’m feeling very calm inside myself. More than ever I feel that I am together. As boy I’m doing exactly what must be. I almost feel myself fitting into the space I occupied in the dream. I put Perta in the box and go out to the place beside the wall. There’s a slight depression in the ground. I dig the hole half-looking, expecting a matchbox to be there. Al will never know about the treasure we didn’t find. In some way it was there, there, in the power of our dream.

  There’s no matchbox and I put my matchbox with Perta into the hole. I cover it over and look for myself up on top of the aviary. I’m not there. I go back into the aviary and take the popsicle stick I use for scraping out the corners of the cages. I clean it off and print the message on it with a dark pencil. I go out and push it into the ground over the grave. There are no bird tracks. I wake up.

  During the day I can’t keep my thoughts from the dream. My throat hurts because I’m not crying when I should. We’re having final exams so no one notices me much.

  That night I’m still standing by Perta’s grave. The dream has become more like a dream. Things don’t happen the way they used to. I don’t see any of the other birds. When I fly, I fly in slow motion. It’s like a dream.

  I fly up to the babies and feed them. I tell them their mother won’t be coming back but I will take care of them. I spend all that day and night sitting on the edge of the nest, feeding them when they’re hungry and remembering Perta. I know they will not remember her. To them, she’s in Echen and that’s all there is to it. It’s not worth thinking about; it doesn’t matter.

  In my dream, over the next weeks, I bring the young birds up till they can fly from the nest and join the others. They are free, they can fly where they want to. My babies are completely bird. I do not show them where Perta is buried, it would mean nothing. I’m getting more and more boy in my dream, the bird in me is fading. The dream is becoming less and less real.

  As boy, I’m not as interested in the breeding of birds either. I’m seeing them for what they are, canaries. Everything in the aviary seems so automatic. The young birds all look alike. I can’t tell them from last year’s birds anymore. I can feel it all coming to an end. Something is finished.

  I build a feeding platform on top of the aviary. I build a roof over it to keep off the rain. I build perches for the feeders so the flying birds can feed up high away from cats. When it’s done, I let all the birds out of the new flying cage. Some few females are still sitting on nests, so I allow them to stay in the cage.

  When the last nest is finished, I put the floor back in the cage to separate the upper part from the lower. I begin to select out the singing males from the female flight cage, and put them in the lower cage. As the breeding birds finish up their third nests, I move them into the flight cages, too. Birdie is tired but as friendly as ever and I ta
ke her out for a free flight. I take Alfonso out too and it’s the first free flying for him. His flight is weak from the long time in a small cage but he quickly finds his wings and takes long flights to the tree and the house. I’m not sure he’ll come back to the cage but he does. I decide to leave Alfonso and Birdie out with the free fliers. They deserve it.

  The free fliers are now totally out of the cages. They sleep in the tree or on the house. I leave the cage door open but they don’t come in. There are about sixty birds out flying free. It makes me proud to see them. I feel I’ve helped put them back in the air where they belong. I wonder if they’ll stay close to the house now when they don’t sleep in the cages. At the end of summer will be the time for northern hemisphere finches to migrate. What will these birds do? Will this instinct take them off and in which direction? Will Birdie and Alfonso leave and fly with them? How far can a finch fly without eating? There’s no way I can think of for them to get to Africa, their original habitat. Will they learn to live on the grains and fruits our finches live on here? Will they interbreed with other finches or stay apart? It doesn’t matter. It’s so great to see them flying free.

  There are over two hundred birds in the flight cages. More than half are males. The price of birds is astronomical. I’ll be glad when the birds are old enough to sell. I don’t want to keep birds in cages anymore. I’d really like to set all of them free but these young birds without free flight experience could never make it. Also, my father is very happy thinking of the money we will get when we sell them. He’s kept my mother off my back, so I can’t let him down. He’d like to get all the free fliers into the cage and sell them, too. He keeps listening to them and has all the males identified. He’s up to thirty-five males.

  I’m dreaming again, but in my dreams I’m always alone. I see the other birds flying but I stay away. I fly all the night alone. I fly to every place I’ve ever been. I fly over the roof tops and trees or sometimes high in the sky. It seems so easy and I’m more me, not so much a bird. It’s me, a boy, flying. I’m flapping my arms like wings and it’s easy. It’s just knowing I can do it that makes me fly. In my dreams I’m always wanting someone else so I can show them how to do it. It would be such fun to teach Al or my father how to fly. When you can do it, it seems so incredibly easy.