The Little Bird

It all started when my wife saw a baby bird fall out of a nest. From the kitchen window, she'd been keeping her eyes on the nest that clung to a branch nearby. The nest had several shiny eggs that hatched and the mother bird, who looked like a large sparrow, was busy flying to and fro, bringing the babies' food.

"Oh, Jeez, Morry. A baby bird just fell out of the nest. Get out there and see if it is still alive."

I put on my pants, got up from my armchair, and slowly walked outside. I was fearful I might step on him. But no, the little brown feathered guy was pecking at a leaf. When he saw me, he looked up with wide-eyed amazement. I bent over, picked him up, and cradled him in my two hands.

He pecked at me a few times. I carried him into the house and put him in a cigar box with a few grapes and some bread crumbs. I figured the grapes would give him something to drink until I got him a proper setup.

The next morning he was still alive but hadn't eaten much, if anything.

"Go find him a worm," said Molly.

"And then you're going to ask me to chew it up for him?"

"Just go find one."

I learned in marriage that when the wife tells me to do something; I do it--immediately. I got up from my chair and headed to the shed where I kept my gardening equipment.

I dug up a corner of the garden where I'd put some mulch earlier that month. As I turned over the dark soil, there on the shiny spade shovel was a clump of dirt with a wiggling bunch of worms. I transferred the worms with the soil into a coffee can. The little guy seemed happy when I put a chopped-up worm into his box. The food was gone in no time.

Over the next few days, I kept feeding him, digging up more worms to replace the ones he ate. He was too young to fly, but there was no doubt he knew who his mother was--it was me.

When I'd put my hand into the box he'd climb over my fingers and nestle there, rubbing his little body against my fingers.

I began to notice something strange. The little guy was no longer so little. He was certainly bigger than his real mom out in the tree, and much larger than his brothers and sisters, who were spreading their wings and learning to fly. He'd outgrown the cigar box, so I transferred him to an old bird cage I'd put away a while back, it was hanging from a rusty nail in the shed.

By the end of six weeks, he was as large as a rabbit and couldn't get enough of me. By now, his nails were quite long and when he climbed onto my hand, it was a real problem to get my hand free. Because of his size, just getting him out of the cage was a problem. I used pliers to enlarge the cage door's opening.

"That bird is in love with you," said Molly.

"Yeah, but I don't know if that is good for him. It's time he learned to fly and took off."

I bought some chicken wire at the hardware store and made a cage outside in the corner where I'd dug up the worms. The little guy was now as big as a squirrel and was able to fend for himself. I let the garden hose drip into a shallow pan and got involved with other things.

A few weeks later I remembered and went out to check on him. He was nowhere to be found but there was a hole in the clapboard siding of the house. I realized he'd peck out the hole and was now living under the house.

It was an old house, built in the 1920s. As the standard of construction back then, the house was supported on wooden piers, not on a slab of concrete as they do nowadays. That was perspicuous as the house crawl space was compacted dirt, so the bird could forage for worms easily.

I marveled at how intelligent he must be. I opened the low door to enter the crawl space and with an LED flashlight spotted him in the corner. He had built a sort of nest from a burlap bag and started tweeting rapidly when he saw me.

I called to him, "Come here little bird," and waved to him.

He hopped out of his nest and moved in my direction. He was a lot a lot bigger than when I'd found him, when he'd jump in my hands. He was bigger than my hand. I could see he was now about the size of a small dog. He rubbed against my palm and then gave me a sharp peck.

"Hey, little guy, that hurt."

I crawled backward to get out from under, the house, being claustrophobic I avoid crawl spaces.

Once outside I examined my hand that was bleeding profusely.

"Jesus, why'd ya do that," I said under my breath.

I went inside, poured hydrogen peroxide on the wound, and showed it to my wife.

"You might need a few stitches to close that up."

"I'll use those special bandaids to hold the skin together. If that doesn't work I go to the emergency room tomorrow."

Fortunately, the special pressure bandaids did the job, but that peck, unwarranted in my opinion, killed most of the affection I had for the bird. I did notice some changes besides his size. His eyes were larger and ruby red. His body was covered with feathers of a dark brown color, like his mother's, but his feet were out of proportion, being quite large.

After that experience I abandoned caring for the bird, he seemed to be doing fine on his own. I kind of forgot about him and assumed he'd taken to the skies like a jumbo jet and flown away. The weather was changing and flocks of migrant birds were overhead, from as far away as Canada, and were reported to be winging their way south.

I didn't see the bird again for a while and by the time it was Halloween I assumed he was gone for good. I was in my easy chair strumming my guitar, trying to pick out the chords to a song I liked when the house began to shake.

There was a loud hammering and then the floorboards in front of me exploded. As the dust settled, I guessed there was a gas leak, but no, it was that damn bird. He was as big as a bear and heading toward me, and he was looking very angry.