ANNA GILMORE HEEZEN

We knew something was wrong when they started watching us. We were slightly uneasy because they were spending a large amount of time staring at us as we pecked about our business. We didn’t understand the new attention. Normally, we lived in a peaceful state of ignoring each other, we had our separate lives parallel to theirs, but not anymore. It was the strangest thing. They stopped leaving the house, and when they did, they covered their faces with pieces of coloured cloth.

Sparrow, who nests in the eaves of the Sainsbury’s, told me that when the humans go shopping, they line up outside, silently standing apart. Crow said if you fly high above the city it is like a ghost town. Robin roosts across the street from the primary school, and she said that the playground is abandoned. Seagull flew in from the coast with reports of empty beaches, devoid of families and picnics. As usual the geese were above it all, cutting through the sky like the prows of airborne ships. Lark couldn’t take the uncertainty, so she perched on the windowsill to see what the matter was. She reported back that they were hunched in front of strange rectangular objects emitting unnatural glows, like electric suns.

We were baffled. How did it get like this? What terrible thing had happened? For the first time we wished that we could ask them directly.

There were upsides to their strange new silence. As the motorway’s roar subsided, we seized the opportunity to fill the air with our song. They fed us more, bringing out leftover bread in the mornings.

We were hesitant at first, eyeing them from the safety of the trees as they sprinkled the crumbs, smiling up at us. We hadn’t seen them smile for a long time. We gradually became less wary, fluttering closer.

One day, the teenage girl spoke to me, as if I were her only friend. She told me things were not good in her world, that a horrible sickness was sweeping the globe, and that many people were dying. She said their government decreed that everyone should stay at home to stop the spread. She hoped things were better for me. She thanked us because we had taught her how to look and really see. She even apologised for the recent staring. She confessed she envied us, since we were free and could fly up into the fathomless sky without a care in the world.

As she spoke, I noticed her golden hair had grown very long. She must have seen me looking because she laughed sadly, said that hairdressers weren’t even open. I wasn’t sure what that was, so I just nodded.

After a pause she sighed and glanced at me. She acknowledged that she must sound crazy, sitting here, talking to a bird.

She knew that I didn’t understand. But I did. I didn’t want her to feel alone, and so I took her under my wing.

Anna Gilmore Heezen’s short story was an original and vivid idea delivered with humour