Zelder winter stories...
***
The Life of Mine
This winter seems never-ending. A short spell of vernal snowless weather feels like a cruel joke now. I roam the streets on foot, because I'm too lazy and bitter to join the others on the roof. I'm always bitter in March, because I hate uncertainty and indecisiveness. If only I could reach the sun and tell it to make its damn mind.
"What's up, Grump." That's my friend. He calls me Grump because I am. I call him Pirate because his one eye is missing and he likes telling everyone how he once traveled on a ship. The hell he did. The only ship he ever traveled on had double 'e' in the middle.
"Food anywhere?" I ask him, and he shakes his head.
"Streets are swept clean."
"The ravens?"
"Them, bastards. Told ya we should of stashed some."
I mix snow and mud under my foot and draw circles in the slush. "We'll be fine."
"Where did you catch the optimism virus? Does the winter start to mess with you brain?"
"Get out of here." Laughing hurts - I mistook a stone for a nut yesterday and scratched my throat badly - but I laugh anyway. Pirate rubs his missing eye on his shoulder and whistles a tune. He doesn't hit a single note right, yet I feel better. If Pirate starts singing - the spring is near. He never believes me when I say so and when spring does settle in a couple of days he always waves me off, his chest slightly protruded and a smile fighting its way into the light. Dogs trod by, throwing hungry stares our way. We stay put - the dogs know they don't stand a chance with us.
My stomach rumbles and I raise my head searching the trees for any berries left over from the fall and not yet snatched away. My eyes drift over the tree tops and stop on the roof. Dolly is sitting on the edge and Buck is cooing into her ear. My feathers are ruffled in spite of me.
"Come, we'll try the roof," I say to Pirate.
"Yeah, right. They'd rather bite my head off than share food with me. I was stealing from them the whole summer."
"Your head is more than they can chew, buddy. Let's stretch our wings."
Pirate sighs and grunts at the same time, but takes off after me. There we go, a pigeon and a one-eyed sparrow, soaring into the sky, restlessly seeking to outfly the misery of our lives.
The spring will come, it always does. We'll be fine.
