Bird Dreams of Woman

“Oh, that stings,” Gladys said, but the flitting pain fizzled quickly.

It was a small cut, and instead of blood, a uniform-drab bird dripped out of the wound. Taking flight after its sudden, startled birth, Gladys waited, knife in hand, for the thing to bash itself in confusion against the windowpane over the sink. Instead, it alighted on the countertop.

The blue-gray gnatcatcher preferred open woods, and this one was increasingly curious, peering around the kitchen. White rings circled ink-black eyes, one pointed outdoors, but without means to get there.

The other eye took in a world its passerine mind couldn’t grasp. Gladys’ kitchen, and Gladys herself: the woman with her apron, wine, and a sensible, balanced dinner half-prepared. Chicken cutlets waited for the pan, already pounded flat. The gnatcatcher flew to the windowsill, flapped a hop-step, and cocked its head.

“I bought that from the grocery,” Gladys said. She opened the window, but the bird stayed, watching her. “You have reservations, do you?”

The gnatcatcher’s talons made almost imperceptible clicks on the tiled counter. It stared with one eye, and then the other, as Gladys rinsed her cut in the sink and returned to dinner prep.

While she chopped the rest of the carrots, the bird switched its tail, scaring and eating insects fleeing from the commotion.

As the chicken was dropped in the pan and sizzled in hot butter, the gnatcatcher scolded Gladys—one shrill whistle. 

And when the bird searched the cabinet’s undersides, those hard-to-reach corners, for a spider’s web to build a nest, Gladys’ meticulous housekeeping frustrated its efforts. The bird shat on the counter.

Gladys laughed. “If I did that at every disappointment,” she shook her head. “Just imagine.”

And Gladys did. She imagined using her knife, sharp and intentional. She imagined all the flapping and squawking and indignation she would unleash.

Gladys would deflate as fish crows, mockingbirds, and robins flew out from her skin. An Eastern bluebird would sing of the times she said yes and swallowed her objections. The Phoebe’s call would be the voice she’d greet strangers with, impersonal and unassertive. Gladys’ cactus wren wouldn’t shy from confrontation. No, he crouched and scrabbled and pecked for whatever he could take.

Gladys invested her dreams in whistling white-throated sparrows. They puffed up against the cold and nestled in a barren rose bush. All thorns, and twisting, helical branches, and safe from cats.

One day, the turkey vultures she’s birthed would hold a funeral and cast shadows with their improbable outspread wings caped over the departed. They would honor all her sacrifices. They would mourn them. And her.

Gladys imagined herself in birds she would never be. She finished her wine, refilled the glass, and used her free hand to flip the chicken.

Dinner would be ready soon, and no one would notice her blood on the carrots. She left the single, tiny gray feather right there, on the windowsill.