Soar (7 page)

“Oh, okay.” My face becomes warm, and I freeze. This is one of those times when you plan something out in your mind but it doesn't go the way you'd hoped. “I guess I'll see you around, then.” I turn to leave.

Gabriela opens the screen door. “Wait. Do you want to stay and meet Papa's friends? I have a feeling that you will like them.”

“Um, okay.” But I really want to say, “Thought you'd never ask.”

Gabriela holds the door open all the way. “Come in.”

I step inside the house, and it's eerily quiet. “Where is everyone?”

“This way.” Gabriela motions for me to follow her.

She leads me through the living room, toward the covered porch. She opens the back door and we step onto the porch, standing outside a circle of people sitting in chairs. Some are older and gray, others are around Mom's age.

The best part is, each person in the circle has a parrot
perched on his shoulder. Nearly all of the birds are macaws. There's one dark blue hyacinth macaw, three blue-and-gold ones, and two green ones. Then there's Silvio, the only scarlet macaw, who perches on Papa's shoulder.

Gabriela turns to me. “We moved here so Papa could be part of this group. He loves animals, so it makes a perfect fit. Training the birds is like therapy for mute people. It is the only group like this in the western hemisphere.”

“The only group in the western hemisphere?”

Gabriela nods, smiling.

“Welcome to our friendship circle,” says a lady with a great green macaw standing on her shoulder. “Glad you could join us. Are you also mute?”

She's clearly asking me, so I answer. “No.”

“Asking is always the easiest way to find out,” she explains. “What's your name?”

“Eddie,” I tell her.

“Okay, everyone, let's welcome Eddie to our circle.”

She does something in sign language. Her hand motions look like a cross between sewing with a needle and playing air guitar. “All together now, on the count of three. One . . . Two . . .”

On three she says “Welcome, Eddie,” and then the birds say something that sounds just like that.

With everyone looking at me, I'm sure my face is the color of Silvio's bright red feathers. “Thanks,” I tell everyone. “Glad to be here.”

“You're welcome,” says the lady. “My name is Carolyn Foster Rosetta Sinclair Mitchell, but you can call me Carol. And we, Mr. Eddie, are the Bird Talkers. Everyone here, except you, me, and Princess Gabriela, is deaf mute. That means they can't hear or talk. Well, let me clarify. Some can hear specific sounds, but none can talk. Would you like to hear the birds talk some more?”

“Sure.” I glance at Gabriela. She's obviously amused at the spotlight being thrown on me.

Papa strokes his black beard. I wonder if he can hear me, or if he can only read my lips.

Carol sits up straight and counts to three again, showing the numbers on her fingers. When she says “three,” the adults gesture with their right hands, making a sign that resembles their first two fingers going down a waterslide together.

The birds all say, “Groovy.”

Carol laughs, and the circle laughs silently. “That is my all-time favorite, Mr. Eddie. That's a silly nilly word. It doesn't get much use in the real world, but it sure provides some laughs for us. Wouldn't you agree?”

I look at Gabriela. We hide our smiles so we don't offend Carol. It's all I can do to not laugh at this whole situation, not in a mean way but in an awesome, I-can't-believe-this-is-happening-to-me way.

After a couple more demonstrations from Carol and the gang, Papa brings out snacks and drinks from the kitchen. I eat a handful of Brazil nuts, then wash them down with one of Papa's delicious berry drinks.

I toss my plastic cup into the recycling container. “I better get home for dinner.”

The macaws are amazing, and the truth is, I'd rather stay here than go home, but it's only fair that I show up for dinner. Mom's probably lonely and needs someone to break up the quietness.

Gabriela walks me to the front door.

“That was awesome,” I tell her. “You're lucky to have those macaws at your house.”

“It is good therapy for them. They have a real connection with the birds. Though Carol can be a lot to handle.”

We laugh together.

And that makes me feel like flying.

When I get home, I open my journal and flip to my drawing of Silvio.

It's crazy what you discover about art when you haven't seen it for a while. It's by far the best sketch I've ever done! The head and beak are proportionate, and the feathers are just as colorful and vibrant as Silvio's in real life.

I want to look at the older sketches in my journal, but then I'll be up all night fixing wings and crests and beak shapes. I can't be tired at school, especially during science class.

I turn the page and begin sketching the northern cardinal from Gabriela's front yard. I've seen a lot of them this year, but this one was more impressive than the rest, maybe because it was near Gabriela's house. Everything that comes close to Gabriela seems bigger and better.

Bird: Northern cardinal

Location: Gabriela's front yard (in giant oak tree)

Note: Most impressive northern cardinal seen this year.

Dad: You would flip out over the Bird Talkers.

I've never seen so many colorful feathers in one place.

It makes me wonder about myself.

Am I a colorful person?

T
he next Friday, before school starts, I wake up early and head to Miss Dorothy's to look for the golden eagle. I walk around the side of her house, the brown grass crunching under my shoes.

Miss Dorothy leans on a cane behind her screen door. Her white hair matches the house's chipped paint. She waves at me, and I wave back.

“Morning, Miss Dorothy!” I shout.

“Shouldn't you be in school?” she asks.

I look at my watch. “Not for another twenty minutes!”

“Go ahead, Eddie. It's all yours.” She smiles and gestures to her backyard, like she has just unveiled a magical forest for the first time.

“Thanks, Miss Dorothy!”

She cups a hand behind one ear. “What did you say?”

I put both hands around my mouth to funnel the sound. “Thanks!”

She turns and hobbles back into the kitchen.

Miss Dorothy can't hear like she used to. It's too bad she's going downhill, because her land is going with her. It used to be nice back here, so nice that Dad would let me swim in the pond. But now the water is low from lack of rain. Besides that, people with nothing better to do sneak back here and throw parties and leave their trash everywhere.

Today an old tennis shoe and a Doritos bag float on the water. Plastic bags and soggy cardboard boxes sit at the pond's edge. And then there's that dead fish smell, which never goes away.

Still, there are enough rabbits, mice, and other small rodents here to keep raptors happy, and that's what matters to me.

I circle the pond and head toward the railroad tracks. The tracks mark the end of Miss Dorothy's land.
Coop likes to perch on the telephone poles back there, so I might catch her chasing down breakfast.

When I get to the tracks, there's no sign of Coop anywhere. Maybe she's still sleeping, or maybe she's already tracked down a sparrow.

I search the ground for traces of the golden eagle. All I find is a rusted coffee can and an old bicycle. I kick the can, and it tumbles forward, clanking off a hollow log. The bicycle hides down in the brush. It's been out here so long that it's hard to tell the paint from the rust.

BANG!

I hit the ground and cover my head!

BANG!

Gunshots?

Someone is shooting!

I look around and then bolt for cover under an elm tree. I stay low and wait, breathing hard, trying to control my thumping heart.

No more shots are fired, so I run around the pond to where I think the shots came from. The pond's far side is empty, so I scamper past more trees, all the way to the railroad tracks. Squatting behind a log, I brace for another gunshot.

But there's only silence.

I wonder where Coop is, and if she's okay.

I hide in the brush, my head sticking out far enough to follow the tracks. A man stands on the railroad tracks, about three robins' nests away. He wears a camouflage jacket and pants, and a bright orange hat. He points the shotgun into the air.

BANG!

A northern bobwhite stops midflight, free-falls from the sky, and lands between two railroad ties.

It's the first time I've ever seen a person shoot a living thing, and it's a bird. I swallow twice to keep my throat from getting dry.

The hunter leans the shotgun against his leg and turns up his jacket collar.

I move back into the brush, out of sight, until I can figure out who's hunting on Miss Dorothy's land.

The hunter walks my way, holding the shotgun across his chest like a soldier. As he gets closer, I notice he's wearing a camouflage bow tie.

It's Mr. Dover!

But that doesn't make sense. Mr. Dover loves birds. He's helping Zeus recover from his broken wing. How can he be out here killing quail?

I can't let Mr. Dover strut past me without saying
something to him, especially after that whole speech about the lightning storm and saving Zeus's life. What would Zeus think of all this? His own savior out killing his distant cousins?

I stay low, hidden in the brush. The tall, bristly grass reminds me of a jail cell, and that's about how I feel right now. Like a prisoner, trapped in Mr. Dover's bird-killing dream.

Mr. Dover stops walking and drops to one knee. A golden retriever bounds down the tracks, tongue hanging out, like Gabriela's dog when it yanked me off her fence.

The dog leaps into Mr. Dover's lap. He pets the dog's head and says “good boy” over and over until I think he's never going to say anything else.

Then he says, “Apollo, go get it,” and the dog bounds toward the quail, snatches it up, and brings it back to Mr. Dover.

My bottom jaw hangs loose. Since when is it okay for your science teacher to shoot a bird and then order his dog to retrieve the carcass for him?

Mr. Dover stands up and walks toward where I'm hiding.

I wipe my sweaty hands on my shorts. Then I take a deep breath and whisper to myself, “You can do this.”

Apollo runs his nose over the tracks. He scampers a few more feet and sniffs the grass. He comes closer, possibly tracking my scent.

Before I can talk myself out of it, I stand up.

“What are you doing here?” I ask him.

Mr. Dover looks at me, surprised, holding the limp quail by the neck. “Eddie?”

“Why are you killing birds?”

He puts one hand in the air. “Eddie, wait. It's not what it seems.”

“Really? Because it seems like you're out here wasting quail and making your dog round them up for you.
And
you're on Miss Dorothy's land. I thought you had your own
property
.” I clench my teeth.

“Eddie, please, let me explain.”

Apollo trots over to me and weaves in and out of my legs, but he's more curious than aggressive.

“My dad was right. You're a fake.” I storm away, hoping to never see Mr. Dover or a dead bird again.

Mr. Dover calls after me. “You're the fake, Eddie.”

I
stop in my tracks. Apollo weaves around my legs again, then runs off to chase something in the tall grass.

I turn around, facing Mr. Dover. “Me? I don't go around talking about birds like they're the greatest creatures on earth and then use them for target practice.”

“Quail hunting is a sport, Eddie. I eat what I kill.”

The word “kill” rings in my head. He's a murderer, and he's admitting it. How can this quail killer be my science teacher?