Then she’ll fly back to my perch. She flies so beautifully with her head out and her feet tucked back. Her wings in the room make a whispering sound. If I want her, all I do is hold out the perch and call her with PeepQuEEP. This is a sound she knows. Probably it’s more her name than Birdie. ‘Birdie’ doesn’t mean anything to her when I say it. I keep thinking of her to myself as Birdie but PeepQuEEP is the name I call her with.
At first, I give her a little grain or two of treat food when she comes to me, but after a while I don’t. I know and she knows we’re playing together.
Sometimes she teases by flying back toward the perch and then, at the last minute, swerving away and landing somewhere else. One time she lands on my head this way. I can watch her fly all day, and I even like to watch her hopping around. She searches all over the floor and finds little things I can’t even see. I watch her carefully to get any droppings. If my mother finds any bird shit on anything, the whole game is finished.
It’s a long time before Birdie lets me stroke her head or her breast. Birds are that way; they don’t even stroke each other. Birdie learns to like it though. She’ll come to my hand and puff up when I run my finger over the top of her head or down her wings. Her toenails need cutting, but every time I try to wrap my hands around her to pick her up, she panics.
Usually when I let Birdie out, I pull the window shade, but one day I forget. She flies out of the cage door when I open it and straight at the window. She hits the pane of glass in full flight and falls fluttering to the floor!
I dash over and pick her up carefully. She’s unconscious, limp in my hand. There’s nothing deader than a dead bird. Movement is most of what a bird is. When they’re dead, they’re only feathers and air.
One of her wings seems dislocated. I carefully fold it back and hold her in my two hands to warm her. She’s still breathing very lightly and quickly. Her heart’s beating against my hand. I look for something broken or bleeding. Her neck is hanging loosely over the end of my fingers and I’m sure she has a broken neck. The way she flies, with her head so far ahead of her body, confident with her flight, this is what would happen.
Her eyes are closed by a pale, bluish, almost transparent lid. There’s nothing I can think to do. I pet her head softly. I PeepQuEEP at her and try to breathe warm air over her. I’m sure she’s dying.
The first sign she shows is to move her head and lift it from hanging over my finger. She opens her eyes and looks at me. She doesn’t struggle. She blinks her eyes slowly and closes them. I PeepQuEEP at her some more. I stroke her head. Then, she opens her eyes and straightens her head. She couldn’t do that if her neck were broken. I begin to hope. I pull her legs out between my fingers and straighten the toes so she’s standing with them on my thigh while I hold her. She closes her eyes again but she keeps her head up. She doesn’t grab with her feet on my thigh. The toes are limp and fold in on themselves.
I hold her quietly some more, petting her head and queeping at her. Then she queeps back; tired, a faint queeEEp? I queep and she queeps again. I loosen my grip and she manages to stand on my thigh. She’s all puffed out in a ball and her feathers are ruffled from the sweat of my hands. I cup her on both sides with my hands so she can’t fall. I hold her again and try to smooth her feathers. I feather out her wings one after the other. They seem all right. I let go of her and she stands alone on my thigh. She bristles and fluffs out her ruffled feathers. She leans back and runs each flight feather in turn through her beak. She shits. Then, she straightens herself and hops along my knee and queeps, quite like her old self. I queep back and put my finger out to her. She hops on it and turns. She wipes her beak on my finger. She’d never done that before. It’s wonderful to see her moving again. I didn’t know I was crying but my face is wet. I carry her over to the cage and she hops off my finger and into the cage. She’s glad to be back in her safe place. She eats and drinks.
I watch her for about an hour after that but she’s fine. I can’t believe my luck. It would have been awful without her. From this time on, I can always pick her up and hold her. A few days later I cut her toenails.
I begin wanting to tell somebody about Birdie and all the things she can do. I try talking to Al about it but he isn’t interested much in birds anymore.
She’s such fun. I leave her out at night sometimes and train her to sleep on top of the cage so her droppings fall onto the cage floor instead of all over the room. I put her cage on the shelf behind my bed, so she feel comfortable. It’s the highest place in the room. In the morning, she hops down onto my head and picks at my nose or the corners of my mouth till I wake up. She never picks at my eyes.
I learn a lot of canary words and can tell her to stay and to come and I learn a sound for eat and hello and good-bye. I’m beginning to hear the differences in the things she says.
That night they put me up in quarters with the orderlies. The CO guy on Birdy’s ward shows me around. I pump him about Birdy. He tells me Birdy’s been here almost three months. He says, for a long time they didn’t even know who Birdy was; had to go through all the records for somebody missing in Waiheke, the place where Birdy was hit. That’s an island off in New Guinea, he says. He tells me Birdy has bad malaria on top of everything else.
That night I have one of my screaming dreams. I wake up hollering out loud. At Dix, on the plastic surgery ward, nights, it’s more like a damned loony bin than this place; everybody trying to work it out. The CO comes over but I tell him I’m OK. I’m having the sweats again, whole bed soaking wet. I move over to another empty bed. I wonder if the CO will tell anybody; Christ, they’re liable to lock me up, too.
Next morning I go see Weiss. He’s not in yet but there’s a fat T-4 with a typewriter; Underwood, stand-up job. He says he just wants some information for the doctor. I try to explain I’m not one of the crazies but he’s got out a blue form and turns it into the machine. He sits there grinning at me. He’s got me pegged as a loon for sure.
Great questions he asks, like, How many people in my family have done themselves in? or, Do I get pleasure when I take a shit? What creepy questions! But that’s not the really weird part. First, he asks me my name. He types it out, four fingers hunt and peck, then he looks at it and spits! Spits right at my name on the paper! Jesus! I figure maybe something got caught on his lip; try to ignore it. Then he asks me my serial number and outfit. He types this out, stares at it, and spits again! Maybe he’s a loon, slipped in here while the doctor’s out. Maybe it isn’t happening at all and I’m nuts myself. I try to get a look at the T-4 without his noticing. He grins back at me, a bit of spit still hanging on his fat lip. Maybe it’s some kind of a new psychological test, the spit test. Who knows?
He starts asking more questions. Same thing every time. Not big goobers or anything gross, just a fine spray kind of spit. The whole typewriter must be rusty inside. He asks another question, types it out, looks and spits. I check the door and distances. This light blue form he’s typing on is turning dark blue. He’s almost finished when the doctor-major passes through to his office. He gives me his psychiatrist smile; holding out on the military this morning.
We finish. The T-4 gently pulls the form out of his typewriter. He knows what he’s doing; he’s pulled wet forms out of that machine before. He holds it by the corner and carries it into the doctor’s office. Then he comes out, thin grins at me, rubs his hands together, probably wiping off the spit; and tells me to go in. The doctor-major is staring at the wet paper and reading it. He motions me to sit down. The paper is flat on his desk; he’s not touching it.
I’m waiting for him to comment on the spit. Maybe congratulate me for passing the spit test or blaming me, or something. Nothing! He’s used to spitty papers. He might just be the nut himself, won’t read anything that doesn’t have spit on it; hires this T-4 especially to spit on his papers. Could be anything. He looks up; very serious, very dignified for a fat man. His eyes are glinting behind his glasses; very much the working psychiatrist this morning.
‘You say here you were court-martialed?’
‘That’s right, sir.’
Give him the old ‘sir’ bit; get no doctor-ing from me. Got to get out of here