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Fran peeked out through the leaves of the bush and hopped lightly from her nest. The others had already come and gone, ground all scratched up and discarded seed around the pole.
“Hi, Fran! Hey, hey! Fran! Look at this!”
“Um, hi Phillip,” she warbled, trying to dart past her newest neighbor as he hopped about, kicking one of his feet out to the side every third hop. He shook himself, feathered crest on his head sticking up straight.
“I’ve been practicing!”
“It’s um, it’s nice?” She took a step and he cut her off, tail spreading dramatically as he dipped his head, bob-bob-bobbing and kicking one foot out again. He spread his wings wide, easily rivaling the spread of the crows that liked to gather the next yard over, and bowed low.
“What do you think?”
“It’s very…dramatic?”
He chirped and shook his tail. “Thanks, Fran! I’m glad you think so! I’m going to build a nest, too. Already started.”
“That’s good,” she said weakly.
Of course he was building a nest. It was almost spring, and he’d be finding a mate soon. She slipped past him and hurried on her way.
“Morning, Fran.”
“Hi, Charlie.” She hopped over closer to the glass door and settled near the striped, ginger house-cat.
“Any seeds left?”
“Yes, thank you.”
“Would you help me out again today?” he asked, tail lashing as he yowled to be let back inside.
She hopped closer and settled near his paw, fascinated as he flexed it, razor sharp claws stretch-stretch-stretching before retracting again. Would it be fast, too quick to register the sting, if he used them?
“Oh, hey, there she is,” Fran confirmed as one of the humans appeared in the room. She flapped her wings and gave a little hop as Charlie yowled again and then slapped a paw down on her back, pressing her flat to the ground.
“I think it’s working,” she whispered, and Charlie gave a wheezing purr in response. He wiggled his paw and she tried not to laugh, doing her best to give the impression of dead or dying.
Charlie hated being outside, but for some reason the humans kept putting him out at night.
“HEY, GET OFF HER YOU FELINE BONER DEMON!”
Fran opened her eyes to see Phillip diving from the branch of a nearby shade tree, murder in his eyes. “Phillip, no!”
“Me-owwwwwwwwwch!” Charlie yelled, just as the door slid open.
“Emperor Charlemagne, you stop that right now!” the human woman said.
“Me? Ow, hey, stop that…bird…guy!”
Phillip pecked at the cat’s rump again, and Fran flapped her wings and gave a little hop. “I’m fine, see?” she chirped. The human scooped the cat up and carried him inside.
“Thanks, Frannie!” Charlie called as the door slid closed.
Phillip hovered, hopping foot to foot, then kind of…landed on her, like a mother bird on her chicks. “Oh, sorry, bad aim,” he muttered, hopping back. “Are you all right?”
“Of course,” Fran insisted, spreading her wings wide and warbling a few notes. (Why on earth was she singing for him)?
“It—I saw—and you—I thought you were dead!”
Fran chirped in curiosity. “Why?”
“Because, Fran!” Phillip cawed, “The CAT had YOU under his CLAWS! You weren’t even breathing!”
“I’m getting better that that,” she agreed. “I can hold my breath a whole 30 seconds now.”
“I—you—” Phillip shook himself, then did that thing again, the spreading his wings and leaning thing, then lifted off from the ground, settling grumpily in the shade tree. Fran watched him go then hopped around a bit, collecting stray seeds and a juicy ant from the patio stones before fluttering back to her bush.
She wasn’t a very good flyer. Sometimes she thought she might crash or be snatched from the air by the hawk that sometimes hunted the yard.
She’d already had one near miss, the day she met Charlie. The hawk interrupted his nap and the cat did not appreciate it.
Fran had a tail feather tucked away in her nest, a memento of the day she made a friend.
She had a pebble from the day Phillip first landed on the feeder, too. And the hull of a sunflower seed.
She ran into Phillip again when she emerged later for a little splash in the pedestal bird bath. The water was cool, and she dipped her face in, drinking a little and shaking her feathers. She liked the way the water on them sparkled in the sun. She set about straightening her flight feathers, dragging them through her beak and then shaking her wings and tail.
Sometimes she wondered, if she pulled a few out here and there, would she fall from the bath when she tried to fly out? Perhaps catch an errant breeze and smash against the glass door?
“Hi, Fran.”
She lifted her head from beneath her wing. “Hello, Phillip.”
“Sorry. Um, about earlier?”
Fran cocked her head to the side. “Whatever for?”
“I, um…I was…I mean, it’s instinct, and it’s hard not to…anyway I’m sorry if I, you know.”
“No, I have no idea, but I accept your apology.”
Phillip puffed his feathers again, hopped a few times and did the weird bow thing with his wings out, before shaking his tail and then hopping into the bath with a splash.
Oh, yes. She was hogging the best sun angles. “I’m going,” she said, then hopped a time or two and flew back to the bush.
“Fran! Wait!” Phillip launched himself from the bird bath, landing near her bush with another flurry of foot-lifting hops and a series of warbling chirps.
Kind of catchy, actually. She even bobbed her head a time or two.
“I started the nest!” he announced proudly. “It’s big enough for two, strong with good twigs, and I’ve been collecting pine needles for the lining.” He paused, angled his head and leaned. “I added some cat hair, too!”
“Oh, that sounds lovely,” she managed, but the closest she could offer to a happy chirp was a sad wheeze. Fran shivered, settling lower in her nest, but she forgot about the part on one side that kept collapsing.
“It’s soft,” Phillip was saying, “And warm, and I’d really like if you would—”
Fran tumbled out of her nest, falling to the ground, the remains of her home tumbling down on top of her. The pebble bounced and rolled to land by Phillip’s foot. He tapped it and looked at her. “Are you hurt?”
Fran turned her head away, tucking it under her wing. He’d go now, take back the pebble she stole and give it to his real mate and—
Phillip pressed close to her side, cooing softly. “We don’t have to share, if you don’t want. You can just take it, I made it for you.”
“Made what?”
“The nest of course! I made a new nest in a safer spot, and I practiced my dance. I’m sorry you didn’t like it. I thought—you don’t even have to lay any eggs, I just wanted—” he stopped and sighed. “It’s okay, I wouldn’t be a very good mate anyway.”
Fran lay on the ground in shock, unable to even move as he flew back to his branch and settled beside the nest he’d worked so hard on.
“For me?” she whispered. “Oh.”
Fran scooped up the pebble in her beak, and grasped the hawk feather in one foot, eyeing the branch. It was higher than she usually flew, but he was right about the location. It was the best nest on the best branch in the yard. Fran pushed off with wings and one foot, flying determinedly up and over, until she landed with a clumsy little hop and toppled into the nest.
The one Phillip built.
For her.
He’d lined it with some of his own down, and pinfeathers, in addition to the fur and pine needles he told her about.
Fran carefully tucked the hawk feather so that it stuck up from the side, against a fork in the branch. The pebble she deposited gently, moving it this way and that until it was in the perfect place. She eyed the yard, spotting some straw and a tuft of fur at the edge of the patio. Perfect!
She retrieved those and brought them back, arranging everything to her liking.
“I think you’ll be a very good mate,” she chirped. “If you…if you want to be.”
Phillip lifted his head, staring at her for a long moment. “Really?”
Fran bobbed her head, sang a little tune, one just for him, and Phillip echoed her before shuffling carefully over.
“It’s cozy,” she said, settling into the nest. “Not so warm as I expected though.”
“I’ll make it better! I’ll get—”
“I think it’s all the empty space. Maybe you should join me. Just to be sure that’s why.”
Phillip’s chest feathers puffed.
“I can do that.” He joined her, settling side by side. “Better?”
“Much,” Fran affirmed, tucking her head beneath his beak, rubbing up and down against the feathers of his chest and throat.
“You’ll really…you’ll really be my mate, Fran?”
“I don’t think I could be anyone else’s mate, Phillip.”