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If there was one thing Theo hated in this life, it would be calculus. Because what did we need that for anyways? Surely it didn’t take a genius to know that bridges need supports to work. People didn’t need to fly or drive from point A to point B, there are horses and hostels, and besides, the view is half the point of a trip!
But here he was. It was finals week (or my final week?) and the cockatiel was trying to relearn the entire course’s material tonight. He knew it was futile, but as long as he could make a 70 on this exam tomorrow, it would drop his lowest exam grade and he could pass the class with barely a C+. The practice questions had long stopped jogging his memory, and fighting sleep was an uphill battle. I need to stretch my legs.
When he tried to stand, he found himself suddenly slumped back in his seat. Huh. Hadn’t noticed my legs fell asleep. He stretched them a little, and the pain in his legs gave way to pins and needles. He looked around, sunglasses long ago lost to the depths of his backpack, making the harsh overhead lights feel blinding. The study pod he was using was in a corner by an emergency exit staircase, and window behind him showed the moon, shining brightly above him. The lights in the library made it hard to see through the glare, but he found a bright star looking back down at him, making him smile. This time, when he attempted to stand, his legs functioned, though he still wobbled a bit from the lack of movement before this.
He decided to do a lap around the floor. Considering that it was now 2:57 am, according to his watch, this should only take a few minutes, since no one would be in his way. He made his way over to a bookshelf, pausing to read a title and hold onto the shelf while his legs got used to moving again. Who would’ve thought the Dewey decimal system could be so informative?
Slowly, he began to walk, half-hugging the shelves as he passed by. The only sound that surrounded him was the sound of his boots hitting the tile floor, which got interrupted by the a/c kicking on again. The cockatiel shivered, then sped up, as if that would shake out the wintery cold that had seeped into his bones when he was sitting at the window. One could argue that the building being open 24/7 during finals week was a blessing, but to Theo, it just meant he had more time to torture himself. If that included not moving for several hours and not realizing he was cold and stiff like a corpse, then it was a fair price to pay for passing an exam.
As he rounded a corner, Theo looked at the empty desks and study pods. When he got here this afternoon (yesterday afternoon?), they were chock full of students and group projects that had much more life than Theo’s laptop and notebook. He could argue that the library’s designated “quiet floors” really shouldn’t have tables for group work, as it was supposedly meant for individual study, but whatever. At this point in time, nothing mattered to the cockatiel more than going to bed, finishing this test, and moving on with his life.
He began looking down the aisles of books as he passed, as if it would give him some motivation to be an academic. Truly, Theo was a great scholar, but he just hated calculus. Really, all types of math were despised equally by him, but at the moment, his current enemy was in front of him, and in less than 12 hours, he would be going head to head with it. Never let the enemy know your next move, as he would say. Hopefully the enemy wouldn’t predict a 12 hour study session in the library.
Theo put his hand on the end of a shelf again. He looked down the aisle, then almost yelled at the sight. He blinked rapidly, as if he couldn’t believe what he was saying. There, in the middle of the row, was a… ghost? Holding open a book? Though he also looked like he’d fallen asleep. Did I just find a body…?
The “ghost” finally looked up, and Theo rubbed his eyes, as if that would take away the sleepiness, and potential hallucination in front of him. Yet when he opened his eyes, the other avian was in front of the cockatiel, his wings wrapped around himself as if he, too, had hardly realized the cold that had seeped in over the course of the night. He blinked at Theo, and Theo just… stared.
“Can I… help you?” The man looked at his book in front of him, then put it down, his puffy jacket a cushion between him and the floor. It was a nice muted brown, Theo’s second favorite color.
“How long has it been since you’ve seen the sun?” Theo croaked. He hadn’t realized he hadn’t spoken for the better part of the 12 hours he’d been here. He cleared his throat. “Um, actually, do you know how to find a, uh, a derivative of a logarithm…?”
The macaw hybrid, or at least, he guessed the other was a macaw, stared back at him. “Uh… yeah,” he decided after a moment. “I got a… a B+ in calc 1. I can probably remember.”
“Cool… my name’s Theo,” the cockatiel offered.
“I’m Parrot,” the other replied.
“What a creative name your parents gave you,” Theo chuckled.
“You could say that.”
Theo stretched out his hand to help Parrot stand, which the macaw accepted. He stood, then seemed to realize he was leaving his stuff all over the floor. He kneeled over to put all his stuff back in his bag, then stood back up. The macaw’s eyes met Theo’s, and the two held their gaze for a moment, almost as if wondering why the other was still here (and how much of a nerd the other was for still being here). The cockatiel led the way back to his pod, giving up on finishing his lap around the floor.
When he arrived back, he slumped in his seat, Parrot pulling up a chair next to him. It was still an awkward view of Theo’s laptop, which was almost dead, so he wrote down the problem on a new sheet of paper and handed it to Parrot.
“Dude, how can you write this bad, you’re in university…” Parrot mumbled to himself. Theo didn’t hear him over the sound of his backpack’s zippers.
The early December chill fell over the two avians again as Parrot studied every detail of the paper that had been placed on the table in front of him. His wings drooped, and the macaw started to fall asleep, sitting right there, at which point Theo realized this was maybe not the best idea. He grabbed the paper back, realizing his fate would soon match this stranger’s. He slung his backpack onto him while turning in this seat, and was about to leave before he realized he felt… pity? For leaving the macaw alone? He was a grown man, and so was Theo. He had no responsibility to check on him.
“Hey dude, I’m going back to my apartment,” Theo said. The cockatiel nudged the macaw, who startled as he woke. “You gonna be okay here? You can have my seat.”
“No, I’ve gotta go home soon too,” Parrot replied.
“Where do you live?” Theo asked.
“I’m a commuter, I just park in the lot down the street. I live like half an hour from here,” replied the half-slumped over macaw.
“Dude, no way you’re driving home. I don’t want to be the last person to see you alive. Take a nap here or something.” Theo nudged him towards his study pod.
“No, I’m okay I swear,” replied Parrot. He tried to stand, but stumbled as he turned to reach into his bag, presumably to look for his car keys.
“No you’re not, you’re falling all over yourself!” Theo reached a hand out to steady the macaw. “Walk with me to my apartment, the couch is a pullout. My roommates probably aren’t even home.”
“Here, how about, if I can get down the stairs without stumbling, I’m fine to drive home. Not sure why you’re so worried about some guy you met in the school library anyways,” Parrot mumbled the last part to himself.
Theo laughed at the idea, knowing this would work out in his favor. “Sure dude. Come on.”
Theo led the way to the main staircase, having to stop several times to let Parrot catch up. When he opened the door, he turned around to let the macaw pass him. He watched as the other man slinked through the door, only to catch his foot on the notorious dip in the floor where the door had swung open many times before, and stumbled, barely catching himself on the handrail to the stairs.
“Yeah, you’re not driving,” Theo said.
Parrot sighed. “Fine.”
The pair swiped their student ID cards at the exit of the library before beginning the bone-chilling walk back to Theo’s apartment. The frigid breeze seemed to cause the macaw to lose his sense of balance more often than the average person would. His wings pressed tightly against himself, tucked inside the warm brown jacket that was hardly keeping any of the cold out, from what the cockatiel could tell. Theo had given up looking for his sunglasses, figuring he’d find them whenever he woke up, leaving the streets much more illuminated than he’d even realized they were, even for 3 am. Wet streets reflected neon signs’ colors, a pink and purple hue lighting the street that the avians had turned onto.
Another gust of wind struck them as they passed a gap between two buildings, making both of the men shiver now. They walked silently though, the half-asleep macaw trusting the cockatiel to lead him somewhere safe. The cold air was the thing keeping him awake enough to walk, but the monotonous rhythm of boots falling on the ground was lulling him to sleep already. When Theo stopped at a crosswalk, giving the button a simple press, he saw Parrot look up at him. He wondered if it was safe to look at him, to make sure that the other hadn’t turned into a phantom next to him yet; the macaw’s pale skin clammy as Theo reached for his hand to drag him across the street. I guess that means he’s still real, he thought, letting go of the other as they reached the opposite sidewalk.
It was really a short distance from the library to Theo’s apartment, being just off campus and a fast walker, so Theo usually made this trip much faster. However, with the stumbling avian at his side, he had gotten much colder at the prolonged exposure to the outdoors. When he began to fumble with the keys to his apartment, he heard a small chuckle from the macaw.
“What is it?” Theo asked, looking around.
“You can’t even open your door,” Parrot replied. He chuckled again.
“I don’t suppose you could either, with how frozen your hands are,” Theo muttered.
The click of the door led way to it swinging open, and the dark living room became slightly illuminated from the lights outside. The cockatiel stepped in, turning on the lights, then turning to let the macaw in behind him. Parrot stumbled through the door, the low light level of the string lights making it hard for him to see anything. He turned to the couch and put his bag down next to it. Theo walked over, pulling out the seats to become a bed, then pushing the ottoman to the side of the room.
“Thanks, Theo,” Parrot said as he grabbed a throw pillow from the seat next to the couch.
“No problem.” Theo opened the lid of the ottoman to grab a blanket, handing it to the macaw. “The bathroom is down that hall, first door on the left. My room’s at the end of the hall if you need anything. Get some sleep, man.” With that, he patted the macaw on the shoulder and went down to his room, unlocked, then closed the door.
A few minutes later, he heard shuffling, then a door opening and closing down the hall. He checked the clock on his nightstand - 3:40 am. Oh man, there is not enough time in this world for how much sleep debt I’m in. He waited to hear the door open and close again before he turned off the lamp in his room. He saw the faint illumination of the fairy lights from the crack under his door. Theo had set them on a timer for 15 minutes, though surely it would take the macaw less time to fall asleep. As they faded out, so did Theo, with one last waking thought:
That final is going down.