Chapter Text
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As the afternoon bled its golden glory into the evening, chinks of light were cast into the Unstable University library, gilding each surface it could touch with slivers of amber shades. Dust motes darted through the shafts of the windows, falling like dreary snow in the facility.
A lone avian student sat hunched in his chair, slumped in a bleak corner of the cozy space. His slightly dull and untended wings were folded as neat as humanly possible against his back.
Each evening many students still mingle here at the UU Library well past the last classes of the day to hang out with friends or study for upcoming classes and assignments.
In Parrot’s case, he was preparing. It’s not that he didn’t have any friends - his friends would beg to differ - he just likes his alone time.
An additional toll on the number of students still left in the library has been made prominent, especially with the final assignment details being released.
Parrot couldn’t believe his eyes when he had opened the file for the final assignment details.
'To write about the beauty in life', when he had already dropped off flowers at his best friend’s grave last night?
How cruel and ironic.
Wifies said he loved forget-me-nots. Specifically in the blue-purple shade, which always made him happy because it reminded him of his friendship with Parrot. Said that his old friends - Ken and Wato - used to exchange forget-me-nots with him before he transferred to Parrot’s high school.
Sad how he didn’t make it past high school. Would’ve been less of a sorry soul at managing money and waking up in time for classes at the literal break of dawn.
He would’ve slipped those little sticky notes with birds scrawled in the corner into Parrot’s notebook, reminding him to eat or sleep or live properly, or if the avian chud had any extracurriculars after school.
He would’ve gotten grades higher than Spoke’s sugar levels.
He would’ve reminded him the meaning of appreciating life.
Parrot shook his head, blinking away the tears stinging at the corners of his eyes. He wasn’t going to break into ugly sobs in the middle of the library, no, not ever.
It was just the dust, that was for sure.
(..Parrot really just missed Wifies' stupid smile and nerdy yapping.)
The avian scratched his messy brown hair, adjusting the rims of his glasses and dusting off his black trousers and beige sweater with a cockatiel sown lopsidedly onto the pocket.
(That was when Wifies taught him how to hand-sew. ..It didn’t end well.)
Instead he opted to scroll through the email sent by his professor:
'You are all given a month to find inspiration and to write those ideas down.
In this month it is recommended to go out to places you’ve never been before. To find beauty in something new. To find beauty in moving on.
To acknowledge the end of an era.
To see a beginning trickling into the horizon.
Good luck - and in case I don’t see you - good afternoon, good evening, and good night.
- Professor Jumper [Head of Literature]'
Parrot blinked. So it wasn’t going to be that hard.
..Until he realised the fact that he’d have to pay if he was going to go on a trip.
And that would cost money.
And it would eat at his little savings.
Oh, how unbelievably cooked he was.