The Joy of Life: An Unfortunate Flock

Missing details

We talked as he lead me to his mom. The walk was short but nice as I was able to get a better gauge of his personality when we reached our destination; another tiny brick house that had children's drawings all over the front wall and a thatched roof roughly painted blue. The sign read, "Mrs. Sheer's boy daycare."

"We have to wait. Mom an' Dad are busy."

Before even going inside, the sudden idea of letting two pretty birds with a bunch of toddlers didn't sit well with me. I had already begun considering if I could just give him the potatoes and look elsewhere, but once we got to the door, I felt obligated to let him show me around.

The building was originally somebody's house based on the interior design. But in place of the kitchen, they turned it into a first aid area. The back of the house was walled off with wood and stone walls, and in the intersection between them, there was a small stool that had been separated from the rest. The main room was a nearly empty, dirt floor playroom with a drawing of a sunny sky and a biblical quote on the left wall. A few shaggy carpets filled the space, along with a few toys and papers filled with scraggly doodles and writing. Two other boys and a young woman were there when we came in. They looked at us, then they looked at me and then my two birds.

"Wow! Birdies!" said the first boy.

The first boy seemed more well fed then the other two but seemed to stagger while walking over. The second boy looked at the birds as well, but I can tell he's also looking at my stomach. "I'm not the biggest person there is you know," I thought to myself. After a while of them gawking at us, I asked for Mrs. Sheer.

"She's there. She's busy." the first boy said, quickly gesturing towards the back of the house.

"May I go inside?"

"You can." replied the young woman from the corner. "Just please be considerate of Mrs. Sheer's work. She is always busy with something."

I went through the door to find that it couldn't open the whole way. Beyond the wall, the small room I was in was a lot like the playroom except that a window to outside showed a woman, presumably Mrs. Sheer, washing a pair of trunks in a small basin. Inside, it looked like a very compressed house. To my right, one of the beds was right in front of the other in the corner with a tiny bed stand against the end of the wall. To my left, a tiny serving area with four chairs, a cabinet with a lock, and two stools for makeshift tables.

I looked out the window to get the attention of the woman. In the minute that I had been looking in her room, she had used a small table to cut and prepare two tomatoes and a squash. She was now making a small fire on a rocky patch of her backyard as a man was cleaning out the wash basin with a cloth.

I waved at them to get their attention but they wouldn't look up. So, I knocked on the window a few times until the birds started charging at the thing like boars and startled the two. Thankfully, they didn't notice the few scratches on the glass when the woman yelled "Come out here!".

Their backyard was smaller than it looked. It had a rocky patch for small fires, a tilled spot for vegetables or fruit, and a small shed probably filled with tools and equipment. And from up close, the dirt looked rocky. Mrs. Sheer was taller than anyone I have seen in this town, which was mostly just men, and even seemed fairly strong for what looked like a woman in her late thirties. The man by comparison looked like an older nephew of the woman.

"Who are you?" she nearly snarled, her lips not forming any semblance of content. "Did you want to drop off your kids?"

"No. I wanted to ask you about Eliot's parents. Do you know when they'll be back?"

> Mrs. Sheer: I'm his mother. What did he do?

> Jubilee: He didn't do anything. I just wanted to know if you knew of someplace I could rest at.

> Mrs. Sheer: Why'd you want to stay here? You running from something?

> Jubilee: No. I'm just looking for someone to care for these birds.

> Mrs. Sheer: There's a house that takes in strays over there and I don't want birds, so get those things outta here.

> Jubilee: Thank you. Have a nice day.

There went my original choice. But it wasn't all that bad. When I decided to go the stray house, I didn't know if she meant me or the birds as strays, Eliot asked if I could bring him to see the place. Obviously, I couldn't since going with a stranger without a parent's permission was dangerous. I also didn't want to make it harder for myself when I eventually leave. However, as I started to leave, he and the skinny boy walked over to me. The skinny one seemed embarrassed when he stood in front of me as he spoke.

"Do you have more seeds?" he asked pleadingly.

"Sure." I said. Reaching into my pocket, I made a few more seeds in my palm and handed them over. As he grabbed them, the larger boy hobbled over to us, picking out a seed to eat before Eliot covered them up with his own hands.

"Wait. For birds!" he said as he pointed at them on my shoulders. "I wanna feed the birds!" My birds seemed to know that they were about to be fed, but still gave me the side eye. I nodded my approval, which also was enough to push them off, and watched them gorge themselves on the seeds. "Thanks Juby-lay!"

Although I had not been able to find a home to the birds yet, I found myself pleased with what had happened so far. I had begun to think about my plan for the stray house, considering that the animals there might just eat the birds anyway, when the young woman had approached me. Despite her rounded frame, I could see where the girdle protruded along the bottom of her ribcage, meaning she hadn't had much to eat as well.

"Excuse me," she said, "but are you a sister?"

The question threw me off a bit until I realized she meant a member of their local church. My clothing, a dark and long dress with no accessories or thoughtful design that covered me from neck to toe, with the exception of my face, hair and hands. I didn't want to sound weird to them about why I wore seemingly uncomfortable clothes during spring, so I went with it. I thought I looked like death, but a religious person seems better.

"Yes, but not of any local church." I said.

"Oh. Where?"

"Up North, through the passing in the woods." at least I wouldn't lie about where I came from.

"Well, then may I ask you a question concerning the people there?" she asked as her hands coiled into themselves.

"Go ahead."

She hesitated for a moment. "Uhh. Well, has your church taken in any younger... orphans? Or maybe uh... homeless people?" Her form was quickly downtrodden; she couldn't look me in the eye any more and wouldn't relax her grip on her left wrist.

"You're looking for someone who ran from somewhere?" I asked quietly. She quickly glanced down, patting down her already clean dress, and subtlety nodded.

"I'm looking for my younger brother. He ran from my husband's home a few days ago. My sister-in-law said she would keep an eye if she saw him down south, but I haven't heard anything yet. He looks like Eliot almost, only taller and more fit."

"Well, no, but did you know where he might've gone too?"

"He used to ask about the strange lights that happen up North supposedly. But that was months ago. He could be anywhere he wanted now." Her last word slightly quivered as she choked back what I believed to be sudden sob. Something seemed to tick in the distance, like a tiny needle was hitting glass.

"What was his name?"

Coughing to regain her composure, she replied, "Alan D. Shoemaker. And I am Christina."

Without any hesitation, I said, "I'll look for him."

"Oh thank you!" she said. "You don't know how grateful I am to hear that. If you do see him, please tell him I'm sorry if I upset him." her words fell out like she had been holding them the whole conversation. But so was I.

After the kids were done playing with the birds, I went directly back into the woods. I hadn't even thought if i will see those men again; I just went along the path I had come in through.