South for Winter (standard:Psychological fiction, 1446 words)
Author: sayan	Added: Jul 25 2004	Views/Reads: 3391/2246	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
The story of one winter in the back of beyond.

Click here to read the first 75 lines of the story

It was cold and green. Sometimes you cry even if not happy. Polly I 
mean- little things die so easily and forever. I turned my face away 
often to avoid staring it. I couldn't help her, she had flown away. 
Clouds in the sky hid her. They won-the clouds. Since the last two days 
I couldn't find her. It had been raining as in Calcutta and we had rain 
with scary thunder, lightning and storm. It would have died 
anyway-Polly I mean because 17th was bitterly cold, dark, cloudy, 
stormy. Besides it was a little thing. ... 

Where was I? ... I never believed what my teacher or mother said. I
liked Polly, first time someone didn't make fun of me or turn away to 
hide. Compassion? .... Anyway days, weeks and months slipped happily 
by, I sometimes wept to myself, Polly never did, she stayed the same in 
her cage, in my left hand. The clouds embraced us and we were wet. It 
began raining as it does in Calcutta from 14th. On 15th morning she was 
missing and her cage door was open. I looked for her in the cloudy sky 
and smiled sadly. ...I feel so cold now. 

... 17th was bitterly cold, dark, cloudy, and stormy. I ran madly and
reached my house, went into my cold room, shut the door and cried in 
the dark. Polly was cold and green. That night it continued to rain as 
in Calcutta. The rain fell with great fury on everything, forming a 
mist. It pattered on the glass panes when the wind threw it there at an 
angle. Always-angry wind, blowing flowers (and dead leaves) onto my 
face. Tiny drops dripped onto the floor forming a small pool which no 
leaves covered and where you couldn't see your face. Near dawn the rain 
was over. A full moon rose and a silvery ray fell on my face through 
the still wet glass panes. I closed my eyes, red and tired..... 

The rain is dying down now, as I was saying. ...... Polly? my parrot's
name-no-I shouldn't have thrown Polly out of the window, expecting her 
to fly away south for winter. Parrots don't. Living in captivity for so 
long she couldn't adapt to the cold, dark, cloudy and stormy weather. 
It was my fault. I couldn't find her clouds were in the way. On 17th 
morning I found her cold and green, near the window, when she had tried 
to return. Nobody had noticed as it was raining hard like it does in 
Calcutta. I remembered what I had done, felt very angry, picked up her 
body, ran all around, till I fell and cut myself over and over on that 
bitterly cold, dark, cloudy, stormy day. 

When my parents understood why I was crying they hid their silly smiles.
Why? Why? Mother said “It's only made of Plaster of Paris, we'll fix 
it, don't worry”- What? Polly had tried to return home when she 
couldn't find other birds to fly south as it was too deep in winter. 
How can you fix it? What's mother talking about... 

The rain has stopped long ago. Lying on the bed I can see the sky
through the curtains as the wind gently sways them. Tonight stars are 
falling from the sky-time has changed everything in the last forty 
years-for the better. ... What's mother saying- I don't understand-its 
so cold-and nobody ever understood me. Why? Why? Was it because I never 
talked since I was five years old?  Only Polly my little bird who 
nearly flew south for winter. 


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