A Bird In the Hand, by Gabrielle Kaasa

Courtesy of Jeanette Kremer

“A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush!” Shirley sang, fairly tittering with glee.

Get this fucking bird out of my hand right now is more what I was thinking. Shirley had dragged me here to this hippie restaurant in the middle of Atlanta. All I wanted was to stop at the Varsity, get an orangeade and a hot dog and keep driving through to Tallahassee, but no. No, we had to stop at some vegetarian place where they keep fucking birds and eat cabbage and hold a goddamned bird. I hate hippies, and I hate cabbage, and I hate birds. Shirley knows this.

She also knows that I won’t say much about it, not out loud anyway. Under the best of circumstances, I’m not a very vocal guy. I’d like to say that I’m the strong, silent, John Wayne type, but I can’t lie to myself- I’m really just a pussy. I’ve never seen much point in arguing with people. I’m not a tall guy, and not big, either. I wear glasses. I got a weak chin. I blend into the walls. No one even notices me, much less takes me seriously. So I don’t argue. Especially not with my girlfriend Shirley. Especially not while we’re on the way to Florida to go to her dad’s funeral. I’m a pussy, but I’m not an asshole. So when she wanted to stop at the hippie place and eat cabbage and get me to hold a bird, I didn’t say anything. It seemed to make her happy, and she needed some happy right then.

The bird seemed happy, too. It started tweeting and twittering a pretty little song, which I probably could have enjoyed if I didn’t hate birds so damn much. it unnerved me, this bird singing in my hand, and moving its little feet around and poking me and singing and all I could think was get this fucking bird out of my hand right now.

“Hold still, let me take a picture!” Shirley rummaged around in her huge purse for her tiny digital camera. It took forever for her to get it out of the padded case, then turn it on, then get the settings just right, and all the time, I still have this damn bird in my hand, tickling my palms with its tiny, dirty little bird claws and it’s driving me insane and I’m about to scream-

“Say cheese!” Shirley twittered, her voice shrill and tinny and loud.

It was real loud, loud enough to startle the bird, who flapped its wings in my face- right in my face, oh god- so I threw it out of my hand and it flew up and away from me and over to the hippie birdkeeper guy, who gave me a very dirty look. He held the bird tight and still, smoothing its feathers and speaking to it in a low, soft voice while he carried it back to its cage, never saying another word to us.

On the way back to the car, Shirley stopped and checked the picture.

“Oh, it’s so good! Look!” She thrust the camera into my hand. I’d moved too quickly, and the shot was blurry, off-center, and had only captured my open hand with the bird flying away.

“I want to paint this,” Shirley said with that dreamy look in her eyes that she gets when she’s being “creative,” or “artistic,” as she would say, or “a lazy fucking daydreamer,” as my dad would say. Shirley painted, and she was alright, I guess- I’m no art critic, I didn’t even go to college- but she never sold any. I thought it was because her paintings all were kinda…I dunno- lazy and fuzzy- like the edges of everything were all smudged. She could draw really well, so why didn’t she just paint things the way they really were? I wondered, but I didn’t ask her, of course. She did the cooking and cleaning, and I didn’t bother her about getting a job, or her paintings hanging all over the walls, and that worked out just fine for us.

I didn’t think about the bird again for a while. The funeral and the trip back were really hard on Shirley (and me, honestly- I had to do all the driving) and then work picked up for me when we returned and I didn’t take much notice of what Shirley was doing. She painted during the day and then cooked and cleaned and I came home and we watched TV in bed until we fell asleep. It was a comfortable life.

Then one day, I came home and found Shirley cooking steaks in the kitchen.

“Steaks? I thought we were having meatloaf, babe,” I said as I set down my lunch bag. I liked steaks a lot, but I loved meatloaf, and I won’t lie, I was a little disappointed.

She turned to me with a huge smile. “I did it, sweetie! I finally did it!”

“Did what?”

“I sold a painting!” she said, throwing her arms around me in a huge bear hug. “One of the regulars down at the bar is redecorating her office and heard I painted, so I showed her some of my stuff and she bought four paintings!”

“Well, that’s nice, sugar,” I said,giving her a kiss on the nose. I was happy if she was happy. It was hard to believe someone actually paid money for one of her pictures, but hey, I’m no art critic.

“Her favorite was the new one I did- you know, from that picture of you and the bird.”

“Really? That picture was all blurry and shit. Oh well, I guess that’s kinda like your paintings, anyway, huh?”

Shirley pulled back from our hug with a frown. She didn’t say anything, but she stood there and stared into my face like she was looking for something. It was creepy. I put my hand up to my nose, thinking I had a booger or something.

“That was a mean thing to say,” Shirley finally said.

I wasn’t trying to be mean. I was trying to make a little joke. Why did I even say anything? This is why I never say anything.

“Naw, I wasn’t trying to be mean, baby! You know I just don’t get art. Come on, don’t be mad.” I pulled her back into a hug and kissed her forehead. She softened a little bit. I could smell the steaks beginning to char and looked over her shoulder at the stove.

“Those steaks smell real good, baby.” I thought I felt her get a little stiff, but she didn’t say anything, she just turned and flipped the steaks like she won’t ever mad, so I went in the living room and turned on Wheel of Fortune. Then we ate steaks and potatoes and went to bed like always and never said one more word about it.

I didn’t know she was still mad until I came home from work on Monday. All her stuff was gone, all the walls bare, all her fuzzy paintings gone. I had her in my hand, all quiet and still, until she started singing her own song- then, without meaning to, I opened my hand and tossed her out. And she flew away.