Tommy

‘Oh you bastard!’
+++++I slap at a mosquito.
+++++I straighten and wipe my forehead with the back of my glove and feel mud smear on my skin. Taking off my glove I rub at it. My left thumb feels like it always does. Woollen, dull, thick. Like it’s wearing three layers of gloves on its own.
+++++I squint down at the bucket. It’s only half full. My rule for weeding is that I’m not allowed to stop until it’s three-quarters full. If I don’t discipline myself the back garden path would get overrun with ivy.
+++++Leaning forward I pinch a clover stem between my thumb and index finger. That’s an exercise I’d had to practice often after my injury. I roll the tiny leaves back and forth. They feel cool, smooth and moist on my index finger pad. A sensation of something there but not much else on my thumb. I pull it out. Little clumps of dry dirt cling to the creeping roots.
+++++I throw it into the bucket. It misses. I can’t be bothered to bend down and pick it up.
+++++‘You’ll die anyway,’ I tell the errant weed.
+++++Picking up the bucket I decide it’ll have to do. Plus the path’s not looking too bad at the moment anyway. The summer dry’s helped keep the weeds in check, though once the rains start properly again in two to three week’s time they’ll grow back with a vengeance. Bloody weeds. Last to die, first to grow.
+++++Walking back up the path I hear a familiar cry.
+++++‘Agggh. Agggh. Agggh.’
+++++‘Tommy!’
+++++Emerging from under the rose arch I see them. Vera walking slowly through the lawn, her mottled black head dipped as she listens to the ground in front of her. Tommy running along side, his chest and legs covered in down, his beak open widely, long pink tongue showing, yelling in his mum’s ear to feed him. Vera stops when she notices me and watches with wary hopefulness. She ignores her noisy son. He stops and turns and watches me too. Inquisitive beady black eyes above the little nostril holes in his beak.
+++++‘Hello guys,’ I say.
+++++Tommy’s beak opens and closes without noise. I see him looking at the bucket.
+++++‘Sorry guys, I don’t have any bread or cheese on me.’
+++++He takes a step forward. Cranes his neck.
+++++‘Don’t you believe me?’ I bend down and tilt the bucket towards him. ‘See? Nothing you can eat.’
+++++He stretches out his wings. They tremble. He lets out a plaintive ‘Waagggh’.
+++++Vera gives up on me and continues listening for bugs. Tommy takes a few steps closer.
+++++‘OK. Don’t be a scaredy cat then.’
+++++I leave the bucket where it is and cross the lawn slowly in a wide arc to get to the back door. I get the Tupperware container of bread and cheese cubes out of the fridge. When I go back outside Vera’s gone but Tommy’s standing by the wheelbarrow garden.
+++++‘Has your mum left you?’ I say.
+++++He peers at me through the wheel’s spokes.
+++++I crouch and hold out a crust. He looks interested but doesn’t move.
+++++‘C’mon,’ I say. ‘I’m not going to throw it to you.’
+++++We watch each other for a moment, then he runs forward a few steps, pounces, brings up something in his beak. I hear a crunch.
+++++‘What did you get?’ I say.
+++++He ignores me.
+++++‘C’mon.’ I put the crust back in the container and pick out a cheese cube. I hold it out and jiggle it. ‘My legs are getting sore. I can’t wait all day.’
+++++He sees the cheese. Starts running up the lawn. Little baby legs pumping. The cutest thing in wings.
+++++There’s a loud ‘CAW’.
+++++Jack the crow swoops down and Tommy the baby magpie jumps and flies away.

Suvi Mahonen is studying for her Masters (Writing and Literature) at Deakin University in Australia. She has published short stories in various literary magazines and online in Australia, the UK (including on East of the Web) and the United States (most recently on Mad Swirl), and has worked as a journalist both in Australia and Canada. She lives in the Dandenong Ranges near Melbourne with her husband and writing buddy, Luke Waldrip. Examples of her creative work can be seen at Redbubble.