My Dinner Interrupted

Excellence Award in the 'Write Along 2018' competition

I wheezed laboriously as the dust fumes from the fire clogged my airway, the ringing in my ears pierced my skull, making me feel dizzy inside. All I could remember was strolling across the footpath in the humid, damp air on my way back home from work, then suddenly, BOOM! The shop nearby exploded into fragments. My dinner must be getting cold, I thought miserably. I had a delicious dish of curry waiting for me at home. I grumbled in annoyance; why couldn't it be just like any other normal day? Why of all days, today when I have my mother's special recipe of curry waiting for me at home? I glanced around, my sight all fuzzy, though I could just make out my surroundings. I was still on the footpath, covered in rubble. I groaned tiredly as I tried heaving myself up, a searing pain shooting up my spine. I could hear people wailing for each other, kids crying, fires crackling. Nearby, I could hear a strangled sound, almost like something was wailing and in pain. I crawled across the footpath, shifting debris from buildings and houses out of the way toward the source of the sound. My eyebrows were seared from the heat of the blaze, my skin scorched, but I plodded onwards. As I peered into the gloom, trying to track where the cry had come from, a movement caught my eye. I gasped. In front of me lay a helpless baby canary, only a few months old. He had small blue feathers just emerging from his skin, and there were patches around him which were pink from burns. His eyes with big, blue circles like saucers surrounding them, were still slits. I bent down towards the nestling, gently raising it in my palm. "Where's your mother?" I murmured to the poor creature, stroking him on his fuzzy head, which had small tufts of feathers emerging out. The youngling flapped its wings in alarm, gaping its beak widely, squawking for food. Its right wing was at an odd angle. He struggled to lift himself up, flailing his left wing furiously, turning around in circles. "Shhh," I soothed the poor thing. "We need to find your mother, she'll know what to do." Bird in palm, I limped toward a safer area and started whistling, signalling for the mother bird of the baby. After a few minutes of calling, I slumped down, exhausted. "I'm sorry little one," I whispered to the hatchling. Just as I was about to lose hope, a piercing squawk cut through the air, like a knife through butter. As I looked up, a blue, adult canary soared above. It came swooping down, eyeing the youngling in my palm. The mother gently landed on my shoulder, and she nodded her head in gratitude toward me. Carefully, she clutched her baby in her claws, and with a beat of her wings, they were off. I smiled toward them in a silent farewell. "Goodbye," I whispered.

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