He hopes she won’t go in the back yard, because he doesn’t want her to find out that way. Slipped and fell on a garden fork stirring compost in the rain. He feels like a dumb old man.

He was scared until now, but now she’s back from her trip, and he’s calm. He can’t see her yet, because he’s still hidden away, waiting to burst out.

It’s dark where he is.

He has trouble remembering.

There’s still some of him out back, staring up at the dim gray cords of falling rain, which push more of him into darkness with each slapping drop.

Over the last few days, most of him filtered down through layers of grass roots, muddy topsoil, clay, sand. Ants drank drops of him. Worms used him to remoisten themselves. The marbling veins of mold absorbed what they needed as he sank through them.

He finally met a hard surface, then found pores to push into and passed through it almost like a ghost, regathered himself and slid into a large, dripping chamber.

There were others with him, so many others. Parts of others. Sent bobbing and spinning by more falling drops. Drifting. Some muttered clipped phrases in other languages, some in ancient tongues, some roared or growled, or they chittered, squawked, or grunted. But most were silent. He passed them, passed through some, felt their anger or sadness or confusion, felt some of it come with him, felt himself shrink a little.

The others frightened him, so he used the pulse of drips in the chamber to move along the walls, and found a way out. A long black tunnel full of others sitting, muttering, idle. It was harder to push through them, and they pulled more from him as he went.

The tunnel shrank and split.

He thought to split himself with it, to see where both paths led, but stretching apart made him feel weak, blurry at the edges.

So he chose only one and followed it.

Now he waits at the mouth of the tunnel, seeing light for the first time in days, staring down at the kitchen sink drain.

He hears her take the kettle from the stove, smells her vanilla hand cream—and he rushes forth into the kettle. He’s dizzy, blurred with others and bubbles in a new dark place. Loud metallic whooshing rises in pitch as it fills.

This churning is almost too much, but the rhythmic click of the stove lighting reminds him of who and where he is, and that he may see her.

Others relax into the heat and stretch themselves into division. Their mutterings go monosyllabic, then silent.

He focuses himself.

The water bucks and roars. Fragments of others split further, expand, and blow out the spout in a scream.

The kettle lifts and he feels the water calm.

Porcelain tinkles, and he’s poured into a mug where he mingles with sweet, pungent chamomile leaves.

She looks distracted—he’s almost forgotten why—and she disappears.

The stairs creak. Thumps above as she walks down the hall and says his name again. Then again.

Stairs creak, and she reappears, curls her hands around him, a single concerned eye visible past the lip of the mug.

She has her phone. He recognizes his own voice quiet and tinny. Then she speaks, but from all of it, he only understands the sound of his own name.

She puts the phone down and still looks concerned.

Everything shifts as the mug rises and tips, her face grows in the sky like a planet, the water lifts to touch her lip, air gusts from her nose above him, stirring the steam, and he relaxes and splits, and half of him disappears into her mouth.

That part sees more darkness. Another descent. He feels warm and thick, and the walls are soft and more porous than the chamber in the yard. He pushes through membrane and pulls in all directions, divides, and blurs to nothing.

The rest of him sloshes and drifts and watches from the mug. He has trouble staying together, is too relaxed now, and divides, and divides again, and expands and rises from the surface to float before her face, her eyes staring through him, before he forgets himself and joins the air completely.

Thanks for your interest in the birdcage. Yes, that green is the original color! I was going through a box of my mom’s things this weekend and happened to find this photo (attached) from when she bought it in 1969. The photo is b/w so you’ll have to trust me that it was green. The bird is mom’s macaw, Salvatore. That’s my mom sticking her finger through the bars, and it’s a family joke that this photo was taken seconds before she lost the tip of her finger, which actually happened about a week later.

The cage was small for a macaw, but Salvatore only came out on Sundays to sit on my dad’s shoulder when he smoked his pipe on the back porch.

Macaws can live for 50 years, but he died very young. My brother opened the cage, and Salvatore flew right through the plate glass window. He probably thought it was Sunday.

Then mom kept a pair of budgies in the cage. My brother taught them to say “Jane, stop this crazy thing!” and they’d say it to each other for hours. Then while we were at school mom taught them to say “Jetson, you’re fired!”

I know there are photos of mom with the budgies, but I haven’t found them in her things yet. I’m pacing myself.

Gandalf89, your offer is generous, but I’ve decided to keep the cage. I’m very sorry. Thank you for reminding me of these things I’d almost forgotten.