"It's too early for this," said the unknown man. He looked at the green, digital numbers of his car's clock and sighed.
'6:30'
The long line of traffic in front of him had clogged at the merge of two highways. Off in the distance, he could see a rise of skyscrapers and the smog that trailed off of their slender forms. For the first time in his life, he longed to be already under their shadows instead of in this blasted traffic. He furrowed his brows and slumped back into his seat, keeping his foot slammed against the break.
"Well never get there in time now. She'll be leaving for work soon."
The little Toyota Corolla's grinding engine was the only reply. Boxes of harnesses and medieval pamphlets littered the back seat and vibrated along with the old engine. The man turned and moved some of the boxes to retrieve his phone from his jacket pocket. He was about to dial a number when he looked up and saw that the line of cars had moved forward. He tossed his cellphone behind him and quickly moved to close the gap between him and the little Nissan in front of him. Though sluggish at first, the traffic slowly picked up, and he began to make up for the time he had lost.
A loud shudder came from the box in the passenger seat. A wing beat against the little metal cage door in a burst of energy.
"Calm down, Prithee. I know you're excited to see Beth too," he said. He put his hand near the bars and the shuddering stopped. A beak peaked out and chirped at his gesture.
"I know you're restless. You'd usually be out and getting ready for the first performance by now, wouldnt you?"
The beak affectionately pecked his thumb and retreated back inside the kennel. The man patted the kennel and returned to his steering wheel.
"It's nice to get a day off from the hustle and bustle though. We've been doing performances in the heat for the past 6 days and I don't know about you, but I needed a rest. Plus, I get to surprise Beth," he said, cheerfully. Prithee seemed to ride better when she could hear his voice, so he kept talking.
"She doesn't even know we're coming to see her," he continued. "I called her on the phone this morning and told her we got rained out with the thunderstorm, but she doesn't know we got the day off. It's an hour and half drive to the city, but it's worth it. It'll probably be the last chance you and I will have for a visit for a while... the Renaissance Faires biggest crowds are supposed to be coming in for the next three weeks."
Prithee seemed to be quieting down. He glanced at her through the small holes in the sides of the kennel and saw her large form had settled into the bottom.
Good. She can sleep until we get into the city.
Soon, the man turned off at an exit for New York City. It was always a long drive down from Tuxedo, but he enjoyed the time away from the rugged, rough characters that he worked with. His fellow austringers weren't that bad, especially when they all cared for the birds together, but the rest of his co-workers always made him uneasy. The other performers at the Ren Faire were jousters or horseback riders, all pretty intimidating. But that was normally how he felt in any social situation, so maybe it was just him.
As he drove into the city, he saw that, as usual, it didn't matter how early it was. The city was always alive. He crossed into the city street traffic, taking his place among the taxis and busses that crowded the lanes.
He hated driving in the city. It was always so cramped and crowded with people. He remembered that, as a child, he used to cling to his mothers pants when they'd ride the subway. It was only when Beth would find him a seat away from all the strangers that he would be able to relax. Their mother always told her not to coddle him. That he had to get used to the busyness of the city or he'd never adjust.
Guess she was right.
The man sighed deeply and turned a corner. A red sedan blared their horn as a pedestrian hurried across the crosswalk in front of them. She was carrying a tray of coffee and almost spilled it at the sudden noise.
Prithee shook the cage and screeched in a short, shrill tone. Red Harris Hawks are among some of the most common hawks used for hunting and performance work, but they don't like to be kept in tight spaces for as long as it takes to drive from Tuxedo to New York City.
"Just a few more minutes, Prithee. Well be there soon."
Prithee screeched and rattled the door again. She tried to expand her wings and hit the sides of the kennel in exasperation.
I should've let her out before we got into the city.
There were plenty of places he could've given her a break along the way, but he was anxious about the time. Now that they were in the city, there were no places to let her out without being noticed.
He turned the corner on Central Park N and blinked as the morning sun shined into his car through the lack of buildings to his right. Rising up on his left were apartments that towered above them, casting slated shadows across the pavement. Prithee screeched again. Loudly. She rocked her kennel frantically, banging her wings against the metal. The man swerved in the road out of surprise, invoking an angry honking from the line of cars to his left.
The man grunted in annoyance. Central Park's large greenspace called to him from his right. The large green American Elm and Hornbeam trees stretched up towards the sun, mirroring the party of women doing yoga beneath them. Small children who weren't in school ran around the playground while their nannies gossiped in the shade. Joggers paced the sidewalks, shiny with suntan oil and sweat.
Ugh... People...
He drove further down its side and stopped at a traffic light. While paused, he glanced again at the greenspace. Prithee called out, sounding impatient and getting more and more riled up as the moments passed.
"I can't bring you in there, Prithee. Its not allowed." He said, agitated. In reply, she banged the roof so hard that the kennel popped up into the air for a second.
"Ok! Ok! You win!"
The man took a hard turn and skillfully maneuvered them into a parking lot off of Central Park. He positioned their vehicle at the very end, close to a crowd of trees. People were mulling around, but at this hour most seemed to be staying in the open spaces meant for walking and cloud watching, not into the trees where the man was planning on bringing his bird.
The gravel under his feet seemed too loud as he made his way to the passenger door. He unlatched the straps on her carrier in swift, familiar motions, his ears acutely aware of every sound that could bring attention to them. He grabbed his satchel from the trunk and picked up her carrier, trying to make himself small.
Sneaking into the park as inconspicuously as possible, the man ducked under a rope barrier meant to deter visitors from the unfrequented sections, away from the main walking and hiking trails. People didn't seem to notice him as he carried his possessions down a small dirt path that led into the trees. Large trees, preliminaries for the bigger forests that Central Park was known for, welcomed him and his bird.
He looked back. No one was following, no one was even looking his way. He smiled, his tendency to being unnoticed doing him a service for once. For the first time since being back in civilization he let his shoulders relax and allowed nature to swallow them whole.
After walking for a while, he came to a remote clearing, with lots of overgrown grasses and bushes, letting the man know that it didn't have a lot of foot traffic or maintenance workers. He opened his satchel and put on a hawking glove, the leather cracked with use and age. Prithee chirped excitedly, knowing that freedom was moments away. He laughed at her and opened her cage. She hopped on his glove and perched to stretch her wings.
The unknown man looked at her beautiful wings with a sense of pride. He named her Prithee for the grey tinge on the ends of her feathers. It reminded him of the grey gloves the noble cosplayer women at the Ren Faires wore. They always spoke in proper faire slang, Prithee meaning please, a quaint, proper term that felt good to hear. It was unusual for red Harris Hawks to have such grey and brown feathers. Usually they were brown with a gorgeous rush of red on their wings. He always suspected she wasn't a purebred, from the differences in her size and coloring. She was bigger than the others of her species and seemed to prefer him to her own nest mates. Maybe it was due to how she wasn't fully one breed or another, something the man felt they had in common. Or maybe she could just sense how much of an outsider he was and took pity on him. Either way, he loved his bird very much and treasured the time they spent together.
She perked up for a second, looking out into the trees on the far side of the clearing. He let go of the rope that was tied to her ankle band, allowing her to pursue anything she may spot. Suddenly, she leaped off her perch with a great force of leg strength and flew across the clearing into the trees. The unknown man jogged after her like he usually did, quickly losing sight of her in the branches. He bent to stoop under the first outlying branches and entered the trees. He breathed in the familiar scent of dirt and underbrush and began the search for his companion.
He never felt at home in society. Getting a normal job, surrounded by normal, fake people all day... It never attracted him. He remembered the long nights he spent on the roof of their apartment with the carrier pigeons he raised as a boy. He would spend hours with them instead of doing homework or playing with friends. He took care of them and raised them, always feeling more at home with them then he did with his broken family.
Beth was the only one who ever cared.
His sister, Beth, had been the only one to support him when he joined the staff of the Renaissance Faires, apprenticing under one of the hawk masters there. His mother had wanted him to get a real job and go to college, but his sister had supported him, understanding he had never really fit in with society.
Realizing his mind had wandered, he stopped and scanned the forest floor for a sign of a kill.
Nothing.
He walked for ten minutes more with no luck of finding her. Beginning to get worried, he pulled out her whistle and began to call her back to him.
Nothing.
He made his way deeper into remote territory, checking his watch and saw it was now 7:30. He needed to get back. His sister usually left for work around 8, and he wanted to surprise her before she left.
"Prithee! Here, girl!" he called, worry creeping into his voice.
He had raised her from an eyas, given to him from a fellow austringer at the Ren Faire. If he lost her to these woods, he'd never forgive himself.
Suddenly, he hears a screeching.
Prithee!
She sounded in destress. Very in destress. He ran towards the sound, slicing his fingers and legs on the brambles of the underbrush. He burst out of the trees and onto the bank of a bubbling stream. On the other side lay a dead rabbit, half eaten with bones littering the shore.
Then he saw her.
She was laying on the bank, covered in a green, sticky substance. It had coated her wings and body, the bones that she had been picking at stuck into her feathers. She was struggling to be free, screeching a horrible call of panic. He trudged through the stream as fast as he could, watching in horror as a faint white haze wafted off her body.
It was burning her.
Finally, he reached her, kneeling down at her side. His anxiety was at a high, not knowing what kind of substance was killing his precious bird. The goo was leaking from an odd-looking canister a few meters up the side of the bank. Acid maybe? Or maybe some kind of radioactive waste?
Without thinking for his own safety, he plunged his hands into the liquid, pulling his bird out. The green substance oozed down his arms onto his legs, immediately filling him with a horrible burning sensation. It smelled horrible and stuck to him like it wanted to cover him completely. He tried to get up and bring her to the creek to wash her off.
One step... two steps
His arms began to seize up and twitch. He dropped Prithee on the ground, crying out as she hit the dirt. He yelled in horror as his limbs began to burn with a renewed fire, convulsing his muscles so he didn't have power over them.
He fell to the ground. He screamed, even though no one could hear him this deep into the woods. He cringed and gasped as what felt like patches of needles poking through his skin from the inside began to form along his arms and chest. In his state, the man managed to look over at his bird, but quickly looked away, tears streaming down the sides of his face. He saw she was being destroyed by the liquid as well, thinking he had seen bones starting to protrude from her small frame. The man looked up at the sky through a break in the tree branches, breathing rapidly through a clenched jaw.
It was clear, with a few clouds scattered around to provide occasional shade for those who wished to spend the day outdoors. They probably were the outliers of the thunderstorm currently canceling the Ren Faire in Tuxedo. But here, it would be a perfect day to bring his birds out. They would've loved to feel the sunshine on their feathers, practicing their landing on his glove.
If only I had been able to tell Beth goodbye.
He closed his eyes, and let death have its victory.