Breakfast with the Birds

My name is Molly, and I love birds. I also love Sunday mornings. And I totally love peanut butter for breakfast. On school days, I spread it on toast, but on Sundays I put it on plain bread because I’m in much too big a hurry to wait for the toaster to pop up. That’s because I get up really, really early on Sundays so I can do my most favorite thing in the whole world. I have breakfast with the birds. I’m the only one in my house who gets up early on Sunday. Mom and Dad don’t get up early because they work all week and every other Saturday. On Sundays they like to sleep late. My little brother doesn’t get up early because he’s only six and he hates to wake up anytime. Really! Dad has to wake him three or four times just to get him out of bed for breakfast. So he’ll never get up early. My brother’s name is Fred, but I call him Ferd. Sometimes I say it like this: “Hi, Ferrrrrd,” or “Good morning, Ferrrrrd,” or “Get out of my room, Ferrrrrd.” He gets mad at me for saying his name like that. I think that’s why he’s always getting into my stuff and sneaking into my room to try to scare me. Well, he can’t because I’m almost nine years old and I don’t get scared. So there. Mom likes birds as much as I do. She tells Ferd and me which birds are which. Like the nuthatch. Is that a funny name for a bird or what? And the cowbird. That’s Ferd’s favorite because he thinks that it will go “moo” one day. Sometimes when Mom spots a cowbird, she tells me first so I can run upstairs and tell Ferd that there’s a cow in our backyard. He knows what I mean and runs down to hear if the bird is mooing. It never does. I like when Mom teaches us about all the different birds that come to our house. She told us which birds stay around all winter, like the cardinals, and which ones go away and come back in the spring, like the robins. She’s even teaching us how to tell the boy birds from the girl birds. Dad knows as much about animals as Mom because both of them are veterinarians. That means they’re animal doctors. Pretty cool! Mom said that we get a lot of birds because we live close to the water. The place where we live is called Orient Point. It’s in New York, and it’s super cool because there’s a state park nearby and a lighthouse and tons of different animals and birds. The best part about Mom and Dad being veterinarians is that Ferd and I get to see lots of animals. We even get to help feed some of them. And we get new ones all the time. But the best thing that has ever happened to me in my whole life happened on a Saturday a few weeks ago. Ferd was playing in the tree house that Dad built for him in a cherry tree. Mom and Dad were at their veterinary clinic, and I was in the kitchen. Suddenly Ferd came running into the house, screaming, “There’s a monster on top of my tree house! There’s a monster on top of my tree house!” “What does it look like?” I asked. “I don’t know,” Ferd said. “Then how do you know it’s a monster?” “Because it’s making funny noises and scratching and thumping on the roof.” “Maybe it’s a rabbit.” “Rabbits can’t climb trees, Molly.” “Well, maybe it’s a lizard.” “Lizards don’t make funny noises, Molly.” “Okay, I’ll go look at it.” “Oh no you won’t!” Ferd screamed. “You’re not allowed in my tree house. You’re a girl. I’ll go tell Dad.” Ferd won’t let me come up into his tree house. He says that it’s just for him and his friends and that girls aren’t allowed. Whenever he tells me that, I look right at him and tell him that I don’t care about his silly tree house because I’ve got a super cool dollhouse and he can’t play with it because boys aren’t allowed. So there. “Well, what are you waiting for, Ferrrrrd?” I said. “Go tell Dad.” I waited until he ran out of the kitchen. As soon as he was gone, I raced outside and climbed as fast as I could up above the tree house. I couldn’t believe what I saw. Something was flapping around and making funny sounds, just like Ferd had said. And even though I thought it would have been cool to see some kind of monster, it wasn’t anything like that. It was a bright red cardinal. I knew something was wrong with it, so I started yelling that there was a sick bird on the tree house roof. I pushed some leaves out of my way to yell again, but Ferd was already running toward me. And boy was he mad. “What are you doing in my tree house? You’re not allowed in my tree house. Get out of my tree house.” “I’m not in your tree house, Ferrrrrd. I’m in the tree. So there! And it’s a bird, Ferd, a cardinal—a boy cardinal. And something’s wrong with him. He can’t fly and he’s flapping only one wing and making funny noises and dragging himself in a circle.” “Are you sure?” “Well, duh, Ferd. I think I know what a boy cardinal looks like.” “Can you get near him?” Ferd shouted up. “Yeah, I think so, but I’ll have to go onto the roof of the tree house.” “So go,” Ferd said. I hollered, “You just told me you don’t want me in your tree house.” “You won’t be in my tree house, Mol. You’ll be on it,” Ferd hollered back. I didn’t waste any time because I was afraid that Ferd might change his mind. But as soon as I stepped onto the flat roof, the cardinal got scared. He started flapping his good wing, scratching at the roof, chirping loudly, and spinning around in a circle even faster than before. I was afraid he would fall off of the tree house, so I moved super slowly, trying to get close to him. I reached out to grab him, but he suddenly started to flap again. This time he pulled in his good wing and tried to run from me, chirping even more loudly. “Look out, bird!” I yelled. But it was too late. He fell off of the tree house, screeching and flapping as he dropped through the leaves. “Oh no!” I screamed. “Ferd, he fell off of the tree house. He fell off!” “He’s okay, Mol. He’s flapping around on the grass. What should I do?” Ferd sounded scared. I hurried across the roof and back onto a tree limb. Then I climbed inside the tree house through one of the big open windows. I found Ferd’s escape rope, yelled “Look out below,” and pushed the whole pile of rope out of the open space. I climbed down by stepping on the knots in the rope. As I got close to the bottom, I saw Ferd’s scrunched-up face. “I was only inside for a second, Ferd,” I said as I jumped down off of the last knot. “What’s wrong with the bird?” Ferd asked as we moved closer to see it. I looked at the cardinal, who was struggling in the grass and making weird sounds. “I don’t know. But Mom and Dad will, that’s for sure.” The cardinal was flapping his good wing faster. I knew that I would have to pick him up, and even though I had never held a bird before, I wasn’t scared. I don’t get scared. He kept flapping, but he wasn’t going very far. So I leaned over slowly and very gently put one hand over his flapping wing. The cardinal screeched and I jumped. I wasn’t afraid. I was just being, uh, careful. I reached down, covered his good wing, lifted him up very softly, and started walking fast. Ferd ran beside me. “Is his wing broken?” Ferd asked. “What if his wing is broken? Can Mom fix it? Will he ever be able to fly again? What if he can’t ever fly again? What will he do, Molly?” “Just be quiet, Ferd,” I said. “We have to get him to the clinic so Mom can examine him. Come on.” Guess how long it took us to get to the clinic?