Erin Fisher - That Tiny Life

“Late,” he calls from the breeding pens. “Already took care of the feeding.” Filled a bucket — her job — with feeder chicks and did the rounds. Slid yellow tufts into each pen. Walked the yard. Made sure the chicks were eaten. Removed leftover bits so the meat didn’t lie there and rot. All that, and he didn’t even force Cody, who’s loitering on the front porch — skirt and all — to help him. Would have been a headache. Not a doubt.

He sets down the bucket of chick scraps. “Took more than two hours to get through feeding without you.” The last time he made the rounds alone was late spring, when Kendra broke contract and attended the falconry meet, and without having to dig the pen doors out of the snow the work took a third the time. Broke contract — ha! The trip might as well be chiselled into her contract since she absconds every year.

“I’m fine,” she calls back. “Thanks for asking.” She clasps her hands behind her head.

Cody makes his way down the porch and hangs his fingers in the netting around the yard. Lately, Axel’s left the taming and fist-training to Kendra, and instead sketched breeding plans for March. Predicted projected offspring’s plumage based on the female — the white — and different males. This is the year his reputation rides on. He breeds this trait, she takes that to the meet, see what they say then. Can’t deny what he’s built after eyeing that white bird.

And Kendra’s late on the day he’d planned to start flying that first, flawless gyr. Late, after her nattering all year about the definition of apprentice. The month before Cody arrived she refused to do anything that didn’t deal with birds — no electrical repairs, no painting, no shovelling — though he pays her for eight-hour days year-round.

“No way you’ll get that truck out.” The engine ticks cool under a growing mask of snow. “Doubt anyone’s towing today.”

“Shit.” She slaps the hood and walks down the drive. “Yeah, I know.” She fishes her keys from her pocket and unlocks the door to the yard. Cody tugs his hood up and hooks his fingers back in the net.

“At least I didn’t hit the river.” She paws through the scraps of gristle in Axel’s bucket, picks out the larger bits, and fills the pockets of her vest. “Training the white today?”

She stands there in front of him, her refurbished fishing vest packed with feed like they can carry on. Like it doesn’t matter to her she’s late. Like her affronts have been nothing. “The weather’s too bad,” he says. It isn’t. Not with the netting as a filter for the snowfall.

“The weather’s too bad,” she repeats. “Unbelievable.” She Velcroes the flaps down over her pockets of chicks and tightens her ponytail.

“Did you see the snow?” Cody says. Is he joking? He doesn’t say it like he’s siding against Kendra, he says it like he hasn’t seen anyone in years, he’s got that much energy. Kendra exhales.

“See the snow? Did I fucking see the snow?” She gestures to her hair — the ends evolving icily at her back — and her clothes. “You’re not flying her, then. Christ.” She pushes past Axel’s shoulder and takes a shovel from the equipment shed. The netting that forms the roof has collected a layer of heavy snow overnight.

“Drove out just for that?” he says.

“What did you expect?” She prods the roof with the handle. She does it gingerly, trying to keep out of the way as clumps of snow plop through the nets onto the ground. Why is she so difficult? Like she doesn’t understand that he wants her here. If he didn’t want her here, would he have let her follow him home like a puppy? Apprentice the last three years? If he didn’t want her here, he wouldn’t be pissed off.

“Might as well have stayed in town,” he says.

“Bitch to yourself.” She walks the yard prodding the mesh until the roof of snow is down and she’s breathing audibly into the clouded sky. “I was late, that’s all.”

“Might as well take off, then, now that your work’s done.” He nods to the truck. “Good luck with that.”

“Because of the goddamn snow. My truck’s in the ditch because I was on my way here. Fuck it, Axel.” She stabs the shovel into the snow. “Give me my bird and I’ll go.”

Three years ago Kendra had been grateful to be in the vicinity of his birds. She’d looked him up after, she said, she’d found out ninety percent of the gyrfalcons flown at the meet — all the gyrs bred in captivity — came from him. She’d seen him swinging a training lure in the pasture one summer morning and left her Nissan door hanging wide to the wind. She stepped off the highway with a stride like she was used to walking fields and she stayed on. He thought the nephew would be as enamoured as she had been. But the kid, clinging to the netting, seems on the verge of hysterics. He can’t deal with this now. He turns to the house.

Kendra calls after him. “Going to take it to the grave. I should have known.”

If Kendra is going to bridle he’s not going to give her the satisfaction of giving in. He steps inside.

“It’s in your will, then?” Kendra calls as he shuts the door.

He sits at the table and pulls the jars of leather dyes toward himself. Their coloured shadows stain the wood: green, red, deep blue.

They’re his falcons. They’d be hers too if she backed off. She’s young, serious about birds. The time the hawk grabbed her neck she stayed calm. He hasn’t marked a bird out for her, the bird he wants her to fly is not an heirloom he’d put in his will, he wants to hand it over with honour. Why can’t she see the act is, how can he put it? — not religious, but holy. And now, because of the boy, she thinks she has sway. Damn her. He’s always counted her vote.

He pulls the snakeskin into the shadow of the leather dye. The kid’s quilt and sheet are folded on the couch. A mess of papers on the floor beside the table. Momentary guilt about the kid. He rubs his thumb over a spot of dye on the table and tosses the leather aside.

On the mantel and bookshelf beside the table are over thirty hoods. Small, jewel-hued, snakeskin-crested, feather-topped, one entirely of rabbit fur that looks like a pom-pom. Dainty things, and an art the boy might like.

The front room has been empty all morning and still the air around the couch smells of his brother’s daughter’s son’s minty hair soap, or, loath to think, the boy’s perfume. A comfort in the scent, regardless.

The freshness in the air — the snow has brought down all the exhaust and dirt of the highway. Crows are about. A teed-off school of them alights in the poplars by the road and suddenly it’s as if the trees have leaves, there’s that many birds. They’ll need to piss off. They create too much distraction. Them, and Milo tearing down the fence around the slurry in the dairy yard — there’s a bad idea if she ever saw one.

“You know who else bred falcons?” she says. “Hitler. Bred them to kill Allied carrier pigeons. Nazis gave it up after bringing down their own doves.” She tucks her thumbs in the armpits of her vest. “Fuck him. We’re training the white.” Cody reaches his hand through the net wall and unlatches the door’s lock from outside. Hilarious. “Don’t let Axel catch you breaking in.”

He blushes and backs out. She grabs his sleeve. “God — I was kidding. Come in.” His jeans are wet and dark from the shin down. She’d send him back in for boots but doubts the kid has enough nerve left to ask Axel to loan a pair. Anyway, it looks like he’s wearing his entire wardrobe — jeans, kilt, hoodie, orange fleece under the hoodie. He’s probably layered enough socks in his sneakers to keep his feet dry.

“Go on. Grab a glove.”