Mary Alice Monroe - Skyward

“Looks good.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve been doing this for years. Now you try.”

He watched as Lijah worked the leather. As with most things in bird care, attention had to be paid to the details. Once, he’d found a hawk hanging by one leg so high up in a tree Harris couldn’t get to him, all because of bad jesses. But the old man’s enormous hands worked as daintily as a seamstress’s making French knots, he thought, looking on with admiration.

“You’re good with your hands.”

“Yes, I am. They been good to me over the years. I can build just about anything with some wood and nails. Done some ironwork, too. And I’m handy with a net, if you ever need help there.” He held his hands up and looked at them with more respect than admiration. “Always wanted to try these fingers on a piano, but we never hooked up. I like to think we’d make pretty good music.”

Harris took a breath, rubbing his palms together, knowing that the next conversation would determine if this particular versatile man would stay on at the center.

“A bit cold today, don’t you think?”

“Cold? Nah, it’s not that cold. ‘Posed to warm up to the forties by midday.”

“Really? That’s good. Good. We can put the birds out to weather.” He cleared his throat and tried again. “But the nights are cold, aren’t they?”

Lijah chuckled softly as he worked the leather, nodding his head. “Oh, yes. The nights sure are cold.”

Harris waited a moment or two before saying, “I imagine it’s cold, even in that cabin.”

Lijah’s hand stilled and he lowered the hand tools. He sat for a moment, not moving, then he sighed heavily and turned to face Harris with an open expression.

“I don’t mean no disrespect,” he said somberly. “I keep it clean and I’m careful not to disturb nothing.”

“I know,” Harris replied. He paused. “Lijah, do you not have any place to stay?”

“No, no. I’m staying with friends—just down the road a piece. But getting back and forth to see Santee every day got to be troublesome. See, I need to be close. I need to sit with my bird a while to see her through this. I reckon like you did for your child back when she was in the hospital.”

Harris felt a strong sympathy for the man’s situation. Lijah loved that bird as any father loved a child. “I understand,” he replied. “But damn, Lijah, there’s no heat in there.”

“I do all right.” A sly smile slipped across his face. “It’s a sight better than sleeping in the car.”

“Lijah, it’s not right, you sleeping out there in the cold. We’ll have to figure something else out.”

“You don’t have to worry none. I’ll just clear out of that cabin and find somewhere else. It ain’t no problem for you.”

“But where will you go?”

He shrugged. “Don’t matter. Like I said, I have friends. And it’s only temporary.” His expression altered to worry. “I hope this don’t change your thinking on letting me keep coming here. Leastways, till Santee be well. I like working near these birds. And I daresay I’m doing a good enough job here?”

“You know you are. In fact, too good. You’re coming near every day now and that’s more than just volunteering. I don’t want to take advantage of your generosity.”

“You can’t take advantage of what I’m giving freely,” he replied with his serene smile.

“Well, I certainly don’t want you to stop coming. There’s no fear of that. But the conditions of your working here have suddenly changed. You’re working as hard as any of the full-time staff, but the problem is, I can’t afford to pay you a full-time salary.”

He drew his shoulders back. “I never asked for money.”

“I know you didn’t. But you deserve it. So, I’ve been thinking. What would you say to a salary? We could negotiate a fee that you feel is fair.”

Rather than brighten with enthusiasm, Lijah seemed a bit wary. “I thank you for the offer,” he replied. “It’s kind, to be sure. But all that strikes me as too permanent. I ain’t looking for a job. I always pay my own way and earn my own keep. Done so all my life. And I don’t want to charge you for working here because I’m only here on account of my bird friend. Here’s the way it is. I like keeping to myself, like coming and going as I please. I just need to sit with Santee a while to see the bird through this. Then, when she well, we can make our way back home. Soon, hopefully.” He met Harris’s gaze. “You need to understand that when Santee leaves, I’ll leave with her.”

“I understand that.” He sighed, reaching a decision. “I suppose we could open up the cabin early this year. Put a kerosene heater in, open the plumbing, fix up a bed, and you could join us for meals in the house. Though after you’ve tasted Miss Major’s cooking, you might forgo that pleasure,” he added with a smile. “What do you say? You can stay for as long or as short as you wish.”

“In that case, I thank you for your offer and accept.”

They shook hands and smiled in that companionable way that men often did when they were relieved and comfortable with the way a situation was resolved.

“I confess,” Lijah said, that wry smile playing at his lips again. “A couple of those nights near froze my vitals off. But we’re heading toward spring, so I’m hopeful.”

“You won’t freeze another night, not if Miss Majors has anything to say about it. She’s the one saw you creeping out of the cabin at dawn and has been worrying about you ever since. Knowing her, she’ll have that place in right order before nightfall.”

Lijah’s brows rose. “Miss Majors? That your new lady friend?”

“Good God, no! She’s the nanny. She only just arrived yesterday and will be staying in the house with us, looking out for Marion, cleaning, and—heaven help us—cooking our meals. Speaking of which, what have you been eating these past few weeks?”

“I’m an old man and the appetite ain’t what it used to be.” Amusement sparkled in his dark eyes. “I been making good use of the microwave in the clinic to heat up a can of soup or stew. And from time to time I stay with a relative or a friend I know lives nearby. They can’t stop feeding me. ’Course, there’s biscuits, jerky, the kind of things I can pack up. Oh, and I come to like that Slim Fast in a can. Tastes pretty good. Only thing I miss, though, is a good hot cup of coffee in the morning.”

Harris released a smile, amazed—as he often was in life—at how things sometimes came around full circle. He put his hand on Lijah’s shoulder.

“Today’s your lucky day. I happen to know just where you can find one.”

Brady Simmons traveled to the Coastal Carolina Center for Birds of Prey vowing to make everyone at that rehab joint as miserable as he was.

He sat in the passenger seat of the family’s Ford pickup that belched smoke and whined like a tortured animal every time it shifted into high gear. If being seen in that sorry-ass piece of tin wasn’t embarrassing enough, his mother was driving him.

Not being allowed to drive was all part of this mother lode of punishments that had been dumped on him since the police pinned the shooting of that eagle on him. That bird wasn’t even dead and his own life had been wiped out, as far as he could tell. It was bad enough that he had to spend every Wednesday afternoon and Saturday morning for six long months doing so-called community service hours. He’d a done that without complaint. He deserved it. He shouldn’t have pulled the trigger.

But why did they have to go and punish his whole family? Just on account of him doing something so stupid? The authorities told them they was lucky to only have to pay 1,800 in fines. Lucky? They weren’t no wealthy family that could just write a check for that amount. That was about every cent the family had put away, and then some. Mama had cried for days about that and wouldn’t talk to his father, blaming him for being so pigheaded as to trespass on government property and to drag his son right along with him. And if trespassing weren’t bad enough, she’d hollered, he had to go tell him to shoot the goddamn national emblem!