Pigeon Day

Charlie puts food on the table of the hotel suite. I feel her look over at me and turn the radio off, pulling the buds out of my ears as I wave hello. I have a really good wave.

"You’ve been quiet all morning: you didn’t even call me once when I was out."

"I wath listening to the radio," I say, because I was. I grab my white cane from beside the couch and go over to the table. I’m getting tons better at figuring out where one binding ends and another begins, trying to only sense the surface bindings of things rather than the depths.

"And?" she says.

"Huh?"

"The radio, and —?"

"And I went for a walk around the block."

Charlie pulls out food and says nothing.

"And maybe made friendth with a pigeon and got hit by a car. But only a little bit!"

"You got hit by a car."

"I’m fine; I’m tough, and! I pulled the world around me and left before I was theen. It wasn’t on the news or nothing; I was listening," I grumble.

"Uh-huh. In the future, kiddo, try not to end sentences like ‘I was listening to the radio’ with a comma."

"You heard that?"

I can’t see Charlie’s face anymore but I feel as much as hear her grin. “I might not be a magician, but I do know a few tricks.”

"Oh! Thorry," I say.

"It’s okay, Jay. Just don’t do that again next time. Tell me when things happen, all right?"

I let out a huge sigh. “We have bread, right? I kind of invited the pigeon for food?”

Charlie pauses. I can hear cawing and the beating of wings in the distance. “How many did you invite, Jay?”

"I did thay it could bring friends."

She turns to the window and says some really rude words that don’t make her friends with the pigeons at all. I feel the bindings between us shift and duck the first loaf of bread she throws at my head.