rise up | {marr}

[ z e b e r a ]
"electricty: it flows
right through me"

I had named her Matilda.

She was a barn owl with a broken wing, and she had taken to me instantly. No one believed me when I told them she could talk. No one claimed they could hear her when she gossiped with me, and in a way it was annoying, unfair, even. Matilda was probably one of the best listeners I had ever met, and she always knew just what to say to me when I felt directionless. But in another way, I was glad people were so naive and silly when it came to my little friend. If everyone ever heard the sweet murmurs she whispered they would surely have tried to take her away from me.

But that was the thing.

Matilda had told me of her adventures. She told me what it was like to fly. She said the wind beneath her wings was a feeling unlike any other feeling and I believed her. But I could tell with each passing day that she was aching to get back to the skies. "I'm just not meant for this, Zeb," she would sigh, "I need to go home."

I couldn't blame her. Just the small fraction of wisdom she had shared with me made me jealous of her life. Just the small pieces she allowed me to hear made me wish I could be right next to her among the clouds.

"My wing is all better now, Zeb. See?" she asked through the bars, and I frowned at her. "Oh, relax. I'll come back and see you."

They always told me that.

They always told me they would come back and they never did. I think it was just their way of avoiding hurting my feelings, but really when they never resurfaced it hurt more than it would have if they had just been honest. But instead of arguing I just mutter, maybe more to myself than to her. "You better."


The walk seemed especially long. With each waking step she seemed to grow more and more excited. "I'll get to see my friends again! And I'll get to hunt! Oh, how I have missed hunting! It's the little things you take for granted, you know?"

"Yeah, I know."

When I finally reached a spot -- a hilltop just next to the borders -- I found myself battling tears. "Don't cry, little one. Some things just don't make sense to us right when they happen, but eventually the pieces will come together." I didn't speak -- I couldn't. There were no words. Countless times I had nursed the birds and the rabbits and the squirrels back to health, and still I was faced with heart break when they were ready to leave. So I did not speak to her. I just nodded.

And I opened the cage.

"Be good, Zeb. I'll be keeping an eye on you." And with that, she was gone.

Watching her fly away was a new kind of pain, but I found it impossible to look away as she stretched her wings to their full potential. Even if she was soaring in the opposite direction. "Goodbye, Matilda."

I watched until I was left staring at a blank sky, and then I watched some more. The tears kept resurfacing so eventually I stopped trying to blink them away. Then I heard a voice, and I forced myself to look away for the first time ever. "Hm- What? No, I'm fine. What?"