The Contract

After six years together, Ophelia and I are parting ways. They tell me it is what is best for her, but how can it be best when she will never know love again? Never know the security of being protected and cared for. From this point forward, she will be on her own, defenseless against the elements. I shall never again serve as her protector and provider. Never again will I bring her the frogs, lizards, and small rodents I catch in the meadow behind my house. She must take responsibility for her own survival now. I don’t think she’s much of a hunter. I spoiled her by catering to her needs. The mice stopped coming into the barn shortly after she moved in, so there is really nothing she can hunt. She must leave the safety of her little hideaway, and I must let her go.

I found Ophelia the day her mother died. Oh God, that dreadful day. I hadn’t meant to kill her mama and leave her orphaned. It was those damn chicken hawks and my glaucoma. How the hell could I not tell the difference between a vexatious chicken hawk and a majestic creature like the one I killed? The hawks had been invading my farmyard and harassing my chickens for weeks. I had already lost my prized laying hen. So naturally, when I heard all the commotion emanating from the coop, I thought it was those confounded, murderous beasts again.

I grabbed my rifle, exasperated and hellbent on vengeance; I took off after the killers. Still twenty feet away from the henhouse, I saw a bird take flight. That might be the dirty bastard who killed my hen, I told myself. Best not let him get away. I aimed my rifle skyward; trembling hands and blurred vision hindered my accuracy. The only way I knew I hit my target was when I heard the loud thump of something hitting the ground beside me.

“I got you, you filthy bastard,” I cackled into the silent evening air, certain it was my enemy who lay at my feet.

“Well, might as well you get you out of here. Tilly will faint sure enough if she drives up and sees your rotting carcass in the front yard.” I laughed at the thought of my well-intentioned but overbearing sister, stumbling upon a bird’s corpse and shrieking out in disgust.

I stooped down to retrieve my prey. That’s when I saw her, Ophelia’s mother, the most beautiful barn owl I ever saw. Tawny feathers covered her back and wings, her face and belly gleamed pure white except for the crimson rivulet that trickled down her breast. But it was her eyes, those brilliant green orbitals, that chilled my spine. She peered at me, though stone-cold dead, she spoke through her keen, wide open eyes. I owed her, she told me. By taking her life, I signed a blood contract. I owed her.

An icy finger of fear coursed through my veins as I realized the deceased animal communicated with me. And I knew what she wanted. I remembered the faint chirping sound I had heard in the barn for days. Slowly, I trekked toward the decrepit outpost. It was mid-February and a gray sky hung low over patches of melting snow and puddles that glistened with ice crystals. The relentless wind howled and rattled my arthritic bones. Inside the barn, I ignored my aching joints and climbed the ladder to the loft. There I found her. In a corner, all snug inside a nest her mother painstakingly built for her, was a single owlet—my Ophelia.

Frightened and alone, her little voice quivered as she feebly cried out for her missing parent. “Poor thing.” Gingerly, I lifted her out of the nest and stroked her tiny head. Sparse gray and white feathers poked out of her pink, goose pimply skin. She squirmed, and I replaced her in the nest. “I’m your mama now,” I cooed, tickling at her soft neck, and she bit my finger.

As time went on, Ophelia and I developed a co-dependent relationship. She needed me for nourishment and protection—I never let outside the barn. Of course, I expect she could have escaped if she wanted to. She could fly faster than I could shut the barn door, but maybe she knew how I much I needed her to ease the loneliness of my isolated existence. I never had any visitors, except Tilly, who came around a couple of times a month to bark orders and remind me what a loathsome disappointment I was to the whole family. Tilly never stopped talking long enough to hear what I had to say. It seemed Ophelia really listened.

Besides Tilly, the only people I ever saw were my customers, the women who bought my fresh eggs and the men who purchased my contraband liquor. Even the deputy sheriff said I sold the best shine in Duvall County. So Tilly was wrong. I was not a hapless drunk. I was an entrepreneur.

It was okay that nobody wanted much to do with us. Ophelia and I got along fine without them, until the day I started having pains in my gut, and I noticed a little bulge in my abdomen that hadn’t been there before. Tilly showed up a few days later to do my laundry and remind me what a rotten excuse of a human being I was. I heard her model-T clamoring up the driveway, and then I heard her shooing away the chickens that were undoubtedly pecking at the varicose veins on her stubby legs. She let herself in, and it’s a good thing she did, because I didn’t have enough strength to make it to the toilet, let alone the front door.

My sister found me doubled over in a fetal position on the floor beside my bed. “Oh, for heaven’s sake, Clayton! What have you done to yourself?” She pawed at me, meagerly attempting to lift me off the dingy rug.

“It’s no use, Tilly,” I told her. Even though my sister outweighed me by a good hundred pounds, her muscles had atrophied from lack of use. “You have to go get Sheriff White. Tell him I need to get to the hospital pronto.”

Soon, I passed out. I was not aware of when or how Tilly and the sheriff got me to the hospital, but I awoke in a sterile white room, surrounded by beeping gadgets and a pretty nurse checking my iv line. The doctor spoke to Tilly in a hushed voice out in the hallway, but I overheard words like “cirrhosis” and “final stages.” So that was it. The grim reaper was fast approaching, and I didn’t even feel like drinking to numb the agony and terror.

When I returned home, Tilly moved in with me. She fussed over me, making sure I had enough blankets, and I ate enough of the right things. She scolded me every day when I ventured outside to feed Ophelia and reassure her. I felt certain Ophelia was as frightened as I was.

“You’re going to have to let that filthy animal go,” Tilly told me one night while we were eating vegetable stew and watching the sunset through the kitchen window.

Filthy animal? My Ophelia? Why, she was cleaner than most the humans I knew.

I remained silent but Tilly was adamant. “No one else is going to take care of her, and she will starve cooped up in that barn. You’ve spoiled her so. She will be lucky if she is able to survive in the wild, but she will have a better chance if you just leave the door open and let her go.”

Tilly was right. I knew she was, and I hated it. I should have left that barn door open a long time ago and let Ophelia come and go as she pleased, but I was afraid she would never come back if I did. Maybe it was never her I was protecting. But I just got so damn lonely.

I procrastinated letting her go until a week later. By now, my stomach was bloated, and I was in constant misery. It was just a matter of time before The Maker called me home, or wherever He decided to send me.

“Clayton,” Tilly said, as she sat in her rocking chair, darning socks and listening to the radio. I was lying on the chaise lounge beside her. “It’s time. You have to let that bird go. We have to sell the land to pay your debts and no one will buy it with that scavenger hanging around.”

“Why do you hate, me, Tilly?” I asked. I figured since I was dying, I might as well try to set a few things straight on the way out.

“Hate you?” she scoffed. “Don’t be silly. I just want you to be practical.”

“I’m not just talking about Ophelia. You have always acted like I was such an inconvenience to you. Like you would be better off without me.”

“Oh, Clayton,” Tilly sighed, leaning her head back, plump cheeks flushed solid red, blue eyes glistening with tears. “I never hated you. It’s just when Mama died, she made me promise to take care of you. It was okay at first, but when you got into drinking and law breaking, I had to worry about you so much, I couldn’t do any of the things I wanted. I couldn’t have a beau because none of them liked you. Of course, that meant I could never have children.” Her voice trailed off, and my heart broke. For the first time, I saw life through someone else’s perspective besides my own.

Somehow, I pulled myself up off the couch. I walked over to my sister, and gently kissed her soft, warm forehead. She looked up from her sewing. “Where are you going? It’s freezing out there. You’ll catch your d..” She stopped herself and dabbed the moist corners of her eyes with the sock she held.

As I followed the familiar path to the barn, I noticed signs of spring everywhere. The dogwoods showed off their frothy blossoms, the sweet scent of honeysuckle wafted up from the meadow, and bunnies scurried about the field. I would never experience another harsh winter.

I left the barn door open just as Tilly had instructed. Ophelia was standing on the roost I made her out of a broomstick. I was too exhausted to put on the heavy glove and let her ride my arm. All I could do was bid her a tearful farewell and give her a little nudge toward the exit. Stubborn as the man who raised her, she remained with her talons wrapped around the wooden perch.

The house is less than a hundred yards away, but it might as well be a hundred miles. I will never make it back and Tilly will never forgive me if I croak over in the front yard, leaving my frozen corpse to be discovered by the milk man or the traveling shoe peddler.

Defeated, I nestle down in a bed of hay. Something jabs my side. I reach under me, and I retrieve a mason jar full of clear liquid. My last pint of homemade whiskey; the last I will ever brew. I snuggle my killer as though she is my lover. I close my eyes and darkness ascends. I never see Ophelia take flight, but I hear her wings flutter by as she escapes her prison.

My contract with her mother is fulfilled, and so is my sister’s obligati on to me.