The Gift, pt. 1

Smack. Smack. Smack. “Ugh, come in!” Celia grumbled, looking up from her magazine at the door but otherwise not moving from the bed.

Smack. “Just open the stupid door. What’re you, deaf?”

Celia suddenly recalled that she had locked it, a few hours prior, in one of her common fits of rage.

“Ugghh… Coming!”

She slipped off the bed and begrudgingly opened the door for the impertinent stranger.

A lanky, thatch-haired, twig-like figure greeted her.

“Oh. Its you again.” Celia said, at a loss. He might be her brother, but she still never quite knew what to say around him.

“Good day, dear Celia!” He said, beaming. Celia eyed the poorly disguised gift bundled in his arms.

“Don’t call me that. And is that for me?”

“How perceptive! Eyes like a hawk, I always said. And indeed it is!”

Celia sighed and motioned for him to come inside. She had had experience with his “gifts” before but there wasn’t much one could do to prepare for them.

Celia bustled about tossing junk off expensive pieces of furniture, while Laelius just stood there with wide eyes as though he had never seen a teenager’s bedroom before.

“Pretty.” He said, picking up a small hand mirror from the dresser. “Prettypretty.”

“Ummm how about you put that down…”  Celia quickly removed it from his grasp before he could do any damage with it.

“So what’s this about a present?”

Laelius pulled his gaze away from the other shiny objects on the dresser and sat down on the floor, cross-legged. Celia sat on the beanbag chair across from him, while the gift sat in between them.  

Celia could see it was some kind of wooden box or crate. She had the sudden hope that maybe Laelius had gotten it right this time. Maybe he had figured out the whole “human girl” thing, and gotten her clothes or jewelry or even books or something.

Laelius pushed the box forward with an awkward, lop-sided smile, like he wasn’t used to the expression. “Open it.”

Gingerly, Celia tore off the weirdly colored paper, noting the many long scratch marks and tears. Finally she was left with a stained, time-worn wooden box that didn’t outwardly reveal any of its contents. It definitely didn’t look new. Maybe it was supposed to be that way- new things pretending to look like old things were all the rage right now anyway.

“How do I open it?” She asked, confused about where the crate started and began.

“Dear sister let me help-“ Laeilus extended a thin-fingered hand and Celia shrunk away. “That- that won’t be necessary. I can do it myself, thank you.”

Her fingers finally found the edge of the lid, where it appeared to have been sealed or glued down. With an affirming nod from her brother, she gripped it and pulled with all her might. It came off with a loud crack.

Squeak. Squeak. Squeak, squeak, squeaaaaak?

Celia stared inside the box.

“You didn’t.”

Laelius was beaming again.

“The hell, Laelius?!”

“They’re from the southern scrub forest. I caught all of them myself, without eating any on accident too!”

He grabbed the box and dumped its contents into Celia’s hands.

A half a dozen minuscule, mud-colored mice suddenly found themselves with an enormous amount of freedom, and began to run about madly.  

“I….” Not for the first or last time, Celia was at an utter loss for words.

“Do you like them?”

“I….” Celia just gave up and nodded. The pile of stolen car keys and paperclips had been weird. The porcupine bones had been even weirder. But this- this topped all of them off by a long shot.

“Well, I suppose I should be off now- I have an audience with the duke of ravens this afternoon and no one wants to be late to THAT.” Laelius stood up and rustled his clothes, like a bird about to take off.

Celia watched, as though in a trance, as each of the mice disappeared under furniture or into the walls.

“If I’m fast, I may also catch an audience with the queen of the swallos.” Laeilus continued, walking to the window and yanking it open.  

Celia suddenly broke out of her trance. “Errr… why don’t you use the front door? I’ll- I’ll walk you down!”

She wasn’t sure if he even heard because the next moment he had a leg out the window despite the lack of footing underneath. 

“Can you NOT-“

“Enjoy your gift and use it well- Perhaps I shall collect some more, and we may feast upon our next reunion! Goodbye, dear Celia!”

Before Celia could even react to that sentence, Laelius was gone. She stumbled to the window half-expecting to see a crumpled body in the yard, but as always it was empty.

She thought she heard a faint “Happy birthday!” on the wind. But perhaps it was just her shocked imagination.

One never really knew what to expect with a bird-brother. Never.