Quoth the Raven

It is a sunny winter afternoon in Seaboard. Mom and I have just arrived from Durham. I have unpacked the car and I am settled in on the blue couch in the parlor talking to my sister on the phone. I hear a loud rustling in the background, but assume it is my mom in the den. We continue to talk. Mom continues to rustle.

Except.

When I get off the phone I walk into the den. Mom is sitting in a chair as still as a mouse reading a book.

“Mom, er, were you doing anything while I was on the phone?” I ask in a hopeful tone. My stomach has began to drop. I think I know the answer. It is a firm no.

Bird. In. The. Chimney

My heart is thumping. I not quite sure why I have the heebie jeebies about birds in the chimney, but I do. I once pulled a snake out of a birdhouse with my bare hands as if I were just taking mail out of a mailbox.  I have wrestled with biting dogs as if it were a walk around the AKC ring. But Birds In The Chimney are another matter.

Battlestations.

My aged mom thumps into position and balances on her cane at the door near the piano. I dash about, closing blinds to make the afternoon shadows even more shadowy. I move the flotsam and jetsam away from the front of the Buck Stove insert in the chimney and hand Mom her weapon. She grasps the broom like a gladiator.

I open the side door. I slide the latch near the piston to insure it stays open on its own, for it has a job to do. To coyly entice whatever winged dementor from hell is scrambling inside the chimney.

Next I tiptoe to the chimney. My heart is pounding though I have done this many times before. I  squat and unlatch the double doors, first the right and then the left. fully expecting to be bowled over by the desperate fluttering of a trapped bird.  The doors make a satisfying clink as they reveal the inky interior and, to my horror, the skeletal remains of a  once-trapped and now-desiccated  bird. My imagination runs wild as I picture it’s solitary death throes and my adrenal gland puts my heart on high alert.

And now to open the flue. It creaks eerily as I push it true. And, oh dear God!,  the skeletal remains of a second bird flutter to the ashes. I stumble backwards, regain my footing and unabashedly hide behind my my 88 year old mother.

Mom comments dryly “that one is not going to hurt you.”  

We pause a moment and listen. I hear nothing but the beating of my heart. We realize that this is going to be a bit of a waiting game. Mom settles down on the seat her walker still clutching the broom. I ease onto the couch and grab an afghan. (For what? to throw on the bird? To cover my head? In the dusky room I am sure my face is glowing red as I cram it back into the corner.)

Silence. Not even a rustle. Mom asks if I am SURE I heard a bird. Yes. Yes. Yes. There is a BIRD IN THE CHIMNEY. More silence.

The phone jars to life and I answer. My voice is cracking with excitement. It is my oldest nephew.

“WHERE ARE YOU?” I demand and launch into a description of our current situation.

He begins to laugh and tells me it will take him a while to get here, he’s in Richmond. Expletives begin to explode silently in my brain. “When you get here” I say “you are getting the dead ones out!” He finds this funny. I ask that he dial 911 if he arrives to find us incapacitated.

He rings off and we go back to our game. It requires nerves of steel. When we can bear it no longer, I creep back to the Buck Stove and jiggle the flue, backing quickly away.

This time SUCCESS. The blackbird bursts from the fireplace in a flutter of iridescent movement and straight and true takes flight towards the blue rectangle of the open door. The last we see of him is an inky silhouette as he moves up and out of our range of vision.

It is done. We exhale. I close the Buck Stove doors on the skeletons of the two that didn’t make it. They can wait in the dark for my nephew. I bring light back to the room, opening blinds and curtains and shutting the side door. The broom goes back to its resting place and Mom back to her perch on her favorite reading chair.

I sit on the couch in stunned and grateful silence, listening. I am quite happy to have helped this dark bird pry open the maw of death and fly away.  I hope my heart stays as brave and true as the one that got away.