Another one of my brothers was killed today, which really spoiled my Friday afternoon. And I saw it, too, which made it even worse. He was sitting in the street, and of course they’re always waddling around in the street so it’s not like that was anything new. Usually my boys would fly out of the way in time, but this guy was beginning to lose his hearing. Too long spent around city traffic, I think. Taxi turned the corner and the rest of his brothers fled. He couldn’t hear.
But I could hear. And I could hear his final screech, a sound forced out of him as the vehicle flattened him. And I could feel his tiny bones crunching as they were pressed into the ground, and when the cab was gone all that remained was a red stain on the pavement, feathers sticking out in every direction.
Passersby didn’t notice. Well, that’s not true. They did notice, but only in as much as they wrinkled their noses in disgust when they saw my brother’s corpse, carefully sidestepping the puddle of gore as they crossed the street.
I didn’t get up to go inspect the body. I just sat on the bench and watched forlornly, running a hand through my hair. I’m pretty thankful I have arms and legs and all that human stuff, because if it weren’t for that I’d be getting crushed under tires just like my little boys.
That night when I got home, I lit a candle to commemorate another fallen bird. I’m not sure why. The birds don’t know that I mourn for them. But I think perhaps it makes me feel a little better.
I woke up to a glop of shit on my face, which was not entirely unusual.
“Oh, come on,” I groaned, shoving the culprit—a particularly rotund pigeon—off my bed as I wiped the guano from my face. “That’s nasty, little dude.”
It came as no surprise that the whole room was full of pigeons, all waddling around and bumping into each other, cooing softly. The whole apartment, actually. It’s only one room.
New York City is expensive, and the Avian Council only pays a small stipend. Perhaps if I were a bigger god, one of weather or something, then I would be making the big bucks. But for now, I settle for my little studio with its gorgeous view of the brick wall less than two feet across the alleyway from me.
I got out of bed, which wasn’t so much a bed as a thin mattress I’d shoved in the corner of the room, and headed for the sink to go wash up. Pigeons crowded at my feet inquisitively, because despite the fact that I did this every morning, it still confused and fascinated them.
I really needed to stop leaving the window open at night.
But when I leave it closed, I can still feel their pull. They wanted to be inside, to be with me, with their kin, their sibling, their guardian.
Their god.
So I guess I can’t blame them, but damn, does it make my apartment smell bad to have constant pigeon action going on. I shooed a few off the edge of the sink, who then landed on the toilet and in turn shooed the pigeons off the toilet, who in turn flapped their wings over to the shower, shooing the pigeons who were already in the shower out of the tiny bathroom window.
I glanced around the edge of the sink and then shouted, “Alright, which one of you motherfuckers has my toothbrush!”
Yelling at them didn’t do much, of course. They didn’t understand my words. They only understood when I whispered to them. It wasn’t whispering so much as it was thinking at them, but it felt intimate somehow, like I was murmuring in their little avian ears. So I whispered, much more kindly, asking if any of them had seen my “mouth stick.”
One of my brothers from over on the windowsill beat his wings and landed daintily on the faucet, toothbrush clutched in his beak. I’m not sure when or why I started thinking of them as my brothers. It’s not as though all of them are male. Pigeons don’t even have a concept of gender. Maybe it’s because there’s something a little ecclesiastical about it.
“Gimme that thing.” I swiped the toothbrush from him, and he squawked reverently. They don’t know when I’m being mean to them. They don’t know anything. They’re pigeons. Still, I felt guilty about snapping, so I petted the little guy on the head.
“Thanks for this,” I said as I rummaged around in the medicine cabinet for toothpaste. Luckily no birds had stolen that. Only when I slammed the cabinet shut did I catch a glimpse of the sticky note I’d left for myself on the mirror, now encrusted with white and brown streaks.
“Shit!” I shouted, so loudly that a few of the loyal pigeons at my feet fled in alarm. I ripped the note from the glass, reading it again to make sure I’d gotten the date right.
“I can’t believe I forgot again! Stupid stupid stupid!” I banged my fist on my head.
“Alright, out of the way, shitbags,” I commanded as I made my way through the sea of pigeons, though the message I really whispered was, Give room, lovelies. The pigeons parted, leaving a space just wide enough for me to bound through, over to my wardrobe, which is actually just a plastic bin overflowing with clothes. I grabbed the first two items I could find, a grey sweatshirt and some light wash red jeans, and threw them on.
“Move move move!” I shouted, whispering to the boys, Give space, please. Must make speed. I was out the door within thirty seconds, but then darted back in to deposit my toothbrush back with the pigeon who had given it to me. Then I was running down the stairs, feathers still clinging to my hair.
We’ve all heard stories about Mount Olympus and Asgard and all those other places where gods meet in mythology, which is why I’m pretty disappointed that we meet in a conference room at a Hampton Inn. I mean, I get it, we’re not exactly the most important gods out there, but still, it would be nice if they splurged for a place that at least gave us complimentary croissants or something.
The sign outside said “International Ornithology Association Meeting,” which, I mean, it’s technically true, but it still made me laugh to see it written out.
The Prince of Sparrows insists on doing an official roll call at the beginning of each meeting. He rattled off names: Queen of Doves, Emperor of Penguins, Mother of Storks. And then he got to the Lady of the Blackbirds. I felt a little pang of anxiety just at the mention of her name. I whirled around to spot her, and in the corner of the room I saw her raise a shy hand. She wore her usual white flowing dress, which contrasted starkly with her dark skin.
“Well, seems like we’re mostly accounted for,” said the Prince.
Oh, not again. I hate this part. I raised my hand begrudgingly.
“You, um…you forgot about me.”
The Prince looked down from his podium. “Oh. You’re late.”
“Well, yeah, but like…I’m here now.”
He rolled his eyes and sighed. “Okay, Pigeon Guy?”
I nodded solemnly and looked for an open chair.
The Prince raised an eyebrow. “You have to say ‘present’.” He brandished his pen.
“You know I’m here,” I said, dropping into the nearest seat.
“Yes,” the Prince said, “but you have to say ‘present’.”
“You’re joking.”
“You’re slowing down this whole meeting, you know,” he snapped.
“Present,” I grumbled. “Are you happy?”
He nodded as if to say, not really, but that will do, and then gestured for me to have a seat. The meeting dragged on—some kind of dispute between the Guardian of the Crows and the Lord of the Ravens. The Cardinal Cardinal asked for a new name. I didn’t pay too much attention, really. I was too busy rehearsing my speech in my head, wringing my hands in hopes that the twisting in my stomach would die down.
After what felt like an eternity, the Prince finally said the words I had been waiting for:
“That concludes the items on the agenda. Does anyone have additional items to propose?”
I raised my hand, and at the sight of it the Prince let out an exasperated sigh.
“What do you want?” he asked.
“I was thinking we could do something about, uh …” I scratched the back of my head, averting my eyes. “… The way that no one really likes, uh, my birds?”
“And what,” he said, raising an eyebrow, “would you have us do about that?”
I shifted from foot to foot. “Oh, I mean…I don’t really know. I thought…I mean pigeons and doves are technically the same bird, right? I thought me and the Queen could—”
“Absolutely not,” The Queen of Doves cut me off. “I refuse to work with you.”
“But—”
“It’s nothing personal.” She raised a haughty hand to stop me. “It’s simply that our two breeds of bird are far too different.”
“But they’re literally the same bird!” I said.
“Well, not really,” the Prince cut in.
“And what’s the difference?” I asked.
“The difference is that if you show someone a dove they’ll say ‘that’s a dove’ but if you show them a pigeon they say ‘that’s a pigeon.’”
“See?” the Queen of Doves added unhelpfully.
“I’m sorry,” the Prince said, “but there is simply nothing we can do for you.”
“But—”
“Sit down, Pigeon Guy. We have other matters to attend to.”
“You just said we finished the agenda.”
“Sit. Down.”
I pulled up my sweatshirt hood and did as I was told, sinking into the stiff red hotel chair.
Pigeons die all the time, of course, and every time I feel it, so it’s always a dull throbbing in the back of my awareness. But this one woke me up in the middle of the night with its violence and cruelty. Someone had wrung the neck of a pigeon to cook into stew. Somewhere nearby, too. It was the creature’s panic that woke me, I could feel it in my stomach, and I knew that someone was gripping it tightly. Then I felt the sharp snap of its neck, and the fear dissipated as the bird’s short, dirty life came to an end. I felt tears spring to my eyes unbidden as my throat began to tighten. It’s just another pigeon, I told myself, it happens all the time. But then again, isn’t that the problem? That it happens all the time? And my one job is to protect them, and I can’t, no matter how hard I try. And the doves and the blackbirds and the sparrows and the eagles, they don’t have to deal with this. But here I am, in my grimy little pigeon-shit-covered studio apartment on West 54th Street, sobbing into my pillow and trying not to let my sadness turn to rage. You’ll mourn your brethren, I told myself, just like you always do.
I pulled on some sweatpants, walked over to the folding table that serves as my dining room, and lit a candle.
“You know I would have driven you to the Council meeting, if you’d asked,” the Lady of the Blackbirds told me, tossing breadcrumbs to some of my boys. They pecked at the ground eagerly, only a few of them successfully hitting their mark. The rest just hammered their beaks at the ground. My poor, little idiots.
“I didn’t wanna put you out,” I said, pulling my hood lower over my head. We sat on a bench looking out onto City Hall Park, where countless pigeons dotted the pavement. The Lady gave me a warm smile and I turned away, pulling my legs into my chest. She’s always so nice to me. I don’t get it.
“You wouldn’t be putting me out,” she said, taking a bite out of her croissant, spilling even more crumbs for my little ones to fight over.
I knew that was a lie. She was just being nice. It’s just like how she always said it’s no trouble to visit me. “I was just passing through,” she would always claim, “and I thought I’d pay you a visit.” But why would the Lady of the Blackbirds have any business passing through New York City? She could spend her whole life in the Adirondacks where she belonged. And yet, some days I would wake up to a knock on my door, and when I opened blearily to tell the Mormons that I’m already a god so I don’t need another one, I’d see her.
“What are you doing here?” I’d always ask, though her answer was always the same.
“Taking you to coffee.” And she’d smile and take my arm.
She did it out of pity. I knew she did. And that day of all days was proof. She knew that I embarrassed myself at the meeting, and that I probably wouldn’t have the motivation to crawl out of bed for the next week, so she came to my rescue. It wasn’t fair to her, really. It’s not like I had anything to offer her. I pulled at the strings of my sweatshirt, watching my boys strutting around like they don’t know everyone thinks they’re flying rats.
“You have a point, you know,” she said as she folded her takeaway bag gingerly and tossed it into a nearby trash can like a discus. Even the way she throws her garbage away is graceful. “It’s not fair to you, the way everyone treats your birds. It’s not like you’ve done anything wrong, and they haven’t either—”
“Yes, thank you!” I exclaimed “I mean, what about seagulls? Seagulls are nasty little thieves! The Captain of the Seagulls just lets them go nuts! And is everyone shitting on him for being irresponsible? No!”
She nodded slowly, and I felt my cheeks begin to burn after my outburst.
“I just—I—” I stammered. “I get a little worked up, ya know?”
“I would too,” she said, holding out a welcoming hand to one of my little guys.
It’s alright, I whispered. She’s a friend.
The nearest pigeon pumped its wings and landed awkwardly in the Lady’s palm.
“Hi there, love.” She turned to me. “What’s this one’s name?”
“Name?” I furrowed my brow. “Oh, I don’t name them. There’s way too many! I just call them ‘the boys.’”
“How strange,” she mused as she dragged her fingers along the creature’s back. It cooed appreciatively. “I name all of mine.”
“Oh, I mean, I just—” I shoved my hands deep in my pockets and turned away, “I try not to get attached.”
“That’s part of the job,” she said as the pigeon nuzzled her fingers. “All creatures die, you know.”
“How many blackbirds get flattened on subway tracks?”
She sighed, looking down at the creature in her hands pityingly. I could feel myself starting to sweat. Stupid stupid stupid.
“I’m sorry,” I mumbled, hiding even deeper in my sweatshirt. “It’s just—”
“I understand,” she cut me off, and even though I knew there was no way she could possibly have, I still wanted to believe her.
“I’m sorry it’s just…it’s not always easy seeing my little guys meet an end that’s so—”
“Violent?” she guessed.
I sighed, looking at all my ephemeral little boys in the park. “Yeah.”
“They should have given you the help you asked for.”
“I was just being whiny.”
“No, you were being responsible. You are their guardian and you’re trying to guard them.”
I felt my face begin to burn. “I’m doing a pretty lousy job.”
“That’s not your fault.”
“But you agree. I am doing a lousy job.” I could feel the stinging in my nose as tears started to burn my eyes.
“I didn’t—” She cut herself off and looked towards a group of children playing around a fountain. “I didn’t say that.”
“I know. But it’s true.”
I felt a wave of panic wash over me. I was messing this whole thing up. I was making her sad. I was annoying her. I was being too self-pitying. I was being uninteresting. I stood up abruptly.
“I should go,” I blurted out. “Thanks for coffee and…thanks.”
She looked up at me in surprise. “But—”
I fumbled for my wallet.
“Here,” I said, practically throwing some crumpled bills at her. “For the croissant.”
“You don’t have to—”
“I gotta go.” I dashed off, whispering to my boys so that they made a perfect path for me to walk through, then converged once again so that the Lady couldn’t follow me.
I sat on that same bench a week later, still turning over the interaction in my mind. She was only trying to help me, I stared out at the park, soaking in the sweet city stink as I sunk deeper and deeper into myself.
One of my brothers landed gingerly on my finger. I looked at his feet, a gnarled and broken talon wrapping around my finger. He only had one toe left on his left foot, and his right foot was hardly more than a stump.
“What’s happened to you, my love?” I asked, running a hand over his grey feathers. He cooed happily, rubbing his head against my arm. His iridescent feathers shimmered in the New York sun. He looked beautiful. Maybe I just thought that because he was one of my own, but he was beautiful. How could you see such a majestic creature, so simple and well-meaning, adorned with sparkling, colorful feathers, and think of it as vermin? These were my siblings, my children, my followers, my creatures…my boys.
Suddenly I was struck with a stab of panic. It was not my own. It was a call for help from one of my boys, one nearby. I turned my head instinctively to the road, preparing myself to see a pigeon flattened, but no, that didn’t make sense. The sensation of a pigeon being crushed is brief and sharp, but there is no fear. This was not the feeling of death. It was terror. I whirled around looking for a pigeon in peril, but it’s pretty difficult when there are so many goddamn pigeons.
Then I saw it.
A teenager had scooped up one of my boys and was holding it in a too-tight grasp. He approached two of his friends—one was doing kickflips on a skateboard, and the other reclined against a tree, smoking.
“Bro, look!” the one with the pigeon shouted to his compatriots. “I caught one!”
“That thing is nasty!” said the skater as he stumbled off the board. “Let it go, dude! It’s probably got, like, diseases and shit!”
“Nah, I just caught it!” the first protested. “I can’t just get rid of it!”
“But it’s gross,” the smoker said. “You’re not gonna take it on the train. Everyone would freak the fuck out.”
“Well I gotta do something with it,” the first insisted.
“Just let it go, dude,” the skater said.
A grin broke out on the smoker’s face.
“Wait, hold on,” he hopped up, flicking aside the butt of whatever it was he was smoking. “Guys, guys. I have an idea.”
“What?” the skater asked.
The smoker’s grin turned to a devious smile. “Do you wanna see what pigeon guts look like?”
In one fluid motion, he whipped out a pocketknife and stabbed deeply into my brother. The pigeon gave a shrill cry of pain, and so did I, I think. The boy who was holding the pigeon jumped back in alarm. My brethren, now skewered on the knife, flapped his wings frantically as the boy cackled.
“Pigeon on a stick!” he laughed.
“Ew!” the skater cried, but the boy who found the pigeon seemed entertained. He grabbed the pigeon again and removed it from the knife.
“Do the back! Do the back!” he goaded, flipping the bird over. He didn’t seem to mind as my brother’s blood dripped down his arms.
This time I shut my eyes tight and did not see the stab, but I heard the cry and maniacal laughter that came after it. I could feel that rage beginning to burn in my chest, the same rage I felt that night I was awoken by the snapping of a pigeon’s neck, the same rage I felt when the Avian Council continued to ignore my pleas, the same rage I felt—well, all the time. Let it go, I told myself. You’ll mourn him, just like you always do. You’ll go home and light a candle and this will pass. But in the moment, all I could hear was the maniacal cackling of those boys, and all I could feel was the pain and terror of my brethren. And it didn’t feel like it was going to pass any time soon.
My children near me were oblivious to the gruesome sight happening so close by. I listened to their dissonant voices. Food? More food? Give more food?
Before I even knew what I was doing, I whispered: Attack.
At first I was met with confusion: Attack? Why fight? Female? Must fight for female?
“No, you idiots!” I growled. “For revenge! That’s why fight! Revenge!”
Of course revenge is a concept that is alien to pigeons, so I tried a different approach: Fight. Fight for your life. Enemy. Danger. Fight.
This chain of thought got the pigeons pretty worked up. They started flapping their wings erratically and squawking loudly. A few passersby glanced over but the sight didn’t look entirely out of the ordinary, just a group of pigeons that was a bit more active than usual. I closed my eyes and reached out with my mind, connecting with every pigeon near me, even those I could not see, they blinked into existence in my mind as I searched for them.
Fight for your brothers, I told them all, then directed my mind to the group of boys playing with the pigeon corpse.
They needed no further command.
At this point the unfortunate pigeon was dead, and the boys playing with its mangled remains. I only briefly heard their screams when they saw the growing mass of wings and talons that descended upon them, though soon their cries were muffled by grey feathers.
The cries of bystanders, however, were not.
“Well, admittedly this is, uh…this is not a situation that we have to deal with often,” the Prince said as flipped through the pages of the Avian Council Handbook, scratching his head and displacing that stupid little crown he insists on wearing. “There’s not really any precedent for, um, pigeon rampages.”
“It wasn’t a rampage,” I protested, but the crowd erupted in mumbles of, “well, it sort of was” and “Seemed like a rampage to me,” and, “I think I might be in the wrong ballroom, I’m gonna go get a concierge.”
“Ah!” The Prince jabbed a finger at the text triumphantly. “There is a passage about bird-related punishment for crimes against humanity!”
“This was definitely not a crime against humanity!” I said.
“Well it was a crime, was it not?” the Prince raised an eyebrow.
“I mean—”
“We have Avian Rules. And you,” he brandished his pen at me, “you’ve broken the Cardinal Rule.”
I cocked my head quizzically. “Don’t provoke a cardinal?”
“No, that’s the Rule About Cardinals, not the Cardinal Rule,” he said.
“That’s confusing. I think we should change that.”
“The point still stands. You committed a crime, and it was against humanity, was it not?”
“I mean, humans were hurt, but it wasn’t intended—”
“Killed. A human was killed.”
The room, which was usually full of discontent mumbling at any given moment, fell silent.
“And the Cardinal Rule,” proclaimed the Prince, clearly eating up all the attention he was getting for the few precious moments that the council was listening to him, “is that no guardian of their kind shall intentionally incite violence against humans.”
I looked down at my worn sneakers. “I…I didn’t mean for anyone to die.”
“But you did mean to hurt them?”
I wrung my hands inside my sweatshirt pocket, glancing back toward the rest of the council behind me. They watched me with a mix of expressions—some angry, some pitying, but mostly? Disgusted. Were they appalled because a human had been killed? I don’t think so. I think it was because it was done by pigeons. If a stork had pecked someone’s heart out, it would make a tragic poem. If a raven had eaten someone’s eyes, it would be a gothic lullaby. But this was pigeons. And pigeons were not beautiful. They were just nasty.
“Yes,” I murmured, still looking back at the crowd.
“What was that? I can’t hear—”
“Yes!” I snapped back to face the Prince. “I did mean to hurt them. They were killing my brothers. And I couldn’t do nothing.”
Pity softened the Prince’s face. He furrowed his brow and sighed, looking down at me paternally.
“I’m sorry,” he said, and I think after all these years of complaining to him about my plight, this was the first moment he ever took me seriously. “But that’s no excuse.”
He looked back down at his book.
“This punishment is a little antiquated, but…” he glanced up at me, back down to the page, then up at me again. “It’ll have to do.”
I suppose this makes sense, I thought to myself as I watched the seagulls begin to gather in the sky. The Captain of the Seagulls was not keen on having his brethren used for this purpose, but eventually the other members of the Avian Council had worn him down. Wouldn’t his children enjoy a nice snack?
I didn’t bother trying to resist. At least they didn’t chain me to the edge of the cliff, dangling over the sea. The Queen of the Doves had proposed that, but everyone had agreed that would be a bit much. Instead, I was perched right on the precipice. As far as I could tell, the Captain of the Seagulls hadn’t given the order yet. The birds swarmed overhead but they did not yet descend.
“Seems a little hypocritical, if you ask me,” said a voice behind me, “to use birds to kill someone as a punishment for using birds to kill someone.”
I whirled around to see the Lady of the Blackbirds, perched daintily on a small boulder. The hem of her white dress billowed in the wind.
“Lady!” I cried. I ran over to greet her and was promptly yanked back by the chains I’d forgotten. “You came!”
“Of course I did,” she grinned. “I’m not going to miss this.”
My stomach dropped. “You…you want to witness my execution?” Oddly enough, the overwhelming emotion I felt was embarrassment. How humiliating, to have someone so beautiful witness your guts being pecked out by seagulls.
She threw her head back in hearty laughter. “I’m joking!”
The Lady propelled herself off the rock and walked over to me. A dark figure against the blue sky, I thought she almost looked like an angel descending. She produced a piece of metal from a pocket in her dress and made quick work of the locks on my wrists.
I stared at her, stunned. “But…but won’t you get in trouble?”
She shrugged. “Can’t get me in trouble if they can’t find me.” With that, she turned away from the edge of the cliff and began to walk the way she had come. I trotted after her.
“You mean you’re running away?” I asked, stumbling over stones as I caught up with her.
“I don’t think of it as running away. I see it as ..” She looked up at the sky. “Going someplace else.”
I felt my face begin to burn as my next question left my lips unbidden: “Can I go with you?”
“Of course you’re coming with me.”
I blinked. “Oh. Um. Why?”
She laughed. It left me blushing, as if I’d done something wrong.
“What?” I asked.
“Nothing,” she shook her head, though obviously it was something. “Has anyone ever told you that you’re kind of like a pigeon?”
I rubbed the back of my neck, uneasy about where this was going. “Um…because I’m annoying and I mess stuff up?”
She shook her head again, her hair bobbing. “You are so used to people ignoring you that you actually start to believe that you’re not worth paying attention to. But I pay attention. And I see how much you care. That’s a rare trait, in humans and gods alike, and you don’t seem to realize how special that makes you.”
I knew I must be turning beet red. “Th-thanks, Lady. But I don’t understand why that makes me like a pigeon. I mean, pigeons don’t really care. I love ‘em, but they’re just…they’re just stupid birds.”
“What I’m trying to say,” she stopped walking, and she grabbed my hand and spun me around so I was facing her, “is that you get so convinced that you’re a stupid little bird, you don’t really see how beautiful you are when the sun hits you just right.”
“You like how pigeons look in the sunlight?” I asked.
“Of course I do.” the Lady continued forward. “They have iridescent feathers.”
I paused, letting the Lady get ahead of me. I didn’t think anyone else had ever noticed that. She turned over her shoulder, beckoning me to follow with a satisfied grin.
There’s probably a new Pigeon Guy in the “International Ornithological Association” now. I hope whoever they are, they get a more dignified title than “Pigeon Guy.” And I hope they give their pigeons names.
We’re somewhere else now. Somewhere with wide open spaces, far from the cramped confines of the apartment on West 54th. It’s strange being a retired god. But at least it’s not lonely. We’ve got each other, and our little ones. Yeah, I was surprised they stuck with me after everything. But when I whisper, I know they still listen.
Alex Kingsley is a writer, comedian, and game designer. They are the creator of the sci-fi comedy podcast The Stench of Adventure from Strong Branch Productions. They are the author of The Strange Garden and Other Weird Tales. Their fiction has appeared in Radon Journal, The Storage Papers, and more.
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