A man was selling pigeons down the lane.
You could see one of the plump birds ten blocks away. Pure, virgin white, fat and juicy. The fluttering sounds of their oversized wings woke Harry up.
Harry went for a walk. He was gruff and used, looking more like a heap of decaying flesh hanging on a frame of calcium than one of fresh meat. He had ragged clothes and torn shoes.
He came to the middle-aged pigeon salesman. The salesman was prompt in making his offer. Harry made a face, as if he was giving it a thought. Six pence per bird. Then he agreed. His previous pigeon had not return. And he had given up hope on it returning.
Harry was not homeless, instead he was an owner of a rather tastefully architectured recidency settling down the very lane they stood at. He was its architect. The house cost him a fortune, but during those days, Harry did not give a fuck.
A crowd ushered in. People came, young and old, white and black alike, wallets ready, each making their pick a wit faster than poor Harry. Seems like everyone has letters to be sent. Everyone made their purchase swift, then as swiftly, they left. It was as if they did not notice Harry's presence or his stench.
And then all that's left is one. Skinny and ruffled and messed up. Very Harry-like. I will call you Hedwig, Harry finally spoke, as he paid for his pigeon.
Its weak eyes flickered in atonishment at its new owner.
...............
The park was empty. Harry and Hedwig shared a park bench and a tomato sandwich. It was when the man lifted his pupils into the vast, vanilla skies, that he thought of Ginny. Ginny was his love. She
was love.
And she was the cause of all his misery.
He would be reminded of a story Ginny always told to him. It was about an old man who had fixed tens of leaf blowers underneath the house he and his late wife has built, and he would fly the house of into the sky, to Paradise Falls or wherever he vowed to bring his wife to, whilst she was still alive.
However Ginny never did finish the story, she left it untold, whether he had reached Paradise Falls, Harry was not told. She would finish it, only under one condition: make her his, which never happened. A hole burnt through Harry's fragile heart at the thought.
The moment she left him, he slept. For two weeks. He knew by sleeping he would not look at the bright sky which reminded him of her, and he would not be hurt. It was until the sound of fluttering pigeon wings that had woke him up.
But maybe that was too long a time for one to be asleep.
He went home as more people gathered at the park. He wasn't in the mood for
fun. Plus no one noticed his presence there anyway. He made Hedwig clutch to his shoulder and they went home.
