{ a boy and a bird }

For a moment, the tattered blue kite was silhouetted against the sun, and time seemed to stand still; the sun cast its warm rays over the orchard, lighting up the laugh of pure joy etched on Danny's face. He would always remember this particular moment with fondness in his heart, remembering how good it felt to be innocent and free from the burdens that troubled adults carried around with them. Although he didn't know it at the time, this would be one of the last carefree moments Danny would ever enjoy as a child. The kite floated on the breeze for a moment more – then, with a small crash, it landed amongst the topmost branches of a tall oak tree.

Danny ran to the bottom of the oak's trunk, peering up through the gaps between the tree's gnarled branches, but to no avail. He could only catch a small glimpse of a solitary blue ribbon attached to the kite's tail; it was dangling high above his outstretched arms, far too high for him to retrieve by himself. With a small sigh, Danny dropped his gaze to the ground, tracing a circle in the dirt with the worn-out toe of his right sneaker. He knew his mother would not be pleased; she had told him just last week that they could not afford to keep replacing the toys that Danny would always inevitably lose.

Inwardly groaning to himself, Danny silently chastised himself for being so foolish. However, he perked up at the thought of visiting his hidden sanctuary. A few weeks ago, he had been frolicking about as usual, when he had stumbled upon a willow tree whose boughs and branches bent down toward him as if to embrace him in a hug. What was more, he had discovered an old wooden bench built on the ground right next to the tree. Although the paint was peeling off and the wooden boards were rotting with decay, the bench was still able to support Danny's weight; thus, he found himself spending hours sitting upon it, daydreaming of adventure and of what places awaited him beyond this simple countryside. Danny would oftentimes bring peaches, his favorite fruit, to eat while sitting on the bench; he would also occasionally bring a few beat-up paperback novels to read.

Once he reached the willow, Danny sat down on the bench, casting his gaze around at his surroundings. To his left, there were a few green shrubs; to his right, there were multiple patches of fruits and vegetables, a large garden of sorts planted by the old man that lived nearby. His eyes fell on a small patch of watermelons growing close by. Danny got up to take a look; he had always been a giant fan of watermelons, even though his family rarely bought them. He admired the large green fruit sitting at his feet, experimentally poking one with his foot. It rolled over a few inches, and out of the corner of Danny's eye, he saw a small flutter of movement. Turning his head to the right, Danny saw a small bird lying on the ground amongst the tangled watermelon vines. Getting closer, Danny noticed that its wing was bent at an odd angle; the bird was too weak to do much more than let out a feeble chirp.

Bending over at the waist, Danny gently picked up the bird from the ground. It flapped its wings weakly for a moment, but then gave up resistance. Danny held the bird close to his chest, cradling it in his palms as he ran back to his house, which was a kilometer or so away. Lungs burning, Danny nearly cried with relief as he saw the top of his house peeking over the crest of the next hill in front of him. With one final burst of speed, Danny sprinted to his front porch, where he proceeded to rest while he gasped for air.

The rest of the day was a blur in Danny's memory. He vaguely remembered his mother taking the bird gently from his hands, but he could not recollect much more than that. It took a while for the bird's wing to heal, but Danny's mother was an incredible medic; she had yet to meet any person or creature that she could not heal. After some contemplation, Danny named the bird Melon after the watermelon patch he had first found the bird in. It wasn't long before Danny was spending less time at his orchard and more time indoors, tending to Melon and keeping him company. As Melon grew stronger, Danny began feeding him bits and pieces of various fruits, namely Danny's favorite, the peach.

The boy and the bird became inseparable.

A few seasons had passed, and it was now a late afternoon in early spring. Melon had grown larger and more energetic; his favorite pastime was to sing and warble, all while puffing up his chest feathers in a show of importance. Danny hadn't been playing with him that day, for his head had been feeling light since that morning. Suddenly, Danny's vision blurred, and the room began spinning. He wobbled to his feet, only realizing what a terrible idea it was when he crashed to the ground, too weak to support himself. Twitching ever so slightly, Danny's eyes slowly slid shut, for he was too tired to keep them open. Vaguely, Danny thought he heard the sound of a woman screaming, but it sounded as if she was far, far away. His limbs became limp, and he let unconsciousness engulf him in a wave of darkness.

It was just three little words. Acute lymphoblastic leukemia, said the doctors. But those three words meant so much; it meant that the lives of Danny and his family would never be the same again.

Danny was sitting in the waiting room -- on the letter A to be precise, for he was sitting on one of those alphabet children's rugs. In a room not too far away, his mother was slumped in a chair, staring blankly at the wall as she wondered what she had done to deserve this. His father opened and closed his mouth several times, finding that words refused to emerge from his lips. Rage did not arise in either of them; instead, an overwhelming sense of despair and desolation threatened to engulf them in a wave of heartrending anguish.

It was simply too late.

Danny's leukemia could possibly be treated; however, chemotherapy was expensive, and while Danny's parents would have done anything for him, his leukemia had already progressed to the point where chemotherapy would barely do anything at all. The doctor had gently suggested that the best path might be to just let Danny enjoy and make the most of the time he had left.

"Promise me that you won't forget me."

A small tear formed at the corner of Danny's eye, but he blinked quickly, willing himself to hold it back. Danny's health had been deteriorating for the past two months, and while his parents would suddenly become quiet whenever he entered a room, he knew that he was the topic of most of their conversations. These days, it was all he could do to rise out of bed in the mornings; his knees would often shake from exertion, and his words were almost always accompanied by a rasping cough.

Melon gazed evenly back at Danny, chirping sadly in response to Danny's words.

"I love you, Melon."

The clock struck noon just as the last shovelful of dirt was dumped onto the grave. Bowing his head slightly in respect, the worker surveyed his handiwork as he gazed down at the grave in front of him. He had been privately hired a handful of times before, but he had never before been asked to dig a grave in an orchard, which was essentially what this place was. Danny had thought that his little refuge was a secret, but he hadn't realized that his entire family knew where he spent those countless summer hours.

Whether or not Danny's orchard was a secret, the allure that the orchard held for Danny did not hold true for the grave worker. He cast his gaze around the landscape slowly and evenly, but he couldn't seem to shake the feeling that there was simply something not right about this place.

It was only later that the worker would realize that he had heard no birds singing that day.

Melon sat among the green grass near the willow tree, steadily casting his beady-eyed gaze at the tombstone. It had been a while since he had last seen Danny, and Melon's heart ached with sorrow and love, for he knew that he would never again see the boy. With a small, sad chirp of longing, Melon picked up the fruit sitting next to him in the grass. It was relatively small, but all the same, it was still a peach.

Melon placed the peach on the top of the tombstone. It was symbolic of his love for Danny, but at the same time, it symbolized the bond between a boy and a bird – and how that bond could not be broken, even in death.

It was another autumn day. The sun shone down on the orchard and the wind blew, but everything in the orchard seemed subdued, lackluster, and devoid of its usual merriment and charm. In life, Danny had instilled joy in people's hearts; he had resonated deep in the souls of even the most caustic of people.

Now that Danny was gone, the world was a bleaker place. His mother would find herself turning around, thinking she heard bright peals of his laughter, and then she would furrow her brow with sadness and despair as she discovered that she had been deceived by her own ears once again. His father would find himself spending more and more time locked away in his study – it was only there that he would let his own tears flow, streaming silently down his face. And Danny's little sister would find herself growing up, the memory of her older brother slowly fading; there were days when she would struggle to remember the precise shade of his blue eyes or the exact contour of his nose.

But despite everything, life would move on. The sun would keep shining, the wind would keep blowing, and Melon would grow older, even without Danny. And one of these days, when Danny's tombstone was crumbled and faded with time, maybe another child would find his hidden refuge and grow to love it just as much as Danny had. And maybe, just maybe, the child might notice the old, nondescript tombstone and the small, brown peach pit still perched on its top.