Fife

By far, the most unusual bird I had ever seen.

On Christmas day, it arrived on my doorstep in a wood and hammered tin box, the ornate patterns of puncture holes serving to keep the creature alive during transport, though with the twenty degree wind chill outside, just barely.

It hadn't been a white Christmas, just a damn cold one. The biting wind tossed fallen leaves on my gray front stoop, jostled my wind chimes, tore at my clothing. Steam swirled out from the little air holes like a tiny man hid inside with a lit cigarette.

The tag on the lid said it had been gifted by my grand uncle, deceased for over ten years. Although it raised suspicions about the contents of the container, the scratching sounds and the pathetic whimpering assured me that nothing of obvious danger lay inside.

Unlatching the top, I grabbed the bumpy gray handle attached to the polished oak lid piece. I couldn't tell if the unpleasant squeak that followed came from the rusty hinges or the `gift' itself.

The animal lay in mounds of fetid rags and newspaper, splattered with purple-yellow droppings covered with its moltings, a colony of something tiny and white swimming through the sludge. Some of them curled upwards to investigate the opening lid before returning to the filth, perhaps with the intent of crawling up to meet me. 

Tiny flies also inhabited the box, though I couldn't tell if they spawned from the white things, or if the white things were a form of parasite.

No food, no water bottle. I wondered: Weren't pet birds supposed to have little rocks in their cage? Salt licks and beak shavers or something? Some kind of seed bar to nibble?

Even if properly cleaned and given humane treatment, the bird would have been a zoological enigma.

A pair of bloodshot yellow eyes stared back at me, rimmed by dark circles and huge bags that suggested perpetual sleeplessness. Additionally, an eagle's beak and furrowing eyebrow ridges gave its visage a permanent sour appearance, as if frozen in the midst of saying "What the hell are you looking at!"

Long, black, goose-like neck, duck's body, which, incidentally, had the oily coloration of a common starling. 

The creature uttered short squawks that reminded me of a human baby's wailing. Its mottled white-purple beak even seemed to match an infant's mouth movements. 

I shuddered, tempted to throw the box, animal and all into the nearest dumpster. I didn't, though, because I was an animal lover.

Heartbroken by its mangy, downright sickly appearance, I felt obligated to either nurse it back to health, or (as I sadly suspected) at least make its last days on earth as comfortable as possible.

Its face kind of reminded me of Don Knotts. Maybe that's why I did it. I'm not sure.

Naturally, I put on gloves to handle the wretched thing. I found the crawling white things alarming. I did not want them anywhere close to an open cut. In fact, I hesitated to even pick up the creature until it had been washed thoroughly, but the freezing temperatures forced me to bring the animal in.

I lived in a split level suburban. 1970's architecture, hadn't been updated since. Cream colored walls, polished wood trim, hardwood flooring upstairs. The dining room chandelier was busted, and I still had crayon on the walls from the previous tenant.

I had a checkerboard tile area inside the front door, to protect my carpeting from dirty shoes and such. I could only hope the tile would also allow me to spot and kill any renegade worms before they could hide within the green fiber strands a few feet away.

I hurriedly filled a dishpan with warm water. I didn't like the fact I couldn't make it hot enough to kill the worms, but I didn't know if the fowl could take that kind of shock to the system. I wasn't even sure about the use of Dawn dish soap - the little duckies in the Gulf hadn't been as near to death's door as this thing.

When I came back with the sudsy dish pan, the bird was rolling on my carpet, getting its filth and little white things all over the place. I thought I even saw one go under the sofa, though the throw pillow on the cushions had threads that matched their coloration exactly. I shoved the creature into the bubbles as a form of damage control.

Instead of webbed toes or chicken feet, the animal had five claws. With opposable thumbs. This it used to grip the tub every time I tried to push it in. I had to really fight to get it cleaned up.

The bird uttered the sounds of an old woman in pain, punctuated by its weird baby cries, as large quantities of feathers drifted away with the suds. Its wriggling companions did not seem to be affected by the water one bit. They casually propelled themselves along through the liquid, going wherever they pleased.

The water turned dark gray as it exposed literal goosepimples.

I hadn't really thought about how to rinse the damn thing off. I had a sprayer in the kitchen, but really didn't want that shit anywhere close to my food. I ended up preparing a rinse bucket, which involved more feathers and worms in my carpet. Healthy or not, the little bastard loved to hop out of the water and make messes.

All of a sudden, the red chicken comb atop its head became rigid and needly like a dinosaur fin, and its beak came down on my finger hard enough to draw blood, through my rubber gloves.

"You little fucker! Can't you see I'm trying to help you!"

It could have been my imagination, but I swear that sour expression had changed to a self-satisfied mocking leer. If I hadn't been so kind hearted, I probably would have just hurled the feathery abomination out into the yard with its rotting container of pestilence.

When I moved it to the rinse bucket, the creature lost so many feathers that it resembled an emaciated uncooked Butterball turkey...well, after it had been carried wet through a small pillow factory. The mange seemed irreparable.

I showered as many worms in the carpet as I could find with Lysol disinfectant and salt, and they laid still. I couldn't tell if that were the same thing as dead, but I could only hope so. Earlier I had tried crushing one with a shovel, but only succeeded in creating two creepy crawlies.

A compulsive ritual followed, where I kept refilling and dumping out rinse buckets and spraying worms. The bird stupidly rolled on my Lysol and salt solution whenever my back was turned, screaming like a baby with a wet diaper. I felt bad about that, but not really bad.

It took me an hour, but I finally got the creature de-wormed and dried with a hair drier. The first thing it did to repay me was shit on the carpet.

I decided to name him Fife, after Don Knotts' character on Andy Griffith. I can only presume maleness due to the comb and turkey-like wattle. 

At any rate, Barney had gotten his drinking done in the bath, as disgusting as it was, but he still needed a good meal.

Obviously, the pet stores are all closed Christmas day, so I had to make do with what I had. 

I didn't have that much experience with birds. I've only owned one my entire life, a budgie, and it died. The experience taught me something about what you do with them, but I was far from being an expert.

And this thing...I only had guesses.

I had a large laundry basket, not great as a cage, but I couldn't think of anything else to keep Fife out of trouble. Some coarse kosher salt would have to work for the salt lick for the time being, presuming that you gave salt to this particular breed.

I found an old seed cake under the sink. I used to watch birds through the sliding glass window in the dining room. The first couple cakes brought some interesting specimens, but then squirrels started eating the seeds, so I gave up. This particular cake was past its expiration date.

I offered the items, and some saltines (though they be empty carbs) to Fife, but he didn't want any of it. I feared he already had something terminal.

I spent hours searching for information online about my sick animal, but I didn't know Fife's species, and all my emails to veterinarian websites went unanswered. I could only hope I could take him to the pet store the following day and get some advice, maybe check him into that Banfield place.

Sometimes you can use Google Lens to pull up an animal or object for identification, but the only thing I got from photographing Fife were parrots, frozen chickens, and, most bizarrely of all, a homeless man sleeping on an overpass. I fell asleep on the couch, phone in my hand.

A baby-like scream interrupted me from my slumber. I rushed to help, but it was too late.

The bird lay stretched out dead in the middle of my floor, a shit pool indicating the postmortem evacuation of its bowels.

Worse than that, I noticed that the worms, still floating in a solution of salt and Lysol, had returned to life.

A hair-thin white squiggle emerged from below my eyelid, wiggling across my field of vision.