Treehouse Cardinal

“How on earth could you carry that up here?” Haley whispered mostly to himself, but also to this beautiful red bird that just flew into his treehouse.

The cardinal flapped fervently. Haley scooted back into the corner, away from this maniac-invader. “Red, can I call you Red?” Haley asked as the bird kept flapping and dragging its payload into its own corner of the treehouse. “Red! You stop that right now!”

Haley got up. “Thank goodness. I could have helped you if that was all you wanted.” Nodding to the bird, he walked over to the window. His family’s garden wasn’t far away. He looked at his house. Mom and dad must still be working inside. Red kept preening his brilliant red feathers as Haley hopped up onto the window sill. “How could you bring that all the way up here? It must weigh as much as you do.”

The cardinal flew past Haley. Towards the house, a wiffle ball that had not been used for a long time sat embedded in the grass under Dad’s grill. Red pecked at it, pried it out of place, and kicked it. “What a strange bird,” Haley laughed and went back to playing a game on his phone.

Back on the ground, Red was working on this wiffle ball. He could not quite grab it with one claw, so he hopped up onto the ball, grabbed it with both feet, and flew back to the treehouse. This time, Haley barely noticed. A startled glance was all Haley gave, as Red sat the grass-stained white plastic ball down near the tomato.

The app was proving tiresome, again. “Why can’t they make a good free game? No, I don’t want to buy diamonds to get more stuff. No, no, no.” Haley tapped repeatedly on the screen that was playing an advertisement in the middle of his game. He closed the app with a gesture.

Looking from his phone, around his treehouse, he now saw the wiffle ball beside the tomato. “Wierd,” he said as he got up and walked over to check them out. Haley picked up the ball. “Heh, we’ve only played one game since grandpa died.” He picked up the tomato with his other hand, but then his phone buzzed. Haley immediately lowered the items the cardinal brought him. “Still weird!” And checked his lock screen to see what the buzz was. He found Snapchat from his good friend Joel. Unlocking his phone by thumbprint, Haley watched Joel’s video of his family’s cat prowling after a bird. It looked like a robin that seemed way too distracted by eating worms in the yard. Haley smirked at the feline violence. He quickly replied with a few emojis and then reopened his game.  

Haley absentmindedly went through the motions of advancing his avatar in his game. His mind, however, was multitasking on the tomato and wiffle ball. He thought about how the family used to love wiffle ball. They had a first base tree. Second and third bases were yard ornaments. Home plate was near the back porch. “Why did they stop playing?”  

He closed his game and got down from his treehouse. The tomato and wiffle ball were tucked into his left elbow as he made his way down the ladder.

“Dad?” No response. “Mom, look what I found!”

His mother was working on dinner in the kitchen. “Oh, did you pick that for me?” She was referring to the tomato. “No, actually; a Cardinal brought this up into my treehouse. Isn’t that crazy?”

“That’s not possible, is it?” She asked him more about it but he wanted to talk about the wiffle ball. “Mom, why did we stop playing ball?” She got a little misty-eyed. “Well, dear, I guess it just wasn’t the same without grandpa.” Mom went back to cutting up some vegetables for their casserole. It looked like big purple eggplants, long green zucchinis, and tomatoes: red and ripe like the one the cardinal brought to Haley.

“You know, grandpa used to like eating tomatoes too, under that tree of yours. Do you remember that?” Haley was pretty young when they would eat ‘maters under the tree. “Ya, I think I do. Will you excuse me? I need to go back outside.” Haley ran out the door, back to his treehouse. His mother watched in a lovingly confused way, shaking her head and saying to herself: “boys.”

Back in the treehouse, Haley had his phone back out. He opened google and searched for cardinals and relatives. The first results were not what he hoped for. He read one out loud: “The Cardinalidae are a family of passerine birds found in North and South America.” He hit x on that search and tried again: “do relatives come back as cardinals?” Saying it to google’s search microphone thingy. Jackpot:  

Cardinals - Sign from Heaven?  

Does my father Visit me as a Cardinal?

Are Cardinals a sign of a loved one?

Why do cardinals represent lost loved ones? (Haley clicked on that one.)

According to superstition if you see a cardinal, one of your loved ones wants you to know that they're watching over you and that you're not alone.

“I knew I heard that somewhere!” Haley got up excitedly, put the phone in his pocket, and brought both the tomato and wiffle ball to the treehouse window. He looked around, leaning out as far as he could to find Red. Little did he know, Red had perched in the roof of the treehouse all along, watching his research.

The bird came from inside the treehouse and landed on the window sill next to Haley.

Haley jumped inside and backed a step away from the window. Red followed a few hops closer along the window’s ledge.

“Grandpa, is that you?” The cardinal flapped madly all around the inside of the treehouse! “Holy ————“ Haley muttered in awe and amazement, watching this red bird fly laps around his favorite place. Red flew at the boy, slapped him on the head with one wing, and came to rest on the tomato.  

Memories came back: “We used to eat tomatoes right here under this tree.” Haley could see them, backs to the tree, grandpa eating neatly but tomato juice and seeds pouring down Haley’s chin.

Red fluttered to the nearby wiffle ball and nudged it towards his grandson. It fell off the window ledge and rolled to Haley. He picked it up and threw it out the window. Red just looked at him. His cardinal-black-mask turning left and right along with a bright orange beak. “I kinda thought you’d go get it.” Haley decided Red was not playing fetch like a dog. He got the tomato and started down the ladder. Red flew to him and landed on his shoulder.

They went to get the ball together and took a lap around the old bases. Then, back at the tree they sat and ate that tomato.