Finale

(continued from The Eagle & The Hummingbird, March 7, 2005)

Shelly looked up. It was a beautiful morning, the sun was shining and the pale blue sky was dotted with fluffs of cottony clouds. Squirrels were scampering across the field, chasing one another from one tree to the next. Flowers were beginning to blossom everywhere, and there hadn't been any sign of snow for weeks. Shelly smiled. Spring had arrived.

Unfortunately, Shelly had no time to linger. She had to finish an assignment, which she conveniently forgot until she woke up this morning, 3 hours before the deadline. To make things worse, it was turning out to be harder than she expected. This morning, Shelly rushed to the library the minute the doors opened, hurriedly grabbing books for her research.

She ran back as fast as possible, stopping for a brief moment to inhale the sweet scent of spring. "Tulips!", she thought with joy, spotting her favorite flowers in the garden near her dorm entrance. Grumbling to herself, Shelly reluctantly peeled her eyes off the purple flowers and raced up to her room.

No sooner had she opened the first book, then Shelly heard a familiar noise outside her room. "Oh no, not again", she moaned, "how many times does he have to do that?". Thoroughly exasperated, Shelly leaned out her window and yelled, "Shut up you freak! It's 7am! Go to SLEEEEEP!!"

The noise stopped, temporarily. Cursing under her breath, Shelly tried to concentrate on her work. The research was interesting, to her at least, noone else understood what Shelly found fascinating about biology. But, even she couldn't deny that the assignments were tough. And this time she had to write a 3-page paper on animal behavior.

Deciding to take the easy way out, Shelly turned to the most convenient source for information, the Internet. She Googled for her topic, "hummingbirds". Within seconds, she found what she needed. Relieved, Shelly leaned back on her chair, savoring the moment. Something caught her eye. It was a link to somebody's blog.

"Why not? I've got time to spare", Shelly thought. She clicked on the link and read the girl's diary. The more she read, the more Shelly was struck with disbelief. As soon as she finished the last word, Shelly raced out of her room, through the dorm hallway, down the stairs and out the door.

And exactly as she expected, she found him. There he was, the owl that disrupted her sleep with his hooting, the owl she yelled at every morning. But it wasn't him that she wanted to look for. "Where are you?", Shelly wondered. She looked more carefully, using the owl as her guide. And she finally saw her among the tulips. For a brief moment, Shelly saw.. the little hummingbird.

At that instant, Shelly understood the owl. Contrary to what she knew about owls, this owl didn't return to his perch in the morning after his nightly forage. But he wasn't a freak as Shelly had thought. The owl was just spending time with the hummingbird.

Shelly looked up. This time she wasn't looking at the dawn of early spring. She scanned the skies for a long time, and then she knew, that there was no eagle now. Only the owl and the hummingbird.

THE END