Screeching
The sunlight falls on him between the buildings of the family compound. I am five, and he is beautiful. He holds one of his bright blue feathers in his beak. He is uncaged.
I take slow steps. He opens his beak, and his feather snaps back into place. The parrot watches me with ruffled feathers. I lift my banana. His feathers smooth. He leans forward and eats from my hand.
I tempt him further up my arm. He steps on my wrist, walks on my arm, until he stands on my shoulder. I am triumphant, until the adults come in screeching.
Rosalinda Alcalá teaches at an elementary school near the Pacific Ocean. She is a former competitive distance runner that settled down where suburbia meets the chaparral trails. Rosalinda earned a fiction certificate through UCLA Extension. She lives with her husband and two teens and the wild birds they feed.