For someone with an empty bag, I felt heavier, you see.

Every time I took a walk, I would always attract a bird with my singing. A broken bird or a sick bird, a bird in need of help, or a perfectly fine bird that 'only needed directions'. The ones with a wound inside, just like me, or the ones that only wanted to eat from the seeds in my hand. Some type of very unique birds, you see. And I like birds. I particularly love to show birds all the kinds of items I own, and what I could help them with, so I'd always take them home.

I collected so many birds over time. Some now dead, some alive but have moved ownership, some flown away, some that pricked at my eyes. Too many birds, you see. I didn't know when I started to hate the sight of them. I was tired, you see, from all the bending and bending, and chirping and chirping. Until one day, on my walk, I was completely silent. No fingers tapping, no singing, no seeds in hand. Some birds would come and chirp and chirp, and sing and sing, check my hands, see they were empty, and fly away. Some would chirp and chirp, and whistle and whistle to get me talking, "Maybe if I got her to sing`, I'd get some seeds." But I kept on walking, and so they flew away.

The second day, I noticed even fewer birds. Third day, the same. And on the fourth day, hoping I'd hear some chirping to cheer me up and guide me through my path, there were no birds on my walking route. I finally noticed their silence and realized how much I needed their chirping to guide me through, so I shrugged it off.'I don't even like them, anyway. Why do I need them to guide me?' I walked and walked until I caught something at the corner of the bend. Me: 'A bird' The voice inside my head: 'No, it's a human.' Me: 'But I thought I saw a bird?' The voice inside my head: 'It's a bird-human??' Me: 'A bird turning into a human?' The voice inside my head: 'A human turning into a bird.'

There had been other humans all along! All watching me and turning into birds to beg for my seeds. 'Why?' I thought to myself. How come I never noticed the other humans on my walks? 'Does the bird become the human, or the human becomes the bird?' I have no feathers, no tail or a head shaped like a bird, but I could possibly turn into one, except I didn't know how. I took another walk, and this time, my heart twisted at the sight of a bird. I couldn't help but think if it was an actual bird or a bird-human, whatever that was.

That night, I went home and sent out all the birds I owned. The dead ones mixed with the whole, the sick ones with the broken ones, the healthy ones that just wanted to be fed, the ones seeking company, the good ones... All of them went out. I heard 'mad', I heard 'bad'. I heard all the words I had never heard a bird speak before. I heard 'insane', 'She's a witch'. All too familiar, like my father had said before. It wasn't a problem anyway. I could handle that. I went on another walk with the aim of being a bird this time, but I couldn't turn. I watched the humans at the corner and saw them chirp and chirp, and sing and sing until they changed, but I failed horribly when I tried. So I kept going back and back, hoping to turn.

On day four, I saw a deer. I didn't realize until then that I never noticed the other animals on my walks. This deer suddenly spoke to me. It brought me an orange flower in exchange for some seeds. I ignored it and went on my way. 'Those orange flowers are really pretty, though,' I thought to myself 'But the hole in its heart is also quite big, like mine.' The next day, the same deer appeared, whining and whining, singing and singing. I gave it some seeds and continued on my way. The following day, the deer appeared again, and this time, offered only the pretty orange flowers. 'I do not want your seeds,' it said. 'Just sing with me.' It sounded genuine, and so I got confused. 'That's strange,' I said, and continued on my way.

The seventh day, I saw no deer, nor a bird; somewhat, I was relieved. But just at the turn of the bend, in the middle of my path, were the pretty orange flowers with a note on it: 'I just would like to be your friend, if you'd let me.' I loved the colour of the flowers so much, and the deer did seem honest, so I picked them up and went home. That's how I became friends with a deer.

Oh! what a pretty deer, an intelligent deer, an everything deer. It taught me everything about the colour orange and told me where to find seeds. Together, we talked about EVERYTHING; the other birds on the path, the humans turning into birds at the end of the street, and the other animals on the route. It showed me such a gentle love, and slowly, I became domesticated. What a turn of events! There and then, I vowed to myself to close up the hole in its heart. And it probably did the same.

I said so because it would come to my door even when I no longer had seeds, and I would call out its name when I noticed it no longer sang to make sure it was okay. Sometimes I could tell it was sick and pale, but I was fully out of seeds to give, so I couldn't offer help, and it would hurt each time that I had nothing to give except my singing. So I tried desperately to get more and more seeds. I finally found one deer friend, and I didn't want it to die or fall sick. I wanted it to keep singing joyfully. And although they liked my singing and it helped, sometimes, I couldn't stop thinking that some seeds would've been a better help. Yet, in its condition, it would sing with me and bring me some food, even when I didn't ask. For someone with an empty bag, I felt heavier, you see.

Every time I looked at its window to see why it was no longer singing, knowing it needed some seeds that I couldn't provide, my heart would break even more. At some point, I noticed my singing wasn't even cutting through. 'I needed more seeds.' I desperately needed more seeds. I searched day and night, morning and evening, begging the stars to shine on a pile of seeds, but I couldn't find any, and because my dear deer knew I was lacking, and perhaps figured that I'd need to eat some food to have the strength to find more seeds, it still left me some at my door. And I felt heavier.

For some reason, everything came flooding all at once. I started seeing the ghosts of all the birds I met, all the birds I threw out. I started noticing all their scratch marks on my body. I tried to appease their ghosts and sing to the wounds, but they wouldn't heal. The hole in my heart became deeper and wider. I couldn't tell the deer what was happening. They wouldn't understand, and I feared that they'd hate me for all I later did to those birds. Most importantly, I couldn't tell them as they would offer me more food, and I didn't want that.

So I grew heavier and heavier as the day went on, an inch from burying myself in the ground. A drop one day, and drops the next, until I was shedding full tears. I slowly became smaller and smaller, and lighter and lighter until one day, as I was walking, I noticed I was getting shorter with every step. My feet had changed, my head had changed, my hands had changed, my eyes had changed, everything had changed, and I became a bird. 'A bird! I'm a bird!' I was amused, then confused, and almost immediately, irritated and angry. How on earth did I become a bird? The one thing I hated so much. Now I had to chirp and chirp, and sing and sing to get some seeds. 'A bird?! How do I face my deer friend now?' So I thought to hide myself away, take another path, and work and work until I got enough seeds to go back home and feed my deer to heal its frail body. 'Maybe it would even forget to address my new form.' I thought.

For a day, I watched the other birds; how they sang and how they chirped. The next day, I chirped and chirped, and sang and sang as I'd seen them do, but I guess my heart wasn't in it because I couldn't attract a single human. The following day and the day after that, and the day after that, I grew tired. It took me a long time to admit that if I were to be a bird, I would rather be the one that chirps at you once, and you take in as a pet, and feed and feed, letting it live without stress until it dies. Maybe I too, wouldn't mind that, but I'm too aware, too weary, too elder-daughterly, too motherly, too compassionate, too useful to waste my potential on that, as my mother would say. And so when I think of every human passerby I see on their walks, I try not to be the bird they're already having to face, so I keep quiet. And that's why I failed miserably.

I then think to myself, 'How am I supposed to go back to see my deer friend and give her some seeds? How am I supposed to turn back into a human being and face my dreams?' Those dreams…I keep having those dreams of the birds that bit me and the ones that scratched me, and tore at me. I have so much to deal with, and yet, I keep noticing everyone and everything with a hole in its heart. 'Maybe if I stopped seeing, I wouldn't notice.' So I made a decision. A very wise decision, actually, to pluck out one of my eyes and find my way to another town. I knew my dreams kept hunting me, and the thought of taking food from my deer friend did as well, so maybe I needed to go to another place, to chirp and chirp, and sing and sing, and that's what I did.

This time, all types of birds did I see. Red, purple, yellow, white, all sorts! I thought most of them wouldn't approach me, with me being partially blind, but that wasn't the case. I guess my voice was effective here, too. I had been so excited and engrossed in this new experience that I didn't realize I could still vividly see the ones with holes in their hearts. I could even smell them now, too. They smelled different than the others. I tried making friends with them, to learn their ways, and mirror how they lived, but I still couldn't fully commit. I had work to do and nightmares to get rid of. I even made friends with 2 yellow ones. Very lovely and lively birds, you see, but they shone too bright that it sometimes hurt my one eye. I must admit, though, I enjoyed the brightness until I got the urge to chirp and chirp and sing and sing about my dreams, my lack of seeds, and my deer friend, and oh my! I couldn't keep up. My dreams were still keeping me awake, you see, and I didn't want to dim their light, be bothered by my lack of seeds, and the gaping hole in my heart, so I left them. And on I went.

But one day on this new path, not long after, I saw a purple bird. It wasn't blindingly shiny, but I definitely smelled it before seeing it. I noticed it, and it noticed me. And as expected, it also had a gaping hole in its heart, except it was regenerating. I halted for a second, 'Oh, this is new.' I didn't think it was right to approach, but I felt gravitated towards it. 'This purple bird. What was even the point in plucking out my eyes' I muttered under my breath. We nodded to each other on the first day, exchanged pleasantries on the second day, and chirped for hours after. The following day, nothing was said, and the next, we immediately got to talking about the kind of humans we had both met. Quite a conversation, really, just how I like it. It seemed to enjoy it too, and so, it slowly became a routine to chirp and chirp with this bird. The one bird that had a healing hole in its heart.

One day, we had planned to meet on the path in the evening. I had a long day trying to find seeds, but I couldn't miss chirping with this bird. We chirped even more, then sang together and matched cadences, and I enjoyed it. Perhaps, I might have bared myself too much, because just when we finished chirping and singing, it said, 'There's something wrong. You could talk to me, you know.' and that was my final cue to leave.

Oh, how I so much wanted to be friends with this bird, but I couldn't let that happen. How could I?? It noticed the hole in my heart. That was supposed to be my line, but he reversed it. I noticed the hole in its heart was slowly closing too, and I didn't want to disrupt it or slow its process. I didn't want to make it worse. I felt ashamed to tell it my dreams and my lack of seeds. I didn't want it to see me without my feathers, nor did I want to make it heavier as I felt. That would be cruel, wouldn't it? Besides, it also scared me to bare myself enough to be noticed that way, and so, I did what I do best. I turned around and took another path.

Not too long after I began on my new journey, I started to feel quite sick. I noticed I felt heavier, my legs were hurting, then my hands, and suddenly I was limping, my neck was aching, and my eye, twitching. But I couldn't afford to think about it. I needed to focus on finding seeds to take back home to my deer friend. Plus, now I had a new quest in the queue, I also needed to conquer my nightmares so I could go back to befriend my yellow and purple birds again. I needed to pay back my duties. So, I ignored the pain I was in.

I worked and worked, and walked and walked, until my eye started to go black. One drop followed by another, and eventually a big pool of tears. And as I kept walking, I started to feel taller and taller with every step, and bigger and bigger, until I somehow became human. Back to my main form. I was almost excited, but a sudden realization hit me. I wasn't moving. 'Why aren't I not moving?" I couldn't walk, and I couldn't talk. So many thoughts began to fill my head. I couldn't sing, and I couldn't chirp. Everything went bleak. I was on the floor now. I could hear the calling of my deer friend and those yellow birds, and my dear purple bird, but I couldn't call out back. My heart beat was now slower, my eye now closed, and everywhere was now dark and dark, and silent and quiet, and void, and then, dead.