001 | Bird
Salty wind whipped at my face and the rain danced its evil dance upon my head as I tried to get my bearings on the isolated beach. The black swans followed my footsteps.
Just hours before I had been packing my stuff, ready to head onto the road again. Hiding was all I had and all I needed to keep myself safe.
I just had to cause them to lose my trail.
Coming up to a cliff that stood far out, separating this beach from the next, I had to stop and think about my next way out. The black swans we’re approaching fast.
Climb.
“What?” I asked myself.
Climb, Ophelia. Do it.
Rain continued to beat down on my skin as I reached up and began to climb up the rocks. As I got a few feet higher, a hand wrapped around my ankle. I kicked and struggled to keep my grip on the slippery rocks.
Using my other foot, I kicked him in the face. He let go of my ankle and I swung back up. I planted my feet on some more rocks as I continued to climb up.
My hand slipped from one of the rocks and I skinned my knee along the side of the cliff. “You got this,” I whispered.
I got my hold on the wall again and continued on.
When I got to the top of the cliff, I knew it would take too long to climb back down. The black swans we’re fast on my trail, still following.
I bent my knees and pushed my feet off the skinny edge and dived into the ocean below. The water could have been colder had I not been swimming in it as of lately.
I spun my body until I was facing the surface, searching the top of the cliff for their bodies.
They appeared for a bit, and a few quick gestures were thrown around before they descended back down the way they’d come.
I swam to the surface and gasped for some air. I swam back over to the shore and crawled onto the sand, coughing. I’d gotten away this time but I had to be more careful. There may not have been a next time.
The search for a new hiding place would be rough, but I knew what I needed to do. I had to continue, despite how much I wanted to rest. I had to survive.
I got off the ground and began on my journey for a new temporary home. I had left my bag on the other side of the cliff because I had no power to take it with me. Carrying light was the only way to go in my state.
The rain continued for only about thirty minutes before the clouds had emptied themselves entirely. The cloud began rolling another direction after the job had been completed.
Walking through the trees only took an hour or two, and by the time I had found myself a waterfall, the sun came to celebrate with me for escaping the black swans.
Was there a cave behind it? If so, it would be the perfect hiding place.
Black swans covered every inch of this island. They always kept their eyes peeled for white swans. We were forced to hide away for the rest of our lives just to survive.
Some days I asked myself whether or not it was worth it to keep running. But as soon as I pictured the white swan I’d found a month back, I knew I had to keep going. I never wanted to end up like him.
They’d ripped every feather from his body. He’d been bruised like a banana well past the ripe date. His skin had been coated in so much blood while his face was not even identifiable. A bone had been broken in his arm, protruding through the skin.
The black swans did that to him. They stole what was his and punished him for existing. That kind of death was not the way I wanted to go out. I refused to give my feathers to anyone. They were mine and I would run until my last days if that was what it took to avoid the brutal torture they put us through.
The wind picked up and blew the hair away from my face.
I spread out my arms and closed my eyes as the mist from the waterfall hitting the water drifted my way. My clothes clung to the front of my body while running away from it behind me.
Yellow arrays of sunshine warmed up my cold skin, promising me that everything would be okay. This was where I was meant to be, under the sunshine and near water—but I was free.
I sat down on the rock outlining the edge of the waters. This was the kind of reward I needed to remind me why I was running and I had done well getting away today. There was nothing else that compared to the way the sun beamed on me.
You did it for us, Ophelia. You saved us once again.
That voice soothed my worried soul. The swan inside me was pleased with my skills today and that was enough to let me know I had accomplished what I’d intended to do. She was right. I saved us from a vicious end.
I stood up from the rock and removed my clothes, leaving them in a pile behind the rock. I stepped into the water and closed my eyes once more.
Every bone in my body shifted, and my skin changed it’s texture until feathers covered every inch of my body. My neck extended and my head shrunk down until my human form was left as a swan.
Floating across the water told my muscles to relax and that was exactly what I did. Black swans made it seem as if being a white swan was shameful or that we didn’t deserve to exist with our feathers attached to our bodies. I was not ashamed. It was just sad that I had to live my life this way because some bad people admired my feathers too much to let me have them.
