The jay’s left wing is bent backward, exposing crumpled cartilage. Foot mangled, pinkish-red leaking from its tiny body. It squawks again, its voice fainter this time. It tries to stand as Sam gets closer, frantically batting its right wing. Mrs. G’s dirty-white clapboard house frames the background. 

The jay lifts a few inches off the ground before falling over again, furiously whipping its wings to regain its balance.

What should I do? Sam’s hands tremble. He feels water pricking the back of his eyes. He shoves the feeling down inside himself. Don’t cry. He can’t take the bird home; his mom would kill him. She’s always saying birds carry lots of germs. Besides, its wing is broken. 911 won’t help. Sam begged his mom to call 911 once when they found a hurt deer across the street, and she just asked, “What do you want us to do about it?” Plus, he has to get out of here. Mrs. G lives in this house. His mom says she’s crazy and meaner than Cruella de Vil. A little boy used to live with her, but then he didn’t anymore. After that, she stopped trimming her lawn. 

Sam swallows a sob. The jay’s whimpers grow softer and softer, its body flailing less and less wildly. Don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t—

The door of the white clapboard house flies open, and Mrs. G steps out wearing a gray nightgown, coffee stains blotting the fraying fabric, and brown slippers dotted with holes. “What the fuck did you do to that poor bird!” She shouts from the front porch. She lets go of the screen door, and it snaps shut. Sam opens his mouth, tries to explain, but his second-grade stutter comes back, and words choke in his throat. 

“What the fuck did you do?” She struts toward him, limping slightly but moving fast, slippers slapping the ground, white hair matted and stiff as she walks. 

Mrs. G looks at Sam and smiles. 

The hair goes taut on the back of his neck. She gets close enough that he can smell her stale breath. She lurches toward Sam, as if to grab his collar, but stops short. Sam is paralyzed, glued to the sidewalk. Don’t cry. 

Mrs. G pauses for a moment, deep in thought. She turns and walks to her neighbor’s yard. Grabs a large, loose stone from their cobble driveway and marches back over.

“Here!” She drops the flat rock in front of Sam’s feet. It thuds against the concrete. Sam looks down at the rock. “You’re Martha’s boy, aren’t you? Yeah, I see you walking that ugly dog sometimes. What’s his name?” Sam stays silent. Louder, “I said, ‘What’s your dog’s name?'” Sam looks up slowly and stops at her chin, afraid to look her in the eye. 

“Spark.” 

“You hurt this poor bird, and you think that’s okay, huh? At least finish the fucking job.” “You want me to…” Sam’s voice trails. 

“I want you to end its suffering. It’s in pain because of you.” The word “you” strikes Sam like a flame in his stomach. “Here!” Mrs. G grunts, picks up the rock, and holds it out towards Sam. He accepts it, arms bowing under its weight. “Now, you don’t want your mom hearing all about how you hurt this weak little bird, do you?” She frowns, mouth slightly agape, and Sam glimpses a swath of greened teeth. She prods him closer to the bird. 

He looks down at the broken blue jay, its right wing twitching on the concrete, eyes black and bulging. Tears well up, and this time he can’t stop them. They gush down his face like a dam bursting. 

“Are you really crying like a little fucking girl? Are you ever going to stop being a fucking baby and man up?” Again, she prods him toward the bird. 

Sam looks at the jay’s inky eyes. He thinks of Spark, his class gerbil, and feeding birds in the park with his mom, how her cheeks press upward as she smiles, watching him play with their neighbors’ pets. 

Sam isn’t sure he can drop the stone until he does it, lifting it as high as he can, arms trembling, small muscles flexing against his paper skin, hardly seeing through his tears. He drops the stone and hears a crunch. Here’s a frantic, high-pitched screeching.

“You only crushed the bird’s legs. “Are you a dumb fucking baby?” Mrs. G picks up the rock, red streaks painting the stone’s belly, and hands it back to Sam. “Again, but actually kill the damn bird this time” 

Sam drops the rock, then he picks it up and drops it again, and, as it falls, he stops crying.