(161) Day 1:
They say that everything happens for a reason, but for the life of me I just can’t figure out why I am dressed in all black in the middle of the desert with a toilet, a dead tree, and a parrot. I don’t know why, but something tells me I’ll be here for a while.
I woke up with a sharp pain in the back of my head. Reaching up to touch the sore I felt instead a hard plastic. Taking my other hand, I felt around the plastic covering my head. Sliding my hands up the plastic head ware as far as I could, I realized that it was probably a cone hat. It wasn’t the only weird thing I wore. A long black raincoat, black combat boots, and a white face mask. It was insanely hot under everything, but I decided not to take them off, since there must have been a reason I wore them. Sitting there was uncomfortable, but I didn’t feel like moving or getting up. Something inside of me told me that there’s no point. I watched as the sun started to go down and went back to sleep.
Day 2:
I stood up seeing if the extra height would allow me to see anything but sand for miles in every direction. It didn’t. North, south, east, and west. All of it was sand (though I could only tell where east and west were, by virtue of the sun). I did however find what had probably caused me pain before. A plain white toilet in the middle of the desert which was what I had been laying up against. What makes it all the more peculiar was the dead tree branch that stuck out of the toilet bowl. The seat and lid were missing, and the tanks lid was laying a few feet from the toilet. And atop the dead tree branch was a bright red parrot. I thought this parrot must be here for a reason, so I walked over to the parrot
“Looks like were stuck here together,” I said.
“Awwk! You’re Alone!”
I decided not to interact with the parrot anymore.
Figuring there was nothing better to do I lay back down against the toilet. It wasn’t all that comfortable. But because that’s how I woke up the first day, I stayed lying against the toilet. I was sure I had done it with good intention, thinking that maybe the ground had felt worse. Though it took me awhile I eventually fell back asleep.
Day 3:
I woke up with a massive crick in my neck. I massaged it, sitting up. I wondered if it was normal for deserts to be this flat. There were thick clouds in the sky, and I was hoping it would rain soon. I’d been thirsty for a while. There was water in the toilet, but I was, decidedly, not that thirsty. I turned my head around to see if the parrot was still there. It was. I found it weird that it hadn’t flown away by now but didn’t push the matter further. I pointed at the parts of the sky where the clouds were.
“1, 2, 3, 4, 5.”
The clouds were small and still mostly white and thin, like strands of white hair. I knew I learned the name for them at one point, but I couldn’t recall for the life of me what it was. Either way I knew that it probably wouldn’t rain in a while.
Day 4:
The clouds were a lot thicker than before. Like a bunch of cotton balls clumped together. I was pretty sure these ones were called cumulus. They were also the best-looking ones for cloud watching, forming in more interesting shapes than most other clouds. Two of them next to one another looked like a dog barking at a fish with a long horn at the top of its head.
“3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18, 21, 22, 23.”
I salivated at the thought of the water, which is a weirdly addictive feeling when your mouth is otherwise dry. The parrot flew in front of my eyes a number of times circling me and the toilet. It did that every day. For a bird that can fly anywhere, it sure was weird to see it stay in this one place. Maybe it was content.
Day 7:
The sky was finally a little darker during the day. Unfortunately, that meant it was hard to cloud watch for clear shapes. On the bright side, I was counting for holes in the clouds, instead of clouds in the sky.
“3, 6, 7.”
It would definitely rain tomorrow. Maybe even tonight.
I heard flapping behind me as the bird perched on the tank and began drinking from it. It did this every time before it started flying around in a circle.
“Awk! Drink stupid!”
It said this every time too. The parrot seemed much more intelligent than any other parrot I’d heard of before. Almost as if it was speaking to me. Afterall, I never said any of the words it had. I wasn’t going to drink after a bird though and especially not when it came from out of a toilet.
Day 8:
When I woke up to the dark clouds overcasting the sky and got excited.
Rain! Rain! Rain!
I couldn’t wait to taste the water on my tongue. Unable to contain my anxiousness, I started to stand. I planned to stay up until it rained. My body was slower to rise than my mind was as I realize just how harmful it was to go this long without water. The bird’s screechy advice echoed in my head as I decided staying seated until it rained wouldn’t be so bad.
The Parrot seemed to be happy today too. Spending more time at the water tank. I decided to turn around to watch the bird on this jovial day and realized a weird habit it had picked up. It drank from the tank and relieved itself into the toilet bowl. I guessed the parrot was someone’s house pet. That could have explained why it hadn’t left yet either. Not smart enough to survive on its own, smart enough to know that it couldn’t.
“You seem pretty happy little guy,” I smiled.
“Rain! Rain! Rain!” It cried.
The bird began circling around as it usually did for a while when it started flying away at what looks to be its full speed.
This was bound to happen I suppose.
I sighed at the thought of our departure, but before the bird could get more than a good thirty feet from the toilet, it stopped in mid-air for a long moment then began flying backwards faster than it had forwards. My eyes widened as a I laughed at the almost impossible feat of nature.
I didn’t know parrots could do that!
The parrot began circling again repeating its trick a few more times before it landed on the tree again. This was the strangest bird I had ever met.
When it finally started to rain, I was on my feet, so happy for the little water I could get in the desert.
“Awk! Catch Water! Catch Water!”
The parrot seemed to say it as soon as I noticed. This rain was probably going to be the only one in a while. I didn’t know how long, but I wasn’t willing to find out unprepared. I took off my cone hat looking at it for the first time. The hard plastic didn’t have a hole at the top.
Thank goodness.
I stuck it into the ground and let it catch water.
“Awk! Catch Water!”
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For some reason the parrot’s words made me think I needed more. After some debating with myself, I took off my raincoat and hung it on the tree branches to catch more water. Under, I had worn a brown shirt and blue jeans. Not wanting to be completely soaked I placed them on the branches under the coat so that I could wear them when the sun came out. Black underwear. I kept that on, deciding I’d let them dry after on the branches. The parrot didn’t seem to want to stop cawing so I took off my boots to see if they could hold rain, though that water would definitely be for the bird and not me. I turned to the side and saw the tank lid again and decided to flip it over to catch some more water.
The bird kept cawing, but there was nothing else to catch water with. I laughed at the idea of following the birds every word. It still was just a bird after all. After a while me and the bird were just dancing in the rain. It tuckered out before me, hiding under my raincoat, on a lower branch. It ruffled its feathers dry. Then it spun its head around to its back, resting it there and going to sleep. It was then I realized it was probably night, the clouds had made the entire day dark, and I was completely unaware of the time after it began to rain. Cumulonimbus clouds. Clouds that stacked upwards into the sky from cumulus clouds. I couldn’t sleep, though this was the first time staying up past the parrot.
Thunder roared loudly causing me to jump. I turned to look at the bird who slept soundly. I was worried about lightning, but they say animals are smart when it comes to this type of thing. If there’s danger it’ll get moving. So, much more alert of the dangers of the sky, I stayed too.
I eventually grew tired of the rain too and hid under the raincoat. I moved up to wipe my face when I remembered that mask I had worn. I took it off. I could catch a little bit of water with this too. I placed it on the ground a few feet from me, out from under the raincoat and lay on the floor for the first time. It wasn’t as rough as the back of the toilet.
Maybe somethings don’t have a reason.
Day 9:
I woke up to the calls of the parrot. I felt disoriented from waking on the other side of the toilet. Still, it was a much more restful sleep than I was used to. Seeing the sun almost setting in the sky I realized that I must have stayed up long into the morning yesterday. I sluggishly crawled to my feet as the words of the parrot finally registered to me.
“Awk! Breakfast! Awk! Breakfast!”
My eyes widened at the thought of food, but I quickly came to my senses as I realized that the bird doesn’t know everything. My eyes narrowed at the flying bird for telling such a crude joke.
I knew it would be best to refrain from drinking water, but I couldn’t help but at least check all of our new water sources. I froze as I turned to the tank lid. Hanging over the edge, drinking it ferociously were a group of desert rats.
Breakfast!
Trying to be as careful as possible, I picked up one of my boots and poured some of the water out when I stopped and reluctantly took a swig. It didn’t taste awful, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it again and poured the rest out onto the ground. I then closed in on the unsuspecting rats and glanced at the parrot, now landed on the top branch. It lowered its body at the tank lid. I lowered myself too, and, once I felt ready, leaped forward. The rats turned out to be not so unsuspecting of me and all ran from my charge. Right towards the parrot.
It played me.
Luckily there was one straggler who had the poor insight to run through the water of the lid rather than around. I raised my shoe and dropped on the rat. As I heard it scurry up and down the inside of my boot, I realized how poor a choice it was to try to catch it instead of killing it with the sole of my shoe. Unwilling to let the rat go, but unable to come up with a plan to kill it while it scampered inside my shoe, I sat there with my shoe watching how the parrot fared.
The parrot was ferocious. While flying it grappled a rat with one claw and clawed deep into it with its other and then dropped the twitching corpse on the ground. In that same movement it picked another one by its beak and threw it high into the air. Then it flew at another pair of rats catching the first; the second got away with a large gash that slowed its escape speed significantly. Ignoring that one, the bird looked for the other three rats who had intuitively decided they did not fare well with the parrot. Clawing the one in his grip motionless before dropping it as well, the parrot flew directly in front of the rats corralling them back towards the toilet in my direction. As they closed in, I contemplated my willingness to catch the first one with my hands as the parrot caught the third and closed in on the second. I knew this wasn’t the time to be asking that question. I turned away, pretending not to notice it, before I thrust my hand at the surprised rat. It dodged quickly, though still running in my direction. I pulled my outstretched hand back to catch it from behind. As my hand closed in however, I hesitated long enough for the rat to turn around and crawl up my hand.
I screamed shaking my hand as hard as I could. The mouse went flying twenty feet away from me and kept running. The other airborne mouse, the one the parrot threw into the sky, hit the ground and I watched as the parrot grabbed it after scooping up the one with the large gash still attempting a futile escape. Killing the last two rats the parrot turned to me.
“Hey! I caught one,” I defended myself, but as I felt a tingling sensation on my hand, I screamed again shaking my hand wildly, and, like the one before, it flew a significant distance away.
I checked my shoe and saw it ate a whole through the toes. I blushed.
I’m in the middle of the desert, mostly naked, and getting embarrassed about a bird catching more rats than me.
The first thing I was sure to do was to check if my clothes were dry. The bird flew up to me, landing on the other side of the tank lid and cocked its head and uttered its next words as if asking a question.
“Fire?”
Day 15:
I took the two tiny branches I pulled from the tree five days ago and went at making the fire again. It had been five days and I was still completely unable to make a fire. Since then we’ve had a bunch of other animals come by to our water sources. Scorpions, Kangaroo Rats, and even a gecko. The assortment of animals made me realize that there were ways to figure out where this is. However, I couldn’t remember a desert that has all of these animals in it. I stayed up two nights ago to look at the stars for an indicator, but I couldn’t make out a single constellation. The best I could do was make a few rough looking pots in the sky and confirm that they looked nothing like the big and little dipper. Maybe I should have taken an astronomy class.
As for the fire, I hadn’t been able to do a single thing with that. I watched a lot of Discovery channel, Natural History, and the like, but for all his wisdom, Neil deGrasse Tyson never teaches you to make a fire on COSMOS.
I knocked the sticks to the side. I was so fed up. I thought of eating the rats raw. I remember learning they lose protein or something else important in the process of cooking them anyway. I looked over at the parrot and quickly changed my mind. Lying by my mask, it had punched a whole into the center of the rat and was now taking slowly picking at its insides with a bloody beak. At least it was eating. I needed something, but, even though I was pretty sure the scorpion was not poisonous, something about eating a thing that might kill me at the taste didn’t sit right with me. I needed to make a fire.
Still, I needed a break, so I turned to the toilet. After the rain, one thing was made clear to me. Someone was trying to grow a tree here. There was a lot of the sand in the toilet, along with parrot, and human waste. Whoever had set this up, probably trained the bird to poop into the bowl specifically. I remember learning that this was possible with the branch of a living tree and the right kind of soil and fertilizer, but not only did I not know what fertilizer or soil that was, I was pretty sure this tree branch was as good as dead. Still, I wasn’t going to give up on it, there was nothing better to do anyhow. I picked up my right shoe, the one that the rat had chewed through, and, using the heel of it, knocked as much of the water out of it as I could, spilling out onto the ground in front of the toilet. There wasn’t much water in the toilet, due to the large amounts of sand already in the bowl, but I knew too much water would be unhealthy and occasionally tried to remove some of the water. I know I should have gotten rid of the water faster, and in one sitting, but I couldn’t bring myself to stand over the toilet for too long. I suppose if I used the entire boot, I might be able to get the water out faster, but I decided not to, in case I wanted to wear it again.
I dragged my feet returning to my sticks. Taking the long way around I walked counterclockwise around the bowl, watching the bird consumed in its dinner. Next to it, on the inside of the mask, I noticed markings. As I knelt down to take a closer look, I realized that they were tallies, not unlike those you see in movies with a stranded or imprisoned person. They stopped at nineteen.
Day 17
Always before thirty. Once I noticed the first set of markings, I started to notice these tallies everywhere. Then I started looking for them. Twice on the cone, the bottom of my right shoe, the sides of the toilet bowl, the back of the toilet tank, on the tank lid, on the tall branch of the tree, they were everywhere. Not a single tally made it passed thirty. I have been out here for fifteen days and, though I’m pretty sure that these notches mean nothing I can’t help but be nervous, being more than halfway through the max. Though hesitant at first, I decided I would start my own tally, using a branch to make my notches.
I finally made a fire, but I was so focused on just starting it that I forgot I would need to maintain it. It went out in just a few seconds. I continued trying to restart the fire. Next time it was ready I would sacrifice apart of my shirt. As I spun the sticks together, I noticed in the distance a rat that looked to have been dead for a while now. I was sure that it was one of the ones I had thrown into the air a few days ago. I couldn’t help but feel a little proud. I had killed my first animal, not to mention I noticed it before the bird had. It was only about 40 feet from the toilet. Hoping to get it without the bird noticing, I ran towards it.
As I started running the bird cried. I turned back to see it flying after me. It must have noticed the dead rat. I found it first though, so I thought if it wanted to get it, it would have to beat me to it. I sped into a full out sprint and then suddenly stopped. Not voluntarily. I looked down at the rat, it was only 10 feet away. I remembered the parrot’s weird flying, stopping in midair and flying backwards twice as fast. I realized it before but ignored it. It’s not that I didn’t know parrots could do that. It’s that I knew that parrots couldn’t.
Parrots can’t fly backwards.
With the power of some invisible force I was thrown backwards, in full force, at the toilet.
(179) Day 1:
They say that everything happens for a reason, but for the life of me I just can’t figure out why I am dressed in all black in the middle of the desert with a toilet, a dead tree, and a parrot. I don’t know why, but something tells me I’ll be here for a while.