T-L Spencer: Dreaming, Writing, Reading

Will that infernal macaw ever shut up, I think, as I look through the horizontal bars of the cage. He always makes such a racket.   I thought that he had been sold but obviously I was wrong. I can’t say I blame them. Who would want a gobby parrot with a feather problem? Today is the day. Today I will say goodbye to this 8 by 12 box and say hello to paradise. Tonight, I will be in a big house with warm, fuzzy saw dust, yummy food and blissfully cool water. I just have to be good, advertise myself, curl my tail like a good little rat and run on my wheel for all the little humans – even if they smell funny. A shop keeper refreshes my water; about time too! It’s been warm and between you, me and the rat post, it was starting to smell. And it had green stuff in it! The woman drops a treat in my cage and I eat it gladly, taking a peek at my neighbours. To my right are the albino mice. Odd creatures if truth be told – their eyes are creepy – I can never tell where they’re...

Rain pelted against the windows as a heavy storm raged on outdoors but inside, in the darkness of his normal home, a different kind of storm was brewing. He was wide awake and burning. Every cell in his body was screaming at him. What should he do? Should he listen? Should he ignore? He had to decide soon, his body was on fire.   He knew instinctively that there was only one way to quench it. Her: she could extinguish the flames, sooth his racing heart, cool his burning body. But she was the reason he was hot in the first place, plaguing him, his thoughts, continually… Especially at night; she was lethal at night. Something stirred in the air. She had returned. The infernal siren that kept him awake night after merciless night: praying for rest, praying for mercy, praying for release. It was always the same. The same time, the same place, the same voice… the same husky, impossible requests. It was driving him mad. She returned in the usual manner, a soft s...