"What time is your flight, Mom?"

"Around 4 pm." she answered, glancing at the clock and then frantically ran back to the closet to get her suitcase.

I leaned against the wall and sighed, "You could stay a little longer."

She dragged her suitcases to the front door and then turned around to look at me. "I'm sorry, Eli. I want to, but the company called."

Yeah.

My mom was almost never home because she worked as the assistant of some guy who owned a multinational company. She traveled a lot for business trips and I was mostly alone at home. For most 17 yr olds that'd be awesome.

And it was for me too, but I also wanted her to be there sometimes.

We put all her stuff in the trunk and got into the car. I always drove her to the airport, no matter what time she had to leave. That way, we got to have a little chat just before she left.

"Eli, you're driving too fast." Her blue eyes, same as mine, widened and she grabbed her seatbelt with both hands.

I laughed. She did this everytime.

"No, I'm not."

"Yes, you are. Do you want to turn us into a pretzel around a tree?"

I slowed down a little and saw her relax in her seat. She let go of her seatbelt and pulled her short brown hair into a little bun at the nape of her neck. I had the same hair colour as her, but I had longer hair down to my waist.

Also, as ridiculous as they were, I understood her worries with a fast car. Because my dad died in a car accident. I was around 6 at that time.

I never really felt the loss of my father, maybe because my mom took really good care of me or maybe because I didn't remember him that well. Either way, it never bothered me that I didn't have a father growing up.

We finally reached the airport and she kissed my forehead after getting all her stuff out of the car.

"Take care, Elliot." She smiled.

"You too, mom." I smiled back and I gave her a hug before she headed inside.

I walked back to the car. The sky was dark now. It was probably about to rain soon.

As soon I started driving back home, it started pouring. I got a feeling of deja vu, watching the droplets strike the windshield.

I finally reached home and parked the car in the driveway. I didn't get out of the car though. I just sat there, thinking.

Do I have homework? Well it's Friday, so I have time for that. What should I eat in dinner? Pizza will do. How about taking a bath? Sounds good.

It was really quiet except for the pitter-patter of the rain. I sat there staring out of the window and suddenly my eye caught a movement in the lawn. I couldn't see clearly but there was something twitching on the ground.

I got out in a hurry, almost slipping and squatted down in the middle of the lawn.

It was a bird.

Perhaps it's wing was broken. There was a bit of blood on it's wing but otherwise it looked fine. It fluttered it's better wing aggressively when I tried to touch it.

"There, there. It's fine. Shh. I gotchu." I mumbled and gently picked it up and ran inside the house.

I grabbed a towel from the kitchen, wrapping the bird in it. Now that I looked at it, it was actually really cute.

It was completely white and was round. I chuckled. "You're like a little snowball."

The bird wasn't trying to move around now and seemed to be staring at me curiously. I stroked its head with my fingers and it let out a little chirp.

I couldn't help but smile. "You're so adorable. Come on, let's wash you up."

I took it up to my bedroom upstairs and filled my bathroom sink with warm water. I was also drenched and was starting to shake slightly, so I turned on the hot water in my bathtub.

I washed the blood off of the bird, being careful with its broken wing. After I was done, I put it on the towel again and placed it in front of my hairdryer.

"Does that feel nice?" I smiled, stroking its head again. The bird chirped in response, making me laugh.

My bath was filled now, so I took off all my wet clothes and slipped in the hot water. It felt heavenly. I added a lot of bubbles and sighed happily.

I turned to look at the bird and it seemed to be staring at me again.

"I will take you to a vet tomorrow. I would take you right now, but it's raining. I hope the pain in your wing isn't that bad." I said, wishing I could do something right now for the poor thing.

The bird chirped and hopped around on the towel as if saying that it was fine.

And then it suddenly dawned on me, do birds usually behave like this? Also I hadn't ever seen any white, round birds around here. I thought all birds did was shit on people. Well, it could be some sort of rare species or something.

Or maybe I'm just overthinking.

Yeah, definitely overthinking. Who cares what kind of bird it is? A bird is a bird.

I sat in the bath for a while, talking to the bird occassionally, to which it just chirped in response. It was really cute.

The water started to turn cold so I got out. Wrapping myself in a towel, I picked up the bird along with its little blanket and carried it to my bed.

"Well, you rest here and I'll clean up the place." I said as I set it down.

I put on some shorts and a shirt and spent about an hour cleaning up the bathroom and the kitchen. I threw my wet clothes into the washing machine before heading back into my bedroom. It was nearly 8 pm now and it was still raining. I didn't really had anything to do so I decided I'd hit the sack early.

The bird's eyes were closed and it was sleeping while leaning against my pillow. Jesus, it was so cute.

How would I prevent myself from dying from all this cuteness?

I turned off the lights and layed down, keeping distance from the bird so that I wouldn't harm it if I rolled over.

"Goodnight." I whispered softly and the soothing sound of the rain put me to sleep.