Short Stories by Matt Slater

The Aviary of Henry Weston

PG-13; Bullying, Language

Location: Ruston, Washington

Time: 9:01 AM, December 19th, 2014

Connor Weston stared through the glass wall. He stood on the parlor side, within the 6-bedroom, 7-bathroom, ocean-view house that his late Uncle Henry had bequeathed to him, his sister, and three cousins. Each Weston had a job assigned to them after Henry's death the day after Thanksgiving. Henry's lawyer would evaluate their work on Christmas to determine whether the job had been completed in a manner that would've satisfied Henry's wishes, whatever that meant. If they had, they would receive their share of the estate.

Henry's big sister, Isabel, was renovating and re-opening the once-popular Marina Diner, an old haunt of Henry's that shut down in 2008. His cousins Samantha and Timothy, Henry's kids, were given high-ranking positions at Henry's construction company. His cousin Burt was tasked with restoring the cars in Henry's collection, saved from the crusher years before but not touched since. Connor's job, however, was the oddest. The job waiting for him on the other side of the glass.

The birds. No, not the movie. The birds of Henry Weston's aviary, a peculiar collection of exotic, yet legally obtained pet birds, of whom Connor had been made the de-facto guardian. Successful people are notorious for being quirky, but the extensive bird collection of the late Henry Weston had people talking. They wondered what would compel an army veteran-turned-construction mogul, a husband, and father of two, to adopt all those birds, much less build a dedicated extension on the house for them. One or two birds would not have turned the rumor mill, but fifty's just weird, Connor thought.

Henry's wife, Iris, who passed a year before Henry, had agreed with this sentiment. However, with Henry being one of the nicest people you'd ever meet, people generally kept their opinions to themselves.

***

Connor snapped out of his stare after feeling a hand smack his back. He turned around to glare at the perpetrator: his abrasive cousin Burt.

"What are you trying to do, nerd," Burt sneered, "make them explode?"

Connor brushed his cousin off and went into the atrium to feed the birds. That's when Horace, Joey, and Glenda, Henry's largest macaws, started squawking obnoxiously.

"Con Man! Con Man!" Horace yelled, repeating an unfortunate nickname Burt had given Connor in middle school.

"Oh, shut up!" Connor shouted.

"Shut up! Shut Up! Con Man!" Joey yelled.

"Screw you!" Connor scolded.

Glenda then proceeded to squeal so loudly, Connor gave up and fled the room.

Conner was diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome when he was five. He hated loud noises and would easily get overwhelmed by sounds like a crowd at a party, styrofoam squeaking - or the macaws' recent outburst.

Isabel had come into the parlor before Connor had and saw him taking deep breaths against the door of the aviary.

"I'm guessing the feeding didn't go well," Isabel inquired.

"I didn't even get to that!" Connor said. "Those macaws are devil spawn!"

"Connor, are you sure that you don't want me to do this for you?"

"No, I have to do this myself!"

Before Isabel could respond, Connor braced himself and went back to the aviary, slamming the door behind him. The macaw start started squawking again, but Connor chose to ignore them this time. He walked across the room, past the colorful birds of Henry Weston's aviary, and into the supply shed. He grabbed the giant bag of bird food he had opened after cleaning the aviary yesterday and pulled it to the center of the room. The birds went quiet. Although they usually weren't well behaved, they knew not to bite the hand giving them food. They waited as Connor filled each bird feeder with seeds, dried fruits, and nuts. He then closed the bag after loading the last feeder and took it back into the shed.