Feathers Of A Bird

Chapter : Nine (Part Two)

(Listen to the music while reading for a better experience!)

We spent the rest of the night talking. It seemed to me that the connection between me and Grace was created in an incredibly short time.
The time it takes for a minute hand of a clock to go from one 12 to another 12, was the time it took for us to jump into this beautiful friendship. Because just after an hour of us conversing and giggling, we both admitted that we felt this lovely, warm feeling inside of our hearts. We called it love.

The conversation we had that night was the one I was longing for- for a long time! We didn't sleep, instead, we stayed up and talked. We sneaked into the kitchen and made a flask full of coffee. We listened to songs as we constantly finished mugs of it. We took out all my books and made up towers with them, pretending to be little children again while the whole city was sleeping.
It was like disobeying the rules of the world and living our own lives in our own ways.

At dawn, when the sun was about to wake up from its sleep and wave away the darkness, we both sat beside the window, with the purpose to watch the sunrise. We heard the birds chirping and flying around as the sun came up.

Suddenly, I noticed a bird flying onto the cornish above the window. And suddenly, with the breeze coming from the North, a feather of it flew inside of my room and landed right in front of me and Grace. I picked it up, it was a beautiful golden feather.

"Which bird was that?"
I thought, playing with the feather.
"And why...why did this feather fall from the bird?!"

I smiled as I was abruptly reminded of Ryan's note.

I peeked at Grace. She rested her head on the glass of the window, with her eyes closed and a smile on the corner of her lips. She seemed tired.

"Grace."
I called.

She opened her eyes and looked at me.

"You should fall asleep now."
I smiled at her.

She got up and stretched her body as she said,
"That's right! Mom will scold if she finds out we stayed up all night and played with books!"

We both laughed.

She curled up inside of the blanket and suddenly looked at me again.
"I have bipolar disorder, so I often can't sleep at night-"

I nodded slowly.

"But why weren't you asleep, I wonder!"

I laughed awkwardly,
"I have insomnia!"

"Whoa whoa!"
She was surprised and then she started laughing.

"Why are you laughing?!"
I asked while laughing myself.

She replied,
"We're one big mentally ill family! And I'm the biggest psychopath!"
Grace kept laughing. I could see her covering her face with the pillow, hiding her tears.

Once more, I realised how miserable someone's life can be. I got a little bit closer to her and grabbed her arm.

"Why are you saying it like that, Grace?"
I stopped for a moment.
"Having bipolar doesn't mean that you're a psychopath! Some people have physical problems- like, diabetes, asthma! Do they call themselves 'paralysed people' when they're sick and can't get out of bed?!"

Grace stared at me.

"No, they don't. And even if they do, they shouldn't!"
I kept saying.
"Then why would you call yourself a psychopath?! You can't do that! Just like the people who have physical problems, we have some sort of mental problems. What is so wrong with that? We're human, containing the same blood as they do. There's no freaking difference between us."

I stopped as I noticed tears falling from Grace's eyes again.
"Nobody..."
She stuttered.
"Nobody has ever talked to me like this..."
She laughed again.
"Without my therapist of course. But-"
She let out a heavy sigh.
"A therapist is someone whose job is to tell us, ill people, those things. But it doesn't help."
She looked at me.
"But when you said them...the felt different. Your words were different, Kathy. And the love in your eyes was different too..."

I smiled at her.

She continued.
"I can't thank you enough for thi-"

"You don't have to thank me! What are friends for?"
I stopped her in the middle of the sentence and laughed weirdly.

She started laughing too.
"Okay!"
She wiped her tears and settled on the bed.
"You should maybe try to take a nap too! You have school!"

I nodded as I turned the light off.

Grace fell asleep in five minutes. I got up from bed, with that feather in my hand. I walked straight to my table and took out a brown diary from the stock of books. I opened it and put the feather between two of my favourite pages; one had some pictures of my family and the other one was filled with my thoughts that came to my mind that day Ryan visited our house.

As I closed the diary, I saw a lilac coloured paper sticking out of the diary. I opened the page and out it again in its place with care. Only looking at it made me smile. The note from Ryan.

I abruptly remembered that our school trip was in that week.
"Maybe it's on Friday. Ah! I can't remember which date Miss Bailey said!"
I regretted in my mind.
"Nevermind, I'll ask her again today."

I wriggled into the bed and sat by the window again.
"Trip is soon, no doubt. And..."
A big smile appeared on my face.
"Ryan is coming too!"