someone had loved and missed it enough to put up those posters. His young and childish mind had wondered if his family would do the same. And somehow, he had come to the conclusion that they wouldn’t. He had envied the parrot. He snuck out that same night to come back for it, and he squatted down on the sidewalk and looked at it for a pretty long time. He grew angry, thinking that thing had something that he hadn’t. And he was jaleous. First just because people seemed to like the bird, because someone wanted it and he himself felt unwanted. That had been short after the incident that he didn’t like to think about, but he knew it was the thing that had shaped the whole personality that he was today. He had seen the grave of a pet once, he knew the animal would be missed. People loved their pets, even after they were gone. He had thought that this bird would live on in peoples memories longer than he would, and while today he knew this wasn’t true, back then he believed it. He now knew that memories and experiences stuck with people and understood how he came to- not even resent but envy these animals. He collected every missing bird poster that he might find on his walks, and there were many, at least on trees close to the trampled desire paths that many people seemed to wander.

This wasn’t one of these paths, he was in the middle of nowhere. He figured it must be someone who knew the places their pet liked to go, whatever species it might be. Someone who knew their pet so well, understood them deeply, that they came all this way out here to hang up a poster. So he came closer. Grabbed the paper and ripped it off the tree. He hadn’t been far off from the truth, he figured. It was a picture of a light blue bird with a phone number underneath. He folded the sheet carefully and slid it into his pocket. This one seemed to have a story. It would be a cherished part of his collection. Emotionally, it became valuable to him on the spot. It wasn’t more than a missing