The Wren

Something caught my eye as I looked out of the kitchen window. It was the wren that I'd noticed a few weeks ago. Then, it had been dusk and he was just getting his last meal of the day. It wasn't dusk now: although I had no idea what time it was…To be honest, I had no idea what day of the week it was either. Thursday? Friday? Did it matter?

As if he heard my sigh, the wren hopped onto the kitchen windowsill and looked at me. "What's wrong?"

I should have been surprised that a bird was talking to me but nothing could surprise me at the moment. I was still seeing flashbacks of that darkened room, still hearing Monk's voice and the sounds of laughter: even though no-one was physically present. A talking wren was low on the scale of madness I seemed to be experiencing.

I sighed again. "I'm a junkie," I said.

The wren put his head on one side. "No, you're not."

"Yes, I am. I look in the mirror and that's all I see."

"I think you need a new mirror then," the wren observed. "From where I sit, you're a recovering addict, not a junkie."

"Same thing. Different words."

The wren hopped nearer and tipped his head to the other side. "I thought you knew the importance of using the right words. Junkie implies someone who's high and intends to stay that way. You're recovering."

"It doesn't feel like a recovery. It feels like a waking nightmare." To my own ears my voice sounded pathetic. I was wallowing in self-pity and I hated myself for it.

There was a tutting sound. Can wrens tut? This one sounded as if he was. His bright eyes looked at me kindly. "You judge yourself too harshly. You're just stuck in the low. The physical is affecting the mental, the emotional and the spiritual. It'll get better."

"I don't know if I can make it," I admitted in a whisper. "It still hurts."

"That'll pass. It's only been a couple of days. Allow yourself time to heal."

"I can't think straight. I don't feel like I'm going to be any use as a cop ever again."

"You will be. You'll be back to your old self soon."

I shook my head. "No, I'm broken. Flawed."

The wren's eyes twinkled. "Good."

"Good?"

"It's better to be a diamond with a flaw than an ordinary pebble, don't you think?"

I almost smiled. "That sounds familiar."

"Confucius." The wren bobbed its head up and down.

Only I could hear a wren quoting Confucius. I really was losing it.

"What else is bothering you?" he asked.

"I feel cut off from everything I know. My world's been shattered. I feel…alone."

"Then your mirror's not old, it's broken…You're not alone. Look around you…What about Huggy?"

I nodded. "Yes, Huggy's been great. I'll never forget him taking me in and letting me hide at his place till the worst was over. I owe him more than I can repay."

"And your captain?"

I swallowed. It was hard to find the words to describe how grateful I was: knowing that Dobey was unofficially in the know, and was helping Starsky to cover for me, was humbling. The flu story they'd concocted would explain me being off for a week and any tiredness I might exhibit next week when I got back to work. "Yeah, you're right. I've got great people around me. I'll never be able to repay him either."

"There's no need to repay friends. They love you. They know you'd do the same for them."

I knew the wren was right but it still surprised me.

"You seem astonished anyone could love you."

I shrugged. "Sometimes I am. I've got too many flaws."

"Love sees the diamond not the flaw. Time you did, too. Look around you and see what you can help to fix. It's all about mending what you can and living with what you can't." Hopping backwards, as if he was about to take flight, the wren asked, "And what about him? He could do with some fixing, you know."

"Him?"

"Behind you," the wren said. He jumped off the windowsill, flying the short distance to the nearest small tree, and disappeared into a space between the roots and a rocky wall into which it had seeded itself.

I turned around and looked across the sun filled cottage. Sprawled on the sofa was my partner, sleeping as if dead to the world. My conversation with the wren hadn't disturbed his untroubled sleep. For a moment, I was jealous. I'd give anything for untroubled sleep.

I walked closer and looked down at Starsky's face.

Then I saw it. What the wren had been talking about. The lines of worry etched across his brow. His sleep wasn't untroubled: it was the sleep of a man exhausted beyond his ability to fight any longer and yet his brain was still racing with anxious thoughts. He twitched as I watched him and I felt my heart constrict. Maybe it was time for him to stop looking after me and for me to start looking after him.

It must be breakfast time. I'd see what I could rustle up. I went to the fridge and found Starsky had stocked it with eggs, bacon and juice. I seemed to remember a conversation with him about me needing 'proper' food for a few days before I started back on my health shakes. I smiled and shook my head. The least I could do was make him a 'proper' breakfast. I poured the juice and put plates on the table. I scrambled some eggs and started frying the bacon. Predictably, the smell of bacon woke my partner up. He sat up and struggled to his feet, staggering with tiredness as he joined me in the kitchen area.

"Hey, what's all this?"

"Thought I'd do you a breakfast. You deserve it, partner. It's just a start on thanking you for everything you've done for me."

I sounded soppy to my own ears. Hopefully, he'd blame it on withdrawal symptoms. I was rewarded by a kilowatt grin, as he sat at the table. I placed the bacon and eggs in front of him and watched as he happily tucked in.

Through a mouthful, he said, "Hutch?"

"Yes."

"You do know it's four o'clock in the afternoon, right?"