penny and peter

"come here, nicki." kanchana, our coordinator, stood near the window and motioned to me to come over. she pulled aside the curtain and pointed to a pigeon. 

"pigeon is hurt, so we have to let it get better until it can fly again. one week, maybe two. we let it get better." in a cardboard box in the corner of my porch sat a sick-looking pigeon, missing a few feathers and looking like she'd seen better days. 

but here's the thing. she's not always alone. sometimes, there are two pigeons. i couldn't really figure it out for a while; i didn't know if maybe there were always two pigeons and i just didn't look hard enough before. but no, there was indeed only one pigeon sometimes, two other times. penny and peter, i decided to call them (because maddy's around, and since she names everything, i might as well, too). penny is the injured one. she managed to hop out of the cardboard box and now spends most of her days in the corner. peter flies in to keep her company (and food/water, i assume, because she's still alive), usually at night.

it's a bird love story. 

whenever i open a curtain to look at them, both of their eyes bug out and peter scoots closer to penny, protecting her from whatever potential evil i might inflict on her (which is obviously nothing, but how is he to know that?). so i try to give them their privacy, but i still check on them everyday because i'm a worried momma. for the last week, they've just been in the corner, waiting for health to float down on penny. nothing's really changed. 

this morning, both of them were standing and walking around. my face broke into a proud-momma smile and i came immediately here to tell you guys about it. i think it's a good sign for today.