Once I found a baby bird on the ground. She was chirping pitifully, and I wanted to help her, but I remember my father telling me that if you touch a wounded animal, they will be shunned by their own kind. I debated for a moment, his words ringing in my ear, and then I picked her up anyway.
I took the baby bird home and nursed her. She was tentative at first, but warmed to me. Within weeks she couldn't bear it when I left home for work, and she nearly chirped her head off every time I came back. I told my friends she was my one and only girl -- Gabby, I named her -- and it was true.
For a while. Then I met Melissa. She was an injured baby bird too, in a way. And I nurtured her, helped her heal. Like Gabby, she'd been abandoned by her family, and I took her under my wing.
Now she's my only girl. Gabby passed away, and when she did, a part of me went with her. Melissa tried to help me, tried to fill in that empty, chirpy space. But it's not the same, and it never will be.
Gabby wasn't my only girl, but she was the one.
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