A true story by Ivy

A small breeze whistled through the maple tree’s leaves in my backyard. I jogged past the maple to the very back. I was looking for the sugar snap peas that we had planted under the trellis in the spring. I smelled their sweetness in the air. They must be ripe! I whispered to myself. My mouth watered.

“Tweet, tweet,” a bird chirped nearby.

What’s that? I wondered.

Looking around I noticed a fluffy gray baby robin perched on the trellis. It can’t hurt to try and touch it, I thought, as I crept forward. I had attempted to touch wild animals before but never succeeded.

I continued creeping toward the baby robin. As I moved forward, slow as a sloth, I gradually stretched out my arms. Just as I was about to snatch it, the bird leapt from the trellis. It landed on my head, jumping and flapping its wings.

“MAMA, MAMA!” I shouted as the bird’s claws poked my head. My heart pounded. My mom rushed out the back door and onto the porch. She gasped as she ran toward me. Just when she arrived, the bird hopped off my head and onto the ground. I was still trembling, and so was the bird!

“Did you see what happened?” I felt a little light-headed from shouting so much.

“Yes, are you all right, Honey?” My mom asked.

“Did you take a picture?” I asked.

“No, I didn’t have my phone with me,” she said, examining the bird.

I giggled. The fledgling bird looked like a ball of fluff hopping around on the ground. It flapped its fluffy gray stub-wings, seeming eager to fly. My heart fluttered and warmed as I watched it.

I laughed again but suddenly stopped. I thought about the neighborhood cats and dogs that got into our backyard sometimes. Will the baby be safe? Who will take care of it? I wondered.

We decided to set the baby robin in a basket full of green leaves and soft paper towels to help it feel more at home. We gently placed it in its temporary home. My mom hung the basket on a sweetly scented lilac tree. The bird flapped about, but soon settled down.

“Should we feed it something? It doesn’t seem to have any parents,” I asked.

“Let’s wait a bit longer,” my mom replied.

We backed away and began watching from a distance. The baby robin was no longer alone! Two grown yellow finches, smaller than the fledgling, were feeding it small worms and bugs.

I snuggled up to my mom and watched the adoptive parents caring for their baby. I sighed deeply and smiled.

Ivy, 9, lives in Wheaton, IL. She loves to be with animals. Ivy hopes to be a fiction and fantasy writer someday.