© James Pyles
Daniel was in the henhouse gathering eggs, but he also wanted an opportunity to check in on Henrietta. Gerald the Rooster was elsewhere in the barn yard, so there was time for this clandestine meeting.
While the other hens appeared as they always did, the ten year old was shocked to find the talking hen missing feathers and with her left eye swollen. What had happened to her?
“Henrietta. Are you okay?”
© James Pyles
Ten year old Daniel let the screen door slam behind him as he walked into the kitchen. Uncle Ethan was working with the new horses this morning and Aunt Abby had gone into town. He grabbed a glass from the cupboard and filled it with ice cubes from the freezer.
Ethan and Abby still had a freezer old enough to need ice-cube trays. The child momentarily considered this a charming anachronism in the 21st century.
He filled the glass with water and swallowed it down, attempting to quench not only the heat of an Idaho summer morning, but the growing sense of surrealism he was experiencing, particularly at the latest disturbance, a talking hen.
