The Story Bird

John lived in a big blue house by the seashore. Every morning he would go down to the beach to say hello to the sea gulls who screeched back at him. John built sand castle that the waves would eventually sweep away. He imagined the castles being carried far, far away to give shelter to some little homeless fish, so he worked hard to make them special.

Then john collected shells to take home with him. He glued them all over the walls of his room until it looked like a wonderful underwater cave.

One morning as the wind rattled at the window, john woke with a start. He got up and when he looked out, he saw that the sea was dark and angry and the sky was low and black with clouds. He heard the gulls and calling and ran to the beach-but they did not come to greet him, they just circled in the sky.

John walked toward the sea gulls but stopped suddenly. Lying at his feet was a beautiful multi-coloured bird, its enormous wings bent painfully by the raging wind. He gently wrapped the exhausted bird in his coat and carried it inside, into his room full of shells.
John fed the bird and sat it with all day. Late that night, when he fell asleep, he dreamed that the bird was perched by his pillow, and he was sure that he could hear it whispering in his ear.
“thank you, little boy, for my help, said the bird. I have flown here from far, far away, and I still have a long way to go. I must travel to the other side of horizon to tell the children of the sun all I have seen and heard. I shall tell them that a little child just like them, a little child beside the sea, saved my life.”
The next day when john woke up, he saw the multicoloured bird looking at him with dark, bright eyes, and he smiled.
“pretty bird, did you talk to me while I was asleep?” asked John, but the bird did not reply.
John sat down on a big shell and said to the bird “I know some lovely stories that sea told me, about the animals that live in our world. Take them with you to the children of the sun!”
John told those stories to the bird. When at last john stopped talking, his head was heavy, and he knew he was falling asleep.
The bird perched at open window and looked out. It turned back to john and whispered, “thank you!” then, opening it’s multicoloured wings, it flew away-far, far away- to tell the children of whole world those wonderful stories- the very ones that you are about to disover.
Pictures credit: freepik.com and Google images.