Read Little Bird for Free Online

her purse and phone, and ran through the nightly routine once more. Then, all of a sudden, Colette and Shandra were gone, and the flat was silent and still.
    I sat on the edge of the couch, listening for Maisy. I was too nervous to turn the television on in case it disturbed her, so I studied the lounge room instead. There was a huge print on the wall directly opposite the couch. It seemed weird to arrange the furniture around art instead of pointing the couches at the television. The picture was by someone called Klimt: a woman holding a baby, her long hair covered in flowers. I said the name softly. It sounded like a paperclip hitting a tiled floor. I don’t know much about art, but the image was absorbing and tranquil. I allowed myself to relax a little. At least I wasn’t at the movies with Dougal tonight, making awkward conversation with his left shoulder while Tegan and Blake sucked face.
    I crept across the room and put the television on, with the sound turned down so low I had to strain to hear it. Every five minutes or so I stood outside Maisy’s room, afraid she may have woken and cried out and that somehow I hadn’t heard her. Each time her breathing was slow and regular.
    On about the tenth time, I actually ventured into the room and peeked inside the cot, and I got the shock of my life. Maisy was on her back, quiet, but awake, eyes wide open. When she saw me she smiled, a wide-mouthed, gummy, utterly disarming grin. I swear I’ve never seen anyone so happy. I couldn’t help but smile back.
    Maisy was a classic baby shape, with a round head covered in soft curling fuzz rather than hair, big Spence-blue eyes and a small rose-petal mouth like Colette’s. Though she kept smiling, a slight scowl puckered her forehead and for a moment she looked uncannily like her father. Then her forehead smoothed out and she looked like a baby again. She made a happy noise that matched her grin, a pleased ‘ aii! ’ sound, as if greeting a long lost friend.
    â€˜Hi, yourself,’ I said. I bent over the cot and scooped Maisy up in my arms. It was at that moment, as I lifted her, bearing her full weight, warmth seeping from her body into mine, the sweet biscuit-mix smell of her filling my nostrils, that it hit me. I felt a warm trickle in my belly, and an electric tingling sensation shot right through my bones. And I knew, with sudden certainty. This was love. Love at first sight. Or first touch. Maisy’s hand crept up to rest trustingly on my neck, her fingers finding a curl of my hair, which she gently held. She was unexpectedly heavy, and I slid one hand under her soft, nappied bottom to heft her up. She rested her head on my shoulder, and gazed up at my face. It felt like the most natural thing in the world, loving Maisy, her smooth pink cheeks, her glittering eyes, her soft, spidery lashes.
    â€˜Are you hungry?’ I asked her, feeling golden and dizzy. ‘Let’s get you something to eat.’
    Maisy was very patient as I clumsily buckled her into her high chair. Her wide blue gaze followed me around the kitchen as I retrieved an ice-cube tray and struggled to pop out a colourful assortment of the cubes. I microwaved them for ten seconds at a time, nervously poking the icy lumps around with a spoon. Microwaving wasn’t a natural gift with me.
    The feeling of love hit me again as I sat down in front of Maisy and offered her a spoonful of food. Something about the trusting way she opened her mouth wide, like a baby bird, flooded me with a sense of peacefulness. It was a feeling I recognised from when I was little, lying in front of the heater on a wintry night, listening to the wash of my parents’ voices and the background hum of the television.
    After dinner I lifted Maisy from the chair and took her into the lounge room, where I laid her out on the rug. Maisy smiled up at the light fittings and kicked her legs joyfully while I gobbled hastily reheated, but still