Little Davey

Little Davey hated that he could never go swimming with the other boys. He hated that he wasn’t normal. He had little wings growing out of his back and they worked. He could fly. The other kids would probably think it was cool, but his mom didn’t seem to think so.  She thought it was something that needed to be kept a secret. He also wasn’t allowed to play sports because he was stronger than the other kids and his mom thought it gave him an unfair advantage.

He was resigned to reading a lot of comics and collecting bugs. He wasn’t very cool. It was hard to make friends when there was something important about yourself that you couldn’t tell anyone. He was only 11-years-old and he felt like his future was already decided for him. He was different and, supposedly, special. He wouldn’t be able to go to college or get a real job. He would probably never get married and he would probably die young, fighting some sort of crime.

His grandpa had gotten lucky. He had lost a leg in a war and couldn’t use his wings and his strength to fight crime, so he was still alive. His great-grandfather hadn’t been so lucky. He had saved a lot of lives, but he had died in the end. For some reason, his mom didn’t have the wings or the strength. Maybe because she was a she, maybe it was only passed on to the men. No one knew and since they didn’t want to become science experiments in some government laboratory, they hadn’t ever asked a doctor.

He put down the comic book that he was reading and looked around. He wished that he didn’t have to be so private. It would be nice to have a friend.  He took of his shirt; he was going to go for a flight. He did it several times per week because his mom and his grandpa both said that it was an important skill to hone. They didn’t need to push him to do it because it was amazing. The wind in his hair and the smells and the breeze all gave him total freedom. There was no feeling like it in the whole world. If he had a friend, he would have taken him or her for a flight. It was an amazing gift that he wished he could share.

He zipped and zoomed around as fast as he could. He made sharp turns and came to screeching halts. He flew as high as he could and then dipped as low as he could. The buzzing his wings made was soothing. It was rhythmic and perfect, like the buzzing sound that a bee makes when it flies near your ear. When he got tired, he landed. As he was putting his shirt on, he heard a noise. He turned quickly and got ready to hide.

A girl stepped out from behind the trees.

“Hi,” she said, “ you can fly, that’s cool.”

And right then he knew that everything was different.