Copyright – Jan W. Fields
They said he meant nothing to her; she’d used him, then abandoned him.
He knew he’d won her heart with his blues last time she visited. How he wished she’d stayed. But now she was back, and he was ready. Hesitantly, she approached; the others’ showy, inept arrangements merely a momentary distraction.
They hadn’t a chance. He stepped forward – strutting, inviting, mesmerising.
One glance at his sapphire strewn floor, at the light dancing on cobalt baubles and indigo trinkets festooning every twig, the cornflower and cerulean strands draped from drooping branches within his bower, and she was his again.
*****
Here’s a blues performance that will delight you.
And in case you don’t believe ‘blues’ can go with ‘spinet’, think again.
This is my offering for Friday Fictioneers. Thanks to Rochelle Wisoff-Fields for hosting and managing this venue for a large and diverse group of writers each week. The challenge is to create a story of 100 words or less in response to a weekly photo prompt. Read the other stories here.
And if you’re still interested, here’s another video about the courtship antics of an amazing Australian creature.
Dear Margaret
Clever bit of misdirection that. The bowerbird in the story was luckier than the one in the video.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Yes, he was, but if you have time to look at the second video (from National Geographic), there’s a more successful outcome – in fact it’s a bit of an ‘adults only’ scene – blush. Thanks for your lovely comment. I’m glad you liked the story.
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Such a different and entertaining take on the prompt, Margaret. Well done. I felt sure it was going to be a peacock you were writing about.
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Thank you, Sandra. I’m glad you enjoyed it. A peacock – that’s interesting. I don’t know if peacocks behave in a similar way – I must google it.
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Very good, I love your use of language. Much of this could also apply to teenagers/young adults!
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Thank you, Ali; I’m glad you liked it. That’s an interesting thought about teenagers. You’re probably right – certainly my years as a high school teacher provided me with plenty of examples of display and odd behaviour in the mating rituals of young humans.
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I love where you took this. Well done.
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Many thanks, Alicia. Glad it worked for you. It took me long enough to get it posted.
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Wonderful. In the end, we all want the same, and fancy trinkets often help… What a great idea, and the videos are fascinating.
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It seems all satin bowerbirds want the same, at least. As you would have seen, the videos show that the display and mating are all they need. The female leaves immediately after they’ve mated and that’s that for the male until the next female comes along. I think that may have been in the last little video I linked in – a National Geographic one that shows a successful mating. Thanks for reading and responding, Gah. Glad you liked it.
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Yes, I’ve seen them both, they are fascinating. I wonder what they used before all that shiny plastic was around, do you know? Colourful fflowers perhaps?
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From my reading I’ve discovered that they’d use berries, flowers, feathers, stones, leaves with blue colours. They also chew some blue coloured berries, which becomes mixed with their saliva, and with this they ‘paint’ twigs etc in their bowers.
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I love all the many pieces of your story, the blues and the satin bowerbird, which I never heard or seen before. This is quite an assembly. It all came together in your splendid story. If only the bird would have had that luck in the video. Better luck next time, I guess. Enjoyed the music, too!
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I’m delighted it pleased you, Amy. Your comments are very encouraging. It’s a shame the bird in the first video didn’t succeed, but the last little video shows a successful courtship. Glad you enjoyed the blues spinet performance too.
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Oh, I didn’t watch the last one. I want to see what success looks like! I’ll have to come back to watch. Thanks! 🙂
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You’ll have to watch carefully – bowerbird ‘success’ is very brief. It hardly seems worth all the trouble they go to.
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interesting take on the prompt. i enjoyed reading it.
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Thank you, Plaridel. I appreciate your response. Glad you enjoyed my story.
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Amusing, entertaining, beautifully written AND educational. I just lured my husband in from the next room by laughing at the videos! No blue objects involved.
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That’s great. I’m glad you enjoyed them, and I hope your husband did, too, even without any blue objects. Thanks for your lovely comment, MJL.
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Cute video. Maybe the last line should have read, “Better cluck next time.” 🙂
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That would have been a perfect conclusion. Poor little bird – he tried so hard.
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Such a mesmerizing story, you drew me right into that courtship. Lovely!
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I’m so glad. Thank you for replying.
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Beautiful blues, indeed — and so many shades, thereof!
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There are so many shades, and such lovely names for some of them. I was spoilt for choice in colouring my story.
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Bowerbird romance – loved it.
KT
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We all like a bit of romance, I do believe. Glad you enjoyed my story, KT.
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Good twist with it being a bower bird, Margaret. That was really cute. I enjoyed the second film about the blues played on the spinet. Well done. 🙂 — Suzanne
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I’m glad you liked it, Suzanne. The poor old spinet seems to have taken second place to the bower bird videos in my comments, but it’s quite an unusual sound, don’t you think?
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Oh I was totally mislead at first… but I have to say it could have been a “normal” courtship.
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That’s what I was hoping to achieve, so I’m glad it worked.
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I finally got back over to see that last video. It was worth it! What a hoot.
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Oh that’s good. I liked it too. He goes to a lot of effort for little reward, it seems to me.
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