‘Fred woke with a start and looked around – his sister was nowhere to be found.’ Photo: Linocut of birds and ferns.
‘One rainy day, in a forest far away, two little birds came out to play.’
Chick lit: Andrew Rutter and Jake Buchanan share a creative spark
When the Covid lockdown was introduced, I wrote to a handful of children in our Meeting, sending them this linocut of birds and ferns. I asked them if they would enjoy using their imaginations to write something based on what they saw. Jake, aged twelve, replied with a story he called ‘Lost Love’. It was worth sharing.
One rainy day, in a forest far away, two little birds came out to play.
The two birds were best friends and played every day outside their nest.
These little birds were brother and sister, the brother was Fred and the sister was Sara. They were as happy as could be.
Until one fateful day when the wind was fast and the rain was fierce the two birds were playing as always and they didn’t see the tree falling…
Hours later Fred woke with a start and looked around – his sister was nowhere to be found.
The brother flew high and low, and long and hard, but try as he might he could not find his sister.
After hours and hours of searching he knew he would not find Sara, so off he flew. He flew and flew and flew until he spotted another bird flying around. He sped downwards as fast as his wings could carry him but when he reached the ground it wasn’t his sister at all.
With his head hung low he kept on flying and after many many days he finally stopped at a house and landed on the windowsill.
As he looked in he saw a family all playing a game together laughing with joy and a tear rolled down his cheek. He missed his sister so much.
He kept flying until he reached a little village. He decided this is where he would start his life again.
Years and years passed and Fred met a bird called Mary and they had some baby birds, one called Tom and one called called Sara, named after his sister.
He was happy but he still wanted to see Sara one more time. He was quite old now and was losing hope.
But one day when he was very old he went for a fly. He flew a while and was going to go back when he saw a bird walking along and his heart soared. It was Sara!
He took his frail sister back to his tree and she met his family. They lived their last weeks as happy as they had ever been.
Then one day as the sun set and the baby birds had left, they sat in the tree and looked out on the world and thought ‘I am content’.
