Red Room Where the Writers Are

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“It’s the turkeys,” her brother laughs when she calls him, and now she remembers the story he told her about the huge wild birds, dancing at their reflections, watching themselves in the sliding glass doors and shitting all over the deck.
When they’d arrived at the house that afternoon, they’d gone through and opened all the curtains, unlocked the doors, aired out their grievances from the long, slow drive.  But it wasn’t until evening, when he offered to make a fire in hopes she’d warm to him again, that they found the piles.
He shrieked like a child when he saw them by the woodpile.  She rolled her eyes, smiled a little, then hid her amusement as she went to meet him on the porch.  They were everywhere, little walnut-sized clumps and coils, in a near-perfect line that led all the way around the house, stopping finally on the mat outside the kitchen.
The cold she’d felt all day broke; she couldn’t help laughing at him, at the bewildered disgust on his face.  And now, imagining the stupid things watching themselves, dancing and defecating and delighting in their own image, she chuckles again, the sound blending with the laughter on the other end of the phone as he looks on blankly.
He hears the melody of shared humor, knows he’s the odd man out.  He feels the cruelty of exclusion slice through him for a brief moment, then he turns back to the fire he’s building.  As he coaxes the sparks, the obedient logs catch on command, warming to him instantly, rewarding his efforts with the soothing hiss of the flame.