By Christina K Sangma
On a quiet morning when the sun was still stretching its golden arms across the farm, Sumi the hen wandered near the tall reeds by the pond. She was searching for twigs, she loved redecorating her nest every few days, convinced it kept her chicks mentally stimulated, as she liked to say.
That’s when she spotted it, a pale blue egg, smooth and slightly larger than her own. Oh my, she clucked softly. Who left you here all alone? It looked cold. Abandoned. And Sumi’s heart was too big to leave anything lonely.
So, she carried the egg gently under her wing and hurried back home.
Her chicken coop was warm and slightly chaotic, eight chicks bouncing around like fluffy popcorn. When sumi placed the blue egg in the middle of them, the chicks gasped as if she had brought home a magical treasure.
Is it a special egg, Mama? chirped Cheep, the smallest. It’s an egg in need of love, sumi said, settling over it. So, we shall love it. Days passed sumi kept the egg warm. The chicks sang lullabies to it, terribly off, key, but heartfelt. And one afternoon, with a soft crack, the egg opened.
Out popped a duckling.
The chicks stared. They had expected a chicken with slightly different colours, maybe stripes, or glitter, or something exciting. But this creature had a very long beak, webbed feet, and a soft quack instead of a chirp. Sumi blinked, surprised for all of two seconds. Then she puffed her feathers proudly. Well, she said, he’s perfect. The duckling, whom Cheep immediately named Ansel, grew quickly. But as he grew, so did the differences.
When the chicks scratched the dirt for worms, Ansel wandered to puddles and splashed happily. When they tried to teach him to peck grains properly, he kept swallowing water instead. And when they practiced jumping off a crate to strengthen their wings, Ansel didn’t flap, he glided crookedly into a mud patch.
Why am I not like you? Ansel asked Sumi one evening as she tucked him under her wing. Sumi nuzzled his head. Because you’re not supposed to be like us, she said. You’re supposed to be like you.
But Ansel wasn’t satisfied. He felt something tugging him toward the pond, a strange, watery calling he didn’t understand. One day, following that tug, he waddled to the pond’s edge. There, on the other side, he saw ducks, creatures that looked just like him. Their quacks echoed across the water. Their webbed feet paddled smoothly. For the first time, Ansel felt a sharp jolt of recognition.
That’s what I am, he whispered.
A duck. He rushed back to the coop, breathless sumi watched him carefully. Mama… I think I know who I am, he said. And it’s different. Sumi smiled, slow and soft. I know, sweetheart.
You knew?
Since the day your egg cracked open, she chuckled. But love doesn’t depend on matching feathers.
Ansel’s chest warmed. His wings trembled. He looked at his chicken siblings, silly, loud, devoted fluffballs. They weren’t like him, but they had loved him fiercely from the moment he arrived.
Can I still be your son? he asked. Sumi wrapped a wing around him. You always were. You always will be.
And as the evening breeze ruffled their feathers, Ansel finally felt whole, not because he had discovered who he was, but because he realised he had been loved all along.
