A Friend Indeed

Summer was just around the corner. It had become more and more hot recently. It was difficult for me to walk without sweating a little bit.

My laziness had never known any bounds. But my friend had dragged me with her for a morning walk everyday since last month. Now it was our daily routine to walk in the garden opposite to her house.

After walking for a long time, I decided to sit and rest. I wanted to evaporate my condensated beads of sweat. We were in our own worlds while sitting side by side on a swing.

What pulled me out of my dreamland was a crow's cawing.

In my life, there were many things of which I was scared. Birds are one of them. Although I have never feared crows vey much, but upon seeing their ferocious nature up close recently has made me deadly afraid of them.

From the days I have begun my morning walk, I have been troubled by the crows everyday. They would fly past me in a dangerous manner. It would scare the wits out of me.

Not only that, I even heard someone say that he had to undergo surgery on being struck by a crow's beak.

It made me come to a conclusion.

A Crow is not a timid bird.

Although I always try to restrain my fear of them while walking, but it shows nonetheless. My body gets on the super alert mode on spotting a crow. And an internal turmoil sets in me.

Eventually I made a decision of trying my best to ignore their existence. But when I would spot a crow, I would get far away from it.

Now that I have seen it, I will definitely get away. But the problem is that my friend has been laughing at me on seeing my fear. It doesn't matter as it is not the first time happening.

Eventually persuaded by my friend's words, I decide to ignore the crow who was still far away from me.

And that's where the problem arises. Me being afraid of heights, did not swing very high. But my friend was literally flying in the air.

A crow who was flying by was hit by her leg in the process of her flying. Both of us were stunned.

I stuck out my right leg to stop my swing but my friend was still out of her senses. Right then, a group of crows came together in our direction angrily. They were dozens in number and quickly surrounded us.

Upon seeing crows coming towards me, my first reaction was to get away. And so I did. I tried to run far away from where we sat. But of course it proved to be difficult.

When the crows surrounded my friend, I quickly slipped away from my right side. When I found that I had exited the park, I realised that my friend was running in the same direction as me.

As fast as I could, I ran away without any hesitations and embarrassment towards the exit of the garden.

But who would have known that my friend was still following my footsteps.

Knowing that there were a group of scary crows right behind me, I forgot in fear to exit the garden and kept running in circles on the walking path of the garden.

No matter how fast I would run, I would find my friend and a group of crows just behind my back.

My body forgot that it was tired and I ran in my fullest speed exerting all my potential completely.

There weren't many people walking around this time. Among the few who were present, some were stunned and some were avoiding us.

It was after I had run almost three laps of the garden that a kind hearted man took the lead in scaring away the crows.

I was relieved.

But my first reaction was not to go back home. I quickly ran towards my friend who had fallen in embarrassment and helped her stand.

Even though I was still experiencing the fear and awkwardness of the incident, I tried to not mind it and instead focused on helping her.

A hand slapped away my hand which was put forward to help my friend up. The hand that slapped me was of my friend. I was dumbfounded.

My friend had stood up on her own and left the garden without looking back.

It then came to my mind that I had ran away when she was in a dire situation.

Although I was feeling guilty, but I think I am still a good friend.

Even though I ran away, I never completely abandoned her. I still tried to help her at the last.

Though the proverb says-

A friend in need is a friend in deed.

I think I am indeed a friend.