She doesn’t, but we get her untangled anyway with a fair amount of swearing on my part and lots of low, soothing murmurs on Gideon’s. I’m not saying I want to be a grouse, but if he talked to me like that, I think I’d do anything he said.
“There we go,” he says, and holds her up in front of himself, looking her over. “That wasn’t so bad.”
The bird and I both make a noise.
“Female, about a year and a half,” he says. “This will probably be her second clutch of eggs this spring, which is good. More chicks survive with experienced hens. Looks to be in good health, average size, no molting.”
The bird struggles again, and a few small feathers drift to the ground. Gideon’s hands around her don’t budge, firm and gentle and soothing.
“All right,” Gideon says, and I have no idea whether he’s talking to me or the grouse. “Now comes the fun part.”
He shifts his grip like he’s gonna take one hand off, but the moment he does, the grouse kicks up a fuss so hard she nearly gets away and Gideon’s hands clamp back down.
“Shit,” he says, and glances over at me. “She’s really got it in for me.”
“You trapped her in a net and subjected her to indignities,” I point out as he gets his hands back around her, all stern and frowny.
“No more of that,” he says, low, authoritative, and gentle. Not that I notice. “You ever put a radio tag on a bird before?” he asks me in his regular voice.
“Sure. All the time,” I say. “What else am I supposed to do on a Friday night?”
Gideon shoots me a look that’s not at all soothing.
“Pliers are in my outside coat pocket, and the tags are in the breast zipper pocket,” he says. “I’ll talk you through it.”
He does, though he’s considerably less soothing and patient with me than he is with the bird, and I try not to take offense. A few minutes later she’s successfully got a thin metal radio tag band around a leg, and no one has been irreparably scarred.
“Is that it?” I ask, sliding the pliers into my own coat pocket. Gideon clears his throat and there’s a pause so slight, I almost don’t notice it.
“Could you take a picture?” he asks. “My phone is, ah, in my pocket. Of my pants.”
“Which one?” I ask.
“Right. If you don’t mind. Please.”
Gideon is blushing furiously and making eye contact with the bird as if his life depends on not looking at me. Not that I can talk, because I’m also blushing, maybe because he’s blushing. We’re all having a very blushy time right now, except this grouse, who looks as though she’s somehow exacting revenge.
“Sure,” I say, and delve into his pocket before I think about it any more.
It’s just a phone, just in a pocket, and it’s absolutely no big deal except it’s all the way down at the bottom of the pocket and Gideon’s thigh is very warm and very hard and verythere, and I’ve been doing my best not to notice anything about his thighs for several days now. It hasn’t been working. This isn’t helping.
Fuck, I’d like to touch more of his thighs.
“Okay, here,” I say, pulling the warm phone out. “Just—uh, like this?”
“Get the tag and her distinguishing features,” he says, as if I know what distinguishing features look like on a grouse. It’s not like she’s got a mermaid tattoo on one forearm, but Gideon directs me and thirty seconds later, I’m done.
“You might want to step back,” he says, rocking to his feet. “Sometimes there’s a real flutter when I let them go.”
I’ve never seen a bird look so angry on takeoff before, but there’s a first time for everything.
“So that’s it,” I say, still watching the sky where she took off.
“For now,” Gideon says, brushing his hands off on his pants. “Once I get her data into the system, we’ll track her movement patterns and come spring, her nesting behaviors, but that’s all for right now. Let me see your hand.”
“What?” I ask, mind still half on the bird, but Gideon takes my hand and frowns at the parallel scratches running across the back. I’d already forgotten that they were there, three puffy pink lines. One has a few small drops of blood beaded in it. That talon must have been the longest.
“Fucking birds,” Gideon mutters, sliding the pad of his thumb close to the scratches, rough on my skin.
