On the second day of Christmas

This story is 99.3% made up.

On the second day of Christmas, I decide that I am going to stay at my old friend's apartment. I cannot go back to my apartment, because the scars are still fresh after receiving the worst present I have ever gotten. I feel like my insides are eating away at my flesh, and I wonder if this is a symptom of Asian Bird Flu.

Speaking of which, I go to the doctors to get a vaccine for Asian Bird flu, and it turns out there isn't a vaccine for Asian Bird flu. There isn't even Asian Bird flu. There is however, Avian Bird flu, but there isn't a vaccine for that either. I didn't know that water companies and birds teamed up to stricken hundreds of millions of people, but either way, the whole situation stinks.

I get to my old friend's apartment and I immediately get a call from my true love. She has called me roughly ten times today, and seriously, this shit is getting old. We broke up yesterday. It's time to move on.

"Hey" I say to my old friend, who is preparing a meal. And by preparing a meal, I mean he is putting a TV dinner into the microwave.

"Hey, your girlfriend came by earlier."

I throw my coat onto the couch, right next to the bird cage.

"I don't ever want to see her again."

"Because she got you a bird? Come on man, that's not a bad present."

My old friend shows a lot of empathy towards bad present givers. To him, there is no such thing as a bad present, because it is the thought that counts. My guess is he thinks this way because he is an only child, and an orphan, and isn't married or dating anyone, so no one buys presents for him. One Christmas, when we were kids, I ran over to the orphanage to show him all the great and expensive presents I got from my large and loving family. I found him sitting by the Christmas tree, the pine long wilted, the lights no longer flashing. My friend was sitting there, tears streaming down his face, alone.

He would have enjoyed getting Avian Bird flu.

"I don't want to talk about it."

"She knows you're upset. She wants to make it up to you, man. Look."

He points towards the birdcage. I look inside and see a dove inside of a green shell sitting on a perch. I look a little closer and see that there is another one on the floor of the cage. There isn't just one dove inside of a green shell. There are two doves with green shells trapped inside of this cage.

"What the hell is that?" I manage to sputter.

"Two turtle doves." My friend responds.

On the second day of Christmas, my true love gave to me, two "turtle" doves.

I can't believe what I am seeing. This is demented. How are these poor creatures supposed to fly while trapped inside of this shell? Sure, there are benefits to being a "turtle" dove. For example, I'm sure that the hard green exterior would be able to deflect shots from a pellet gun. On the downside, they are still stuck in a shell, unable to fly. And who has a pellet gun anyway? A Colt .45 or a sawed off shotgun would smoke those birds like a motherfucker. Turtle dove or "Turtle" dove, no one escapes the raw, unbridled power of a shotgun.

My old friend sticks his finger inside of the cage. The "turtle" dove sitting on the perch tries to fly away, but can't because it's stuck inside of a shell. The bird falls on its face.

These "turtle" doves have no hope, just like my old, orphaned friend has no hope of getting any presents this year, and just like the relationship with my true love has no hope.

I know why the caged bird sings.

This is the worst present ever.