“Predator” by Libby Peckman 11th grade, Highland Park High School
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I was an owl, looking down at a cat. She was small, curled in a pool of sun, fur rising with each breath. I watched from the branch, Claws sharp, hunger sharper.
She blinked, slow and steady, as if she knew I was there. As if she had been waiting.
I opened my wings, ready to drop like a predator. But she rolled to her back, stretched her limbs, and showed her soft belly to the sky. An invitation, I thought. A surrender.
She looked at me, and her eyes were darker than anything I’d flown over. I paused midair. My hunger changed shape.
I sang to her, a song I hadn’t meant to sing, a thread of sound pulled from my chest. She listened. She listened and she loved me.
So, I came down. Wings folded, claws tucked in. I came with peace. I came with a white flag.
But white turns red.
When I landed, she rose. And when her mouth opened, it swallowed every part of me I hadn’t meant to give. There was no fight. Only teeth. Only the warmth of being taken.
Now feathers float where I should be. The wind forgets my name. My song vanished between her lips. The sky holds nothing but red.
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