I Read Stories: The Peacock by Jawziya Zaman
The Peacock by Jawziya Zaman in Inklette
A peacock acquires 17th Street off Khayaban-e-Badban. Human-peacock relations have unwritten rules; the guard who previously kept undesirables away now attends him. No one meets the peacock’s eyes. The inhabitants feed him every day, sweep every balcony and ledge, knock down walls so he can get about more freely.
Peacocks are important and everyone tries to one-up each other in tending to the peacock’s needs. And more, there are changes to clothes and fashion, to the colours of the street.
Until one day, maybe the peacock is not so important.
Read This: For an alien presence that is just barely
explicable; also during lockdown 4 peacocks escaped the local farm they live on
and began exploring a nearby town and this was a fun reminder
Don’t Read This: There was great variation in the response
to the peacocks (not least from the local seagulls) and here there’s just one,
which matches up the themes I guess but a more multi-faceted approach would
have been interesting