Pigeon Kids

Part 3

The Pigeon Kids learned much that winter, even how to get food. As they gained knowledge, they became more clever and shrewd. They realized that they could trade rabid cats for restaurant food with the mean group of kids who didn't particularly like the taste of cooked meat. And when the mean kids all died off, the Pigeon Kids could take over their territory. They also learned how to make dandelion tea from the common city weed. Soon, other street children began joining the Pigeon Kids. Their concrete pipe was too small for their following, so they began having classes in an old, abandoned meat-packing warehouse. Some kids began working with metal, forging very impressive abstract sculptures. Some kids started experimenting with electricity and how it made dead cats look alive. Some kids learned the trade of butchery, practicing their cuts on various wildlife. Some took up culinary arts and taught themselves how to improvise common spices from asphalt and squirrel hair. Some of the kids took a special interest in math. They used their skills to cheat at card games. As the Pigeon Kids saved up the money they raised from gambling, they began talking about building a real school. Unfortunately, it would take much more than petty change from cheating homeless people to even rent a building in the city. One day, though, Marvin stood up, gripping his pigeon-stabbing stick, and announced that he had a plan. In his reading, he learned that pigeons were delicacies, and baby pigeons were even more desirable. The Pigeon Kids needed to go back to their roots. They would kill pigeons, but this time sell them to the swanky restaurants downtown.

�But what about the mean kids? They�ll eat us before we get to the restaurants,� said Little Pauli.

�I sent some scouts down to their territory yesterday. They�re all, uh...having their brains analyzed. They won�t be back for...a while,� responded Marvin.

So, selling their pigeons to the swanky restaurants (which will remain nameless), the Pigeon Kids eventually earned enough to rent out a small property in their neighborhood. They put a sign out front reading �The Pigeon Institute,� with a interesting metal sculpture of a pigeon. In the back, Marvin managed the �cafeteria,� where students would have a hearty meal of pigeon and some dandelion tea for lunch. The classrooms were partitioned with soggy cardboard until a particularly brave posse of children raided an office building and stole all the cubical walls. Classes ranged in number from six to twenty. The most popular class was the math kids� class, probably because they were running a gambling ring to feed their addiction. The least popular was Little Pauli�s P.E. class, since he wouldn�t let students use both arms when playing sports. Shep was in charge of the entire school. He had big dreams for the Pigeon Institute. One day it would be a shining beacon of hope in a black sea of desolation and despair. One day it would be known city-wide�even nationwide�as the steadfast symbol of courage and determination that it had always been, from the day it was birthed in that concrete pipe. Faculty, fellow students, friends: today is that day!

The End