Like an Alien, by Marie C. Higgins

The thermometer rose to the young man's attention at one-hundred degrees Fahrenheit. The dog days of summer aren’t nice to creatures, including him, but especially orphaned altricial birds searching for water. He did admit, however, that savvy is what he thought of the bullfrog: it skulked like an alien from the pond to eat the maggots atop the dead little brown bird, and then sidestep-hopped back into the transformative water, the only place to be outside on a day like this. Thomas, he just walked back into the air conditioning and poured himself some refrigerated iced tea.