I never heard so much pain in my friend’s voice. Barely five minutes ago we were joking pretty loudly. He got off the phone because someone wanted his attention at home, or so I thought. He then called me back to explain the sudden commotion at the background…and the terrible news.

“My parrot flew away,” he said. The jocular voice had gone and what I heard now was a wheezy, whispery speech with broken syllables.

The pain stunned me. My friend, whose seeing days were ended by a shiny red cricket ball that landed hard on his forehead…so hard that it detached the retina in both his eyes, took pride in maintaining a tough exterior.

And why not? The Alexandrian he bought in the city’s pet market has been with him for three-and-a-half years. He set up a large cage in his drawing room to afford the bird some space to fly. When the bird was still a chick, he let him sleep on his chest; claws grabbing the fabric of his shirt. His wife doted on it as if it were her own child.

“This place has too many predatorial birds and I’m worried he might be hurt,” my friend told me over phone, his voice still a whisper. “And I don’t know how I’m going to console my wife.”

As I listened to him, my heart melted, and throat tightened. The bird isn’t my pet, but my friend had once carried it to my house on a small cage. On several occasions, I heard the parrot imitate my friend during our phone calls. The bird’s screechy tone provided the backdrop to our conversations many times.

“How did it happen?” was the only thing I felt like asking, as I didn’t want to sound too soft or patronizing, knowing well that he’d hate both those things.

His caretaker had cleaned up the parrot’s cage that morning and forgot to latch it back. I sensed his voice toughen and tone raise as he spoke about her “negligence”. “I told her so many times to be very careful,” he told me, seemingly ready to strike at his caretaker any moment.

The enormity of life’s challenges may have toughened him, but my friend usually isn’t the irrational or angry sort of a person. He knew the value of kindness like most people with disability, but never felt safe around anybody to express it. In this situation, it was grief and the gravity of his loss that gave way to his anger and frustration. Also, the suspicion that people barely pay close attention when a disabled person asks them to do something wasn’t a comforting thought, although that may not be true all the time.

I usually trusted my compassion to work on a person in times of grief. Now, I was struggling with concern for my friend. I wouldn’t want him to explode on his caretaker at the wrong time and prayed that his dear ones actually understood the sorrow rather than dismiss it as over-reaction. I worried they might tell him that it’s “just a bird” and ask him to cheer up, which’ll only isolate him emotionally.

The pain in his voice returned as he once again wondered about the bird’s safety. “He doesn’t know how to protect himself,” my friend said, his voice breaking up several times as if he was about to have a hick-up. “My house is surrounded by vegetation with all kinds of animals. What if one of them hurts him?”

We both stayed silent for several minutes. It gave me time to search for the words that’ll comfort him. I briefly thought about assuring him that his parrot will return but realised quickly that he’ll be more depressed if it doesn’t.

“That’s why I don’t prefer having a pet,” I told him in a half-whisper, affirming to myself why emotional investment in anything could be costly. I’m old enough to invest in spiritual practices like self-love, meditation and, more importantly, understanding my connection with the universal force we call God. The exercise is self-fulfilling to me. My friend and I had spoken about it several times, but I realised this wasn’t the right time to talk about detachment or letting go.

Thankfully, I managed to strike the right measure of tone and meaning when I said: “You may be concerned, but you didn’t create that bird. God did. And it’s created to thrive in its environment.”

“Yes, I agree,” my friend said in a tone of resignation. “But still, I can’t do anything to ensure he’s safe.”

“Indeed, you can do something,” I told him. “Send out a prayer for his safety. Prayers move mountains, they say, and I’m sure a soulful plea to the divine will keep him safe from the predators and natural forces.”

I asked him to think of the symbolism of the bird leaving its cage, often used as an analogy to describe the soul leaving the body, which led us to reflect on coping with our losses. “It must’ve been more painful for you to accept your aunt’s death,” he told me in a moment of empathy and compassion that may not quite fit his tough exterior. But personal losses can soften even the hardest of people, and my friend isn’t an exception. “I mean, what I’ve lost is a pet that had spent three-and-a-half years with me. You lost a human being who had been with you since birth.”

We fell back into silence, taking comfort from the empathy we showed each other.

Much later in the day, seated at the table for work, I thought about that rare moment when it felt as if we could find a door to each other’s souls and heal our wounds with the touch of compassion. I was grateful for the experience, which I was sure would allow my friend to make peace with the lost pet.