Shihoendra hears the bucket before anyone else. Before the first grain even falls, she is already at the gate, head tilted, waiting for the sound she knows. She is blind, but she crosses the yard as if she has counted every stone.
For a while now she no longer walks alone. Two chicks have attached themselves to her, or she to them, it is hard to say. They stay close to her feet, and wherever Shihoendra goes, they go. She has taken them under her wing as if it were the most natural thing.
Together they walk the fixed rounds. Past the vegetable garden, past the trees, to the feeding spot and back again. Shihoendra knows the route by heart, and the two little ones learn it from her, step by step. A branch hanging just a little too far, a threshold by the shed, she knows it, and walks around it.
At the feeding spot she finds her corner, always the same one, with the chicks right beside her. Towards evening she joins where the chickens gather, a big brown shadow with two small ones beneath her. No one gets in her way. She hears exactly where everyone is standing.