Rude: Creative Nonfiction by Colette Chang

The mallard duck is everywhere. It is the ancestor of all duck species. Although their mating season is not until spring, mallard ducks form relationships much earlier, courting in the winter, and eventually laying eggs in the summer. When ducklings are first born, they are all the same yellow-bellied babies. They live harmoniously as adolescents in their separate spheres. For the first months of their lives, mallard ducklings waddle as a clutch behind their mother. As equals. 

At ten months, mallard ducks grow plumage. The male drake’s head is an emerald green that gleams in the sunlight. Its yellow bill stays silent, a low raspy call escaping only when there is a slithering snake of an intruder. The male puffs its purple-ish brown breast out, its neck held high. Its silver feathers are slicked back like blades; a suit of armor. When the drake ruffles its plumage, it reveals a streak of sharp sapphire on its back and struts away from its old mate, in search of a younger, more lively female. Rude. The clutch of ducklings has been brought into the world; his job there is done. He doesn’t pay alimony. He tells her he is going to get milk. He instead buys a one-way ticket and skips town. 

This cycle repeats with a new drake, wooing a new female, and creating a new clutch. Look: it is already happening. 

A soon-to-be mother duck fusses over her nest, building, digging, and lining the internal walls with her grey down feathers, taking the clothes right off her own back. Her mottled brown belly bulges with eggs. Twelve. Over half of her body weight. With her head laid back and her webbed feet tucked under her body, she relies on her mate to gather seeds and pondweeds for the two of them. Day after day, the female visits her nest for an hour. She produces a new porcelain-colored egg and covers the nest again with her fatigued body, shielding it from unfriendly visitors. She pays no attention to her mate, who is off frolicking with other ducks, and flattens her back as if to declare, “I’m not going anywhere.”

The female was there the entire time; you just didn’t notice her. She was shuttling her offspring from one place to another, assembling meals, and watching them vigilantly as they explored new terrain, all while you were busy admiring the male prance about. She was the loudest, but you didn’t listen to her. You drowned her voice out with oohs and ahhs for the wild plumage of her male counterpart, but those were her words stolen and rephrased. She works day and night, away from her family, and away from her kids, only to be paid less than her male coworkers. But while she works, you criticize. She does too much. She does not care about her children. She is a bad mother. And yet, when they get home, they can smell the pot roast wafting through the house, the floors are sparkling, and their saran-wrapped PB&Js lie on the kitchen counter ready for school tomorrow. She is the last to sleep. After tucking them in, she wipes off her makeup and changes her clothes, sliding into bed next to him, who is snoring loudly. 

But you didn’t see any of it.

Colette Chang is a San Francisco-born, Hong Kong-raised, Taiwanese-American writer who spent her summers eating her way through Taipei night markets between stints in Mandarin Camp. She discovered her love for writing in the fourth grade and like any great love, the relationship has had its ups and downs. Her writing interests include fiction, personal narratives, and creative non-fiction. When she’s not writing, she can be found K-Popping in the dance studio, singing in her school musical, playing the Oboe in the orchestra, volleying with her doubles tennis partner, editing GirlTalk Magazine, or co-leading the Asian Students Union. Connect with her @colette.chang28. 

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