by Erin Hortle
‘Yup. That’s me.’
Harry notices the way Mitch’s eyes fix on her chest. He’s probably heard something about it. The way the peninsula tends to be, Harry’d be surprised if he hadn’t.
‘You two haven’t met before?’ Flo asks.
‘Nope,’ Lucy says.
‘Actually, we have,’ Mitch tells her. ‘We met briefly at Falls years back. Harry was there too, remember, Harry?’ He grins at Harry, his head cocked to one side.
‘Oh really?’ Lucy looks at Harry too, as does Flo. ‘You never mentioned it,’ Lucy adds.
‘Yeah, well, it was years ago.’ Harry shrugs. ‘Didn’t think you’d remember.’
‘Hmmm. Sorry,’ Lucy says, ‘I don’t think I do.’ She shrugs and smiles apologetically at Harry, then Mitch.
‘Well, I remember,’ Mitch interrupts. ‘You were with Jem and all your friends from … Melbourne, I think he said. You hadn’t been down here long.’
Did Harry see a spark of recognition in Lucy’s eyes? She was certainly frowning now. What was she remembering?
But Mitch isn’t done. ‘Remember that Falls, Harry?’ he’s saying. ‘That was the Falls you passed out before New Year’s and vomited all through your swag. Those were they days, ay, bruv?’ Mitch gives Harry a nudge with his elbow. ‘We used to get up to all sorts of shit,’ he adds to Lucy. ‘Anyway,’ he continues, ‘don’t mind if I jump up in the boat and do me check?’
Harry feels like he’s underwater as Mitch climbs into the boat. His limbs have gone heavy with dread and all he can hear is the boom-boom of his heartbeat resonating in his ears.
He doesn’t know what to do.
‘What happened to your clothes?’ Mitch asks Lucy, obviously spying the sorry little pile on the boat floor and putting two and two together.
‘I had an accident,’ Lucy mumbles. Harry grimaces at this, and then again, when his mother lets out a nervous whinny of laughter.
Fuck. Neither of them seem to be able to play it cool. He wants to throttle the both of them.
But Mitch mumbles awkwardly, ‘Oh, right,’ as he eyes Lucy again. Then he says in a kind, father-like voice: ‘Boats can be tricky like that.’
Oh god! He thinks she shat herself, Harry realises, and nearly laughs himself. And, really, that might not be a bad thing. It might explain the vomit smell at least, and might stop him sniffing too hard and getting a whiff of the birds. Bloody hell, though, he must be wondering what she’s eaten to get her shit smelling like that.
‘Jesus, Harry,’ Mitch says, now peering into the fish bucket. ‘You said you got a coupla snotties. You’ve cleaned up, bruv!’
‘Yeah well. You know what nets are like. Sometimes when they turn it on, they turn it on.’
‘I might just give ’em a count,’ Mitch declares.
‘Oh, you don’t have to do that,’ Lucy calls up to him. ‘I already counted them. There’s eighteen.’
‘Good to know,’ Mitch says. ‘But I might just give ’em a count myself, if it’s all the same to you. One, two, three …’ he begins counting officiously as he takes each fish from the bucket.
Lucy catches Harry’s eye, and she cringes as she mouths to him: They’re under the fish.
Harry grimaces.
He has to admit, it’s an ingenious hiding place. Not only are they buried, the mound of fish would stop the smell good and proper. And Lucy couldn’t have known that bloody Mitch would want to count the bloody fish.
‘Twelve, thirteen,’ Mitch counts, and Harry prays that he’ll realise it’s impossible for the bucket to hold another seventeen fish and will stop. But he knows Mitch: knows that Mitch will be loving this—being the centre of attention, being the man with the power—and will press on and so find the birds.
Sure enough, when he gets to fifteen, the counting stops. ‘What’s this?’ he asks, looking down at them and holding one of the chicks up by its feet for them to see. ‘What have you three been up to?’
‘We only got a couple,’ Flo bursts out. ‘And we only done it this once. Honest!’
‘Jesus. I know you know it’s illegal, Flo,’ he says, pointing his finger at her imperiously, brandishing it as if it wielded all the power of the law.
‘Mate, could you turn a blind eye, just this once, for old—’ Harry starts, but Mitch cuts him off.
‘Don’t ask me that, mate. I got obligations now,’ he says, and he turns the finger that had been pointing to Flo on himself, jabbing himself in the chest with it, imbibing himself with that power.
‘So what’s going to happen?’ Lucy asks in a small voice.
‘Well. I’ll have to seize these, as evidence. And write you up. And you’ll have to appear in court.’
‘And then what’ll happen?’ Lucy asks.
‘You’ll get a whopping fine and it’ll go on your record. But, Harry,’ he says, now grinning again, ‘for old time’s sake, and ’cos I’m in such a good mood, if you want, I’ll only write one of you up.’
This is just like Mitch, Harry thinks bitterly. He won’t relinquish his power, but he’s more than happy to play the big man in town, try to win their gratitude by doing them a bullshit favour.
‘Then write me up,’ Flo says.
‘What, Flo? No!’ Lucy protests, but Flo cuts her off.
‘Don’t be stupid, Lucy, it’ll go down bad with your job if you get a record for poaching, and Harry: I’m your mother. It was me that did it anyway—not you two.’ As she says this, she points a finger—this one loaded with fierce maternal clout—first at Lucy, then at Harry, and gives them both a look so severe Harry knows there’s no point arguing with her.
‘Righto,’ Mitch says. ‘Step over here a moment, Flo, and I’ll get your details.’
‘Oh my god, I feel awful,’ Lucy says to Harry as Flo and Mitch talk. ‘I mean, I talked her into this!’
‘We did,’ Harry murmurs. ‘But Mum’s right: it makes more sense for it to go on her record than yours. And she’d skin me alive if I tried to take the blame for it.’
‘I’ll pay the fine,’ Lucy says, looking up at him, looking right into his eyes.
This time, he holds her gaze. She looks sad and pathetic, shivering in the yellow glow cast by the streetlight. He wants nothing more than to reach out, grab hold of her, press her body to his and rub at her back—to comfort her, to warm her up a bit, offer her whatever he can. But he doesn’t do that because as he looks back into her eyes, it seems to him that the intimacy he thought he’d seen in her earlier gazes has faded. Something has broken. Something feels, in some intangible yet definitive way, over.
NO BIRD IS ONLY AN I
He would slip the message down his chick’s gullet, just like his parents slipped a message down his when he was a chick: on a slick of regurgitated krill and fish.
They told him to follow his beak and relinquish himself, and then they disappeared into the orb of the sky, which glowed pale through the mouth of the burrow, to be as flock, as they must, leaving him to digest their message with their food. He absorbed it until he grew so hungry he understood that he couldn’t stay there, cocooned in his burrow, alone as an I.
Your beak will tug you into flock.
No bird is only an I. We are bigger than that.
We span the world, we span the world.
As a chick, he followed his beak up out of his burrow and saw for the first time the sky and sea thrown wide. He waddled about the headland, beating at the air with his wings until, one day, it bore him and the sky took him.
He tumbled through the air, shooting up on plumes of heat rising, and dropping on shafts of cool air sinking. Spotting the rough water of a bait ball breaching, he tucked his wings to his body, plummeted after his beak and burst into the ocean, which was dense, so dense and slick and cool, buffeting and reverberating against his oily wings. Bubbles flurried in his wake, krill and small fish pounded down his gullet in great gulps.
When he popped back up through the filmy surface, he discovered it was true: his beak ha
d tugged him into flock. All around him were other fledglings, digesting and preening as they floated in a raft, which rippled on the ocean swell. They chittered as they rose and fell with the waves, marvelling at the motion which was so different from their still, warm, dark burrows, and gazed up at the sky and out across the expanse of the ocean, wondering at how big the world is and how much space there is to soar through.
Their beaks drew them up, up and along.
They catapulted through a grid of contrails which unfurled with the earth’s magnetic force and were crisscrossed with columns of heat and cool that sometimes, but not always, condensed into clouds. They spread into formation, spanning forwards and backwards and sidewards, and as flock, they undulated across the sky, drawn by the mesmeric pull in the bridge of their brows and the whoosh and whistle of soft air rushing through tunnels of air wound dense, the pressurised wrench, the urgency that tugs them, soaring on on on, soaring soaring soaring until, suddenly, they stopped.
They burst into the water and into the sky, and hunted and rafted and scattered, and hunted and rafted and scattered, and so wove into the greater flock, the adult flock.
As flock, they hunted and rafted and hunted and rafted until their beaks drew them up, up and along. As flock, they hurtled south again along tracks of air, flowing and rippling across the sky; drawn by the mesmeric pull through the whoosh and whistle, air soft, air dense, the pressurised wrench, the urgency that tugs them, soaring on on on, soaring soaring soaring until, suddenly, they stopped.
Her scent drew him towards her, as sure as the need to migrate drew flock north then south again. North then south again. North then south again. North then—
South again, and together, he and she teased themselves from flock, and together, they formed their own little us (no bird is only an I). He flew in her wake and she flew in his, dodging and feinting on the breeze, bombing bait balls and darting through the water after fish. Always, they rafted up side by side.
They excavated a sandy burrow with their beaks and webbed feet and then, in its hollow, the egg birthed from her downy under-feathers as the full moon births from the mauve haze of the oceanic penumbra: it surfaced as a perfect, pearlescent orb. But as it continued to emerge, it stretched into an ovate shape and was not like the cold moon at all. Tucked up beneath his fluffy, feathery rump, it was smooth and round and warm warm warm. Tucked up beneath her fluffy, feathery rump it was smooth and round and warm warm warm. Warm warm warm warm warm.
When it wasn’t beneath him he was hunting the ocean for krill to share and when it wasn’t beneath her she was hunting the ocean for krill to share. The orange slough burst from him when he returned to their burrow and found her preening the wispy down of their chick: it burst from him and into their chick’s gaping gullet. Then he preened the chick’s down while she hunted the world, nuzzling the soft fluff with his beak, breathing in that new chick smell.
He and she and the chick were their own us, in their own burrow. No bird is only an I.
Soon, their chick was so hungry he needed two gullet-fulls a day, and they had to leave him on his own to scour the silken plane of the ocean for the darkened rough of bait balls breaching.
Disquiet shrouded him, disquiet as tangible as the light of the near-full moon glowing in the air about him. In his brow, he could feel the beginnings of the tug to be as flock, to leave their chick and span the world.
But not yet—
Their chick would follow his beak after them.
But not yet—he was not as flock yet.
He would slip the message down their chick’s gullet, just like his parents slipped the message down his: on a slick of regurgitated krill and fish. And their chick would follow after them.
As flock.
But not yet—
He spread his wings wide to catch a billow, and sailed it towards their burrow, spotting a turbulent triangle of wake, headed by a small boat, beneath him as he flew. Uneasiness thrummed in his belly and krill fluttered in his gullet. He beat the air with his wings and surged ahead of the drifting gust. Harder faster, he flew. Harder faster. He beat at the air. Beat at it. Beat it. Beat it. Beat it. Beat it. Beat it. Burst into his burrow at flight. Krill sloshed at the seam of his beak as he tumbled into the sandy hollow. The sandy, empty hollow.
He burst back into the orb of the sky and flew low, searching the colony for their chick who could not yet fly, who could not have gone far on his own.
Their chick could not have gone far. He could not yet span the world. But he could become as nowhere as the sun at night.
He waited beside her in their empty burrow, as their guts digested the food that was not meant for them and then shat it out into the sand. He plucked feathers from his belly. Sand and shit clung to the blood on the tips of his quills. He plucked some more and waited—
Waited to be as flock again; waited for his beak to pull him from their empty burrow and into flock and away from this.
Waited, beside her, to be no longer an us, no longer an empty us.
Waited to be no longer an I in pain. No bird is only an I.
We are bigger than that. We span the world. We span the world.
THREE
I AM SHE
I jet and I twirl and I curl and unfurl and the surface dips closer and I feel I see soft starlight brush my skin. I trace my arms along the sand and watch tiny fish and lice scatter up into the water that sways and sighs about me. My arms curl and unfurl and gather and swirl the sand and the silt as I jet and I twirl and I—
An urchin!
I touch I taste the poison in its spikes as they stab into me hurting me and I jet away jet away jet away. The flurry of bubbles rubs my skin clean so I curl and unfurl, curl and unfurl and as I twirl I remember it is sweet is nutty is spongy flesh in my beak.
I remember I lurked I watched from a grove of swaying weed as a lobster reared up above the urchin and flipped it with its claws. Upside-down its spikes were smaller were softer and I saw its mouth was weak was penetrable as I watched the lobster pull its flesh through the hole and a haze of filaments curled through the water and brushed against me and I touched it tasted it wanted it. I rippled slowly from the weed to the rocks above the lobster and spread my mantle wide and dropped onto it pulled it into me, engulfed it flapping flexing thrashing in my arms and held it held it held it tasting its panic its confusion its defeat as it went still. I thought about pressing the lobster crushing its armour in my beak but in its claws in its maw the urchin tasted felt looked so sweet so nutty. I dropped the lobster let it scurry beneath the rocky ledge and I dipped the tip of my arm into the urchin’s mouth and curled a wedge of flesh out and pressed it to my beak and it was spongy was bliss.
I jet back to the urchin and float above it and know it is spiny is bristly is poisonous. I need a lobster to flip it for me or something to flip it for me, something to flip it with? A rock to flip it with? I feel I see starlight brush my skin and I scatter sand as my arms unfurl, searching searching searching, and over there—what is it?
Sand sprays as something stomps, punctures the surface and scatters air in bubbles. There is a crash and a thrash and a thrash and eddies curl and swirl and I taste that it is a she like me, but she is not like me, and she becomes still becomes drifting becomes floating and the surface laps against her, swirls about her.
Slowly safely safely slowly I jet towards her and curl through her eddies and taste her eddies and see her skin her hair and taste what she is and feel she is warm. Gently gently I touch her, test her, curl my arms about her and she is covered in soft spikes that tickle me and her pores open against me and leak her bubbles onto me tickling me tickling me and she is tense and is a she—but what is this? I trace my arm along her and taste that she blends with … he? I taste something he, I touch something he, and she kicks and knocks into me and scatters the surface and bubbles flurry about me and I jet away jet away jet away. I feel strange, my body is pulsing is purring is humming is whirring and my legs dance and curl an
d unfurl and I feel strange and I taste I am she on the currents that swirl about me. I taste so she, I was she and I am she I am she I am she.
I find the urchin again and float above it and know it is spiny is spiky is poisonous. I need a rock to flip it with and I jet and twirl and the surface dips closer and threads of starlight shimmer and curl and I am slippery am sleek am she, and I trace my arms along the sand and scatter tiny fish and lice as my arms unfurl searching searching searching and over there—what is it?
It is a he like me and he is jetting is rippling is dancing towards me, and I taste he is ready is wanting and I taste on his eddies that he senses me as she—as pulsing as purring, as she—and I coil and curl and then I unfurl and he dances he dances, he spirals and twirls and his arms curl and unfurl. He brushes me touches me and I coil and swirl and slowly unfurl and his arms touch me and taste me, trace over me, under me, and one arm dips into me, slips into me, and I feel my body clamp around it clamp onto it and I feel it pulse pulse pulse. We are still, and I feel it pulse pulse pulse.
And it is enough now, I have had enough now, and I coil up and jet off and drag him knock him from me and he jets away jets away jets away and is gone.
The world sighs slowly as currents swirl about me and I taste us, taste she and he and something sweet and nutty, and I jet back and on the sand is the urchin and he must have knocked into it swept it flipped it over!
I dip my arm into its mouth and curl a wedge of flesh out and crush it to my beak and it is sweet is nutty is spongy is bliss and my body is brimming is pulsing is purring.
SPUN AIR
Lucy is out and about in Hobart with Kat and her mate Shani. They’re in a pub Lucy has never visited, maybe because she never really goes drinking in Hobart, but probably more because she feels, deep down, that she’s a bit too prissy to visit a place like this without the right kind of company. The people here are real, and scruffy in that urban fuck-the-man way that Lucy can never quite pull off. Despite the fact they’re worn and filthy, her Blundstone boots feel contrived. Her newly finished tattoo stings when her merino brushes against it. There’s a part of her that’s tempted to lift her top and flash her octopuses about; to show people that she’s badass too.