Birds of a Lesser Paradise

by Megan Mayhew Bergman

  Typically, I said, we help our clients assemble the correct gear and map a course. We drop you off at daybreak.

  I took a red pen from my pocket and circled an area near Lake Drummond.

  The best nesting sites for warblers are here, I said. What do you know about songbirds?

  I want to go in with you, he said.

  Dad was born on the outskirts of the swamp at a time when it was desolate, hard, and flecked with ramshackle hunting cabins. His father had been into timber, and Dad was raised wild—the kind of man who could pick up a snake by its neck with the confidence I’d exhibit picking up a rubber version in a toy store. He was sentimental about his family home and the town. Anything he was used to having around he wanted to keep around. So when the town got too small to sustain a post office, he converted the blue mail drops into composting hubs in the back corner of our lot. He bought the abandoned elementary school at auction for almost nothing—no one wanted to pay the taxes on it, and looters had already taken the copper pipes and pedestal sinks. He rented it out for birthday parties, weddings, and to local artists for studio space. When a developer leveled the city park, Dad reassembled the jungle gym in our side yard near the garden and let the scuppernong vines go wild.

  We lived in a dying town with a dwindling tax base. I never thought I’d come back, but the swamp was in me; if Dad was half feral, I was one-quarter. I liked the way the water tasted, the sound of birds outside my window in the morning. A few years in Raleigh studying conservation biology at the state university and I needed to find a place where I could look out my window and see nothing man-made. I missed the smell of things rotting, the sun bearing down on a wet log.

  Nothing in the city seemed real to me—it was fabricated, plastic, artificial, fast. After years of biology classes, every come-on was a mating call, every bar conversation a display—a complicated modern spin on ancient rules. I didn’t believe in altruistic acts—I could find a selfish root to anything. Eventually I felt as if I was looking out at the busy world and I could see nothing but its ugly bones.

  I was taught that at the heart of all people, all things, lay raw self-interest. Sure, you could dress a person up nice, put pretty words in his mouth, but underneath the silk tie and pressed shirt was an animal. A territorial, hungry animal anxious to satisfy his own needs.

  At least in the swamp, there was no make-believe chivalry, no playing nice. It was eat or be eaten out there, life at its purest, and it’s where I wanted to be.

  Another thing—I loved my dad. I’d never known my mother—she’d died just after giving birth to me—so he was all I’d ever had. He was honest, fun, and unapologetically himself.

  I’m not asking you to come home, my dad said, when I approached him with the idea. You won’t find a husband here, he added.

  I don’t want one, I’d said—and for a while, that had been the truth. Perhaps it was all the years I’d watched my father carve out a happy life alone.

  Your old room is packed solid, he’d said. I disassembled a tobacco barn. Numbered the slats. You can’t move in ’til I sell it.

  I’ll take the room over the garage, I said. I have some money to fix it up—I’ll put in a shower.

  Aside from serving in Korea and a short stint living on a houseboat in his twenties, Dad had remained hidden from the world in the swamp, inhabiting the same house, trapping the same illegal lines, fishing the same shallow waters.

  We didn’t watch the market or follow politics. That was part of the appeal, for me anyway. For centuries people had used the swamp to hide from their problems. Runaway slaves, ruthless fugitives, shell-shocked soldiers, and cheating wives—all had hidden in the swamp at one time.

  When I moved from the city to the swamp, the things I could not have became special again. Cappuccino was special. Driving forty minutes to eat second-rate Indian food was special. Planning a day around the “good” grocery store—special.

  You got about half fancy living out of town, Dad told me.

  I was a thirty-six-year-old single woman living in a poor man’s theme park, running birding trips into the swamp. Most of my binocular-laden clients were pushing sixty and just as concerned with sunscreen and hydration as they were with spotting a pileated woodpecker. I drove them into the swamp in Dad’s pickup, left them with a map, a bagged lunch, water, a GPS device, and a phone, and picked them up at twilight in a place that seemed less wild every day.

  For the most part, I was happy.

  Can I offer you some water? I asked Smith, walking toward the main house, the farmhouse in which my father had been born.

  What I don’t understand, he said, is how you band a royal tern.

  Netting, I said. Fine netting. Or find the juveniles before they flee the nest, which they do, quickly.

  I brought Smith into the kitchen. Even though our house was a mess the old juniper paneling made it smell clean.

  The downstairs consisted of three rooms. Dad had taken out walls and combined the kitchen and living areas. On the countertops, cups brimmed with pens and cooking utensils. We’d piled old quilts on top of threadbare chairs and sofas for the cats and Dad’s dog, Betsy, to nest in, dirty paws and all. Photographs were tucked into the dusty frames of older pictures. The doorway was lined with mud-caked boots and waders. Coon, fox, and rabbit skins were pinned to the paneling. Dad kept a bulletin board heavy with dried snakeskins, maps, and articles on the ivory-billed woodpecker.

  He still believes they exist? Smith said excitedly.

  Some days, I said. But most people know they’re extinct. I know.

  There are sightings, Smith said. Mostly Florida, right?

  They’re just seeing the pileated, I said. Or maybe a sapsucker. People catch sight of a big bird like that and they see what they want to see.

  At that moment, Dad came in. As he opened the door, the maps and clippings on his bulletin board flapped wildly.

  Who’s this? he said.

  Smith extended his hand.

  Smith Jones, he said. Bird enthusiast.

  If you like birds, Dad said, moving toward his computer, you’ll love this video.

  Dad had just discovered the Internet. He pulled up a clip that set the ardent mating displays of birds of paradise in New Guinea to Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean.”

  The birds, dripping in vibrant plumage, skated across branches, flicked their heads, and called like wild flutes to the heavens. Dad slapped his thighs and his laughter filled the house. His laugh was unmistakable, almost an affront. Smith smiled; he didn’t look uncomfortable.

  Want a beer? Dad asked.

  Smith nodded.

  As Smith brought the bottle to his mouth I noticed his full lips. I imagined them sliding down my neck, grazing the back of my hand. I pressed the cool bottle to my forehead. I had to laugh at myself, the way lust crowded my judgment. Still, I was lonely enough not to take a good-looking stranger for granted. It could be years before one appeared again.

  That a spaniel? Smith asked, nodding at Betsy.

  Something like that, my dad said. Gun-shy and made of God knows what mutts.

  Eyes like a woman, Smith said, reaching down to scratch her chin.

  Betsy shoved her tender brown nose into Dad’s thigh. She rarely left his side, except on bird expeditions, when she was crated. She was a slave to her instinct—the spaniel in her needed to flush birds. The woman in her wanted to please my father. Her eyes were a piercing amber, knowing. Dad rubbed her ear, gently pulled a burr from her coat.

  What’s this? Smith asked, touching a black-and-white photo on Dad’s bulletin board.

  Broken-necked bear, Dad said. Fell from a tree slicked up with honey.

  There are hundreds of bears in the swamp, I said. Go in for a few days and you’ll see one, I promise.

  Maybe ivory-billed woodpeckers, too, Smith said, raising his eyebrows.

  It’s possible, Dad said, his voice quiet and serious.

  I shook my head. Not a chance, I said.

&nbs
p; I’ve seen one, Dad said. Years ago, when I had been out in the swamp for three days. I had started to feel a part of it, then. I hadn’t spoken to another human being in hours. I was ready for it, know what I’m saying?

  Soon it was like listening to two men speak excitedly of buried treasure; their shared enthusiasm was evident. Smith and my father conceived a weeklong expedition in the swamp. If there was an ivory-billed, they would hear it, find it, and record it.

  There’s a reward, Smith said, scanning a site he’d pulled up online. Fifty thousand bucks.

  Nothing short of three days in the heart of the swamp will do, Dad said.

  While we’re at it, I said, why don’t we look for unicorns? Get excited, Smith said. It could be the definitive canvas of the Great Dismal. We could know for sure.

  We already do, I said. There’s no question. They’re gone. It’s possible, Smith said. Give us that.

  It’s not, I said.

  Don’t be a black cloud, honey, Dad said.

  It always sucked to be the realist.

  I put out olives, crackers, and a block of cheese for supper. Dad passed out a second round of beer.

  Eventually Dad excused himself; he liked to read for an hour before going to bed. I dug out the Scrabble board and unfolded it on the floor.

  You play? I asked.

  I will, Smith said.

  He sat cross-legged on the floor, his beer beside him. He cocked his head to study the board before laying down his letters. He wasn’t clean-shaven; his whiskers were ash blond and gave him an innocent look.

  I flipped on the radio; the silence was too provocative. Dad kept it on the oldies station—he loved Motown—but lately it had occurred to me that the men singing these songs, these songs Dad and everyone else had been listening to as long as I could remember—“I’ll Be Around”; “Be Young, Be Foolish, Be Happy”; anything by Ben E. King—were dead or dying. These men could sing about love better than anyone, but now they were long past loving women, and their impotence depressed me.

  “Bernadette” by the Four Tops was on. To be Bernadette, I thought. To be a muse, to inspire jealousy, to make a man shout into the microphone: You’re the soul of me.

  Another beer? I said, walking over to the refrigerator.

  Please, Smith said.

  There were interludes of mindless banter between plays. Smith inched closer to me. I noticed the strings tied to his wrist, the tan line on his arms revealed by short sleeves.

  L-A-U-P-E-R, he spelled.

  As in Cyndi, he said.

  Not sure that counts, I said.

  Where do you live? I asked. I’ll pick you up in the morning to shop for provisions.

  An unfinished neighborhood, he said. Builder put in all the septic, cleared the lots, put up a clubhouse and a pool and built three spec homes, and then—boom—foreclosure.

  Did you buy the house? I asked.

  What do you think? he said, laughing. Squatter’s rights.

  I shook my head. I had no idea what this man was capable of, what his values were. Perhaps he’d known about the reward for an ivory-billed sighting, and that’s why he was here. The swamp was as good a hope as any. My attraction to him was instantaneous, and I worried it was palpable.

  He moved in close, as if he was going to kiss me. Perhaps he read the panic on my face, because he pulled away.

  I went to school with the builder, he said, standing up. See you in the morning. Turn right two lights after the old post office and you’ll see signs. There’s only one inhabited house. You can’t miss it.

  I drove into Smith’s abandoned neighborhood at nine. The sidewalks were overgrown and the swimming pool was green with algae and thick with debris. The clubhouse at the heart of the development was unfinished—the windowsills were unpainted; the screen door leaned against the stained stucco. Sewer pipes were stacked next to grass-choked For Sale signs on weedy empty lots. A sign advertising the development featured a toddler in sunglasses reclining on an inner tube, and a slogan: Home is HERE. It also said Satan Lives in red spray paint.

  I couldn’t see Smith when I pulled up to his house, so I idled the car and dug out an old tube of lip gloss. The car door opened while I was homed in on my face in the rearview.

  It’s not like the world can’t tell what’s hiding underneath, Smith said, sliding into the passenger seat. And besides—you have nothing to hide.

  I didn’t see you coming, I said.

  That, he said, pointing to the clubhouse as we drove out, is my command central. I put a minifridge and my radio in the office there. I don’t cook, though—the oven isn’t real. Just a plastic facade the builder put up when he ran out of money.

  It’s quiet here, I said.

  I have my cats, he said. I let them hunt the place.

  You like it? I asked.

  No real expenses, he said, shrugging his shoulders. I got a car out back—no plates, though. Drive at my own risk. Got an old cow skull glued to the front. He laughed.

  Do you have waders? I asked. You’re gonna want something like that to keep the mud out of your pants in the swamp. And, you know, in case you surprise a snake. There are snakes.

  We drove to the army/navy store. Dad has a tent you can borrow, I said, before going in.

  Smith shopped quickly. He high-fived the seventy-year-old buzz-cut clerk and paid cash for a pair of cheap gaiters and insect repellent. We started the drive back to his house.

  You know the elementary school? I said.

  The empty one?

  Dad owns it. Got it for a thousand bucks, I said. It’s beautiful inside. Wanna see it?

  We parked in the untended lot, now raised and broken by tree roots. My heart raced as I unlocked the enormous double doors. Smith ran his fingers down the marble stone with the date the school was built: 1917.

  The sun wasn’t on the building yet and the brick walls kept the place cool. Our voices bounced off of wooden floors the color of honey, floors scarred and gashed by hundreds of small shoes, sliding desks.

  Smith grabbed my wrist and pulled me into a dark classroom where the ceiling tiles heaved with moisture and outdated maps curled against a chalkboard.

  After years alone and long stretches of celibacy, I’d forgotten how it felt to be flipped on like a light, to try to concentrate when your blood and heart were screaming inside you.

  I leaned against the cinder-block wall. Smith put one hand above my head and closed in on my face. I hadn’t been touched this way in years.

  I gave him my mouth and tilted my head back to keep the hot tears in my eyes from spilling down my face. I wanted to keep them to myself. I worried they came from something awful, like gratitude.

  The next morning, Smith met us at dawn. He was all arms and legs and his pack rattled when he walked—too many useless carabiners dangling from straps and zippers. I found my skepticism of Smith renewed, despite our strong attraction. What did he want from me? I thought. From us?

  Let’s bring that old dog of yours, he said to Dad. I’ll hold her leash if you need to approach any birds.

  She does like adventure, Dad said. And it’s not too hot. I’ve got a packable water bowl.

  Dad was always looking for an excuse to have Betsy along. She rode in the back of the pickup, which we left at the head of an old logging road a mile into the swamp.

  The spring sun was already warm as we threw on our packs, which were stuffed with sleeping bags, tents, food, and a few changes of clothes.

  Dad, I said. Can I dab sunscreen on your nose?

  He closed his eyes like a relenting child and kept talking while I smeared lotion across his face. His skin was porous and age spots were beginning to form on his forehead.

  I can’t help but be excited, he said.

  The trail was sandy and flat and the tree cover was thick; the thin trunks of young pines and oaks arced over our heads. The farther we went in, the more my ears grew attuned to birdsong. Dad kept a water bottle in one hand and led the procession with a fast pac
e, which made him wheeze. His excitement and hope began to nag at me. I didn’t want to see him let down.

  Smith handed me a bag of homemade trail mix.

  The good kind, he said. Minimarshmallows, chocolate, peanuts, and dried cherries. Every few steps he tossed a peanut to Betsy, who had left my father’s side and now followed Smith with food-driven devotion.

  Who is this man? I wondered. Where had he come from?

  Where’d you go to school? I asked.

  Middlebury, he said. For two years. Took some biology.

  We kept walking. I could smell my hot skin. My pack was too heavy, but I wasn’t going to admit to such a novice mistake.

  The male ivory-billed, Dad said, has a black chin and a red crest. Juveniles and females have a black crest, but the bill is chalk white. The call sounds like a horn.

  Smith turned to smile at me over his pack. A navy bandana covered his wild hair. I felt guilty sharing a secret with him, that my father was unaware of what had taken place between us.

  Smith stopped, midtrail, and put his hand on my father’s shoulder. He placed his finger to his lips and cupped his ear.

  Listen, he said. From over there.

  Dad paused.

  It must be a double drum, Dad said, shaking his head. That’s a single. Not the one.

  I glared at Smith.

  Look, Dad said. It’s probably not going to happen, and if it does happen, it won’t happen this soon.

  He trudged on, a little heavier, a little more tired. After a few hours Dad’s neck was drenched in sweat and he wiped his forehead often.

  Can I carry your camera for you? I asked Dad.

  Did you bring the woodpecker call? he asked.

  I nodded. We walked on, hot and hungry. I was ready for a break, but I’d go as long and as far as Dad wanted.

  Don’t get his hopes up, I whispered to Smith. This might be fun for you, but it means something to him.

  Smith looked like I’d sucker-punched him.