by Wendy Reakes
Bill and Dolly got out and walked hand in hand across the road to her folk’s house. There, away from the light inside the porch, Dolly and Bill had their first kiss.
After that, they’d courted for six months before they got engaged and then another six months after that. By the time that year had passed, he would have broken down walls to get that woman into his bed.
That was twelve-years back.
Over at the Reeds, he found Arthur in the barn with that tree. “How d’ you get her back, then?”
“Some of the lads gave me a hand. Billy Short brought his truck with a hoist on the back. Dragged her all the way here, we did,” said Arthur, laughing.
“I was going to help you.”
“It happened so fast, I didn’t have time to come and get you.”
“You should have rung.”
“I only had my mobile on me. You know what the signal’s like this side of the hill.”
Bill nodded. It was a bone of contention for him. The only way the farms could communicate was by landline. They were having a mast put in next year.
“You going to cut it all tonight?”
"No, I've got some for you though, Bill. I'll help load it in the truck if you like."
"All right. But I only need some for the cottage. We're all right down at the house," he said.
Bill backed up the truck and put the tail end inside the door of the barn. “Those damn birds have been hanging around up the hill,” he said.
"Whereabouts?"
“Near the estate. Hundreds of ‘em.”
“I never saw anything.”
"It's got Dolly all upset," Bill said. "Are your chickens all right?"
“Not laying.”
“Same as ours. Bird flu, Dolly reckons.”
Arthur laughed. “That’s not right. I’ve heard about that Asian bird flu. It doesn’t do that to chickens. Google it.”
“I hate that internet.” It was true. The kids used it and Dolly used it for the holiday let, but it wasn’t Bill’s friend.
They loaded the truck a quarter full and called it a day.
"All right, mate," Arthur said. They shook hands and Bill made his way back home.
Dolly had the tea on the table when he got in. “Might rain,” he said.
“I don’t think you’ll have time to do that window now, Bill.”
"It should be all right, my love. I won't feel right having it open like that all night."
“I’ve put some plastic sheeting up.”
“Did you?”
“Aye, that plastic the new mattress came in for the bed up at the cottage. Good job you never threw it out.”
“I’ll have a look at it.”
“I did a good job.” She had her hand on her hip and her eyebrows raised up to her head.
“I’m sure you did.”
“The children can sleep with us tonight. Plenty room in our bed.”
He knew that was coming. "All right, my love."
The children were tucking into some nice bangers and mash with lovely onion gravy. Bill’s favourite. Dolly made it so well she cooked it once a week, normally on a Friday night.
“I might have some beer with this.”
“Go on, then.”
Bill got up and went over to the fridge. Dolly always left four bottles in there for him.
It was exactly at that moment the house started to rattle. He swung about and saw Dolly looking skyward and the children with their mouths wide open.
“What was that?” Dolly shouted.
He knew it was the birds.
Chapter 5
They had just sat down to eat when the house started rattling like an earthquake was going on around them. Bill had never felt a quake before, but he'd seen enough on the TV to know what they looked like when the tremors made the house shake.
But he was wrong on that score. It wasn't an earthquake at all. It was the birds.
The sound was the worst. The hollering and screeching, like they were insane, and they wanted everyone to know about it. The noise tormented his mind like he was in a living hell.
“Billll…” Dolly screamed.
For a minute there, Bill didn’t know what to do. Normally, he was a calm soul, dealing with things with a level head. But right then, he was at odds with himself, unsure if he should go outside or not. And what of Dolly and the children? He should stay and protect them, shouldn’t he? But from what? They were just birds.
Feeling as if the roof was going to come down upon them at any minute, Bill kicked all doubt from his mind, when he realised he had to do something. He needed to go outside.
While the noise carried on, Bill instructed Dolly to sit at the table, so that she could calm their crying children. Dolly shook her head as she huddled in the corner holding them behind her as if that was all it would take to protect them. “It’s going to be all right,” Bill shouted above the noise. Their frightened faces were the last thing he saw before he opened the main door, just an inch, allowing him to close it quickly if the birds were hankering to enter.
He already noticed from the window that it was clear outside. It didn't make sense considering the noise. From the sound of them, he’d expected to see hundreds of birds flying around, but there was nothing untoward, no birds.
He stepped outside and closed the door firmly behind him. The sky was about to turn from day to night, but he had enough light to see what he was doing. The drive, leading from the house to the road was clear. He couldn’t make head or tail of it.
Then he saw a raven flying from the trees across the way, to above his head. From where he was standing he couldn’t see the roof, but he somehow knew that was where the bird had landed.
He stepped further out, sensing he should keep his steps slow and to make as little fuss as possible. He spotted another bird flying from the trees across the drive. All logic told him they were definitely landing on the roof. He just needed to see it.
He knew how far out he should go to get a clear view. He’d done it many times in the past when a tile had slipped from its fixing.
He kept walking. Slowly.
He reached the charred patch on the grass at the side of the drive, where earlier he had burned that pile of dead birds.
As another bird flew past him, up over his head, he turned.
There, covering his house with wings of chaos were hundreds, of threatening crows, blackbirds, ravens, and gulls, facing him, watching him. Tomorrow, when he saw Arthur Reed, he'd described it by saying ‘the house looked like it was wearing a feathered hat.' Yes, that's what he would say when he saw Arthur.
Bill’s eyes travelled downward, to the door and the kitchen window. Dolly’s face was peering through, her eyes wide with fear.
Without moving, Bill assessed the situation. If all those birds fancied doing what that one bird did last night, breaking the window to fly inside, then his family wouldn’t stand a chance against such a mass of murderous birds. A murder of crows! Ironically, it was a proper term.
The kitchen window where Dolly was peering out, had shutters at the side. They hadn't used them for years, not seeing the need, except for that time they went off for a weekend in London, but that was three years ago. Now, he didn't know if they worked or not. What if he tried to close them up? Would they just fall off their hinges and crash to the floor?
He had a million thoughts charging through his mind. He needed to think decisively, to make the best move, so that the best outcome was achieved.
The first part of his plan was to walk back to the house, quickly and quietly, with no sudden movement. He used the moment to consider his second manoeuvre: to close those shutters. Beyond that, he would work the problem and not let his panic get stirred up.
In front of the house, he could no longer see the birds, but he could hear them.
Dolly was shaking her head. “What’s going on?” she called.
Bill shook his head back at her. He put his finger to his lips.
Her eyes
grew wider as she saw another bird fly past
By then Bill had a good hold of the left shutter. The fixing mechanism was rusted over but thankfully it opened nicely, allowing him to shut it over half the window. In the refection of the glass, he saw another blackbird fly past. He needed to go faster. He needed to get indoors. He grabbed the other shutter on the right and he pulled it across and fixed it in place.
He sidled to his left and put his hand on the doorknob.
He opened the door, and it was then the birds took flight.
He found Dolly and the children in the room off the kitchen. A small cosy sitting room they used at night when the young uns were in bed. They were looking through the window to a scene that befuddled their minds. He pulled them away and sat them down on the couch.
He heard a window break upstairs.
Outside the birds were circling the house, looking for a way in. But they couldn’t be, could they? Bill thought. They were just common birds, not vultures. The whole thing didn’t make sense. He had lived in Cornwall all his life and he’d never seen anything like it.
A gull crashed through the window of the sitting room. Dolly and the children screamed. He picked them up and took them to the kitchen, knowing they’d be protected by the closed doors and the shutters on the window. It was dark in there. Dolly went to switch the lights on, but he stopped her. “Leave them off,” he shouted above the noise.
He left the kitchen and checked the other small rooms, a pantry, a bathroom, a utility, all with windows. So far, they were secure. He made sure all the doors were shut.
He heard Dolly scream. “Billll…”
He ran back into the kitchen to see the birds pecking away at the door. He could see the tips of their beaks coming through. He picked up the table, put it on its end and shoved it against the splintering wood. It was a heavy table. It would keep them at bay.
He left the kitchen once more to go up the stairs. As he was halfway up, he heard another window smash. He looked at the doors leading from the landing. Would it be sensible opening those doors? He decided it wouldn’t be, and that whatever was going on in the bedrooms was better off left alone.
Bill wondered about the plastic sheeting Dolly had put up over the children’s window. Would it hold? He didn’t know. All he could do was walk away and pray those birds couldn’t get through the doors.
Walking back downstairs, he thought about how, in the past he would never have turned his back on potential intruders. In the past he would have faced them square on, tackled them, got them out of his house, but now it was different. Now, he knew that if his pride got the better of him and he charged into the bedrooms to confront those birds, it would mean the end of Bill and his family. Still, he glanced back at the doors, forcing his anger to give way to sensibility.
Downstairs in the kitchen, Dolly and the children were huddled in the corner. Before he closed the door, he collected all the coats from the hooks in the hall and then laid them out on the hard tiled floor. He sat his family down upon the coats, lit the fire to give them warmth and light, and while the birds raged outside, they waited it out.
Dolly was asleep at five am, when he ventured out of the kitchen to the hall. It was how he’d left it, bare of the coats they’d covered themselves with.
Last night, the noise had abated after ten minutes. The screeching had left them, and the fluttering of the creature’s wings had faded. Bill suspected they’d gone, or that they were waiting for him to go outside. He didn’t know. What man, in modern day Britain, could predict what had happened last night? Birds attacking humans, trying to force their way into his home! It beggared belief.
Now, he needed to inspect the damage.
He went into the sitting room off the kitchen. The bird, which had crashed through the window, was still there with its neck lolling, covered in blood. Ironically, it seemed as if its body had prevented other birds from entering, like it had stuffed the hole in the glass.
He closed the curtains. Soon, he would venture outside and pull that bird out of the glass, before Dolly and the children saw it.
He went back out to the hall and checked the other downstairs rooms. The window in the utility room was cracked from corner to corner and the one in the cloakroom looked as if it had a bullet shot through it. Then he climbed the stairs.
The first room on the landing was the double, his and Dolly’s. He opened the door slowly, expecting the worst. The window was intact, which surprised him. He clocked up the amount saved by not having to replace that one. Better to go down than up.
He discovered the worst of the wreckage in the children’s room. Complete disarray. The birds had entered, probably en-mass, and pecked the two eiderdowns until the feathers covered every surface, like snow. Pictures were hanging loosely from the walls, lolling like that bird’s neck in the glass downstairs. A chair in the corner had been overturned, against the window, broken the previous night, the wardrobe had been moved and pecked at, now looking as if it had monster woodworm. The plastic sheet that Dolly had used to cover the window, now hung in shreds, no deterrent to the birds sharp damaging beaks.
Bill sighed and rubbed his face. He’d had little sleep last night. He went out and closed the door to the chaos inside the room.
Downstairs, he found Dolly picking up broken china. She was shaking her head as she gathered the pieces in a plastic bowl. He couldn’t see her face, she kept it averted, so that he couldn’t see her pain.
Bill removed the table that had blocked the door. He put it the right way up and tucked in the chairs. The kettle was boiling on the stove. Dolly was going to make tea.
He decided to go outside and check things over. Dolly didn’t say anything.
It was still dark. The morning was fresh, as a white mist covered the ground. He couldn’t see much, but he could smell pine trees, freshly dug dirt, smoke and hay. The sound was eerie, since there weren’t much of it, except for the sound of the leaves on the trees, rustling, and the sea in the distance breaking waves over the rocks and against the cliffs. Bill went back inside. With the danger lurking beyond the house, there was nothing he could do until it was light. He’d at least have a cuppa tea first.
“What about the cows?” Dolly asked as she got some milk out of the fridge. “Will you let them out on the field later?”
“Of course,” he said. Why wouldn’t he, Bill wondered.
The children were still asleep, lying stretched out on the coats on the floor, their limbs askew. Bill pulled on his overalls after he’d covered them over with his old oil coat. “I’ll have a cup of tea first.”
Dolly sat down at the kitchen table and poured his tea before hers since he liked it weak. Her face was sorrowful, as if she’d just heard of a death in the family. He placed his hand over hers. Her skin was cold even though the fire was still burning. “It’s all over now,” he said, reading her thoughts. “They couldn’t get in, so I wouldn’t think they’d be back.”
“I don’t understand it, Bill. Do you?” Dolly asked.
He shook his head. No, he didn’t understand it at all. “I’ll put the news on.”
“Don’t! Not yet. Let the children sleep a little longer.”
He did as she asked, but then he picked up the phone.
Gladys answered on the third ring. He was relieved to hear her voice. "Are you all right, mother?"
“What was all that noise last night, son?” she asked.
“Did your house rattle?”
“No, but there was a lot of to-ing and fro-ing going on in the middle of the night. I just kept my lights off and went to bed.”
"All right. Have you been outside yet?"
“Too early, Bill.”
"As long as you're all right."
"I'm all right, son."
“Get some things together. I’m going to come along and get you later. I’ll bring you over here. Just till we know what’s going on.”
“No, I’m not doing that.”
“No arguments. You can go
back after I find out what’s happening. Have you put the radio on yet?”
“First thing I do, you know that.”
“Anything about the birds?”
“Birds? Oh, yes, I remember them saying something about some strange occurrences. What’s that all about then, Bill?”
“They’re out of sorts,” he said.
By nine o’clock he’d seen to the cows. The truck would pick up the milk at ten. They were down on their quota. Just like the chickens weren’t laying their normal amount of eggs.
Before he did anything else, he’d found some decent planks of wood in the barn and start boarding up the windows. He’d feel happier once he knew the house was secure. Just in case they were going to come back.
When he came out of the barn, he saw Dolly backing out of the chicken coop where a dead sparrow fell onto her shoulder. She jumped and brushed herself down with repulsion. He dropped the wood and rushed over to her. He took her in his arms and hugged her, as he kissed her hair.
“My nerves are on edge, Bill,” she said.
“I know.” He looked about to see where the young uns were. “Where are the children”
“Kicking a ball about around the other side of the house.”
“Tell them to come back around here, and to stay where we can see them.”
“All right.” She pulled away from him so that she could look up at his face. “Remember, the people from Bristol are arriving at two o’clock. Do you think we should put them off?”
“Why? No, we’ll need some extra money to pay for the broken windows. The milk quota’s down.”
"Well, if you're sure. But I think it might be a good idea to close the shutters up at the cottage."
“I’ll do that when I go up later. You’ll want me to take a box up, won’t you?”
"Aye, but there's not many eggs to spare," Dolly said glumly. "You think the birds will come back, Bill?"
“I doubt it. My thoughts are, they’d got a bit frenzied, what with winter coming. That arctic wind, it was, love.”
“Why are you bringing Gladys over then?”