by Wendy Reakes
“Last night. Rocking the roof of my house they were.” He put his pint down on the bar. “I’ve never seen anything like it in all my days.”
One of the locals shook his head, thinking they were all crazy.
Another one said, ‘I had trouble up at my place too,’
“Whatttt?”
“Aye. Lost two windows and they made a right mess doing it.”
Bill could do better than that. “I found a large black crow sitting at the end of my son's bed. That wasn't normal.”
Annie came out carrying two plates of food and took it over to the visitors. The landlord used the remote to switch on the news on the television above the bar.
All eyes went to the screen. Special report 'An isolated incident of birds acting strangely at a golf course near London'.
“What did I tell you?” one of the locals said. “And not just here by the sounds of it.”
“It's the end of the world.”
“If the birds attack all over the country, they'll have to send in the army, I reckon.”
Mrs Gates from the bird watchers club was sat on a stool between them. “And what good do you think that will do?” she said with a guffaw. “Do you have any idea how many birds there are in the world?”
She got all their attention. “There are over ten-thousand species and over two-hundred billion birds across the planet.”
A smattering of chatter.
“I promise you,” she said. “if the birds amass and attack the population, we wouldn't stand a chance.
“The army would shoot them,” said one local.
"There's not enough bullets in the world, I promise you."
“Gas them then.”
“And the people too while they're at it?!” she chuckled. “Besides, there are too many holes in your story for me to believe all this nonsense.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, for one thing, they're not clever enough to launch a systematic full-scale attack. Their brains aren't big enough, you see.”
“Do birds of different species flock together?” Bill asked. He’d been wondering that yesterday.
“Ah, do ‘birds of a feather flock together’, you mean?” she chuckled at her own question. “Corvids, like crows, are territorial towards other birds, but I often see crows and seagulls together. The seagulls are indifferent to the crows, and the crows appear to harass the gulls, so it may be in their nature, but it’s not common.”
“How do you explain the attack on the farm then?” Bill asked. “There was all manner of birds, all doing the same thing.”
“There could be a number of reasons, but I would imagine they were hungry...what with winter coming on.”
Bill didn’t want to be rude to Mrs Gates, but he did think she was a bit off with her analysis. “It wasn’t really like that,” he said. “Besides, the fields still have enough food. Winter hasn't set in yet.” Dolly had said that only yesterday. “What about the crow I found in our Toby’s bedroom?”
“Nothing strange about that. Just make sure you close your windows at night.”
“The window was closed. The bird crashed into it and flew right in.”
Mrs Gates frowned as if she didn’t believe him.
Then everyone stopped their chattering and looked up when they heard Harry Fear shout. “Look.”
Chapter 14
Harry looked out of the window and saw a crow fly past. Damn birds, he thought, what the hell was wrong with them?
He had never been a lover of animals, not since he was bitten by a dog when he was a kid. That was in the States. His parents took out a libel suit against the owner. Harry said they got a measly twenty-thousand dollars for it when the insurance company settled. He still had the scar on his leg. The truth was, since he hadn't lost his leg to gangrene, he was proud of the scar. He felt it made him more macho. His father once said, ‘twenty-thousand dollars and an ego. Money well earned.'
He and Melanie were waiting for their food to arrive. They could smell it cooking in the kitchen “Don’t they have an extractor fan?” Melanie said. Harry didn’t think the place was as bad as she was making out. He’d ordered a burger, but frankly, he couldn’t remember ever having a decent burger in the UK. Except for The Boathouse of course. They made the real McCoy there. It was their speciality, that and the southern barbecue ribs. Everyone loved their ribs.
Once again, his eye caught a couple of birds, flying low, past the window.
The news reports of occurrences across the country had put him on edge. Then he reasoned, how can birds make men nervous? It beggared belief.
He overheard the locals talking. There was a woman among them. She seemed to know what she was talking about. She was tabooing the whole thing. Harry agreed with her. Panic, that’s what it was. As if the internet wasn’t enough, now they had the damn birds. On the way down in the car, they’d heard a story on the radio about an attack in France. ‘Another Normandy landing’, one reporter had quipped. A listener had phoned in to say the comment was crass, insensitive and uncalled for. She’d been in a hotel overlooking the beach in Normandy. ‘I saw pure carnage,’ she’d said.
Harry had doubted the whole thing and Melanie had agreed. ‘Pure speculation,’ he’d said. It all seemed too far-fetched.
Another bird flew past.
He wondered if the kids were all right in Bristol. He turned over his phone and dialled Matt. Then his phone died. No signal and only ten per cent charge. Damn. Well, if he couldn’t get a signal down there, it didn’t matter much about the charge. Except he liked to play online sudoku when he wasn’t doing anything. It was free, with no gambling involved. He had always been a gambler, which was why he avoided it at all cost. Got it from his father, his mother always said. Harry had gambled the house. He knew that. And he knew Ellen would never forgive him. But now that the restaurant was picking up, he would see a profit within the year and they’d be quid’s in, as Matt liked to say.
The landlady came out of the kitchen carrying two plates. One was piled high with French Fries. The one was Harry’s.
He saw another bird and as the landlady stopped in her tracks, holding the two plates out in front of her, she looked through the window and her mouth dropped open.
As Harry wondered what she was looking at, and as he also wondered why he kept seeing birds flying past the window he swung his head about and looked outside.
Harry stood up.
Now he lived up to his name. Fear!
“Look,” he shouted.
Outside the window, on the opposite side of the road, hundreds of black birds and seabirds surrounded the park, sitting on the railings watching the children as they played.
Chapter 15
Dolly left Bill’s mother sitting quietly with a nice cup of tea and a crochet hook. She was a dab hand at the craft. “Plenty of wool there to keep you occupied,” Dolly said before she left.
“How am I supposed to see the hook with me eye?”
“You said your eye was all right,” Dolly argued.
“It is that. Don’t worry, girl. You go off. I can manage.”
Dolly shook her head and closed the door behind her. Then she stuck her head back in. “Don’t go opening this door, you hear me, Gladys?”
“Aye.”
Arthur and Nancy’s farm was only a two-mile walk. From the house, she would cut across the paddock to the pasture on the opposite side.
As she walked, Dolly thought about the children and hoped they were all right. Bill had better be keeping an eye on them. Dolly was a stricter parent than Bill. She was always quoted as saying that he was so laid back he was practically horizontal. My man, Bill, she thought, with a smile on her face. He’d made her the happiest girl alive. When they’d married, she thought the angels had blessed her with everything she could have wished for. Good things like that didn’t happen to girls who grew up on the estate.
The estate was one of the roughest places around there. Mostly council houses with low-incom
e families. Her mother and father were both dead now, so strangers lived in the house she grew up in. With little industry around those parts, except for farming and fishing and tourism, most of the residents had stalls on the Thursday market in the village. They sold crafts, homemade food, roast chickens, anything the tourists would like and pay for. Dolly had a stall, albeit it was just a small trestle table selling vegetables from her plot behind the barn. And eggs. She wouldn't be selling many of those when next Thursday came around again. Worries, worries, worries. All Dolly could think about were worries.
She stepped over a wooden stile to reach the lane and as she walked, she wondered about that dog they'd been talking about lately. Bill wasn't a great lover of dogs since he’d been bitten by a sheepdog on his family's farm when he was a kid. He always made account of how his father, with shotgun in hand, had aimed the gun at that dog and shot his brains out. Bill never got over it. Now, they were under pressure from the children. They said they'd look after it, feed it, make sure it got walked. Dolly wouldn't have any of it. She knew their enthusiasm and their promises would dry up as soon as they brought the dog home. Gladys was on their side. She said it was unheard of for a farm not to have a dog. ‘You could give it a good life if you took one of those rescue dogs,’ she’d said when they talked about it. Then, when her own had died just last year, she said maybe it wasn’t a good idea after all. ‘They just go and die on you and break your heart.’
Now, Dolly was thinking about her walk and how it would be nice having the company of a dog. That was until she saw one, about two hundred yards in front of her.
She stopped.
As if the heavens had heard her thoughts and sent her one down, just up ahead, a black sheepdog stood rigid on four legs, barking up at the trees.
She looked around, wondering who he belonged to when out of the woods stepped a man. As he too looked up at the trees to see what the dog was barking at, and just as Dolly walked nearer as her eyes tried desperately to focus, what looked like a black cloak came down from the trees and covered the dog in an instant. It looked like a black cloak but of course, it wasn't. Her eyes had deceived her. It was a blanket of birds, now feasting on the poor yelping mutt.
The man, a poacher probably, aimed his shotgun at the moving black mound on the track through the trees. And as Dolly became frozen to the spot, she watched the man fire the gun, sending a spray of shot over the birds. The dog made one final yelp as the cloak of birds split and set upon the man, burying him in a mass beneath their wings of death.
Dolly wanted to scream but no sound would come from her throat, as if her vocal chords were paralysed. Panting, she fell to the side of the path and laid on the grass, covering her head while she waited for the birds to set on her. After a minute and as her body trembled, she looked up and discovered the birds had gone.
That’s when Dolly stood up and ran as fast as her legs would carry her. Running for her life.
She arrived at the reeds. It was closer than going all the way back home. She’d have a calming cup of tea with Nancy and then Arthur would probably run her back before fetching the police. After the scene she’d just witnessed, that would be the wisest and safest option.
Arthur's truck was parked outside. Handy for when she wanted to leave. The way she was feeling, right then, it wouldn't be long before she begged them to take her home. She just wanted to get back. And she felt like she wanted to sleep for a week. That was strange since Dolly never slept in the day. Couldn't see the appeal of it.
She called out. She’d gotten her words back, even though her throat was hoarse from screaming. The horror up the lane was one she’d never forget. Not by a long chalk. She was just glad she never had the children with her.
“Nancy,” she called, her voice quivering with distress. The door was open, but around there, no one bothered locking their doors in the day. “Arthur? Are you here?”
The place was silent. It was a deafening silence. That’s how Dolly described it and that’s how she’d tell it later when Bill asked her what happened. The kitchen was as familiar to her as her own. Nancy was her best friend in the world, apart from Bill. They’d grown up together, and they’d met their men at exactly the same time.
She noticed the broken plates and cups on the dresser. Good grief, Nancy would have a fit when she saw that lot.
Then, like night turning to day, she knew. Those smashed plates were the fault of intruders.
Birds.
Along the corridor, she walked, one step after another. She knew the bedrooms. Theirs was the one on the left. She didn't know why she was walking that way, she just had the strangest feeling…
The door was ajar. She pushed it inwards.
Ahead of her, a cracked window held the carcass of a crow, its neck broken in its quest for entry, hanging loosely downward towards the sill where shards of bloodied glass lay scattered. She stepped inside and saw the duvet had been torn to shreds, its duck feathers covering the room, looking as if white birds had burst from within, like four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie.
Dolly turned her head.
There was Arthur.
Bile rose to her throat as she stared at the man who was once a lifelong friend.
He sat with his back against the wall wearing striped pyjamas. And all that was left of his eyes were black bloodied holes.
Dolly turned to rush out in a frenzied dash. Reeling along the corridor as if she was ricocheting off each wall. She went back into the kitchen and stopped for breath. Her mouth was agape as she looked downwards and saw Nancy’s legs protruding from below the pine table.
And all she could think of was how many times Nancy had scrubbed that table.
Chapter 16
The birds surrounded the park like a border of black around a green square tablecloth. The fence was there to protect the children, but now it was their enemy as it served as a perch for the savage birds. Inside the pub, Bill Hock went up behind Harry and with his eyes wide with unspent terror, he spoke as if it were his dying breath. “Will you help me?” he asked. Harry simply nodded. Yes, he would.
Bill put a restraining hand on Harry’s arm. “Slow,” he said as if his life depended on it.
Behind him, Melanie called his name. Harry lifted his fingers to his mouth and shushed her, indicating she should sit down and wait.
They stepped outside, and Harry closed the door softly behind them. The street was wide enough for three cars. Both men knew without discussing it, that they needed to cross without making a sound that could alarm those blasted birds.
They walked slowly.
No sound was heard as they crossed between parked cars. Pedestrians cowered in doorways, folk stared through windows as they hid in stores. The only sound was of the boats on the harbour rocking back and forth and the sound of the children playing. The moment was eerie, a page from a children's picture book, except that was a tale of horror and not one to read to a child at bedtime.
Harry moved alongside Bill, like brave brothers in arms, about to fight a battle whatever the outcome.
They reached the gate, a turnstile really, except at its side was a gate that could be opened for prams and bikes and such like. Inside, the children played on, screaming and laughing since they hadn’t noticed the birds lining the fence around the park. A mother with a baby in a pushchair stood up as Harry and Bill reached the gate from the outside. She stood in slow motion, as if she couldn’t believe her own eyes. Shaken, to balance himself, Harry placed his hand on the side of the fence. A bird pecked it and he snatched it away. He wanted to lash out, but he daren’t.
Bill looked at him. His expression told him to wait while he ventured inside to warn the children. Harry turned his head to look across the road where Melanie stood inside the pub looking out in disbelief.
He remained where he was, as his eyes fixed on the birds, as their eyes, in turn, watched the children. Along the fence, the birds jostled for a better position in which to attack, resembling spectators at a gla
diator fight, screaming for blood.
Harry watched Bill walk into the arena. His arms were outstretched as if he was balancing on a wire. He reached a boy. Harry recognised him as Bill’s son Toby. He tapped him on the shoulder and the boy stopped his playing and swung about. He froze as he looked at the birds.
His sister did the same until all the children were looking where Harry stood holding the gate open.
Bill guided the children as they moved one by one.
He reached the woman with the pushchair. With the baby inside, he moved it and it creaked.
And that was when the birds took flight.
“Run!” shouted Harry as mayhem erupted.
One after another the children fled through the gates, but their escape was premature. The birds quickly turned their attention on them running over the streets, flailing and dashing anywhere, just to escape certain death. They were babies, that was all, thought Harry. They didn’t deserve that.
He picked up a girl, no more than five. He tucked her under his arm as he ran with her through a mass of black.
A child lost her glasses and got covered by birds. With the other child under his arm, he pushed them off and grabbed her cardigan. He pulled her up towards him like she was a small sack of potatoes. A bird clung to her back as he kept moving, crushing her glasses beneath his blind hasty steps.
A car was next to them. He let go of the girl and placed her on the tarmac floor. He used his foot to kick off the bird from her back. Its claw was embedded in the wool of her sweater, so another swift kick was called for, before she was free of the assassin. He pulled the handle on the door. He didn’t expect it to be open, but it was. He pushed the two girls inside the car just as a bird, weighing a ton, landed on his back. It pecked his neck like he was a piece of raw meat. To be so close to those deadly, murderous eyes was horrifying. It looked like a vulture claiming its next meal.
So, he slammed his back against the car, crushing the thing beneath him. It squealed as if in fervent pain. Harry was glad of it. He was really glad.