by Wendy Reakes
He let the hatch down quietly and locked it. “We need to get out of here,” he whispered to Mr Hock and the cat.
Chapter 22
Melanie was over the whole thing. She’d never had such a terrible get-away and now she just wanted to get back to Bristol. The weekend had been a disaster from start to finish. She loved Harry, of course, but she was beginning to wonder if she’d taken too much on, dating him. He had baggage. An ex-wife he still loved, despite him assuring her he didn’t, and three kids, who never talked to him, much less her. Now, with the way that day was going, she wondered if she should have stuck with Mike.
Mike had been the love of her life. They'd lived together and almost married until he found out about Harry. Yes, she'd cheated, but hadn't he too once, when they'd first met? After they split up she decided to go steady with Harry, besides, he’d offered her some work at the restaurant, so it was a win win for Melanie.
Her main job was an interior designer, but she was also a fashion blogger. She reported on the public when they were out in the street wearing the in-thing, or she tackled unsuspecting shoppers in changing rooms, just to see what they thought about the clothes they were buying. And she did pieces on the Bristol elite. The ones who dined in good restaurants and attended all the charity galas and red-carpet events.
Now, while she was sitting there doing nothing, waiting for Harry to come back, her laptop was up at the cottage. She could have been getting on with a bit of work since it would certainly beat twiddling her thumbs all day long. She still had a full battery. She could write her piece and then post it when they got back on-line. That would work. And if Harry complained, saying she shouldn't be thinking about her job while she was on a get-away with him, then she'd tell him to take a run and jump and remind him that he had left her, not the other way around. It was her birthday too. Probably the worst one ever.
The old lady was in the kitchen, cooking ‘tea'. Tea! She meant dinner, of course. Mrs Hock was asleep on the sofa since she was all shocked out and the children were upstairs in their room, doing homework. Or so they’d said. The old lady had told them to play a game of cards with Melanie while they were waiting for the men, but they'd wandered off and never came back. Gladys had offered her a cup of tea three times in the past hour. How much tea could a person drink? She sincerely hoped the woman had a strong bladder.
When Melanie found herself drumming her fingers on the arm of the chair, she thought That’s it. I’ve had enough. If she had to sit there any longer she’d go crazy.
She stood up and went into the kitchen. The closed door leading to outside loomed ahead of her. She just needed to get through it without someone complaining. As she crossed the room, the old lady looked up from the pot she was stirring. Melanie grabbed the door handle and turned it. Then she was free. At last.
The woman called from the doorway to the kitchen as Melanie made strides along the drive. “Oi, where are you going?”
She turned around as she kept walking. “I’m going back to the cottage. I won’t be long.”
Then she just kept going.
She reached the sea within twelve minutes. She was a good, brisk walker, despite Harry treating her like an ignorant city girl. The wind was coming in fast. The sun had died away and now a chill had settled in the air, creeping through the windbreaker Harry had bought her. When she got inside, she’d light the fire. That would be a nice surprise for him when he came back. They’d stay the night and then head back home tomorrow, instead of Monday. Then she’d never come back to Cornwall again. Ever. They can keep their sea air, and their beaches and their clotted cream, and most of all they can keep their damn birds.
She looked out over the sea to the horizon. How odd that the gulls were resting on the surf like that. As if they were rubber ducks in a bath, floating aimlessly. The noise of them was disturbing, especially after the high jinks they'd caused earlier in the village. Honestly, Melanie had her own suspicions about the whole matter. That the birds were mating, and they were all anxious about it. She thought it was a fair assumption. She'd watched programmes about survival and such like. When animals mated, they got all territorial, defensive. She remembered, David Attenborough, saying that. Or was that Richard? She always got the two mixed up.
She hugged her arms about her as she turned away from the sea. It was rough looking. Not the sort of sea you’d go frolicking in. The English Channel! Grey and gloomy she called it. The Med was more to her taste.
She walked over to the cottage. At least she didn’t need a key. She’d been put out when Mr Hock said they didn’t bother locking it. What if someone came along and stole her laptop or her stuff? The luggage was designer. Expensive. They’d just sell it on eBay for god’s sake. As it was, she’d hidden it under the bed before they’d left for their walk earlier.
She felt her stomach rumbling. She remembered they still hadn’t eaten. Harry would be starving too. What had Mrs Hock put in that box of groceries? she wondered, as she also wondered if there was any wine. It was her birthday after all.
She wrapped her fingers around the doorknob and turned it. The she pushed open the door and it creaked inwards.
She unzipped her jacket as she stepped inside.
Then she looked up and froze.
Inside the cottage, over every available surface, were birds of all sorts, shapes and sizes. They were watching her as the odd one squawked and pecked. Melanie gasped and took a step backwards, but her heel caught the edge of the door and it slammed closed.
That’s when the birds took flight, charging at her in a muddled furious frenzy.
Chapter 23
When Bill and Harry returned to the house, they took the cat with them. The children were delighted. It wasn’t a dog, but it was the next best thing, for the time being. Bill realised after they’d left that he hadn’t seen Arthur’s dog. He wondered briefly where it was.
Bill was exhausted. The same sort of tiredness he felt after a long day working the farm. As it was, it was only six o’clock, with still four hours before bed.
Seeing his friends like that…well, it was more than just a shock. The feeling of loss and horror and anger and downright shame had washed over him the way the waves washed over the sand. He couldn’t remember when he’d felt such devastation. The last time was when his father had died, but even then, it wasn’t as bad as seeing his friends in the state they were in.
Arthur and Bill had gone through school together. They'd grown into men, side by side married their women…taken meals together…got plain drunk. Now he was gone in the most brutal fashion and Bill hadn't been there to save him. The guilt he felt on that was overwhelming. And Nancy. The mess of her face had made his stomach churn. It still felt bad. He couldn’t imagine eating another thing in his lifetime. Each time his eyes went to look at something, her savaged appearance flashed upon him, making him want to squeeze his eyes shut and never open them again. Thank God Dolly had never seen her face. He thanked the heavens for that.
His poor Dolly had run. She’d climbed into Arthur’s pick-up and drove like a racing driver along the main road to home. When he thought of it, he imagined all sorts. What if she’d crashed? What if she’d met some birds of her own? If he lost Dolly, he could never live another day. That would be the end of it.
Before they went home, Bill and Harry had walked up the lane. Bill had taken Arthur's old shotgun with him since he knew where he kept it; between the linen in the cupboard in his bedroom. In front of Harry, Bill had made it look as if he was just searching for sheets, but mostly he wanted to see if Arthur's gun was there. It was.
Harry, he’d proven to be a good man since they’d met only a few hours before. He had gumption and Bill admired that. Especially for a city man. And an American. He couldn’t have predicted it, but then who could have predicted the events that were going to happen when the two of them came down for their holiday? Bill wondered for a minute if they’d want a refund, but the thought was soon pushed out of his head. He simply did
n’t care.
They found the man and his dog up the lane where Dolly said they were. Like Arthur and Nancy, the man's eyes had been taken, but the dog…well that was something a lot more horrifying and harder to comprehend. The birds had plucked out its innards. Taken them like they were going to build nests with guts instead of twigs. It didn't bear thinking about. He couldn't look at it anymore. He threw the sheet across its body before he checked the pockets of the man at its side. He found a wallet with ID that told him his name was George Pepper. He lived north of there, in the next village. There was no telling what he was doing around those parts. Poaching maybe? Bill couldn't tell. He put his wallet back in his pocket. Whoever came for his body would see it and contact the family. Bill had no means of phoning, so it was best left for now. He felt bad leaving him and his dog in the lane, but there was little he could do for them now. He covered him up, but before they left, Bill offered George Pepper’s gun to Harry. He looked at it as if he didn’t know what to do with it. Bill showed him. Now his new friend Harry Fear was equipped to deal with the birds and if God was his witness he’d kill every last one of them.
After he’d deposited the cat into the arms of the children, he went straight in to see Dolly. She was just getting up off the couch, no longer wanting rest. He went to her and put his arms around her weak form. She was small next to him. He kissed the top of her head where her hair was in array. She looked up as she clung to his waist. “Did you see them?” she asked, her voice softly quivering.
“Aye.”
“Was Nancy…?”
“Aye,” he said softly. “She’s gone.”
Her eyes closed. She was past crying. She was all teared out. “What did…”
Bill stroked her cheek. "Don't think about it anymore, love," he said. "I put them next to each other, as they would have wanted. Covered them up…don't worry."
She nodded. “And you saw the man and his dog?”
“Aye. I covered them up too. His name was George Pepper. I’ll go down tomorrow and report it.”
She nodded again. He held her as they walked from the sitting room into the kitchen. The smell of food was overwhelming. Gladys had been cooking.
“Sit yourselves down,” his mother said to Bill and Harry. “I’ve got some nice beef stew and dumplings.”
Then Harry, from the doorway said. “Where’s Melanie?”
Chapter 24
Harry went with Bill in the truck up to the cottage. When Bill’s mother said Melanie had left, but that she'd be back, chills had threaded through his body like zip wires. What the hell? Why would she go up there alone, after all, that had happened?
He looked at his watch. Just after six. The day was ending, while the night was coming on rapidly as they raced against time. They didn’t know how long they had, but they knew, without any doubt, they should be indoors when night fell. Anything could happen at night.
It had been a horrendous day. He’d complained about his life in the past, challenging every aspect, but never had he faced anything like the events that had gone on earlier. Harry swore when it was over, he’d never complain about another thing in his life again. He compared it to complaining about having a headache to a man who was blind. It just didn’t equate. A lot less than equal.
And what a moaner he’d been. No wonder his kids wouldn’t speak to him. He’d messed everything up. He’d caused chaos in his family in the same way the birds were causing chaos over the country. Maybe not to that scale. But it was still chaos. Maybe it took something like that to make him see sense. And man, what a lesson it had been!
He held a gun across his lap. A gun! Not even in the States had he owned a gun. In fact, he was all for gun control. The politicians sat on their damn arses while kids were getting shot in schools. He didn’t get it. Now, there he was with one of his own, ready to fire at anything that moved.
He willed Bill to go faster. He needed to get to Melanie. He had a feeling in his bones…He couldn’t think about it. If anything happened to her whilst she was with him, on vacation, for Christ sake, he would never forgive himself. No, this was the defining moment in Harry Fear’s life and he intended to overcome it and save the girl.
His thoughts had been with Ellen all morning. He didn’t know why. Maybe it was the strange events unfolding and for once he wasn’t with them, his family. He’d messed up his relationship with Ellen, well and truly. And he’d probably mess up the one with Mel. He was a loser. A damn loser.
The cottage appeared when they went over the brow of the hill. Earlier, he’d wondered why the farmer and his wife didn’t have a house with a sea view. But when he stood outside the cottage, he realised that the Hock’s 150 year old farmhouse was strategically tucked inside the valley to protect it from the high winds coming in from the Atlantic. It made sense then and he admonished himself for his city boy outlook on life.
Bill slammed on his brakes, whipping up the sand lying on the road next to the cottage. He pointed to the slanted roof, to a hole made by the birds, as big as a truck tyre. He remembered the birds in the attic of Arthur Reed’s house and those zip wire chills returned with a vengeance.
Melanie! Oh, God. He ran to the cottage door with Bill close on this tail. The gun he’d abandoned already, not knowing in his haste, nor his panic what to do with the thing.
He pushed the door, but it was blocked from the other side. He could hear the birds, frantic in their bid to murder all in their path. He put his shoulder up against it and as Bill joined him, they pushed, forcing that door open an inch, enough for him to put his hand inside and grab Melanie, lying on the floor. He tugged at her jacket, but the birds pecked at his bare hand. He snatched it away, then relentlessly, he darted his hand in and grabbed more of the windbreaker she was wearing. He called her name over and over, but the sound of the birds drowned out his voice as he and Bill forced open that door as much as they could as Melanie’s inert body blocked it. A few birds escaped, calm as you like, as if they hadn’t a care in the world.
He lashed out with his foot and tried to kick one, but as he missed, it simply waddled away, a dumb creature, ignorant of its ability to cause fear.
Harry finally pulled as he took the best grip he'd had yet. Her arm was slack like it was made of rubber and that it wouldn't be grabbing his hand back. He pulled as Bill pushed and finally, as he achieved a motion of dragging, he pulled her out of the cottage, away from those dastardly, murderous beasts.
Chapter 25
Ellen and the rest of the people were locked in the cellar. The ones who’d taken over, the men, had insisted upon it. ‘At least we’ve got plenty of food and drink,’ one of them had said when he locked the door from the inside and stood guard over it.
It was true. The cellar contained several fridges and freezers and crates of beer piled up against the wall. Through some heavy metal doors, was the refrigerated room that held the barrels and other items that needed cooling, crates of soft drinks and bottled beers. In a cage down the end, in the corner, the spirits were stored. Ellen had refused to give them the keys. It was bad enough being locked in there with twenty other people, without them getting drunk on top of it.
When one of them, Mark Shark, asked for a bottle of whiskey to calm his nerves, Ellen told him that she was unauthorised to open the cage.
“Unauthorised?” He laughed. “Do you have any idea what’s going on here, lady?”
She regarded him with cool composure.
“This is it,” he raged. “This is the end of the world. We can’t fight those birds. There are too many of them. We don’t stand a chance.”
“I can’t think that way,” she argued back. “I have children. I’m not about to let their future disintegrate for the sake of dumb birds. Besides, all of this could finish as quickly as it started.”
“Your optimism is astounding and misguided. You saw what happened today. Everyone out there didn’t stand a chance. The birds took them out better than any atomic bomb would. This is Armageddon, woman.”
So young! What about her own kids? Every time she thought of them alone in the house up on the Clifton Downs, she shivered with dreaded anticipation. Lord, she prayed they were all right. Please let them be all right.
Earlier, Mark Shark had restrained her when she demanded to be let out, to go find her children. He’d insisted she stayed with them, for her own good.
She’d fought, and she’d fought, but finally, it was the waitresses who had asked her to stay. “Please, Ellen. We won’t be able to cope without you.”
Frank and the other chefs were down in the cellar too. They had remained calm throughout, allowing the customers to take the lead. To Ellen, the idea of losing control to the public was abhorrent. The restaurant belonged to her family.
One of the chefs shouted "Quiet." He wore earphones, listening for news on the radio.
Everyone watched him as he took in the information and related it piece by piece. "It's everywhere…London hit badly… coastal towns suffering…people stranded…vehicles abandoned…Fires breaking out…emergency services overloaded…hospitals stretched to breaking point…
“Wait!” another voice shouted. He had an old battery-operated radio. Ellen recognised it from the kitchen. The chefs used it to play CDs on it mostly. She doubted the radio had been used for years. Now they could all hear the news coming through all the available stations.
