pg.

The Birds
Randall wright

On November the eighth, the fog-filled wind shattered across the windshield as I locked my foot on
the gas pedal to maintain a steady seven miles per hour over the speed limit. My squinting eyes rapidly
glancing back and forth from the road to the speedometer; anything to distract my brain from turning my
head to the right ever-so slightly to see her in the passenger seat looking at me. I knew she was and I knew
that when her and I came back from the cabin in Bodega Bay that we would no longer be together. She
knew it too but what better way to escape from everything just one last time? Other than the wind, the drive
up was mostly silent and my car stereo decided to make things more grievous when it stopped working a
few days before we left. Do you have the pills? I asked her without making eye contact while pretending to
be obsessively focused on the road. Yea, they're in my bag she mumbled back with such a quiet tone that
made her words fly gently across the inside of the car to paint a muted veneer on the side of my face.
The four hour drive seemed far beyond infinity and I am certain that somewhere in an alternate
universe, we are still driving in silence, destination: forever. We made it to the cabin and I was more than
relieved to get in there. Come on Evey, let's do this. I said to her as I was walking towards the cabin door,
hoping my voice would make a U-turn from my mouth to the ears hanging on her head that was still sitting
atop of her body in the car.
The Cabin was themed after the Movie The Birds that was filmed in Bodega Bay, directed by
Alfred Hitchcock. I hadn't seen the movie before getting there and neither did she. Heck, I didn't even know
what the movie was about, I just called the company that was offering cabins and they had a few available
so I went with the one that sounded the most enthralling.
I opened the cabin door, stood beneath its frame, took a deep breathe and filled my lungs up
completely with the atmosphere of what sentimentally felt like this place was the typical "cabin in the woods"
scary movie setting. Every square foot had some kind of bird posing for the cabins guests; wooden birds,
plastic birds, actual stuffed birds with missing feathers and eye balls. Before I could keep looking at all the
fake birds anymore disturbing as they were, I stared into the nestly cabin to lay my eyes on an old grand
piano and rushed over to it. Have you ever heard Clair de lune by Claude Debussy? I asked Evey as I

pg.2

noticed that she had made it to the doorway of the cabin. Make yourself at home. I calmly assured her
while I started playing the classical masterpiece that beautifully rattled throughout the walls of the creepy
bird cabin that I gave anything to ignore.
Evey leaped from the doorway and took flight straight up the stairs and into the master bedroom as I
dove on top of the living room couch and landed on my back as I heard a door upstairs slam and lock.
Looking up at the ceiling, I twirled my eyes around at all the fake birds until my pupils constricted and came
to a jolting stop at a shelf by the television. There was a DVD leaning on a stuffed crow perched on the shelf.
I walked up to the DVD, grabbed it and wiped the dust off of the cover when I realized what it was. Hey
Evey! I subtly shouted just enough for my voice to seep up through the ceiling and into the master bedroom.
Do you want to watch a movie with me? A simple No echoed back from my movie offer. It seemed she
wasnt going to leave that master bedroom anytime soon and I was glad because she had a job to do
anyway.
Half way through the movie, I became extremely uninterested by it and flipped it off, literally, I
flipped it off with my middle finger, took it out of the DVD player and placed it back onto the shelf to hopefully
rot away, regretting that I had even wiped the dust off its cover.
I went to the backyard to smoke a cigarette. There was no fence for the yard because there was
nothing in sight to keep the cabin fenced in from. No Neighbors, no nothing. We were literally in the middle
of nowhere until you listen closely and could hear the waves from the ocean in the far off distance. I smiled.
Nothing could have been more perfect for Evey here. The sun fell and the night rose as I flicked my cigarette
into the dying day and walked inside to dive back on the couch where I stared at all the fake birds again until
I drifted off and fell asleep.
Screech! I flung up out of the couch from my sleep faster than I heard such a piercing animal noise
which sounded like a bird inside of the cabin. That couldn't be possible but it would be extremely ironic,
given the fact that there are hundreds of fake birds in here and that the cabin has such a name. I looked
around the living room trying to prove my ears wrong until I realized that when I smoked that cigarette, I had
left the back door wide open. I immediately sprinted upstairs to see if Evey was okay and tried to push the
door open but it was locked. Evey! Are you okay?
Yea im fine, just sitting in the bathroom. she said with a very breathy pitch that almost audibly appeared
like she was in mid-cry. Why, what's wrong? she asked with concern.
Nothing, everything's fine Evey. Just do what you have to do and let me know when you're done,
okay? My first priority was keeping her safe both physically and most importantly, psychologically, so the
last thing I would want to do is tell her there's a bird inside of the house.

pg.3

I carefully walked downstairs when I saw that there was a fake stuffed crow laying on the floor next
to the couch in the living room. I wasn't sure if it was the wind coming in from the open door that knocked it
off the shelf or what but I knew that I had to close that door as soon as possible. I made a beeline to the
back door when I heard something that sounded exactly like feathered wings flapping violently around the
corner and sure enough, when I looked back, there was a massive crow flying straight towards the stuffed
crow on the ground. I pounced my back against the wall next to the open door. Hoping that I was some kind
of wall chameleon and that the crow wouldn't see me, I froze and watched it land in front of the fake crow.
This bird was larger than normal birds that I've seen and there were things very off about it. I studied it closer
as I saw it jumping in circles around the fake crow. I could see this bird had blood dripping from random
parts of its body onto the floor and it had what looked like to be white, bubbly saliva foaming out of its beak. I
almost moved rapidly in attempt to scare the bird off so that it would fly out of the open door when it made
an even louder, more terrifying screeching sound. It stopped jumping around in circles, looked down at the
fake crow and started pecking viciously at it until the stuffing and feathers became completely obliterated.
The crow then flung itself up in the air and into the kitchen, landed on top of the landline telephone and
ripped the cable plug in half with its beak, almost assuring me that I wouldn't be able to notify anyone
outside of the cabin that there is some kind of poisoned, deranged bird trying to kill me.
The crow, with its foaming face, sharply turned its head sideways to look at me with its one red eye
and gave out another deathly screech. It started flapping its blood-filled feathered wings and made a path
towards me so fast that I had no time to react. The bird plummeted me on to the floor as I grabbed its head
with one hand and one of its wings with the other hand. I squeezed its head with all of my strength until I
heard and felt its skull crack into pieces underneath its feathery scalp. I grabbed its other wing and pulled
both of the bird's wings as far apart as I could until they both ripped apart from its body, pouring blood and
guts all over me. I could hear Eveys voice melt through the floorboards of the ceiling. Its done.
I threw the crow down onto the ground as I saw that an egg rolled out of its body. The Crow was
somehow inhabiting one of its babies. I picked the egg up and just as I did so, it started to crack. I
immediately ran outside, cupping it in my hands as it gave birth and flung itself out of my palms. I watched it
flail away through the infinite yard until the night drenched it's body and the sound of its movements became
soaked by the oceans waves.
An hour later, Evey had come downstairs ready to leave and made one request before doing so. She picked
up the landline telephone and called her mom to tell her everything was okay. And then we left.
I could feel the blood splatters from the bird all over the right side of my face, so much so, that I
would feel it accumulating into little droplets and dripping down my neck, soaking into the collar of my white
shirt but when I looked into the rear-view mirror, my face was clean. There was no blood at all. You okay?
she asked looking down at herself, interrupting me staring at my confused reflection while her feet were
kicked up on the dashboard with both of her hands cupping her flat stomach.

pg.4

In the sense that she was not looking at me when she asked if I was okay, it made me wonder if she actually
wanted to know if I was really okay or if she was just asking so that I would ask her the same question after
my response to her question. On top of that, it wasn't like I was the one going through all that pain, so why
would she even ask me that?
Yea, you? I replied, looking over at her. And just as she went to respond, Clair De Lune started playing on
the radio and overpowered Eveys voice to where it had faded deep into the sheet of the piano music.