said.
âAnd about Mom, too?â
âYes,â he said.
Her gaze hung on him.
Sheâs special, Kathyâs ghost-voice spoke up in his head then. A special child.
âIâll only be a few more minutes,â he said, and eased the bathroom door closed with his toe.
9
Nineteen months earlier
Â
I t was one of the rare evenings he stayed late at the university grading papers. Walking across the quad, the night was a cold, wet soup. Late-winter snow swirled around the lampposts, weightless as dandelion fluff, and never touched the ground. He took the footpath to the parking lot, slowing in his progress when he noticed something small and dark flapping about on the path. He came within two feet of it and saw that it was a small brown bird. It was still alive, its twig-like feet scrambling for purchase on the stamped concrete. As David watched, one of its wings flared open and fluttered maniacally to no avail.
David crouched down and watched the bird die. It took less than a minute. By the time he stood, a chevron of geese was honking across the sky just above the treetops. He thought it odd that they were there in February. Didnât geese fly south in the winter?
He coughed into a fist as he continued along the footpath toward the parking lot. There were still a number of cars in the lot, even at this hour. His Bronco was parked at the far end of the lot, since heâd misplaced his faculty pass earlier that month and didnât want to risk being towed by parking in any of the faculty spots without it. The tow-truck drivers fished the campus parking lots day and night and were ruthless.
He was halfway across the lot to his car when something exploded off to his left. It was very close, the sound of its detonation causing him to drop his briefcase. He looked around but could not see what might have caused it. The lampposts were spaced too far apart, and it was too dark to make out any realâ
He caught movement out of the corner of his eye, a large object bulleting down from the sky at such an alarming speed, David drew his arms up to cover his head despite the fact that the object was crashing down several yards away. It struck the hood of a Volkswagen with a sickening solidity, rolled up over the windshield, then toppled to the asphalt. It took David only a second to realize what it was, but by that point, more and more had begun to rain from the sky, a mortar attack. Only instead of bombs, they were geese.
A car alarm went off. Windshields imploded. Most of the geese were killed upon impact, but a few of them survived, albeit mortally wounded, and their shrill cries were more like the agonizing shrieks of a child than any bird heâd ever heard. Some of them screamed just a few feet from him, their massive, twisted wings sliding cruelly along the pavement.
The whole thing lasted thirty seconds, maybe less. When it was over, the parking lot was a minefield of dead fowl, the occasional spastic jerk of a massive black wing, the incessant trilling of a chorus of car alarms.
David gathered up his briefcase and ran for the Bronco, thankful that heâd misplaced the parking pass, which had left his own vehicle, parked so far away, unscathed.
He felt the urge to call someone on the drive home, but who would that be? The police? The fire department? The goddamn ASPCA?
It was generally a thirty-minute commute home, but an accident on the beltway had knotted up traffic near Baltimore, and David found himself staring at a wall of taillights for over an hour. Rain began to fall. To make matters worse, someone thumped against his rear bumper, and David had to get out and examine the damage. There was only a faint white scuff on the Broncoâs rear bumper, but it was enough to cause him greater unease. He couldnât stop hearing the shriek of those birds, the terrible sounds they made as they smashed through windshields and caved in the hoods and roofs of those cars.
By the time he
âAnd about Mom, too?â
âYes,â he said.
Her gaze hung on him.
Sheâs special, Kathyâs ghost-voice spoke up in his head then. A special child.
âIâll only be a few more minutes,â he said, and eased the bathroom door closed with his toe.
9
Nineteen months earlier
Â
I t was one of the rare evenings he stayed late at the university grading papers. Walking across the quad, the night was a cold, wet soup. Late-winter snow swirled around the lampposts, weightless as dandelion fluff, and never touched the ground. He took the footpath to the parking lot, slowing in his progress when he noticed something small and dark flapping about on the path. He came within two feet of it and saw that it was a small brown bird. It was still alive, its twig-like feet scrambling for purchase on the stamped concrete. As David watched, one of its wings flared open and fluttered maniacally to no avail.
David crouched down and watched the bird die. It took less than a minute. By the time he stood, a chevron of geese was honking across the sky just above the treetops. He thought it odd that they were there in February. Didnât geese fly south in the winter?
He coughed into a fist as he continued along the footpath toward the parking lot. There were still a number of cars in the lot, even at this hour. His Bronco was parked at the far end of the lot, since heâd misplaced his faculty pass earlier that month and didnât want to risk being towed by parking in any of the faculty spots without it. The tow-truck drivers fished the campus parking lots day and night and were ruthless.
He was halfway across the lot to his car when something exploded off to his left. It was very close, the sound of its detonation causing him to drop his briefcase. He looked around but could not see what might have caused it. The lampposts were spaced too far apart, and it was too dark to make out any realâ
He caught movement out of the corner of his eye, a large object bulleting down from the sky at such an alarming speed, David drew his arms up to cover his head despite the fact that the object was crashing down several yards away. It struck the hood of a Volkswagen with a sickening solidity, rolled up over the windshield, then toppled to the asphalt. It took David only a second to realize what it was, but by that point, more and more had begun to rain from the sky, a mortar attack. Only instead of bombs, they were geese.
A car alarm went off. Windshields imploded. Most of the geese were killed upon impact, but a few of them survived, albeit mortally wounded, and their shrill cries were more like the agonizing shrieks of a child than any bird heâd ever heard. Some of them screamed just a few feet from him, their massive, twisted wings sliding cruelly along the pavement.
The whole thing lasted thirty seconds, maybe less. When it was over, the parking lot was a minefield of dead fowl, the occasional spastic jerk of a massive black wing, the incessant trilling of a chorus of car alarms.
David gathered up his briefcase and ran for the Bronco, thankful that heâd misplaced the parking pass, which had left his own vehicle, parked so far away, unscathed.
He felt the urge to call someone on the drive home, but who would that be? The police? The fire department? The goddamn ASPCA?
It was generally a thirty-minute commute home, but an accident on the beltway had knotted up traffic near Baltimore, and David found himself staring at a wall of taillights for over an hour. Rain began to fall. To make matters worse, someone thumped against his rear bumper, and David had to get out and examine the damage. There was only a faint white scuff on the Broncoâs rear bumper, but it was enough to cause him greater unease. He couldnât stop hearing the shriek of those birds, the terrible sounds they made as they smashed through windshields and caved in the hoods and roofs of those cars.
By the time he
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