Homing Read Free Page B

was a small dish holding two wrapped biscuits. Digestives – the kind that Ray enjoyed with his tea. She pulled the cellophane off one, but her stomach rejected the thought as soon as she got a whiff of its mealy sweetness. It broke in her fingers, and once there were crumbs in her hand it was only natural to throw them to the carpet for the birds.
    In an instant the boldest bird had hopped down from the minibar, legs outstretched and wings braking. The others piled in. They were shades of the same grey, birds and carpet, but the jostling animals’ colour was alive and various. Wings fanned and snaky heads jabbed at the crumbs. She broke up the second biscuit.
    An extravagant thought came to her: room service. The phone was to hand, right next to the bed. She ordered toast, coffee, aspirin. More toast.
    When the knock came, she went to the door and opened it just a crack to take the tray, ignoring the waiter’s knowing smile. As soon as he was definitely gone, she poked a hand out again to hang up the DO NOT DISTURB sign.
    Crumbs on the carpet, on the credenza, on top of the TV cabinet, at the foot of the bed. Nona poured herself a strong coffee and settled back against the pillows to watch.
    More birds hustled in through the window, shouldering each other, flapping and squabbling. Their claws scraped and ticked excitedly on the veneer cabinets, snagged in the bedspread. Every now and then one lofted into the air, wings clapping, before climbing back down into the skirmish. The carpet seethed. Once again, Nona was the still point in a moving scene. Her eyes grew heavy. There was a dusty, sweet smell of feathers and bird shit in the room, and a restful coo and rustle. She drowsed.
    She dreamt she was walking in the hotel, down a long gold corridor, looking for a way through the building. A flight path. But there were no exits here, no clear routes. The birds were with her and they were trapped, battering up against glazed windows, winging down corridors into dead ends, tangling in elevator cables. She pushed at the walls with her hands, searching for secret doorways; but the hotel could not be unbuilt.
    She woke and dozed, woke and dozed, drinking more water and using the bathroom. The birds were dozing too, perched on towel rack and headboard. She wanted to sleep with them for ever, suspended three storeys in the air.
    It was late afternoon when she finally rose. The pigeons were gone, leaving only their feathers and the blots of their droppings.
    Already she could see that the room – despite the soiling, the smell, the clothes on the floor – was shrugging off this brief habitation. When the carpet shook its nylon pelt, all trace of living things would be repelled. Soon the room would be dreaming again in its pristine blankness, thoughtless, faithless, without memory. Readying its cool, promiscuous surfaces for the next encounter.
    She dressed quickly, packed her few things, put out a large tip for the cleaning lady and left the key in the door. Back down the corridor, into the elevator, across the carpeted entrance hall and out, avoiding the eyes of the red-jacket boys and girls.
    Then down the long avenue of palms, rustling and stirring, with their own wild tribes of birds lodged like seeds in the cracks between the fronds. The grounds did not seem so enormous to her now. In every direction – beyond the flickering mesh of the tennis-court fence, past the rose garden – there was a wedge of pink wall blocking the line of sight. She left through the gates and walked the long way round, back home. The sun was low.
    She was a block away when she heard the whistling. High and looping – not the birdman’s, but still familiar. Funny, that you could recognise the voice in a whistle.
    When she turned the last corner, Ray was out in the alley, head cocked to the sky, seed in his outstretched palm.
    “Home early,” he said.
    She put down her bag. “Missed you, didn’t I?”
    “They didn’t pitch up this morning.”