Ugly Duckling
In the Spring of 1993 the crows swooped down each night and stole away one of her babies. Anna awoke every morning to their cries: shrill and dark, somehow unnatural, as though not quite of this world. She walked down to the river and saw the ducklings huddled in the drizzle behind their mother: twelve, then eleven, then ten... every morning until only three remained. Anna watched the mother and her ever-decreasing brood as she moved purposefully along the bank, and her innocent charges stumbled along behind her, as if resigned to the inevitable. And from the trees all around the black devils watched her, marked her out.
One morning, alone, as her father slept amidst the haze of stale cigarette smoke and spilled beer, Anna slipped barefoot onto the damp grass and across the green and into the stream. The water, not too cold, ran tiny grains of sand and pebble over her feet and between her toes, and she knelt and watched the now-diminutive family just feet away as they clustered by the bridge. As the mother pulled away first one then two of her children tumbled obediently into the water behind, and on impulse Anna reached out and grabbed the third. It made no attempt to escape and she cupped it in her hands. Its warm, soft body trembled a little and it looked at her with unblinking eyes, docile against her young fingers, and she looked at it, and love and wonderment all at once rushed through her. She set it down on the grass close to its family, and it fell into the stream and hurried after them.
Later that day, at a loose end and surplus to requirements as the pub buzzed and brimmed over with Saturday walkers, Anna wandered again along the stream and away from the first picnickers of the year, failing to notice her amidst their cherry tomatoes and Tupperware. Stopping on the other side of the bridge, out of the corner of her eye she saw a bundle of browny-yellow fluff caught behind a rock in the current. Bending down she saw the duckling, its neck twisted at an angle, its eye still open, still staring. She scooped it up and stroked it and cradled it and frantically wracked her brains for what one should do, but this time it didn’t tremble. It lay motionless, still unblinking. And then there were two.
It was her fault, her mother said matter-of-factly on the telephone that night. This was nature, you see. She had taken it away from its mother, and in so doing its mother had rejected it. Anna had given it a different smell and she had failed to recognise it as her own, leaving it to the mercy of the water, and it had been too young, too innocent, to survive. Anna had taken the baby away, and, parted from its mother, the baby had died. Anna had killed a baby. That night, the crows cackled louder than ever above the crashes and singing from downstairs. They gathered in hoards, greater and more malevolent than ever, this creatures straight out of a Grimm fairytale, and they shrieked and cawed and thanked Anna for their gift, for saving them a task that day. And they marked her out.
Thirty years on Anna struggled to feel again. She knew that somewhere, deep below the surface, there were good memories, but she couldn’t remember how to find them, or what to do with them once she did. A dim recollection in the back of her mind told her there had been happy times, somewhere, long ago, but they were buried under layer upon layer of pain and sadness, like the myriad deposits of sedimentary rocks, forming, changing over time, covering over one level and starting again, coating hurt over hurt, despair over despair, until the bottom layers were so crushed and so beaten by the waves that they became unrecognisable. In the dimming light of the day life became merely an exercise in the passage of time, of filling the hours as best she could. In the darkest, quietest hours of the night glints of reminiscence plagued her, half-remembered thoughts and feelings fought for prominence in her half-conscious mind, but never the positive ones. As time wore on the dreams became more vivid, the crows louder and more prominent. They gathered in ever-increasing numbers and their discordant chorus became stronger as Anna’s efforts at rational thought grew weaker, until she awoke fighting them away as their beaks and claws dug deep into her skin. One morning she rinsed the dried blood from her hand where she had scratched the skin away, then off her ankles, them her arms and legs, then her face. Her lips bled as they ripped away flesh as she dreamed, until one night she ran.
On a late-Autumn night in 2013 the crows swooped, their threats easily distinguishable amidst the coos of the pigeons and the cries of the seagulls. On Hungerford Bridge she looked down at the water rushing by, and she saw the deadly current whip up debris far beneath, and as the devils swooped at the rallying cry of their master she tumbled obediently into the water, while all the while, they watched her.
One morning, alone, as her father slept amidst the haze of stale cigarette smoke and spilled beer, Anna slipped barefoot onto the damp grass and across the green and into the stream. The water, not too cold, ran tiny grains of sand and pebble over her feet and between her toes, and she knelt and watched the now-diminutive family just feet away as they clustered by the bridge. As the mother pulled away first one then two of her children tumbled obediently into the water behind, and on impulse Anna reached out and grabbed the third. It made no attempt to escape and she cupped it in her hands. Its warm, soft body trembled a little and it looked at her with unblinking eyes, docile against her young fingers, and she looked at it, and love and wonderment all at once rushed through her. She set it down on the grass close to its family, and it fell into the stream and hurried after them.
Later that day, at a loose end and surplus to requirements as the pub buzzed and brimmed over with Saturday walkers, Anna wandered again along the stream and away from the first picnickers of the year, failing to notice her amidst their cherry tomatoes and Tupperware. Stopping on the other side of the bridge, out of the corner of her eye she saw a bundle of browny-yellow fluff caught behind a rock in the current. Bending down she saw the duckling, its neck twisted at an angle, its eye still open, still staring. She scooped it up and stroked it and cradled it and frantically wracked her brains for what one should do, but this time it didn’t tremble. It lay motionless, still unblinking. And then there were two.
It was her fault, her mother said matter-of-factly on the telephone that night. This was nature, you see. She had taken it away from its mother, and in so doing its mother had rejected it. Anna had given it a different smell and she had failed to recognise it as her own, leaving it to the mercy of the water, and it had been too young, too innocent, to survive. Anna had taken the baby away, and, parted from its mother, the baby had died. Anna had killed a baby. That night, the crows cackled louder than ever above the crashes and singing from downstairs. They gathered in hoards, greater and more malevolent than ever, this creatures straight out of a Grimm fairytale, and they shrieked and cawed and thanked Anna for their gift, for saving them a task that day. And they marked her out.
Thirty years on Anna struggled to feel again. She knew that somewhere, deep below the surface, there were good memories, but she couldn’t remember how to find them, or what to do with them once she did. A dim recollection in the back of her mind told her there had been happy times, somewhere, long ago, but they were buried under layer upon layer of pain and sadness, like the myriad deposits of sedimentary rocks, forming, changing over time, covering over one level and starting again, coating hurt over hurt, despair over despair, until the bottom layers were so crushed and so beaten by the waves that they became unrecognisable. In the dimming light of the day life became merely an exercise in the passage of time, of filling the hours as best she could. In the darkest, quietest hours of the night glints of reminiscence plagued her, half-remembered thoughts and feelings fought for prominence in her half-conscious mind, but never the positive ones. As time wore on the dreams became more vivid, the crows louder and more prominent. They gathered in ever-increasing numbers and their discordant chorus became stronger as Anna’s efforts at rational thought grew weaker, until she awoke fighting them away as their beaks and claws dug deep into her skin. One morning she rinsed the dried blood from her hand where she had scratched the skin away, then off her ankles, them her arms and legs, then her face. Her lips bled as they ripped away flesh as she dreamed, until one night she ran.
On a late-Autumn night in 2013 the crows swooped, their threats easily distinguishable amidst the coos of the pigeons and the cries of the seagulls. On Hungerford Bridge she looked down at the water rushing by, and she saw the deadly current whip up debris far beneath, and as the devils swooped at the rallying cry of their master she tumbled obediently into the water, while all the while, they watched her.
posted by RLS at 3:31 pm
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