Three weeks ago, I woke up to the landline ringing. It was never a good sign. It either meant someone had died or some once met relative got engaged. That time it was a nurse. My grandmother had had a fall. My parents moved to the south of France two years prior and I had kept the family house. One uncle moved to Canada, the other was a heroin addict. It was on my 24 year old shoulders to look after their 87 year old mother, which is why she’s in a retirement home. I threw on a bathrobe, got in my beaten ‘03 golf and drove as fast I could to Willow View retirement Village. The roads were practically empty at half four. Apart from two Crows, picking at a fresh chunk of roadkill. I wasn’t looking to see what it was. Could’ve been a ham sandwich for all I knew. I still have feathers stuck in my car grill from that day. The bird gunk splattered on my bumper got a raised eyebrow from a paraplegic who had been wheeled outside to see the sun rise.
My grandmother ended up being fine, despite cracking her head on a marble counter corner. She put it down to all the milk she drinks. I work, kind of, for the only mechanics around, so I cleaned my car myself. No damage other than a slight dent. Another to add to my collection. Two weeks ago, I first noticed my new… friend. I was welding a fender outside the garage. Some guy drove into a lamp post, happens all the time. I saw a Crow perched on the gutter of the house next to us. The funny little guy was staring right at me. I noticed it had a single white feather on its left wing. I thought about it for a second, then went back to work. I clocked out an hour later. The next day I was greeted by Gerry, the one other apprentice at the Shop. The first thing he asked me, without a hello, was if I saw a little Crow around the garage yesterday. It almost slipped my mind but I told him I had. Gerry laughed and went off to glue his hand to a wrench again or whatever he does. Weirdo. I saw the Crow again that day. It was perched on a metal “Grease monkeys are we” poster inside the Garage. It just stood there and watched me. I must have stopped working as I stared back at it because Doc, the guy who owns the Garage, ergo my boss, slapped me around the back of the head and told me to get back to it. Bastard. Doc was around fifty, grey neck beard and oil stained Chicago Bulls baseball cap. He lurked around the garage for most of the day. He never did any manual work, he just greeted the people who pull up and bullshits them out of five hundred dollars when all they needed was a new spark plug. He threw an apple core at the Crow as he walked past it. It missed and the bird didn’t budge from its perch.
I was on the other side of the lot when I heard a scream. Begrudgingly I walked over to the garage to see what happened. I knew it was Gerry who had screamed, I recognised from the last time he dropped a headlight on his foot. Gerry stood over Doc, his face white as winter. Doc lay in a pool of motor oil and blood. I gagged a bit but felt no remorse. I crouched down beside him and rolled him over to check his breath, not sure which side of the neck a pulse was supposed to be. He had a hex bolt in his forehead. Pretty dead as far as I could tell. I looked up at the bird for some reason. It was gone. So was a hex bolt from the grease monkey poster.
They put it down as an accident. Fair enough I suppose. Until the will was sorted, and the garage went to a family member of his, I was on paid leave. Gerry told me it was probably gonna be his brother taking over the place. I didn’t care so long as the apprenticeship transfer went smoothly. Since I had some time on my hands for the next few weeks I took up painting. I remember being good at it at school, I had nothing better to do anyway. I started with the view from my kitchen. The woods of Harnett County. And then I saw it again. A little Crow, perched on a tree, staring at me. At first I didn’t realise it was THE Crow, since its identifying white feather was partially covered in… motor oil? It was a good painting in the end. I signed it ‘Bob Ross’ as a joke. I decided to leave some seeds out for my new friend. I saw him around the next few days. Every time a new perch. He just stood there, watching. I decided to name him Crowley. Creative, I know. Six days ago I woke up to the sound of a tap tapping on my window. I put it down to a tree branch in the breeze. The next morning I opened the curtains and saw that my window was covered in scratch marks. I wasn’t financially stable enough to care about cosmetic damage to a window, so I added it to a list of things for future me to sort out. Later that day I saw him. Crowley. He was in my kitchen. I thought of the disease he could be carrying and gagged. I grabbed a broom and shooed him out a window like a pest. That’s all he was, a pest.
I didn’t hear any scratching that night, despite the wind being stronger than it was yesterday. I went downstairs at three to get something to drink. There was a dead rat on the counter. I jumped back when I saw it like it was going to attack me. Blood was dripping out and running down the cupboard. I almost threw up as I picked it up by the tail and flung it out the window. I cleaned up, had a shower and went back to bed. For the entire night all I heard was squawking.
The next morning I found the intestines of the rat on the back door step. The way they lay… it’d didn’t feel like they had just been strewn across the step. I saw Crowley perched on a tree in my garden. His beak still red with rat blood. Ever staring. I wonder what he was thinking. What he knew. I put some rat poison in his seed bowl. I thought that might do something. It didn’t. I watched from my window as he inspected the grain before flying away, having not touched it I brought a cat later that day. I didn’t even bother naming it. I just hoped it’d kill the bird.
The next day the cat was dead. I found the bird seed I had poisoned in its food bowl. I went inside, took my Glock 19 from my bedside cabinet and shot at Crowley. He flew away. I tried relaxing after that. I did everything Google told me to do. I tried some meditation, lit a cinnamon Yankee candle and took some deep breaths. It helped actually. After unwinding I got in my car and drove into town. I didn’t trust the food left in my kitchen. I came to realise I was being dumb. Was I really scared of a bird? A fucking bird. What could a bird possibly do to hurt me?
When I came home my house was on fire. I just kneeled down in the driveway and started crying. I was born in that house. I’ve lived there every day of my life. Crowley perched on his favourite branch of the oak in my garden, before it too went a blaze. Gradually, neighbours and fire fighters flocked to the area. They couldn’t do anything to help. Their blank words of remorse meant nothing. I just got back in my car and started the drive back to town. From there… I’d get a bus into Raleigh, stay with a friend for a few nights. From there, it was anyone’s guess. I’ve never even thought about not having a house. My parents always told me it was a guarantee since I was a kid. On the drive there I saw him. Crowley, I’m sure of it. Standing in the road pecking at something. I swerved into the other lane to run him over. Right into the path of a freighter.
I woke up this morning, in hospital. I’m now a double amputee, right below the knees. Most of my body is in a cast. It’s taken me nine hours to type this out with just my right hand. When I started typing, Crowley was at my window. Now he’s perched on the table next to me. I can’t do anything. I can’t move. I can’t make a sound. All I can do is watch him peck at my IV drip.