Murmurations
by David A. Gray
Eric counted the maggots devouring the rat, using the same technique his mother had taught him in order to tally starlings above the fields at dusk. First, imagine a small square on an edge of the murmuration. Quickly estimate the number of birds enclosed. Now fix that square in your mind, and overlay it on the larger picture, guessing how many times it might fit.
The starlings had numbered in their thousands, then. The evening air had pulsed with high cries and a stuttering of wings as clouds of sharp silhouettes expanded and contracted. Eric had read recently that the little birds were in decline, that the skies back in Scotland now belonged to gulls on chevauchees from the coast.
But where the starlings had been a billowing three-dimensional puzzle, adding complexity to the count, the maggots were a slow seething coating atop the lumpy gristle of the rat. Eleven seemed about right. Eleven times twelve, equaled 132.
One hundred and thirty-two maggots the color of old ivory. No, one hundred thirty-two. Eric’s son had chastised the old man for his extra “and” when they’d last talked a month and three days ago, had seemingly forgotten that Skype would show the irritation that passed quickly across his face.
“How long have you been in America, dad?” he had asked, shaking his head in exasperation.
Eric had started to defend his stubborn grammar with as much good grace as he could muster.
“Hold on a minute, son,” he began, only to be interrupted by a chorus of children mocking their grandfather with loving casual cruelty.
“Hawd awn a minnit!” they had shrieked in crude imitation of his Scottish accent. “Hawd awn jist a wee minnit, son!”
The starlings had numbered in their thousands, then. The evening air had pulsed with high cries and a stuttering of wings as clouds of sharp silhouettes expanded and contracted. Eric had read recently that the little birds were in decline, that the skies back in Scotland now belonged to gulls on chevauchees from the coast.
But where the starlings had been a billowing three-dimensional puzzle, adding complexity to the count, the maggots were a slow seething coating atop the lumpy gristle of the rat. Eleven seemed about right. Eleven times twelve, equaled 132.
One hundred and thirty-two maggots the color of old ivory. No, one hundred thirty-two. Eric’s son had chastised the old man for his extra “and” when they’d last talked a month and three days ago, had seemingly forgotten that Skype would show the irritation that passed quickly across his face.
“How long have you been in America, dad?” he had asked, shaking his head in exasperation.
Eric had started to defend his stubborn grammar with as much good grace as he could muster.
“Hold on a minute, son,” he began, only to be interrupted by a chorus of children mocking their grandfather with loving casual cruelty.
“Hawd awn a minnit!” they had shrieked in crude imitation of his Scottish accent. “Hawd awn jist a wee minnit, son!”
Eric had pretended to laugh as his daughter-in-law ducked past with an apologetic half smile, to shush the unkind chorus.
The maggots’ feast was coming to an end, Eric saw as he peered down to the subway tracks from the platform’s edge. The tracks had been recently cleaned, wiping away the drifts of dropped and aimed trash. The bottom of the channel was a rich brown. Was it rock? Or painted and smoothed concrete? Eric felt a momentary and overpowering desperation that it be soil, packed hard and deprived of sunlight but alive, if sleeping.
Maybe his son was right. Maybe Eric’s mind was starting to wander. “Wander,” with a carefully pronounced capital W and a judgmental pause after, to let the suggestion take root. Such a lovely word to describe such a horrid decline. To be young and to wander was to embark on a brave adventure. To be old and Wander was to be shuffled into senility with fake smiles and childlike words of comfort.
The rat was little more than a writhing outline, except for the long cataract-colored tail, which was untouched. Eric briefly wondered what exact question he might type into his elderly computer to elicit a sensible answer to that mystery.
Most of the maggots were content to squirm in their tacky dessert. But some explorers were inching away in both directions, and to the sides. Those were, Eric noted, the larger maggots. One, seemingly intent on climbing up toward the electrified third rail, kept rolling back, before trying again.
A press of warm air and a distant light heralded a train’s approach. The fastest maggot was positively sprinting towards the source of the breeze. Eric estimated that it was moving at a speed of an inch per second, which made for a pace of five feet a minute, therefore 300 feet an hour. Did rats eat maggots, he wondered? Were the maggots accustomed to the regular howling wind? Would the pioneer survive long enough to become a fly? Then what?
Eric imagined a person-shaped outline down there, pictured the glee with which the maggots would greet their bounty before it and they were whisked away, and the stragglers and stains sprayed with bleach.
The maggots’ feast was coming to an end, Eric saw as he peered down to the subway tracks from the platform’s edge. The tracks had been recently cleaned, wiping away the drifts of dropped and aimed trash. The bottom of the channel was a rich brown. Was it rock? Or painted and smoothed concrete? Eric felt a momentary and overpowering desperation that it be soil, packed hard and deprived of sunlight but alive, if sleeping.
Maybe his son was right. Maybe Eric’s mind was starting to wander. “Wander,” with a carefully pronounced capital W and a judgmental pause after, to let the suggestion take root. Such a lovely word to describe such a horrid decline. To be young and to wander was to embark on a brave adventure. To be old and Wander was to be shuffled into senility with fake smiles and childlike words of comfort.
The rat was little more than a writhing outline, except for the long cataract-colored tail, which was untouched. Eric briefly wondered what exact question he might type into his elderly computer to elicit a sensible answer to that mystery.
Most of the maggots were content to squirm in their tacky dessert. But some explorers were inching away in both directions, and to the sides. Those were, Eric noted, the larger maggots. One, seemingly intent on climbing up toward the electrified third rail, kept rolling back, before trying again.
A press of warm air and a distant light heralded a train’s approach. The fastest maggot was positively sprinting towards the source of the breeze. Eric estimated that it was moving at a speed of an inch per second, which made for a pace of five feet a minute, therefore 300 feet an hour. Did rats eat maggots, he wondered? Were the maggots accustomed to the regular howling wind? Would the pioneer survive long enough to become a fly? Then what?
Eric imagined a person-shaped outline down there, pictured the glee with which the maggots would greet their bounty before it and they were whisked away, and the stragglers and stains sprayed with bleach.
A hoarse cry echoed off the station’s sooty tiles, was distorted by tiny stalactites and obsolete cables hanging like plastic vines. Eric turned to see a ragged man with a bushy beard running more or less toward him.
The man was young and filthy and barefoot. He had started his sprint at other side of the platform, and was angling across the widest part, waving his arms. His long black coat was tattered like mangy feathers, flapping out to the sides and behind as he gained speed. There were little silver buttons on the coat, Eric saw, that caught the lights and glittered.
Eric estimated that it would take the man fifteen to twenty steps to cross the platform, at which point he would be running as fast a regular person could – around sixteen miles an hour. His course would be irreversible soon and would bring him on an intercept with the front of the train, which was in the station, and decelerating. At that point the train would be moving only a little faster in the opposite direction. Assuming the howling man was intent on collision, the closing speed would be a little over thirty miles per hour. Impact would be on the metal and glass front of the first car. Which would surely be fatal, if you added the subsequent rebound down on to the tracks ahead of the train.
An estimated five steps remaining, and the only sounds were screeching of the braking train, the rasping yelling of the man, and the slap of bare feet on cold stone.
At the last moment the runner veered a little, possibly correcting his course, and clipped Eric, spinning the old man around and causing him to tumble to the floor. Away from the tracks, at least.
Eric did not see the moment the man hit the train, but he heard it. The sound reminded him of the bonnet of their first car slamming, hard, and his dad climbing back into the old Austin Princess, rubbing his purple hands in front of the little dash heater as the wipers failed to clear freezing slush from the windscreen. Windshield. Hawd awn a minnit, old man.
“Your tights make a fine fan belt, Agnes,” his dad had said, grinning at Eric’s mum in appreciation and something more. Eric had laughed along, knowing he was missing something but unconcerned.
Eric lay on his back for a bit, feeling the cold of the floor through his coat, admiring the craftsmanship that lay under the grease-blurred ceiling tiles. After what might have been a second, or possibly a minute, a knot of chittering passersby lifted him to his feet and brushed him off.
“Here, Grandpa, you lost a button,” a woman with a cheerful knitted hat said, pressing something into Eric’s hand. The old man saw a tiny silver star in his palm, trailing a fine black thread.
The man was young and filthy and barefoot. He had started his sprint at other side of the platform, and was angling across the widest part, waving his arms. His long black coat was tattered like mangy feathers, flapping out to the sides and behind as he gained speed. There were little silver buttons on the coat, Eric saw, that caught the lights and glittered.
Eric estimated that it would take the man fifteen to twenty steps to cross the platform, at which point he would be running as fast a regular person could – around sixteen miles an hour. His course would be irreversible soon and would bring him on an intercept with the front of the train, which was in the station, and decelerating. At that point the train would be moving only a little faster in the opposite direction. Assuming the howling man was intent on collision, the closing speed would be a little over thirty miles per hour. Impact would be on the metal and glass front of the first car. Which would surely be fatal, if you added the subsequent rebound down on to the tracks ahead of the train.
An estimated five steps remaining, and the only sounds were screeching of the braking train, the rasping yelling of the man, and the slap of bare feet on cold stone.
At the last moment the runner veered a little, possibly correcting his course, and clipped Eric, spinning the old man around and causing him to tumble to the floor. Away from the tracks, at least.
Eric did not see the moment the man hit the train, but he heard it. The sound reminded him of the bonnet of their first car slamming, hard, and his dad climbing back into the old Austin Princess, rubbing his purple hands in front of the little dash heater as the wipers failed to clear freezing slush from the windscreen. Windshield. Hawd awn a minnit, old man.
“Your tights make a fine fan belt, Agnes,” his dad had said, grinning at Eric’s mum in appreciation and something more. Eric had laughed along, knowing he was missing something but unconcerned.
Eric lay on his back for a bit, feeling the cold of the floor through his coat, admiring the craftsmanship that lay under the grease-blurred ceiling tiles. After what might have been a second, or possibly a minute, a knot of chittering passersby lifted him to his feet and brushed him off.
“Here, Grandpa, you lost a button,” a woman with a cheerful knitted hat said, pressing something into Eric’s hand. The old man saw a tiny silver star in his palm, trailing a fine black thread.
“He was standing in the middle of the field, just watching the sky, then he fell ower, deid,” the older of the two boiler-suited men said, raising his collar against the cold that reached eagerly from the ground to greet the darkening sky.
“Deid from what?” his younger colleague said with morbid interest. He looked around, took in the lack of people filing out of the tiny chapel, the absence of cars parked. “Loneliness?”
“No, apparently he had a big smile oan his face. And an American passport in his pocket, wi a wee silver star tucked inside it. That’s what the newspaper said, anyway.”
“A silver star? Was he a sheriff, then?”
“A what? No, he was just touched in the heid.”
“Doolally, then,” the younger man said. “My gran was like that, too.”
“Well, whatever he was, he’s somethin’ else.” The older man nodded to the crematorium’s pitched roof.
Smoke gouted up from the chimney, a plume of black soot particles that caught an unfelt breeze and wheeled and swirled for a moment before dispersing through the bare branches of the oak tree.
“Deid from what?” his younger colleague said with morbid interest. He looked around, took in the lack of people filing out of the tiny chapel, the absence of cars parked. “Loneliness?”
“No, apparently he had a big smile oan his face. And an American passport in his pocket, wi a wee silver star tucked inside it. That’s what the newspaper said, anyway.”
“A silver star? Was he a sheriff, then?”
“A what? No, he was just touched in the heid.”
“Doolally, then,” the younger man said. “My gran was like that, too.”
“Well, whatever he was, he’s somethin’ else.” The older man nodded to the crematorium’s pitched roof.
Smoke gouted up from the chimney, a plume of black soot particles that caught an unfelt breeze and wheeled and swirled for a moment before dispersing through the bare branches of the oak tree.
David A. Gray is a Scots-born creative fella living in long-term incoherence in New York City.