Sea Change

Stretching his neck to the very back of his rump, Crow plucked a scrawny feather from his tail and dropped it off the roof, watching as it settled in a curving free-fall on the damp grass and moss below. It had missed the agapanthus and blown slightly towards the centre of the lawn. He cawed raucously to the feather as it lay there. Nothing happened. He cawed again. Still nothing. On the third call, which was increasingly less serene and composed, the feather sprang to attention. Quicksilver, it anchored itself to the ground, quill first and spun three times clockwise and three times anticlockwise, which by rights should have left it back where it started but did not. Within sixteen seconds of this starting it had become quite still. On the surface, at least. Still, that is if you didn’t count the surging growth spurt that made it, within ten minutes, no longer a small dark Crow feather but instead vermillion, blue, ochre, pink, yellow and brown. Inch by inch, it had transformed into a five metre tall feather tree. On a level with it now, Crow dipped his head to all angles until, satisfied, he clucked in deep appreciation and scanned the horizon for similar feats of engineering, that had been agreed during the Barn meeting, called as a matter of urgency to discuss the changed landscape and the few trees left after all the new houses had been built. After a great deal of complaint and angry shouting about how unfair life was, the meeting had finally come to the decision that at the sound of the early church bell on Monday morning, each Crow would contribute one of his or her precious balancing feathers to create this new lifeform on earth. And so, this very morning, very slowly, all over the village and beyond, tall feather trees began to show themselves, swaying gently in the early morning breeze. Crow cawed a soft satisfaction song to himself.

Just then, exactly as Oh Wise Won had predicted would happen, Scholian’s green post van spun around the corner of the cul de sac. A racing driver by nature, if not by profession, Scholian loved to whirl and glide into each driveway, bound with a spring in his step to the postbox and flit once again towards the still running engine, where he would smartly close the door and drive on to his next port of call. Although the company liked them, he himself had no time for those new fangled postboxes fixed to pillar and post, which simply spoiled the fun as far as Scholian was concerned. Here then he came, right on time past the first and Crow felt, the finest of all the new creations. Scholian, however, was busy listening to his elderly mother who, despite many years in their newly adopted country insisted on talking to him as if they were still in the heart of Europe. Against company policy and his own better judgment, Scholian’s mother also insisted every day on accompanying him, with her flask and sandwiches as he delivered the post. For himself, Scholian was full of thoughts of his next trip to France where he would spend time taking apart the Ford Mustang that he and his brother Pavel had found there on their last holiday. Inside his head, he was already there, fingers covered in grease and dust from the old engine, the steady thrumb of piston, camshaft and carburettor playing a melody that cast a warmth over the words his mother intoned, allowing Scholian to nod happily along to everything she said, without hearing a single word.

Crow watched Scholian’s routine pattern of dive into the porch, lift the flap, push the post through, snap the flap closed and dash to the still running engine for the next drop. By the time he had done three houses, Crow finally muttered his frustration before spilling off the rooftop to the pillar of the next house on Scholian’s route.

‘Morning Crow’ Scholian beamed at him, his brogue rich and pure New Irish belying the heavily accented Polish he and his mother used between them as he reversed the van at speed into the empty driveway. ‘Caw’ said Crow, strutting back and forth, his bottom cocked in the air, willing Scholian to notice his bare rump. ‘Caw’ said Crow again as Scholian drove past him with a cheery wave. ‘Stupid man’ Crow thought to himself and tried again at the next pillar. ‘What Crow, are you helping me with my rounds today?’ Scholian laughed as he sped past him, missing that house completely. ‘Nothing for number four today Crow. Sorry to disappoint you’ he said, driving as fast as he could down the small road before doing a quick handbrake turn at the end to bring him in line with the last postbox in the estate. Expertly, he flipped the lid, dropped the mail and the latch to the box at the same time and turned back the way he had come.

Crow watched the van leaving, hopping from one leg to the other and wondering how to attract Scholian’s attention. Just then, the screech of brakes curled a blue fog from the wheels and the van shivered as it came to a sudden stop before reversing back to the small edge of green between numbers twelve and two. Scholian sat in his seat, his mouth wide and his eyes wider still. Crow ahemed to himself, puffed out his chest feathers and sauntered up to the van ‘Well?’ he smirked. ‘What the?’ Scholian started and then stopped, looking from Crow to the tree and then back to Crow again. ‘Did you?’ he stopped again. Crow, for some reason Scholian did not understand had turned his back and was sticking his bottom up in the air. Scholian looked away, embarrassed. Crow wiggled his bottom and said ‘See?’ Scholian blushed and was about to ask Crow to please turn around when he suddenly noticed the bare patch on Crow’s rump. ‘What happened to you?’ he asked in surprise. Crow spun around to face Scholian once more and with a wave of his wing, bowed and pointed to the feather tree that towered above them. ‘Voila’ he said triumphantly. ‘Voila what?’ said Scholian, afraid almost to imagine what the reply might be. ‘You see before you the new species of tree. Gloria Crowcus.’ Crow announced proudly. ‘See?’ he waved his wing again towards the skyline. Scholian climbed out of his van to get a better look. Across the village and out into the countryside tall feather trees waved in a variety of sizes and shapes, each a dazzle of glorious technicolour. ‘Well I never.’ Scholian said, rubbing his hand over his face as if this would help him understand it better. ‘Well I never’ he repeated again.

The words were no sooner out of Scholian’s mouth than a great rumble was heard from the far side of the hill, down at the water’s edge. Scholian grew pale, paler even than the bare spot on Crow’s rump. A fierce thumping followed which Scholian definitely did not like the sound of one little bit. He looked from Crow to his van and then back to Crow again. With a fierce little nod to Crow, he jumped into the driver’s seat and raced towards the end of the road. There, he hesitated for just a moment, uncertain whether to continue on his rounds or to head back to the village where he could call on help if needed. Then, as if the van itself decided for him, Scholian found himself heading towards the dark and brooding sound that was coming up from the cliff. Beneath the wheels, the van trembled against the strangely vibrating road. Scholian watched a dark cloud forming ahead of him and switched on his lights to get a better view. The air had grown suddenly cold and then warm and then cold again as if a giant breathing was taking place all around him. Scholian shivered and wished that he had turned towards the village while he still had the chance. Beside him, his mother had busied herself with another layer of sandwiches and a second cup of tea, completely unaware that Scholian was more than a little perturbed at the sudden turn of events.

Ahead, the road quivered and broke open in a jagged line, splitting in small cracks and then widening as the two parts of the crust broke away under the terrible thunderous march of whatever was coming up the hill. Scholian was very afraid now and tried to turn back but the road was narrow and his only way was forward into the terrifying sound. The sky had darkened to almost black but no stars came to light the way. This was the darkness of the underside of the stone, the darkness of the split earth below the grass and Scholian muttered under his breath about not liking the look of things at all. Suddenly, out of the corner of his eye, he spotted Crow’s feet clamped firmly to the top of his windscreen. Just as he was making certain that it was Crow, a raucous Caw Caw was heard and Crow launched himself ahead of the small post van towards what Scholian was now sure would be certain doom. ‘Crow!’ he shouted after him through the glass, knowing in his heart that Crow would not hear him and even if he did, would not turn back either.

The dark had become thick and soupy, making Scholian cough and gasp a little for breath. Still, he kept on, his foot firmly pressed on the accelerator from habit as much as anything else. Ever since he had learned how to drive as a small boy there was only one speed that Scholian ever allowed himself, full throttle and nothing less. This would be his saving grace, even though he didn’t know it at the time. As he neared what he felt must be the source of all this terrible noise and dark foreboding, Scholian closed his eyes and pressed even harder, if that were possible, on the little engine to get him to the Cove. With a leap, the brave little van raced towards the final corner, lost all hold on the road beneath his wheels and sailed across the breach towards the far hill. Crow was ahead of him, shouting encouragement all the time and this, Scholian would assure Missus Maloney later that morning, was what most certainly saved him.

From the vantage point of their new landing place, Scholian and Crow looked back on the devastated landscape where the sea had finally crashed through all defences and torn the road to shreds. As they watched, the tide retreated, drawing with it enormous mouthfuls of black asphalt, boulders, trees and hedges, a child’s plastic ride on tractor and numerous bits of rubbish and debris including the hideous garden gnomes that Missus Quinn was so fond of. Crow watched the gnomes depart with particular delight, remembering one particularly unpleasant incident when the gnomes and a gigantic mock Persian tomcat belonging to Missus Quinn’s bedridden sister, had ganged up on him.

Later, sitting eating hot apple tart with Missus Maloney and her house guest from Australia whose name Scholian could never remember, it was all he could do not to mention Crow’s trees. Secretly, he and Crow had agreed that the trees might just have been the thing that started it all. Although, if Scholian was really honest, he didn’t believe that. The trees were one thing. The sea monster that he was sure and certain he had witnessed from inside his little brave van was another altogether. ‘Mmm!’ Scholian thought to himself, wondering if anyone would believe him.

What neither Crow nor Scholian had counted on happening in their race to the Cove, was the strange disappearance of Scholian’s grumbling, tomato sandwich eating, milky tea drinking wrinkly and bad-tempered mother. At the very moment that Scholian had closed his eyes to urge his little van across the cavernous gap that had opened in the road, the passenger door had swung wide, spitting mother, flask, sandwiches and handbag towards the foaming froth below. To his eternal shame Scholian didn’t even remember hearing the door open or close and only noticed his mother was missing when he landed safely across on what had suddenly become a far and distant shore. A double-bind Scholian said to himself. If he told the post company he would lose his job. If he told the authorities the Coast Guard would send out search parties. No more France, no more greasy fingers and old cars, no more racing around the road. 'No more mother' Scholian said firmly to himself, agreeing with Missus Maloney that the apple tart was indeed very good and yes please, he would love a second piece. He smiled sweetly at Crow and handed him the cream. In the look that passed between them as they spooned warm pastry, cooked apple and frothy cream into their mouths, Scholian and Crow silently agreed that they would finish their tart and then go out to look for Scholian’s Mammy.

Meanwhile, Missus Nakowski, as she was known to her friends, completely unaware that she had tumbled out of her son's sturdy but speeding van, as it sailed high over the broken cove road, found herself flung, with no dignity whatsoever, onto the back of a wild Irish Salmon that himself got such a fright, he leaped a clear ten feet above the waves before settling back on course for his long swim to his spawning ground. Luckily for her, Missus Nakowski, was not one bit afraid of the sea, having been a champion swimmer in the cold northern lakes of her homeland as a young girl. She fixed Salmon with a fierce gaze and sternly bade him in Polish not to jump so high in future. So saying, she tweaked each gill on either side of his head with a firm but friendly pinch, shouted out and dug her slender ankles freshly against his sides, urging him ever onwards.

Alas, this was no Salmon of Knowledge on which the good lady found herself but rather the more mundane back of the class, dunce type and he simply stopped still in the waves at her antics and refused to budge another inch. Besides, to be fair, he had never heard anyone speaking Polish before. The pause caused by Salmon’s hesitation is exactly what gave Crow the opportunity he had been waiting for. Freshly fortified by Missus Maloney’s generous helpings of apple tart, he swooped upon Scholian’s Mammy and placed his strong claws either side of the good woman’s head, ready to heave-her-ho towards her waiting son and the dry and welcoming cliff beyond the sea.

For her part, Missus Nakowski was having none of it. She clung firmly to her place on Salmon’s back and slapped Crow twice with her crocheted handbag, which she had, in its design and making forty years earlier, had the good sense to fortify with several pounds of sling shot. The thwack that resounded on poor Crow’s ears could be heard for miles around, all the way even to northern Spain and the holiday makers sunning themselves on the beach there who looked up in surprise, wondering if that was the hotel’s call to lunch already. Meanwhile, Salmon had finally grasped the notion that things were now very different to how they had been only two short minutes ago and lunged with all his might towards the bottom of the ocean, dragging Missus Nakowski, Crow, handbag and all into the depths with him.

High above on the cliff, beside the Danger Cliff Subsiding sign, young Scholian and Missus Maloney, who had insisted on coming along for the drive, watched anxiously for some signal from Crow that he had executed the rescue as planned. Instead, imagine their shock to see Crow, Scholian’s Mammy and Salmon disappear in a flash and a flick of fishtail below the foaming surf. 'Oh my!' said Missus Maloney, clutching Scholian to her bosom in fright, from where he struggled to free himself after some moments of rest in the warmth of her embrace. ‘Oh dear! Sorry!’ said Missus Maloney when he finally broke for air, his face a very dangerous looking shade of red. ‘I got a fright, that’s all, seeing your poor mother going like that’. At this point Missus Maloney burst into tears, pulled her apron up to cover her face and ran, as she thought, towards Scholian’s trusty little van which had brought them to this high spot safe above the water.

Unfortunately for Missus Maloney and as it would turn out for Scholian too, with her apron covering her face, she was not really clear about the direction she was taking, all of which resulted in her crashing into the Danger Cliff Subsiding sign and sailing clear off the edge of the land towards the rocks and waves below. Scholian would have been spared the same fate had not a button from his shirt become entangled with the ties of the apron, dragging him too, head over heels towards the lapping sea. Alas, now all hope of rescue seemed lost, with Crow and Missus Nakowski sailing in the deepest waters with their new friend, Salmon and Missus Maloney and Scholian up to their necks in surf and in danger of following them to the flat sand below.

Only Scholian’s van now remained and brave as his little heart was, he was, he assured himself a little tearfully, not made for sailing off the edge of cliffs or for floating on the ocean wave. He thought and he thought and he thought some more. He revved his little engine as loudly as he could, he honked his horn, he flashed his lights but all to no avail. ‘Doomed, doomed’ he thought to himself and hung his head, unwilling to watch what was happening any more. Time, it is true, was getting on and still there was no change. Scholian and Missus Maloney were fast heading for the dark line of the horizon. Missus Nakowski and Crow were nowhere to be seen. Overhead crows and gulls wheeled and glided, searching all around for their beloved friend.

Suddenly, a dark shape appeared at the edge of one creamy white wave, then another and then another. Dozens and dozens of them popped like corks to float in a ring around a growing circle of water. A prideful voice sounded across all the land and the sea, bouncing from cliff to cliff ‘We are here to help’ said a lobster of the brightest red-pink Crow’s friends had ever seen. Round and round in a circle the lobsters in their pots went, churning the water into a huge funnel reaching all the way to the sandy bottom. Then, with a loud splash, they stopped suddenly, becoming perfectly still, which caused the water to reverse its flow with a whoosh! Now! Up came Crow. Up came Scholian’s Mammy and up came Salmon with a mighty splash.

Crow quickly flew to one of the lobster pots, drawing Missus Nakowski with him, his claws locked in a vice-like grip, which despite all that he had endured with the sling-shot handbag, he had never once relaxed, even at the bottom of the sea. There, against the twisted cane frame, the old lady lay gasping for air and thankful to be able to breathe freely once more. Crow shouted ‘You stay there’ into her good ear and flew as fast as he could towards the two dark specks he could just see heading far out to sea.

The little van, opening his eyes to peep, could scarcely believe it when, as suddenly as Crow had gone, he was back, with Scholian grasped firmly in one claw and Missus Maloney in the other. Swooping high now to the far edge of the land, away from the cliff edge, Crow laid them gently down, checked that they were breathing and not too frightened after their big adventure and then hurried back to the water to complete his rescue mission. This time, Missus Nakowski did not swipe him with her handbag. Indeed, it was the only thing that had not resurfaced when the lobsters had stopped their dance. Most likely, she decided, the slingshot was too heavy for it and it was lost beneath the waves, forever and ever. ‘Never mind, she thought, I can buy a new one in the sales.’ and busy with ideas of what colour she might like, she relaxed as Crow once again grasped her firmly by both shoulders and hoisted her towards land. ‘Thank you’ he called as he flew away, dipping his wings in a pilot’s salute to the lobsters below, already sinking out of sight as they began their journey back to the bottom of the sea. Crow’s friends cawed and shrieked and cheered their Great Hero, their wings clapping and slapping for all they were worth.

‘Thank you’ Crow shouted, mischievously pretending to drop Missus Nakowski so that they would ooh and then agh as he pretended to catch her again. The sound of clapping rang out all over the land and all over the sea, once more puzzling the Spanish holidaymakers, who had been disappointed earlier to discover that it hadn't been lunch time after all. Very soon, back at the Cove, everyone was all together again, surrounding Scholian’s little van and thanking their lucky stars for being back on dry land, laughing and shouting all together and waving towards the sea and the land and back again as they each told how really, they hadn’t been that frightened. Still, after all the excitement, Scholian felt it would be a good idea to turn the little van towards the village where they could all eat ice-cream for the rest of the day and tell the story over and over again, to anybody who would listen.

‘Phew! what a big adventure!’ Crow thought to himself, wondering if his feather had really been the start of it all. He wondered, too, for a moment if he should ask Scholian what he thought but decided that maybe it was best to let sleeping feathers lie. ‘Until the next time’ he said, with a little Crow smile to himself.