Birds of Paradise by Oliver Langmead (top ebook reader TXT) 📕

Adam in the leg, then he will return the favour. The driver falls backwards, blood pouring from the wound in his calf, crying out.

Adam pulls the bolt back on the rifle, loads another round.

On the wooden decking there lies a still-warm stack of clothes. Adam crouches, observing the silver crowns scattered across them. Perched atop the rose’s bell jar is a large magpie with a crumpled beak, beady black eye glinting.

The magpie hops onto Adam’s shoulder as he takes the bell jar, wrapping it in Fox’s fur. The package is light, and he cradles it protectively against his chest, as if it’s a child.

Apart from the moaning of the driver, the greenhouse is now very quiet. Ada’s broken body cools nearby. Adam isn’t sure why he pauses, but he does, observing the parody of paradise that surrounds him. It’s like a bad dream, he thinks, where he knows that nothing is quite real. Only the magpie perched on his shoulder feels real. Only the matted fur between his fingers is real. Only the rose he carries feels real.

On his way back to the fake construction site, he stops at the shore of the greenhouse’s artificial lake and throws the rifle into it. The gun splashes and sinks, still visible beneath the clear waters even as it comes to a rest among the pebbles at the lake’s bed. Feeling light-headed, Adam clutches the bell jar between his hands, making certain that it will not tumble from his grip. He has left bloody handprints on the glass, and further matted Fox’s fur, he notices. The bird on his shoulder chatters at him until he wakes from his hazy delirium; he continues, retracing his steps to the loosened pane of glass.

Crouching through, he emerges into the bright night.

Through the kingdom of greenhouses he stumbles, the magpie on his shoulder stretching its wings to keep its balance. Sometimes he looks down and notices how wet his leg is with blood. It’s possible, he thinks, that one of the bullets struck an artery. Still he continues, turning only to see that the mansion is quiet. Curtains twitch, but nobody comes running out to try and stop him.

It feels like it takes years for him to cross the hills, eyes fixed on the stars as they slowly emerge in the dark. He mumbles constellations to himself – the constellations he once named, lying on the warm hills of Eden, in a language long forgotten. He remembers Eve’s gentle laughter, her warm breath against his neck, the softness of her skin against his.

At last, he arrives at the abandoned petrol station.

When he stumbles against the car, he realises that he doesn’t have the keys. He slides down with his back against it, vision wheeling; the soft moon is a blurred streak in the sky. He knows he should make efforts to remove the bullets and bind his leg, but he’s feeling suddenly very tired, and he lets himself relax for a moment. He observes the long trail of blood he’s left through the grasses in his wake, like a black river meandering down the hillside.

Placing the rose and fur on the concrete before him, he feels his eyelids trying to close. He doesn’t put up much of a fight. A bit of rest would be good, he thinks. He can’t remember the last time he went on holiday. But then, he can’t remember much of anything, really.

The last thing Adam sees before unconsciousness takes him is the magpie with the crumpled beak. It perches resolutely atop a petrol pump, observing him with one glinting black eye, flashing the whites of its wings as it flicks them.

VI

A tree is a very difficult thing to kill. With a man, there are so many weaknesses that can be exploited: skin is easy to puncture, bones are easy to break, and organs are simple to smash. With a tree, though, a knife won’t do. You can’t kill a tree using your fists, and you can’t kill a tree by shooting it, and you can’t kill a tree by subjecting it to working conditions demeaning enough that it throws itself off a tall building. Killing a tree takes strength. It takes the application of an axe to its trunk, chipping away bit by bit until it topples. It takes great machines, with whirling saws. And even then, it might still survive. Even with its trunk gone, and its branches gone, and its leaves gone, its roots remain, buried deep in the earth, and the tree might live yet.

Eventually, Adam wakes.

He’s laid out on a cold metal table, and there are bright lights aimed at his leg. Bowed over that leg is a middle-aged woman in sickly lime-green scrubs, digging around with some metal tools. Adam knows he should be in pain, but what pain there is seems distant, so he watches in fascination. She’s using a pair of tweezers and a scalpel, and her hands are tremendously steady. The tweezers twitch and pull something free, and she exhales sharply, dropping the remains of a bullet onto the tray beside her. Satisfied, she lays out her tools and removes her gloves, searching around in drawers for a needle and some thread.

“Got a staple gun?”

Startled by the sound of his voice, she stares at him, lowering her mask.

“You shouldn’t be conscious.”

“A needle won’t do it.”

“I gave you enough sedation to keep a rhino under for a week.”

There’s a pause as she considers the needle.

“I do have a staple gun.”

Pinching his flesh together, she applies the gun. There are sharp points of pain beneath his skin, but they feel far away, and he doesn’t flinch. His leg is already covered in scars; this isn’t the first time it’s been put back together. Eventually, each bullet hole is sealed up. The woman cleans the wounds and wraps his leg with fresh white bandages. Then she wheels her chair back, and goes to wash her hands.

“I don’t have any crutches,” she says, “but