The breeding season seems to fill the gulls with an unstoppable bloodlust. They will attack each other with as much fervor as they do the pigeon guillemots and cormorants. I have seen the gulls engaging in cannibalistic orgies, tearing at a neighbor’s throat and wolfing down its eggs. They do not even limit their assaults to other birds. Packs of young males will go after seals, wheeling around a sleek, gray head and screaming, chasing an animal the size of a motorcycle into the sea. They would happily wipe out the biologists, too, if they could only get a clear shot — hence the hard hats. Mick told me recently about a gull that followed him up and down the shore, working itself into a frenzy. After painting his shoulders with guano and yelling furiously in his ear, the bird grew so outraged that it slammed into Mick’s hard hat at full speed. It broke its own neck and fell to earth, stone dead.
THE OTHER DAY I was in my room, staring out the window. Lucy and the men were on the grounds on Bird Watch, but I had abstained, pleading injury. I had not yet worked up the courage to tell the others about my pregnancy. Instead, I had blamed my bad ankle, even going so far as to wrap it in gauze.
To protect myself and my baby, I have been spending a lot of time in the house. The noise is muffled there, at a remove. I do my best to ignore the thunder of wings, pretending that the chorus of clucking and cackling has a soothing quality, like an atonal symphony. On top of everything else, there is one lunatic gull that has claimed the entire front porch as his personal nesting area. Most birds manage to hold on to, at most, a few bare inches of rock. But this gull is bigger, stronger, and crazier than the rest. We call him Kamikaze Pete. He does not eat or sleep; he just fights, all day long. There is a permanent smudge of bloody crimson on his face. Each time I step onto the porch, Kamikaze Pete appears out of nowhere, walloping my shoulders with his wings and pecking with such ferocity at my hard hat that it makes me see stars. We have all taken to using the back door of the cabin for our entrances and exits.
Now, seated at the window, I caught sight of an elephant seal moving among the nests. The animal appeared to be an adult female, albeit underweight and undersized. She was at some distance from me, making her way toward the water. The image was odd, like a boulder rolling down a snowy hillside. She had a pattern on her shoulder: a birthmark in the shape of a star. I watched her shuffle toward the sea, dislodging the birds, who rose around her with exasperated squawks.
Almost all the elephant seals are gone. The females, pregnant, have moved on. The males, with no harems remaining, have abandoned their precious territory. The pups have taken the leap too, diving into the surf, chasing fish, tumbling and playing, vanishing into the blue. The animals that linger are the ones who cannot leave. The frightened, the sick, the lame — the seals who are unwilling or unable to brave the ocean. This is no place for them. This is no place for anything weak.
The female was already in trouble. I watched her lumbering awkwardly, favoring one of her flippers. Perhaps she had a deformity. Perhaps she had been injured. A few gulls were soaring above her, tracking her. They had not yet worked up enough courage — or ire — to attack. But it was only a matter of time. The seal limped among the nests, and her pursuers screamed and circled.
One gull dived. Another followed suit, closing its wings and plummeting. The seal picked up her uneven pace. The birds began to shriek in a kind of ecstasy. My heart was in my throat. There was nothing I could do to stop this.
Something happened — a flash of beaks — too quick for me to follow. The seal bellowed in pain. Her face was bloodied. The birds dove again, their beaks glinting in the light like bullets. They were aiming for her eyes. They snatched the whiskers off her snout, clumps of fur from her head. She could not defend herself. She could not reach the water. She screamed again, and I saw a gull rising with something in its mouth. A dark, glistening orb, trailing a skein of blood.
After that, I turned away from the window. Mick later told me that the birds had picked the seal’s body clean. There was nothing left but bones.
32
A FEW DAYS AGO, I sat down with Mick. It was a breezy afternoon in May. The others were away on Bird Watch, as usual. Lucy had taken Forest and Galen with her to the murre blind. They had brought the video camera to film the birds in secret — the ultimate voyeurs. They would not be back until nightfall.
I brewed a pot of tea. I poured two cups. I handed one to Mick, who was sitting on the couch, watching me with eyebrows raised.
“I’m pregnant,” I said.
He paused before he replied, taking a long, contemplative sip.
“I know,” he said.
I stared for a moment, then sat down beside him.
“I didn’t know,” I said.
He shrugged. “Well, I’m smarter than you.”
He took another pull of tea, inhaling the steam. I hadn’t touched mine, though I drew some comfort from the warm mug in my palms.
“You’re pretty far along, aren’t you?” he said. “I’d say you’re into the second trimester. The jawline — the breasts — and you’ve got the mask of pregnancy on your face. The pigmentation of the skin, right here.”
He reached toward my cheek. I batted his hand away.
“I’ve been watching you for weeks,” he said. “I’ve got three sisters and about a dozen nieces and nephews. You were never going to be able to hide it from me. The way you walk. The way you get up from a chair.”
“You’re the first one I’ve told,” I said.
“Really?”
“Really.”
My conscience gave an uncomfortable squirm. I had sent home several postcards in the past month, all of them bland, frivolous, and mendacious. Perhaps it was unforgivable that I had left my father in the dark. If anyone deserved to know — to be prepared — it was Dad. He was my only real family, after all.
But I had not told him, because I could not tell him. There were no words. The words were unready, unripe. I could never find them on my tongue or the tip of my pencil. They were somewhere else, floating, slippery, half-formed.
I felt a splash of hot liquid across my arm. My mug of tea had begun to tilt. The room seemed to pivot. The ceiling was twisting like a cap coming off a bottle. I thought I was going to faint. A moment later, Mick had his arm around me. He shoved my head between my knees, his hand on the back of my neck.
“Breathe,” he said. “Nice and easy. That’s right.”
“Sorry,” I gasped. “I haven’t actually said it out loud before.”
Spots danced in front of my eyes. Mick rubbed my nape.
“Congratulations,” he said. “I guess.”
“Thanks,” I whispered.
I inhaled in rhythm with the movement of his hands. His fingers tracked up and down my spine, guiding my breath.
“I know what happened,” he said.
“What?”
“I know who the father is, I mean.”
“Goddamn it, Mick.”
“It was Andrew, right?”
I punched him. I used all my strength. The blow was wild, glancing off his upper arm. Mick observed the action with the bemusement of a cat watching the flight of a bumblebee. He dusted off the place where I had struck.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I know you’re in a tough spot. I’m sure it’s been hard.”
I stared down at my lap.
“But I did the math,” he went on. “I know it wasn’t me.” He held up a finger. “Definitely wasn’t Forest.” A second finger. “Sure as hell wasn’t Galen.” A third finger. “So that just leaves—”