It was cold but sunny, the morning air thick with the salty smell of the surf. The beach house is partly obscured by shrubs and a tall unruly hedge fences the property, providing shelter from the ocean's tempestuous advances. Two dead sparrows lay in the centre of the sandy path that lead to the back door, Harris gingerly stepped over them, noting the puncture wounds in the small bodies as he continued toward the rear of the house.

The key turned with force and he was greeted with the musty smell of enclosed months. He made his way down the dark hall to the bedroom, the soft murmur of the sea outside already calming his strung-out nerves. He flung his business jacket and overnight bag onto a chair in the corner and pulled the curtains, wincing as hard light flooded the room. Loosening his tie he changed into an old pair of jeans and a t-shirt and set about airing out the bungalow. Opening the lounge window, a Tui swooped from nowhere and arced within an inch of the pane, blasting Harris with song before disappearing as quickly as it had appeared. Harris gathered himself together, breathing hard. “Bloody bird,” he thought to himself as he held his hand to his chest, his heart beating quickly.
He had noticed that the longer he spent in the city the more phobic he had become about 'natural' things, birds in particular. He didn't like the way their eyes seemed to follow his every movement, the abrupt shift of their wings, or the way they tilted their heads to one side as they peered mercilessly into what felt like his very soul. He shivered, lit a smoke and turned the stove on to boil a pot of tea.
Harris opened the latch on the French doors that faced out towards the coast and sat on the top step in the sun, admiring the expansive view as he finished his cigarette. He thought about work; he was a broker for a large multinational and had enjoyed the challenge of the first five years but the long hours had driven a wedge between himself and his wife Daphne. They had been separated for three months and the phone call he had been dreading had come last night, cementing the inevitable divorce.
Finishing off a bottle of Chivas and his last few grams of coke, he had packed a bag, and steered his BMW toward the coast at four o'clock in the morning. The old family bach has always afforded some sort of security for him, from his parent's death now to his impending divorce; he fled to a reliable peace of sorts, albeit temporary at least until he could think about what to do next.
The creeper chortled violently from the hedge next to the house, waking Harris from his thoughts. He remembered the pot on the stove and hurried inside. It was cold to touch. The element was switched on. He remembered the power board and flicked the main switch on - dull yellow light suddenly illuminated the hallway as the dusty stereogram tucked in next to the sofa-bed in the lounge crackled into life - Dave Dobbyn singing about being 'loyal.'
Harris touched the element just to make sure the power was really on and burnt the tips of his fingers; cursing his stupidity he turned the cold tap on, having to step back as it spluttered and shook, spraying rust-coloured water out of the faucet 'til it ran clear. Cooling his fingers he looked out the small kitchen window into the yard; the old clothesline pole leaning limply against the frayed line, a few stray wooden pegs, scattered flax against the hedge, the grass a good foot-high . . . another dead bird lay on the shelled path under the clothesline. It looked like a fantail with a sizeable chunk out of its small body. Harris leapt back from the sink as the Tui alighted on the sill, tapping its glistening black bill aggressively on the glass. Tap tap tap. Tap tap tap.
Harris quickly filled a glass of water and opened the window ready to douse the malicious protagonist; the sleek bird had of course seized the opportunity to retreat to the clothesline where it perched on the swaying line, chortling and tilting its head madly as it puffed its plumed breast, its white collar displayed like a proud priest uttering the last rites over the crumpled bird below. Harris drew the blinds angrily, disbelieving the bird's audacity.
He knew he'd been hitting the coke a bit hard since Daphne had left him and he knew it was part of the reason she left him in the first place and he knew it was the reason why he was strung out now, letting some pugnacious bird freak him out, of all things. He knew he had to stop his self-destructive habit, which was why he'd retreated to the bach; 'cold turkey,' he'd done it before and knew he could do it again, for good this time. He pushed his anxiety aside and decided to get some much-needed sleep, three days straight without hadn't helped at all. Sleep came quickly as he lay on the wire-frame single bed, always the most comfortable bed he'd ever slept on despite all the expensive hotels and design-store brands that had been a part of his adult life for so long now. There was something to be said for simplicity and maybe, just maybe, for being alone, he thought to himself as he slipped into a dream.
It was dark when Harris woke to the sound of the Kowhai tree scratching the side of the house. He lay awake on his back with the moonlight streaming through the window and the sound of the approaching storm gathering momentum outside. The old bach creaked as the wind pushed its weight against the corrugated iron roof. Harris could hear the powerlines that lined the only road of the hamlet, moan as the wind whipped through the small community. There were roughly twenty or so baches in the small cove, surrounded by ancient pohutukawa trees - one gravel road in, one road out; a small store that sold fishing supplies and over-priced canned food and cigarettes, and a jetty in dire need of repair.
At least half the residents still lived in the dwellings, the rest were like Harris - out-of-towners who headed north in their SUVs and European cars for the occasional weekend away. Daphne had whinged at him to buy a more elaborate 'bach' elsewhere - somewhere with restaurants, golf courses, and a marina - so he had. Most of the time they would travel across to the other coast and spend a few days hob-knobbing with the people one would usually be trying to escape by going to the beach in the first place. The new 'bach' had set Harris back a cool half million and an extra year of overtime at the office, but it had kept her happy and that was the main thing. He had drawn the line when she tried to suggest he should get rid of the 'old bach.' It was handed down through the family and he was damned if he was going to get rid of it on a whim from her. His thoughts slipped away again as the house started to shake with the force of the wind and the rain that now lashed the outside with a vengeance.
Harris shivered and pulled the blankets up under his chin, he fumbled in his bag beside the bed and produced a hip flask of whisky. After a few sips, he felt the chill evaporate from his body and a sense that everything would work out all right. Not just the storm raging outside but within himself. There were plenty more women out there, he was rich and successful and good-looking. He would fall flat on his feet again shortly, “Harris Tripp always bounced back” he reassured himself, as he took another long swig. He checked his cell phone and realising there was no coverage threw it in disgust on the floor. A tremendous crash sounded from the kitchen, the sound of glass breaking and then followed by loud thumping noises.
Harris threw himself out of bed, unsteady on his feet with the whisky and fumbled for the light switch, stubbing his toe on the corner of the dresser as he did so. There was no power. Not knowing what to expect, he grabbed an old oak walking stick off the coat rack in the hall as he made his way slowly towards the horrible banging noise emanating from the kitchen. The house was unbearably cold and his breath came in short gasps of fog in front of him, his eyes narrowed as he tried to distinguish shape from the darkness.
The kitchen door was wide ajar, the wild wind blowing sheets of rain into the kitchen, leaves and debris swirling amongst the puddles of water on the linoleum. Harris dropped the cane and rushed forward to close the door against the storm, letting out a piercing scream as the broken glass from the small pane in the door cut into his bare feet. He fell to the ground and tried to cup his lacerated feet in his cold hands, blood running as freely as the rain under the back door. Taking his t-shirt off, Harris tore it in half and applied a tourniquet to both feet, effectively stopping the blood flow.
On hands and knees, he scrambled through the cupboards looking for the earthquake kit Daphne had given him for Christmas last year, as if she had known that his life would befall such a disaster at some point or other. Disregarding the mice that scampered across the back of his freezing hand he breathed a sigh of relief as he found the plastic case which, amongst other things, housed two candles and some safety matches. After much fumbling and striking, Harris managed to ignite a match and subsequently the candles. He found a couple of empty whisky bottles under the sink and after hauling himself up on his sore knees, placed the candles strategically on the mantle piece above the coal range.
After managing to get himself into a chair at the kitchen table he rummaged through the earthquake kit and found a small first-aid kit with a pair of tweezers inside. Unwrapping his tender feet he was pleased to see that the lacerations weren't as bad as he first thought and had coagulated nicely. One cut on his instep was particularly nasty and looked as though it would require a few stitches, Harris removed a sliver of glass the length of his finger from the cut, fresh blood escaping from the wound. He reapplied his makeshift bandage and proceeded to remove the rest of the glass from his other foot under the light of the flickering candle. All the while the storm howled and shook the small bach with a fury he hadn't witnessed for a long time.
After gathering his strength and securing the kitchen door with the back of a chair, Harris blew out one of the candles and hobbled back to his bedroom with the aid of the other. He could hear ghostly drips in the spare room on the bare floorboards and feel drips on his shoulders from where the rain had crept in under the iron and leaked through the roof. The place was in need of repair and as he slumped back into bed, he resolved to spend some money on the place and get it back to new. After all, the bach was in a family trust and Daphne wouldn't be able to get her greedy hands on it when the divorce settlement came through so he may as well make it as comfortable as he could.
His feet were starting to throb with pain, he would have to go into town to the doctor tomorrow and get some help. In the mean time Harris self-medicated with the rest of the whisky. He lit a cigarette off the candle now perched on the small table next to the bed and inhaled deeply. He couldn't believe his bad luck. “They say things happen in threes” he mused to himself, “Wonder what the third piece of good luck will bring with it?” He lay as still as he could, watching the smoke from his cigarette drift up towards the ceiling then get swirled away by unseen drafts of cold air, the curtains fluttered in the breeze that crept through the cracks in the old window frame, moonlight flashed across the small room as the clouds parted for brief seconds as they bought more torrential rain and wind with them.
Outside, the wind began to subside as the rain became heavier on the tin roof. Harris began to slip into unconsciousness, the drink taking its course, he thought he could hear that infernal Tui warbling its haunting refrain, hidden in the shrubbery somewhere camouflaged in the darkness. The flame of the candle flickered as the curtains blew gently in the breeze and Harris slipped into another dream. The noise of the rain on the roof lulling him to sleep.

*

Harris sat on the veranda step and smoked a cigarette as he looked out at the expansive view, the ocean a slate grey colour, flat as glass. He couldn't believe the calm of the day after the night before. The fire engines had left half an hour ago with the officer in charge recommending that Harris follow them to the small hospital in the next town to get his feet seen to. Blue smoke still twisted sluggishly from the soaked remains of the bach. He hadn't realised how small the section was until now; the clothesline now lay on the grass, the hedge still boxed in the section although gaps were evident from the thrashing it had received the night before, the kowhai tree still stood strong though slightly scorched where it had the night before as it scratched away at the side of the house. Harris felt sick yet somehow pleased. He guessed it was just something less he had to worry about now and he was feeling rather lucky as he thought how he had managed to escape the inferno he had himself inadvertently created. He looked back over his shoulder and couldn't help but suppress tears welling up inside as he pushed back the good and bad memories of the bach now flooding back. His sore feet walked him toward his car, a blackened key clutched in his dirty fist; he stopped in mid-step and raised his foot to look beneath.

Harris already knew what he had stepped on - the dead fantail lay flat on the path, looking peaceful despite being obviously dead. Harris looked around the property again and there amongst the blackened limbs of the Kowhai sat the Tui, his head tilted to one side, its beady black eye focussed intently on Harris's passage. Harris took his last cigarette from the packet and lit it, crumpling the packet and throwing it at the bird. It fell well short of the mark and the Tui just watched. Harris turned gingerly and made his way to the car. He just couldn't get over how calm the day was, after the night before.

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