Salvatore and the Crows

There was a boy who would “go away.”

Just for a few seconds.

Everyone knew the rule:
Don’t touch him.
Count to ten.
He’ll be back.

Until one day… he wasn’t.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:33

We were ten, or near enough. The year would have been about two thousand or just after. Sort of year that feels like a hinge when you're standing in it. And like any other year once it's gone. Course they made a big fuss out of the new millennium, the Y two K bug, the Euro edging slowly closer into being on the horizon. The town was small enough that you could walk its length before you even started to regret it. A main street, a church that leaned slightly as if listening. A school with a yard that turned to gravelly slurry in winter, and gravelled dust in summer, and fields pressed close on all sides as though they might reclaim it if nobody kept watch. That's where I knew him Salvatore Murphy. You'd need to understand the name before anything else, because names carry their own gravity, and something is determined with them. Salvator Murphy in a place where most boys were called John, or Pat, or Michael, or Sean. It sat oddly in the mouth, like a word borrowed from another language, and never properly returned. His family called him Toto. They said it lightly, the way you might call a much loved pet, with no explanation offered and none asked for. In a small town explanations are a form of boasting, and nobody wants that. What you boast of was likely to be taken from you. So it was said. Salvador had six older sisters. They had more normal names, clearly selected by the mother. They moved around him like weather, not hovering, not protective in any obvious or deliberate way, but present. Always present. If he was in the yard, one of them was near. If he walked home, there was a shadow of them somewhere behind or head. They spoke for him sometimes. Often sometimes. And oftener they did it without being asked. He doesn't mind, one would say, when he clearly did. He'll be back, another would say, when he was already there. He was quiet, but not shy. And that's an important distinction. Shyness is fear of being seen. And Toto didn't seem to mind being seen. He simply didn't need all that much of it. He'd a way of standing that made it seem as if he'd arrived slightly before the rest of himself. You'd talk at him and he'd listen. Big watery hazel eyes would fix at you. He'd properly listen. Not waiting for his turn. Not preparing a reply. Not wondering about something else. Just perceiving what you said. As if it could be useful later. Then he'd answer.

SPEAKER_02 3:36

If an answer was required, in a voice that was so soft and so certain. I liked him. That's the plain truth of it.

SPEAKER_01 3:45

He was a nice fella. There was something restful about him. Being around him felt like stepping into shade on a hot day. And as is the way of friendships when you're ten, you think you'll be friends forever. The first time I saw him go, I thought I'd miss something. We were in the yard behind the school, a rectangle of gravel with two goals painted in white onto the pebbled ash walls. The kind of setup no insurance company would allow in a school these days, with every available surface designed to scrape and gouge and cut. It was one of those days where nothing quite settles. The wind kept changing direction. The clouds moved as if they'd somewhere else to be. We were playing a game of ball that called for very little skill and a massive amount of shouting. Salvador was standing near the goal, not quite involved, but not quite separate. Someone kicked the ball toward him. He rolled to his feet. He didn't move. That in itself wouldn't be unusual. He often let things come to him without interfering. But there was something in the stillness that made me look properly. His eyes were open. His face was unchanged. He was simply not there. I don't mean to say he'd fainted. I don't mean to say he'd daydreamed in the way children do. Where they drift and then return with a blink. I mean that something had stepped out of him, or stepped away, or perhaps stepped sideways into a place we couldn't see, but that he couldn't avoid. Someone shouted his name, Toto, was one of his sisters, though I don't remember which. They always seemed to know before the rest of us. She came over quickly but not with panic. Leave him, she said. Don't touch him when he's away. Away. The word sat there among us like a rule of forgotten learning. How long? Someone asked. She shrugged, already turning away. He'll be back before you count ten. She began to count, not aloud, with her fingers and her thumbs, folding them in one by one. I watched his face. Nothing moved. The yard noise went on around him, slightly hushed, as if someone had put a hand over the world. By the time she reached her tenth finger he blinked. That was all. He blinked, looked down at the ball, and then at us, and smiled in that small, apologetic way of his, as if he'd been delayed by something minor. Sorry, he said. What happened? I asked. He tilted his head slightly, considering. I went, he said. That was the word he used. Went. After that, we began to notice. You'll understand now that children don't observe in the way adults do. They don't catalogue or analyze. They absorb. They accept. It takes something persistent to make itself known as strange. If it persists longer, it becomes normal. Salvador's departures were persistent. They happened in the yard, in the classroom, on the walk home. He'd be there, and then not, and then there again. Always standing, always upright, always with his eyes open. Once in class, the moon tour asked him a question. Something simple about history, about an English king who had done something regrettable. He stood beside his desk, hands at his sides, and said nothing. The teacher frowned, thinking he didn't know. Salvador Murphy, she said, sharper this time. No response. She took a step toward him, a bit of worry rising, you could tell. Miss, one of the sisters said, not looking up. He's away. The teacher paused. You could see the calculation happening. A calculus of authority over the algebra of uncertainty. How long? she asked. Before ten, the sister said. The Muntor hesitated, then nodded, as if this were a procedure she'd been versed in, in Mary Eye. Very well, she said. We'll continue. And she did. He returned on the eighth count, by my estimation. My little fingers and thumbs had somehow learned to twitch in perfect tandem with the sisters. He blinked, looked at the teacher, and gave the answer as if no time had passed. She praised him. That was how it was handled. Not ignored exactly, never explained, accommodated, counted on and for. The crows the crows came later. They'd always been there, of course. This is Ireland. Crows are as common as rain, but these weren't the ordinary sort. He could tell by the way they gathered, not in loose flocks, not scattered along hedges or fields, but drawn together into shapes that looked almost deliberated. Lines along the ridge of a wall, a cluster on a roof that left the rest of the roof bare, as if the tiles beneath them had been picked special. They made a sound that was not quite the usual call. There was a thickness to it, a wetness, a longing rasp, as if the sound had been carried a long way and had picked up something along the route. The first time I connected them to Salvador was by accident. We were walking home along the narrow path that ran behind the fields. The grass on either side was high, brushing our legs as we went. The air smelled of spread winter slurry and distant rain. Salvador was ahead of me, his bag slung over one shoulder. Only the little ones used both straps. The crows were in the field to our right, a great manny of them. Two men. They weren't feeding, they weren't fighting either. They were standing waiting, all facing the same direction, as if looking for a signal. As we passed their heads turned. I swear their heads turned. Not in unison, not perfectly, but with a kind of slow agreement. They fell quietly silent. Salvador slowed. I saw his shoulders tighten.

SPEAKER_02 10:48

Don't he said quietly, though I'd done nothing. Don't what? I asked. He shook his head. Delsey.

SPEAKER_01 10:58

Who? He gave no answer. We walked a few more steps, then he stopped. I knew without knowing how that he was about to go. The air seemed to hold its breath, or that might have been me. The crows stayed silent. Not one of them made a sound. It was as if the field had been at once emptied of noise, leaving only the wind and her breathing. Toto, I said, but without thinking. He looked at me then, properly. There was something in his eyes I hadn't seen before. Not fear exactly. Recognition. I'll be back, he said, and then he was away, standing there, eyes open, body still. The crows moved, not toward him, around him. They lifted, not all at once, but in a series of soft, heavy flaps that sounded like cloth being shaken out. They circled once, twice, low enough that I could hear the air parting around their wings. I wanted to run. I couldn't run. So I counted. One, two, three. By seven my voice had gone thin. By nine I couldn't remember what ten meant. At ten, he blinked. The crows were gone, not flying away or even seen leaving. Gone. The field was empty in the way a room is empty after someone leaves without saying goodbye. He looked at me, and for the first time he didn't smile. They don't like it, he said. Who? He didn't answer. After that, I began to watch for the signs, the crows gathering, the stirless silence before, the way the air seemed to thicken, as if something had been added to it that we couldn't see but felt. The sisters knew. They'd say quietly he's going, and they'd step back. Always the same rule. Don't touch him when he's away. He'd be back before you count to ten. Once he wasn't. It was only for a little longer, twelve perhaps, maybe fifteen, long enough for the count to break. We stood there, a small circle of children around a boy who was not present. And the numbers lost their shape. Keep counting, one of the older sisters said, her voice tight for the first time. We counted past ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen. He returned on fourteen. He staggered slightly, as if catching his balance. Sorry, he said again. Where were you? I asked. He looked past me towards something I couldn't see. It's far out, he said, and that was all. The festival was in the summer. Every town I suppose has one, a day or two of pretending the place is larger and more important than it really is. Stalls, music. A stage set up in a field that smells faintly of cattle even when there are no cattle present. There was a schedule printed and pinned to the notice board. Local talent, children reading, songs. A man who claimed to swallow fire and mostly succeeded. Salvador was on the list. I don't know who put him there, not himself at any rate. One of the sisters, maybe the Moon Tor who thought it would be the making of him. Maybe the town itself, which is a way of drawing people into the open whether they wish it or not, when it wanted to have a good look at them and take them in. He was to read, a short piece, something simple. I remember him standing behind the stage before it was his turn. The summer sun was low, that soft evening light that makes everything look briefly golden and forgiven. The crows were there, not in the field this time, on the roof of the hall behind the stage, on the wires, spilling over and onto the fence. More than I had ever seen in one place before. They made that thick sound, low and constant, like a conversation you aren't meant to hear. Toto, said one of his sisters. He nodded. I'll be back, he said, though nobody last. When his name was called, he walked out onto the stage. There was a small ripple of applause. Grown ups do like to encourage children. It makes them feel kind. He stood at the microphone. He held the paper in both hands. For a moment nothing happened. Then the crows fell silent, completely. The sound cut off as if a door had been closed. The air shifted. You could feel it even in the crowd, a pressure, a waiting. He looked up, nodded us, at something beyond us. He opened his mouth and he went, not gradually, not with warning. He was there, and then he was not. The paper fell from his hands. It drifted down in a slow, ordinary way that felt like an insult. There was a pause, a long one. Someone laughed, uncertain. Someone else said, Ah now. One of the sisters began to count, not with her fingers this time, out loud. One, the sound carried across the field. Two. People shifted. Three. A murmur began. Four. Someone else said his name. Five. The crows didn't move. Six. The air felt wrong. Seven. I realized I was holding my breath. Eight. Her voice was shaking. Nine. She stopped. She didn't say ten. Nobody did. We stood there, a field full of people, looking at the empty space of a small boy on a little wooden stage. Waiting. The crows lifted. All at once. The sound was enormous. A tearing of air. They rose and turned, a black shape folding and unfolding against the sky. For a moment, just a moment, it seemed as though they formed something. Not a pattern you could name. Something that was a bit like a mouth. And then they were gone. They didn't fly away. They were simply no longer there.

SPEAKER_02 18:14

The paper lay on the stage. The microphone hummed. The evening went on.

SPEAKER_01 18:24

People talked about it later, of course. They said he'd run. They said it was a trick. They said he'd been taken. Or they said nothing at all. The sisters couldn't explain what had happened and how it might have been explained. I don't know. The father stood in the doorway of their house for a long time that night, and many nights after, looking out at the road as if expecting someone to return by the usual means.

SPEAKER_02 18:56

He'd call once Toto softly, as if not to startle him. He was never seen again. That's the truth of it. No trace. No body. No explanation. Only the story. And the rule. Which I haven't forgot. Don't touch your monies away. You'll be back before you count to ten. We didn't reach ten.