BooksBarbecue
Back The Harpy Save as PDF
Chapters (52)
  1. The Harpy
  2. Also by Megan Hunter
  3. Title Page
  4. Copyright
  5. Dedication
  6. Epigraph
  7. The Harpy
  8. Part I
  9. 1
  10. 2
  11. 3
  12. 4
  13. 5
  14. 6
  15. 7
  16. 8
  17. 9
  18. 10
  19. 11
  20. 12
  21. 13
  22. 14
  23. 15
  24. 16
  25. 17
  26. 18
  27. Part II
  28. 19
  29. 20
  30. 21
  31. 22
  32. 23
  33. 24
  34. 25
  35. Part III
  36. 26
  37. 27
  38. 28
  39. 29
  40. 30
  41. 31
  42. 32
  43. 33
  44. 34
  45. 35
  46. 36
  47. 37
  48. 38
  49. 39
  50. Part IV
  51. Acknowledgments
  52. Back Cover

As I left the room, I lifted my phone from my back pocket. I would delete the message before there was any risk of Jake seeing it and getting angry. It would be gone, not-­happening just as quickly as the email I sent had happened; momentous decisions, whole lives altered by a tap, something barely more than a twitch.

I went straight to the kitchen, bathed myself in the cool beam of the fridge light. Upstairs, I could hear Jake reading to Paddy in our bedroom, his voice a single, steady noise. I reached in for a bowl covered by a plate, something else wrapped in clingfilm. Lately, I’d been having an extra supper, leftovers, scraps eaten standing up, without cutlery, taste after taste pushed into my mouth.

This was a new kind of hunger, the kind that made me hold a wedge of cheese in my hands and chew its sides, like an apple. I went through every bowl of leftovers in the fridge, spooning whole cresting waves of tuna mayonnaise straight down my throat. Just as my mind had quickened, so had my mouth, it seemed, my neck, my entire digestive system. I was always empty, these days, a completely open space, waiting to be filled.

~

As a child, I once made the mistake of telling someone. Wings, I mentioned. A woman.

Ah, the other person said, their voice only lightly mocking. A guardian angel!

On the news one day: a skeleton with wings. Proof, people said. Of angels, or something else. But it turned out to be butchery, rather than miracle. Chickens, fingers working in a dark shed, making the dead into something else, trying to make them rise.

~

28

28

It was Paddy’s birthday in a few weeks, towering up against me, despite everything, a distant monument, its details hidden from view. A big party would be difficult to afford, but seemed unavoidable; how else would we keep him happy, prevent him from being an outcast? I’d sent the invitations before the end of term, hoping the Easter holidays would mean that most of them couldn’t come. It had become normal to invite the whole class, at least thirty children, to hire a hall, an entertainer. Enjoyment did not seem to be the purpose of these events; children were often skittish and anxious, parents exhausted at best, traumatized at worst, handing out recycled-­paper treat bags with shaking hands.