Stories

Intervention

Samuel W. Newby

 

            They were all there to bury someone. A few of them had come farther than the others. Not everyone came and there were those who came that were already there. Nonetheless, together they would lie to rest a wife, a mother, a family member. It was to be a private family burial at noon. They would surrender her in the family cemetery that was situated in eastern part of Roger’s spread under a few elm trees. His father and mother were buried there among a small host of relatives.

            Behind the blue light, across from the brewing kitchen in the stale front room, Joshua knelt watching the shape shifting rainwater streak the window panes. The soft conversations taking place in various rooms were distilled by the protrusion of his interest upon the dynamic relationship between gravity and water.

            The pink shades of a face appeared in the reflection of the glass intruding into his space the presence of another. One he was trying to ignore, his grandfather, who sat alone on the other side of the room. Why wasn’t he talking to anyone? They had been there all morning and he’d hardly spoken a word. Was he asleep? Did he find her, his wife that is, dead? Were her eyes open? Did he cry?

            He was gratefully relieved to learn the coffin was not at the house and would, in fact, not arrive there until tomorrow morning just before the funeral. He had dreaded the prospect of sharing a house with a dead person at night.

            The echoes of an automated laugh track caught his attention from a television down the hall. The noise was coming from the recreation room where his cousins were. He came into the room not to see them but because he remembered the huge, ivory longhorns mounted above the mantle were in there and they were among only a few other items, a stabilizing sight in the mostly cold, peculiar house.

            The whole of his cousins or ‘the kids’ as they were referred to were in there, amiably detached from the dominating pathos elsewhere in the three bedroom ranch house.

            “Hey, Josh.” Sarah said, sitting on the couch next to Kate and Ellie. The three were late high school aged and shared interest in cosmetics and third party conversations. Everything he knew about teen age girls, he’d learned from them. Ransom and Randy his second cousins and fraternal twins sat at the foot of the couch with their backs to him. They were represented by baseball caps and baggy t-shirts with messages on them that he made it a point to memorize in case it would ever come up. They were loud and did not feel as important to him as the others.

            “Hey.” Joshua responded backing out into the hallway. He always felt little when they were all together; it was better one at a time or in pairs. He had no brothers or sisters. Family gatherings, whatever their nature, were in opportune time to learn about people and what he was supposed to be like.

            The kitchen was being employed by various aunts and female relatives, scraping and sorting, washing and drying all in a peculiar manner that seemed to him to be entirely put on. They had been doing this all morning and he was sure by now every pot, pan and plate had been bathed twice. They ran cotton cloths along the faded linoleum over and over. What were they talking about and how could they communicate so seamlessly without looking up at each other, their voices so quiet.

            “Hey, babe, his mother said with her back to him, sorting coffee cups in a high cabinet. “You hungry yet?”

            “Uh, no, I’m…no.” He said.

            The kitchen opened to an informal dining room where most of the men sat around the table cradling glassware and looking out in different directions.

            “All right, well, the kids are all in the rec room watching T.V.” She said.

            He was listening to his aunts: Dawn and Genevieve as they discussed something about Robert and alcohol and cold turkeys. He looked over at Robert the only one engaged in conversation; he was talking to Joshua’s father, Walter. Joshua hadn’t seen Robert in several years.

            “Okay, mom.” He said, passing through the maze of women in tan pants and long skirts. There was an empty chair next to Robert at the table. The intimidation of the men was reduced by his sincere conviction that they did not take him seriously. He pulled the brown oak chair out and plopped down onto it. Steven, Roger’s only son, sat next to him. Joshua nodded his head at him as he pulled the chair up. Steven attempted to smile at him but it came out more like an expression of concern. This made him very uncomfortable; looking across the table he found his dad and watched him closely. The movement of his adam’s apple was intriguing. He passed a hand across his own larynx; the smooth skin was comforting; the angular bump seemed smallish though.

            He began to hum in a low pitch, examining the vibrations, thinking perhaps this would cause it to grow. Maybe that’s how it grew, by talking; that would explain how Joey Simone, who was always talking in class, had such a large one, adam’s apple, that is. Humming might get the job done faster, a type of cheating. In his excitement, he looked up to find he had managed to capture the attention of all those present at the table. His embarrassment was usurped by the odd feeling of togetherness that the situation created. Was this what family unity felt like? A kind of shared awkwardness? The sensation was so strong he smiled nervously at which point they, the men, dismissed their attentions from him leaving him again in the disjointed fabric of their long silences and occasional exchanges of facial expressions.

            “So, Unlce Robert, I hear you’re quitting cold turkeys.” The pubescent boy began garnering again the table’s attention including a now wide-eyed father. “Are they bad for you or something?” Robert looked up at the ceiling and down again at the table. His father shot a menacing look into the kitchen where the women, oblivious to them, were still shifting and straightening various items. “Not exactly, Joshua.” Robert responded.

            They were interrupted though by the doorbell which brought Roger’s brother George and his wife George Ann to the party. George Ann came across the threshold dripping, carrying a bouquet of assorted wild flowers wrapped in wet cellophane. George emerged a moment later fumbling to bring an open umbrella through the door. Roger stood up and walked through the parade of salutations and down the hall into his bedroom closing the door behind him. They all paused for a moment and then continued to greet one another.

            “Where are them kids?” George asked.

            “Probably watching T.V.” George Ann said.

            “You guessed it.” Anita answered. Anita was the daughter in law of George and George Ann. She took it upon herself to carry the burden of the social weight at these family events; always asking questions in a high pitch that were understood to be directions for everybody else.

            “Well, ladies, should we start dinner while we let them visit?” Anita asked. They slowly shuffled back into the kitchen and dining room. Joshua wondered how he was related to his grandfather’s brother. Was he a great uncle or a cousin? He remained in the front room, studying the room’s antiquated arrangements. He kept feeling like it was Thanksgiving or Christmas; he was not used to being there apart from holidays. Nor was he used to everybody being in the house together. They were usually scattered across the farm on chores with Roger or walking down to the horse pastures to watch them graze.

            The rain had insulated their activities and the absence of his grandmother was so very strange. Her soft, easy eyes and gentleness were the hinges of these family gatherings. They were like lost dogs he thought as he studied the portraits of family members from a range of decades. He stopped at a picture of him with his parents. Where did they get that sweater he was wearing, he didn’t remember it all? Was he ever that young?  He came across what must have been his grandparents when they were much younger. His grandfather’s hair was so black. She was, well, so good looking. Weird.

            There was one photo where they were all together. There at the ranch, the picture was taken after a Thanksgiving meal. He could remember the day vaguely, five or six years ago. One of the blue heelers ran in front of them just as the shot was taken. The weight of the picture forced him backwards nearly tripping him on a cluttered stack of magazines. Why were they never all together like that? Why did he feel so badly about it? The more he thought about it, the more he realize each face in the photo represented part of what he had in life and the thought of that not staying the same was more than he thought he could bear.

            The clanging of pots and the sounds of chopping and unwrapping grew louder from the kitchen. Rich, familiar smells began to pervade the front of the house. Joshua began to think about night fishing for catfish down in the pond. They would go out under the starlight chasing fireflies along a dirt path until they reached the slope that led down to the water. Occasionally, a loose heifer would appear from out of nowhere, startling them with its lonesome crying. He always thought it sounded like they were mourning the loss of something, but he could never figure out what.

            Between the lurching of bullfrogs and the frenzy of a catch he would watch for shooting stars and occasionally attempt to count the ones he saw until their vastness undermined his security. Then he’d fake the howl of a coyote to scare the others, always earning the twin’s rebuke. They would fish until the girls got bored and he never really caught much, but he would always manage to be the first one into the barn so he could have the tan pole with the silver reel. One day, a couple of years ago, he had raised a big scene protesting their departure and his parents had more or less written him off to his pity, but Ellie, his grandmother had gone and fetched that pole. She brought it to him and said as long as this pole was here; he would have a reason for his parents to bring him back. It made sense to him and he left justified.

            Maybe they could fish tonight he thought; if the rain stops. He ran back to the bedroom where he and his parent’s bags were and started rustling through his for a pocketknife. There was a tapping on the door, he turned to look. Nothing. “Daddy” A female voice petitioned. “Daddy, are you in there?” It was his mother Elise at Roger’s bedroom door. Joshua turned to listen.

            “Daddy, we’re about to eat, won’t you come out and join us?” Her voice sounded weak, almost desperate. He had never heard her sound like that before. “Daddy, please?”

What is wrong with him? Why won’t he answer her, he wondered. Maybe he’s not a safe man after all.

            “Joshua.” She exclaimed visibly surprised as she came into the bedroom. “What….what are you doing in here?” Her eyes had wrinkles under them, they looked glossy. “Looking for my pocketknife.” He said. “Oh, okay, well, supper will be ready shortly. Go and wash up, okay.” She said. “Okay.” He said.

            He was relieved to leave the room though he felt like he should have said something; he just had no idea what. Should he tell her it’s going to be okay? He’d heard people say things like that before. Should he tell her he loved her? He did; she might think he was up to something though. Oh well he thought, turning back into the room he said: “Mom, I love you.” Walking over to him, she put her arms down around his shoulders and squeezed hard telling him she loved him too. He felt the vibrations of her body as she cried.

            He had no idea what that was about, but he felt bigger doing it, like someone people could need.

            George Ann and Genevieve were facing each other on the couch in the front room speaking quietly. Joshua sat down in the chair opposite them pretending not to listen. George Ann’s face was a deep red and she fumbled with a deteriorated tissue as she spoke to her. “I don’t know, sweetie, I don’t know” he heard her say. “Sometimes I don’t think they ever will. I can’t make him.”

            “I know, I know.” Genevieve said. “We’ll just keep praying.” What were they talking about? Make who do what? He knew there was something between Grandpa and George, but he couldn’t figure it out. His parents would never tell him and none of the cousins even cared.

            George Ann began to cry loudly, but muffled the noise immediately. What in the world is going on he thought. He walked out of there into the hall incensed. Why wouldn’t anybody tell him anything? What happened? Did he do something wrong? Obviously, Grandma had died, but that wasn’t it, there was more, he knew it, he could sense it but there were no words. No language for the unrest being transferred from one room to another. Anita’s shrill voice came ringing down the hall from the kitchen, “Come get it! Time to eat. Kids? Roger? Come and eat!”

            Eating was the last thing he wanted to do much less be with everybody.  He wanted to leave and he felt badly about this. The kids came like zombies down the hall, dazed from hours in front of the television. Roger came too, slowly into the kitchen. There they all stood in the kitchen and around the table holding their plates. Joshua looked up and around enraged. Why was everybody pretending to be okay? It’s not okay. We’re not okay, he thought.

            “Who wants to say grace?” Anita chimed in.

            Joshua could no longer contain himself. “Grace? Grace? Who wants to say grace? Who wants to say hello? Who wants to say I’m sorry? Why is no one talking to each other? What’s wrong with everybody!”  He screamed throwing his plate down onto the tile floor, dashing it to pieces, sending shards of glass across the floor and onto the shoes of family members aghast at his behavior. He burst into tears and ran out the back door.

            “Walter.” His mother said to his father. “Do something.”

            “No,” George interrupted. “Leave him be”

            Joshua ran through the downpour as far as he could, his shoes sloshing, coming at last to the barn. He pushed back the heavy gate a couple of feet and came inside trembling. He went down to the far side where all the fishing poles were in a couple of buckets. Reaching down he pulled out his tan rod. He sank down onto the cold concrete flooring and slowly turned the reel.

~        

            The ground was damp beneath their feet as the family convened in the eastern pasture for Ellie’s funeral. A sheer blue sky presided over their ceremonies. Joshua pulled at his tie and adjusted his collar with one hand while he held his mother’s with the other. Some of the girls cried and Anita passed tissues out among the group. They all stood behind Roger who kept one hand on the casket as Walter read from the book of John. After he finished, they all sang together. Joshua wondered how they knew which song to sing and attempted to follow along.

 

 

We Claim Our Own

 

   Samuel W. Newby

 

Ellie danced in Roger’s dreams. Danced in the daylight and in shadows, from a distance he could never breach. As he watched, aching, the flowery summer dress circled her, twirling, wrapping, falling about her calves harmoniously; grace and motion her subjects and she his cauliflower queen. He had first called her that the summer before they married, playfully, as she washed vegetables in the sink. He had called her that last two weeks before as she died.

The kids came back to the farm for a private burial on the land Roger had inherited from his father.  Though their offers to stay were many, Roger declined and said little of anything. A painful silence the family bore in bewilderment.  

~~

George wiped the sweat from his forehead slowly as he looked out onto the plains. Ten acres rolled out into hills, pastures divided by ribbons of barbed wire as far as he could see. Thickets of large trees flagged the landscape; shadows fell about them onto the dust, worn by cattle resting in the cool.

            He watched a zephyr gently pursuing the golden headed grain fields.  Lightly kicking the dirt, he heard an engine humming in the distance. A gravel road wound a couple of miles along the western part of his land. After a minute or two, he could see a stream of rising dust and then a truck.

            Moving through the gate and over the cattle guard, two large blue heelers came bounding toward him barking sporadically. They came about two hundred yards from their dugout coup next to the back door. The sound of gravel churning under rubber grew louder as he walked up the yard.

            Evan pulled an old, blue Chevy up to the edge of the drive and got out. He looked down inquisitively at the worn tires scratching a shaggy brown mat of hair. Heavy set but not obese, his broad shoulders stood, not slumped on his large body. An old flannel shirt held his flesh in one place. He owned a large farm a couple of miles north and besides Roger was the only other landowner in the area.

            As he walked toward George, the hounds met him first, tongues and tails in full array. He dropped a hand to be investigated by the pups, otherwise ignoring them as he continued toward the old neighbor.

            “Well, he yours?” George started as the two reached each other in the yard.

            “Don’t know. Don’t think so.”

            Evan studied the horizon as George stared into the grass. Minutes passed before Evan began again: “It’s one of our bulls.” His words came out slowly. “Well. Hmm. Roger coming?”

            “Supposed to.”

“Hmm. How’s Roger handling everything?” Evan asked.

“I haven’t spoken to my brother in over four years.” George responded

“Well, I know that, hell, the whole county knows that. I just thought with Ellie passing, things would have changed.”       

            Nothing was said for a matter of minutes.

 

            .

            “Yeah, well this is gonna be some chore, getting this bull.” George stated.

            “ Shouldn’t be that bad?”

            “Yeah, you’d think. But this bull’s got himself holed up in an odd spot. It’s going to take all of us to get him out.  There’s a little pasture in one of the corners of my land, backs right up to Roger’s spread.  I can’t really get into it except on foot.”

“How’s that?”

 “Well, I got a brook that cuts across it and just beyond it is a thick clump of old pines that kind of form a natural barrier.  I can’t get a truck into there, so I never used it for nothing. But, a crop of gophers got the pasture so torn up, even if I could finagle a horse into there, which I can’t, he’d be liable to break his legs in those holes,” he said as he continued to pull ropes off the wall and lay them at Bob’s feet. Leader ropes, four stranded nylon rope, braided ropes.

            “Oh hell,” Evan moaned. “Look, he’s not mine, I’m pretty sure.”

            “How do you know for certain?”

            “I only have six and…”

            “And how do you know it’s not one of your ranch hands…” George quipped, pointing in the direction of Evan’s land. “…and why didn’t you bring any of those hands with you?”

            “I got them all on a project, picking up equipment upstate.”

            The thud of a closing door interrupted them and Evan stepped out to see Roger looking out from under an old ball cap for the men. Spotting Evan, he descended toward them.

           

             Evan began to pick up the ropes eying George carefully. George reached for a pair of gloves, looked around in dissatisfaction and headed toward the door. Roger joined them as the door was being shut.     

             They stood there for some time, each waiting for the other to say something.

            Roger scratched a reddish grey beard, long since forsaken of a razor. He had come after receiving half a dozen messages about the loose bull. He wore a denim shirt open to a black t-shirt. He sunk soiled hands into his jean pockets, exhaling quietly.

            “How’s your crops coming, Evan?” George asked.

            Evan waited a few moments before answering: “It’s coming.” he said giving George an expression of curiosity and disdain.

            Broad strips of clouds streaked the pale blue October sky. The three men stood there captive to the silence.

            “Roger, I was sorry to hear about your wife” Evan said quietly.

            The men, neglecting to make eye contact, stood there in the wake of the comment.

            Evan studied the earth, holding the ropes, shifting.

            “So, you got one of our bull’s running around on your land, that the story?” Roger asked finally.

            “Looks like it, you missing any?” George asked.

            Roger shrugged and mumbled that he wasn’t sure.

            The men slowly made their way up to the driveway filling Roger in on where the bull was located and why they couldn’t just use their trucks to lead him up.

            “Look,” Evan began, “what are we talking about? Roping a bull? I didn’t come here to rope a bull, the three of us can’t do that. And what are we going to do if we get him out of there?”

            George leaned up against the hood of his truck fishing in his shirt pocket for a toothpick which he speared between his teeth.

            “I dropped a cattle trailer off down there about an hour ago.  I’m thinking we’ll chase him out of there and grab him with the truck and lead him into the trailer. Get him back to one of your pens.”

            They proceeded to climb into George’s truck. They sat there for a moment, affected by the strangeness of being in a truck with other men. The truck started, the low rumble of the diesel engine vibrated the cab as they made their way along a dirt road down into the eastern portion of the land.

            The men jerked up and down as the earth gave and took from the path at various points. Roger watched the wobbling knees of a calf as its mother licked its head. A flock of vultures circled to the west of them about a hundred feet up in a counterclockwise direction.

            When they reached the point where the trail ended and the grass began, George hopped out and walked over to the cattle trailer. He unlatched the gate and flung it open. Wands of light bled through the windows into the darkness of the trailer. A bed of hay and some hooks on the walls were all they illuminated.

He walked back and pulled the rope out of the bed of the truck.      .

            Evan grunted, climbing down reluctantly from the cab. His matted hair moved with a light breeze. He looked down on the brook and up at the great, thick pines with squinting eyes.     

            The three men walked into the shadow of the old trees, their silhouettes sinking like sunsets as they scaled down the bank of the brook.

            Coming up the other side, they moved into the thicket of trees coming out at last into the insular pasture. They came into the grass, overgrown, looming at their waist. A configuration of dead oak trees stood forebodingly just beyond the fencing like giant decaying statues in the wake of some building long since gone.

            They barely noticed these things as their attentions were fixated under the frightful spell of the massive Angus bull that stood and faced them just a hundred feet ahead. His pitch black coat swam as the sun caught it. His Herculean head, raised in fierce majesty, rested at an easy six feet off the ground. As he took two steps forward, it appeared that he was sheer muscle, the very symmetry of brawn; moving with the coiled ferocity of a tiger in the body of some mythical animal.

            He was, in fact, the largest bull they had ever seen.

            The men stood before it with a strange sense of fear and wonder.

            “Dammit.” Roger mumbled.

            “That’s yours?” Evan asked wide eyed. “That’s some bull”

            No sooner had Evan finished his sentence then the bull, poised in a vigilant watch, began to sway slowly from side to side.

            The men froze, their faces like portraits, watching as the bull picked his dark hoof up and smashed into the earth, repeating this action in a sublime rhythm.

            The beast jerked its head up and began his initial assault, a violent rush right toward the men.      

            For a second, they remained there, in the cold grip of shock watching as midnight closed in on them.

            Then they ran. George first, dashing to the right and into the pine trees behind him. Evan followed closely behind him. Roger waited a moment longer then ran left along the land’s edge and into the wooden sanctuary. He looked out to see the bull turning in circles where the men had stood seconds before.

            Standing in the midst of the trees, George handed Evan two ropes and worked with one he was holding.

            “Give one to Roger. I’m gonna come up from behind him” he said as he jogged away the opposite direction.            .

            The violent, hallow snorting of the bull startled Evan as he looked through the matrix of pine trees for Roger who was slowly making his way over to Evan, cutting further back and angling toward him.

            Evan slung the ropes around his shoulder and watched the beast as it sniffed the earth around the forested border. Roger emerged over the sound of pinecones cracking, raising his eyebrows as he reached out to Evan for a rope.

            “This is a joke.” Evan said frustrated.

            The shrill pitch of the exhaling bull interrupted them. They turned to see half his torso protruding from the trees, the other half lost in their girth.

            “Come on.” Roger instructed running toward the pasture. “He’s headed out, let’s find George and get to the truck.

            Standing in the middle of the pasture, George motioned the men over to him as they emerged.

            “We got a bird’s eye view of the eastern range from here; let’s wait and see what direction he takes.” George said as Evan breathed heavily, his hands on his hips.

            Ten minutes passed without a sign of the bull.          

            “Guess we missed her, C’mon let’s…” George began

            But his words fell to the ground as the bull came shooting out of the woods like a bat out of hell.

            Again the men split, this time in three different directions. Roger ran back toward the fencing and to his right, Robert went the same way in the opposite direction. George sprinted out to the left and came back behind the animal.

            He came directly up behind the bull, out of its eyesight, and threw a lead that arched perfectly over the bulky terrain onto its thick neck. Surprised at his aim, George dug his heels into the ground and heaved back zealously.

            Roger and Evan came in on him quickly to stabilize the effort. Feeling the cold sting of the noose, the bull turned and jerked its head up, flipping its body around to pursue George. As he was in this action, Evan’s lead found its way right on top of George’s. Now pulled in the opposite direction, the black cow paused in an idle confusion. Roger’s threw a lasso that grazed down the bull’s face.

            “Damn.” he erupted, retracting the lead. He fumbled with it, reopening the noose and made another attempt. Missing again, he opened the noose even wider and running up to within ten feet of him he was able to get the final rope around him.

            There was a brief conference of intentions as they decided to lead him back to the pine trees where they could at least tie the lines to the trunks and slowly work him out.

            “That’s it, steady…” Roger said as he moved to his right, coaxing the animal.

            George backed up slowly, veering left to maintain the rope’s tension.         

            As the bull took a few steps forward, they tightened their grips.

            “Easy,” Roger commanded.

            They managed to start moving away from the fencing and gaining momentum led him carefully across the pasture, employing a triangle of precise movement..

            The bull’s mighty shoulders eased up and down as they went. They watched him fearfully like children in the midst of some forbidden activity.

            Suddenly, the silence was split by the sharp barks and growling of the blue heelers as they bounded into the clearing.

            “Get them out of here,” Roger snapped at George.

            “Sampson, Jake, Go home, Get!” George ordered as the dogs began running circles around the behemoth bovine.

            Whether the bull had up this point been in compliance with the men or merely entertaining their efforts, they now would never know.

            As one of the dogs came around the bull’s backside, nipping, he caught the flesh of one of his legs.         

            The bull shot his hind legs out barely missing the menacing hound, thrusting all his weight forward. Pushing back, he bucked up taking all of himself into the air. As he landed he swung all his weight to the left whipping Evan with him violently. He caught his left foot in a hole and came slamming down hard. The rope whipped out of his hand as the bull continued to buck and thrust in greater force.

            The dogs retreated at the fury of the bull.

            “Evan?” George shouted.

            Evan attempted to stand, but fell down quickly with a loud cry.

            George raced through the tall grass over to Evan.

            Writhing on his back, Evan sank his teeth into his lower lip.

            The bull gave the earth hell as Roger dodged his path meanwhile entertaining a distant memory. He pictured Ellie, wrapped in a faded, pink night gown, laying on the couch. She was cradling Steven, their first child, the day after his birth. The light from her eyes danced before him. “You wanna hold him?” She asked gently, smiling.    

            “No!!” Roger screamed as he began jerking the rope in a blind fury. “C’mon!.” 

            The specimen, fourteen hundred pounds of sheer will, barely felt Roger’s labor of wrath.

            Meanwhile, Evan slung a clumsy arm around George as he pulled him up and crutched him back toward the truck. His ankle was broken. He had no illusions about this.

            “What’s he doing?” Evan asked perplexed as he looked back over his shoulder.

            “I don’t know. He doesn’t know when to quit.”

            “Huh, what’s that like?”

            As they came to the brook Evan moved away, “I got it from here. Go fetch Roger.”

            George pretended not to hear him, reaching for Evan’s arm again.

            “I said I got it.” Evan barked

            “He’s can take care of himself.”

            “He can? Well, good, suppose we all can. Even them kids of his that you’re so hacked off at him for not talking to.”

            “Who do you think you are,” George growled, seizing Evan’s shoulders. “Stay out of this!”

            Evan pushed George off him.

            “You think no one knows what this is all about? No one knows that ya’ll aren’t talking because of some land dispute. About some argument over your daddy’s will?”

            “You don’t understand!” George snapped.

            “Damn right I don’t!”

            George backed away slowly, an expression of shame running down his countenance.

            Roger maintained a cautious distance from the bull’s path of destruction, looking for a break in his movement to capitalize on. From the corner of his eye he could see George racing up to him. He turned the other direction and did not see George as he speedily took one of the free lines and began to pull in tow with Roger.

            “Let go!” George screamed.

            “Me? You let go! This is my property.”

            The bull began to back up forcing them to choke up on their ropes. Fighting for every inch, they found themselves being pulled closer to the bull.

            “Why aren’t you talking to them?” George screamed over the tension.

            Roger ignored him as they both feigned not to heed the terror of their predicament.

            “You think you’re the only one that’s lost something.” George shouted.

            Roger released his grip, sinking backwards into the grass. The loss of tension catapulted George off his feet backward, he flailed his arms as he became horizontal in mid air.

            The sable bull turned abruptly toward the fencing and sprang over it into Roger’s property. He caught his hind legs on the top wire and shook them free with little effort.

            A splotchy harvest moon had moved into the expanse of sky. George studied it lying on his back. From his knees, Roger watched as the dark outline of the animal grew smaller and smaller.

            “Roger, you remember