CONTENT WARNING: butchery and sensory descriptions of gore
Leaves crushed beneath its hooves, as the deer leaned over a fern for a few bites. The air was cool, as the sun inched over the horizon behind it. John placed clicked his release onto the string of his bow, before puling his finger to his lips. K watched him intently, her breathing ceased. Pulling back his arm, John seemed to struggle at first, but once the arms of the bow had bent back, and the wheels which held the bowstring spun one notch over, it seemed to lock into place. John held his breathe, lightly resting his finger on the release. The deer took another step. John placed his index finger onto the trigger of the release, and pressed it down. The bow string collapsed faster than K could see, as she heard the deep resonance as the bowstring returned to its resting position, the air zipping through the air. Hearing a crash, her gaze returned to the deer, as it bolted away.
"Its getting away, daddy!" K said, as her heart raced, and her stomach growled.
"No, it was a good hit; should have a strong trail."
John then placed his bow on the hook behind him he had drilled into the tree. Looking down at K, he began to explain.
"When you hit a deer good, it runs at first. Its got all this uh--adrenaline, makes it wanna bolt. Won't take long for it to bleed out. But we need to wait first, otherwise we'll just scare it deeper into the brush."
"What's adrenaline?" K asked.
John scratched his patchwork beard, as he sighed.
“Something your mother coulda answered better. Its this stuff in your body that makes you excited.”
K imagined a bunch of tiny men inside her body, pushing down on little pumps to make her muscles twitch. She wondered if the little men in the deer were scared. She knew better than to ask her dad further, she knew he wouldn’t know.
“Mommy knew a lot of things.” K said, mostly to herself.
“That she did, K.” John replied, looking out into the distance, as a few droplets of rain pattered against the metal of their tree stand.
Soon, as the sun continued its crawl upward behind the gray of the clouds, the crickets slowed, and the whistling of the birds picked up. For a while, K and John sat in silence, listening to the birds. K kicked her legs restlessly. She tried imagining a field of monsters coming towards the stand, with only her and John able to stop their march towards the town beyond them. In her mind, she pulled out a gun made of sticks, and fired into the crowd of creatures, watching them fall one after the other, before jumping down from the tree, and removing a magic wand from her pocket. She then cast a spell on the remaining monsters, turning them into fairy-dust, which she quickly scooped into her pouch for future spells. She often imagined herself as the hero of the woods, conquering the monsters that came out the darker paths that John always told her they were supposed to avoid.
This distraction did not last long, however, as boredom continued its endless march towards K’s mind. She needed to move, run, climb, anything. She couldn’t keep this up. It felt like it had been years since she last moved. “Is it time to go now?” She eventually asked John.
“Not yet, hon.” John replied.
“Will it be soon?” She asked.
“It’ll be a bit.”
K hated when John was dismissive like that. She wanted a clear answer: how many more minutes, or even hours would they have to wait.
“Can I go walk around down the tree?” K asked, a desperation in her boredom clear in her words as the trickled out of her mouth.
“No, its not safe, hon.”
“But why?”
John sighed, “bad guys could be hiding, and if you’re down there, I won’t be able to get to you in time.”
K exhaled sharply, hoping her John would notice her displeasure. “There’s never any bad guys.” K insisted.
“That’s right—until there is.” John said.
They waited another few minutes, K shutting her eyes hoping to sleep away the time. As she began to drift back into dreams, John shook her awake.
“Don’t sleep. You might fall out of the stand. It wasn’t made for kids your size.”
K snarled “I’m not a little baby anymore, I’m a big kid.”
“That may be so,” John replied, “but even big kids fall out of trees when the stands are made for grownups.”
“How long do we have to wait?”
“Well; should wait at least half-an-hour for the deer to bleed out, and its been about 10 minutes, so I’d say about 20 more minutes.”
“How do you know it hasn’t already been half-an-hour?” K protested.
John smiled beneath his beard, and pointed to the sky.
“The sun moves throughout the day. It always moves at the same speed.” He then pointed down to the ground. “See the shadows? They move with the sun. Shadows are long and point west—means its morning. Overtime, they move just a bit, and by noon, they point north. When you get to be my age, you start to notice how long its been by where the shadows point.”
K scoffed, “I think its been half-an-hour.”
John laughed to himself, “Deer don’t think so, and if we go down before he thinks so, we’re libel to spook him.”
K shot a stream of air upwards towards the strands of hair which hung down her forehead, and crossed her arms. She wanted to move, she didn’t care where.
“Can’t you come down with me? I don’t wanna wait anymore. We don’t need to look for the deer yet.”
John sighed, scratching his chin, “Sorry, hon, we gotta wait. Best you learn patience. I won’t be here forever, and when you need to survive on your own, you’ll need to be used to waiting.”
K became silent, her face solemn. She didn’t like thinking about her father being gone. She missed her mom too much already.
“You don’t have to leave.” K finally said.
“I’ll try my best to be with you as long as I can, but sometime everybody goes.”
“Even me?” K asked.
John looked down at his daughter, placing his hand on her head.
“Sorry to say, even you. That’s why we gotta be careful of bad guys, so you don’t leave too soon.”
He then kissed her on the forehead, and looked back out towards the horizon.
K thought about her mom. She tried to remember her every day so she would never forget her face. She had a thin smile, with brown eyes and hair. Her cheeks were skinny, and her skin was smooth. Not like her father’s, who were full and rough. She was tall, too, twice K’s size! She had little hands like K did, with thin, pointy fingers like spider legs. She had the most beautiful hair. K looked at her father’s hair—all matted and tangled as it was. It smelled too, not like her mom’s hair. She had hair like lavender, and blankets. John’s was like sweat, and leather. She remembered that her mom had crooked teeth, and she used to say that she was glad that K had been born with her father’s teeth, since they didn’t make braces anymore. K didn’t really know what braces were. No matter how they looked though, K thought her mom was the prettiest woman in the world, and she would have done anything to see her again.
K started to cry. When john noticed, he pulled her head into his side.
“Its okay, its okay. What’s wrong, baby?” He asked.
“I miss mommy” she replied.
John turned his body so he could press K’s head into his chest.
“I do too, K, I do too.”
“Will we ever see her again?” K asked.
John thought for a moment, looked K in the eyes, and said, “No. I’m sorry, hon, but we won’t. All we have is what we can remember.”
K squeezed John, as she cried harder.
“Here,” John said, as he scooped K up into his arms, “you can sleep. I’ll hold you so you don’t fall.”
The moment that the words left John’s mouth, K fell asleep.
She dreamed of her mom and the house they used to have on the river before the winter came and took it. She dreamed of the city they lived in when she was barely 4, and the troops that used to beat on her dad. She dreamed of the deer; imagining it with rivulets of crimson gushing out from a gaping hole in its chest, its eyes turned white, and jaws lined with fangs. She dreamed the deer bit into her neck, and killed her.
John shook her awake again.
“Time to go, hon. Let’s get our breakfast.”
K yawned, stretching as much as she could contained in Johns arms.
The two made it down the tree stand, John climbing down the ladder first, followed close behind by K. Once they reached the forest floor, K realized her legs were like pins and needles. She whimpered lightly, as she stomped her leg like her father had showed her. Before long, her leg stopped hurting, and they started their walk.
A thousand steps ahead, John stopped them, and pointed to the ground.
“See K? Nice thick trail.”
Looking down, K saw a splattering of blood like in her dream. Not as much, though.
“That much blood means we probably hit an artery—that’s good. Now, we follow the blood trail to the deer.”
K followed close behind John, as he looked along the ground, only occasionally looking up to make sure he wasn’t walking into a tree. K always found the search exciting, because that meant it would be time to eat soon. John always field dressed the deer quick, and once they would make it back home, he’d butcher it just as quick. That first day with a new deer, he always cooked backstraps, and smoked the rest in the hut by the cabin. After a few weeks, K would always get sick of the smoked deer, but on the first day, the backstraps were always delicious. John would make it with salt he took from bay water, and would grind up the peppers he grew in the garden. He called it barbecue, but K didn’t really know what that meant.
Before long, John stopped them, and cheered.
“We got it, baby, look!! Its a 10 pointer!”
K was happy to see her dad so excited, but she always hated seeing the bodies of the deer once they found it. They always looked so sad.
John held the deer’s head up by the antlers, and showed K. He looked proud, but K didn’t wanna look at the deer anymore.
Taking out his knife, John sliced down the deer’s gut, moving quickly and carefully. He didn’t put the knife all the way in, only the tip, and slid it down the fur. As soon as he did, the deer’s gut fell out of its body, the sound of air exhaling out of the newly opened cavity. The flesh squelched as John gently removed the guts, before yanking hard, tearing out the rest once the guts were emptied. He then cut into its neck. A little red tube was visible, before he reached back into the cavity, and pulled out its lungs and heart. He then put the lungs and heart into a pouch he kept on his side, and slung the deer over his shoulder.
“Alright, lets get home and get cooking.” He said.
As K and John walked back through the woods towards home, K looked up into the tree tops. She watched as the branches swayed, the leaves gently falling to the surface. The rain picked up, droplets coating K’s face as she looked up. She liked the feeling of the cold rain on her face, especially when she had been walking. The birds sang out through the treeline, as squirrels danced between the branches. In the distance, K heard a few trees breathing, as their bark crackled under their weight, before she heard a distant crash. She knew a tree had fallen.
Soon, they had made it back to their cabin. It was small, made out of wood that John had collected 4 half a year prior. They hadn’t lived in the cabin for long, and K knew that once they got through fall and winter, they’d be back on the road. She wished they could just stay in the cabin.
As K went inside the cabin, and got out of her dirty camouflage coat, and muddy boots, John got to work butchering the deer. Within an hour, he was finished, and had hung most of the meet, lungs, and heart to dry in the smoker, bringing the backstraps back inside to cook.
Starting a fire in the hearth, John coated his iron pan with butter he made from the goats milk he got from the town. He then coated the backstraps in the bay salt and dried chilies, before putting them in the iron pan. It sizzled loudly, as smoke pooled up and out the hearth. The smell made K’s stomach growl even louder. After a few minutes of cooking, John pulled out the meat, and sliced it thin, before putting it on a wooden plate, and taking it to their table.
K and John ate quickly, the desperate hunger keeping them from savoring the taste. This had been their first deer in months, and for a while, they’d been living off squirrels and morning doves. But eating deer, with the knowledge that there were pounds and pounds more smoking away, made K relax knowing the next few weeks of fall would be nice. But come winter, she knew that they’d need a lot more deer if they were gonna avoid ending up like her mom.
Prev. Next