Beware of Flight Attendant

by Cactus Moloney

  Salty’s wagging appendage was bedeviled by two-foot length strands of fur that knocked every full glass of wine, juice and milk off the coffee table. Stains covered the living room carpet from his wagging eagerness. His shaggy tail would swish past Betsy’s cacti plants, collecting a spiked succulent to form a swinging barbed medieval flail. Detailed thousand-piece puzzles were a thing of the past, between Blake’s grabby fingers, and Salty Dog’s furry tail madness.

  The dog’s fate became a Disney’s Lady and the Tramp scenario. Salty Dog took a backseat after two babies were born within a several years of one another. Literally, he rode in the back of the pickup truck.

  “Get off the couch Salty!” Her husband Jared shouted, showing his irritation by scrunching his dark eyebrows together.

  “He isn’t hurting anyone,” Betsy would defend the dog.

  Jared would hold his angry glare, while raising his voice, and changing his irritable focus to the messy house.

  “Look at the hair on the couch,” he would pinch a clump of white fur between his fingers, holding it up for her to view. “It’s everywhere. That dog could jump on the baby. Keep him off the couch. You need to vacuum the house. Disgusting. Fur is going to end up in your cakes and you’ll get sued.”

  Salty Dog was fed a grain-free diet, one and a half cups twice a day, so he didn’t itch from his wheat allergy. The sound of the dog tags clanking and tinkling together when the dog itched drove Jared mad.

  Jared worked two weeks on shift on an oilrig in the icy waters of the Cook Inlet, Alaska—rotating two weeks at home. When he was home, he mostly played with his friends; fishing for salmon and halibut all summer, hunting for moose and bear in the fall, heading to the Caribou Hills to ride snow machines during the winter. It was probably best he went away to do his drinking. Best he was not around the kids, as far as she was concerned. Betsy led a lonely, busy life.

  The same week she had decided to leave Alaska—to leave Jared—Salty Dog joined Betsy and the kids for his final ski. The dog bounded ahead. She noticed he had spotted something off the trail and went to investigate. Betsy’s skis came to a sliding stop; the sound of the friction on the squeaky snow and her heavy breathing quieted. Silence. No birds. No motors. Even the shimmering snow falling from a branch was dampened. She saw movement to her right and caught a glimpse of his gray fur bobbing in the deep snow.

  Slam!

  It was the sound of an animal traps icy metal jaws clamping shut. Followed by sound of her dog’s silent struggle howling through the winter wonderland.

  Betsy had Clarabelle strapped to her chest. Blake was sitting in the sled. Her breath quickened as she unhooked the harness strap around her waist, with her quivering, fleece-gloved hands. She stepped her skis off the musher track into the four-foot-deep white powder, sinking down into the snow she held her daughter’s head with one hand, struggling to move deeper.

  Betsy could see Salty grappling against the trap ten feet away. She gradually started breaking a trail towards her trapped friend. The dog had started to slow his struggle by the time she arrived. One agonizing minute felt multiplied by ten. It was his last minute; during which he flipped and flopped and twisted in harrowing pain. She reached down to investigate the conibear traps claws, gruesomely digging its spiked jaws into Salty’s neck and head. Clarabelle’s neck noodled, jouncing against the baby carrier, as Betsy struggled to free the dog.

  “Salty, I’m here baby,” she could feel warm salty tears freezing to her face.

  She tried to pull the bloodied trap apart with her gloved hands, but it wouldn’t budge. Salty’s body stopped moving. He lay still. She petted his warm fur with her gloved hand.

  “No, this isn’t happening.” She whispered into the snow muffled silence.

  She kneeled in the frost next to his body, taking her gloves off, she attempted to pry the trap open with her bare hands. Her sunglasses fogged from her labored breathing; the moisture from her tears and the snot dripping from her nose. She threw the steamed glasses into the snow. Betsy looked for a spring release or for any button that might loosen the traps death grip. Clarabelle began to cry from all the rough jarring movements her mom was making.

  “Mama, come bac'!” Blake screamed out to her.

  She turned to see him through her blurred eyes; he was standing in the red sled looking her way. She started packing the trail down by taking extended strides with her skis towards him, holding Clarabelle tightly to her chest. When she returned to Blake, she took Clarabelle out of the front carrier and laid her flat on her back atop the sled. The baby wore a warm, blue down snowsuit with fur trim lining her doll face; a Blake hand-me-down. Her daughter would be warm enough.

  “Blake, Salty Dog has been hurt by an animal trap and he has died,” she sniffled, and then asked her three-year-old, “Do you understand?”

  “What happen to Swalty?” he asked furrowing his brow with worry, the spitting image of his father.

  “I’m going to get him, and you need to be a big boy and take care of your sister while I’m gone. Can you do that Blake?”

  He nodded his small head with astute understanding.

  She was much quicker returning to her dead dog, after the snowy path had been packed down, and with no baby in her arms. She pulled the trap from the frozen ground and attempted to lift the lifeless animal. Quickly realizing she couldn’t lift his dead weight. She dragged Salty’s body, holding him by his hind legs through the snow, making a bloody trail across the white, but he was too heavy. She dropped his body. Panting from the exertion, she retreated to her waiting children, her breath fogging the air.

  “Blake, sit in the snow and hold Clarabelle in your lap until I return.”

  She pulled the red sled over to Salty Dog, lifting and dragging his quickly cooling body onto the plastic toy. His disfigured face had frozen into an anguished snarl. Blood poured from the jagged wounds around his crown and throat. The red ice was freezing to the trap. She was willing to suffer the monetary fine, a consequence of illegally removing the legal trap. She couldn’t leave him out in the forest for the wolves to eat.

  "Fuck you, trapper!" She screamed, huffing and puffing for momentum to drag the dead dog onto the sled.

  Latching the sled to her waist strap, she pulled the dog back to her frightened children. She took off her jacket to cover her friend, hiding the dog’s punctured body from her son. Then she lifted Clarabelle from Blake’s slight arms and slipped her into the front carrier.

  “Blake, hop on the sled with Salty Dog.”

  GOING TO THE DOGS

  6 Derek Beeman

  “Folks call me Derek Beeman,” the statuesque man said with his hand extended, while standing in front of the mirrored back drop of the bar, reflecting his new designer travel apparel.

  He spoke with a slight Australian twang when he introduced himself to the middle-aged blonde man wearing an expensive suit. The blond man had a small scar running from the middle of his cheek to the edge of his thin upper lip. Derek recognized the guy; he just hadn’t placed him yet.

  When Derek entered the airport bar, he immediately homed in on the sharply dressed man. Choosing the stool one over from him, so to admire the man’s gold Rolex and three-thousand-dollar designer suit. Chances were high they would both be flying first class to Miami. The well-dressed man returned the handshake firmly.

  “Nice to meet you, Mr. Beeman. I’m Florida Senator Mike Young,” he motioned to the attractive forty-or-so-year-old woman on his right, introducing her with a friendly drawl, “And this is my lovely assistant, Ms. Stacy Pettington.”

  Derek had in fact heard of the Florida senator. He considered himself a human name index. Remembering the faces and names of every individual, their wives, children, and even their dogs.

  Derek considered himself a seasoned world traveler and an adventure enthusiast. His job often assigned him to the most desirable destinations, and exploitable world locations, to scout out production venues. He had been raised surrounded by the farmland
s and vineyards of Adelaide, Australia, and as a young teen, he spent the summers with his father, taking tourists on cage diving shark tours off the south coast. When Derek was fifteen his father had been offered a job opportunity to dive the oil platforms in the Gulf of Mexico, choosing to relocate the family to Houston, Texas.

  Derek was senior consultant for Outstanding Trips Abroad Inc.; a company specializing in planning film locations, as well as the implementation of special requirements needed by movie and television production companies from around the world. His last project had been planning an exciting educational episode, allowing TV viewers to follow the fearless, risk-taking Chef Kevin Fontaine, sampling the indigenous delicacies with locals, traveling across Myanmar, with the number one rated food program Experience Eating.

  With the undertaking, Derek was tasked to organize filmable locations, and plan the travel itinerary by plane, train, and by bus through the volatile country not well traveled by Hollywood. The assignment entrusted Derek with keeping Fontaine in front of the golden-tipped temples, highlighting the star’s golden mop and deep dimples. Also, Derek was charged with keeping the food guru and film crews away from the Buddhist Myanmar security forces, driving the Muslim Rohingyas from their land; burning down their mosques, looting and setting fire to their homes, along with raping the women. It didn’t make for good Food Network television.

  Recently Derek had been consulting on a more local level for a movie currently being filmed in Florida. The directors were looking for white sand beaches, without sunburned tourists peeling about. The task wasn’t as hard as he thought it would be. He dismissed searching the devastated beaches of central Florida, covered in a nasty-smelling red alga, stemming from the Lake Okeechobee runoff. Instead, he aimed his attention south towards Miami.

  “The secluded “local” beaches are no longer a secret after I pull out this wad of hundred-dollar bills,” he would say when bragging about his negotiation skills.

  The second request proved more difficult. The directors wanted to film a high-speed boat chase in Miami-Dade County river waters, deemed Manatee Protection Zones by the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. He had spent weeks attempting to bribe county officials to grant a pass, filing numerous requests for one-time use permits.

  “The only way to get a speed boat on that river is to get legislation passed allowing motorboats in the manatee protected areas,” explained a cranky bureaucrat. “You’ll also need to increase the speed limits in those protected areas.”

  He was told that several key Florida senators had been working on game changing amendments to the current conservation laws; making efforts to end protections in certain Florida waters. One of these senators was Mike Young, sitting next to him shaking his hand.

  “Yea mate, think we have time to grab a bite to eat?” Derek asked the senator. “I’m starved, and I sure as shit don’t want any airplane food. You’re flying to Miami, right?”

  Derek tried not to work the guy too hard. Hold back, he reminded himself. Don’t be a space-invader. He held his award-winning grin waiting for the senator’s reply.

  “I’m so hungry I could eat a horse,” the scar above the senator’s lip curled into a crescent moon when he smiled, “and I’m willing to bet the food on the plane will likely taste like dog meat.”

  Derek hailed the bartender, by saluting his arm, with a small dismissive wave. When the bartender arrived, he ordered a cold one, and eighteen spicy chicken wings, with blue cheese dip.

  “Would you like another cocktail, Senator?”

  The senator nodded to the bartender signaling for one more.

  “Speaking of food tasting like dog,” Derek started. “I was scouting out locations in a town in central Vietnam called Ninh Binh. The town is a couple hours south of Hanoi by train. It’s well known in Vietnam for its goat delicacies—and spelunking, but that’s another story….”

  Derek was looking for acknowledgment from the senator. He could see he was losing the man by the way he stirred the speared olive in his martini, focusing his attention on the baseball game playing on the flat screen above the bar.

  “Like I said, the town is known for its gourmet goat cuisine,” Derek started again raising his voice a notch and speaking slower. “I was scouting out locations for a TV program…you might have heard of Kevin Fontaine?”

  The senator stopped stirring his drink and turned his gaze to Derek. His interest was piqued once again.

  “I might know of that program.”

  “Well, you see I was consulting for the studio, so in this case traveling on my own budget, staying in the seedier places…if you will. The hostel was clean enough, but my room was four flights up a steep staircase, and bloody freezing.”

  Derek chortled as he took a sip of his beer; the froth left a brew mustache reminiscent to the Nazi Adolf Hitler’s above his upper lip.

  “I asked the front desk attendant where a good place to eat goat meat would be. Getting the local input is always key to really experiencing the culture you are in. The hotel clerk ordered me a taxi, letting the driver know where to go. I was unfamiliar with the town and as the driver turned down side street after side street…yeah, I became disoriented. The taxi pulls into a dead-end alley next to a dark stained concrete restaurant with large windows, shuttered for the winter, with no identifying sign hanging out front. The driver motioned for me to get out. I paid him ten thousand dong and slammed the door, crossing my fingers I would find a taxi back to the hotel after dinner.”

  “I was then ushered to a seat at an empty table set for eight. A petite woman produced a laminated menu and set a glass of warm water in front of me that I hadn’t planned on drinking if I didn’t want to bloody shit my pants for the next week. The menu was printed completely in Vietnamese; I turned it over and tried reading the sub-lines. The menu had zero English words and I don’t speak but a few words of Vietnamese…so it was useless. Of course, the waitress didn’t speak English either. I had obviously accomplished my mission of jumping off the beaten path!”

  Derek laughed heartily. The senator was rapt with his story. He had succeeded in gaining the prominent man’s attention. The bartender returned with the chicken wings, setting out small plates in front of each of them, napkins and wet wipes for the secretary Stacy, Derek, and the senator.

  “At the top of the menu,” Derek held his large arms out acting like he was holding a menu and pointed to the top section. “There was a tiny picture of a goat in the corner. I pointed to it and the waitress nodded understanding, then she ran off to put my order in. At that same time, I observed a family, sitting at a table near my own, being served a large portion of steaming stew, accompanied by the perfect fresh baked French baguettes overflowing the basket.”

  He held his large hands a foot apart to describe the size of the fresh bread.

  “The sheila returned with a plate of mixed greens; basil, mint, and other mixed herbs…rice papers for rolling the thinly shaved goat meat and herb mix…along with a delicious light sauce served on the side for dipping.”

  His dark eyes looked off longingly thinking of the Vietnamese meal, while he licked wing sauce from his juicy lips.

  “I just couldn’t get that stew out of my mind, and I tried asking the waitress what it was called by pointing to the meal being devoured by the family next to me. The waitress indicated the item on the menu…but it was in Vietnamese. I pointed again to my neighbor’s food and requested one for myself, by signaling one with my finger.”

  Derek raised his thick square pointer finger, aiming it at the ceiling.

  “She returned with my stew shortly after and I dipped the warm scrumptious French bread into the thick broth. Potatoes and carrots were mixed with squared beef-like meat. I dug in and ate the warm stew. It wasn’t bad; the broth was seasoned nicely. It was the perfect meal for that cold winter night.

  I noticed it didn’t taste like the goat I had just eaten, and it definitely was not beef; with the fat gristle holding tight to the edge
s of meat chunks. The texture was different. While I sat contemplating the flavor, I heard barking coming from behind the kitchen. I looked out my window through the wooden slats. Behind me, next to the kitchen I noticed several mutt dogs tied with ropes to metal hooks along a concrete wall. I kept chewing—and then with a sort of realization I opened my napkin and spit the bite out of my mouth.”

  The senator looked at Derek seemingly confused.

  “Why would you spit it out?”

  “Because it was dog, man!” Stacy rasped while sucking on a chicken wing.

  Derek didn’t really have a problem with eating dog per say. It wasn’t his favorite meat—with its gristle and gaminess. Most people found the unappetizing story funny and disgusting. The truth was he saw no difference eating one species from another. Forgone conclusions regarding food were based solely on a person’s culture. Not taste. He had learned that from food guru Kevin Fontaine.

  Derek watched a feather-light blond woman walk into the bar, dressed in periwinkle pants and matching shirt. She glided on her toes like a ballerina dancer, before requesting a glass of chardonnay.

  “They told me the black dogs taste the best...ha ha ha,” Derek chortled, “but I’ll tell you one thing brother...dog doesn’t taste like chicken!”

  The senator stretched his arm out to inspect his Rolex.

  “Looks like it’s just about time to board our flight and I could sure use another drink.”

  7 Aunt June

  She had never received so much attention as today. It wasn’t her on the receiving end really, it was Buster who was getting all the complements and straight up gawking by strangers. She knew he was an impressive animal to look at with his substantial girth and bowling ball size head.

  “Does your head weigh sixteen pounds like a bowling ball,” she jokingly inquired to Buster.

  She looked at his dark face and imagined the eyes to be the two small holes for the fingers and his mouth the hole for the thumb. His head as tough and dense as the southern Florida lignum vitae hardwood tree the game balls were originally made from. Her husband used to collect the wooden spherical bowling balls produced before the 1900s, some small and without holes. However, they used the newer polyurethane balls, with more bounce, at the alley they used to manage.