by Roy Kesey
Nothing happens. The horse never kicks. She slides higher and higher, rises up and out of the stump, hangs there for a moment, drifts out of sight. Donny sits down in the pile of duff. Doesn’t feel drunk anymore. Son of a bitch, he thinks. First thing I’ve ever done.
He wonders how it will feel—the kick over the top, the fistful of mane. He gets to his feet, looks around for the net, remembers Mitch pulling it out. He finds the walkie-talkie, keys the mike, calls. No answer. Calls again, and nothing. He cups his hands and shouts. He waits, looks at the faces in the wood, throws duff at the thunderbird, hears voices, and then nothing.
He scrabbles at the wall but can’t find a handhold. He tries jumping, and not even close. He calls one more time, and now Mitch answers, says to hold the fuck on. Donny looks up the funnel. The circle goes darker, pure gray, like fog or smoke. He waits. Silence. He waits. Again the buzzing, maybe hornets, but he can’t see anything moving. It gets louder, and maybe there are magnets in the wood, polarization, ions swarming like rage but maybe there’s some other kind of leprosy, some good kind that no one ever talks about where only the bad stuff dies and sloughs away, and that’s how you become a thunderbird in the first place, your wooden wings go feathered and strong, you fly clean.
There’s a shout and the buzzing stops. Donny looks up. It’s Mitch. He kicks at a mass of black and it slides down the side. Donny climbs the net hand-over-hand, and as his head clears the top of the stump the world goes loud, then settles into itself—the moaning crowd of tweakers below, a rain crow that whistles and falls quiet.
–Time to go, says Mitch. Come give me a hand with the gear.
Donny doesn’t answer. He’d thought it would be brighter out here. The air’s fresh but the mist slides thick through the trees. He climbs the rest of the way out, trots down the planking, sees the empty shackle, a piece of strapping loose on the ground. He pushes into the crowd, looks around for the girl, doesn’t see her anywhere but the guy in the Copenhagen hat is on his knees, his arms wrapped around the horse’s neck, and he’s blubbering and stroking the horse’s face.
The horse’s eyes are open. Copenhagen gets to his feet, tells the horse to stand the fuck up. Donny sneaks a look, and sure enough: girl horse. He turns and now Mitch is beside him.
–What she needs is some water, says Donny. You see a bucket anywhere?
–Donny. The back leg.
Donny shoves a tweaker out of the way, steps forward, looks. Broken near the ankle. Not hanging limp or twisted at an odd angle but fucking bone coming out through the hide. Donny looks at Mitch, and Copenhagen screams at them, pushes out of the circle and runs.
–Donny, seriously, time to make a move.
–I don’t believe it.
–I know. It sucks. But things are about to go bad, and we need to leave.
He pulls on Donny’s arm, and Donny goes with him, wishing things would hold still in his head. The rain crow whistles again. They’re halfway across the clearing, tweakers to either side like an escort, when there’s a shout.
Copenhagen is walking toward them, and he’s carrying a shotgun. Donny glances at the pickup, then back across the clearing. A few of the other tweakers reach toward the guy as he passes, but don’t touch him. Donny asks Mitch if they should call for backup.
–Backup, right, like maybe a ladder truck? We’re an hour from everywhere. Just stay cool.
–Cool.
–All part of the job. He’ll figure it out. But don’t, you know, nothing stupid.
Copenhagen walks up, shouts again, puts the muzzle of the shotgun in Donny’s face. Donny and Mitch lift their hands. The circle has closed behind them. Copenhagen jabbers, howls, points the shotgun at Mitch and back at Donny.
The mist curls around everyone’s heads and the redwoods lean in. Copenhagen points the gun at the woman beside him, pretends to pull the trigger and shouts, Boom! The woman raises her hands and lets them fall. A few of the tweakers wander off, and everyone else comes in closer.
Mitch starts talking, quiet and calm, working through how things happened. Copenhagen growls and grunts but Mitch keeps at it. The barrel lowers bit by bit until it’s pointing at the dirt.
And Donny’s had enough of that. They were too stupid to keep the horse safe and they’re too stupid to end her hurt. He turns, hears Copenhagen shout but doesn’t stop, pushes his way out of the circle and now Mitch is shouting too. Donny walks straight to the pickup, roots around under the seat.
He pulls the pistol out, undoes the strap, lets the holster fall. He flicks the cylinder open, spins it and snaps it back into place. He walks around the circle and up behind Copenhagen. He hears Mitch say half his name. Copenhagen turns and Donny puts the barrel against the man’s forehead, whispers boom.
Copenhagen drops the shotgun. For a moment nobody moves, and it all seems over but it’s not, they’re coming, and Donny swings the pistol left and right, tries to cover them all. There is no sound in the world. Copenhagen bends down to pick up his gun and Donny almost shoots him but sees that he’s reaching for the tip of the barrel. The other tweakers open up to give him room, and he turns away and wings the gun into the mist. Donny hunches, waits to hear it land. Still no sound. Copenhagen nods and heads for the trailer.
The mob tightens around Donny as he backs his way over to the horse. She’s not moving at all, maybe dead already, but then she shivers, and so does he. He steps up close, but how do you do this? How do you even go about starting a thing like this?
There’s a hand on his back and he whirls and the pistol goes off. Mitch, just standing there. Donny looks him up and down. There’s no blood he can see.
–Holy fuck, says Mitch.
–Sorry, says Donny.
–You fucking shot me.
–Where?
Mitch looks at himself all over.
–You tried to shoot me.
–No I didn’t. You scared me. The gun just went off.
–Fuck you, Donny. I had everything under control and you …. Fuck you. For all of this. I’m done.
Mitch turns and walks toward the pickup, and the tweakers are coming again. Donny raises the pistol. The tweakers are getting closer, and he will kill every fucking one of these motherfuckers.
Then the girl comes out of the trees and the mist. Donny watches her come. He hears Mitch gunning the motor, hears the horn, and this girl—then he has it. She looks a bit like Susana. Just enough like Susana. The eyes maybe, yes, the eyes.
Which is why Donny lets her come so close. She’s talking to him and he wonders what she’s saying. She reaches toward the pistol and everything’s slow and smooth. Her hand wraps around the barrel and sits there for a second. Donny looks at her, at her eyes. She pulls on the gun just a little. Donny holds on, then lets go. She nods. She turns around, shoots the horse in the head, and now Donny knows he’s in love.
Acknowledgments
For giving me access to stories without which my own stories couldn’t have been written, I would like to thank Robert Sylar, Ivana Širović, Gerry Halphen, Tom Kesey, Craig Benson, and Marco Jerkunica.
For their help bringing this book to the world, I would like to thank Matt Bell, Karen Craigo, Steve Gillis, Maria Massie, Steven Seighman, and Dan Wickett.
For their companionship, love, and patience, I would like to thank my wife, Ana Lucía, and our children, Chloë and Thomas.
I would also like to thank the following people for their expertise, time and generosity: Eric Abrahamsen, Ramesh Avadhani, Alex Badyaev, Marcia Belsh, Lisa Biffle, Mark Briscoe, Richard Buchholz, Stephan Clark, Becky Cole, Bruce Cruser, Ron Currie Jr., Lucinda Nelson Dhavan, Kevin Dolgin, Xujun Eberlein, Malcolm Ehrhardt, Pia Ehrhardt, Mark Emerson, Pamela Erens, Jeremy Flanagan, Marko Fong, Tracy Ford, Heather Fowler, James Frampton, James Fristrom, David Gerard Fromm, Avital Gad-Cykman, Clifford Garstang, Alicia Gifford, John Harlin, Susan Henderson, Tiff Holland, Mark Hubbard, Lindsay Brandon Hunter, Erin Karnatz, Jane Kesey, Ron Kesselring, Tim Kesselring, Douglas Nolan Kimba
ll, John Leary, Jessica Lipnack, Joy Ma, Pasha Malla, Mary McCluskey, Shauna McKenna, Kirsten Menger-Anderson, Court Merrigan, Roger Morris, Ingrid Müller, Jim Nichols, Ulla Odgaard, Brian Reynolds, Jim Ruland, Matt Samet, Seth Shafer, Barry Simms, Birgitte Sonne, Scott Southwick, Kelly Spitzer, Liz Theile, Jim Tomlinson, and Girija Tropp.
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
The author would like to thank the editors of the magazines and anthologies in which early versions of these stories first appeared:
“Any Deadly Thing,” Stacey Swann, American Short Fiction. “Bloodwood,” Jim Clark, The Greensboro Review. “Double Fish,” Speer Morgan and Evelyn Somers Rogers, The Missouri Review. “Cochlear,” Frederick Barthelme, Carrie Spell, and Mary Robison, Mississippi Review. “How Things End,” Christopher Chambers, New Orleans Review. “Asunción,” Eli Horowitz, McSweeney’s; Jordan Bass, The Better of McSweeney’s, Vol. 2; Stacy Bierlein, A Stranger Among Us, OV Books. “Wall,” Darlin’ Neal and Jocelyn Bartkevicius, The Florida Review. “Levee,” Keith Hood, Orchid. “Today/ Tomorrow,” Jenine Gordon Bockman, Literal Latté; Luca Dipierro, Santi: Lives of Modern Saints, Black Arrow Press. “Probably Somewhere,” Terry Bain and Hilary Bachelder, Zoetrope All-Story Extra. “Body Asking Shadow,” Tracy Truels, Abdel Shakur, Justin Long, and Megan Savage, Indiana Review. “Learning to Count in a Small Town,” Josh Melrod and Dave Koch, Land-Grant College Review; Jon Fullmer, Knee-Jerk Magazine. “Gorget,” Leslie Jill Patterson, Iron Horse Literary Review; Chris Vaughan, Ronin Press. “Stillness,” Giancarlo DiTrapano, New York Tyrant. “Nipparpoq,” Philip Graham and Jodee Stanley, Ninth Letter. “Scree” and “Stump,” David Leavitt, Subtropics.
Copyright © 2013 by Roy Kesey
Cover design by Steven Seighman
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ANY DEADLY THING
By all that is hirsute and gashly!
—Laurence Sterne, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman
Consciousness is all the holiness we have.
—William Gass, Habitations of the Word
She used the word yes to its best advantage, when surrounded by no meaning and left alone from other words.
—Richard Brautigan, Trout Fishing in America
And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover. —Mark 16:17-18
He was awakened when they brought the body. They weren’t exactly the quietest body bringers in the world.
— Richard Brautigan, Trout Fishing in America
(F)or hate is finest when it elevates and saves.
—William Gass, Habitations of the Word
—The whole entirely depends, added my father, in a low voice, upon the auxiliary verbs, Mr. Yorick.
—Laurence Sterne, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman
ANY DEADLY THING