Paramedics rushed out to help the cowboy, who lay unmoving in the dirt. Patrick looked back at Nicole and saw a look of horror on her face.
“They should kill that bull,” Jessica said.
“It’s not his fault—he’s just doing his job,” Alex said.
Nicole’s skin was pale, as if she was sick. People started to leave the stands. Patrick stood and asked Nicole if she wanted to go. She nodded without saying anything.
“It was so nice hanging out with you,” Jessica said.
“Yes,” Nicole said softly, although it seemed like her thoughts had taken her far, far away.
Once off the bleachers, Patrick asked if Nicole wanted to walk around the fair for a while.
“No thanks.”
Now he started to get angry. Back in the truck, as they waited for a line of cars to move and she was still silent, he said, “Nicole, you can’t just come in here and start judging people.”
As the truck crept forward, she said nothing, so he filled the silence with his own words. “People around here are ranchers. They work with cows and horses, and this is their entertainment. They’re not vegetarians from big exotic cities who…” he trailed off.
Nicole let out a laugh. “Las Vegas is not exotic.”
“People here,” he said, “they eat meat and they don’t think the cows are being abused and they like it when the bull-riders get kicked around a bit. It’s like Nascar—it ain’t worth watching unless there’s a crash. That’s what they think. The people here, they don’t need your judgment.”
The cars in front of them crept out of the parking lot. The interior of the truck was bathed in red from the brake lights.
Patrick said, “I had a great time with you tonight, Nicole, but the people around here, they don’t need you looking down on them just because they do things differently. They ain’t like you. They’d do just fine without you being here altogether.”
“You’re using the wrong pronoun,” she said.
The traffic was at a stand-still again, and he turned to look at her. In the glow of the brake lights, her face was colored a harsh red, more vivid and jarring than the subtle sunset shine from a few hours ago. But still, even red and angry, she was like no girl he’d ever seen, and his own anger dissolved.
“What’s a pronoun?” he said modestly, trying to show her that he wasn’t upset anymore, that they should move past this and remember how good the evening had started.
“You should be saying ‘we.’”
He thought she was saying “we,” as in the two of them, Patrick and Nicole. He was silent for a moment, trying to make sense of what she was saying, feeling pleased despite this recent conflict to think of the two of them as a “we.”
“Don’t say ‘they think this’ or ‘they do that,’” she said.
Patrick heard the hurt in her voice and realized he’d misunderstood.
“You mean ‘we’—you and them,” Nicole said. “You ain’t like me. You’d do just fine without me being here. You mean you, don’t you, Patrick?”
“Yeah,” he snapped. “So what?”
She didn’t reply. He opened his mouth to speak but then stopped. He kept telling himself that he should apologize, that he didn’t mean what he said, that he was confused and didn’t really even understand what he was saying. But he couldn’t form the words for the apology in his mind. Then the silence grew between them like distance and time, and then speaking seemed impossible.
When he pulled into her driveway, he grabbed his door handle to walk her to the door, but she stopped him.
“It’s okay,” she said, and then, politely, added, “Thanks for taking me out.”
He watched her walk away, her shoulders bent, her head down. She didn’t go into the house. Instead, she skirted its edge and headed toward the barn out back.
Patrick put the truck in drive and headed down the driveway. He hit the brakes abruptly, and dust from the gravel wafted through his headlight beams. He imagined Nicole inside the barn, sitting on the floor, her knees pulled to her chest, crying.
He had to make this right. It wasn’t too late.
He swung the truck around and went back. He shut off the engine and walked through the yard. The air was cool, the sky so clear he could see the Milky Way among the endless stars. The silence was ferocious—there was no sound but his own breath.
Then a thundering clap of hooves burst out of the barn and into the field behind it. Patrick jerked, his heart pounding. The horse galloped up a hill, moving with a playfulness that seemed more like dancing than running. It was a magnificent animal, Patrick could see that, even by starlight. Its fur looked chestnut, its body lean, muscular and something about it—its energy—made him think it was young. He guessed it was a filly.
Patrick laughed at how startled he’d been. This would be something funny to tell Nicole once he’d patched things up.
“Nicole,” he called, as he entered through the barn door.
The building was dark except for an electric lantern at the other end. Patrick walked toward it, past empty horse stalls. He’d been in dozens of barns in his life, and none had ever smelled like this. Instead of the dusty smell of hay or the pungent odor of horse shit, the barn smelled like the deep forest: pine needles, rich soil, flora.
He stopped when he was a few feet from the lantern. Hanging on a hook on a four-by-four beam was a dress that looked like the one Nicole had worn tonight, with the red ribbon from her hair draped over it. Her sandals were lying on the floorboards next to her purse.
“Nicole,” he called again, louder, to be sure she heard him before he stumbled upon her in the nude.
But she wasn’t there at all.
He stepped out of the back of the barn into the pasture and looked around. The horse, barely visible in the dark, galloped in a wide arc. It headed in the direction of the barn, and then it came to a sudden, urgent stop and stood looking at him.
At this distance and with the darkness, Patrick had trouble making out the animal with much detail. But he could see its chest inflating with each quick breath, hear its snorts. Its eyes glinted in the starlight and, even this far away, Patrick thought he could see a wild, fearful look in its expression.
He wanted to walk forward, run his hand along its nose, put his face against the hair on its ribcage. It was a beautiful animal, but he was afraid of it—one of the wild horses Nicole’s family hoped to keep wild.
He steeled himself to step forward, but then he noticed something else about the horse. He knew his mind was playing tricks on him, brought on by the darkness and his own adrenaline, but it looked like there was a horn protruding from the horse’s forehead. At first, it was barely visible in the gloom, but the more he looked the more he could see it clearly: a pale protrusion, about a foot long, rising into a point.
He had a feeling that he was at an important threshold in his life. He had a choice, and depending on if he walked out and tried to touch the horse or he retreated back into the barn, different versions of who he could be would emerge. One Patrick or the other would wake up tomorrow, but they couldn’t both go on and the Patrick he was right now would cease to exist. He had already gone too far.
Over the years, Patrick thought of this moment often and tried to convince himself that he’d seen some sort of optical illusion. Everyone looked back with a longing—a what if?—for someone from their past: the one who got away. For everyone, there is a person, once real, who over time becomes mythical, unattainable—a unicorn. So it wasn’t beyond belief that Patrick’s mind would manufacture a memory that made Nicole just that.
But late at night, when he has insomnia and flips through the TV channels, or lies in bed next to one woman or another, Patrick knows what he saw that night. He knows he lives in a different world than he would if he’d possessed the courage to step out of the shadows and approach the animal on the hill. To touch her and say, “I’m with you. We are a we.”
But he didn’t.
He backed into t
he barn, hurried through to the other side, his boots clunking loudly against the floorboards, and ran through the damp grass to his truck. He sped away as if he was being pursued by a ghost.
When he saw Nicole at school on Monday, he didn’t make eye contact with her. She attended classes for only a few months before she and her family moved away. The rumor went around that her parents didn’t make a single payment on their property. They just squatted there and then disappeared.
Patrick never talked to Nicole again. Once, before she left, he did make eye contact. He came around a corner in the crowded school hallway and almost collided with her. He jumped, startled, and she smiled at him—a sad, sympathetic smile that made him ache whenever he thought of it. The smile said, We scared each other once before, didn’t we? But we’re past that now, aren’t we?
He walked away without a word.
Sometimes, in his dreams, he relives the encounter in the hallway, and this time he does speak.
He says, “I will look for you for the rest of my life.”
Her smile falters, and she says, “You will never find me.”
And then he wakes up, as he always does, in his world, not hers.
***
Andrew Bourelle is the author of the novel Heavy Metal, winner of the 2016 Autumn House Fiction Prize. His short stories have been published widely in literary journals and fiction anthologies, including the Best American Mystery Stories, D is for Dinosaur, and Swords & Steam Short Stories.
Scatter the Foals to the Wind
Chadwick Ginther
My mom always said, “Michelle, never trust a short man. They’ve always got something to prove.”
Most of her advice hadn’t stuck, but that tidbit had; one reason most of the guys I’d dated had been the size of vikings. The latest was a bruiser of a redhead named Ted. More tattoos than a biker. Mouth like a sailor. Smoked like a chimney. Mom would’ve hated him, 6’4” or not.
We’d had a few dates. I’m sure he’d made the same plans for tonight I had.
He’d come over to my condo and made me dinner. We were having a toke on my balcony, the air was brisk, but warm for a Winnipeg November. He had one arm around me and the other pointed up at the stars, toward the constellation of Orion.
“So there was this giant, name of Veggbyggir,” he said. “And he had this horse, big strong bastard went by Svaðilfari. Could tow a fucking mountain.”
The story of the myth behind the stars had a practiced feel, as if this was something he said to all the girls. It was also wrong. The “horse” constellation he’d pointed to had been Taurus.
“Veggbyggir and Svaðilfari were tasked with building a wall around Asgard—that’s the home of the Norse gods—in only three seasons or they won Freyja, the most beautiful goddess in Odin’s court, and the sun and moon besides. And they’d almost done it. So Loki had to stop them.”
Practiced or not, wrong or not, it was working. I wanted to hear where his story went. “Wait? Isn’t Loki a bad guy?”
“You know Loki?” Ted’s eyes caught the starlight and he laughed.
“Not personally,” I said. “Who won?”
“Not the giant,” Ted said. “And not Loki.”
I took a deep toke, held the smoke in my lungs for a three count, and passed the joint back to Ted as I exhaled. “How’d Loki manage to stop them?”
“He turned into a mare and lured the stallion away.”
“Classic honey pot,” I said.
Ted laughed. “Right?”
“So why’d you say Loki lost? Sounds like he had the last laugh.”
Ted shrugged. “He came back pregnant with an eight-legged horse son.”
“Bummer,” I said. “Which constellation is Loki? Where’s he hiding?”
He stopped pointing at the stars to pull me close, and I figured he was going to kiss me, so I closed my eyes, leaned in, and over the balcony I went. As I tumbled ass over tits, his grin flashed; a crescent that glowed bright as the moon.
The last thing I saw before I clenched my eyes shut and waited for the impact was that smile. Wind whipped through my hair. I counted the seconds. One. Two. Three. We’d been on the 16th floor but I definitely should’ve hit the ground by now.
I opened my eyes. I was only two floors down from my balcony. Ted looked smaller but his smile looked bigger. The cherry of his joint glowed bright orange after a toke. I smelled the pot. His cologne. His…overwhelming pleasure with himself.
I looked down. I didn’t want to, but I needed to see. The ground seemed so far away. So did the balcony. How could I get there? How could I get back? How could I be hanging in the air?
This was madness. It made no sense. None.
“I suppose you’re wondering what’s going on?” Ted called down from the balcony. “I suppose you also want to know why you’re a horse?”
“What?”
The word didn’t come out. Just an angry whinny.
I craned my neck around and the fucker was right. I was a horse. My hooves rested on air as if it were asphalt. The wind whipped through a mane and tail, not a head of hair.
Ted leapt over the balcony railing, joint still between his lips, and hurtled toward me. I spun, trying to get away, but he landed on my back.
“Didn’t think we’d be going bareback tonight,” he said, grabbing a handful of my mane and patted my flank.
The jokes.
I used to love his jokes. I used to think he was funny. Now, I just thought he was an asshole, and I wanted him gone.
I spun. Whirled. Bucked. He held on fast. Each leap shot me higher into the air, and I landed as if it were solid ground. He hung on. I tried something else. I tucked my legs tight to my body, and we plummeted like a rock.
“Woooooo!” he yelled. From his enthusiasm, I could only assume if he’d owned a cowboy hat, he’d be waving it.
Two storeys from the ground, I untucked my legs and ran on the air, gradually changing the angle of my descent. My hooves touched the ground and turned back to bare feet. Ted tumbled off my back and onto the grass. I whirled and kicked him right between the legs. My skin prickled with the cold, and I realized my clothes must’ve torn off when I’d transformed.
Perfect.
I’d loved that dress. And the lingerie beneath it had been expensive.
I was torn between trying to cover myself, or kicking the jerk again.
He moaned, and struggled weakly when I pulled off his now ridiculously-baggy t-shirt to cover myself.
“Okay, prick,” I said. “Explain yourself.”
“I’m not the one who’s a horse,” he said.
I kicked him again.
When Ted was done cradling his plums and whining, he started talking. And what he said made no sense.
“First off,” he said, exhaling a cloud of weed, “my name’s not Ted. I’m Loki.”
“You’re Loki?” I asked. “Norse god, Loki?”
“Yup.”
I snorted a laugh, before realizing he was serious. “God of lies and trickery and questionable romantic partners?”
“And you’re trying to decide if Loki would lie about his own name?” He raised and lowered his eyebrows like one of the Marx Brothers.
“No, I wonder why he wouldn’t lie about being a horse fucker.”
He smiled that shit-eating grin and I wanted to turn back into a horse so I could kick him even harder. “Also, don’t be so hard on yourself about the ‘questionable romantic partners’ thing. You’re great, but I’m not into you that way.”
“Loki? You’re serious? Loki?”
“Why would I lie?”
“It’s what you do.”
He pouted. He actually pouted. “It’s not all I do.”
“So what am I? Your descendant from when you were a lady horse?”
He tapped his nose with his index finger and then pointed it at me. “Right in one.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“You’re the one who’s a horse.”
“
You’re the one creeping on their descendant.” I shuddered. Ewww. I can’t believe we were going to…just…I shuddered again. “Ewww.”
“We should go inside,” Loki said, glancing at my chest. “It’s cold outside.”
I crossed my arms. “I don’t have my keys. Thanks to you.”
“Leave it to me.” He gestured toward the door. I didn’t move. “Trust me.”
Loki didn’t pick the lock to my building’s front door. He just walked over and opened it. He bowed, gesturing for me to enter first. I did, and grabbed the door, pulling it shut behind me. I don’t know how Loki slithered his way in, but when the door slammed shut, he was behind me. I screamed. More in frustration than terror. The elevator door dinged open as we walked across the lobby. It was empty. Loki’s grin told me he’d done it. Somehow.
I didn’t argue. We got in the elevator and headed up to my condo. He hummed a song…might’ve been Genie in a Bottle, the whole way up.
“Why?” I asked as Loki opened the door to the condo as easily as he’d got us into the building.
“They always ask ‘why?’” he said with a chuckle.
I wanted to protest. Ask who “they” were. I was oddly disappointed Loki fucked with other peoples’ lives. I shouldn’t be surprised though. Disappointed, but not surprised. I guess we’d never said we were exclusive.
Nothing should surprise me anymore, since apparently, I was a werehorse.
“You’re not a werehorse,” Loki said as we went back inside. “If that’s what you were thinking.”
I closed the door behind me hoping he wasn’t really a mind reader. Locked it. Latched it. Not that I believed a thin chain would impede Loki if he wanted to leave.
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