by Chad Lutzke
Allen quickly jumped off the couch and turned to face the door in just enough time to see the door open. As though every move was premeditated and extensively choreographed, the man gracefully entered the house, grabbed a wooden bat next to the door frame, and swung it backhandedly at Greg’s head. Two teeth raced from Greg’s mouth to the floor as the rest of him chased after them; his limp body crashing to the floor. The dog lunged at Greg’s leg ripping into it, as his lifeless body gave way to each tug from the dog.
Allen stood in shock. He looked from Greg up to the batter. “Stop! Stop your dog! What are you doing? We’re lost out here. That’s it, man! We’re not here to rob you or anything! Stop your dog! Please! Stop!”
The man was staring at Allen unfazed. He stepped aside several feet from the door so as not to block it. “Run,” he said calmly, almost in a whisper.
Allen looked down again. A pool of blood began forming around Greg’s head, his hair acting as a mop with each tug from the dog, leaving crimson streaks on the wood floor in chaotic patterns.
“Run!” The man roared at Allen.
Allen hopped the couch and charged the door. He cried out loud in disgust and remorse as he jumped over his old friend’s feet; the dog still wrestling Greg’s leg. Once outside the cabin, Allen’s mind raced. He ran straightforward into the woods, careless and dazed; his thoughts fixed on the surreal moment. Adrenaline and fear acted as an anesthetic, as branches cut across his arms and face. Later—if he lived—he would feel the pain.
“Go!” He could hear the command forty feet behind him. It wouldn’t be for another ten seconds of running before he made sense of the command. The dog. The sound of its four speeding paws grew closer. Allen’s mind left the cabin and focused on the woods in front of him. Up ahead, he made out a wooden structure in a tree. Initially it reminded him of the forts he and Greg made 15 years earlier. It was a tree blind for hunting. Hunting what? Humans?
He focused on the tree blind as his safe haven—at least from the dog. Had it not been for the small creek cutting between Allen and the blind, the dog would have caught up and taken him down. Allen cleared the creek with a foot to spare.
The way up the tree wasn't immediately apparent. Allen struggled to jump and desperately grabbed upward at branches until he saw the makeshift steps made from pieces of 2 x 4 lining the length of the trunk. While Allen scrambled to get to them, the dog caught up. Allen pulled himself up as the dog's teeth sank into the back of his knee catching a hamstring. Allen kicked out at the dog and yelled in pain. The weight of the dog forced the tendon to slip out of its teeth, still intact. In a ballistic frenzy, the dog leapt repeatedly toward the now bloodied leg, missing each time as Allen scaled the tree ladder.
Sitting approximately fifteen feet off the ground, the tree blind's floor was sturdy with thick plywood. The structure sported two walls that went up three feet forming a corner, while handmade 2 x 4 railings helped keep it sturdy on the other sides. Allen, wincing in pain, heaved himself up on the platform making sure no part of him was near the edge, like a woman on a table after retreating from a mouse.
The dog continued to jump and bellow with a ferocious tenacity, as though Allen were its last chance to ever eat again. Allen sat up facing the cabin. He nestled his back in the walled corner; backpack still in place. He had a clear view of the cabin, but there was no sign of the man. The cabin door was now shut but the shack open. Allen looked down at his leg. Though his pants were ripped and wet with blood, from a quick glance at the wound he knew the pain was exaggerated. Allen looked down at the dog. A beautiful German shepherd, now stained with the blood of both him and his friend.
Allen stared through the dog as it barked and growled at him. Poor Greg. He didn't deserve that. Allen wished Greg alive, but he saw the impact of the bat, the heavy fall, the amount of blood, and the desecration of his leg. To think the one who brought the violence would suddenly summon help for Greg’s condition didn’t seem plausible. He let me run. The thought doubled the confusion and answered nothing. Perhaps it was a sick game for the dog to play. The pain and surrealism of everything that took place in the last two minutes was just too much for Allen to try and make sense of.
Allen took the shirt off his head and tied it around his wound. It wasn’t bleeding enough to worry about, but the idea of doing what he could to take care of it made him feel less helpless. The dog gave no sign of giving up until it heard another command from its owner. “Come!” The dog obeyed by running toward the cabin as the man walked to meet him. Whether the dog was still at the bottom of the tree or half way to the cabin made no difference. Allen knew had he tried to escape the tree now it wouldn't be long before the “Go!” command was again shouted. The result would likely end differently, and though Allen's leg wasn't as serious as it could have been, he was running nowhere.
Allen watched the man and his dog rendezvous. A rifle was now strapped to the man's back and he carried two large military-style duffle bags.
"Sir, I'm sorry we barged into your home the way we did. It was wrong of us... wrong of me actually. It was my idea. Is my friend okay?" Allen yelled through the woods.
The man never looked up but continued to walk toward the tree.
"Sir? We could maybe call someone for help and get this all situated. I'm sure you'll be in no trouble. You were only defending your home from some strangers that clearly surprised you. If we could please just get my friend some help." Allen desperately lied. There was no self defense and they both knew it, and he half knew there was no friend still alive to save.
The man continued without looking up. Once near the tree, he dropped the two duffle bags and finally looked up at Allen. He raised the rifle and took aim at him.
Allen raised his hands in submission. "Sir. I want to be gone just as much as..."
A bullet whizzed just inches above Allen's head, tearing a large piece of bark from the tree and leaving a hole where the bullet had punctured it. Allen jumped as a result and began breathing heavier than he had been.
"Sir. I am no threat to you. We are lost out here. That's all." Allen's tone brightened slightly. "I have money. I have seventy bucks I can give you."
The man bent down and picked up a brown leather wallet lying on the forest floor, then smiled and showed it to Allen before putting it in his own pocket. Allen checked his pants. Must have dropped it during the chase.
"Stay." The man said it while glaring directly at Allen, making it unclear whether he was giving another command to the dog or mocking Allen's predicament. The man then turned to leave while the dog remained, clearing up any confusion.
Allen rehearsed various begging spiels in his head; none of which he felt optimistic about. The man obviously had some sort of plan and showed no evidence that he could be swayed from it. Allen stared down at the bags. If dismembered, Allen’s body could certainly fit into them—the first of many grim thoughts concerning his future in these woods.
He continued to stare at the green bags, guessing their contents. The backpack! In his panic, he had forgotten his own baggage. He looked to make sure the man was still walking away. He was. Allen quickly took off the pack and began to rummage through it. A full canteen of water, a towel, some granola bar wrappers, a small box full of compartments that held fishing lures, and a container of dirt inhabited by nightcrawlers all filled the main pocket of the pack. He searched the smaller side pockets and found his cell phone and a pocket knife. He snatched the cell phone, pulled himself up using the 2 x 4 railing, and held the phone high trying to reach a signal. Nothing. Reality twisted his stomach as he crumpled back to the corner of the blind. The water would sustain him, but everything else seemed to be useless.
Allen toyed with the idea of jumping on the shepherd and stabbing it to death. If he managed to do it while the man was back at the cabin, he might have a chance to get away. He'd still be seriously lost but would at least get away from the psycho hunter and his mystery bags. He would eventually run into a road, path, familiar landmark, or the larger
lake.
Allen peered over the edge and watched the dog as it lay there. He glared at it, fantasizing about jumping down directly on top of it and driving the knife through its body. The jump would surely hurt his leg, but it would be a pain worth trading for the dog’s life. He gripped the knife tightly in his hand, his heart racing. Allen breathed deeper as he slowly moved his legs off the platform, allowing them to dangle in preparation for jumping should he find the courage.
Gunshot fire boomed straight ahead of him. Allen looked up startled. The familiar sound of a bullet whizzing over his head and hitting the tree startled him nearly off the platform. He looked toward the cabin but saw no sign of the shooter. Behind Allen, on the trunk of the tree, was a second patch of missing bark with another deep hole just inches away from the first. Another warning shot. The man had let Allen know he wasn’t safe regardless of the distance between them.
Heavy with anger, fear, and discouragement, Allen scooted back to the corner, folded up his knife and put it in his pocket. The knife may as well have been a stick. Allen seemed to be at the disposal of this man. There was nothing he could do at this point other than wait; wait for an opportunity of action or just see what horrible outcome would transpire at the hands of the madman.
An hour went by before the man came back. Plenty of time for Allen to scheme, fantasize more, and circle back around with self pity and discouragement. The cuts from the sprint through the woods had started to remind Allen they were there, adding to the throb in his leg.
The man came back carrying a large cooler and the rifle. He sat the cooler down next to the duffle bags. Allen watched the man as he opened one of the bags. The contents were neatly packed in. The bag seemed to hold a small tent and everything to assemble it, including stakes and poles. He’s building a camp right under me. The thought was disturbing; a person entertained by tormenting another.
"What are we doing here, man? What’s the plan? Are you killing me, messing with me...torturing me?”
Allen's tone was different than the last time he tried communicating with him—less desperate, more angered. He'd had an hour to stir the anger. The man never answered. Allen sat and watched him expertly put together the tent. The man's appearance reflected that of a war veteran; white shirt, fatigue pants, combat boots, neatly trimmed hair, well muscled. He was too young to have been in Vietnam; perhaps the Gulf War. Allen tried a different approach.
"You serve?"
Again, no answer; more tent building.
"You look like you know what you're doing there. You build the cabin yourself?"
Silence. The last stake pounded into the ground; the tent stretched taut with no wrinkles as though set up for a catalog photo shoot. The man kicked leaves and sticks away from an area several feet in front of the tent. He opened the other duffle bag and pulled out a small, folded shovel and started digging a shallow hole in the cleared ground. With that shovel, definitely a veteran...or some crazed hermit survivalist.
The man then picked up the empty bag that once held the tent and walked deeper into the woods. Allen continued to eye every move the crazy hermit made while he went for his canteen and took a swallow, being careful not to drink too much. The gulp of water triggered Allen’s bladder, and the urge to urinate slowly crept its way to top priority. Though he hadn’t had much to drink all day, there was still the remaining beer from the night before, and the water from earlier, that now needed to make an exit.
Allen again used the railing to pull himself up and leaned his side against the tree while he unzipped his pants. The stream hit the trunk and rode its way down, pooling at the bottom. Had his leg not been injured, he would have maneuvered to the other side in an attempt to cover the dog with some warm revenge.
Allen was done before the man came back under the strain of a now-loaded duffle bag. He set the bag down near the hole and began to empty it of large rocks. He surrounded the edges of the hole with the rocks. Of course...a fire. This guy really is getting off on this. As the last rock was being placed, the man looked toward the base of the tree and let out an agitated grunt. Kicking the bag away from the clearing, he stormed off toward the cabin. Minutes later he came back with a long length of rope tied to a white plastic bucket.
“Do not relieve yourself in my camp. If you have to go, use the bucket.”
The man hurled the bucket up over a branch close to the blind and tossed the other end of the rope to Allen, who caught it. The rope now acted as a pulley over the branch, with the bucket and an extra 12 feet of rope resting on the ground. Just how long did he think this was going to go on for; an entire campsite and now this makeshift Port-A-Potty? Allen tied the other end of the rope around the railing.
“Listen. All this is a bit excessive, ya know? We got lost on your property. Have you not found yourself accidently trespassing before?” Allen stressed.
The man opened the cooler and grabbed one of many beers submerged in ice. He closed the lid, twisted the cap, and took a drink while looking intently at Allen.
“What are we doing here, man? Is this some kind of game you’re playing?” Allen asked.
The man continued to glare at Allen.
“Hello?” Allen yelled.
“Piss in my yard again and I’ll...”
“I know, man! We’ve already been there! Use the bucket!” Allen said holding up the rope and shaking it.
The man grinned at Allen. “Piss in my yard again and I’ll cut off your feet.”
Allen shut down. Some of the newfound anger turned back into fear as he retreated to his corner. The remainder of daylight, Allen spent isolated in the corner as he listened to the man below. Listening to hours of sticks breaking, zippers opening and closing, and packages being ripped open told him there was a full fledged camping experience going on below him, complete with beer drinking and fire starting. The occasional wisps of smoke from the fire began to irritate Allen’s eyes, and eventually his throat. He sipped more water in an attempt to quench his thirst and ease his throat but did so carefully for fear of filling his bladder, regardless of the permission given to use the bucket. What if it spilled? The smell of cooking meat caused Allen to finally peek at what his ears had already been telling him.
The man sat on a sleeping bag near the fire watching the flames toast thinly cut strips of meat lying across a metal rack. Three beer bottles sat empty on the ground with a fourth one open and sitting on the cooler beside him.
As though he knew he was being watched, the man broke the several-hour silence. “Smells delicious, doesn’t it?”
Allen hadn’t eaten since breakfast and it was close to 10:00 p.m. Delicious is an understatement. He inhaled the aroma deeply, eyes shut.
“Hungry?” The man asked.
Another understatement. The man took two of the cooked strips off the fire and tossed them in the bucket a few feet away.
“Go ahead.”
Allen stalled, contemplating why the man would bother to feed him. Is it poisoned? He pulled the bucket up using the other end of the rope and took one of the small steaks from it. He stared at the meat, searched it over, and brushed off each side on his pants as though cleansing it of any possible poison.
“If I was going to kill you I’d come up there and straight put a bullet in your head, not waste my time with all this only to poison your food,” the man said without looking up at Allen.
He was right. Allen cautiously tore off a bite. He anticipated the bitterness of a poison but it never came. It tasted like pork, not poison. Images of rats, raccoons, and possums entered his mind as he considered what vermin he could be eating but thought it was best not to ask.
“See?” the man said. “Your friend didn’t die in vain now did he? I suppose you could consider him a bit of a martyr....a very tasty martyr.” The man’s explosive laughter filled the quiet woods.
Greg! Allen spit the meat out and threw the piece he held in his hand. It hit the railing and landed on the platform. The thought that he had just been consuming hi
s old friend’s flesh was too much for his stomach to handle. He violently hurled onto his lap what little contents his stomach held.
"You sick freak! What kind of person...." Abruptly interrupted with more heaving. Other than water and some bile, there wasn't much for Allen's body to get rid of. He frantically grabbed for the canteen and swished water in his mouth, spitting it into the bucket where a piece of the flesh remained at the bottom.
The man's laughter died down, but his smile remained as he began to plate up the remaining pieces of cooked Greg next to a small puddle of A1 steak sauce.
"You're done, man! Done! People will come looking for us. My wife knows exactly where I'm at." Allen half lied.
"This wife?" The man held up a picture. "This wife that lives at 7227 West Chestnut?"
Allen looked down and saw the man holding a picture Allen had kept in his wallet. Is that some kind of threat? Once again, anger took fear's place. He pulled the knife from his pocket, opened it, held the blade, and threw it, wishing heavy impact between the eyes. The wish failed, and the knife did nothing but bounce off the taut vinyl tent.