by David Thorne
I jerked awake. It felt like I had only nodded off for a few seconds but my fire was out, the ashes covered by a light dusting of snow. Large flakes fell gently outside my shelter, some making its way through the open roof of the trunk and collecting in the folds of my jacket. The wind had stopped and the forest was eerily silent apart from a crunching sound. At the base of the tree where the squirrel had been, a deer stood eating Cheetos.
This was my chance, I thought. My chance to be a real part of the hunting party, not simply a distraction. My chance to be a part of the group instead of joining the group. I’d shoot the deer and walk out of the forest with my kill across my shoulders - or maybe dragging it as it looked pretty heavy. They’d cheer and slap me on the back and then we’d head back to camp and sit around a roaring fire. I’d tell them
I tracked it or something and took the shot from hundreds of yards away, maybe mid-leap. They’d probably give me a cool nickname, like Buckslayer or Deerplugger. Okay, perhaps not Deerplugger. I’d think of a better nickname on the walk back.
I reached slowly and quietly for my rifle, flicked the safety off, and raised the stock to my shoulder. The deer’s rump was facing me and, at that range, its butt-hole filled the scope. Nobody would believe my story of a long-range mid-leap kill if I shot it in the arse.
“Hey deer.”
The deer raised its head, scanning the area slowly. Its gaze paused directly at me, I held perfectly still. My heart was beating astonishingly fast. Loud enough, I was sure, for the deer to hear. Through the scope, I could see my shelter reflected in the deer’s shiny dark brown eyes. In camo with a coating of snow, I was just part of a burnt stump silhouetted against the white landscape. It would be quick, between the eyes; the deer wouldn’t even know what happened. Snowflakes were trapped in its eyelashes.
I watched someone die once. Her name was Emma and I was holding her hand when it happened. It was late at night on a dirt road in the middle of nowhere. Four of us had been drinking in a small country town pub, fifteen miles from an area called Stockport where we all worked on a large horse riding property. It was the kind of place where schools hold overnight ‘Adventure Camp’ excursions. I hadn’t worked there long. I was in the back seat with a guy named Michael, the oldest son of the property owners. We got on well as he had a huge collection of porn. Emma was in the front passenger seat and her boyfriend Brian was driving. We’d left the pub early because Emma and Brian were fighting. He’d been told off earlier that day by our boss for helping a young girl, twelve or so, onto her horse by clasping her bottom.
There was a rule against touching bottoms and that particular rule had only been added to the rules because Brian had a habit of it.
It was raining and the dirt road was slippery. Emma yelled for him to slow down. We all did. We were doing almost double the speed limit when Brian lost control. The wheels slipped a bit and I guess he overcompensated trying to correct the car’s direction. It happened quickly. We were travelling sideways when we hit the bank of a bend. If we hadn’t slid, if it hadn’t been muddy, I don’t see how we could have taken the bend at that speed anyway. I told the jury that during Brian’s manslaughter hearing. The car flipped, rolled twice. Twice and a half really. It was like watching slow-motion footage. I heard screaming and breaking glass, watched bodies thrash back and forth, arms and legs fly up and down. The sound of the roof sliding fifty feet along the road, inches beneath my head, was deafening. Interminable. Then it stopped. It was dark and silent but for the clicking and flashing of emergency lights.
I was upside down with the seatbelt cutting into my waist. Managing to undo the buckle, I dropped onto my side. Michael did the same, landing on my head and causing my only injury. There was no glass in the windows, we crawled out. Brian was half way out of his window, Michael helped him to his feet while I knelt besides Emma’s window. She was still upside down but had slipped through her seatbelt. Her arm was trapped under the roof, it must have flung out as the car flipped and been caught. Sliding along the road had taken most of the flesh from it and ripped the bone from her shoulder. It was only held on by a few inches of meat and stretched skin. Blood poured from what looked like a fat hollow pasta noodle. I pinched the pasta noodle closed between my thumb and index finger and pressed my palm against the exposed meat surrounding it. Emma cried out, looking up at me frightened. She tried to pry my hand away with her free one. I grabbed it and held it away.
“You’re bleeding,” I told her, “I’m just trying to stop it.”
“Am I going to die?”
“No, don’t be ridiculous. Your arm is a bit fucked up though.”
“Is it in my hair?” she asked.
“The blood? Yes.”
Her long blonde hair hung in a growing pool on the roof of the car. There seemed to be an awful lot of it.
“Fuck. I straightened it today.”
Brian knelt down beside us. “Are you okay, Emma?” he asked. His eyes widened and he put his hand over his mouth. Vomit sprayed out between his fingers, splashing the side of my face and neck as he stood and stepped back.
Michael took his place, staring at Emma’s arm and putting his hand on my back.
“I’ll go and get help,” he said.
This was before mobile phones were a thing. They existed, but came with a case that you carried over your shoulder with a strap and only American businessmen on television had them.
“Okay, be quick. And take him with you.” I nodded towards Brian who was twenty feet away, punching a speed limit sign.
I heard Michael yell something at Brian, watched them sprint off down the road. Brian stopped and ran back.
“I don’t have my license,” he said, “Will you tell them that you were the one driving?”
“Go and get help, Brian.”
“But will you?”
“No.”
He called me a cunt, then turned and chased after Michael, disappearing in the darkness.
“Are you alright?” Emma asked.
“Me? I’m fine. Just a bit of a headache. Everyone’s fine but you. Didn’t anyone ever tell you to keep your arms inside the vehicle at all times?”
“Is that a joke?”
“It was meant to be. Sorry.”
“That’s okay. Am I going to lose my arm?”
“I don’t know. Maybe they can stitch it back on. Does it hurt?”
“Not really. It just feels cold. Brian will leave me if I only have one arm.”
“Brian doesn’t deserve you with two arms. Besides, if you do lose your arm, you can get a robot one. That would be pretty cool. I’d swap an arm for a robot one.”
Blood was leaking through my fingers, running down my arm and dripping from my elbow. I was still holding her other hand.
“Emma, I’m going to let go of your hand because I need to use mine, okay?”
“No,” she tightened her grip.
“Alright, I’m going to press harder then. Does that hurt?”
“No but you’re runnnn nyr hoodie.”
“Sorry?”
“Ruining your hoodie. M sorry. M really tired.”
“It’s an old hoodie and I don’t think you are meant to go to sleep. They’ll be back soon. It will probably take them twenty minutes to get into town and another ten for the ambulance to arrive. Talk to me until they get here. What kind of music do you like? Who’s your favorite band?”
Back then, at that age, most conversations could be started by asking what kind of music the person listened to. The type of music you embraced defined aspects of who you were, how you dressed, who your friends were. It was simpler. In your forties, you can’t just walk up to people at networking functions and chat about your favorite bands. You have to talk about bathroom fittings and look at photos on their phone of the firepit they just completed. It’s harder to make friends as the years pass but when you do, they’re better ones. Or maybe you just get better at fucking things up less.
I meant to ask Brian at Emma’s funeral
who her favorite band was, as she hadn’t answered, but he wasn’t there. The crematorium played Lou Reed’s Perfect Day during the eulogy but I don’t know who picked it. When Emma’s parents asked if she had said anything before she died, I told them she had apologized for getting blood on my hoodie. They nodded and hugged me as if this was somehow an acceptable answer. I didn’t tell them that Emma urinated and defecated when she died. That she hadn’t just gone to sleep, she’d convulsed. That her large brown eyes were open and I tried to close them but my fingers were covered in mud and blood and I got it all over her face. That I didn’t know what to do so I just sat in the mud holding her hand, long after she loosened her grip.
Facebook listed Brian under ‘people you might know’ a few years back, his profile photo showed him riding a jet ski.
I waved as I approached the ATVs. I was late returning and received half-hearted waves in response. Nobody cheered or slapped me on the back. Nobody called me Doedecker.
“Nothing?” JM asked.
“No, I saw a squirrel though. A fat one. It would probably have made a good stew.”
“Well, that’s hunting. Sometimes you get lucky and sometimes you don’t. Maybe we’ll all have better luck this afternoon.”
We didn’t go back out that afternoon; it started snowing heavily so JM, Doug and Murdock packed up camp while I wandered around pretending to look like I was doing something. I asked a few times if anybody needed a hand, just to appear helpful, but people kept saying yes so I stopped. I don’t mind the whole ‘adventure’ thing of camping but I’m not that keen on packing up things. To be honest, I’d rather just leave it all there and buy new stuff next time.
I was invited out to deer camp a few times after that but had to work or go faucet shopping. The photos Murdock posted on Facebook showed the group having fun. There was one of him doing a wheelie on an ATV and another of him chopping wood without a top on. They’d built a larger firepit, using stone from the creek, and added a cast iron pole to hang pots from. I left a comment under the photo saying it looked great and JM replied “it might even be large enough now to keep you warm” which was nice. Another photo showed JM standing beside the carcass of deer. It was strung from a tree by its hind legs. I zoomed in on the eyes to see if it was the one I had hand-fed Cheetos. They were cloudy and dull so I don’t think it was.
The Flying Rabbit opened again last weekend. It was still cold but not bitingly so. I took gloves but didn’t need them. Despite not having practiced for a few months, I shot well. Not as well as the others in our group but still my highest score yet at eighty-five percent. I received a few cheers and a slap on the back. Afterwards, we drank beer from the back of a Chevrolet Silverado and I asked Amar if I could see his rubber penis, but he said no.
Marketing
I know several people in marketing. They’re all dreadful. Somehow every discussion, regardless of topic, turns to results of their recent Facebook ad campaign for sandals made by the tribal women of Klokloklowok or Bedazzled iPhone covers. A hundred years ago, they'd have been selling pencils on a street corner. After clocking off, they'd huddle in sad dirty groups discussing the merits of using a smaller tin to make the pencils seem bigger.
One person I know in marketing, a slightly crazed looking flabby woman in her thirties named Rian, could be the poster child for Dunning–Kruger effect -- a cognitive bias wherein unskilled individuals suffer from illusory superiority, mistakenly assessing their ability to be much higher than is accurate. Devoid of any defining talent or clue and producing work that parents wouldn’t put on the fridge if their child created it, Rian is at a loss to understand why monuments have not been erected in her name, why her Facebook campaigns for pipecleaner& glitter based hair-ties aren’t required reading in university courses, why the tree she painted on her living room wall three years ago isn’t displayed at the New York Museum of Modern Art. Having confidence in one’s abilities is a good thing but just because a dog wants to sit in the driver’s seat, it doesn’t mean it’s capable of driving a eighteen-wheeler or school bus.
While I'm sure many find worth in the services marketing people provide, given a choice between benefits gained from two hour meetings about Adwords campaign statistics or a bucket of warm spit, I'd take the bucket of warm spit. A direction, decision or point being reached in a marketing meeting is a far less likely scenario than finding myself in a position where I need to demonstrate centrifugal force to a group of young children.
From: Pauline Olsen
Date: Monday 27 April 2015 10.12am
To: David Thorne
Subject: Book signing dates
Hello David,
It’s been bought to my attention that a list of upcoming book signing events was recently posted on your website with B&N stores named as venues.
I was wondering if I could have the contact details of your agent or marketing person or if you could forward this email to them as a matter of urgency.
We have the ISBN in our system but no record of the listed events. I've spoken with two other stores and they have no record either.
Thank you, Pauline
................................................................................................
From: David Thorne
Date: Monday 27 April 2015 11.02am
To: Pauline Olsen
Subject: Re: Book signing dates
Hello Pauline,
Thank you for your email. I'm currently without an agent or marketing person. I blame their inability to take constructive criticism well.
I was signed with LA based agency ICM Partners regarding television rights but after receiving a draft script, penned apparently by throwing a keyboard into a box full of squirrels and running the results through a quick spell-check,
I stopped responding to their Skype group video chat requests. What was originally a satirical expose of the design industry somehow turned into a story about a mechanic named Greg. It's possible that I may have missed an artistic and clever point, but just as possible that somewhere Greg is wondering how they could have fucked up his eight part transmission rebuild series so badly.
Penguin represents my first book but my marketing person there is a small angry Asian woman who yells a lot so I have her number blocked. One might suggest marketing consists of more than the author tweeting links to his book every fifteen minutes but one would be wrong. And ungrateful. And should tweet more. We haven't spoken since she accused me of stealing a three-foot cardboard cutout penguin from her office the last time I was there.
Incidentally, Penguin employs a similar system to ICM in regards to calculating royalties - except instead of a keyboard and squirrels, they throw a calculator into an empty box and jiggle it a bit. This is after thirty-six meetings regarding what kind of box to use, three-hundred emails discussing who will do the jiggling, and a six month delay due to pigeons, or hats, or static electricity.
Regards, David.
................................................................................................
From: Pauline Olsen
Date: Monday 27 April 2015 11.28am
To: David Thorne
Subject: Re: Re: Book signing dates
Hello David,
Thank you for getting back to me so quickly.
Who arranged the book signing dates and who at B&N did they speak with?
Pauline
................................................................................................
From: David Thorne
Date: Monday 27 April 2015 11.35am
To: Pauline Olsen
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Book signing dates
Hello Pauline,
There was no arrangement as such. I thought I'd just show up on the day. I have my own fold-up chair and table.
Regards, David.
................................................................................................
From: Pauline Olsen
Date: Monday 27 April 2015 12.51pm
To: David Thorne
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Book signing dates
You posted several venues and dates without anyone at B&N knowing anything about it? You can't just show up. That's not how it works. There are procedures. You have to contact individual stores well in advance. If the store agrees to you doing a signing, copies need to be ordered, a date set, and arrangements made. If you had a marketing person, they would have explained all this to you.
Pauline
................................................................................................
From: David Thorne
Date: Monday 27 April 2015 1.19pm
To: Pauline Olsen
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Book signing dates
Hello Pauline,