by John Inman
“Totally,” Joe echoed in response as he wheeled the hand wagon toward the next enclosure and what were probably the most dangerous predators of all. The leopards.
It was a long, nerve-racking night. All that kept Joe sane was thinking about Ned, sweet Ned, waiting for him on the trail at the end of his shift.
He couldn’t have known that Ned was facing problems of his own.
NED COULD hear his pulse thumping inside his head. He was at that point on the trail when it began to dip into the largest canyon—down, down, down to where the roar from the Cabrillo Freeway could begin to be heard. Down to where the little footbridge stretched across the four lanes of traffic below. He loved the footbridge. He would feel safe there. Safer than where he stood now, at least, because this darkness was really starting to freak him out. He couldn’t see the slashing strobe of the freeway traffic’s passing headlights yet, but the distant hum of automobiles whizzing along somewhere up ahead began to restore his confidence. Frankly, it was the first smidgeon of confidence he had felt since he stepped out of his apartment.
The trail was so much darker than he had expected. Ned had never seen it like this. Light was absolutely nonexistent. Even overhead, there was no moon, no stars, nothing. A hand held smack in front of his face was an empty void hovering over a deeper, denser void. He could squeeze his eyes shut and see exactly what he saw when they were opened wide. Nothing.
After hurrying across Balboa Park’s broad, sloping lawns, illuminated by ambient light from streetlamps and passing traffic back along Sixth Avenue, Ned groped along now on the pitch-black trail, as blind as he had ever been in his life. He had finally overcome his fear of the bellowing zoo animals up ahead and once more held his arms stretched out in front of him to ward off anything that might suddenly block his way. He knew where he was on the trail, but still the darkness left him leery of his instincts. With every step, he imagined himself walking into a tree or tripping over a root or tumbling over a cliff, or simply wandering off in the wrong direction and losing himself among the pines.
Or even more frightening, plowing without warning into another human being approaching along the trail from the opposite direction. A human being, shall we say, with maybe less than harmless intentions.
It wasn’t only the dark and his imagination and the distant cries of the zoo animals that spooked him. It was the sounds he kept hearing nearby. Furtive sounds. The rustle and crunch of pattering footsteps somewhere out there in the surrounding trees. The sounds were so soft and so many, he couldn’t begin to determine from which direction they came. Wherever they were, or whatever was making them, Ned knew they were keeping pace with him. When he walked, they followed along. When he stopped, they fell silent, as if waiting for him to start up again. And when they did grow still like that, it left the woods absolutely soundless but for the thumping of his own heart and the clamoring of the beasts in the distance.
Oddly, the small creatures that usually accompanied him on these walks—the scurrying squirrels and feral cats, the night birds flapping and cheeping in the bushes, the crickets and the humming insects—were no longer present. Or if they were, they were just as frightened as Ned and so had chosen to cower motionless and silent in the shadows, waiting perhaps, for nothing more than this ungodly night to pass.
During one of those frozen moments when Ned stood listening with every fiber of his being for a sound he probably didn’t want to hear, he actually heard it. It was the brittle snap of a twig, off to his left, out among the trees.
At the same time, something settled against the side of his foot. He nudged it with his toe and felt it shift. It was a long piece of wood. Part of a fallen branch perhaps.
When he heard another twig snap somewhere off to his right, as if whatever was out there was maneuvering to sneak up on him from another direction, Ned slowly bent and hefted the branch in his hands. It was maybe three feet long and heavy enough to be used as a cudgel if the need arose. Just the fact that Ned was now standing there in impenetrable darkness gauging the weight of a cudgel in his hand scared him even more.
He stood rooted to the trail, club in hand, turning first one way, then the other. He looked forward, then back, then tried to peer into the trees at either side of the path. Of course, it was all a big waste of energy. It was so dark he couldn’t see a fucking thing in any direction.
He cursed himself again for not bringing a flashlight.
Gulping hard to swallow his fear, he once again began to work his way downhill along the trail. It was steep here, leading down toward the freeway and the little mesh-covered bridge. Once there, he would have light from the cars below and the safety of the wire surrounding him. Danger would only be able to come at him from ahead or behind, not from either side or above. He could defend himself. Maybe.
As soon as he was moving again, the sound of footsteps in the trees started up once more. Those sounds came from every direction now. Clearly, whatever stalked him wasn’t alone. There was more than one of them out there, lurking in the shadows. Ned stopped at the snap of a twig that sounded closer than the others. His heart shot up into his throat, and he gripped the cudgel like a baseball bat, squinting this way and that into the darkness. He worked his fingers around the rough wood, holding on for dear life. A rivulet of icy sweat slid down his rib cage, making him almost gasp. He had tied the extra jacket he carried for Joe around his waist, knotted by the sleeves, to free up his hands. He imagined the jacket offering a little added protection for whatever might come flying out of the shadows to rip his guts out.
That thought was so far over the top, even Ned couldn’t stand it.
His anger swelled, and he screamed into the trees, “Go away! Leave me alone!”
And that’s when he heard it. A growl. No, not one growl. Two. One off in the trees to his right and another to his left. A heartbeat later, he heard yet another growl stuttering out of the darkness somewhere back along the trail he had just traveled. It sounded close. Too close.
Jesus, how many of them are there?
His first thought was to flee, just run like a rabbit and never look back. But he knew if he tried to run full tilt down this sloping dirt trail in pitch blackness he would never be able to stay on his feet. And once he stumbled and crashed to the ground, they’d be on him. Whatever the fuck they were. Then they really would rip his guts out, just like on those PBS wildlife shows where a herd of wolves brought down a moose. Ned, like the poor moose, might be able to fight them off for a minute or two, but then by sheer numbers, the wolves would overpower him. Slowly, with excruciating deliberation, they would settle in and systematically tear him to pieces.
Ned swung the cudgel hard enough to hear it whistle through the air. The rustle and snap of branches coming from two or three different directions told him whatever was out there was still drawing closer.
There wasn’t much doubt about it now. As in that PBS special, Ned was the prey, and he was being stalked.
Suddenly through the blackness at the side of the trail, he saw two red spots of light. Eyes. Then from back along the trail behind him, another set of eyes. They disappeared for a second as the beasts, whatever they were, blinked. Then they were back again, along with two more pinpoints of dim red light that appeared on the trail just ahead of him. It was that last pair of eyes that told him he was surrounded. And that realization made his heart give a fearful lurch.
To Ned’s own surprise, with fear came a bubbling up of anger. He gritted his teeth and hunched in on himself, holding the bat in readiness for the assault that he knew was about to come.
Somewhere in the analytical part of his brain, Ned wondered how those eyes had absorbed enough ambient light from this impenetrable darkness to create a reflection. But in a more practical part of his mind where his furious desire to survive had apparently lain dormant until this very moment, he just wanted to get the battle over with.
“Come on, then, motherfuckers!” he screamed. “Take your best shot!”
As if goaded into ac
tion, they did exactly that.
From four different directions they moved in. Dogs. For that’s what they were, Ned suddenly realized. Plain old frigging dogs. A couple of them weren’t even that big. Terriers, maybe, by the sound of them. Ned couldn’t be sure. But even if a couple of them weren’t exactly big enough to snatch his life away, there were still two others Ned had to worry about. By the deep thunder of their growls and snarls, he knew those two weren’t small at all. And it was from them that the greatest danger would come.
The utter lack of light seemed to heighten Ned’s other senses. He could smell the dogs now. It was a sickly, sour smell. Unwashed. Feces and wet fur. They were probably feral like the cats that lived in the canyons. In their stench, he thought he discerned a wary anger. A hunger. As if they had it all planned out. As if they would bring him down, rip him to pieces, and divvy him up like four homeless guys splitting a Big Mac.
Ned’s reflexes too were suddenly sharper than he could ever remember them being. It was like he had sonar. As if even in utter darkness, he could feel the animals approach. As if he would be able to sense when they came within reach of his club. And when they did, he would swing it with all the force he could muster and knock their blocks off.
The first dog to attack came from beneath the trees to his right. The scatter of pine needles beneath its scurrying paws gave away its location, and as soon as Ned heard that sound, he roared at the top of his voice and swung the cudgel low across the ground in front of him, right where he knew the attacking beast had to be. And sure enough, it was.
He felt the reverberation in his arms when the club struck the animal’s legs. A howl of pain erupted, and no sooner had it risen up than Ned swung the club again, this time chopping it straight down toward the ground like an ax.
His second blow struck the animal’s torso. Whatever it was, it felt big. Like German shepherd big. He thought he heard the crack of ribs; he knew he heard a great expulsion of air and a second whimper of pain.
At the rustle of weeds behind him, Ned whirled and once again swept the club through the air in a wide, sweeping arc. This time, by sheer luck, he struck another creature, this one lower to the ground. One of the smaller dogs. By the feel and give of the blow, and by what sounded like the clatter of teeth, he thought he had banged it across the head. It collapsed to the ground as the club swept into it again with a dull thonking sound, and this time there was no whimper of pain. There was no movement at all. Ned knew he had either killed it or knocked it senseless, and either option pleased him just fine. The little fucking mutt.
He was about to give a victorious shout, when strong jaws clamped around the back of his shoe. He tried to kick the creature away but couldn’t. The teeth had latched into his tennis shoe like a vise. He whirled around, trying to strike at the beast with the club, but he couldn’t get the right angle. This wasn’t one of the small dogs. Its low, thundering growl sounded ferocious. And big. Another German shepherd maybe. Or a Rottweiler. He felt a vicious tug and knew it was trying to drag him into the bushes at the edge of the trail.
Ned got one good swing in, striking the dog in the side, but the jaws only clamped down harder onto the back of his shoe. Still awkwardly swinging his club, Ned tried to shake it off, hopping around on one foot now, screaming in fury at the top of his lungs.
Just when he knew he was losing his balance, when he knew the dog was about to pull him down to the ground, another furious roar exploded from the trail ahead of him. This time it was a human roar. A moment later, a blinding spear of light stabbed through the darkness and settled over him.
It was the beam of a flashlight! And Joe was the one aiming it.
“Beat it, you stupid mongrels. Get the hell out of here!” Joe bellowed like a foghorn, furious and fearless. He waded into Ned’s battle without an instant of hesitation.
As much from the shock of finding Joe suddenly there to protect him as by the tugging of the dog at his heel, Ned finally lost his balance and toppled over, striking the ground hard. Winded by the fall, he quickly rolled over onto his back, thinking the dog would come for him, clamp those ferocious teeth onto his throat and shake him like a rat until he was dead. But whatever the dog’s plan was, it didn’t get the chance to set them in motion.
In the erratic beam of light shooting off in every direction at once, Ned watched as Joe loomed over him long enough to bring the heavy flashlight down on the dog’s head. Releasing his hold on Ned’s shoe at last, the creature snarled once, then tore off into the trees, escaping into the darkness. With their fury suddenly startled out of them and their leader heading for the hills like a coward, the other dogs followed suit, all but the small one Ned had killed with his club.
Joe centered his light on the creature lying dead on the path, then aimed the torch at Ned. “Did you do that?” he asked, coughing up a nervous laugh from all the adrenaline coursing through his system.
“It scared me,” Ned explained, and then he dredged up a wary grin too. Still lying flat on his back, he tossed the cudgel aside and grabbed the hand Joe was holding out. With Joe’s help he hoisted himself off the ground with a grunt.
Still breathless, still trembling with an overdose of adrenaline just like Joe, Ned simply said, “You came.”
Joe stared at him in the light from the flashlight, which was pointed at the ground now so it wouldn’t blind them. Ned watched in awe as Joe’s smile disappeared and his fingers tightened around Ned’s hand.
“I’ll always come for you,” Joe said quietly.
Ned knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that was true. Whatever happened, Joe would always be there for him.
Ned gave Joe’s hand a yank and launched himself into Joe’s arms. Joe accepted him, his strong arms folding around him as if there was no other place Joe would rather he be.
Ned dredged up a shaky laugh. Then, when his fear of the darkness and the dogs threatened to creep back in, he squeezed his eyes shut before the tears could well up for Joe to see.
He pressed his face to Joe’s chest and whispered, “Thank you.”
Joe cupped his fingers around the back of Ned’s neck and pressed his lips into his hair.
That was the only answer Ned needed.
“ARE YOU hurt?” Joe asked, his arms wrapped tight around Ned’s small frame, his chin settled firmly in Ned’s hair. “Are you bitten?”
With his face still resting on Joe’s chest, Ned shook his head. “No. Not a scratch.”
“You were lucky.”
“Thanks to you,” Ned said. “How did you know I was in trouble?”
“I heard you yell.”
Joe breathed in the scent of Ned’s hair. It smelled like strawberry shampoo, with maybe a tiny dash of terror mixed in to give it a little zing.
“I was on the other side of the footbridge,” Joe said. “After I heard you yell, I heard the dogs. They sounded just like the animals at the zoo. They’ve all gone wacky tonight. I guess that’s why the dogs attacked you.”
“It’s the red sky,” Ned said. “It’s driving the animals nuts. You can’t see them, but the birds are still wheeling around up there too. I don’t think they’ve landed all day. They must be exhausted.”
Joe tightened his hold on Ned because he felt so good in his arms. Ned’s trembling had stopped, or at least most of it had. “Don’t worry,” he said. “They’ll have to come down sooner or later. They can’t fly around forever.”
“But what’s making them do it, Joe?”
Joe shook his head, and Ned’s hair tickled his chin. “I don’t know, buddy. I don’t have a clue.” He tucked a finger under Ned’s chin, tilted his head up, and studied Ned’s face in the nimbus of the flashlight’s beam. Even with the flashlight aimed at the ground, it shed enough light to see the remains of panic still rattling around in Ned’s eyes. Nevertheless, Joe was pretty sure he had never seen anything as beautiful as Ned’s face at that very moment. He shuddered with sheer exuberance at having Ned standing there in his arms.
Ned misunderstood the shudder. He stepped back and unwrapped the extra jacket from around his waist. “You’re cold,” he said. “I brought you another coat. Put it on. It’s warmer than the one you’re wearing.”
“Thanks!” Joe exclaimed, taking the coat gratefully. The air was colder than he had expected it to be. An extra coat would help a lot.
Once he had it zipped up snug to his throat, he reached out and laid a hand to Ned’s cheek. “Thank you,” he said.
Ned nodded. His eyes were big and round, and he looked embarrassed. Clearly hoping to change the subject, he asked, “So the animals at the zoo were acting up too?”
Joe smiled, knowing Ned must have already heard them. Hell, Joe could hear them now. He reached up to brush the curtain of pale hair away from Ned’s eyes. “Crazy as bedbugs.” Without asking permission, he pulled Ned back into another embrace.
In return, Ned wound his arms around Joe’s waist. His hands came up to splay wide across Joe’s back. Joe loved the way they felt.
Staring down once again into Ned’s upturned gaze—he still looked a little shell-shocked, Joe thought—Joe threw caution to the wind and leaned in to plant a gentle kiss on Ned’s forehead. Ned closed his eyes. The corners of his mouth turned up in a faint little smile.
“You’ve had a rough night,” Joe said, his lips still grazing Ned’s forehead. “You shouldn’t be alone. When we get home, I want you to spend the night with me at the apartment. Will you do that?”
Following a gentle exhalation of breath, as if Ned had been surprised by the question—but perhaps not as surprised as he should have been—Ned stammered, “Y-yes. Whatever you want.”
The way Ned answered without hesitation caused Joe to smile.
“I can sleep on my couch if you want,” Joe ventured. “You should have the bed. You must be exhausted.”
Ned tilted his head back. His expression was open and sweet and fearless. “I’ll only take the bed if you’re in it with me.” Joe smiled again, pleased and contented. “I suppose that can be arranged.”