Venison - redux (417 hits)
Category: NoneRating: 0.66 on 16 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by earth collapse (View user info) at 2009-03-20 12:54:36 EDT
It was a long time ago and a lot of things have changed. Maybe I say that because it's comforting, some kind of reassurance to say 'a lot of things have changed' but 'I've stayed the same,' because there's comfort in permanence.
But it was a long time ago and looking back I remember fragments, a puzzle missing pieces, and those pieces my mind fills in, haphazardly, not quite as it happened, fictionalized a bit, a representation of a time, a memory not entirely accurate, because it was a long time ago and the mind has a way of filling in the blanks, a way of pulling from the reservoir of memory and experience, fishing it out and transplanting what it catches.
Faces and places are never quite clear, but are fuzzy, blurry, all fogged over. Maybe it's because things are always changing, with no real anchor, no exact image, but rather a culmination of image, stuck together, mixed, running into and over each other, blended, like a collage.
Like the way we tell stories, adding, sometimes taking away, details becoming confused, morphing, invented, taking a life of their own, adapting to the audience, becoming something more, different, or even less. Maybe all stories are lies, not quite true. And that's why you can't trust anyone, because people believe their own lies, their own inventions, their faulty memory that recreates, reorders and reconstructs.
And it's hard for me to be honest, because it was so long ago and I am a different person and the world has changed, and my mind, my eyes, see things differently now. I remember Skeleton Quarry out in East Texas, in the boonies, with deer and armadillo and wild hogs and pine trees and memories I'd like to forget but can't, no matter how much time seems to pass. And I remember I was kneeling over a deer, it's back broken, but its feet still twitching, scratching at the gravel with its big black eyes staring up at me.
It was a young buck, maybe a couple years old at most, and the poor bastard had tried to cross the road just as we came barreling down in Sean's dinky old Ford, a hand me down from his father, the clutch sticky and the body painted an ugly brown, rusty, flaking away.
Maybe it was bad timing, or maybe, as Sean liked to say, "It's suicide season, when all the deer get depressed and decide to throw themselves in front of cars."
And I was kneeling over this deer holding this hammer, unused, polished and still slippery, and the weight felt perfect in my hand. "Just do it, man," Sean said, standing in front of the truck's headlights, his face dark, demented, evil.
"I don't know if I can," I responded, the hammer unconsciously, naturally rocking in my hand. Suddenly I could taste venison in my mouth, that sweet, really too sweet meat and I felt ravenous; the executioner, drawing and quartering with the people watching, their lips quivering, waiting for the onslaught, the breaking on the wheel, the cruelty.
But this wasn't 'cruel', for this young buck lying on its side with a broken back wanted to die. Maybe it didn't want to exactly die, but it wanted this suffering to end, and maybe if it just understood death it might even agree with me. For why would anything or anyone want to suffer needlessly, especially with a broken back, lying on a dirt road with a couple of young kids stoned out of their minds contemplating the easiest method of killing a deer?
The hammer was still rocking in my hand and Sean continued to watch from a distance, egging me on with this bloodlust in his voice thinly masked behind an air of annoyance, and the deer was watching me with these black eyes like planets and all I could think about was the taste of venison in my mouth, on my tongue, between my teeth, the sweetness, the unnatural softness which only comes about after hours and hours of preparation (I think they smoke it), and again I heard Sean say, "Do it man, just hit in the fucking head already so we can get the fuck out of here."
I whipped around to face him, but all I could see was a shadowed oval, "I am, man, chill the fuck out."
Sean lit a cigarette (his second?) and I returned my eyes to the buck, some blood trickling from its nose, feet still twitching, scratching at the gravel and I grabbed hold of its antlers, locking its head against the road and my heart began to race.
The buck whimpered a little, this strange guttural whimper that's hard for me to describe now, and I could see the veins in its neck thumping, maybe as hard as mine and I lifted the hammer, deciding on a spot right between the eyes. Maybe it would only take one swing, maybe two or three at the most.
The buck knew then his fate, that polished, glittering hammer was its end, but it only made it harder, because not knowing is better than knowing.
I heard Sean pacing still in the background, kicking rocks around, still watching I'm sure, just waiting for the violence, and I could still taste the venison in my mouth, and I remember now the first time I ate it, because I ate so much I got sick, and for a long time the memory of the taste revolted me, but oddly now it enticed me. Suddenly I wanted to kill it, I wanted to bring the hammer down between its eyes, the fragile bone protecting its brain. I wanted to see the blood and the horror and I wanted it dead, I wanted its feet to stop twitching and its veins to stop pulsing. I wanted this sweet venison taste out of my mouth. I wanted Sean to quit pacing and I wanted off this dirt road in the middle of fucking nowhere. I wanted this over with and I wanted this buck to stop staring at me with these huge frightened eyes like planets.
"Holy shit, man, come on." I think he said, as I prepared, practiced the trajectory of the swing, the death-blow soon to take this buck's life, but everything went silent, I was focused. It was just the hammer in my hand, an extension of my strength, my power, tangible, as real as the blood leaking from its nose or the settling of dust on the road cutting through the headlights, and then, like a dream, I saw these eyes flash from the brush alongside the road.
Another deer walked out, a doe, across the ditch, seemingly unafraid, staring at me as I held the buck's antlers and the hammer, still rocking back and forth in my hand. It walked over, and maybe I was more afraid of it than it was of me. I let go of the antlers and stepped back and watched as it approached the buck, nuzzled it with its nose and guess-the-fuck-what? it moved a little, made a strange noise, and then, still in a dream, it rose, stumbled for a moment, gained it's composure and then, like a passing stranger saying 'hello', looked towards both of us as if to say 'thanks for caring' and walked off casually over the ditch and into the trees, into the forest and there was a long silence as we stood there until Sean said softly, "What the fuck?"
You see, it was a long time ago and I was fucked up on Ambien, and I had been up for three days straight on uppers and then thought it would be a good idea to take a bunch of Ambien and likewise, I was already stoned out of my mind and I can't be certain what happened, except that we hit a deer at night on this dirt road with Sean's dinky old Ford and that, as I remember, it laid there on its side with a broken back and blood running from its nose. What happened afterwards I can't be sure, because Ambien puts you in a dream, makes everything feel like a dream, makes memory a dream, and nothing can be certain.
But, I remembered something else from that night, another dream, conflicting; I remember I was holding the hammer in my hand and feeling powerful and I saw the blood and I had wanted to kill it, and so I swung, and this doesn't feel as real, but I heard a crack, the body convulsed, a high-pitched sound, and then I raised the hammer again and "Jesus," I hit it again and again and everything stopped, but I kept hitting it; over and over again. I couldn't stop fucking hitting it. And there was blood everywhere, on my hammer, on the road, on my shirt and shoes, and the skull between the eyes was all mushy and bloody and actually, that might have happened, because Ambien puts you in a dream, and whether or not I killed it, we started driving again and I heard
Sean say, "Jesus man, that was un-fucking-real."
And it seems to me now that all life is transient, and maybe I've changed my mind, maybe we do change, but with the world, perhaps because of the world, but it doesn't make much difference, and it doesn't matter how you tell the story, because I'm sitting here around midnight and I'm remembering all these details, fabrications really, and I'm thinking that maybe there was no doe, no buck and maybe none of this happened at all. Maybe it was a story I heard from someone, maybe I saw it in a film or maybe it was a dream. But maybe I did kill it, or maybe I didn't, but it doesn't matter because I can tell it anyway I want and it was a long time ago and people believe their own lies.
That's why you can't trust anyone.
User Reviews
Submitted by wookie (user info) at 2009-11-18 15:58:42 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by scourge (user info) at 2009-03-23 11:21:37 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
tl;dr
Submitted by Mr_Trollope (user info) at 2009-03-23 07:36:33 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
No Comment
Submitted by Judgement (user info) at 2009-03-23 07:22:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by YourNameHere (user info) at 2009-03-22 17:46:00 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Sacrilicious (user info) at 2009-03-22 15:30:21 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
NO
Submitted by Shlongy (user info) at 2009-03-22 09:08:31 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
If there is a bigger baby on Ubersite than earth collapse, I haven't noticed...Although Kaos King runs a close second.
Submitted by pandora (user info) at 2009-03-21 16:13:26 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Mmmm, dream venison....
Submitted by RoadSong (user info) at 2009-03-21 14:00:52 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Hammer!
This is what hunting knives are for.
Submitted by kaos-king (user info) at 2009-03-20 22:48:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Rhymenocerous (user info) at 2009-03-20 16:31:26 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2009-03-20 14:23:03 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
slow start but i did end up enjoying it.
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also, your name reminds me of the band Earth Crisis. Earth Crisis is fucking awesome.
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2009-03-20 14:23:03 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
slow start but i did end up enjoying it.
Submitted by TheGoat (user info) at 2009-03-20 14:07:07 EDT (#)
Ranking: -1
WTFINRAT
Submitted by BLITZKREIG_BOB (user info) at 2009-03-20 13:59:24 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
WTF! I'm not reading all that!
Submitted by skrapmetal (user info) at 2009-03-20 13:57:25 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
Well, I liked it, but then again I had a pitcher of Yuengling at lunch and when that happens my standards drop.
Mmmm, Yuengling.
Submitted by no1hasdis (user info) at 2009-03-20 13:03:14 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
Submitted by Shlongy (user info) at 2009-03-20 13:02:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
I also enjoy ostritch burgers. I AM NOT KIDDING.
Submitted by Shlongy (user info) at 2009-03-20 13:02:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
I also enjoy ostritch burgers. I AM NOT KIDDING.