Foodchain

by Jeff Jacobson

  “Fine. Fine. Okay tough guy. Enjoy your bath.”

  He heard her wipe her hands on her dress, hesitate for just a moment, then heard the cowboy boots striding purposefully through the overgrown lawn and out to the street and just like that, she was gone. He fought the urge to call her back. Fuck her. FUCK her.

  He eyed the Jack Daniels bottle bobbing around in the bath and wished it wasn’t so empty. He had a couple of beers in the fridge, but they wouldn’t work. They’d just make things worse. But the pills he took from the trucker, they were just waiting for someone, they were waiting for someone with a need. Someone with a purpose.

  * * * * *

  Frank stood up in his bath and dropped the underwear. It was the first time he’d been naked outside since the night the quiet gentlemen had made him walk up those stairs to the alligator tank. Today, it felt good. He stepped out of the bath and pissed in the driveway.

  Off in the distance, he heard shooting. But it never got closer.

  There were two kinds of pills in the baggie. Strikingly vivid pale blue pills, the color of ice in the sun, and green and white capsules. Frank tore off a sheet from the prescription pad and folded the paper into quarters. He cracked one of the green and white capsules open and poured the white powder into the creases. He eyeballed it for a while, holding the folded paper up to the light, as if deciphering the chemical breakdown.

  Frank scowled. He set the paper down and tossed one of the brilliant blue pills into his mouth and washed it down with beer. He poured the white powder back into the green capsule as best as he could. That one and the rest of the pills went back into the baggie. He slapped a long piece of duct tape across the baggie, opened the cupboard under the sink and wedged the tape and baggie up into the sink molding, in the narrow space between the edge of the counter and the front of the sink.

  He took his beer back to his room and got dressed. On his way out front, he stepped into the small room at the back of the vet hospital. The pound. Although the dogs jumped to their feet, all wide eyes and wider mouths, thinking it was feeding time, they didn’t bark. They were used to him by now. Some even wagged their tails. He’d cleaned the concrete weeks ago, and now hosed it out at the end of each day. He kicked open the back door and emptied the bag of food on the ground. Then, before he could really slow down and think about it, he snapped open the lock and swung the door wide.

  The dogs blinked uncertainly in the bright sunlight until the tiniest dog, the one that darted forward through the legs of the bigger dogs to snap at intruders, trotted confidently through the open door, crossed the small room, and bounced over the threshold. The rest of the dogs boiled through the open door and ran into the back parking lot, barking excitedly. A few paused long enough to gobble at the dry food on the ground, but the sheer intensity at being outside seemed to override any hunger in most of the dogs.

  He went back up front, grabbed the last beer, and went out to sit with the rhino for a while. He took it slow with the beer, just listening to the crickets, the dogs’ distant barking, and the rhino’s breathing.

  The slow-motion rhythmic pulsing of the rhino’s flanks nearly hypnotized him, when all of a sudden, time caught up with him and it seemed to be gaining speed. Lightning bolts started sparking through his limbs. He managed to slow down enough to reach slowly out and gently stroke the rhino’s head, the space between the ears.

  The rhino closed its eyes.

  DAY TWENTY-FIVE

  The next thing Frank knew, he was lying on the couch in the waiting room with an unbelievable headache. It was the first time he’d felt a truly vicious hangover since the accident, but he didn’t think it was from the alcohol. He sat up and a thousand nails pounded into the glass of his mind. Waves of bleach stabbed at his eyes, his nose, his heart. The hospital had been scrubbed raw; he could eat off the floor.

  He decided he needed alcohol. Immediately. He fought through the haze of chemicals like he was running through tear gas to the back door. It opened to a blast of heat and he stumbled out into a mess of mosquitoes swirling about in the early evening stillness. He swatted at a couple and felt more land all over his bare back, but at least it was better than breathing bleach. As he caught his bearings, Frank finally realized he’d been awfully busy.

  The lawn had been mowed. A handful of dogs watched him from the shade under the tree in the side yard. A large cardboard square, wrapped in several garbage bags stretched tight over it, covered a cracked window. He wandered out to the barn. The monkeys were full of fruit and happy. He had even reinforced several sections of chicken wire. The rhino’s stall had been mucked out, giving the rhino a thick, luxurious bed of fresh hay. The rhino chewed contentedly on a mountain of oats.

  * * * * *

  He found a half-full bottle of rum under the seat in the long black car and collapsed into the driver’s seat and tried to sort everything out. The situation with Annie was well and truly fucked, but he should have known better. Did he really think that she would quit using sex, or at least the suggestion of it, for cash? It wasn’t like they were going to run off together and live in a cozy little house with a fucking white picket fence.

  If nothing else, at least he now knew the effect of the pale blue pills. He finished the bottle and felt a little better, but not much. He decided he would shower, find something to eat, and head out to the ranch.

  * * * * *

  Driving out there, he got nervous, and pulled into the gas station. The sign had just been turned on, pale against the twilight sky. He needed gas, yes, but this little place was also the only place open in town, the only place to get any alcohol. The clowns had moved whatever was left in the liquor store up near the park into the gas station. The last time he’d been here, he’d been with Sturm, and Myrtle had made a point of ignoring Frank. This would be the first time he’d be alone with her since the night her cat died.

  He’d thought about trying to break into a house instead, see if there was alcohol left, but he figured there wouldn’t be anything left behind. Especially alcohol. Facing down Myrtle was quicker.

  As he unscrewed the gas tank, he watched her reflection in the driver’s side window. Encased in her reinforced plastic shell, she stared at his back. Frank slammed the gas nozzle into the long black car and waited, making a point of ignoring her.

  Gallons and dollars thunked along, and with a prickling of hair on the back of his head, Frank realized he had his back to the Glouck house.

  He stood and stretched, working his shoulders, and glanced surreptitiously at the house. The dead tree was empty. The yard was still. Smoke did not rise from the kitchen vent. The gas pump shut off with a deep clunk. He put the nozzle back into its holster and went on in the store.

  It was as hot as always. Myrtle had suddenly come across some important paperwork; her head was down, attacking the order form with her pen. Frank went straight to the alcohol, a stack of boxes shoved into the near corner, leaning against the bulletproof glass.

  He picked out a bottle of whiskey, a bottle of vodka, and three bottles of cheap rum. He lined the bottles up on the counter and waited.

  She made him wait a while. Finally, she looked up and added up the bottles, stabbing the prices of each bottle into an angry adding machine that spit out a strip of paper like a machine gun. “Thirty-nine ninety-five.” The words were delivered in such a flat monotone the adding machine might as well have been speaking.

  Frank slid two twenties through the slot. She took both bills and snapped them into a cash register drawer, kept loose under the counter. Then she went back to her paperwork.

  “You owe me a nickel,” Frank said.

  Myrtle checked the cash register. She took her time. Sure enough, she owed Frank five cents. She flicked a nickel through the slot. But she still wouldn’t look at him.

  * * * * *

  Frank drove for about a mile before he couldn’t take it anymore and simply stopped in the middle of the highway. He fumbled through the bottles on the passenger seat and ma
naged to find one of his bottles of rum. He cracked the seal and took a long, long swig. He shut the engine off and listened to the crickets for a while.

  Off to his left, the sun had disappeared completely behind the mountains, but there was still a little light left in the sky, enough to see the scraggly fence posts on both sides of the highway stretching away into darkening hills. The rum pooled and warmed his stomach, massaged his mind. He rubbed his newly shaved head, still not quite used to the short bristles of black hair.

  Headlights hit his rearview mirror. Hard. High beams, most likely.

  The sudden flash of lights gave him a start, despite the soothing rum. He started the engine, jerked it into Drive, and put the gas pedal on the floor. The long black car surged forward, picking up speed. Fence posts slid past, fast and faster. He realized he didn’t even have his own headlights on yet.

  He turned them on, juggling possibilities. The headlights behind him probably belonged to new hunters. But just for a second there he wondered if it was more quiet gentlemen in another long black car. No. There was no way they could have found him. He didn’t think he could be recognized in the photo on the website. Not this fast, anyway. It might be the cops, Olaf and Herschell. He hadn’t seen them around much, but ever since the day at the vet hospital, he’d been keeping an eye out.

  He pressed down on the gas even harder. The headlights were gaining.

  He was going so fast he damn near missed the turnoff to Sturm’s ranch. He locked up the wheels and slid past the driveway in a blue, acrid cloud. He jerked the gearshift into Reverse. The headlights crested the rise behind him and the highway around him began to glow. He savagely stomped on the gas, downright panicked now, and the car jumped backwards. Back into Drive, turning into the driveway lined with palm trees, he told himself he was being fucking stupid. He had the protection of Sturm, didn’t he? Those cops couldn’t touch him.

  He slowed, watching the flickering headlights as they rushed down the highway. They slowed as well, and turned into the driveway behind him, filling the car with orange light. He hit the gas again, roaring through the palm trees. When Sturm’s house came into view, the front littered with SUVs, he exhaled and realized he had been holding his breath.

  Frank slid to a stop behind the Assholes’ white Cadillac Escalade and jumped out, forgetting the bottles. He crouched low and ran along the fence line out to the barn. There, in the deep shadows, he waited, struggling to catch his breath. Off to his right, the back yard was softly lit with lanterns. He heard laughter and the clink of dishes. It looked like it was dinnertime.

  The headlights reached the house and a deep, vibrating air-horn sounded, once, twice, three times. It seemed celebratory. The vehicle slowed, and Frank could now see it was a tractor-trailer lit up like a Christmas tree. It wasn’t the quiet gentlemen; it wasn’t the cops. Jack and Pine were back.

  Jack shut off the big engine and climbed out. Sturm came around the corner of his house, followed by Theo and the rest of the hunters. Pine opened his door, but stayed in the cab, just swiveling on the bucket seat and propping one leg on the doorframe.

  “Well?” Sturm asked.

  “Thirty-seven,” Jack said.

  “Outstanding,” Sturm said. “Any problems?”

  “Fuck no. Worked slicker ‘n shit. Hell, I think most of them people woulda’ paid us to come haul ’em away. But I can understand. You would not believe how much these suckers can eat. Good thing we’re back, ’cause we’re fresh out of meat.”

  Sturm turned to the hunters. “Well gentlemen, I hope you all are ready for some real shooting, and I ain’t blowing smoke up your ass. The main course has arrived. So here’s the plan. Come dawn tomorrow, you have your rifles ready.” He walked out to the truck and gestured grandly. “You have just been delivered some of the deadliest big cats in the world.”

  Everyone funneled through the gate in the front yard and took a look at the truck.

  Frank figured he’d better go see what all was in the truck too. Sturm saw him immediately. “Howdy, Frank. Where’d you come from?”

  Frank jerked his head back to the barn. “Checking on your girls.”

  “And how are they doing?”

  “Fine.”

  “They like their new food, don’t they?”

  Frank wondered what the hell Sturm was feeding the lionesses now. “Looks like it,” he said. Later, he found out that Sturm hadn’t killed off all the sheep in town. Not by a long shot. There was a pen way out in the pasture and he kept five or six in there at a time. Every night, just before dinner, all the hunters would gather along the tall fences that surrounded that the cats’ corral, and Sturm would lock a ewe inside, then turn Lady and Princess loose. The show wasn’t as spectacular as watching them go after Sarah, but the hunters couldn’t get enough.

  “What’s this?” Frank asked.

  Sturm clapped his hands together like a child. “Didn’t want to ruin the surprise,” he said. “Take a look. We’re in business now, by God.”

  Frank got closer, and before he could even see the cats, he somehow felt the impact of the all those gold stares, striking him from all sides, all at once, as if he was being enveloped in a thick blanket and punched by unseen figures. The cats had been packed tightly into a two level cattle truck.

  One of the Assholes had found a long stick and was jabbing at one of the cats through the round holes in the side of the trailer, giggling as the lioness hissed. The game didn’t last long; there was a quick snap, and the Asshole pulled back the stick, now half as long.

  Mr. Noe snorted and moved away, taking short, precise steps. Frank watched him out of the corner of his eye, waiting until the little man became nothing but a white blur in the darkness.

  “Never would have thought there was this many cats out there in private hands, not in a million years,” Sturm told Frank as he approached the truck. “Apparently, everybody wants just cubs. That’s what brings in the audience. Cute little baby lions, chasing each other around. Maybe even give folks a chance to pet ’em when they’re young like that. But hell, just like anything, them cubs grow up quick. People lose interest. Stop spending money.” He shrugged. “It’s a goddamn shame, really. They get sold. Goddamn cheap, too.”

  “We’re gonna need a hell of a lot more meat.”

  “You got that right.” Sturm said.

  Jack led Frank and Sturm around to the other side of the trailer. Three wolves shared a cage. A mountain lion’s eyes flashed and burned in the blast of Jack’s Mag-lite beam. “Up front, we got hyenas. Mean little fuckers,” he said.

  “This is just the start,” Surm said. “We got more en route this very minute, private owners brining in their own animals, so in the morning, you and Chuck, you go grab as many of them sheep we left in town as you need. Keep ’em in the freezer at the office.”

  “We’re gonna need a place to keep all of these. There’s only seven empty cages at the vet’s.”

  “It’s taken care of. We got the auction yard all set up. You’ll have to stop out there and feed ’em. You’re gonna have yourself a full day tomorrow, that’s for sure.” Sturm grinned, teeth bright in the moonlight. “Missed you last night at dinner. Have a good time?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What happened?”

  Frank didn’t want to think about last night, much less talk about it. “Nothing. I had work to do. She went home.”

  “She went home, huh? Look at me.” Sturm grabbed his arm and stared up into Frank’s eyes. “She just a whore to you, or there something else going on?” He glanced at the knots of men and lowered his voice. “C’mere.” He led Frank out towards the barn.

  When they were far enough away not be overheard, Sturm asked quietly, “Is there something going on here that I need to know about?”

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “You got feelings for this girl? You two got some kind of relationship going on here?” His frozen eyes bored holes in Frank’s skull. “Shit,” he said, answerin
g his own question. “You listen to me and you listen hard. That girl, she’s nothing but a fucking whore. You got that? She sucks dicks for cash. You understand what I’m telling you here. She don’t care about you. She cares about what you’ve got in your wallet. That’s all. And hell, she’s a goddamn Glouck.” He spit. “That family, they’re nothing but trash. That’s it. Worthless goddamn trailer trash. They got no morals. No nothing. Ain’t hardly human beings.” He brought up a fist and popped his index finger out in Frank’s face. “You stay the hell away from her, got it? I’m gonna let her hang around, just so our guests can blow off some steam. Ever since we had that incident last time some working girls were here, I can’t get any more to come all the way up here. Word’s out, I guess. So I’m gonna let her be. But she is off limits to you, understand?”

  “Yeah.”

  “It’s nothing personal, son. I’m just trying to look out for you, is all. You look like you could use somebody to look out for you. You’ll thank me later, down the line, once you find a nice girl and settle down. Trust me. Later on, you’ll thank me.”

  DAY TWENTY-SIX

  They collected thirty of the dead sheep, butchered five, and put the rest in the freezer. Chuck offered to help, but Frank waved him off. He preferred to feed the cats on his own, so he could take his time, talking to them in a soft, almost crooning voice.

  Most of the new cats had grown up in captivity, and knew nothing beyond life in a cage. People had always been sources of food and water and pain and fear, but something about Frank, his slow easy movements, his smell, his low, soothing voice, something made them trust him immediately. They allowed Frank to scratch their ears, closing their eyes and milking the bottom of their cage in pleasure, stroking the floor, extending and retracting their vicious claws as they alternated paws. Some even licked the palm of his hand.

  The hyenas snarled and bristled and snapped at each other when Frank tossed bloody bones into their cage. The wolves were quiet and still as death. They made no move to eat anything until Frank had retreated, taking his clanging bucket with him. The mountain lion paced and ignored the meat.