We Went to the Woods

by Caite Dolan-Leach

  Annabelle grows nearer her time as well, and I can see the worry in Jeremiah’s face as he watches her moving slowly around our farm; truly, she has grown enormous! I can scarce believe she carries but one child. We live so remotely here. If anything should go awry during childbirth…

  Chapter 19

  Summer collapses into autumn almost seamlessly in this part of the world. Hot days creep even into October, and everything is light and warmth, until, at some point, there’s a crisp chill at dawn, perfect fruit, and the danger of frost. The overbearing monochrome of summer gives way to the flashy swoops of goldenrod, Queen Anne’s lace, black-eyed Susans, and asters.

  Beau and Chloe and I took a walk on one of those perfect fall days; it was just cool enough to wear a sweater, which you would strip off once you were out in the sun. We were going to look for raspberries, which were almost gone, but sometimes you could stumble on a patch that hadn’t been ravished by the birds. Also, there was a peach tree up the road whose fruits had been dropping pointlessly to the ground for several weeks, and we wanted to fill our tote bags. Chloe was going to bake a pie, Louisa make preserves.

  Beau was in an especially silly mood and was full of bizarre observations. He dangled from the branches of a tree, and then picked both me and Chloe up, one after the other, to hoist us over a ditch. It was an unnecessary gesture that made me quiver with pleasure; to allow myself to bend passively in his arms, to feel the muscle through his damp shirt, was easy joy, on a day that was too easily joyous.

  The peaches were collecting around the base of the tree in spongy, insect-thronged heaps. It smelled pleasantly tangy, the scent of sugar more prominent than the undertone of rotten fruit. The tree sounded as though it itself were buzzing steadily, such was the drone of bugs beneath its boughs.

  “This tree has clearly been cared for,” Beau remarked, looking at a branch that had been trimmed. “Someone mowed this clearing sometime in the last month or two.”

  “Seems weird that they wouldn’t harvest the fruit,” Chloe said.

  “Maybe they’re out of town,” I suggested. “In any case, it’s a shame to let them go to waste.”

  “Agreed,” Beau said. We gingerly avoided fallen globes on the ground, their pink skin bruised and punctured by the critters who had bored their way into the sweet innards. We plucked from the branches, trying to gauge which were ripest by their size. Chloe sniffed each one before she picked it, craning her neck to catch the whiff of fruit and looking as though she were about to kiss each of her fuzzy selections. Our bags were quickly filled, and I suspected we would come back before the first frost.

  We strolled back home along the edges of the Larsons’ fields. One field was planted with alfalfa rather than hay, and it smelled holy and clean. Beau ran through the green field, and Chloe and I followed; I stopped when my peaches began to pop out of the bag.

  “Hard to remember that the Larsons are evil while you’re walking in this field,” Chloe mused. We looked for our raspberries along the borders, where agriculture gave way to woodland. Finally we found a cluster of berries, hidden from the hungry birds by a tree, and we fell upon the red fruit with starved glee. These berries tasted nothing like the plastic flats of Driscoll’s my mother had brought home for special occasions when I was a kid; those had looked like raspberries, and contained the faint memory of their flavor, but these were the real deal. I liked the feeling of the seeds caught along my gums, freeing them with my tongue and gnawing on them as we walked, satisfied with the way it felt to grind them with my molars.

  “Do you think about the jumper ever?” Chloe asked suddenly.

  Beau glanced at me before looking back down at the ground.

  “I have, on occasion,” he finally said.

  “Yeah, me too,” I confirmed. I had thought of them from time to time, wondering, of course, why they had done it. The truth, though, was that that icy night felt very distant, not part of the same world as this field and this sunlight and the taste of fruit in my mouth.

  “It’s just always felt like an omen,” she continued. “Sometimes I think about her at the oddest moments.”

  “Like right now?” Beau asked, looking around us at the field with a smile.

  “Exactly,” she said. “It’s silly, I guess.” She shook her head. “Let’s go look in on my bees. I haven’t been out there in a week, and we’ll just have to cut around the second cornfield.”

  “Think how pleased Louisa will be if we bring some honey home,” Beau said.

  We circled around the corn, and I shifted the bag of peaches onto my hip; their weight had been digging uncomfortably into my collarbone. Argos bounded out of the woods, seeming to have located us by sheer doggy intuition. I offered him a peach, which he chomped on before racing off for a victory lap, fruit clutched in his jaws.

  As we approached the boxes where Chloe’s hive lived, she began to frown.

  “I don’t like the sound of that,” she said, setting down her tote of fruit.

  “Sound of what?” I asked.

  “Exactly.” She moved slowly and confidently towards the hive. I hung back, not sure what the protocol was for approaching a colony of bees. I hadn’t been stung in years, but the memory of the bright heat of the bite and the cold chills that followed made me leery. Though I needn’t have worried.

  “They’re gone,” Chloe said in a desolate voice. “They’re all gone.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “Do you think it’s a collapse?” Beau asked, looking over Chloe’s shoulder.

  “I’d have to check for the queen, but I imagine it is. Fuck!” She balled her fists and beat them twice against her thigh. Her voice was thick, and I thought she might be crying.

  “Should we get in touch with Jesse?” Beau suggested.

  “Yeah, I’ll call him. But, I mean, there’s nothing he can do. If it’s a collapse, that’s it. It’s over.”

  “What’s a collapse?” I asked.

  “Colony collapse disorder. When all the bees just…disappear. They leave their queen behind and just…go,” Chloe said.

  “Why? I mean, what causes it?”

  “No one knows,” Beau said. “There are some theories. A popular one is pesticides.” At this, he looked over his shoulder, back at the field we had just left.

  “Louisa,” I said, guessing at his train of thought. “She’ll think it’s because of the pesticides the Larsons use.”

  “It very well could be the pesticides they use. But that’s definitely what she’s going to think.”

  “God, she’s going to flip,” I said.

  “Reckon so,” Beau agreed. Chloe said nothing, just continued to stare at the silent boxes where her hive had been.

  “Maybe—maybe we just don’t tell her,” I suggested slowly. “I mean, I don’t like the idea of keeping secrets, but I just worry that she’ll…” I trailed off. What exactly did I fear she would do?

  “Let’s just…not mention it for now,” Beau proposed. “We’ll talk to your man Jesse and see. No point getting that girl all riled up for nothing. You okay with that, Chloe?” He nudged her.

  “What? Oh, sure. I guess.” She waved a hand. “I want to see if I can salvage some of the honey. You guys go on home. I just…I think I’d like to be out here alone for a minute.”

  “Okay,” Beau agreed. “I’ll take your peaches, miss.” He retrieved her tote bag and gestured with his head that I should follow him. We left Chloe there in the wildflower clearing, and I thought I could hear her begin to cry. As we walked home, the sun began to set. The disappearance of the bees made me feel anxious, and the beauty of the day seemed overshadowed by their loss. I knew that there was talk of honeybees disappearing, some fear of their extinction, but it had always seemed abstract.

  “Do you think it’s because of the pesticides?” I asked finally.

 
“I think it’s because of the whole damn world, wee Mack. There’s nowhere to get away from the poison.”

  * * *

  The cold arrived gradually. The blowsy summer blossoms didn’t get zapped by an unexpected frost but, instead, faded and drooped. The drought sapped color from the trees, denying us the usual flame of fall, but the chilled-out permutations of the thirsty trees’ sienna and ocher were still undeniably beautiful, and the sunlight stayed with us well into October. One afternoon, Jack and I sat on the dock near dawn, watching furls of mist plume up from the surface of the still water. Everyone else was still asleep, while the two of us leaned against each other, sharing a blanket wrapped tight round our shoulders. We’d crept through the cold grass, snapping off frosty tips, trying not to disturb a heron that stood still at the far end of the water, its long legs disappearing into its own mirrored reflection. It had been startled by our movement and exploded up into the air in a display of avian power, rippling the pond. We continued to sit, feeling the warmth creep over us as the sun rose. A V of geese honked noisily overhead, flapping southward.

  “Look, Jack. Geese podge home. To Florida, like your grandparents,” I said. He nudged my shoulder with his and gave me a lazy smile.

  * * *

  Autumn is death. I had always forgotten this, or conveniently romanticized it. The brilliant demise of the leaves is such a gladiatorial spectacle that it’s easy to see only the glory and delight of it. The harvest brings an overwhelming surplus of edibles, and the season’s last cobs of corn and the sharp snap of apples feel anything but morbid.

  But as I learned that year on the Homestead, autumn is the season of slaughter. Animals that will be too expensive to feed through the cold to come meet their ends on the chopping block in a harsh burst of gore. On our modest plot, we didn’t have animals to spare; our chickens, whose egg production would taper off during the winter, would nevertheless be needed in the spring, and we hoped to breed Ferdinand when we got a she-goat. Our animal husbandry enterprises were as yet too modest to support our carnivorous diet.

  Not so at the Collective. In addition to their bountiful stock of fowl (some of which would go to their deaths today or in the near future), they had a cow, three sheep, and two pigs. The cow’s milk was crucial to them; not only did they rely on the milk for consumption, but Natasha’s burrata business garnered a pretty penny from her sales to the local butcher. Early attempts to shear the sheep and transform their wool into yarn had met with laughably mixed results, but Fennel decreed they weren’t done trying. This left the pigs. I had visited them in their sty (stereotypes being entirely true in this instance) and watched them inhaling food scraps in a cheerful frenzy. I had been repeatedly told that pigs were smart, but I found myself unable to look beyond their filth-encrusted snouts and indiscriminate hunger; whenever I stared into the pigs’ eyes, I saw only appetite. The pigs weren’t given names; rather, both were referred to as Wilbur. Not being good for much other than boundless consumption, they were always destined for bacon, shoulder, belly. This naturally didn’t sit right with Chloe, and she avoided the pigpen as though their death sentence might be contagious. Or perhaps as though the moral weight of their slaughter was.

  On the appointed day, Beau, Louisa, Chloe, and I trekked over to the Collective, having agreed to help. I was more curious than skilled; after a debate with Jack, I had been convinced that as a meat eater, I was ethically bound to take responsibility for the lives I consumed. Though I felt a wee bit squeamish about the prospect, I granted his point.

  When we arrived, the pigs could tell something was up. They were rootling around their pen, making alarmed noises and pawing in the mud. Fennel greeted us as we crossed the clearing. She wore a large apron that showed clear signs of blood. Behind her, hanging from a tree, were the outstretched wings of a turkey suspended by its feet.

  “Hi,” Fennel called. “I’ve already started.” She seemed already annoyed with us, even though we were barely late.

  “Welcome to the bloodbath,” Louisa said, moving closer to the turkey. Beneath its open neck was a carpet of hay, spattered and soaked with blood. The bird was entirely still.

  “I wanted to get started. Get it over with. Normally I begin with the pigs, but it’s better to have an extra hand.” Meaning our tardy hands, I supposed.

  “Doesn’t anyone here help out with the slaughter?” I asked.

  “Jesse usually does, but he’s got other stuff that needs to be done today. That’s why I asked Beau for help. The vegans are obviously out. And Sy’s AWOL.”

  “Those pigs seem squirrelly,” Beau said, glancing at the restless swine.

  “That’s why I usually start with them. Once they smell blood, they get antsy. And hard to deal with. The turkeys are too stupid to figure out what’s happening right up until you slit their throats. But the pigs know.”

  I shivered.

  “Well, put us to work, lord and master,” Louisa said, mock-saluting Fennel.

  Fennel took this literally and strode towards the pigpen, beckoning. We followed obediently (“like lambs to the slaughter,” my mind treacherously completed).

  “Let’s start with the big guy,” Fennel said, pointing to a massive hog. Both pigs were male; a female might have been spared to breed piglets later. “We’ll put the other one in the barn while we work. He’ll get panicky, and you don’t want to be in the pen with a panicky pig.” Luring the smaller pig back into the barn involved the bribery of tasty slop; while reluctant, the pig couldn’t resist the temptation of corncobs and bread scraps and apples. Short-term thinking. He trotted inside, snuffling, while the larger pig tried to shoulder up to the slop bucket too. Fennel managed to get the pen door closed before Big Wilbur angled his way in.

  “Don’t worry, I saved you some,” she said, patting Big Wilbur on his filthy skull. “It wouldn’t be fair if only one of you got a last meal.”

  I looked at Fennel; she seemed unruffled, even happy. Her calm seemed unthinkable; I was vibrating with anxiety, afraid of how I would respond to seeing a living animal killed before me. Would the sight of blood make me vomit? Was I strong enough for this?

  “Okay, Wilbur. You’ve had a nice little life. Thank you, buddy,” Fennel said fondly, dropping the slop bucket in a corner of the pen and leaning over the fence to retrieve a gun that had been propped there.

  I didn’t know anything about guns, and so I couldn’t determine what this one was. Fennel placed the barrel against the back of Wilbur’s head; he continued grunting, unconcerned in his glutting, and she fired. Wilbur dropped, spilling the bucket and collapsing heavily into the mud, splattering filth onto Fennel’s apron.

  “Everyone should be so lucky as to go out while they’re eating,” Fennel said, wiping a fleck of blood from her face. It smeared across her cheekbone in a gory streak. She looked exhilarated. She pulled a long knife from her apron and bent to Wilbur’s jowl, which she opened with a surprisingly athletic tug. The blood gushed from the wound, pumping in arterial bursts. “You have to do this while his heart’s still beating,” she explained.

  I stared, unable to turn away from the prosaic carnage in the mud. Louisa was unusually silent, and Beau leaned against the fence, interested but distant. Fennel cracked her neck, then stretched her arms. “Once the blood is a bit drained, we’ll drag him out of the pen and string him up on the hoist for cleaning. Pretty much like the turkeys. I’ve got the big water baths heating, and we’ll wait until they get up to temp before we dunk him, to take off the hair and crud and all. You have to get the right temperature—otherwise you’ll spend all day tearing away at dead animals. Not fun,” she added, in case we were in any doubt.

  Inside the barn, Little Wilbur began squealing in escalating grunts, pawing audibly at the stable floor. The sheep on the other side of the barn mewled in response, and the barn resonated with the sounds of troubled animals. Their dread infected me, and I began to feel my heart t
hudding anxiously in my ribs; I watched as Big Wilbur’s spurting heart slowed, and my own raced even faster.

  “I’m, uh, I think I need to take a minute,” I said, not meeting anyone’s eyes. “I’m just going to…take a walk.” I couldn’t bring myself to walk across the pen, the blood now pooling in a corner, so I clambered inelegantly over the fence. I fell to the ground and, too disturbed to feel silly, stumbled away from the barn. As I walked, I heard Fennel talking, still cheerful.

  “It’s always easier with the first one to the slaughter. The others know what’s coming.”

  * * *

  I wandered aimlessly about the Collective, wanting to clear my head (and nostrils) of blood and death. I hunted for Chloe’s blond wisps, sure that she would have found a peaceful place full of life and beauty, rather than butchery.

  And, indeed, she was in the flower garden, stroking the long stalk of a doomed sunflower while she talked to Matthew, who was crouched in the dirt before her. The sunflower had clung to life well longer than its peers—perhaps it had been a late bloomer, an ugly duckling? The carnage of the gladiolus plot lay around her, and Matthew was tidying up the remains. Chloe looked like a wild nymph, taking her tribute from the lowly male earthling kneeling in the grime before her. Matthew stared up at her, and the way her fingers closed around the heft of the plant seemed both sexual and menacing. When I’d acquired my first Georgia O’Keeffe print, flowers became explicit, even pornographic; watching Chloe in the garden, I was struck again by the carnality of petaled plants. I sidled up to them.