Hidden In The Woods

by Rachel Burns

  “Could I only have potatoes?” I asked.

  His smiled faded. “No.” He laid his napkin on his lap. “Britney, I want you to try the food before you refuse to eat it.”

  “I understand that, but I have a moral problem with eating deer.”

  “Moral?” he repeated, as if my words were the silliest thing he’d ever heard before.

  “Yes, a deer is a free spirit. It isn’t right to kill them and eat them. They don’t hurt anybody.”

  “Sounds like I’m being called a murderer.”

  “No, but I would feel better if you didn’t kill anything,” I told him.

  “Why did you think I had my rifle along?” he asked me.

  “In case something attacked us,” I explained. “The deer didn’t attack us. They don’t do things like that.”

  “I know you eat cow meat. Tell me about the time you were attacked from cows.” He folded his arms over his chest. It looked like he was trying to keep himself in check so he wouldn’t choke me.

  “I’ve never been attacked by cows, but it’s socially acceptable to eat them.”

  “And why is that?” He was pissed, and this could end badly. I needed to explain what was going through my head perfectly, or I’d be in big trouble.

  “Farmers feed and care for them for the sole purpose of selling them for their meat and milk.”

  “So you won’t eat deer because a farmer never took care of it?” he summarized what I had said.

  “Sort of.” That sounded right, but I knew that he only had to give my words a little twist, and I’d look like the city kid idiot that I was.

  “So because the animal was capable of taking care of itself you think it shouldn’t be eaten, and I should let the deer population explode so they can kill the vegetation in the woods. Vegetation that other animals need to survive.”

  “I didn’t say that,” I protested.

  He took a deep breath. “I would really like you to try it before you say you won’t eat it.”

  “I’d rather not.”

  “Britney, you don’t have to eat anything that you don’t like, but you do have to try it first.”

  “No, I can’t.”

  “I’ll bet you can.” His hands balls into fists.

  “Are you going to hit me?” I asked him.

  “No, but if you don’t at least try it, I will spank you.”

  “That isn’t fair,” I declared.

  “How so? I spent the whole day preparing this wonderful meal, and you won’t even try it. That’s what isn’t fair.”

  “I saw the deer as a deer. I can’t eat it.” Tears were in my eyes. “I can only eat meat because it doesn’t look like the animals that they are. It looks like food.”

  He stood up so quickly that my heart jumped. In the next heartbeat, my plate was filled with food. “Does that not look like food?”

  “Yes, but it’s too late. I already saw the deer.” I hope my explanation would help him see the light.

  “Take a bite, or I swear I’ll shove it into your mouth,” he threatened me.

  “Why can’t you respect that I don’t want to eat this animal?”

  “I would if you never ate animals. That I could respect, but I can’t respect you refusing to eat the one I hunted for you and cleaned and cooked. To me it sounds like you’re being a beast on purpose. Now eat!” He sat down and gathered himself. He laid his napkin on his lap and put food on his plate, first the potatoes and then deer meat ragout.

  I couldn’t help but pinch my nose as the smell of the deer hit my nostrils.

  He sighed loudly. “You’re making me very mad.”

  “I’m not trying to.”

  “I find that hard to believe. Bow your head so we can pray.”

  “Daddy, I’m really not looking for a fight,” I protested.

  “I said to bow your head,” he said coldly. Daddy was furious with me.

  I bowed my head.

  Daddy prayed, saying that he hoped everyone at the table was truly thankful for the meal we were about to eat.

  I felt guilty. He had gone to a lot of work to make this meal, and I was being very rude. I’d try it and see what it tasted like.

  When Daddy lifted his head, I picked up my fork and knife and put a big piece of potato and little bit of deer ragout on my fork. I lifted it to my mouth.

  Daddy was beaming at me.

  I forced myself to open my mouth with sheer willpower, and then I slowly put my fork in my mouth. I closed my mouth around the fork, and then there was a dead deer in my mouth. I had to cough. I dropped my fork to my plate and covered my mouth with my hand. I spit the food out of my mouth and into my hand.

  “I don’t like it,” I informed Daddy, wiping the food into my napkin.

  I felt his fingers pinching into my ear. He walked over to the sofa and sat down. “You begged for this.” He yanked me down over his knees and assaulted my hind cheeks, which were still sore from the whipping in the woodshed last week.

  “Daddy, please no. I tried it.” I begged him to stop, but he didn’t. The blows got harder and stronger as I screamed and kicked. It must have looked like I was trying to swim on dry land.

  “I have never heard of anyone being so unthankful in all of my life. Normally, you should have helped with the process of skinning the deer and cutting the meat into pieces for storage.”

  I looked over my shoulder. “You skinned the poor thing?”

  His hand slammed into my rump faster than my heart could beat. “You spoiled little city girl. You have no problem eating meat, your problems starts when you see how it’s done. You would rather someone else did the work for you so you can forget that it was ever a living animal.”

  There was a lot of truth in his words. I never had a problem eating meat when I didn’t have to think about what needed to be done to get that meat to the table.

  “Do you honestly think that it would be better if we threw the meat away? Should the deer have died for nothing because Britney is too fine to eat something that she saw in deer form? Would that be the solution that God wanted?” His strong hand landed on my hind cheeks, making me twist around in pain.

  “I don’t know what’s best,” I said through my sobs and yelps of pain. “I don’t want anyone to kill anybody else, and I don’t want to be the reason that anyone dies.”

  He stopped. “I understand that, baby, but that isn’t how the world works. There is a wheel of life. It’s constantly turning. To survive, we have to push some people off of the wheel. We do it for self-defense and to eat.”

  “We could live off of vegetables like the deer did,” I suggested.

  “Yes, but we were meant to eat meat. That was how God made us. We need the animals to survive.” Daddy was rubbing my sore rear end as he spoke so kindly with me.

  “I want to live so no animal has to suffer in my name,” I told him as I wiped my eyes. “I won’t eat any meat ever again.”

  “If you get pregnant, you’ll need meat to make our baby grow strong. Besides, you like to have something between the ground and your feet when you’re outside. You can’t stop eating meat and continue wearing leather shoes and boots and still call yourself an animal lover who doesn’t harm animals.”

  “I want to do the right thing,” I told him, truthfully.

  “I know that. Before I touched the deer, I knelt down and prayed for its soul and thanked it for feeding us and providing us with its deerskin. If it had been a male deer, I could have made things out of his horns, like buttons for our clothing. I don’t waste the animal, and I don’t see hunting as a sport. It’s a matter of life and death.” He shifted me so I was on his lap, cuddled up under his chin as he hugged me. “You’re a very good girl, Britney, but you still have a lot to learn about the facts of life.”

  “I’ll try it again,” I promised.

  “This is also about you showing appreciation for the food I provided for you.”

  “I do appreciate it, Daddy. It’s just that it’s so new for me.�
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  He kissed the top of my head and carried me back to the table. He sat me down on one of the pillows that were there to lean against. “Let’s try again.”

  Daddy got me a fresh napkin.

  We sat down again. Daddy folded his hands. I copied him. He prayed for the deer and promised that the deer hadn’t died in vain, and that we would use his body to nourish ours, and that we would use the rest to. I was glad that Daddy didn’t go into details about what else he wanted to use the deer for.

  When the prayer was over, I took a tiny bit. It was good, different but good. “It tastes very good, Daddy.”

  “It would have tasted better if it were still warm.”

  I burst into tears and cried into my hands. I still felt like the bad guy for eating the meat and for making Daddy think that I didn’t appreciate what he did to care for me.

  “My apologies, Britney. I shouldn’t have said that. I think you’re doing a wonderful job.”

  Slowly, I cleaned my plate. Daddy told me about his travels. I asked him about the picture of him with the monks. He laughed and told me that they had tried to cut it off, but it grew back faster than they could cut it.

  “That’s silly, Daddy. You’re teasing me.” I smiled at him.

  “Just a little he confessed.” He smiled at me, but his smile didn’t reach his eyes. He was hiding something from me again.

  Elias

  I brought Britney to my room and changed her into her pajamas after I closed the curtains. I was certain that there was no one out there, but you couldn’t be safe enough about these things.

  I brought her to bed and got out a book, which I read to her. She quickly fell asleep. I was glad for that. I still had a lot to do and even more to think about.

  Doing right by her and raising her up proper was a big job.

  I worried about the people living nowadays. They lived in such protected worlds. What kind of people didn’t know where their food came from and what had to be done to get it? They ate all kinds of chemicals in their food, but they insisted on avocados and grape seed oil for their shampoos. This was a generation the like I had never seen before. I didn’t understand them.

  When I finished the next dollhouse, I got into bed beside my wife, thinking that I’d had to punish her because she was a product of her misled generation. I’d raise her better.

  I knew it was something that old people often thought and said, but things used to be better and simpler. Britney and I would live off the land mostly, and she’d enjoy good health for it. I loved her so much. She deserved the best, and the old ways were the best.

  Chapter 10

  Britney

  Daddy took me out again. He explained that if he saw a deer, he would shoot it so he could fill up our freezer. I agreed that it was a good idea, but I told him I didn’t want to see the deer.

  He grinned at me and said I wouldn’t have to. In fact, he insisted that I should stay away from the kill, as he called it.

  Daddy tested me, asking me questions about the trees. I seemed to have forgotten everything he told me last time. He explained everything again.

  “You’re a very good teacher, Daddy.” I beamed at him. I was proud that he was mine. We made amazing love every night, and by day he treated me like a princess and took care of me.

  He wanted to spend lots of time with me. I liked that. I was basking in the attention he shined on me.

  “Thank you, Britney. I’m going to go over to that stream and see if I can find something for Thanksgiving. I want you to go back to the house. Walk straight that way. When you get home, I want you to write down the differences between a Fir and a Spruce tree.”

  My shoulders slumped. “Yes, Daddy.” I went off knowing that he was grinning at me. Thankfully, he was very patient with me, and he never got mad about my mistakes at school.

  It was a long way back to the house, and it surprised me that Daddy knew the way in spite of their being no true path. I hoped I was going the right way.

  I heard a shot. Another animal just died. My mind knew that Daddy was right, meat was meat. My heart, however, saw deer as majestic sweet animals that never hurt anyone. It was like chopping down a cherry tree. There was something wrong about it.

  I heard a terrible noise to my right. It was getting louder and coming towards me. I ran like hell as fast as I could in the direction of our house.

  Whatever was out there was faster than I was. It was gaining on me. I spotted our house at the same time I spotted a herd of angry turkeys.

  Unfortunately, they spotted me too. They were closing in on me. The ones closest to me pecked at me.

  I shrieked for Daddy as loud as I could.

  That made them madder.

  Elias

  I heard wild turkeys as I prayed for the soul of the buck I just shot. My shot must have set them off. I got the deer ready to take back home.

  Now that Britney was pregnant it was bad luck for her to have anything to do with killing or with anything dead. It was an old superstition, but I knew what a woman was like when she lost a baby. I didn’t want Britney to suffer through that. I’d take every precaution.

  Britney had no idea that she was expecting.

  How could she?

  She didn’t understand about things like that. But it was a fact that she’d been with me for over a month, and she hadn’t bled. I was waiting for her to ask me about that.

  The idea of becoming a mother might scare her. In time she’d understand what was happening to her body.

  I was half way home when I heard Britney call for me. It wasn’t a normal call, but a drop everything and come running call.

  That was exactly what I did. I dropped everything but my rifle and ran to her.

  I saw that the wild turkeys were in front of our cottage. They were attacking my Britney.

  I knelt down and aimed. I never missed my target. After hundreds of years, you don’t miss unless you want to.

  I killed six of them, thinking they would look good in our freezer.

  The others took off. I waved my hands and yelled and stomped to get rid of them. Wild turkeys were funny animals. If you don’t show them that you’re stronger than they are, they’ll get aggressive with you. The kinder you are to them the worse they get.

  Once they were gone, I went into the cottage. I found my precious little Britney hiding behind the sofa, crying. I help her out and looked at her. Thankfully, I had good quality thick clothing on her. Still, she had bruises from those damn animals.

  I held her and told her that I loved her. She told me that several turkeys had pecked at the window by the sofa, trying to get at her.

  I feared those stupid birds would come back to bug Britney because they saw her as a weakling. They were cruel animals.

  “They’re gone now. If they ever come back, I’ll buy another freezer and fill it with them,” I promised her, meaning every word. No one hurt someone I loved.

  She smiled at me.

  “If I make a turkey for Thanksgiving tomorrow, what will you say when I put the food on the table.”

  “I’ll say give me a big piece.” She didn’t smile when she talked. Instead, she was dead serious.

  I grinned from ear to ear. Britney was learning the ways of the world.

  “I want you to go to your room and lie down. If you’re feeling dizzy, I’ll bring you downstairs.”

  “You don’t have to. They scared me, that’s all.”

  “There sure was a lot of them,” I agreed with her.

  “I didn’t know that they were so mean,” she told me.

  “Those were wild turkeys, baby. They’re mean, especially when they’re together.” I helped her off the floor and to the stairs.

  She let go of me and went down a few steps. Then she stopped and turned back to me. “Thank you for coming to help me.”

  The look in her eyes made my blood run cold. She gave me the impression that it wouldn’t have surprised her if I hadn’t come. She truly appreciated that I had.
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  “I will always come when you call me. You can count on me. Now go rest. No more school today.”

  “Where will you be?” She was scared to be alone.

  I got a bad feeling. She might lose the baby. “I’ll be outside plucking feathers and preparing meat.”

  She nodded and went down the stairs and turned to the left in the direction of her room. I hoped that she wasn’t so upset that the baby lost its hold inside of her.

  I checked on her many times throughout the day and night. She slept on and on. I checked her to make sure she was still breathing.

  Having a little girl wife was coupled with lots of worries. She needed me more than a regular wife did. I never wanted anything bad to happen to her. What happened today had been my fault. I never should have taken her hunting with me. She was a city kid, and they were happier indoors.

  Still, she looked so lovely when her cheeks turned pink and rosy from the cold. She looked healthy when she was outside. Besides, I liked having her by me.

  I decided to take her out for walks and not hunt when she was with me. I’d go when she did her homework or slept. A pregnant woman needed lots of rest. Especially, the first time they got pregnant.

  The changes in her body were a lot for her to take.

  Britney

  Daddy had gotten up early and started cooking. I woke up to wonderful smells. I got up and washed myself.

  I hadn’t slept in my own bed in a long time. We’d been sleeping in Daddy’s room since the first night that he allowed me to do so.

  The next morning, he made love to me before he bathed me in his wooden tub. I loved the mix of modern and old-fashioned things in this house.

  The one thing I didn’t like about Daddy’s room was that his bed squeaked when we made love. If someone else were in the house, they’d know what we were doing. I didn’t like that.

  Of course, there came a time in lovemaking when I couldn’t care less about the bed squeaking. In fact, the squeaking help turn me on further towards the end. The louder and faster the squeaks came the louder and faster I came too.