Dismember

EIGHTEEN

Dave stood over the chopping stump, halving logs and then quartering them. Mr. Boots sat on a pile of already-split wood with a burlap sack between his feet, watching, silent. Dave wasn’t sure what he had in the bag, but it was moving.

Chop. Chop. Chop.

Dave had been counting the number of logs. He was up to forty. If he got to fifty and Mr. Boots hadn’t told him to quit, he’d ask if he was done. He might get smacked in the head for it, but he might also get a smack if he didn’t ask. With Mr. Boots, it was always hard to know the right thing to do.

Chop. Chop. Chop. Forty-one.

Chop. Chop. Chop.

“That’s enough,” Mr. Boots said. He got up and helped Dave stack the new wood with the rest. He left the squirming bag in the dirt.

When they had stacked everything Dave had split, Mr. Boots stood with his hand on the boy’s shoulder and stared off into the woods, sometimes stroking his beard, sometimes only breathing heavily and blinking.

After five years, Dave had learned not to interrupt these silences. He might have to stand here for an hour, tired from the chopping and ready to collapse but too scared to move. Moving too soon would mean a lashing.

“You reckon there’s anything worse than death?” Mr. Boots finally said.

Dave didn’t remember everything from his old life, but he was sure there hadn’t been these kinds of questions, these kinds of tests.

“I don’t know.” It was his usual answer.

Mr. Boots turned his attention from the woods to the boy. “There is,” he said. “There’s plenty of worse things.”

“Okay.”

Mr. Boots took his hand off Dave’s shoulder and picked up the burlap sack. He untied a length of twine from the bunched top and reached inside.

The rabbit he pulled out looked like it should have been dead. One of its hind legs was gone. The ragged, gaping wound where it had been dripped blood and strings of fatty tissue. Its eyes were black, unreadable. But it wasn’t dead; it was foaming at the mouth and trying to bite and scratch at Mr. Boots’s hand and arm.

“What happened?”

“Dunno,” Mr. Boots said. “Found it like this. Maybe a coyote.”

Dave wasn’t sure he believed that. He gulped.

“You think Mr. Bunny wants to live this-a-way?”

I don’t think he can live like that, Dave thought. Not much longer anyway. But he didn’t say anything, only shook his head.

“This right here is worse than death. We’re gonna help this creature best we can.” He nodded his head toward the ax.

Dave said he understood and went to get the ax. He pulled it out of the stump and held it out to Mr. Boots.

Mr. Boots smiled. “No, boy. You’re gonna do it.”

“Wha…me?”

Mr. Boots nodded.

“Can’t you? Please? I don’t want to.”

“I know you don’t.” He laughed, brought the animal to the stump, and pressed it against the scarred wood.

“Don’t try nothing funny,” he said. “If I catch you eyeing my arm instead of this thing’s neck, that wood won’t be the only thing gets split today.”

Dave closed his eyes and shook his head. “Please.”

“Trust me now,” Mr. Boots said. “If you don’t do this, you’ll be all kinds of regretful.” He nodded toward the squirming animal and made a chopping motion with his free hand. “Let’s go.”

Dave stepped up to the stump. The animal writhed, scratched at the wood with its remaining hind leg. It turned its head toward him. Its black, tar-drop eyes flicked back and forth, not seeming to see anything at all.

“It’s hurtin’,” Mr. Boots said. “See that?”

So you left it tied in a bag all this time?

Dave raised the ax over his shoulder.

Mr. Boots nodded.

Kill him. Forget the rabbit. Kill Mr. Boots.

Dave considered it, but the idea of swinging the ax into Mr. Boots’s neck made his hands tremble. He wasn’t sure he could pull it off. And if he tried and failed…well, he couldn’t risk it. He wasn’t sure what Mr. Boots would do to him, but he knew what the man had done for much less severe disobediences. Knew. Remembered. Sometimes cried about.

And although the thought of slaughtering the animal was repulsive, disgusting, wrong, Dave was also a little curious. What would happen when he cut off the thing’s head? Would it die immediately? Or would it hop and kick and squirm until the blood drained out? Would it scream? And what if he chopped only partway through? Or wiggled the ax back and forth through each bone and strip of sinew? Slowly. Carefully. What if he really savored it?

Savored? Seriously? What’s wrong with me?

He closed his eyes and shook his head. “I can’t,” he said.

And before he could open his eyes, Mr. Boots had wrapped a hand around his throat and started squeezing.

“You can,” he said. “And you’d better.”

His fingers flexed, squeezed, choked. Dave’s throat burned, and his eyes watered, and when he dropped the ax and tried to pry the fingers loose, he found he couldn’t move them an inch. He opened one eye, saw Mr. Boots still holding the rabbit against the stump.

“kkkkkkkkkkkkkk”

“What?” Mr. Boots squeezed harder before finally loosening his grip. A little.

“O…okay,” Dave said. His voice was a frog’s croak of a thing.

Mr. Boots let go and said, “Pick up the ax.”

Dave grabbed his throat, sucked in three or four agonizing breaths, doubled over and coughed. And picked up the ax. What choice did he have?

Mr. Boots kneeled by the stump and pressed on the animal. It thrashed. One of its back claws caught Mr. Boots’s forearm, but he didn’t seem to notice. Or care. Blood oozed into the crease of his elbow and from there to the dirt below.

He nodded toward the stump.

Dave coughed again, hacked out a wad of phlegm, and lifted the ax over his shoulder.

Better do it. If your choice is killing a half-dead rabbit or getting choked to death, that’s not really a choice at all, is it?

The rabbit’s side vibrated. It was practically hyperventilating.

This is your fault, he thought at the rabbit.

But how could that be true?

He didn’t know. And no longer cared.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, wondering if he really was, and swung the ax.

The ax head thunked into the wood. It was a perfect chop. The rabbit’s head slid down the stump and into the dirt. Mr. Boots let go of the animal’s body. It did keep kicking for a few seconds, but then it flopped off the stump and into the dirt beside the decapitated head, pumping gory juices across the ground before finally stilling.

Warm blood dripped down Dave’s face and shirt. He let go of the ax handle and turned away from the kill.

Mr. Boots got up and put a hand on his shoulder. “It was the right thing, don’t you guess?” he said. “The only thing.”

A tear slid down Dave’s cheek, but the corners of his mouth curled up just a little. He felt like he had no control over his face whatsoever.

“Killin’s a chore,” Mr. Boots said. “Why don’t you go for a walk. Clear your head.”

Dave frowned. “A walk?” The words burned their way out of his throat. He coughed again and wiped tears from his eyes.

“Sure,” Mr. Boots said. “Clear your head.”

Dave turned to face him. “Walk where?”

“Wherever you want.”

What kind of trick was this? He thought maybe he could choke out one more word: “Wherever?”

“Sure,” Mr. Boots said again. “I trust you.” He flashed his gap-toothed grin.

Dave raised his eyebrows.

“Yep.” Mr. Boots nodded. “I do. Because I know that you know that if you ran, I’d find you. And if I didn’t find you—which I would—I’d just find another boy to replace you. And that would be on you. And I know that’s nothing you wanna live with.”

Dave stared, said nothing.

“So, go on. Take a walk. Think about why what you just did was nice and righteous.”

Dave took a few steps away. When Mr. Boots didn’t follow, he turned and ran.

After plenty of running and scrambling through the undergrowth, he reached a road. He’d never been this far. Not since…before. He stopped and wondered how long it would be before someone drove by. If someone would drive by.

Does he really think I won’t run?

Who cares what he thinks. This is your chance. Finally. The best chance you’ve ever had.

He touched the sides of his throat. It felt like there were still fingers there choking the life out of him. He gritted his teeth and thought about walking up the road. But he was tired from chopping, from running, from choking. He decided to wait.

There were no cars for fifteen minutes at least, judging by the sun. When he did eventually hear an approaching motor, he wasn’t sure if it was a hundred feet away or a mile. Hard to tell. Sound had a funny way of carrying up here.

He’d been sitting with his back to a tree. Now, he got up and hurried onto the road. He stood there with his hands over his head, ready to wave down the motorist, ready to scream for help as loudly as his throbbing throat would allow and beg for a ride to the nearest police station.

I’d just find another boy, Mr. Boots had said.

Dave lowered his hands. He imagined a station wagon with two small boys in back. He imagined Mr. Boots grabbing one of the boys and dragging him back to the room with no windows, tossing him on the not-bed of blankets, pressing his wormy lips against the boy’s ears and…

No. You can’t think like that. It’s not your problem. You’ve got to get while the getting’s good.

Dave thought he might be able to live with himself if he ran, might be able to pretend Mr. Boots would never find himself another boy, that the authorities with their guns and their handcuffs and their sharp-toothed dogs would hunt him down and lock him away.

Yeah right. If you run, he’ll be long gone by morning. He’ll find a new place to hole up, find a new boy, a new choke toy.

Or maybe not. Maybe he’d be too busy hunting Dave down, peeking in windows and picking locks.

And that was what Dave was really afraid of: spending the rest of his life looking over his shoulder, jumping at shadows, screaming anytime anyone closed a door or put on a pair of heavy boots.

What choice do you have? It’s either run and be scared or stay and be terrorized. Lose lose.

Dave rubbed his throat.

I’d just find another boy, he’d said, to replace you.

The car was getting closer. The buzzing of its motor became a grumbling. Dave looked toward the trees, up the road, back at the trees.

He remembered another car. A station wagon. He wanted to run down the road, meet the approaching car, see if it was his mom and dad and brother and dog. But then he remembered the moose, the crash, Mr. Boots. And he remembered the rotting corpses.

Replace you.

The grumbling became a roaring. The car couldn’t have been more than a couple of bends away. Dave started to raise his arms again, but then he growled and ran and dove into the bushes, screaming at himself to go back, screaming at himself not to. He dropped to the ground and watched the vehicle pass.

You idiot. Get out there. This is your chance.

No, it wasn’t. He had a chance to do something more than just escape. He had a chance to make things right. He wasn’t exactly sure how yet, but he was beginning to get an idea.

It was an old truck. Dusty. From his position, he couldn’t see into the windows, couldn’t see much more than the spinning, dirt-kicking tires.

He closed his eyes and waited until the sounds of the motor had disappeared altogether, and then he got up and turned back toward the house.

He wondered what kinds of sounds Mr. Boots would have made if it had been him under the ax instead of the rabbit. He wondered if he would have screamed.

And then he thought he heard something move in the woods. He spun around and stared at a spot between two thick trees.

Was that a flannel shirt?

Even squinting his eyes, he wasn’t sure. Maybe it hadn’t been anything.

Or maybe it was.

He imagined Mr. Boots lying in the bushes, holding a riffle or a bow and arrow.

Don’t be ridiculous. You really think he followed you all the way out here?

Yes, of course he must have. He wouldn’t have let Dave go. He was crazy, but he wasn’t stupid. If Dave had tried to flag down the truck, how long would it have been before he felt a tug in his chest and looked down to see an arrow punched through his shirt or a bullet’s exit wound dripping blood and shredded innards.

He stood still for a long time and waited for another sound or flash of movement. When nothing happened, he said as loudly as his throat would let him, “I’m going back now.”

There was no response.

He waited another few seconds, and then headed back the way he’d come.

As always, he couldn’t say whether he was doing the right thing or not.