Ray Gorham - Daunting Days of Winter

A hundred yards from the road the ground leveled out and the trees thinned. The turkey sounds seemed to come from behind a football field long outcropping of sandstone that lay up ahead of him. Kyle put his gun to his shoulder, eyed the sights, released the safety, and crept forward ready to shoot. Then he heard a different sound, definitely not a turkey. He paused and listened, trying to identify it. It was a bleating sound, like livestock.

As he stood, paused and listening, he detected a faint smoke scent. Kyle sniffed the air, but couldn’t be sure. The turkeys wallowed again, definitely from behind the rocks. He crept forward as quietly as he could. A large juniper bush grew alongside the rock outcropping, and Kyle moved silently in behind it. He peered through the bush and noticed movement.

Up ahead, three large turkeys, their feathers fanned out, paced back and forth in a clearing in front of the rock. Kyle raised his shotgun and aimed at the one nearest him. As he was about to pull the trigger, movement in the background caught his attention. He lowered his weapon just as a goat walked towards the turkeys. It had a chain around its neck that was tethered somewhere back towards the rocks. Kyle lowered his gun and stepped out from behind the bush, peering carefully around the rocks.

The goat’s chain was attached to a stake embedded in the ground about ten yards from the rock face. A fifty-foot radius around the stake was grazed down and nearly clear of brush. Closer to Kyle, up against the rocks, was a wire cage, ten foot by twenty, where a female turkey and at least half a dozen good-sized chicks were caged, the hen being the obvious object of the male turkeys’ attentions. Kyle looked around, searching for further evidence of domestic animals or the presence of people. He saw neither.

Kyle approached the turkey pen, distressing the male turkeys, which circled around behind him making a series of strange, alien-like noises, and rushed him when he turned his back. The turkey pen had a thin layer of waste in it, but was otherwise clean and well tended. Kyle looked at the goat, which was eyeing him as it chewed lazily on a clump of dry grass.

“Hello!” Kyle called out, then waited, but there was no answer. He turned his attention back to the male turkeys, which were as large as he could ever remember seeing. Their heads and necks were bright red, and long flaps of skin hung down over their beaks and swung from side to side as they assaulted him vocally. Kyle wondered how something so ugly could taste so good. He grabbed at the closest one, but it retreated beyond his reach as it warbled threats at him.

Kyle looked around again, still not seeing any signs of humanity beyond the obvious ones in front of him. He looked back at the turkeys and thought how nice one of them would taste for dinner. He raised his shotgun again, pointing it at the nearest turkey, but just couldn’t pull the trigger. Kyle knew what wild turkeys looked like, and these weren’t them. This breed was domestic and obviously belonged to someone.

Kyle lowered his gun and slung it back over his shoulder, took a deep breath, then turned and retraced his steps around the end of the rock outcropping, heading back towards the road. He had just rounded the end of the rocks and turned back to take one last look at the turkeys, which were following him, when a gunshot rang out and a bullet whistled by, ricocheting off the rocks a couple of feet above his head. Kyle dropped to the ground and rolled up against the rocks, then crawled behind the bush he had crouched behind earlier. Another shot rang out, the bullet striking the rock nearby and showering pieces of sandstone on him. Kyle’s head swiveled from side to side, trying to locate the shooter.

“Stop shooting!” Kyle shouted. No response came. He looked towards the road, gauging how long it would take him to sprint that far. He pulled his handgun from its holster and turned so that when he leapt to his feet he’d be moving in the right direction. He was about to make his move when a voice called out.

“Drop the gun and stand up.” It was a man’s voice and came from somewhere in the trees, not too far distant.

Kyle weighed his options. He realized he’d been pretty vague with Jennifer about where he was headed, and if something were to happen to him, there was no way help would show. He tried to figure out where the gunman was.

“I’m not going to shoot you,” the man called out to him. “If I was, you’d have been dead fifteen minutes ago when you squeezed through the fence at the road. Drop your shotgun and pistol and stand up, then I’ll show myself.”

The voice came from behind a clump of bushes forty yards away. Kyle could make out a shape, but was unsure if he was seeing a person or a rock. He quickly weighed his options, then pushed up onto his knees, took his shotgun off, and laid it on the ground, then put his pistol down beside it. He looked back towards the bushes and cautiously rose to his feet.

Kyle waited, but nothing happened. He crossed his arms and nervously leaned back against the rocks. He waited in that position for a couple of minutes until a man slowly emerged from behind the bush, followed closely by a German shepherd. The man carried a military-style assault weapon and wore tan pants and a large camouflage jacket. A green wool hat was pulled down over his ears, and a full beard, more gray than black, covered his face. A pair of glasses glinted in the sunlight.

The man approached slowly, and the dog ran ahead of him, approaching Kyle with a deep, threatening growl that sent shivers down Kyle’s spine. Kyle looked from the man, down to his own guns on the ground beside him, then at the dog, which was now just a few feet away.

“Don’t make any sudden moves, and the dog won’t hurt you. If you go for your gun you’ll lose an arm,” the man said in a matter of fact tone. “Stand still while Copper sniffs you for weapons.”

The dog hit on Kyle’s pocket and growled again. “Do you have another weapon?” the man demanded.

Kyle shook his head. “I have more shells for my shotgun, but that’s it.”

Kyle was instructed to put the shells on the ground. The dog sniffed him again, then returned to his owner and lay down on the ground.

The man crouched and rubbed the dog’s head. “Why are you up here?” he asked as he stood back up.

“I was hoping to find a wild turkey, for Thanksgiving dinner tomorrow. I didn’t realize I was trespassing. Thought this was all National Forest land.”

“It is for the most part. I have a ninety-nine year lease on the land. What’s your name, and where did you come from?”

“Kyle Tait. From Deer Creek.” Kyle began to relax a little. “Who are you, and do you mind not holding me at gunpoint?”

The man looked down, realizing his gun was still pointed at Kyle. He lowered the muzzle towards the ground. “Sorry about that. Can’t be too careful nowadays. Not a lot of law and order to be found. My name’s Frank Emory.” He coughed a couple times, then turned to the side and spit. “Why didn’t you shoot my turkey?” he asked as he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

Kyle shrugged. “I could tell they weren’t wild birds. I’m not desperate, so I’m not going to kill someone else’s animals.” Kyle paused a second. “If my family was starving, I’d have shot it. We’re lucky. We’re not there, at least not yet.”

Frank smiled for the first time. “You’re honest, boy, on multiple fronts. I respect that. Did you prep for all this?”

Kyle looked confused, and Frank restated the question. “You said your family isn’t starving. Were you ready for the EMP attack? You must have known it was coming.”

Kyle shook his head. “No. Can’t claim to have done anything to prepare for this, unfortunately. Guess we got lucky and bought a house in the right place. You? You look pretty prepared.”