Yannick Murphy - The Call

You’re not really much of a hunter, are you? You’re always concerned about the animals, he said. Yes, I said. I wouldn’t feel right about shooting a dinosaur anyway, not when we thought they’d all gone extinct for so long. Listen, I said, don’t bother visiting. Just send me postcards from exotic places, from the tops of the tallest mountains, from the pyramids and glaciers. I want to know my kidney is going places. Write to me you are in the finest health, I said.

WHAT THE SPACEMAN SAID:I’m sorry we never found out the name of the man who shot your son. We can still do that, you know, when I’m out of here. I can still help you, he said. It’s the least I can do.

WHAT I SAID:I thought you already know. I thought that boy… I thought you paid him, I said.

WHAT THE SPACEMAN SAID:Yes. I did give him money. I don’t know what for. For the windows, for the horse that was so skinny. Don’t you think that if I had known the name of the man I would have told you?

WHAT I SAID:It doesn’t matter. I’ve already given that man a name. I call him Danglars. I don’t ever want to learn his real name.

WHAT THE SPACEMAN SAID:Are you sure? The man should pay for his crime, he said, looking again at his bag of yellow urine hanging on its hook.

WHAT I SAID:I’m sure.

WHAT THE SPACEMAN SAID:Maybe there’s hope for us yet, I mean humans. Maybe if the dinosaurs didn’t go extinct, then we won’t. We’ll just evolve, the spaceman said.

WHAT THE WIFE SAID WHEN SHE SAW MY SCAR:So the spaceman really did abduct you. And then my Jen punched my shoulder and said, That was for making me drive a sheep to the doctor’s.

WHAT I SAID TO THE WIFE:Tell me, do I look like our librarian now? The one with the scar? The one who swims in the pool but never looks like he goes anywhere?

WHAT THE WIFE SAID:No, you look good. The scar is small.

WHAT I NOTICED ON THE TREES AS WE DROVE CLOSER TO HOME:Buds on the tips of branches looking like the flames of torches that, instead of burning with flame, glowed with the pale warmth of new green.

WHAT I DID:Opened the window wide to smell the melting snow and the roadside’s fresh mud which was veined with narrow streams whose water was from the melting snow of nearby hilltops and mountain peaks.

WHAT SARAH SAID WHEN I GOT HOME:Where were you?

WHAT MIA SAID:Mommy got a transmission to give the spaceman a kidney and Poppy gave him one so the spaceman wouldn’t die.

WHAT SARAH SAID:Good, then the spaceman will live.

WHAT SAM SAID:Maybe we shouldn’t turn on the radio anymore.

WHAT BRUCE SAID WHEN I GOT HOME:He kept barking at me, maybe he was trying to tell me all the things that had gone on while I was away. I sat down on the hearth and let him stand in my lap and I hugged him and told him he was a good old dog, the best.

WHAT THE WIFE COOKED FOR DINNER:Chicken quarters on the grill.

WHAT THE CHILDREN SAID WAS FOR DINNER:Barbecued dinosaur, aka “Dino on the barbie.” The day was unusually warm, even though we still had patches of dirty snow on the property. I sat by the pond wearing shorts and I wore a straw hat my wife said made me look like a Floridian. I saw how my white legs looked like death. I rested and watched the children paddle around in inner tubes on the pond and try to push each other out. The water was still as cold as snow, but the sun burnt their arms and gave them red cheeks.

CALL:Another goat in labor can’t deliver.

ACTION:Drove to farm on a windless, sunny day. The owner walked me through the barn. Along the way we passed long rows of tables and on the tables were hamsters and rabbits and rats in cages. The owner said they raised them for sale. The primary customers of course being pet shops. I stopped to look at a rat and the owner told me how affectionate rats were and how they would never bite you unless they had a litter of rats and they were trying to protect their young. You can understand that, can’t you? the owner said and I said that I could. When I saw the goat I was disappointed. I was hoping she’d be big and helping deliver her baby wouldn’t be too difficult. I was hoping this delivery wouldn’t turn out like the last one, but the goat was very small. The owner said, I hadn’t planned on breeding her, because she was so small, but one day the farmhand let the male goat out with the nannies by mistake. I put my hand inside the goat. I could feel how the legs were presented first. I pushed one leg back to turn the goat around, headfirst. I explained to the owner while I was doing it how my children wanted a pet rat, but that my wife was against it. Jen thought that rats smelled. It was not so easy. There was not much room inside the goat. At one point I felt something hard, and realized I was feeling the baby goat’s teeth and then I was able to pull the baby goat’s head down, where it ought to be. This delivery would not be like the last one. The mother goat was able to push on her own now. I would not need my.38 today.

RESULT:The baby goat was born and the afterbirth delivered and I washed my hands with cold water from a hose while the mother goat licked her baby. The owner, on the way out as we walked through the barn, tried to give me a rat as payment. She picked up a cage and tried to make my hand hold the metal handle on the top of the cage. Oh no, I said. My wife would kill me.

THOUGHTS ON DRIVE HOME:They shouldn’t have lowered the gasoline prices. They should have kept them the way they were, and all the extra money could have been put toward a slush fund for the development of alternative energy sources.

WHAT THE CHILDREN SAID WHEN I GOT HOME:Poppy’s home! They ran to me. Sarah jumped on my back. Sam gave me a hug. Mia grabbed on to my leg.

WHAT I SAID TO THE CHILDREN:I almost got you a pet rat, but I knew your mother wouldn’t have liked it.

WHAT THE WIFE SAID:Rats stink.

WHAT THE CHILDREN SAID:A pet rat! We want a pet rat! Can we have a pet rat please?

WHAT I SAID:If you keep a rat’s cage clean, then it won’t stink.

WHAT THE WIFE SAID:Yeah, well, we have a rabbit and nobody’s cleaned the cage in days, and the rabbit cage stinks, so why do you think these kids are going to remember to clean a rat’s cage? No, I would end up having to clean the rat’s cage, Jen said. Maybe going to space would not be such a bad idea after all, she said. There I would not have to clean the rat’s cage. I would not have to carry wood. I would not have to cook the meals, pick up the dirty socks, the wet towels…

WHAT WE DID:We attacked the wife. We all ran up to her and hugged her. I kissed her where I could, she was shaking her head so much, not wanting to be kissed. I felt generous. I wanted to give her whatever I could, the way I gave my kidney away. I felt I had evolved, and up to the task of unquestionably helping fellow mankind. A lung. Could I give her a lung? Could she breathe deeply then, relax, love being touched? Sarah tickled her sides. Mia kissed her on the belly. The wife began to laugh. Leave me alone, Jen yelled, laughing. Oh, going off to space without us, we said. No way, we said. We’re going, too. We half picked her up and half pushed her out the door. We stood in bright sunshine right outside the door, slipping on the melting ice dirty and matted with New-foundland hair from where the dogs sometimes sat and kept watch, looking down our driveway and out over our field to the pond. We managed to get Jen over to the field beneath the apple tree, where there was still a patch of snow. We threw her onto it. We landed on her. The dogs joined in, barking and grabbing at our sleeves with their tails wagging, wondering if they should stop what was happening or let it continue because it was fun. The snow wasn’t so soft, but more like gritty crystals that stayed in Jen’s hair as she lay, still laughing, on the snow. Sunlight came through the branches of the apple tree and the children, breathless, lay back on the snow beside Jen and let the sun hit their faces. I lay back too and we all closed our eyes. What I heard was the sound of Bruce and Nelly panting as they lay next to us, and farther away I heard the sound of a car driving on the slick muddied road, its tires sending up the top layer of brown water and making a splashing sound.