C. Morgan - All the Living

Some of the chickens are dead! she yelled.

What? he called. She pointed at the steering column of the tractor and he cut the motor and it fell with a whinny and a low shudder.

Some of the chickens got killed.

How many? he said.

Seven, I think.

Oh fuck, he said and swung down off the tractor, half walked a moment and then ran with Aloma trailing behind him to the barn where he stood and surveyed the chickens lying, yellow scaled legs stiffed out in a manner that was funny, some reluctant part of Aloma’s brain knew, but she was not laughing, neither was he.

Oh shit, Orren said and bent down and eyeballed a chicken at close range before he nudged it with his boot. If we got a sickness in here, we’ll lose ever last one of them if seven is dead already.

Oh no, Aloma said. She looked around at the other chickens, terrified now they would drop dead in her sight. Four sat nested. One journeyed, head bobbing epileptically, among the dead.

Orren crossed to the broody and her early chicks. The bright chicks darted around the darker hen, who stood as Orren approached, her black eyes pierced the air around her. Orren backed away slowly and gazed down again to peer at a dead chicken and then, with a sharp motion, stooped to his haunches to feel with a flat hand the barn floor around the carcass.

Is this feed wet?

Aloma looked at him blankly. He stalked to the feed bag, but while he did this his eyes never left hers and his body moved with a conviction that made her breath catch so Aloma had to physically restrain herself from reaching out to keep him. She knew already from his body, she always did. She was lifting her hands up to her throat in despair when Orren looked down into the feed bag and said, Oh, for fucksake, Aloma, the goddamn feed is wet!

Oh, she said, her voice like a whistle.

What the hell’s it doing over at the door for? She had never seen his eyes so wide.

I couldn’t see it where you had it over in the crib! Aloma cried. I couldn’t see anything! It was — She just stopped then, miserable. She glared down at the chickens. What kind of animal ate ruined feed? It had rained into the barn door a bit and how could she have known that—

Wet feed does that to a chicken, Orren said and he pointed at the chickens, made stupider than they naturally were by death, Aloma thought smally as she followed, unwillingly, his finger.

Oh, she said, more moan than word. Waiting for more, Orren just stood there. Then he raised one hand up to his forehead with an odd yelping sound and, barely restrained, tugged his hair straight up as though he would pull it out by the roots. Then he stalked to the stall and from a wall of long-handled tools, yanked off a wide broom.

I’ll feed the motherfucking hens myself, he said.

Aloma’s head snapped up. Don’t cuss at me! she screamed and then she ran from the barn and he let her go. But she made it only five yards before she turned abruptly so the dust fanned out from her feet and she ran back to where Orren had already begun to sweep up the damp feed. She yanked the broom out of his hands before he even realized she was there and began furiously sweeping at the floor so that the feed and the hay and the droppings swung up into the air and she accidentally struck one of the hens that was still living and it shrieked and flew into the rafters in a storm of feathers and drifting sediment.

Give it here, Aloma, Orren said, calmer now, reaching around her with both arms.

No, she said and jerked the broom away with one hand and used the other to strike Orren at the rise of his chest so he had to step back to escape her. Then she swept the floor with jerking motions, but slightly subdued now so that the sodden feed — what was left of it — could be gathered and thrown away in the trash.

Fine, said Orren behind her and he walked back to the stall and took up another broom and they swept the barn, but with their backs to each other so that Orren could not see the tears in Aloma’s eyes.

Later that day, Aloma counted out the money she had earned from playing piano. It was not much, but she drove it down to the feed store and stood at the back landing where she knew bags of feed and mulch were tossed into the waiting beds of trucks. She waited, but no one appeared. She walked into the building and a small bell made a large pronouncement behind her. Along a shallow gully in the floor worn by men’s boots past the dusty shelves, she walked. She tasted the dust in the air and the faded inoffensive smell of animals. Her face was careful and muted when she reached the register. Two men stood there, one ringing the other out. The clerk, bald as a finial, looked up, and before his shy male eyes wavered, she said, I need to buy chickens. The second man shoved his billfold into his back pocket and glanced over his shoulder, looked away, and looked again. Then he turned fully around and leaned back on the counter, his legs spread wide. He did not have red hair, but his face was spattered with freckles.

The clerk leaned to one side to peer around the other man’s shoulder and said, Ma’am, you gotta mail-order chicks. They come in a box. How many you want?

Seven chickens for laying, she said. It sounded like a question.

The man leaning on the counter did not have to open his mouth to speak to her, it was already slung open. Hey, if you want chickens, I got me some chickens. Chicks or laying hens or whatever you want. Yes-huh, I got a whole mess of em. I can’t hardly stand the sight of em. I don’t even eat no eggs neither. I get sicker’n… His head swiveled toward the clerk. Shoot. I get ill. His voice was more holler than talk.

The man behind the counter coughed up a laugh. Don’t cull no sick hens off on no girl. Ma’am, he said.

How much? she said to the man with the mouth at the ready and fishing money out of her pocket, she held her palm out and up. Is this enough?

Shoot, said the man.

That a get you more hens than eggs you care to eat, the clerk said.

I need seven, she said.

Who you sell your eggs to? the clerk said, but the man interrupted, Well, I got birds if you want birds. I got me a big old place. I bet you seen it if you ever drove out up on 52. You ever drove out that way? I got a big set of land, I got a big house. I got more’n most can handle, he said and he turned back toward the clerk and Aloma saw him wink — both eyes winked when one tried — and he lifted his hand to the clerk in a three-fingered salute. Aloma traipsed after him out of the store and in the half-moon mirror above the door saw the clerk wipe at his nose with mild disinterest as he watched her go. Outside, the man said, Now, I’m about two miles down and left on 52. First place, it’s a big place, can’t nobody miss it. You’ll see. Well, it’s just about the biggest place. Tobacco, mostly. Costy. Ropes me in a ton a cash. I’m fixing to build me a new house. He turned his face to one side, spat, and wiped two rosin-brown droplets from his lip. When Aloma said nothing, only smiled a girlish smile, he tossed his paper bag on the front seat of his truck and placed one booted foot on the driver’s-side running board. He said, Well honey, don’t get lost. Stay right close behind me. I drive faster’n I should, but I ain’t never even got no ticket yet. I ain’t never been shut down, not yet once. And I don’t stop for nothing but sin. I don’t know if you can keep up, I don’t take it easy not even for no girl. And then as she moved to her truck and he saw her empty bed, he said, Hey, you ain’t got no cages.

And she said, Oh. No, no.

That’s alright, he said. I reckon I can haul em to your place. He situated the tobacco in his lip. Where you live at? I bet you I know it.

Fourteen Burnt Ridge Road, she said. Under the ridge. It’s a white house.