Callan Wink - Dog Run Moon

He drank his beer and watched the deer that were coming out of the trees to the feeder near the hill’s summit. He leaned back and propped his feet on the golf cart’s dash. A flock of mourning doves came and settled in the grass, close enough that he could hear their chortling love warbles to one another. He noticed the deer at the feeder were looking back over their shoulders to the tree line. And then, a zebra poked its black-and-white striped head out of the brush and made its way slowly across the clearing as the sun set.

A zebra. It joined the deer at the feeder. The sinking sun burnished its flanks so it glowed like polished variegated copper. The deer were sad dead leaves next to its majesty.

He sat stunned, didn’t want to move, but then it was dark and the mosquitos came out in full force. He turned on the golf cart’s headlights and caught the zebra, its eyes like huge white marbles, before it disappeared. He drove slowly back to the bunkhouse, straining for just one more look, but it was gone.

—

Karl was on his porch scratching the red heeler behind the ears. James pulled up a chair and sat. “Well,” he said. “I just saw a random.”

“Yeah?”

“A zebra.”

Karl straightened. “You’re shitting me.”

James shook his head. “No shit.”

“Huh. I’ll be damned. We got a crew of hunters coming in from Fort Worth next weekend. That would be a hell of a way to kick the season off. Those ol’ boys would lose their minds over something like that.”

“You’d really let them shoot it?”

“Sure, what the hell else would you do with it?”

“I don’t know. Just doesn’t seem right.”

Karl shook his head, crushed his empty beer can in his fist. “I know what you’re getting at, and you’re off base. That thing you saw wasn’t a zebra.”

“No. It was a zebra. I’m sure of it.”

“Nope. Zebras are in Africa. That’s the only place. A zebra anywhere else in the world ain’t a zebra. See what I mean?”

“Not really.”

Karl gave an exasperated sigh. “You set these Fort Worth boys down in Africa and let them unload on a zebra, and then maybe I can see your point. That’s not something they’re worthy of. But here, in Texas? A Texas man is worthy of anything in Texas. That’s how I feel.”

“Karl, I was thinking, what if I stayed on through the fall?”

“What about your one-room schoolhouse and all that?”

James shrugged. “They’d find a replacement for me quickly enough.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Haven’t you ever wanted to be indispensible?”

“Shit. Indispensible don’t exist. God’s a junk man and he’s got spare parts to replace everything he’s ever made.”

“What if you have a family, children? My brother’s wife is pregnant. No matter what happens, that kid will never have another real father.”

“All sorts of ingrates reproduce. There’s nothing sacred about it.”

“I guess,” James said. “But, I’m serious, if I called and told them I wasn’t coming back to teach, would you let me stay on through the fall?”

Karl was using a straightened metal coat hanger to scratch under his cast. “I’m supposed to get this damn thing cut off in a week,” he said. “I’m tempted to go get a hacksaw and do the job myself.” He stopped scratching and leaned back. “Montana, why do you think men come here? The thrill of the hunt and all that? Bullshit. In olden times, when you were sick, you went to the doctor and he vented your blood to release the bad humors. I’ve seen men cry. Grown men with tears on their cheeks confronting the mangy old buffalo they’ve just shot. Tears of joy, mind you.” Karl waved his hand as if to encompass the yard, the ranch, Texas as a whole. “You’re here for the same reason as those Fort Worth boys. Even if you try to hide it behind something else. And, I’m going to do you a favor here and tell you what I tell all of them when they get a little drunk on the last day of their vacation and start in about how they want to come down here and buy a little ranch and just leave it all behind . Do you know what they say in the bar at closing time?”

“What do they say?”

“You don’t have to go home but you can’t stay here.”

—

James packed his things, and then stretched out on the bed. In a few days he would walk back into his house, his life. It would be stuffy after the summer’s vacancy. Her things would be gone — gaping holes in the closets where her clothes had been, the empty place in the toothbrush holder like an unblinking vacant eye. He felt like he deserved a better homecoming. Maybe he’d go to Carina’s first. They could sit outside in the grass under the cottonwoods. She would tell him about her summer school girls and he’d describe Echo Canyon Ranch in ways that made it all seem more spectacular than it really was. He wanted to tell her about the zebra. It was very important that he do it in such a way that she wouldn’t dream of laughing.

It was out there, the zebra, somewhere, moving through the sticky darkness. He imagined what the land would look like if you could somehow strip away all the brush — the mesquite and the cedars and the prickly pear and the madrones — to expose the animals. All the randoms. It would be like a goddamn menagerie.

Maybe there was a lion. If there was a zebra then it seemed like anything was possible. He hoped so.

If all was right in the world, there was a lion out there right now stalking the hills, eating deer and hogs to pass the time, but really hunting the zebra. Eventually the two would cross each other in the brush. The zebra would run, gratefully, and the lion would chase, and, ultimately, under the low shade of a live oak, the lion would feast on the zebra’s flesh before either one of them had to suffer one more indignity.

Rand spent whole afternoons sitting in his trailer, head in his hands, blueprints in rolls on the tables around him, the water cooler giving an occasional gurgle. Sometimes a shadow crossed the sun, flocks of starlings, coming down to perch, chattering in the trees.

It was early spring. When the ice had come off enough, he took his boat up to the Bighorn reservoir. He’d always liked fishing but now he had a hard time concentrating on it. After a while, he stopped bringing a rod. He’d pack a sandwich, a thermos of coffee, and a six-pack of beer. He’d fill an extra gas tank and run upstream against the placid flow of the river, hugging the soaring canyon walls, hearing nothing but the drone of the outboard.

When it was time for lunch, he’d nose the boat into a side canyon and tie off in the lee of a boulder to get out of the wind. After the constant noise of the motor his ears would taste the strange silence of the canyon, and Rand would feel for a moment that there had been a reprieve. He would sit perfectly still until something broke the silence — the boat rubbing against the rock, the croak of a passing raven, a fish jumping somewhere out across the lake — and then the spell was shattered and he’d unpack his sandwich and drink his beer. He’d stare at the wild striations of the sandstone canyon walls and invent lives for the four men he’d killed.

—

The crew leader’s name was Angel. He spoke perfect English. As was usually the case, he’d hired his cousins and brothers to work for him. They did block, concrete flatwork, and stone masonry. Rand had been using Angel’s crew for a few years. Always on time and dependable. He’d never found fault with their work. On the news there’d been a story about a contractor in New Jersey who’d gotten fourteen months in jail for hiring illegals to build a Wal-mart. There were sex offenders who got less time than that. If a man wanted to work, let him work.