Old Bones: A Collection of Short Stories Read online

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  Oddities

  Dead Rabbits Don’t Run

  I SMELL IT again. Past hemlock and below hill the aroma is coming from man’s wooden lodge, drifting to me on smoke from most powerful and burning my nose with the fragrance of the blood of my sins. Although my eyes are closed, I know that if they were open I would still see the tormenting image of man eating his bloodless rabbit meal: chewing, always chewing; licking fingers clean; sucking bare every tawny bone; he will leave no bloodless meat behind. Before he sleeps tonight, he will bury bones into ground behind his lodge near where I committed my first crime. If I could move, I would run to there now and commit one last sin by digging up bones and feasting on marrow for the remainder of my short, pathetic life.

  It was there that I lost my dignity by giving in to temptation. After seeing man bury rabbit bones in ground behind his lodge, I waited until just before the new day to dig them up. I wisely returned all ground before feasting under hemlock. I have returned often since then, alone, always alone, and becoming less and less of a hunter.

  When man left his lodge for two summers, his woman replaced him. She did not bury rabbit bones. Instead, she threw bones with bloodless meat into high grass where it was quickly consumed by my large and stealthy body. Although the bloodless meat was dry and chewy, it had a rich flavor that was addictive. I became a scavenger and stopped hunting my meals.

  If my sons should find me here, dead and broken, will they uncover the follies of a foolish old laggard who spent his final days chasing dead rabbits? Or will the hemlock hide my body as I rot away, and will my death erase all evidence of my foolish ways?

  Did I cry just now or was it the hungry wail of my empty stomach?

  There is a tear in my eye. No. It is snow melting and running like tears. Snow assaults my eyes like large white gnats trying to blind me of the images from the past that haunt my tortured mind and torment my conceited soul. Is this my salvation? Regret is my pardon! Is there no limit to my delusion?

  Rabbits are near. The elder towers above me and looks with his laughing eyes upon my broken body. He mocks my anguish. He knows I am dying and he sneers at my torment with his taunting round face. White and smiling, always smiling, the great white rabbit runs across the sky, mocking my ruin. He has traveled quickly to pull the blanket of night over me. He is right to laugh at me, to taunt me of my predicament. I would chase him away if I could move. His children made me strong and my strength made me a leader. Now I am helpless, waiting to return to ground. I wonder if my bones will make a good meal. Or maybe man will use them instead. I’m sure my teeth would make a beautiful necklace.

  Cold bites deep into my wounds. I have not lived the length of time it has taken me to survive this day. Did I cry just now, or was it the sound of my empty stomach?

  I smell deer … and rabbit nearby. Man cooks the meat of their families tonight. I smell it in the smoke coming from the cabins. They will bury some of the bones in their yards, just as they do every day. That is why I stopped being a hunter. When the rabbits became too fast for me, man made it easy for me to become lazy. I robbed from their graveyards and dined on the old, cold bones of the dead.

  Did I cry again? Or is the rabbit elder laughing with the stars. How many of them are dead, yet living to shine on me still? When I rise without a shadow, I think I will dig up their bones and chew on their marrow for days to satisfy my hunger. And when my strength renews itself, I shall once again be a strong and mighty hunter. I shall…

  I have never been aware of death until this very hour when I have looked upon my birthplace and my gravesite with the same eyes. When I was young, I never thought about death. It either came swiftly and nobly to a warrior fighting bravely for his prince, or slowly and with pride, honoring grand old champions. But my death mocks me and threatens to leave me remembered as a fool, one that chose to live near man. It would be best for my family to forget me, allow me to become nothing, not even a memory.

  Time … season … night … is late. It marches onward, never slowing, never stopping. Or does it? Has it not slowed for me tonight and made me live an eternity? Will it finally stop when I take my last breath? Or will time and I continue somewhere else, with me in some conscious form still subject to the rules of nature?

  Is this daylight, or am I dreaming? I thought I saw dead rabbits running through the summer grass. It must surely be a dream. Dead rabbits don’t run. They can’t.

  Or can they?