Care and Feeding
Edward Ahern
Terry ran crying into the
reeds behind his house. He hopped from tussock to
tussock, staying dry until he reached his secret place.
The patch of ground was circled by tall reeds, making
him invisible. Deer bedded there at night, but during
the day the little island was Terry’s alone.
No one else would want to
come. Terry peeked eastward through the reeds at a
brackish pond, and across the pond, at the town land
fill. The town’s garbage and broken toys and worn out
clothes and grass clippings had been dumped there for
over 50 years. The slope facing Terry was ash-tinged
dirt punctuated with patches of weeds and scrub brush.
He dropped down onto a bed
of broken reeds warmed by the sun. The dried reeds
crackled and puffed out smells of plant dust. Terry
stared at the land fill without really seeing it. He’d
stopped crying, but was pretty sure he’d cry again
tomorrow.
Bruce had hit him three
times then pushed Terry down. Before that, Bruce sat
behind Terry in fifth grade, and behind Terry on the bus
ride home, whispering what would happen to Terry once
the bus let them off and before he could run home. And
Bruce had done it.
The sinking sunlight
behind him robbed the land fill of colors except for
red. And as Terry stared without focusing, wallowing in
his thoughts, something moved out onto the slope across
the water. He squinted. It was a person, no, maybe an
animal, something bigger than Terry. And then it spread
its wings.
Terry turned to run back
home, but before he could jump onto the first tussock he
heard a leathery whooshing and was picked up and dropped
back into the islet.
“Now there’s a bother.” It
wasn’t words, but the sense of the words, uttered
without sound right into Terry’s thinking.
“I am sorry, but I’m going
to have to kill and dispose of you.”
A greenish-red something
was staring at Terry, slowly beating its wings and
flexing the talons where its feet and hands should be.
Terry screamed.
“Only thing that’ll do is
scare away the deer.”
Terry screamed again
anyway. Then he stood up, getting ready to run when a
front limb talon grabbed his arm. “Please, please,” he
sobbed, “Let me go. I won’t tell anyone.”
“First rule: Never trust a
human, they even lie to themselves. No, I’m sorry. If
you have any last thoughts, think them now.”
Despite his fear, Terry
began stared at the thing clutching him. Its thorax was
lit from within by greenish and yellowish lights that
slowly swirled from one spot to another, vanished, and
rekindled. It didn’t really have a face; it had a snout
-- with flaring nostrils and large, pointed teeth. Its
black wings were skin and not feathers, with pronounced
veins and tendons. Smoke roiled from its mouth, and
something was waving behind its back.
“I didn’t do anything to
you.”
“Doesn’t matter. You know
that I exist- you die. But I’m not a wild beast. If you
prefer I can drown you. And although it makes perfect
sense to eat you, I can leave you to rot in the ground
or the pond if you wish.”
“You, you can’t do that,
you’ll be arrested.”
The skin around its mouth
curled up, exposing more pointy teeth. “We’ve been able
to hide from you for two millennia; I doubt the police
would know where to look.”
“But I know, you just came
out of the landfill. Do you live there?”
“Look, Terry is it? I wish
you’d quit asking questions so we can just get on with
this. One bite and it’s pretty well over. But, since you
asked, you’d almost exterminated us when we discovered
the garbage dumps you humans were piling up next to your
cities and towns. You’ve been providing us with food
and hiding places ever since.”
“And you can eat garbage?”
“We swallow all kinds of
plants and animal material whole and cook it into
energy- grass, wood, rats, mixed garbage, doesn’t
matter, we’re better omnivores than you are. The
digestion generates almost as much heat and light as one
of your furnaces.”
“But what are you?”
“Ah. You used to call us
dragons, and spend considerable time hunting us down and
killing us. Once we’d been hiding in the trash heaps for
a century or two you switched to killing other things.”
The dragon tightened his
hold on Terry’s shoulder, talon points pushing through
his skin. “I can just bite your head off if you wish.
It’s messy, but quick.”
Terry’s thoughts had been
churning, but it was like trying to stir cold oatmeal.
“Wait, ah, what should I call you?’
“Hrraushtu. The sound is
like clearing spit from the back of your throat.”
“Hrraushtu, there must be
things that you want but can’t always get living in a
garbage pile.”
Hrraushtu threw Terry back
down onto the reed bed and stared at him. “Of course.
Fresh fruit, we so rarely get fresh fruit. And
chocolates. We almost never find chocolates that aren’t
all dried out and rocky.” He flapped his wings, talons
curling in the process. “But no point wanting what you
can’t have. Sit still little one, while I open you up.”
“No, no you don’t
understand, I can bring you these things- chocolates and
fresh fruit and meat…”.
The dragon paused, and
slithered a narrow, split-ended tongue over the points
of its teeth. “Apples and pears and maybe even a
pineapple… How could you do this?”
“I can buy these things
and leave them here for you. You could come out after
dark and pick them up, but don’t let the deer get to the
fruit, they like it too.”
“And of course you would
want to stay alive to do this.”
“Yes, please. And I could
bring you even more things if you could bring me
something in return.”
“What would I have that
you want?”
Terry reached in his
pocket and pulled out a quarter. “We use these round
bits of metal to buy things. Do you find them as you
burrow through the garbage?”
“All the time. They’re not
digestable, so we just spit them out or excrete them”
“Bring some to me- I can
use them to buy you even more things. And make very sure
you keep our meeting secret.”
And so, despite his better
instincts, Hrraushtu let Terry jump back from tussock to
tussock until he reached his yard. Terry wanted to tell
his mother and father about the dragon, but felt he’d
made a deal, and anyway, who would believe him?
The next day Terry emptied
out his piggy bank. Bruce wasn’t on the bus so Terry was
able to make it home unpunched and walk to the corner
store. He bought two bags of apples and mangos and
oranges and carried the bags of fruit out to his little
island. The dragon waited until dusk had overshadowed
the land fill and flew over.
“Wow,” Terry said, “That
was something. With your wings spread out and your belly
lit up you looked like a bright, flying plate.”
“Yes, well, fortunately
for us your narrow-eyed depth perception is terrible.
What is little and close at night you see as big and far
away. When you notice us you think we’re flying saucers
filled with aliens. Really? Aliens?”
Terry opened up his bags
of fruit and Hrraushtu opened up two plastic grocery
bags as well. In the dim light Terry began to sort
through what the dragon had brought.
“Ah, no, Mr. Hrraushtu.
See, these are metal buttons from clothes. And these
here are pins from elections and conventions. And these
are bottle caps. None of those will help us.
“But here, these are good
for buying fruit and chocolate. See these are quarters,
and these are dimes, both very good for buying. And this
one-wow- if this yellow one is what I think it is I can
buy you a month’s worth of fruit!”
The coins were all covered
with dirt and other things Terry didn’t want to think
about. When he got home Terry washed the coins with dish
washing soap. The little yellow coin had 1863, $1
stamped on it, and Terry was pretty sure it was gold.
During his lunch hour Terry walked over to a coin shop
and showed his coin to the manager. The manager offered
him $50 for the coin, but Terry was suspicious and said
no. Before he could walk out of the shop the manager
offered Terry, first, $100 and then $300 for the coin,
no questions asked. But Terry knew he had something
special, put the coin in his pocket, and walked over to
a grocery store.
Bruce was on the bus going
home. “What’s in the bag, runt? Are you going to give it
to me? Should I just take it from you? Are you ready to
get hit?”
When the bus pulled away,
leaving Bruce and Terry on the corner, Bruce punched
Terry, knocking him down. Then he dumped all the fruit
out onto the ground. “Fruit? Fruit! What kind of an
idiot are you?” Bruce stomped on all the fruit, smashing
it, and walked away.
Terry scooped up as much
of the broken pieces and smooshed pulp as he could and
put it back into the plastic bag. Then he hopped over
the tussocks to his secret place.
When Hrraushtu flew over
he could see that Terry had been crying. “What happened?
Are you maimed? Should I kill you to stop the pain?”
“No and no,” Terry
replied. “But all your fruit is ruined. A bully hit me
and tromped on every piece.”
“It’s not so bad as you
think,” said the dragon. “Remember that I dine at the
dump. But we can’t have this interference. Should I kill
him?”
“Absolutely no,” Terry
said, “but I don’t think I can bring you fruit while
he’s on the bus with me.”
Hrraushtu thought for a
minute. “Shouldn’t you cripple him so he is unable to
take the bus? Or would you just like to intimidate him?”
Terry laughed despite his
fear and sadness.
“Bruce is much bigger and
heavier than I am.”
“And probably slower. Does
he hit you with his right talon or his left?”
“His right, always his
right. But I don’t want to hurt him, just make him stop
hitting me.”
“Hmmm. Slightly more
difficult. Okay I’ll show you what to do.”
In a blur Hrraushtu swung
his forelimb, talons closed, and knocked Terry into the
reeds.
“Ow!” Terry yelled. But
even though it hurt more than Bruce’s punches Terry
didn’t cry, for he knew the dragon had meant it to train
him.
“Is Bruce that fast?”
“No, slower, much slower.”
“This will be easy for
you.”
“And the dragon showed
Terry how to side step, grasping the fist as it was
swung toward him and twisting it hard enough to strain
the wrist.
“This is great,” Terry
said, “Bruce won’t bother me once his wrist is
strained.”
Hrraushtu sighed, belching
out greasy smoke and little flamelets. “How have you
survived this long? He’ll be both angry and a little
afraid. He’s bigger than you, so he’ll try and wrestle
you to the ground, and then punch you with his left
talon.”
“So I shouldn’t have
twisted his hand?”
“No, no you pathetic
biped, when he grabs you, you grab one or two of his
fingers and twist them until they dislocate.”
“I’m not sure I could do
that.”
The dragon sighed again,
smoke swirling around his head. “Okay, just until he
yells. That should stop him from hitting you. Here are
more of the flat metal circles. If you could find
squishy center chocolates that would be a very good
thing.”
The next day during lunch
hour Terry bought pears, a ripe cantaloupe and a box of
chocolates. Bruce sat behind him on the bus, hissing
threats. When they got off, Bruce moved in front of
Terry and clenched his fist. Terry dropped the grocery
bags and waited. When Bruce swung, much slower than the
dragon had, Terry side-slipped the punch and grabbed the
hand, pulling and twisting in the same direction the
punch was swinging. Bruce howled and jumped back,
grabbing his right arm.
“Now you’re going to get
it,” he yelled. Bruce rushed at Terry and grabbed him
around the waist. Terry reached down, grabbed a finger
and yanked. Bruce howled again, almost a scream, and
backed off. Bruce was crying.
“Leave me alone, Bruce”
Terry said. “If you try and hurt me again you’ll be
sorry.”
Terry picked up the
grocery bags and hopped out to his little island. At
dusk Hrraushtu, wings thrumming, landed on the reeds.
“You didn’t cry.”
“No. I almost feel sorry
for Bruce. But will he try and hurt me again?”
“I don’t think so. In his
mind you’ve gone from being prey to being predator. But
I’d stay alert.”
The dragon slobbered his
way through the pears and cantaloupe, and gobbled the
chocolates, box and all. “Ahh,” he sighed, the flames
almost singing Terry’s eyebrows. “That was good.”
They sat for a moment in
silence, watching the sunset. Hrraushtu stirred, and
began picking his teeth with his index talon. A charred
bit of green paper fluttered to the ground. Terry
noticed the number 1 printed on it. “Hrraushtu,” he
asked, “how often do you find these green and gray paper
rectangles with numbers in the corners?”
“All the time, usually
tucked inside something else we’re eating, like pants or
a mattress. They don’t taste very good, do you have a
use for them?”
“I think you’re going to
be eating a lot more chocolates.”
End
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