Fresh Kill
 Michael Bracken

Michael Bracken is the author of Bad Girls,
Deadly Campaign, Even Roses Bleed, In the Town of
Dreams Unborn and Memories Dying, Just in
Time for Love, Psi Cops, Tequila Sunrise, and mor e
than 700 shorter works published in commercial
and small press publications.
He lives with his family in Waco, Texas.
©Copyright 2001
Michael Bracken

“The son-of-a-bitch fired me.” Bobby Thornton crashed angrily
around the living room. “After eight years, the bastard fired me.”
“The kids are asleep,” Susan said softly. She’d been asleep herself
when she’d heard the pickup slide to a halt in the gravel parking lot
outside their mobile home. Now she sat quietly in the living room,
holding a frayed blue robe tightly around herself. “Please don’t
wake them.”
Bobby stopped in the center of the room, suddenly aware of the
silence around him. He scratched at his belly through his blue
flannel workshirt, belched up some of the beer he’d been drinking
ever since Martin had given him the news at the end of his three-toeleven
shift, and looked squarely at his wife. “What are we gonna
do now?”
They’d bought the mobile home from Bobby’s uncle for a few
thousand dollars, but it sat on a rented lot. The truck still had a
dozen payments to go. The freezer contained a roast, some
hamburger, and two dressed rabbits Bobby had shot the last time
he’d gone hunting. The cupboards were nearly empty. Susan would
have to go grocery shopping with Bobby’s last paycheck, and it
wouldn’t stretch far. It never had.
“We’ll get by,” Susan told him. “We always have.”
“That’s all we ever done,” Bobby said. “Just get by. How come we
don’t never get no breaks?”
Susan smiled wanly. She loved Bobby-she’d loved him almost
from the moment they’d met-even though she knew he wasn’t the
smartest man she could have hitched herself to. She didn’t answer
his question.
“And to think I useta go huntin’ with him and everything, just like
we was best buddies and all.” Bobby finally dropped into the
lounge chair, scratching his arm on the frayed edge of the strip of
electrical tape holding the imitation leather arm rest together.
“Did Martin tell you why you were fired?”
“He didn’t say nothing.” Bobby rubbed at the scratch on his arm,
his thick fingers massaging the tender spot. “He just said I was fired.
I hadda clean out my locker and leave. He didn’t fire nobody else.”
Susan nodded, took a deep breath, and held it for a moment.
She’d known the day was coming. Martin had warned Bobby about
his temper. “Did you hit somebody?”
Bobby shook his head.
“Yell at somebody or swear at somebody?”
Bobby shook his head again, the muscles in his deeply-tanned
neck still straining with tension.
Susan took another deep breath. Bobby’s temper came and went
so fast that sometimes it was gone before she even knew what had
provoked him. But he’d never hit her and he’d never hurt the
children. She couldn’t say as much for the bedroom door. They’d
replaced it twice during the three years they’d lived in the mobile
home.
“I gotta go to the unemployment office tomorrow,” Bobby said.
He ran one hand through his short brown curls, pushing them back
away from his forehead. “I don’t like it there. They gonna ask me
why I lost my job. I ain’t gonna know what to tell them.”
“I’ll go with you,” Susan said. She would have to help Bobby with
the forms. Sometimes the questions confused him. The government
never made the forms easy to understand. “Maybe Mama will sit the
kids.”
Bobby grunted. He was glad he had Susan. She made everything
all right. She always had. Ever since high school. Since before high
school.
“We’d better get to bed,” Susan said. “Tomorrow’s going to be a
long day.”
Tuesday they went to the unemployment office and filled out
forms. Wednesday they went to Public Aid for food stamps.
Thursday Susan went to the mill to pick up Bobby’s last check.
Martin came out of his office when he saw her. They talked
quietly for a few minutes, exchanging pleasantries about the
weather. Finally, he asked, “How come you stay with Bobby? He’ll
never amount to much.”
Susan knew what Martin meant. In high school twenty-two years
earlier she’d had her choice. She’d known that Martin was going to
inherit his father’s mill and all the money and responsibility that
went with it. Still, she’d chosen Bobby. 
Martin hadn’t needed Susan but Bobby had and Martin had never
understood the difference.
“There’s still a chance,” Martin said. He’d spent the years alone in
his house at the top of the hill, his only company an elderly
housekeeper who came in three times a week. “I’m still waiting.”
Susan shook her head. She’d been beautiful once, was still
beautiful to Bobby and Martin, but the years had taken their toll on
her. The creases around her eyes had grown deep and her auburn
hair was now flecked with grey. Softly, she said, “You’ll die
waiting.”
Martin shrugged his shoulders, rubbed distractedly at the rounded
belly causing his white shirt to pull at the buttons, and said, “If it’s
not enough, let me know.” He motioned vaguely at the check Susan
held in her hand.
She stood a little straighter, making herself as tall as Martin and as
much more dignified as she could in the homemade print dress she
wore. “It’ll be fine. I’m sure you’ve paid Bobby everything you owe
him.”
Then she turned and left. Susan wouldn’t take charity from Martin
and was offended that he would even offer.
When she arrived home an hour later, Susan found Bobby on the
front porch with his rifles. Junior and Ruthie played on the rusting
swing set Susan’s sister had given them when her own children had
outgrown it.
“Going hunting?”
Bobby put down the rag he’d been using to clean his .22.
“Tomorrow. Early. Leave before the kids wake up.”
The next night he returned home with a squirrel.
“Best I could do,” he explained as he placed the carcass on the
kitchen counter. He’d dressed the squirrel where he’d shot it,
leaving the waste behind for the crows.
“It isn’t much,” Susan said, disappointed. Bobby had always fed
the family from his hunting. Even when jobs were scarce, he always
put fresh meat on the table.
“Two shots,” Bobby said. He placed the empty .22 shells on the
counter next to the squirrel carcass. Susan had taught him early to
bring the shells home. She wanted to be sure Bobby wasn’t
spending more on ammunition than she would have spent on the
same amount of meat at the grocery store.
But Bobby’s father had taught him well. He was a good shot, and
his efforts were rarely wasted.
“The bank called today,” Susan said. “They wanted to know why
we’ve missed two payments on the truck. I told them you lost your
job and we don’t have any money.” 
Bobby had come home empty-handed again. He laid his rifle on
the table. The past two months had begun to wear on him.
“They said they’ll repossess the truck if we don’t pay something
soon.”
Bobby took the last bottle of beer from the refrigerator,
unscrewed the cap, and took a long, slow drink. Then he walked
outside to the pickup.
An hour later he had the truck up on concrete blocks and all four
tires safely locked in the wooden shed he’d built the first year
they’d lived in the mobile home.
When he went back inside, Bobby said, “We’re gonna have to
walk.”
Susan had expected to. In ’84 Bobby had put their old Chevy up
on blocks the same way. The truck couldn’t be repossessed in the
middle of the night if it couldn’t be driven.
“I sold some food stamps to Margie,” Susan said. “And I paid the
electricity bill today. The manager says he’ll give us a month’s lot
rent free if you’ll help him clear out that stand of trees back behind
his place. He wants to store up some firewood for winter.”
“How come you’ve been avoiding me?” Martin asked when he
caught up to Susan in the parking lot of the grocery store. He
pulled off his red hunting cap and wiped at the sweat on his
forehead, using it to plaster his thinning black hair back across the
top of his head.
“I haven’t been avoiding you,” Susan explained as she lifted
Junior out of the shopping cart. Ruthie tugged on her jeans. “I just
haven’t seen you around.”
“Look,” he said, nervously glancing down at the two kids huddled
close to Susan’s legs. “I had to fire Bobby. He was screwing things
up. I’ve got a business to run, you know.”
Susan nodded. Business had always come first with Martin.
Ruthie tugged on Susan’s jeans again. She said, “I haveta pee.”
“In a minute,” Susan told her daughter.
“Do you need a ride?” Martin asked. “I could take you home.”
Susan shook her head. “It’s not far.”
She lifted two shopping bags out of the cart and began walking
toward home, her children following closely behind.
Bobby pulled a second shirt over his thick chest. The weather
had been growing colder every day and soon it would snow.
He looked into the mirror glued to the closet door. He’d stopped
shaving as soon as he’d felt the first nip of October and his beard
had thickened. If he planned to be out in the cold, he had to keep
his face warm.
After he buttoned the second shirt, Bobby pulled on a heavy 
jacket his kids had given him the Christmas before when everything
had been going fine.
Susan rolled over in bed and looked at him. She said, “Good
luck.”
“I’m gonna need it,” Bobby responded. “I ain’t had none in a long
time.”
Susan’s wan little smile returned, spreading itself across her pale
face. “We’re getting by.”
The day before, the sheriff had made Bobby put the tires back on
the truck and a man from the bank had driven it away. Bobby’s last
unemployment check had been cashed, and most of it spent. The
power company had sent a warning but Susan had thrown it away
before Bobby had a chance to see it.
Bobby kissed his wife gently, then he quietly left the mobile
home and began the long walk to the lake. He’d left the .22 at
home, instead carrying his deer rifle. In a small backpack, he carried
twine and a dozen plastic garbage bags. On his hip he wore a finely
sharpened Bowie knife. If he shot a deer he would have to dress it
in the field-like he did the rabbits and the squirrels-and carry the
best meat home on his back. He’d done it before. His father had
taught him how because his mother had thrown up the first time
she’d seen an animal dressed. So Bobby brought the meat home to
Susan, never showing her where it came from.
“I heard you’re not eating so well,” Martin said. He’d stopped
Susan as she’d come out of the Public Aid office. He’d been on his
way to the Post Office just down the block when he’d seen her
come around the corner of the building, holding the throat of her
jacket closed against the bitter wind.
“We’re doing okay.”
“I know it’s been rough on you,” Martin said. “It’s been a bad
season. I don’t think anybody’s bagged their limit. I know I’ve
tried.”
“Bobby does okay. We eat.”
“Why don’t you come up to the house for lunch,” Martin
suggested. “We could talk about old times.”
“I’d rather not. I have to watch the children.”
“Where are they now?”
“With Mama.”
“Let them stay with Mama tomorrow, too,” he suggested. “Come
up to my place. Stay with me for awhile. I’ll take care of you.”
“Bobby takes care of me.”
“I can do a better job. You know I can.”
Susan hesitated.
Seeing Susan’s hesitation and not understanding the reason for it.
Martin said, “Come see me. Spend time with me. I’ll feed your 
family.”
Bobby stepped around the corner, his heavy boots crunching in
the ice and snow. He pretended not to have heard anything they
had said and he stood next to his wife, glowering down at his
former boss and one-time classmate.
Martin nodded at the bigger man, then hurried off down the street
without a parting comment.
“What’d he want?” Bobby asked.
Susan answered slowly. “Nothing, Bobby. Nothing I’d ever give
him.”
The worst snow storm of the winter hit town the day after the
power company shut off their electricity. They spent the night
huddled around a pair of kerosene heaters the mobile home park
manager loaned them.
The next day Susan sold the last of the food stamps to Margie for
only half what they were worth so she could get the electricity
turned back on.
The cupboards were empty by the end of the week, except for
the box of Cheerios they hadn’t dared open yet and the box of rice
Mama had sent home with the Chinese-dinner-in-a-can they’d eaten
the week before.
Bobby, dressed in multiple layers of clothing, headed down the
road toward the lake. If he didn’t bag something soon, the family
wouldn’t eat. And he’d never let that happen. Never.
He arrived at the lake as dawn crept over the horizon, and he’d
been there almost three hours before he saw the tracks in the snow.
The tracks were small but distinct and he followed them through
the trees, quietly stalking his prey just the way his father had taught
him. Within ten minutes he spotted a tiny blur of red in the trees
ahead of him and Bobby knew what he’d found.
Anger flared through him-anger that he’d tried to suppress for
the past months. He rushed forward, quietly as he could, took aim
at the blur of red he’d become so familiar with over the years, and
squeezed the trigger.
The sound of his rifle echoed across the lake as Bobby bent to
retrieve the spent shell casing. Then he hurried forward, the anger
already dissipating, but not the determination to feed his family.
Using his Bowie knife, Bobby quickly reduced the carcass to its
most easily transportable form, packed the fresh meat in the plastic
garbage bags he carried, and strapped the entire bundle onto his
back for the long walk home.
Bobby’s family was going to eat fresh meat
for dinner that night and Martin was going to
keep his promise to Susan. Martin was going to
feed the family.