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December 09, 2024

Stunky

By Casey Richards-Bradt

They had gotten the dog two years before their marriage and three before their first child, so to him, Buster was his eldest child more than Junie was, and he knew this was true in his heart. It made him happy to realize he could recognize such a potent truth about himself; it gave him the sense that he was more in touch with his inner ideals of love than the average person. Sometimes, when the summer rolled around and he’d come home from a long run with Buster, they’d play in the hose water together, towel off with the same towel, panting and squeezing water off their tails. This routine gave him a unique childhood feeling, like he was finally part of the Dynamic Duo. After his shower, he would crank the AC in the bedroom and invite the dog up on the California King. Sometimes, lying in the white noise, stroking Buster’s ribcage, he’d wonder if he loved Buster more than Ruth, too. But he always shook this thought out of his mind.

He had only gone into dentistry for the money. He didn’t want extravagant wealth—just wanted to sleep well at night, in a good neighborhood with a paid-off mortgage. When he’d gone off to college fifteen years ago, there had not been a single thing he had been interested in. All of his classmates had at least been passionate about something. Even the skateboarders, freaks, and art kids who would end up jobless still had a grasp on a dream. Even if they didn’t make it, they had a hobby in their youth that was priceless to them. This was an invaluable idea to him at the time because it was something he didn’t have. But he had all-around decent grades and a knack for memorization, so he felt confident that he could study any high-paying career that only relied on retaining surgery steps and terminology.

Being a dentist also meant a great work-life balance. Some weeks, he felt like he was barely at his own practice. The dental hygienists seemed to work their pay and then some—sometimes he felt they were scared of him—and they always held down the fort when he took a long weekend. By late May he hadn’t taken any sick days or vacations since New Year’s, and with his daughter’s birthday coming up, he felt he deserved a long four days away from the office. Junie’s sixth birthday party was on the 30th. The email was out by the end of the day on the 23rd, a week in advance. And for that long week, he waltzed in and out of his practice light on his feet, knowing the presents were bought, slices of lemon cake would be in his stomach, the kids would be outside with Buster, and he could breathe and close his eyes with his arms folded on the couch and not think of phone calls because nothing would go wrong. It was set in stone.

Friday the 29th rolled around, and he woke up at noon-thirty to the smell of cooling cake in the kitchen. NPR whispered to him from a phone speaker. Junie was singing songs while Ruth chided her not to drip frosting on the carpet. He rolled out of bed, went to the bathroom, and scooped the whisk out of his daughter’s hand.

“That’s mine!” Junie whined. “You’ll get plenty of frosting tomorrow, June,” he said, tossing it into the sink.

“She needs breakfast,” Ruth said to him.

“I’m not hungry,” said Junie.

“Thought you wanted frosting.”

She huffed. “It’s my birthday.”

“Entitled girls don’t get birthdays,” said Ruth. “Their mothers can cancel their birthday parties anytime. Girls who don’t eat their breakfast, either.”

“Mommy,” Junie said, but she said nothing else.

“Tell you what,” he said, scooping up his daughter like the whisk. “After you have some cereal, I’ll give you an early birthday present.”

Junie’s face lit up. “What is it?”

“Clever, but that would spoil the surprise.”

She contorted her face into a grin.

Two bowls of cereal later, Junie woke Buster up from a nap by blowing raspberries at him, leaning upside-down at the confused dog from the top of the crate, and he scratched and whined until she let him out. He vaulted around the living room in twists and circles, scattering a Lego tower across the floor and into the kitchen.

“JUNIE!” Now there was frosting on the floor. He burnt his thumb on a full mug of coffee. “BUSTER OUTSIDE NOW.”

He set the coffee down and let the dog out the back door. He saw Junie was crying, and Ruth was busy sponging icing off the tile floor.

“We don’t let Buster out of his cage without asking,” he said to her, holding her arms at her sides. “If you want to play with the doggy, you ask politely. I know you know how to say, ‘Daddy, can I let Buster out to play?’ Can you say that for me?”

She wouldn’t look at him. She wiped snot on her pink sleeve.

“Daddy can I let Buster out to play,” she said. “Please.”

“Good. Very good. See, I didn’t even ask you to say please. You did it all by yourself.”

She smiled. “It’s manners, daddy,” she said.

“Well. Can I give you your present, now, please?”

“Yes, please, you’re welcome.”

He swung his daughter around and set her down in the TV room on the couch. He went to get the smallest present out of the closet, wrapped with unicorn paper. He kissed his wife on her clenched cheek in the kitchen. “Close your eyes,” he said to his daughter.

She closed them and he handed her the present, but she peeked at the paper from the corner of her eye.

“Sneak,” he said.

She clenched her eyes and tore through the paper like a raptor. Five seconds later she shrieked, running back and forth with the gift over her head. “Daddy got the new Pokémon game! Daddy got the new Pokémon game!”

“Inside voice, sweetie.”

She ran back to him and he lifted her into his arms. “Thank you, Daddy,” she finally said, and he got that rush of gift-giving, of having made a child’s day so easily with a simple DVD case for sixty dollars.

Junie loved any video game featuring animals. She was part of the third of six-year-olds who wanted to be a veterinarian rather than an artist or an astronaut. A video game full of fictional animals was even better. Junie always asked him to play the games with her on the TV, but they were one-player, and he much preferred watching her play and listening to her explain. He didn’t like playing video games. To him, it always felt odd to control the player, like he’d much rather watch the characters interact in a movie instead.

Junie had explained to him how the Pokémon universe worked many times—in her six-year-old way, of course. Human beings developed alongside animal creatures with elemental powers. From an early age, children set off on adventures to become masters of these wild creatures by catching them and training them against others. Upon deeper inspection, he felt the games were unnecessarily violent, but he realized the battles in Pokémon were akin to combat sports or MMA fighting. There was never any animal death, or at least it wasn’t addressed. The magical creatures only fainted from the effects of poisoning or being lit on fire. These creatures lived in harmony with their owners and were a central aspect of business and society. They received free healthcare.

“Come watch me play, Daddy,” Junie said. The gaming system sprang to life.

“Thirty minutes, and then Daddy’s got to shower,” he said. He sipped his coffee and watched his daughter choose her player. The avatar sprang to life in a charming bedroom. Junie headed straight for the laboratory outside the avatar’s small town, where she was instantly given the choice between three powerful creatures, free of charge. The creatures’ cells or data was magically contained inside three cramped spheres.

“There’s a grass type, fire type, and water type,” she said. “Which one do you want?”

He looked up from the news on his phone and looked at the TV. There were three animals, all with glittering auras, like the Pick 3 numbers on the lottery. There was an angry squirrel wielding a stick baton, a black bear cub with lit candles for ears, and a sad fish-thing manipulating rain clouds.

“It’s your game, sweetie. You choose.”

“I just wanna know which one you like best.”

“Well, they don’t have Buster.”

“They wouldn’t have Buster. He can’t fight.”

He put his phone down and looked at the TV closer. He probably wouldn’t want any of the creatures. They looked like more trouble than they were worth. The squirrel would only break dishware, the bear would set fires to smoke you out of the home and maul you, and the fish-thing would flood the basement. If this was a classic game of Fuck, Marry, Kill and he was forced to choose one of the things to live with, he supposed he would have to choose the fish-thing—it looked like he could just buy an extra-large tank for it and forget about it.

Junie had chosen the fire bear when he heard a series of barks from the backyard. He went out the back door and stood on the porch, whistling to Buster. The lab-pitbull mix was back by the shed, kicking up grass and dirt like a bucking horse. He was barking his head off at something moving through Ruth’s lilac bushes—a squirrel. It sauntered triumphantly around the far side of the shed and under the fence.

“BUSTER HERE NOW TREAT NOW!” he called, and only when the dumb dog trotted over did it hit him.

The dog reeked of skunk. Buster sneezed sheepishly and he knelt to waft the dog’s nose. The cloying smell was radiating off his face, head, and chest. He didn’t know what to do. He almost refused to deal with it. There was a chest in the shed that held dog shampoo, but he didn’t want to encounter a potentially territorial skunk. He would wash skunk off his best friend; he would not wash it off himself. It wasn’t in the cards for him—not on vacation. He tried to throw the word ‘vacation’ out of his mind. He threw an outside towel over his companion’s head, trying to scrub off some of the smell. It only moved to the towel, but remained on Buster’s face in the same intensity. He groaned and then groaned again; no neighbors were outside.

“Stay, Buster,” he said. He grabbed the leash hanging over the railing and tied his friend to the banister. The dog whined for a treat.

He went back inside and grabbed his phone from the TV room. He realized he should tell his family before he told Siri what had transpired.

“Buster just got sprayed by a skunk,” he said to his wife and daughter. Ruth pivoted from the sink with a slack-jawed look on her face. She made a breathy noise like someone had just punched her. Junie paused her game and came around to the back door. She pressed both her hands against the glass and stared at the puppy.

“Don’t let him in, sweetheart. We have to give him a bath.”

“It’s ok. He’s tied up out there.”

“He’s so stinky. He looks sad.”

“Christ, I can smell it…shut that back window there, babe.”

He moved to the TV room and locked the windows. “I’ll give him a bath,” he said. “It’s just so potent that I’m afraid the thing’s still out there.”

“We should call animal control or something,” Ruth said. “Skunks aren’t supposed to be out in the daytime. It could have been rabid.”

“It didn’t act rabid.” He thought about going to the vet; having to hold Buster down for fifteen rabies shots. “And it didn’t bite him. Just sprayed his neck.”

Ruth exhaled. “Okay. But I still have to call animal control. And frost this cake. And decorate it. And put the laundry in the dryer. And watch Junie.”

“If I’m washing the dog, then I can easily call somebody about the skunk,” he said, trying not to think about the word vacation. Or weekend. Or Friday.

“I love you,” she said, kissing him on the cheek.

“It’ll all be okay,” he said, and kissed her on the mouth.

Siri told him that he needed baking soda, hydrogen peroxide, dishwashing detergent, and dog shampoo. He grabbed the first three things from the kitchen along with a bag of dog treats. He grabbed a face mask from his bedroom. The scent was more bearable when he stepped outside, but it clouded around Buster specifically in a way that made him angry. The dog sat down expectantly at the sight of the bag. He tossed him a bone and guided the leashed dog to the hose. He tied the dog once more to the empty flagpole next to the hose. He would have to go to the shed to grab a bucket and the shampoo. He didn’t see any unfamiliar movement at the far corner of the yard: only the swaying of May wind through the bushes. He trudged over carefully past the swingset and the trampoline, and could only smell the wave of lilacs in the wind. Nothing suspicious around the front sides of the shed except for a couple of small holes at the base—snakes. He grabbed the shampoo and the bucket and ran back like a kid to Buster.

He got on speaker with the local wildlife control center while he mixed the peroxide potion with a rag. He faced the shed, knowing the potentially rabid skunk could run at him if he had his back turned. He had his eye on the prize while he was on hold—not the phone nor the bucket—with the intensity of reading lottery numbers off a screen. Nothing but wind moved through the tall grass.

Buster was cooperative and quiet while being bathed. He was the kind of dog who loved baths and tried to eat the hose water. By the time he was halfway done scrubbing him with the first concoction, the wildlife center had taken him off hold. He gave the man on the line his address and told him that a sizable skunk had sprayed his dog and was potentially living—squatting, in fact—in his backyard.

“My wife said that because it happened during the daytime, the skunk could be rabid,” he said. “And I don’t want my kid to get bitten.”

“If it wasn’t producing foam I wouldn’t worry,” the man said. “Skunks are primarily nocturnal, but it’s ordinary to see them during the day. If you see it again, call back. We can send a team over and relocate it to a safe location.”

“Thanks, and—” he said, but the man on the other end had hung up. He switched the nozzle to mist mode and Buster sneezed droplets. Bits of baking soda slid off of his snout.

The smell wasn’t nearly as bad once he was through with washing the dog with the first concoction, but he still emptied the bucket in the grass and filled it with diluted peach-pear shampoo. He coated Buster in bubbles, paying special care to the skin under his eyes, and the clean smell of artificial fruit absorbed the remaining oily cloud. Suddenly, everything felt fine again: he remembered that there was a cooling cake in the fridge and extra lemon frosting. Buster had probably needed a bath anyway, and this was God’s way of telling him. He smiled, admiring himself for this recognition of a higher power. Just then, Junie stepped out the back door.

“Daddy, did you know you can play on the big screen or on here?” she said, pointing to the screen in her hands.

“I didn’t,” he said, though he had known it when he bought the system. He set the hose down.

“I wanna show you,” she said. He wiped his hands on his shorts and shielded his eyes from the sun with his hand.

“What is it?”

“It’s a Stunky,” she said. “We just caught one.”

On the device was an angry purple skunk. Junie pressed down on the button with her thumb repeatedly, which kept provoking it and caused the creature to buzz.

“In the game, they’re everywhere. We caught the fourth one we fought!”

“At least I only have one, right?” he said, but it was false optimism.

“I want more Stunkys,” she said. “They’re purple and fluffy, and a lot of kids at school don’t like them because there are so many. Justin likes to kill Stunkys. And Crobats. And I hate him.”

“Hate is a strong word, June,” he said. “And so is kill. But I’m glad you like skunks.” He would never want a pet skunk, he thought, even in a world where they had magical powers—a reeking thing that did what—set fires? Poisoned your enemies? Even if you had enemies, what would stop a venomous skunk in your home from killing you? It all seemed like more trouble than it was worth.

“Are all skunks called Stunky in this game?”

“No. Stunky can evolve. Then he gets a new name. But I don’t remember. I’d have to get my book.”

“Ah.”

“Is Buster almost clean?”

“Soon. I just have to get the rest of the soap off his tummy, and then we can towel him off. And I want him inside for the night after that. I’m gonna keep an eye out just in case that skunk comes around again.”

“You should train it, Daddy,” she said, and giggled. “Can Buster come outside and play tomorrow for my birthday party?”

He thought about how Junie’s birthdays, being in late May, had always been hosted outside in the backyard. “Of course, sweetie,” he said. “Just for today, I want him in. Buster’s had an adventure, hasn’t he?”

She nodded and handed him the towel.

It was already 3 o’clock once Buster was inside and drying off. Junie was locked into her game in the TV room, though Ruth told her repeatedly to spend an hour outside. He made himself a big late lunch and sat down in the TV room again with his daughter, listening to her speak but watching the windows for any sign of movement. Junie’s neighborhood friend Tucker finally came over to play Four Square from five until six-thirty. He didn’t even get up to pee: just laid back on the couch and turned on The Sopranos. He had seen every episode and was still watching the window.

After dinner, he let Buster out on a leash to pee and patrol the yard. Nothing was there and nothing had been there since early afternoon, but he felt like this was only the case because he had been watching. As soon as he took his eyes off of the backyard, the skunk would appear to claim it as its own.

He tied Buster up around the banister again and waited for the sunset from the back porch. The day hadn’t gone as planned, and all his relaxation time had been filled with a watchful tension. He thought about what the next day would bring—how the bad luck would turn itself around for his family. It had made a faux pas and it would correct it.

At around eight, Ruth came out with two glasses and a bottle of wine.

“Junie’s in bed,” she said.

“It won’t come back, right, babe?” he said.

“No. I don’t think so. They spray when they’re afraid. Usually, animals fight, then flee. It wouldn’t just keep fighting.”

He thought about the animals in Junie’s game. The skunk couldn’t light him on fire. But maybe he would prefer to have his clothes on fire over being stinky.

“It just went back to its home.”

“Yeah.”

“Please tell me you’re not out here watching for the skunk.”

“Just waiting for sunset,” he said. “Waiting for you.”

They clinked their glasses together and she kissed him. He had a romantic evening that involved missing the sunset from inside, and once nighttime set in he was wide awake with endorphins, with no golden hue to guide him to sleep.

His wife snored beside him and the night lilac smell blew like a candle through the screens. He had limited experience with insomnia and felt tossing and turning didn’t suit him. He went out to the back porch again with a book and a flashlight; when the mosquitoes got to him, he went back inside the TV room and watched the bugs flicker in the porch lights.

He fell asleep on the couch after four and woke up at 7:30 when his wife came downstairs to confront him.

“Was my snoring that bad?” she said. He did not want to say yes but did not want to admit he had an urge to watch for the skunk, either.

“You were watching the skunk,” said Ruth.

He didn’t respond. He needed a splash of cold water to the face.

“Well? Did you see it?”

“No,” he said, rubbing his eyes. “I didn’t see anything.”

“Maybe we can learn from this,” she said. Now she was speaking to him like a child. “I told you there was nothing to worry about and nothing happened. The skunk isn’t going to come back.”

“Okay.” He felt stupid.

“Say it to me. The skunk isn’t coming back.”

“The skunk isn’t coming back.” He rolled over on the couch and put a blanket over his head.

“I’m a little hungover, so I’m making chicken with our waffles. You and Junie have to be up and ready because the kids start arriving at eleven.”

Buster walked through the kitchen at the sound of the word chicken. He took the dog out to pee and barely looked for any activity in the grass. Buster sniffed the snake hole, but it barely interested him; he kept around the fenceline and went in his kiddie pool. He took the dog on a quick run, showered, and woke up Junie to get her dressed. She picked out her leopard leggings, tutu, Patriots jersey, and purple crown.

“Cake for breakfast,” she said.

“Waffles,” he said. “And I thought you knew how to say please.”

“It’s my birthday, please,” she said, and stuck her tongue out at him.

After breakfast, Tucker and Tyla were the first to arrive. Ruth offered the kids waffles with whipped cream. Tyla nodded and signed please, and she and her brother wolfed down all the remaining leftovers. After the dishes were put away, three minivans pulled in the front yard and the doorbell sounded off with the force of a hundred trick-or-treaters. Buster barked from his crate. There were more girls in Junie’s class than he thought: he counted thirteen in his living room, some carrying gift bags and some holding candy. There were only three that he recognized. The minivans were already pulling out of the neighborhood—no parents. They were all in his hands.

“Did your parents leave their phone numbers with you?” he asked the sea of kids.

“We have phones,” one of the girls said through the sea of blabbing girls. She grabbed another girl’s hand and guided the group into the kitchen.

“JUNIE!” the girl shrieked, and they all erupted into jumping squeals.

“Okay, come on, girls. Let’s take this outside. Welcome, everybody! You can place your stuff on the picnic table.”

His throat sank at the thought of the kids going outside. A flash of the future streaked through his mind—sixteen kids versus a rabid skunk. Kids stinking, bitten, crying; him the only father. But he felt stupid again at the thought of approaching his wife with the thought. He reached for her upper arm anyway as the kids milled about on the back porch.

“I know I’ve been overreacting about the skunk,” he said. “I’m not paranoid. I know it most likely won’t come back. But can we agree that one of us needs to be watching out there at all times—not just for the usual things that could get kids hurt you know, but—”

“Baby. We’ll watch for the skunk. Number three million on the list of things we need to save our kid from.”

“That’s not what I meant. Now you’re making me seem paranoid.”

“No. I’m just saying I’ve already added it to the mental list,” she said. She pointed at her head. “I’m sorry. I think I’m getting a migraine. That’s why I needed to send the kids outside. Would you mind taking the first watch?”

“No problem,” he said, kissing her. “Go lie down.” He wanted eyes on the skunk himself.

Outside, Junie had collected some water guns and a soccer ball from the shed, and the girls were taking turns spraying each other with doggy pool water from the top of the slide. Junie yelled “waterslide!” at the top of her lungs, and the crowd of girls replied with a torrent of shrieks. They started climbing up the slide like monkeys while their classmates sprayed them in the neck and chest.

He was more hungover than he had thought. He had a high tolerance for the screaming of children, but on so little sleep he was white-knuckling the sound of unfamiliar kids, plus his own inability to keep his eyes open. He almost fell asleep at the picnic table, and by the time a girl screamed because she’d been shot with an earful of water, he had half-dreamt of the skunk. He awoke with a start to Junie running over to her with a towel.

“Let’s eat cake and open presents,” Junie said, and the girl smiled.

He grabbed the cakestand and the paper plates from the kitchen table. With everyone close by and seated around the table, he relaxed again. He had gotten a nice extra fifteen minutes of sleep, minus the quick dream. Plus, Junie’s classmates had a surprisingly robust range of gifts for her. There was a small pink acoustic guitar, a pair of sparkly unicorn roller skates, and a plushie as large as Junie. He hadn’t seen her show any interest in music or roller skating—he wondered who these mysterious parents with the impressive gifts were.

Junie thanked everybody and all the little kids said you’re welcome and he felt his smile widen. When he went back inside to dispose of the plates and napkins, Junie asked him if Buster could come outside and play.

“Tucker and Tyla and me only play soccer if Buster’s there,” she said. “He loves playing soccer. He can be on the rival team.”

He thought for a minute. “Ok. I just have to let him out of his crate. And he needs to get acquainted with everyone before we let him off leash.”

“Okay, daddy,” she said.

“Wait to get on the trampoline or in the pool until I get back,” he said. “Birthday girl.”

“Thank you, daddy.”

The constant screams faded away as soon as he shut the back door. Ruth had locked the back windows and cranked the A/C. He breathed in. Her white noise machine was on in the master bedroom. In the spare room, Buster lay awake with the lights off. He unlocked the cage and massaged his dog’s ears. Buster closed his eyes and scratched at his side, then looked up toward the muffed sounds outside.

“It’s just Junie,” he whispered, petting him. “You’re going to go outside and see friends, alright?”

The dog didn’t respond.

“Buster have manners for me,” he said, scratching his backside. The dog tap-tap-tapped with his nails on the wood floor. “Buster have manners.”

Yeah-yeah-yeah, he could imagine Buster saying.

“Buster,” he whispered. “If there’s a skunk, come home.”

Buster got up and started walking out the door.

“Flight, don’t fight,” he said, and realized he was talking to a dog that wasn’t there.

He realized he needed a mimosa. He poured himself a small one, leashed Buster, and went back out the door. The noise flooded back in at top-notch. The kids ran at Buster with open arms and he jumped up on his hind legs, greeting them with barks. “Doggy, doggy,” the world ad-libbed. There were earplugs at the store up the road; dusty in the back of a dresser.

Buster quieted down and let the kids scratch his side. “If he shows his teeth, it just means he’s smiling,” he said, letting the dog off-leash. Junie called the group over to play soccer.

“Who’s on Buster’s team?” Junie yelled. Me, he thought. He slugged the mimosa and fell asleep on his hand.

In his dream, he was running with Buster around the neighborhood toward his house, but he knew he needed a map to find his way back. A fog was about to materialize through the ether—it was on the weather—and he was too late. It came, and blood-shrieking cries came with it, coating the mist like cranberries in a muffin. He wanted to identify who was making the cries, but it would have to wait. He still needed to find his house.

He awoke with a jump, like his body thought he was falling. The screams were real and they were scared. They were familiar. He stood up and shielded his eyes from the sun with his hand. The mass of children was running toward the far fence line, away from the shed like it was on fire.

He jolted out of his seat and ran toward the grass without looking at the present danger. Protect the kids, he thought. A soccer ball whizzed by his head. “Don’t kick it!” Junie screamed, and she pushed a girl—the one with the phone. The ball clanged against the shed. He looked left and saw it whizzing under and through the playground like a pinball. The fastest stinking thing this side of the fence. Buster was doing wide circles around the perimeter of the fence, closing in on it, then repeating in some sort of perilous halfwit game. He couldn’t identify any foam from its swiftness—it wiggled its head like the possessed—but he could see the sheen of its oily coat so clearly in the noon sun that the monochrome hues of its fur shone yellow and purple. “KIDS INSIDE NOW,” he yelled, pointing in the general direction of the porch.

“Fire drill,” one of the kids said, and they ran diligently in the back door. The skunk ran right past him and dove into a lilac bush. It was a fat and feisty fucking thing. He staggered into a run away from it like it was lava and hid behind the picnic table, trying to whistle the dog over to him. Buster could not be tamed. He was barking his head off—howling. Look at this, he imagined Buster saying. Just then four baby skunks waddled through a hole in the fenceposts and disappeared into the bush.

“Buster!” he called with the utmost urgency. He whispered it through his teeth over and over, like the skunks could speak English. He called the dog’s name and clapped his hands a hundred times and Buster did not respond.

Buster was berserk. He was bouncing up and down on his front and hind legs, poking his head dangerously close to the base of the lilacs. He decidedly reached his teeth out to bite the thing that was bugging him, and the lilacs hissed and rustled. He finally moved from behind the picnic bench to disarm the bomb that had already detonated. The cloud toxified the air. Buster sneezed thrice and rolled in the grass as the bush settled down. The skunks had won the army and the war.

He could not remember a time in his life when he had been so viscerally angry at something he could not control. At election results and baseball games, he would yell too loud at the TV for his home team in good fun. But he knew how to take it like a man when he felt something had happened unfairly. He remembered when he was eighteen with his first apartment, and when his parents came to visit him for the first time, they finished all his liquor with one pitcher of Long Island Iced Tea without asking. While he was at his part-time job. His own parents. They were paying for the apartment, so he couldn’t yell at them when he came home. He had slammed his bedroom door while his parents stayed in the living room like he was a kid again. He remembered that seething feeling: blood boiling with all the doors shut when the world did him wrong. Just the beating of a hot brain with the heat locked in.

He went in the back door without Buster and went into the basement without talking to anyone. The kids were booting up the game and it seemed like Ruth was still asleep. He took out his phone and called the same number for the wildlife center. He gave the man his address and told him he was dealing with a skunk—no, skunks—

“Is this the same person who called yesterday?” the man asked.

“Yes,” he said. “And my situation has gotten worse. My dog got sprayed again. And there are more skunks on my property.”

“You’re sure it’s not the same skunk?”

“There is a whole family of skunks living in my backyard that I need to be evacuated immediately. At least a mother and four babies. They’re living in my wife’s lilacs.”

“Does it look like they’ve made a nest in there?”

“Well, they didn’t leave when my dog tried to intimidate them. This time or last time. I’m not looking in there, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“I see. It’s just that if you’re housing a surfeit of skunks on your property, it’s going to be a more difficult undertaking. Mothers are very territorial and protective of their young until they leave at about six to eight weeks. It could take a month and a half to get the job done as easy as possible, depending on their size.”

“Is there a harder way? I don’t need to do it the easy way.”

“I’d need a full team for skunk family removal. Call it about eight men on the task force. But it’s Saturday, and we close at twelve-thirty. Closed on Sundays. Open five a.m. sharp on Mondays.”

“So there’s nothing you can do. Not today or this weekend.”

“If they’ve made their home there, then they’ve made their home.”

“But it’s my home. The home I pay for. And they sprayed my dog—the dog I pay for.”

“Unfortunately, sir. It’s not my choice. If I could, I would do it today. Can I pencil you in for an appointment for Mon—”

He hung up on the man and went back upstairs. He could hear the white noise machine through the floorboards; the grinding of his teeth. The girls were squealing at a game he’d never seen on the TV before—one with a pig and a bear in a hotel. He checked up on the girls to see if they had enough lemonade and shut the curtains. “Too much glare on that TV,” he said. He grabbed a few glasses of lemonade for the coffee table and a bag of dog treats for his pocket. He glanced behind him and slammed the back door. Buster was whining in the corner by the flagpole, talking to another dog over the fence. Life wasn’t fair, but what could you do but shake your head and focus on the motion? He cracked his knuckles and crumbled the rest of the cookies inside the bag. He dumped the contents on the grass and gratefully watched Buster lap them up.

His eyes started whizzing around the backyard for an answer to right all the ways he had been unjustifiably wronged by no one. His bulging eyes absorbed all color and his hands went for the neon pink roller skate box. He had an idea. He took his key out and tore his daughter’s birthday present open. The skates were big and heavy for Junie’s size—she would have to grow into them. Four pounds each, he thought. He ran back inside to get the pitcher of lemonade.

He wasn’t thinking. He thought he was still talking to the wildlife man on the phone. Stupid male secretary with his leg bones rotting sitting at the phone all day, he thought. I’ll show him. I’ll show him justice. He smirked at the concept of justice from a safe distance.

With one hand, he flung the full pitcher of citrus and ice into the lilac bush. A violent spasm of hisses came from hell. The little things ran through the fenceposts with their tails between their legs, and the mother came out behind them in a zig-zag. He knew she wouldn’t be able to fit through the fence like they could. He put his hand into the left rollerskate and flung it as hard as he could as an angle where the fence met the living thing. Its head erupted into a barrage of streaked sinew, and its quivering legs died last. He let out a shaky breath and bolted for the shovel; the trash bags in the shed.

The spot on the fence was easier to clean than Buster was. Maybe it was the toil of cleaning him twice in twenty-four hours. Before Ruth had gotten up from her nap, Buster was relatively fresh again, and he had scrubbed the roller skates twice with Clorox.

He never had any bad dreams about skunks again. What he did that day didn’t keep him up at night. Sure, maybe it would have if Junie ever found out about it. Her love for animals of all kinds never faded as she got older. But he knew he had done the right thing with the hand he had been dealt. If Junie had encountered the skunk and had been sprayed by it, she might not like wild animals now. She could have developed a phobia of them as a child, and then she wouldn’t have felt the calling to be an animal whisperer, which was what made her feel special.

He was lucky Junie had never taken to roller skating. Four years after the incident when he was cleaning out the garage, he smelled something faintly sour coming from one of the storage bins. He lifted up the lid and perused, eventually digging up the dusty pink roller skates by the shoelaces. He sniffed the soles. Something putrid was resonating off the object, but it wasn’t the smell of dirty socks.

He placed the right skate in a trash bag and scrutinized the left one, looking at the spots that had held streaks of blood so long ago. He smelled a chunk of dust lodged between the front wheel and the brake, and the scent was more visceral. He turned the wheel with his finger, and a rounded fragment of a skunk cranium fell into his palm. He felt the fragment between his thumb and forefinger, only half sure of what it was, and the sensation of remaining white skunk fur shook him to the bone.

He bristled with a childlike fear and the piece fell into the trash.








Article © Casey Richards-Bradt. All rights reserved.
Published on 2024-11-25
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