Lycanthrope

The cacophony of chickens rang out through the moonlit farmyard. Their high-pitched voices warned of certain catastrophe as Simon crossed the wooden footbridge that lead across the river. As stealthy as he was, the chickens somehow always knew he was coming. It had been raining earlier and the bridge was wet and slimy. His furred paws slid to the right, and he nearly fell into the water below. Sometimes he wished he were a cat, able to unsheathe and use its curved talons for gripping. But his own were still handy for tearing flesh from bone. He steadied himself, reached up to balance against the mangled body of a tree that sprouted out from the river, then continued at a slower pace toward his nightly smorgasbord.

Simon knew he could dine excessively but he was scrupulous, only taking what he truly needed to nourish him. The lust incited by the golden hued night compelled him forward and made it difficult to control his pace. For a brief moment, he envisioned himself tearing into every clucking fowl in sight, like a child at his first birthday party, joyfully pressing his face into the iced confection before him. There was a beauty in total abandon. There was perfection in holding nothing back. But he was not entirely animal and it was that other part of him, the humanity in his heart, which gave him this compassion to only take what he needed. The tantalizing scent of fowl tickled his nostrils, teased his senses, as he grew closer.

The soggy hen house door creaked open as he pushed it, and he deftly snatched one not-so-sacred chicken from its roost. He was almost past the fence when the grumble of his stomach made him turn back for more, to snatch a few eggs as well. Out and into the yard again, the neon yellow moon spilled onto his face, gnarled and furred, for he had not shaved in weeks. It felt good to discard the pretense and be the real me. It was good to be Simon the Conqueror once again.

His accountant job at Hickle & Sons was mundane. The only power that accompanied his position was when the boss put him in charge of ordering more office supplies. Power surged through him now. It was a euphoric and ancient calling to his spirit that he reveled in. The long hairs on his neck and back prickled against the alien fabric still clinging to his canine body. His hunger and the thrill of another successful hunt drove him to a faster pace. He ignored the bridge entirely on the way back, vaulting to the side of it, splashing across the river. He reached his beige Volvo, partially concealed by some high brush near the side of the road. Simon unlocked the car and then straightened. He fixed his eyes on some indistinct object out in the farmer’s fields and then snapped the neck of the squawking hen. He wrapped it meticulously in the pristine white towel and strapped it into the car seat. Then he drove back into the nebulous suburbs to the gray ranch house his wife called home.

Standing on the cold linoleum floor in a glow of yellow light, he breathed in the smell of fresh kill and sighed with pleasure. Being a lycanthrope had its merits, he thought, as he relinquished his grasp upon the dead fowl, dropping it with a thud, down onto the kitchen table. Simon stretched his weary hunter’s limbs and prepared to feast.

“Simon!”

The icy shrill of his wife’s voice sliced through his thoughts like the knife he held in his hand. She called from the living room. Her voice had a ragged edge from too many Marlboros.

“Are you finally back? Did you remember to get more laundry detergent?” She stood in the doorway, hands on hips, her cigarette wriggling between her lips as she spoke. “I told you three times to get more laundry detergent!”

Simon said nothing, staring blankly at her squat form in the doorway, and then something captivated his attention. It fell from the end of her cigarette, a perfect half-inch cylinder of gray ash. It landed on the very tip of her pink house slipper. Why hadn’t it crumbled on the way down? It just stood there, erect, like a tiny gray skyscraper.

Even as she bounced from one foot to another, her flabs of fat shaking from neck to cankle, the fragile thing stood strong and unchanged by the forces around it. He was mesmerized.

“Simon! Did you hear me? Why do I always have to ask everything twice?”

He flinched and then peered down at plastic-wrapped chicken breasts, bloodless and white on a sky blue Styrofoam platter. He laid the knife to one side, gingerly picked up the package and put it into the refrigerator. Simon exhaled defeated and returned his attention to the groceries, which stood in tall brown bags.

“Yeah, I got everything on the list, Joyce, everything you wanted.”