In The Deep Clearing

She held her breath. Counted silently. Inhaled.
One, two, three, four, five. Exhaled the same. 

She sat in a deer stand long abandoned under an oak that stretched high, a crashed branch below, mushrooms and moss in its skin. Unstable. As the sun gathered itself toward the horizon, the sky thrummed a brilliant fawning. One foot in the clearing, then back into underbrush, rabbits hopped into the clearing, a skirting of shyness like a couple’s first date.

Four total. Four would do for now. One would do
for now. The rabbits inched closer to dried corn,
leaked from woven burlap bags in the barn,
nothing ever to waste. She wedged her 20-gauge
between her shoulder and tree. Ready. 

Counted again. Inhale. Exhale. Calculated, rhythmic, calm. Good for running. Good for hunting. Good for making yourself invisible among angry adults.

Slowly reseating the gun, her gaze focused on the center rabbit. At the bottom of the next breath, she fired. The rabbits scattered, four in the clearing and more along the periphery, ballet dancers waiting in wings. She blinked, and the stage was empty as if no one had ever been there. In the sprinkling of corn, she looked from east to west, the golden light starting to cool. She shook her head and chewed on the side of her lip until she tasted salt and metal. 

The rabbits had been chewing on cabbages and ruining pickles, cucumbers really, all summer. Her grandmother tried poison and a scarecrow. Yet, the girl walked out just that morning and saw one atop the shoulder of the coat, its back to her, a great dark streak down the middle, part of an ear missing already, something between its paws, the last rabbit to scurry when she screamed and flew at them, her arms wide, the wind against wings she could feel growing but wasn’t sure yet how to use. 

A few days later, she brought a bow and arrow, the metal and grease of her gun left under her small single bed wedged in a tight corner, long ago shared with her mother. Never before had an animal eaten from the same garden and read her mind with such ease. As if on cue, the mist began its evening rise and rabbits tittered into the field.

She raised her bow, steadied her breath, waiting for the king buck, who had yet to appear. While the other rabbits continued to snack on clover and wild strawberries, she felt entwined in their collective knowledge. The girl felt his presence in the layers of her skin, her twinging hairs, before she could see him. He had arrived.

He made his way to the middle of the circle, the long flank of his side in full view, but she found she couldn’t pull back the bow and release. She wondered what good would come from the arrow hurtling through air, landing in hot flesh. A single kill among hundreds would do nothing for burgeoning carrots and potatoes.

In that moment, from high in the tree above, the hawk dove. She let out a cry that felt both like herself and a blurring of brown and white, and she thought for a moment the bird struck the ground. And then, flying up and out, beyond her reach, was the rabbit with the streak across its back, the battle-worn ear. It struggled in the grasp of claws, but she could see the fight draining already. 

Just as quickly, they were both gone, and she was in the clearing with the other rabbits who continued to eat as if she was one of them. She couldn’t find her bow in the shadows. The mist thickened, the day cooling, oppressive against her eyes. Her jean shorts were torn from splintered wood, and she longed for the bitter taste of dandelion on her tongue.