20 Weird Love Stories

The Cactus Critter-2

As I watched, they seemed to settle down some. They gathered into a bunch, all of them huddled together in the center of the stall.

I left them there and went into the house.

Lynn already had a pot of water going on the stove and had chunks of the dead ellie’s carcass cooking.

The meat was gold in color.

She held up a wooden spoon with some golden broth puddling in the center of it. I took the spoon into my mouth and—

—just about felt like heaven had decided to drape itself around me.

Never tasted anything like it, ever. It was sweet like apples, but there was a hint of earthiness to it, too. I tasted something close to sage and rosemary, but not quite. There was also a suggestion of vanilla there and to top it all off, a bit of spiciness, like it had been dragged through a field of hot peppers and soaked up that flavor.

It was all so subtle it was almost unnerving. I felt my whole body going electric, as though I was going to turn inside out.

“That is something,” I said.

Lynn nodded. “Yup. I think we got a gold mine on our hands.”

The next day we sold off all our cattle and got into the business of raising ellies.

We soon figured out we made the right decision. Ellies bred like crazy. They tasted good. Their meat kept. It was an easy call.

We made some contacts with businessmen from the east, and established markets for ellie meat.

The rest was just dogged work, expanding the business, building up our herd, and keeping to ourselves, like good westerners.

But now it looked like the feds were after us. Just go and try to make a success of yourself. See what happens then.

“Mary,” called Lynn. “You die in there?”

“Coming,” I said and left the bathroom and my trip down memory lane and came out.

“Well,” she said. “Don’t you look all purty and everything when you take a mind to it.”

“I do,” I said.

Our crew was already at the table. Ned and Horace on one side. Heather, who took care of the horses, on the other. She sat next to Mike, who more or less took care of the money aspects of our operation.

Lynn was at one end of the table. I sat across from her at the other.

A couple of roast chickens rested in the middle of the table. Platters of potatoes, vegetables, and greens surrounded it. No ellie meat, though. You don’t eat into your own profit.

“Who wants to say grace?” asked Heather.

“You’re not religious,” I said to her.

She shrugged. “I don’t think anyone here is religious, much, but that’s what we do, isn’t it?”

Mike nodded. “I’ll say it,” he said.

“Go ahead,” said Lynn.

“To whom it may concern,” he said. “Thanks for the food.”

Everyone laughed.

“That’s the best prayer ever,” said Heather.

Ned and Horace grinned, like they had never heard it before.

We all dug in. I loaded up my plate, taking more than my fair share, but I had been the one who tired myself out today. I deserved it. If anyone noticed, no one said anything.

We all ate in silence for a while. Cutlery clicking against plates. Chewing noises. I drank some beer that Lynn had thoughtfully set out for me.

“This is good,” I said.

“Thank you,” said Lynn.

Murmurs of assent from everyone at the table.

More silence.

A lot of silence. The western way. If no one wanted to talk about anything, that meant there was something that had to be talked about.

“What the hell is going on?” I asked.

They all looked at me.

“No one’s saying anything. It’s like we’re all at a funeral. Someone die I don’t know about?”

“Everyone’s afraid we’re going to lose the business,” said Lynn.

“We aren’t going to lose the business.”

“That’s not what the sheriff said,” said Mike.

“To hell with the sheriff,” I said.

“Not that simple,” said Mike.

“He told us the federal government doesn’t like our operation,” said Lynn. “It’s illegal.”

“How did it turn illegal all of a sudden?”

“There’s this creature. In Washington DC. Strange creature.”

“You talking about some congressman?”

My question didn’t get a laugh. Which worried me.

“No,” said Lynn. “Creatures. Green and skinny and with these long faces.”

“Now you’re just pulling my leg,” I said.

“Nope,” said Mike. He tossed me a magazine. Harper’s Weekly. Issue of February 22, 1868.

“What the hell is this?” I said.

“Look at page seven.”

I turned to the page. There I found a drawing of, well, an alien, I guess. The caption indicated the creature came in a space ship. What the hell was a space ship? And it went directly to the white house where it talked to president Grant. It told the commander in chief that it didn’t want to meddle with earthly matters, but that it had somehow lost its collection of pets and thought maybe they had ended up on earth.

“What in the eternal damnation?” I asked the air.

“Keep reading,” said Heather.

I did. The article went on to say that the creature was looking for five small animals. They had six legs each, a long snout, and liked to turn different colors when they were excited.

I dropped the magazine and I must have gone white because Lynn asked me if I should drink some more water.

“I don’t believe this,” I said. “Must be some kind of joke.”

“No joke,” said Heather.

Ned and Horace both shook their head. “No joke,” they said in unison.

“The sheriff brought this over,” said Mike.

“We’ve been breeding and slaughtering pets,” said Lynn. “And the law of the universe just caught up with us.”

The rest of the meal went by quickly. I had lost my appetite. I had half a mind to round up the entire herd and slaughter them right there on the spot and have a good old fashioned party. Invite the whole county. Invite all of Bisbee. It’d be a celebration for the ages.

But the other half of me knew that was not the answer here.

After everyone left to go back to their evening chores I asked Lynn what we should do.

“Can’t fight the law,” she said.

“Oh come on,” I said. “If we listened to the law, we’d never have gotten together. We’d have stayed scared of each other in Chicago. We’d have been lynched. Or worse. We came out here to escape the law.”

“This is different,” she said. “In Chicago we had to worry about townsfolk. Here it’s the government of the United States.”

“Dammit,” I said. “If we had statehood, we could do something. We could buy our own congresscritter.”

“Stop dreaming,” said Lynn.

“We’re not the only ellie ranch,” I said. “They going to shut them all down?” Once we got our herd going, we sold off some heads to other ranchers in the area. They saw the potential market just as well as we did, and they were willing to pay our asking price, which was pretty high.

“If that alien thing finds out what we’re doing here it could be intergalactic war.”

I stared at her like she was crazy.

She hesitated. “Whatever that is,” she said. “The sheriff mentioned it.”

“I’ll tell you what it is,” I said, “it’s some pretty weak excuse for governing, that’s what. People should be allowed to do what they want to do. We should be allowed to make a living.”

“Mary,” she said, “you’re preaching to the choir, but we can’t just ignore this thing. We have to do something.”

I didn’t disagree with her. The only thing is, neither of us knew exactly what to do.

That night, with Mary and me lying in bed, both of us feeling like our lives were going to change for the worse, sleep eluded us for a time.

“You ever think about what’s out there?” asked Lynn.

“Out where?”

“You know,” she said, waving her hand at the ceiling. “There. In the sky. The stars. The planets.”

“Who cares?” I asked. “We got our own problems right here.”

“I just wonder sometimes,” she said. “The sky. It’s so big. Maybe there’s people out there. People like us.”

“Maybe,” I said. “And maybe those people like us are herded up into corrals and raised and slaughtered just like we do with the ellies.”

Lynn made a noise, then shoved me. “You have a knack for exalted thought,” she said.

“That’s why you love me,” I said.

“Who says I love you?”

“You did. When I came home today.”

“That was just to massage your ego,” she said.

“It worked! My ego is relaxed and ready to go to work.”

She shoved me hard enough that I thought I was going to fall off the bed.

“Ah, Lynn,” I said. “The way I see it, the universe or God, if there is such a gal, she gave us a gift. We have a pretty good life here.”

“We work like dogs,” she said.

“Well what else would we be doing? Work is not so bad.”

“Ever think about taking a cruise?”

“When we retire.”

“Our retirement might be coming a lot sooner than you think.”

She had a point. “We’re going to fight this,” I said. “We have to.”

“We’re going to lose,” said Lynn. “And you know it as well as I do.”

The next morning was bright and sunny. Surprise! We were in the Sonoran dessert. Every morning is bright and sunny.

Lynn was already up. Probably getting some breakfast ready for us and the crew.

I got out of bed and dressed quickly. I went through the kitchen, gave Lynn a peck on the cheek—she responded with a sarcastic “Oh my.” and a fluttery wave of her hand in front of her nose as she stood over a pan of bacon and eggs—and went out to the corral.

Which was empty.

I stood in the still air for a few seconds. The last wisps of coolness were just leaving. They would soon be replaced by the stifling heat of the day.

There were no ellies in the corral. I saw the gate hanging open. Ellie tracks—hundreds of them—indicated they were going south.

I trudged across to the bunkhouse, where my ranch hands all spent the night. Or so I had thought.

Empty as well.

I was putting one and one together and I didn’t like the two that came up.

I went back to the house.

“Our crew stole our herd and ran off,” I said.

Lynn dropped her wooden spoon and looked at me.

“Where’d they go?”

“Couldn’t have gotten far,” I said. “Not with 200 head of ellie.”

“Why didn’t we hear anything?”

“Ellie are quiet.”

Lynn shook her head. “Never should have hired a single one of those hands.”

“You got that right,” I said.

“We going to go after them?”

“Damn right,” I said.

We went to the horse stalls and got another surprise. None of our horses were there.

Now I was mad. I threw my hat on the ground and lifted my head high and cursed at the sky. I even cursed the stars, none of which were visible.

“They thought of everything,” said Lynn. “Now we can’t follow them. How far to the next ranch?”

“Olson’s place is three miles away.”

“You ready for a walk?”

“What’s Olson going to do for us?”

“We could borrow two of his horses,” I said.

“I’ll get some food to take.”

“I’ll come help,” I said.

We began walking back to the house when a motion on the horizon caught our eye. A lone horse approached. It was not a horse either of us recognized.

“I’ll go grab the shotgun,” said Lynn.

“Get mine, too,” I said.