Peter Becnel

Neon Lights the Butcher's Blade

A large wood-saw swung from Jimmy's belt as he rifled through the forest for his ideal Osage orange branch. Four hours passed and he found only Osage trees with wind-twisted limbs, warped erratic coils formed from years of conflicting invisible pressures. With the morning sun still near the treetops, Jimmy spotted a textured green ball hanging from a perfectly straight branch high above his head. He traced the branch to a fork on the squat trunk of an Osage tree; and despite his fear of heights, boosted himself and climbed through the tree's thorny branches. Awkwardly balanced on an accessible branch, he sawed, swaying side to side, determined to harvest the iron-hard wood.

When the branch finished curing, nearly one year after he sawed it from the tree, Jimmy started working on his hunting bow. He cut the Osage branch into a six foot stave, and with an artists' attention to form and figure, meticulously penciled the shape of a longbow on its broad side. He chopped at the form with a hatchet, guided by the pencil markings, and a gnarled and inexact bow emerged from the grain. Jimmy grabbed his draw knife by its short, wooden handles and pared the bow-back until the wood spoke; a sign he had hit the first growth ring. He fitted the rough bow handle into the V-shaped notch at the top of a tillering stick, mounted the assembly on a scale, and drew the bow to twelve inches. The left limb bent in a great arch threatening to snap, but the right limb hardly budged. He cut away the belly of the right limb, carefully shaving away wood and testing the bend. The small workshop was hot and Jimmy's forehead perspired heavy drops as he tillered his bow to sixty pounds at twenty-nine inches; he knew that even the slightest inconsistency would cause the wood to break. The bow held with a perfect bend, the pale orange limbs perfectly synchronized.

Jimmy left to hunt under the cover of the early morning darkness. Wearing camouflage, he was nearly imperceptible among the creeping shadows. The wind conducted a percussive tune played by an orchestra of rattling leaves and branches. A set of tracks marked deep in the soft dirt caught Jimmy's attention, and he crouched to study them more closely. The big hoof-marks headed down a faint side path; he followed them and came to a large clearing encircled by a ring of heavy thicket. Jimmy crouched in the thicket and watched the sun move through the sky. No wind blew across the clearing, but Jimmy noticed rustling in the thicket on the other side. His muscles tightened as he silently drew an arrow, the metal arrowhead exploding orange light the sun. A grunt resounded from the bushes, followed by the clash of wood and bone. Bent at the waist, Jimmy inched around the thicket for a clear vantage point. Through the heavy brush he saw the flash of a white tail. A large buck rubbed its antlers against the trunk of a tree, shredding bark like paper.

Jimmy rose to a three quarters crouch and stepped forward as quietly as he could, but something alerted the buck and it threw its head back and sniffed the air. The deer stood statuesque for a moment, its eyes ignited with fire and its sculpted bone rack twisted menacingly toward the sky. Jimmy didn't breath, he slowly drew the bow with the arrow pinched tightly between his index finger and thumb. The buck turned in a flash, bowing its head away from Jimmy in flight; but swung around and charged, its needle-sharp battering ram aimed at Jimmy's chest. Jimmy thought only of drawing his arrow to twenty nine inches, any less and the shot would not have enough force to kill.

The arrow audibly tore the air and found the charging buck behind the shoulder. The deer threw its great bone antlers over its body and continued its charge, but the arrow's deadly tip found its mark and the buck's legs faltered. The buck's powerful antlers slammed into the ground, and the clearing exploded with dirt, the animal's body sliding with momentum. The forest froze, even the wind remained momentarily calm. The buck heaved and pink froth bubbled around the arrow's shaft; but as the buck lost blood its breaths became short and shallow, and the panic and fury faded from its eyes. Jimmy approached the buck lying lifeless in the clearing fifteen yards away. He dropped to his knees, placed his weapon on the ground near the buck's antlers, and touched the fallen deer's neck with his palm. He stroked the animal's coarse hair gently with one hand; with the other he drew his razor sharp skinning knife.

* * * * * * * * * *

The laws of nature do not apply to the Millenial Market; the temperature is carefully controlled depending on supermarket zoning, the fruits and vegetables are always in season and an impossible number of animal pieces move through the butcher shop every hour. Beneath the humming white fluorescent lights, an old man with a boy's name chops meat with disdain. Jimmy stocks the meat counter, cutting the animal pieces to pieces, and placing the animal fragments on white Styrofoam trays; creating the ambiance that the cuts of violent red were never part of living creatures. Jimmy sees a man's legs approach him, and he looks up as Adam places a plastic Millenial Market bag, labeled Jimmy, on the counter.

“You bagged one,” Jimmy says, opening the bag to look at the contents. Adam smiles, seeing the eagerness in the old butcher's gestures, “Real pretty doe, I hit her with a clean shot in the bread basket and I still had to track her a few hundred yards, quite a fighter,” he says. Jimmy unpacks the plastic Milllenial Market bag, carefully removing three links of sausage, a large piece of back strap, a and a few venison steaks and placing the items carefully on the meat counter. “My God this meat is beautiful, I don't remember the last time I ate meat. Adam, thank you so much,” Jimmy says, and grabs one of the big sausages and holds it close to his face for inspection. “Not a problem man, she had plenty of meat on her, and I never could bring myself to waste it anyway.”

Adam leans heavily on the glass meat counter, and looks at the various cuts of meat on the display shelves. “Why won't you eat any of this meat, Jimmy?” he asks, pointing to Jimmy's morning work, “I mean that rib eye looks pretty appetizing to me.” Jimmy looks up from the sausages, “I just don't think it's right” he says, and slaps one of the big venison steaks near the rib eye for comparison, “look at this venison, you can tell this animal lived out in the wild working for its food every day. This deer wasn't force-fed corn on a stamp-sized plot, this animal ran and jumped,” he shrugs his shoulders and returns to inspecting the venison. “That doesn't make any sense, you're against eating the meat, but you're not against chopping it up? Everybody thinks you're vegan, hell, I thought you were vegan till you asked me for this venison” he says. Jimmy places the venison back into the plastic Millenial Market bag, ties the handles into a knot, then puts the bag on a table at the back of the butcher shop.“That is just a misconception. I don't eat animal products from the grocery store because I don't agree with the way that these animals are forced to live, I have no objections to cutting them up after they die” he says.

Adam opens his mouth to respond, but Joe Glasscock's nasal voice booms over the store intercom and interrupts him, “Millenial Market employees, we will be opening up the store in exactly five minutes. I expect that all of you will be at your stations,” the harsh crackle of the phone returning to its cradle ends the announcement. Jimmy places a large piece of meat onto the chopping block and delicately slices a steak; he looks over his shoulder, “Adam thanks again, but I gotta finish up getting ready for the morning rush, we can talk about this later is you'd like.” “It's alright Jimmy, I was just curious. Enjoy that venison, I promise that doe was living good until I put a bullet in her” Adam says, and walks toward the warehouse at the back of the store.

The Millenial Market fills with groups of customers who travel like fish in family-separated schools. Most of the shoppers are dressed in collared shirts, khaki pants, and brightly colored Sunday dresses. They swim around the store, magnetized to their personal shopping carts, discussing the food they want to buy, or the morning sermon they heard at church. Adam restocks the shelves, filling the depleted spaces with products; a cornucopia of artificial flavors and colors, a collage of packaging, each product specifically designed to draw the customer's particular attention. An old woman with blue hair approaches Adam bewildered “excuse me young man”, she says, “I'm having a heck of a time finding the butcher shop here, could you point me in the right direction?” He points in the down an aisle leading the opposite direction, “just continue over this way and you'll run into it.”

By ten o'clock store swarms with customers, but none of them visit the butcher shop. Jimmy leans against the meat counter and looks up at the massive neon sign. The sign normally glows laser red, charged with electricity and humming with excited gas; today the portly tube-butcher and cow are hardly discernible. Jimmy walks to a telephone mounted on the wall, picks it up and presses a button, “Mr. Glasscock, could you please come to the butcher shop—Mr. Glasscock, please come to the butcher shop” Jimmy's voice booms over the loudspeaker.

Jimmy rearranges cuts of meat in the display case, and he does not see the wiry little man approach. Mr. Glasscock rings the bell on the counter several times, and Jimmy stands,“Mr. Glasscock I-”but Mr. Glasscock interrupts, “Jimmy this better be good, it's Sunday, and I'm very busy, now what's the problem?” he asks. Jimmy points the the colorless sign above his head, “I haven't been getting very much business back here, I think it might be because the sign's out.” Mr. Glasscock follows Jimmy's finger to the sign. His face breaks in disbelief, “this is a travesty” he says, “I had those bastards out here to fix that damn thing last month.” Mr. Glasscock runs his fingers through his oily hair and pounds his fist on the glass meat display case. Mr. Glasscock walks briskly to the telephone mounted on the wall, “Adam please come to the butcher shop—Adam please come to the butcher shop immediately.”

The store reaches its peak business hours, and the customers fill the aisles. Adam stops several times to help customers on his way to the butcher shop;he finds Mr. Glasscock in a frenzy, frantically trying to direct all of the nearby customers to various parts of the store. “Go to the warehouse and get the big thirty two foot ladder and the fifty foot extension cord, and hurry,” Mr. Glasscock shouts, his hands cupped around his mouth. Adam navigates the crowded aisles carefully, carrying a yellow thirty two foot fiberglass ladder, and a bundle of orange extension cord. He props the ladder against the front of the butcher shop, and turns to Mr. Glasscock, “what's going on?” he asks, placing the extension cord on the meat counter. Joe Glasscock ignores Adam and instead turns to a nearby customer, “good morning sir, are you finding everything okay” he asks, the customer replies, “doing fine.” Out of earshot of the customer Mr. Glasscock turns to Adam, “this damn sign has gone out again, that's what's going on, now make a goddamn lap of the sales floor,” he says, then turns to Jimmy, pointing “you, you get your ass up there and fix that sign” he says, then grabs the ladder and props it up next to the gray, lifeless characters.

Jimmy looks at the ladder, and follows the fiberglass frame high up to the sign hanging above the meat counter. “I can't,” he says, and returns to chopping meat. “Get your ass up there, and don't tell me 'you can't' again” Mr. Glasscock shouts, and a nearby customer drops a package of cheese. “Look Mr. Glasscock, I am afraid of heights, and I don't know how to work that sign anyway”, he holds his hands palms up and shrugs his shoulders. “Afraid of heights, did you hear that? Afraid of heights, climb up the fucking ladder! I don't have time for your shit,” Mr. Glasscock grabs the extension cord and tears into the butcher shop, searching the walls for an outlet. He finds one beneath a table at the back, and drops to his hands and knees to plug in the extension cord. The squat pine table has a large ledge which extend well past its legs. Misjudging his ascent, Mr. Glasscock smashes the back of his head into the lip of the table, knocking the plastic bag full of venison onto the floor.

Mr. Glasscock grabs the back of his head in pain, then stoops and picks up the bag and places it on the table. He rifles through its contents with wild eyes, “what the fuck is this?” he asks himself. He turns the bag over and sees Jimmy written on the side. “That bastard,” he mutters in disbelief, and dashes over to the phone, “Adam please come to the butcher shop—Adam please come to the butcher shop immediately.” Mr. Glasscock slams the phone back onto the cradle and storms over to the meat display case. Jimmy reaches into the case as he helps a customer select cuts, “Would you like anything else Mrs.--” Mr Glasscock throws the bag of venison on the display case between Jimmy and the customer. “What the fuck is this? Vegan! Vegan my ass! You're fired asshole! Imagine anyone with the audacity to steal so openly!” he screams, heavy beads of sweat appearing on his forehead. “My word! I will not shop in a store where the staff behave themselves like animals!” the customer shouts, and marches away across the waxed tile floor.

Jimmy stands flabbergasted, but he looks at the bag on the counter and understands, “Mr. Glasscock I am not a vegan, and I am not stealing from-” Mr. Glasscock puts his hand up to stop him, regaining his composure, he says, “you're fired, get your things and get out, no excuses.” Resigned, Jimmy realizes the futility of argument, and he leaves the butcher shop and heads towards the employee break room. Adam arrives at the butcher shop and finds Mr. Glasscock standing behind the butcher's counter helping customers. “Adam, you are going to have to connect that sign, I had to let Jimmy go.” Adam can't imagine Mr. Glasscock firing Jimmy over something as trivial as his fear of heights, “this isn't about the sign is it?” he asks. “No Adam, Jimmy was stealing from the store, I had to let him go, now climb up that ladder and connect that sign” he said trying visibly to maintain his composure.

Adam intends to fix the neon sign, but customers are everywhere, and they continually ask him for help, “Excuse me sir, the soda!” “Do you work here?” “Which way are the registers? I am looking for the registers! How am I supposed to pay if I can't find the checkout!” Adam conducts customers to the customer service desk directly, explaining politely, “I really need to get this sign running.” He climbs the fiberglass ladder with the extension cord coiled around his arm. Mr. Glasscock instructs him to “plug the damn thing in and wrap the extra cord around the sign.” Adam feels the back of the sign until he finds the transformer, then unplugs the cord leading to the old outlet, and plugs in the new extension cord. The sign illuminates immediately, the butcher and the cow once again distinguishable.

The sign burns red and hot inches from his face, and Adam has difficulty avoiding the scorching tubes as he wraps the cord around its base. Every pass around the back of the glowing sign reduces the coiled orange wire on the ladder just below his feet. The customers at the butcher shop lull, and Mr. Glasscock stands at the base of the ladder. “Looking good Adam, hurry up, up there so you can help me chop some meat” he says holding the ladder near the floor. The fiberglass ladder bends slightly under his weight as he shits positions, and Adam feels uncomfortable talking to Mr. Glasscock perched twenty five feet above his head. For a moment he feels vertigo, unstable and vulnerable, so high above the butcher's counter.

He forgets his discomfort, distracted by Jimmy's voice over the intercom, “Attention Millenial Market customers,” he says, and Adam scans the store looking for him, high over the top of the shelves of goods. Adam sees Jimmy, standing at the customer service desk, the bag of venison tucked neatly under his arm. “In thanks for your loyalty to the Millenial Market, owner Joe Glasscock will provide every customer in the store with one free filet mignon! Just proceed to the butcher shop in the rear of the store, and your free steak will be provided for you,” Jimmy slams the phone on the cradle and calmly leaves the store the automatic sliding doors.

Stunned atop the ladder, Adam hears the beating of feet charging from the sales floor towards the butcher shop. He looks down to the floor beneath the ladder, and sees a sea of pastels and khakis; people packed so tightly around the front of the butcher shop that Adam can't descend the ladder. The people in the supermarket mob are smiling, and talking loudly to each other about the amazing give-away. “I have never had a filet mignon, I can't wait to cook one in my own kitchen” says a gray haired woman. “What is filet mignon, some kind of lamb?” asks a large man with a thick head of curly brown hair, “No man it's a type of pork” a little man with beady eyes responds.

Joe Glasscock's terrified eyes scan the moving crowd; people bounce off of each other like excited electrons in a glass tube. He counts the three filet mignons in the display case and retreats to the freezer to count the back-stocked beef. The visible air in the freezer swirls around his warm body, and packages of meat are scattered at random among the metal shelves, anonymous animal parts wrapped in white butcher paper; a mass of frozen animal flesh hangs from a hook at the rear of the room. Joe Glasscock breathes warm air into his freezing hands, and rifles through the various cuts of meat. None of the pieces have labels. He tears away the butcher paper on a filet-sized mass and examines it; he doesn't know what he's looking at. All the cuts look the same and he has no system for identifying or producing the meat. “This place could be full of filet mignon and I wouldn't know it,” he says, spinning around, “even if I did know what the hell I was looking at, I wouldn't give it to those undeserving bastards. I can't let him get away with this, I won't give in.”

Mr. Glasscock returns to the butcher's counter and reexamines the situation; the crowd has grown excited, and they frantically search the meat display case “I don't see enough filets—are any of these pork—why haven't we gotten anything yet—oh look there's the butcher—SIR I HAVEN'T GOTTEN A FILET YET—where is the restroom?” Joe Glasscock distributes the three filet mignons from the meat display case, and then raises his hands above his head. “Can I have your attention please,” he shouts, but the customers don't hear him. “She wasn't before me—where are the other filets—are any of these pork—get out of my way little man.” Joe Glasscock picks up the telephone and shouts into the intercom, “quiet please, everyone, quiet, I have an announcement to make. I am not the butcher—” the crowd thunders a roar of disbelief, “I am trying to tell you that the man who promised to give all of you a free filet mignon, is a disgruntled former employee. We simply don't have any more filet mignon, I have given away all that we had. Please return to your shopping, thank you for being so understanding.”

“Who the fuck are you?” the big curly headed man shouts. “I am Joe Glasscock; I own the Millenial Market, and I am telling you that no more meat will be given away today.” The crowd roars objections, “We were promised filet mignon—I don't care what he says—Where is my daughter, Annie, Annie where are you—Hey butcher, where is the restroom—Get the fuck off my foot!! You are standing on my foot—Don't shove me—don't shove me—YOU promised us filet mignon.” High above the crowd Adam shouts down, “ Let me down, please, I'm really nervous up here, please clear a path for me”, but the crowd doesn't respond.

The big curly-haired man rushes the butcher shop, jumping over the glass counter, and shoves Joe Glasscock hard to the ground, “come and get it” he shouts, and hands out random cuts of meat to the mob, throwing masses of red flesh to their greedy hands. Adam looks over his shoulder, and sees Millenial Market employees fleeing the store through the sliding doors. The mob pushes toward the glass counter, and the shoving knocks the ladder hard; the fiberglass legs groan sideways across the tile floor. Adam feels the ladder budge, and he descends the rungs as quickly as he can. He takes a single step and the ladder gives; for a moment he feels weightless, and accepts that he is falling to his death. Adam opens his eyes and sees the mob still far below him; disoriented from the fall, he doesn't know how he survives. He feels pressure wrapped around his ankle, looks up, and sees the electrical cord ensnaring his leg; he follows the taught orange cord back to the base of the neon sign. Adam shouts down to the crowd for help, “Help me, I don't want to die, I am right here, use the ladder, please help me, someone cut me down!” Ensnared themselves, the members of the mob never look up.

The police, ambulance and fire department arrive minutes after the last of the looters flee from the ravaged supermarket. The firemen right the fallen ladder, and cut Adam from the cord tethering him to the neon sign, while the Emergency Medical Technicians revive Joe Glasscock. The police and firemen hardly believe the condition of the store, “you guys say all this was over a couple of free steaks?” they ask. The two men sit on the bumper of an ambulance, while the EMTs check their vital signs. “How the hell did it get like that?” Mr. Glasscock asks, “what's wrong with those people?” Adam peers through the automatic sliding glass doors. The inside of the store looks like a war zone, through the glass doors he can see canned goods, vegetables and fruits strewn about the floor, the registers knocked over, their drawers pried open, and a jar of spaghetti sauce smashed on the white tile. Adam remembers the feeling of hanging upside down by his ankle, dangling helpless from a thin cord. “I guess they just felt entitled to it. Mr. Glasscock, I quit, and I'm never eating that damn supermarket meat again.”