Pour by Daniel Verret

Q stepped out of his car and closed the door as a rush of heat filled his lungs. The noxious smell of petroleum dizzied his head. Q listened for oncoming traffic as he passed by a long row of nested shopping carts being tethered together. A simple palette: blue, yellow, red, black, and white painted aluminum occupied most of the lot – a prismatic mirage of safe shifts in tone. It’s a short walk, followed by a curtain of air, an immediate drop in temperature, and a period of waiting.

Upon seeing Q, the clerk gestured for him to come forward, “Right here. How can I help you?”

Q took a couple of steps before responding. “Afternoon. Just returning this. It…uh…”

“Is there a problem? What’s the issue?” the clerk asked.

Quite a few people were milling about the store comparing nutrition labels and smelling gray meat. Q gathered himself. “Yes, there aren’t any raisins.”

The clerk strained his eyes in the direction of the box Q had set on the service counter.

The clerk looked up at Q, then once more at the outside of the box. “EXTRA!”. The text and an image of spilled raisins [enlarged to show texture] appeared side-by-side. The clerk opened the box, removed the plastic liner filled with cereal, tilted his head and thoroughly inspected it, marked sweating on the tip of his nose.

Q could barely make out the small print on the clerk’s name tag.

JAMES

“Well…”, his tone flat. “Not a single one.”

“Hey, Emma! Have you ever seen this before?” He was still holding the liner up in the air.

Emma turned to face them but stopped short. Her eyes widened. A small portion of the carpet mat placed at the entrance of the store had gotten pinched by the automatic doors. A hurried man had caught his foot on the lip. He twisted, extended, and braced; all a moment too late. He collided, face first, with a small bakery display showcasing fresh baked goods and pastries in pristine, crystalline packaging: “CAKES, COOKIES, TARTS AND MORE!” The man’s body came to rest just short of a fully stocked end cap. A limp figure. Motionless.

James dropped the plastic liner – cereal spread across the floor.

Q looked down. All he could see was dirt.

§

Q is thinking of his father, Raymond; tall, with hard lumps under his skin. Raymond had inherited farmland in Oklahoma when Q was a child.

Producers use a variety of techniques to raise their animals for varied purposes: meat, eggs, milk, fur, leather, wool, and etc. Raymond had his own way of doing things. He was always astonished by how much the animals could eat.

Most of what Raymond taught Q came later. Toward the end. Raymond’s final lesson: How to Make a Perfect Circle.

Whenever Raymond had a sick animal, the first thing he would do was take it out onto the field. He’d bring a bucket of water, a chain (fifteen to twenty-five feet long), two locks, and a steel pole. He would bury the pole about halfway down and then chain the animal to it – the animal was free to roam roughly twenty feet from the pole in every direction. Lastly, Raymond would place the bucket of water just in reach. He’d refill it from time to time.

In a matter of days, the animal would have made a perfect circle in the weeds. With no food, the weeds chewed down to nubs, the animal would then return to the bucket of water to finish what, if anything, was left.

Each animal would be incorporated into the composting process within twenty-four hours of death.

“We’d sit there, in the dust, and weep”, Q once said.

§

“Is he alright?” Emma screamed from behind the service counter.

The man who’d tripped now sat with one leg crossed, his trunk flexed. A small crowd formed. Blood was rushing down the man’s chin, neck and arm. His lips were split. His teeth exposed. An artery alongside his nose throbbed. Q took off his sweatshirt and knelt down beside him. “Press this against your mouth.” Q handed it to him and fell silent. He’d mistakenly placed his hand in a small pool of the man’s blood, and its warmth startled him. He stared down at the fluid surrounding his outstretched fingers, as though being held. It reminded Q of when he was a boy planting wildflower seed. Compressing the soil. The earth, it felt like fire in the cold air.

Daniel Verret is from Southern California. He received his BFA from Otis College of Art and Design, where he studied sculpture/new genres. His work is featured in Entropy. Currently, he is a Physical Therapy student in Central Florida.