Excerpt: Three Kisses and a Can of Dog Food

“Feed him,” the man said, thrusting the branch into Noah's hands. “He hasn't been fed in a while.”

Noah crossed his arms and shook his head. “No way in Hell am I getting any closer to that bear, thank you very much.” He drew himself up to his full height of five feet, four inches, about tall enough to look this man directly above the belly button. His mom had made sure to measure both her boys on a regular basis, no matter what hardships they suffered, and he was proud to know his exact height. This man's exact height he couldn't calculate, but it was clearly over six and a half feet, huge and bulky with hands big enough to crush Noah. The light, coming from behind as it did, put the man mostly in sillhouette, but what little Noah could see of his face made him look like an aging man just a bit younger than Noah's dad had been, the lines in his face few, but deeply etched. His shorn black hair was turning gray around his ears, and his nose was flat and crooked, clearly the result of a lifetime of fighting. Noah really wasn't scared of this man right at that moment, though he knew he ought to be—the great hulking bear behind him, rustling around impatiently, was absorbing all his energy, and a man just wasn't that much of a threat in comparison.

“Call me Mr. Ian Woon,” the man said. “If you want to join me, you will have to feed the bear.”

Noah wondered what that meant, exactly. He glanced at his hands, and at the stick, and finally choked out, “I need antibiotics.” That was all he really cared about right then, and if he had to feed the bear a stick of berries, well, that wouldn't be so bad. He just hoped his hands wouldn't go in with the deal.

Mr. Ian Woon smirked. The wrinkles on one side of his face deepened, the back lighting making them look like chasms in his face. Noah was pretty sure Mr. Ian Woon was really a monster, a devil, and did this for fun. “We can get you that. But we don't give things to tresspassers.” Here he shoved the branch at Noah, stabbing him in the stomach with the rough twigs. Behind him, the curtains parted, and a woman whose red hair came poking out of every little crack between folds of her scarf came in, an assault rifle in her hands. Her eyes were like crosshairs, and he knew that she would not need to take any time to shoot straight into his heart. “Actually,” Mr. Ian Woon comtinued. “We don't like trespassers very much at all. Feed the bear.” Now there was something worse to fear, and Noah didn't know what to do. Panicking, he stared at the woman. He shouldn't have come here, but he needed antibiotics, and there was no way he could get anything off the speeding trains by himself. Mikey's bite was festering. He couldn't wait, couldn't watch the thick green lines of poisoned blood slink up under Mikey's pant leg, up his thigh and down to where it wasn't visible, snaking into his heart. He couldn't live without his brother, and couldn't watch septicemia kill him. There was no choice. He took the branch out of Mr. Ian Woon's hand and turned around.

A shot rang out and echoed in the tiny space, hurting Noah's ears so much he thought for a moment that they had both been hit, but then he saw two things: First, that the bear's hump of muscle was bleeding, and second, that the front of the cage was lifting. The scream of rusted metal seemed to physically hurt his body, because it came with images of his own muscles and skin rotting between the bear's teeth. With a string of violent curses he didn't even know he knew, he spun on one foot, tripping over himself so hard his ankle felt broken but he didn't care; he bolted anyway. The snow slowed him. He knew it was going to be like this, knew it as soon as Mr. Ian Woon, the black hearted son of a bitch, had said feed the bear, but really, what was he supposed to do? They had terrified him on purpose, and he hadn't been able to plan. Running blind, tears streaming into his furred collar, he didn't care what direction he went, as long as it was away away away from the ursa arctos horribilis, most fearsome when female and separated from her cubs, able to climb and swim quite well, excelent predators who couldn't be distracted. He hated these facts that kept streaming through his mind—hunted as prizes, close to endagered—but couldn't stop them; it was like they were coming from some other source, a loudspeaker blasting them directly into his brain in the voice of a gentle documentary narrator, with a face so twisted and evil he couldn't look at it.

He crashed into a truck. The bear was still coming, running at him, and he screamed—it was so big, fat and muscle shaking all over its body, and he scrambled to his feet and ran inside the truck, knowing it provided no protection. There were card games and several lit cigarettes on a table in the truck, rifles and shotguns and a pistol lying haphazardly as if dropped in a hasty retreat, and though thick sternum and forehead, shot seven times and still attacked the hunter was screaming in his head, he picked up the shotgun and pulled the trigger. It hit the bear, miraculously, since he had shot blindly through the wall of the truck, but it certainly hadn't stopped moving. It instead was now charging through the curtain, and Noah screamed, shooting with his eyes closed. The gun ran out of ammo in two shots and he grabbed another, an assault rifle of unknown model, and started shooting. Hot blood spattered on his face and it felt like saliva; screaming, and still shooting, and backpedaled until he hit a wall and collapsed, dropping the gun and the berries he still carried, waiting to be eaten.

A human hand touched his shoulder and he screamed again, blind with fear now, and threw his fist out as hard as he could. That the hand had been human registered in his mind and came with the irrational fear that he had lost, that he wouldn't be given another chance, and he screambled to his feet. “I need this!” he yelled, punching again, hitting only hard shoulder; his opponent had doubled over with a groan, putting his shoulder at convenient punching range. It hurt. Noah backed off a step, hyperventilating and rubbing his bruised knucles. “I need this.”

“Damn, kid,” Mr. Ian Woon wheezed. “You are a tough little bastard. You were already in, but you just had to go and hit me...” Behind Mr. Ian Woon, the bear lay dead, blood gushing from dozens of tiny holes in its neck and face. It smelled horrible. Then Noah realized what had hit him in the face, and why his mouth tasted so metallic, and fell to his hands and knees, weak and nauseated. “God,” he whispered, clutching his roiling stomach. “You people are evil.”