Page 1 of What Rough Beast

One

Ava

On my first day of work I have to shoot a raccoon in the face.

“You wanted this job,” my new boss, Widow Zedeker, reminds me. She’s sitting on top of an overturned bucket, paring down her nails with a pocketknife.

I did want this job. I also want things like world peace, an end to homelessness, and for women to be treated as something more than sperm drop-off locations. But . . . here we are. Maybe I should stop aiming so high.

My aim, it seems, is part of the problem.

“Between the eyes, and above the eyeline,” Widow says.

I was raised to look at someone when they are speaking to me, so I turn to face her, which is a really bad idea when you’re holding a loaded weapon. She dives to the side, her bucket going over.

“I’m not the one with distemper,” Widow says, coming to her feet and eyeing the trickle of blood flowing down her thumb from the accidental jab of the blade. “Point the gun at the coon.”

“Sorry,” I say, turning back to the raccoon.

“Stop apologizing,” Widow says.

Between us we’ve said about one hundred words since I showed up for work this morning at Restoration Acres, a wildlife refuge that sounds like a tent revival but pulls in a lot less money. Mostly it’s been me apologizing for something and her telling me to stop apologizing. We’ve got a lovely toxic cycle going already, and I haven’t even been here a full day.

I swing the muzzle back toward the raccoon. Its eyes follow the motion, then travel the length of the barrel to look up at me. A lady dropped it off this morning after she found it chasing butterflies on her front porch. She didn’t even have to cage it; it jumped out of the passenger seat of her S-10 and followed her to the main office like a puppy, reaching over to play with her shoelaces as she tearfully explained the situation to us.

“Distemper,” Widow said tonelessly, watching the animal.

“Could it be someone’s pet?” the lady asked. “Maybe it wandered away—”

“No,” my boss interrupted, not following up with an explanation or making any attempt at comfort. “Ava will take it out back and shoot it.”

“I’m sorry, what?” I said.

To which Widow told me to stop apologizing. The woman shoved a twenty-dollar bill into the donation jar on the front desk, then reached down to give the raccoon a pat on the head.

“No,” Widow said again, and the woman froze. The raccoon covered the distance, reaching up to curl its humanlike fingers around hers.

It does the same thing now, grabbing the barrel of the gun, then comically peering into it with one eye. Distemper does this, Widow explains to me. Takes away their fear, makes them bold.

Kind of like how I used to be.

I jerk the barrel of the gun away, but the raccoon’s grip is surprisingly strong.

“Now what?” I ask. “It’s got its hand—”

“Animals don’t have hands,” she interrupts me. “They don’t have fingers, either. They have front feet, back feet, and toes, but that’s it. Anything other than that, and you’re anthropomorphizing them. That means—”

“I know what anthropomorphize means.” It’s my turn to interrupt her. “It means I’m attributing human characteristics to animals.”

“Animals aren’t humans, but humans forget they’re animals,” Widow says. “It’s good to remember that.”

“You bake handmade biscuits for your dog,” I say. The backbone of obstinacy inside of me may be fractured but perhaps not entirely broken.

“That’s different,” she says, her hand falling on the head of her ancient dog—a mutt that won some sort of genetic lottery and ended up all white except for black rings around his eyes, along with black legs and ears. He is appropriately named Panda, and just like that particular species, seems to be on his way out. He’d been slowly ambling to the main office from the front porch when I arrived for work, and managed to get there about ten minutes later, even though they’re only a hundred yards apart.

“We can wait,” Widow says.

“For what?” I ask, readjusting my grip on the gun and focusing on the raccoon again.