Another Thanksgiving

Wild dogs barked somewhere outside. Maybe in the woods, perhaps over at the neighbors. Abigail twirled in front of her bedroom mirror wearing a frilly dress. Just once. At age twelve, the fun had gone out of it, dressing up and being fancy. Blue jeans were hidden beneath the ankle-length skirt because she longed to remain a tomboy, to get dirty rolling around in the grass outside. Not today, nor tomorrow. Abigail glanced at the metal cross-bars installed on her window. “So you won't fall out and hurt yourself,” her dad had told her. She didn’t believe him.

Abigail’s mother opened the door a crack. A gravy odor from the hallway seeped in. “You about ready for our special meal, sweetie pie?”

“I guess.” Abigail crinkled her nose. “Don’t call me sweetie pie anymore. That was for when I was a little girl.”

Her mother smiled. “Of course.” She stood still inside Abigail’s room, listening.

Noise came from downstairs, the raucous laughter and opinions of Uncle Harry and Uncle Fred—who wasn’t an uncle, more a cousin, but he thought uncle sounded more dignified or important.

“How long will it go on for?” Abigail asked her mother.

“A few hours at least.” She bent over. “Best behavior, okay? This is what our relatives look forward to. The family gathering.”

“Always the same. So boring.”

“Maybe you’ll see things differently when you’re older, pumpkin.”

“Don't call me . . .” Abigail stopped herself. “Will there be pumpkin pie?”

“No, but something good.”

Downstairs, Abigail’s father sat smiling, his gaunt face red from drinks. He elbowed Uncle Fred mid-story about a gambler and a friendly showgirl. “Save it for when we have a smoke after the meal, Freddie.” Her father had a tuft of brown hair atop a high forehead and long sideburns. He reminded Abigail of old images of Abraham Lincoln.

“There she is,” said Uncle Harry. “Miss America. How long’s it been?” His brow crinkled, and his mouth shifted, animating his furry red beard. “Don’t think I've seen you since last Thanksgiving.”

“Feels like yesterday.” Abigail sighed then stared at the ground.

“Shush now and give your uncle a hug,” her mom said.

Up close, Harry smelt of aftershave, of breakfast lingering in his beard, and from the pipe tobacco he favored. She pulled away.

“What about me?” Uncle Fred held his arms open. “You look pretty as a peach, Abby.”

“You're not really my uncle.” Abigail curtsied.

“Somebody woke up on the wrong side of the bed today.” Her father ruffled her hair.

“It's okay, Albert.” Fred ambled over to the counter bar to strengthen his drink with extra gin.

“Go easy there,” Aunt Iris said.

“Uh, you’re Harry’s wife, not mine.” Fred sneered, then whispered, “Thankfully.”

“Your wife Ellie might be alive if not for your drinking and carousing in Vegas.”

“That's not what killed Ellie.” Fred glowered. “And you all got a piece of . . . her inheritance.”

“Come on, you two.” Albert extended his hands, palms up. “It’s Thanksgiving. We’re happy to see each other.”

“Some of us are.” Fred grimaced and took a belt of his drink. “I just want to get back to work.”

“And you will.” Albert grinned. “Give it time. Patience is what’s needed now.” He coughed, then cleared his throat.

Abigail noticed the strained smile on Aunt Iris’s face. Each Thanksgiving seemed a little tenser, a bit more on edge. The adults gazed at her with expectation, as if she could say something funny or smart to make them laugh and get along for a change, to have some hope in their bitter worlds filled with arguments and festering resentments.

Her father tinkled a bell in the dining room; the family members slowly convened around the oval table and took their seats.

“Someone say a prayer,” Abigail’s mother said.

“I can,” Uncle Harry replied.

“You did last Thanksgiving.” Fred frowned.

“That was two times ago, but whatever.” Uncle Harry mopped sweat off his brow with the cloth napkin. “Our god has forsaken us, so who cares?”

“God doesn’t exist,” Fred said.

“Enough of that!” Abigail’s mother thumped a fist on the table top. “Just a simple benediction.”

“I’ve got this.” Aunt Iris raised her hand, beaming. “For what we are about to receive, may we all be truly thankful.”

“The only frigging one she knows,” Fred muttered.

“I thought it was perfect.” Abigail’s mother passed the dishes around, then brought the bowl of mashed potatoes over. “Here you go,” she whispered.

Abigail tried to appear excited.

“You told me you loved mashed potatoes and gravy.”

“That was with turkey, before . . .” Abigail spooned a ball of potatoes onto her plate. If she squinted, she could imagine vanilla ice cream—hadn’t tasted that since she was eight.

“I wish we had meat too. It’s been months.” Uncle Harry turned to the window facing the neighbor’s spread and stared, mouth open. “So what have you been up to?” he asked Abigail.

“Same as what I told you last Thanksgiving. Nothing new.”

“Well, I saw a bluebird on the back fencing, hopping around, looking for breadcrumbs. Mischief as can be.” Harry leaned back for a moment, face showing a sense of accomplishment amid the food steam rising from his plate. “Lots of stuff happens if we watch and listen.”

Abigail nodded. “I heard Cousin Fred—”

“Uncle Fred.”

“Uncle Fred talking to mom on the porch this morning from my window. He was begging her for something. She said no way would she agree to such a rude proposal.”

Her mother’s face tightened, suddenly lined.

“Enough on that, Abigail.” Albert stared back and forth at Fred and his wife. “Anyone notice how clear the sky was at dawn? That’s a good sign.”

“Maybe.” Uncle Harry squinted at the window. “It’s green and clouded over again now though, just like usual.”

“Things would be better if not for that jackass running our country. Where’s he hiding anyway?”

Uncle Harry tossed his napkin down. “He’s trying to fix everything your guy before him destroyed. If that criminal hadn’t allowed Russia and China to waltz right in, we’d never be here now, scrounging for food, living like settlers from centuries ago. Cut off from—”

Abigail’s mother tapped her glass with a spoon. “No politics at Thanksgiving dinner. You know that, boys. Repeat offenders will be banned from the next gathering.”

Outside, the daylight dimmed to darkness. Beyond the scraping of forks, the chewing and swallowing sounds, everyone ate in silence until wolves howled in the foothills and wild dogs began barking. Then, the men gazed apprehensively at each other and began talking loudly.

“Haven’t seen any lights on at the Anderson ranch for days,” Harry said. “You don't think . . .”

“I don’t know,” Albert replied, and Aunt Iris’s face went pale. “But we’ll take a look-see along the property perimeter at daylight. Too dangerous at night.”

“Might find some, uh, food stored,” Uncle Fred said. No one else spoke. The adults stared at the table.

When they were done eating, Iris excused herself to use the facilities, and Abigail’s mother signaled her to remove the dirty plates.

In the kitchen, Abigail scraped the rubbish off and set them in hot water at the base of the sink. Her mother joined in the chores, humming loudly to herself.

“I smelled you cooking late at night last week, Mom,” Abigail said. “I never got any.”

“That was possum meat,” her mother said in a low voice. “Terrible stuff. We don’t want you to get a taste for it.”

“But it smelled sweet.” She frowned. “I wanted some.”

“Abby, you told me a month ago you planned to be a vegetarian.”

“And you told me animal meat was tainted from the gas and chemicals around the city. Poisonous to eat.” Her mother didn’t reply to that.

Abigail listened to the adult voices through the cracked swinging door.

“Your daughter is really growing up,” Uncle Fred said. “She'll be quite a woman soon.”

Albert coughed, a ratcheting sound from the bowels of his lungs, making Abigail shudder.

“Hush up, Fred,” he replied. “Marriage age was changed to sixteen by law, but she’ll decide her own future.” He coughed again.

“What does it matter?” Fred asked. “We’re out here alone and can make our own laws. It’s plumb unfair that both you and Harry have wives and I got nothing.”

“Jesus.” Uncle Harry scraped his chair. “And with you being related to the family, Fred.”

“No, I ain’t.” He made a spitting noise. “I was adopted by Albert’s uncle. No relation at all.”

“You degenerate,” Uncle Harry said. “You must be fifty-five and her being twelve.”

“No, I’m only fifty-four, but I’m not waiting five years to get hitched again.”

“You lowlife!” Abigail’s father shouted. The noise of a scuffle ensued, then a thump as someone hit the wooden floor. Abigail and her mother rushed to the table.

Fred stood above Albert, looking uglier and meaner than usual, a tangle of thinning hair jutting into the air, his rust and gray-colored stubble framing a yellowy grin. “You’ll be lucky to live much longer with that hacking cough, Albert.”

Abigail darted over to kick Fred in the shin, then bit into his fleshy hand. While he cried out and bent forward, Albert got off the floor and broke a serving bowl on his head. Fred went down hard.

“You ever strike me in my own home and say what you said about . . .” Albert stopped himself. “Well, you’ll be banned from Thanksgiving—forever.”

Fred shook his head and slumped against the wall. Tears streaked across his leathery face. “Not that. It's all I live for anymore.”

“Then behave like a man, not a goddamn filthy animal.” Fred nodded in agreement as Albert continued, “Time to mosey back to your cabin now. The meal is done. Party’s over.”

Fred pulled himself up, sheepish and defeated, but hesitated. When he noticed Aunt Iris standing with the gravy tureen held like a blunt weapon, he staggered through the back door. “See y’all next Thanksgiving,” he shouted over the yammering generator noise outside.

***

“Let’s have a smoke on the front porch,” Uncle Harry said to Albert after the mess got cleaned up.

“But your lungs, Albert,” Abigail’s mother insisted. “And wear a gas mask if you wander beyond the porch.”

“I'm just going to watch Harry smoke.” He winked at Abigail and followed his brother out.

Abigail moved close to the door so she could overhear their conversation.

The night sky burned bright orange from fires in the distant cities mixed with a green phosphor gas leaking off smokestacks of the shuttered factories. All of it beyond the safety checkpoints. Another world. Their own town was closed down, the mines derelict, the stink of paper mills fading. Individual properties and boundaries marked and fenced. To cross over into someone else’s land was a provocation, an invitation to be hurt. Sometimes families died of hunger or from suicide pacts, then the neighbors went to forage supplies before the roaming wildlife had their way.

“You think the Jepson Mine will ever open again, give us our jobs back?”

“Someday,” Albert said.

“Really?”

Albert didn’t respond.

Abigail pressed against the screen door to watch their expressions and gestures. Smoking both fascinated and disgusted her. She was startled when motion sensor lights switched on.

“Is that Elrod?” Uncle Harry blew gray smoke rings upward toward the hanging porch lanterns haloed with flies.

“Damn, what’s he doing out there?” Albert asked. “The dumbass.”

Abigail saw neighbor Elrod standing by the spooled barbed wire and fencing separating their properties. He held a shotgun pointed up in the air, then tapped its butt against a fence post once. Twice.

“He’s hungry,” Harry said. “Signaling he wants our leftovers or something.”

“Nothing left,” Albert said, extra loud. He walked to the steps of the porch, his whole figure illuminated by lights, and picked up the Browning rifle with a scope. He pointed it skyward too and waited. While Elrod could make mincemeat out of someone close up with his scatter-gun, Albert was giving a clear signal that he’d never get over their high fencing alive.

In better times, before, Elrod had chosen to grow flowers, parsley, a little wheat—his land rocky and not nutrient-rich. Meanwhile, Abigail’s family had harvested potatoes and corn and had scavenged far and wide for fertilizer to enrich their soil.

Abigail heard Elrod grunting and cursing, but eventually he tipped his shotgun toward the ground and sauntered back the quarter mile to his shack. He lived alone presently, and no one ever asked what happened to his young wife or son.

“Shame he didn’t try,” Uncle Harry said.

“A bit stringy.” Albert set the rifle down. “One of these days, he will.”

“Too bad Fred left the way he did.” Harry tamped out his pipe. “I wanted to hear the story of that gambler and the showgirl. Heh-heh.”

“He’ll tell us next time, at Thanksgiving.”

“Hopefully before an accident occurs.”

“You think Fred might drown in the river or take a bad fall?” Albert held a quizzical expression.

“He is the odd man out here. No wife. Not really part of our family.”

Albert glanced over his shoulder and whispered, “We’ll check the Anderson ranch tomorrow, then discuss his future.”

“It’s going to be a long, hard winter without something frozen out in the shed.”

Abigail’s mother came up behind and stroked her hair. “That wasn’t such a bad meal, was it?”

“No, Mom. I love your cooking.” She spoke in a flat monotone, but her mother hugged her anyway.

Back in the kitchen, she handed Abigail a sharp-edged knife. “You're growing up,” she whispered. “We ladies need protection.”

“From what?”

“Wild animals. Monsters too. Sometimes, they disguise themselves.” She sighed before hugging her again. “Hunger changes people. Hey, thought about what you’ll wear for next Thanksgiving?”

Abigail felt safe cloaked in her mother’s warmth. “Will we ever celebrate Christmas again?”

“Not for a spell,” she said. “So have you thought about it, pumpkin?”

For a moment, Abigail wanted to be a pumpkin, to return to being a little girl forever. “No, but I will.”

She would have all night and even the morning to consider her outfit for tomorrow’s Thanksgiving meal, then again for the day after tomorrow and the day after that too.