Under the Summer Moon

Under the Harvest Moon

The sun was setting on Porter’s Hollow on that summer night when Killian Karver first noticed the thick fog that had began to roll in over his pond. The sound of crickets filled the night air and the unyielding humidity still clung to his clothes as he made his way to his front porch. The summer time always brought strange things with it, he thought to himself. The smell of fried chicken and fresh cornbread excited his nostrils as he opened the door and hung his beat up leather Barmah hat on the peg next to the door. He smiled slightly to himself and began to hum quietly under his breath. The hallway leading to the kitchen was narrow and barely accommodated Killian’s six-foot-five height. The sound of his Durangos thumping on the oak wood floors announced his arrival into the kitchen, at which point his wife turned around with a warm southern smile on her face. Killian leaned forward, still humming and smiling, and kissed his wife lightly on the cheek. Chelsea lowered her head blushing a little and said, “Dinner’ll be ready in a bit dear, you’d better go see about Lee. He hadn’t come outta that room for at least 2 hour.”
Killian took a step back rubbed his wife’s arm and nodded. Lee’s room was on the opposite end of the house and on this end of the house the ceiling fans barely circulated air to keep it cool. Beads of sweat began to pop out on Killian’s forehead as he reached Lee’s doorway. He knocked lightly on the door and waited for his son’s response. Lee answered, “Come in.” His father had a way of being patient, and best not to try and test it by keeping his father waiting. The door opened easily without a sound and Lee got a good look at his father, silhouetted in the doorway. He stood at six-foot-five, had a lanky build that deceived his strength. The dark hair that hung down to his shoulders looked as if he had been in stables all day; his tanned skin had an even darker hue to it because of the dust he had been in all day. His spidery hands were stuffed into his pockets and his storm gray eyes focused uninterestingly on Lee.
“What’cha been up to boy? Your momma says you ain’t been out of the room for over two hour?” Killian’s slow, thick, gravelly voice filled the expanse of Lee’s room. His son stared back unflinchingly and said, “I ain’t been doin’ nothin’ papa, just restin’ a bit. I went down to the hollers with buck, but the sun started gettin’ to me so I came back and rested a spell.” Killian nodded, “That ole sun’ll get to you if’n you let it.” Killian’s brother Luke had died of heat stroke one summer in their childhood. “If’n you feel up to it, I reckon supper is about done.” Killian said as he made his way back to the kitchen.
Lee stared at the doorway for a few minutes before putting his shoes on and getting up from his bed. Something seemed off about this particular night. He couldn’t quite place his finger on exactly what it was but he was sure that it had something to do with the huge paw prints he found near the river. He hadn’t mentioned it to his father because he could barely believe it himself. The paw prints had looked like wolf prints but they were far too large to be any wolf he had ever seen. Lee emerged from the hallway that led to the kitchen and put on his best “nothing is wrong in the world” smile and said, “Smells good mama, I could eat a whole cow right about now. That sun did a number on me today.”
Chelsea had always been good at telling when one of her boys was telling tall tales, and tonight both of them seemed to be trying to play poker with her. She would normally drag whatever it was out into the open, but something in her told her that tonight to just let it lie. She handed the plate to Lee and said, “Well, I hope you don’t stay that hungry. You’d like to eat us out of house and home.” She gave him a wide grin and Killian ruffled his hair, “I think the boy is just going through the pains. Go ahead on over to the table son and wait for me and your mama.”
Lee trundled off to the big pine wood table and took his place. He could hear his parents talking lowly and laughing slightly. In that moment in time Lee felt good, like everything was right in the world and the paw prints were forgotten. The rest of the night went as usual; they finished their dinner, cleaned up the dishes and sat out on the front porch for a little bit shooting the breeze. Far off in the distance the half-moon slowly made its way over the trees.
Julius had been nervous when he saw the boy in the holler this morning. He obviously had seen the prints, and was apt to tell his parents about them at the drop of a hat. He ran his hand through his mangy brown hair and decided it was time to wake up Jared. He walked over to where the rest of the pack were sound asleep. The bramble had him them from the kid, but how long until the boy decided to start poking his nose where it didn’t belong? Julius ducked into the bramble and made his way over to a hulking mass that was Jared.
Jared was large according to tribal standards. He stood at six foot even and looked more like a shaved bear than a man. His brow still held the primitive slope that was the norm for the tribes near the pole. His skin held a pale color that gave his coat the white color he was known for and even his ears were large. Jared’s upper lip trembled in his sleep and rose a little bit to reveal the incisors that were always deployed. Julius leaned down and shook Jared’s hulking shoulder. A stifled growl began to rise from the depths of Jared’s sleeping body. Slowly, his eyes opened and when he saw Julius he relaxed a little. “What is it old friend?” he asked quietly. Julius rested on his haunches and told his leader about the boy. The alpha wolf had taken up a sitting position and scratched at his thick, tangled beard. “I suppose we should rustle up the rest and move on then.” He said yawning.
The rest of the wolves woke with little more than a whine and once they were all up and moving they left the bramble. The blinding midday sun beat down on them and in the back of his mind Jared cursed himself for not waiting until nightfall to move. He raised a hand over his eyes and let his eyes shift to get a better view of the horizon. The lush green Carolina country side seemed to thrum with life and the blazing sun coupled with the thick humidity made him irritable. Far off in the distance he saw a blacktop road and on either side the kudzu was so dense that it threatened to take over the civilized world.
“We’re gonna lie in wait for a car. Julius, Mac, and Bernie you take the left side of the road. Gwen, Harold and myself will take the right. You know the drill.” The pack split into their groups and made their way to either side of the road. Jared glanced around once then let out a high pitched whine and a slight yelp and the pack replied back with a yelp. They began to shift into their respective forms and hid in the kudzu. Jared padded out to the middle of the road and laid down, he was their leader and if anyone had to bear the heat of the asphalt or danger of being hit by a speeding car, it ought to be him. He closed his eyes and sprawled out as if he had been hit by a car.
The ford pickup was traveling down I-85 at a smooth speed of seventy-five and the driver saw the white fur in the middle of the road just in time to slam on his breaks. He hopped out of his truck with the baseball bat he kept under the seat and walked cautiously up to the motionless body. He had heard of dogs that got dazed by a car and when they came too sometimes they attacked people. He was about two feet away from the body when he poked it with the thick end of the bat. The last thing the driver heard was the chorus of growls as the pack emerged from the kudzu coupled with his own high-pitched scream.
Kent Montoya ran the little gas station on the outskirts of Porter’s Hollow as his father had before him. When the red pickup pulled in to one of the pumps he couldn’t help but stare. The whole lot of them looked like they had been wrestling around in the mud and not one of them seemed to be talking. He placed the auto-trader magazine on the counter and walked out to greet them. Kent ran one of the only existing attendant serve gas stations in the country, a fact he told every stranger that came through. The trouble was Kent not only ran it but was also the only attendant. The economy had taken that nasty down turn and he couldn’t afford to keep the help. The only thing that kept his business from sinking was the small town of Porter’s Hollow and even that was starting to seem dismal. The man driving the truck stepped out and grabbed the pumps handle. He was about to start filling up the car when Kent spoke, “Howdy there ya’ll, here sir let me get that for ya.” Kent reached for the pump but when the man turned around there was something wrong in this man’s face, something that said “back off mister.” Kent’s smile faltered a little bit then quickly added, “See this here is my store and I’m one of the only existing stations left that pumps the gas for you.”
Julius seemed to relax a little but not enough to set the man’s mind at ease. He tried on a smile and glanced down at the name tag embroidered onto the man’s work shirt. “Well, Kent if that’s the way you run your store then far be it from me to change that.” He handed the handle to Kent and two twenties. Kent relaxed and his smile flickered back to life. He took the money and began to pump the gas. Julius got back in the truck and sat quietly like the rest. A female voice spoke up from the back of the truck, “Hey mister, do you got any of that deer jerky? I hear it’s to die for.” Kent hadn’t noticed the female in the back and now that he got a good look at her he noticed she had the same mud-wrestler look the rest of them had, and her unkempt and dreadlocked hair hung down across her back and spilled over her shoulders. He smiled and nodded, “You bet I do. Went huntin’ last week and got me three of them big ole bucks. See my stuff is homemade, best in the world.” The woman’s eyes seemed to sparkle a little and she looked over her left shoulder at a young man who was bald-headed. He jumped down out of the truck without a single word and started for the store.
Kent finished the gas and went inside to get the jerky for the man. He wiped his hands off on his work shirt and put the two twenties in his shirt pocket. The man stood on the other side of the counter not saying a word. Kent smiled at him and asked, “How much of the jerky you want there sir?” The man didn’t drop his gaze from Kent’s and said, “All of it.” Kent’s smile started to go out and when he spoke he had a crack in his voice. “How…how much?” The man didn’t blink and now he seemed to be getting impatient, and when he spoke he sounded like he was growling a little. “All..of..it.”
Kent didn’t hesitate again, he reached around the right side of the counter and grabbed all fifteen bags of his jerky and gave it to the man. “That’ll be thirty-five dollars.” Kent said quickly placing the bags far enough away that he couldn’t be grabbed if the fella tried anything funny. The other man pulled out a fifty dollar bill and placed it on the counter, and picked up the bags. “Keep the change.” The man said walking out the door.