His mannerisms rough, Billy jammed his feet into his winter boots. He didn’t want to go outside, and he certainly didn’t want anything to do with the dead bird his dad had hunted and killed for Thanksgiving. The farmhouse warm and comfortable, he wanted to stay inside. From the kitchen, he could hear his mother as she started to prep dinner and grabbing his winter coat, Billy heaved a sigh and exited out the pantry and into the crisp late November air.
Nine inches already coated the ground. As he started to slog through the drifts, he thoughts about how he’d over heard from his dad and mom talking about another storm that was expected in the next couple days. His movements slowing even more as he approached the barn, he exhaled heavily and considered ways he could get out of helping his dad.
From within, he could hear the cows as they lowed, the horses as they uttered a shrill neigh. Moving over the small side door, he knock his feet against the jamb to knock as much of the snow from his boots before he let himself in. The barn warmer, he unzipped his jacket as he looked over in the directions of the stalls and place the cows were housed. Not seeing his father, he headed deeper into the barn and toward the cold storage section, certain his dad would be either there or in the office.
A quick look in the office as he passed it and he didn’t see his father there. Continuing on, he reached the cold storage, which kept so all year round, where his dad kept the fresh milk and other dairy products he produced, along with meats waiting to be cured, smoked, packed, or cooked. Peeking in, seeing the turkey already strung up, he also saw his father’s back as the man bent over and sharpened an axe. Shuffling his feet as he entered, Billy stopped when his dad told him, “Pick up your feet,” without even turning around and straightening up, the man reached down the turkey.
With a glance over his shoulder, he told his nine year old son, “Come over here.”
“So why are we doing this? Why can’t we just go to the store and get a frozen turkey, like we do every year?” Billy asked as he plodded over.
“Because,” his dad responded as he laid the bird on the chopping bloke. “This is an important lesson for you to learn. My pop taught it to me, his to him, and so on back several generations. It is something I want to impart onto you that, along with respect for the creature that gave its life so you may eat, that you also know and understand first hand the meat you eat does not simply appear miraculously in the grocery store.”
“I know that,” Billy said in a quiet tone.
“No, you don’t,” his father countered as he hefted the axe and pointing at the meats hung, then the dead turkey, he explained, “You have seen these, and that is furtherest of your knowledge. You do not know the work that goes into to prepare them so. You do not fully ken how it is they go from the living being that goes about on four legs, alive and well, to what you see before you. And next year, I want you to come with either when I go hunting for deer, or when I get another turkey,” and without another word, he turned, adjust the dead bird, and with a grunt, he heft the small hand axe and brought it down.
The neck severed, his dad collected the head and tossed it into a nearby bin. With a wave of his hand, he bid his son closer and when the boy did so, the man plucked a large handful of feathers from the carcass. Holding them up, he explained, “There is also the lesson you need to understand is that nothing is to be wasted. These feathers, your mom will use to stuff pillows,” before placed them in a nearby bag.
Silent during all this, Billy looked at the dead animal and found himself loth to touch it. Hoping his dad wouldn’t make him, he was disappointed when he was told, “I want you to pluck it. I am going to clean off the axe head, and will be back in a bit,” and with a nod, he told Billy, “Get to it.”
Knowing his father wouldn’t take any arguments, Billy took his gloves off. Shoving them in his jacket pocket, he squatted down and with a grimace, reached out and touched the bird. The thing cold and stiff, he suppressed a shudder as he grabbed a swatch of feathers and pulled. Hating the sound they made as they tore from the body, he wrinkled his nose and tried to ignore the smell that came of the dead turkey.
The work slow, Billy didn’t believe he’d made any progress, even as the bag next to him gradually filled, by the time his father returned. A look at the work he’d done and the man told his son, “Good job. Keep at it,” before he turned and began to check his tools.
When he finished, Billy breathed a sigh of relief. His hands chapped, red, and stiff, he flexed them as he stood and stretched. Not seeing his dad, he went to look for him and finding him in the hayloft, he waited until he had his attention before he said, “I’m done,” even as he wanted only to go inside, but knowing he couldn’t yet.
“Let’s take a look,” his dad said as he set aside the hay fork.
Back in the cold storage, after he’d examined his son’s work, and pronounced it good, the man said, “Next, we want to remove the insides,” as he reached for the bird and turned it around. And as he continued to tell Billy what he was about to do, why it was important, missing as he did the look on the boy’s face, he started to remove the innards and toss them into a bucket.
The nine year old trying his hardest to keep his breakfast down, shuffled his feet in place. Watching his dad, disgusted by what he saw being pulled out, he jerked his head up to look at his father when he suddenly grunted,”What the hell,” as it seemed he was trying to pull something out of the carcass.
Instead of taking anything from it, he yanked his back as if he’d been bitten. Scared by how his dad was acting, Billy took a step forward and started to ask, “Are you…” but never finished as he dad turned toward him.
A scream erupted from him at the sight of his dad’s mouth and nose, fused together and starting to push out into what was clearly a beak. In response, he dad opened his beak and tried to say something, but the most he could manage was a strangled yelp that sound like a mix between garbled human speech and a turkey’s call. Still screaming, even as was aware that, on some twisted level, his dad was asking for help, Billy watched as the man raised his hands. Noting that they no longer had fingers, and looked like flippers, the boy started to back away as his father leaned forward, bent his arms in a new direction and uttered another turkey sound.
Frightened and horrified by what he saw, Billy found himself torn. He wanted to run, to go get help, but was unsure who he could tell, who would believe him. Watching as his father began to shrink, he wanted to go to him and find a way to stop the horror show unfolding before him, but didn’t know what he could do. Watching as his the man’s head became bare, what were clearly now wings gained feathers that showed white barring, Billy listened as his father uttered a series of what the boy could only describe as clicking sounds. Feathers, dark brown started to sprout and as his father spun about in place in attempt to get loose of his boots and pants, Billy caught a brief glimpse of the man’s rump, which had a coppery sheen to it and the tail feather’s that had started to sprout.
But none of this scared him more then when his dad turned to look up at him. Finally free of the garments that hindered his legs, the bird peered at him and uttered another one of those yelps. Staring at it, Billy began to scream even more when he saw his dad’s eyes, which, at first, still had a look to the of understanding, intelligence, something he could only describe as human. And then it faded, reducing what the boy was facing to that of a stupid, wild animal.
Unable to stop the noise he was making, he turned from the turkey, which was now about thirty-five inches in length and nine pounds in weight. Without thought as to where he was going, Billy tore out of the barn, wanting only to get away from the horror he’d witnessed. Inside the barn, which was already shifting reality as the cows and horses disappear, and the cold rooms became a place for storage of odds and ends, the turkey let forth a series of yelps and strutted out of into the main area. Taking a short flight upward, it strutted about and pecked at the hay in the loft. After some time, warm and full on the insects it had found, it bed done in the Timothy to wait out the storm it instinctually could sense was soon to come.
Outside, Billy tore across the yard. Gibbering insanely, he paid little heed to where he was going as around him snow started to fall. Racing past the farmhouse, unaware he’d done so, he headed blindly in the direction of the woods. Three days later, when the blizzard that would dump another six to eight inches, he would be found, suffering badly from frost bite and hypothermia, and lucky to be alive. Unwilling to speak or acknowledge anyone, it would be three years before he would, in which, all he would at first say was a refusal of having turkey at Thanksgiving.