Animal
BY Alexandra Leggat
Photography by John Scully
From JFK, my brother Cyril calls me at home. Moments away from moving to San Francisco he wants to make contact. He always calls when he’s on his way somewhere, which he states immediately so he has a reason to abort the conversation if it’s not going his way. His springy voice, youthful and full of excitement, makes me think he’s remorseless. I suspect he’s not alone. He’s too funny, well-rehearsed. He has an audience, probably a young female, too young to care that he’s an ass.
“How was Junior when you left?” I ask.
“Good, good, he’ll be fine.”
“And you, how are you? Was it hard saying goodbye?”
“It’s not like I haven’t done this before.”
Over the loudspeaker his flight is announced. I wish him luck and picture his beautiful estranged wife and their three-year-old son with his throaty Brooklyn accent staring out the window of their thirdstorey condo in a newly renovated brownstone.
In my dreams a naked bald man, back hunched and arms held high, tiptoes across my backyard. I wake up. No one’s standing over me. The sun attempts to get up. I beat it. Don my Kodiaks, pale blue wool hat and scarf, the only one my mother didn’t make, pull on my black down jacket and grab my 80-pound husky. He’s been talking since I walked into the kitchen, a medley of vibratos, howls and whines. We may have had the same dream.
I don’t know if it’s right to escape to the wilderness every time I can’t deal with something. My search for the elusive coyote and ambivalent deer is taking me further and further into the woods and a native friend expressed alarm when I asked if I should stop searching for wild animals. Why do you want to stop searching? she asked. Because I’ll find them, I said.
The last few days there’s only been a few cracking branches in the woods but the ravens went berserk and a gang of blue jays swarmed the area, warning us or warning something else. Last week I saw a furry creature hiding behind a tree. My father said, Are you sure it wasn’t a hairy pervert? His humour that time didn’t amuse me. I’m on a different plane when I’m out there. I take it all very seriously. My dog and I backed off and turned away. When we did, the thing went crashing through the trees. When we revisited the area, there was blood on the ice.
It’s been three months since Cyril left. He didn’t call at Christmas, New Year’s. His two grown girls from the other marriage he left came to visit and broke my heart. They are beautiful and intelligent and independent. They aren’t drug addicts, pregnant or drinkers despite him. But they hurt.
The cruise ship in my dreams sank and somehow everyone swam safely to shore. I did the butterfly in the opposite direction. In an attempt to lure coyotes, I’ve been placing my dog’s poop on the border of what I believe is a pack’s territory. Though I’ve seen no sign of urine markings in the melting snow. I read this practice in a book. A woman on the same search as me placed her dog’s poop next to coyote scat. Nothing happened. But I thought my case might be different. It took the entire book for her to even catch a glimpse of one, and though the narrative was very appealing and sucked me in I prayed a goddamn coyote would show up somewhere in the first 50 pages. Page 180, from a distance one loped across an open field.
Cyril called. Woke me up without apology. I was cold. I had planned that the next time he called I’d lay into him. Tell him what I really feel about his behaviour. Leaving two wives, three children, hurting his good parents, his sister. His first wife says there are various types of narcissists. He seems to be all of them. My mother tells me he was never nice to me when I was young. After all these years, she tells me this while I’m pouring olive oil into the food processor, attempting to find solace in the creation of a classic tapenade.
I ask Cyril how the weather is in San Francisco. He says he’s not in San Francisco, he’s in Utah at the Sundance Film Festival. He has a meeting in 15 minutes with Robert Downey Jr. He’s attempting to get him to appear at his film festival and he’s brought along a mutual actor friend to seal the deal. He’s temperamental, says Cyril. Who? I ask. Robert Downey Jr., he says. Then sniffs and says he has to go.
Since moving to the country I’ve spotted four coyotes, six deer, a fox and a possum. Which of all things scared me the most. We came face to face in my backyard. It reared onto its hind legs and squealed like a hyena. The dog backed away. Christ, I thought. The bald, baby-pig-like creature carried on.
My brother sends me newspaper clippings of his successful film festival. My sister-in-law calls in tears. My nephew won’t eat without his daddy. I don my Kodiaks, yellow raincoat and hat. Raise the sleeping dog and make my way through the overgrown woods. I prod a new pile of coyote scat with a stick. There are no bones, lots of coarse hair and a few berries. In the mud, the dog sniffs the surrounding paw prints.
My mother calls in a panic. Her pastry won’t turn crumb-like. She’s averse to failing in the kitchen. A coyote will show itself if it wants to be seen. We don’t talk about Cyril anymore, as a rule.
