Sheep and Wolves by Jeremy C. Shipp Read Free Book Online Page A

top.
    You study it for a while, frowning. “The tires don’t look very realistic, but I guess it’s alright.”
    “Thanks,” I say.
    You eat the car. You like me to watch, so that’s what I do.
    “How does it taste?” I say.
    “You’re not as fresh as you used to be.”
    “I’m sorry.”
    “Well, nevermind. I’m finished. Let’s go to bed.”
    “Would you carry me?”
    “Fine.” You grab me, and toss me on the bed upstairs. “You know, you look like a fucking idiot without any legs.”
    “I know.”
    “Stay over there. I don’t want you to bleed on me.”
    I’d like to move closer to you, of course, but I stay where I am.
    And my leg continues bleeding, even in my dreams.
    In the morning, you say, “I’d like some head meat for breakfast.”
    “OK,” I say, the way I always say, “OK.”
    Because without you, I’m nothing.
    Scratch
     
    Margaret, one of my least favorite wives, blocks the television as if anything she says is as interesting or witty as scripted dialogue crafted by professional writers; as if her smile with the chipped tooth is as enchanting as a celebrity’s; as if I haven’t seen this one a thousand times already.“I have something special planned for you later,” Margaret says. “It involves strawberries, handcuffs and a very lucky umbrella.”
    I laugh, because she expects me to.
    “Be honest,” she says. “Is that too kinky? Not kinky enough?”
    “You know what, honey?” I say. “I’m not really feeling it tonight. I’m sorry.”
    “Not feeling it?”
    “I don’t think I can do this so…often anymore.”
    “Oh.”
    “I’d like to. It’s just that my body isn’t responding the way that it used to.”
    “I see.”
    She should walk away. Run, really.
    But instead, she steps closer. She can’t help herself. Not because of gravity or magnetism or even attraction. It’s because every night after she falls asleep, I sit beside her, and read to her from my notebook with the kitten on the cover. You probably don’t know this, but that kitten was run over and killed and run over a few more times three days after that photograph was taken. And if you look close enough, with a magnifying glass would be best, you can see fear in the kitten’s eyes. Part of him knows what’s coming. Part of him isn’t so innocent.
    “Don’t look so sad,” I say. “Our relationship has evolved beyond the physical. I get so much more pleasure from talking to you now than touching you.”
    “You don’t like touching me?” she says, closer.
    “I do. Of course I do. But our bodies aren’t what they used to be. We’re not built for sex at this age. You can’t have children anymore, so we’ve lost our physical appeal.”
    “I can get surgery,” she says, on my lap now. “I can change.”
    “Yes, but you can’t change into a younger woman. You can never get back what you lost.”
    She holds me tight. “I don’t want to lose you.”
    “You won’t,” I say, and smile. “No matter what fades from our relationship, I’ll always appreciate what we have. Always.”
    She squeezes me. She cries on me.
    Then she folds into me like a hide-a-bed, and poof. She’s gone.
    “That’s how you do it,” I say.
    Sonny pops his head out of the enormous vase where he was hiding and says, “I’m not sure exactly what you did, Mr. Grelding.”
    “Of course you’re not sure,” I say. “You’re a student.”
    Look at him jumping out of that vase like some green-screened ninja. He thinks he’s so great. Just because he’s young and good looking and smarter than the average bear. I bet he’s never traveled back and forth through time or fought in an intergalactic space war or saved the world from the apocalypse.
    I bet he’s even a virgin.
    *
    After setting down in the forest clearing, I unfasten my rocket pack and let it smash a couple of mushrooms or mice or whatever they were.
    “Now I’m going to teach you how to have a baby,” I say.
    Sonny doesn’t unfasten his