Childs Wood

As a child, I often spent those lazy childhood days wandering through that stretch of woods out behind the back fence. West Virginia, where a large part of my formative years was to be spent, is a glorious land. All those dogwood trees coming to life with their multitude of white blossoms contrasting against that black wood of their trunks; all those bright pink flowers of the wild multiflora-rose bushes with their thorny tangles along the ground and climbing the trunks of ancient white ash and black maples and box elders. It was in this land of rolling mountains and slow ancient river valleys that I learned to shoot, to swing from the rope overhanging that slow flowing red and brown tinged stream, to clean a fish, to skip rocks. It was in this land that I killed that little deer, its points all of five inches above its tan face.
I remember well that morning. Fall in West Virginia is cold, my little gloved hands uncomfortable in their silent shivering. Not a word I said. This was just too important, a defining moment in a young man's life and I would not have it spoiled by some show of weakness on my part. Not there in front of my father and that seven-foot uncle of mine. No. This was time for grit and toughness, this was time for a purging of all those childhood tendencies towards crying and the like. I remember stepping down from the door of that rusted out, old Chevy Blazer that my father drove at the time. I remember crunching down loudly onto all the orange and red leaves that littered the ground. I remember the weight of that rifle being placed into my hands with all the seriousness of a first communion. Surely this was to be a baptism in fire, a washing in blood.
We followed a path that I had known well, for I was a boy and these were my woods. No man can know the forest like a young boy in all his private adventures; in all my chasing of bandits and pirates and sword captains and the like I had come to know these woods. They were mine, and I would defend them fiercely if given the opportunity. As the path wound through the trees we followed it left and right around the large boulders that occasionally litter the hillsides throughout the Appalachians. Down into the bottom, alongside that same red and brown stream with rope still hanging from the branch, echoes of summer ringing in my ears. Careful not to smile, this is a serious affair. I could tell this much.
We made a left onto that game trail, barely wide enough for a boy of seven, none the less the pair of full grown giants that my father and his brother seemed at the time. My father leaned in close and whispered in my ear in the most serious tones, "quiet now boy, you see those tracks there in the mud?"
I saw them.
"Those are fresh, they're today for sure"
Slowly we followed through the tangles of thorns, the brambles tearing at my flesh where the skin showed between my sleeves and gloves. Not a sound I made though it hurt something fierce. Slowly we stepped across that mat of fresh leaves, quietly. Quietly we stalked our prey. As we rose over the top of the hill and looked down among the bare tree trunks there stood a pair of light brown deer grazing, unaware of their peril.
Slowly my father kneeled down beside me, "quiet now, release the safety and take steady aim." Whispers, whispers. A voice, so soft, so urgent.
Shakily, I did as I was told. Slowly inhale, slowly squeeze the trigger.
CRACK! The rifle jumped in my hand. Silence fell over those woods, the only sounds the beating of my own heart, the thumping foot falls of a single deer, running now through the woods. Quick, up and running, my father took off like a dart through the underbrush. Crashing and stomping those giant boots over fallen branches and brambles. My little child legs struggling to keep up. Breathing heavy into little puffs, condensing before my very eyes and off into the wind. As I finally arrived at the scene, the two men kneeling, I cried out. Oh God! What had I done. This wasn't what was supposed to happen! This was not the way I pictured it in my mind. All those sterile heads hanging on the walls with their glass eyes, unseeing. The blood ran out. A crimson river running across the orange leaves of fall, thickening and standing there in the cold autumn air. Pooling. I looked down and saw the twitching of those hind legs, the last throws of death.
The deer I killed, so small, but a child. Still with its spots. Still with its horns, not yet branching, barely rising up through the skin. This was not the way it was supposed to happen. I ran. I ran and ran and ran, until I could no longer hear my father's cries. Those angry voices calling. GET BACK HERE! WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU!! I ran. I came to my rope and kept running, past the truck, past the red and brown stained stream, the brambles tearing at every piece of exposed flesh, and hid up the branches of that big oak at the top of the hill. Hiding there until I could stop the tears. These were my woods, this was an unforgivable betrayal.
I eventually went down to face my shame. Back to the truck where my uncle and father were impatiently waiting. I took my beating without a tear, without a whimper. The ride home was silent. I have not been back into those, my woods.