The Knife of Never Letting Go

I step back again, farther in the dark.

“I ain’t a bad man, you know,” he says, suddenly and kinda confusingly but swinging the machete. “I have a wife. I have a daughter.”

“They wouldn’t be wanting you to hurt no innocent boy, I’m sure—”

“Quiet!” he shouts and I can hear him swallow.

He ain’t sure of this. He ain’t sure of what he’s about to do.

What’s going on here?

“I don’t know why yer angry,” I say, “but I’m sorry. Whatever it is—”

“What I want you to know before you pay,” he says over me, like he’s forcing himself not to listen to me. “What you need to know, boy, is that my mother’s name was Jessica.”

I stop stepping back. “Beg pardon?”

“My mother’s name,” he growls, “was Jessica.”

This don’t make no sense at all.

“What?” I say. “I don’t know what yer—”

“Listen, boy!” he yells. “Just listen.”

And then his Noise is wide open.

And I see–

And I see–

And I see–

I see what he’s showing.

“That’s a lie,” I whisper. “That’s a ruddy lie.”

Which is the wrong thing to say.

With a yell, Matthew leaps forward, running towards me the length of the barn.

“Run!” I shout to Manchee, turning and making a break for the back doors. (Shut up, you honestly think a knife is a match for a machete?) I hear Matthew still yelling, his Noise exploding after me, and I reach the back door and fling it open before I realize.

Manchee’s not with me.

I turn round. When I said “run”, Manchee’d run the other way, flinging himself with all his unconvincing viciousness towards the charging Matthew.

“Manchee!” I yell.

It’s ruddy dark in the barn now and I can hear grunts and barks and clanks and then I hear Matthew cry out in pain at what must surely be a bite.

Good dog, I think, Good effing dog.

And I can’t leave him, can I?

I run back into the darkness, towards where I can see Matthew hopping around and the form of Manchee dancing twixt his legs and swipes of the machete, barking his little head off.

“Todd! Todd! Todd!” he’s barking.

I’m five steps away and still running when Matthew makes a two-handed strike down at the ground, embedding the tip of the machete into the wooden floor. I hear a squeal from Manchee that don’t have no words, just pain, and off he flies into a dark corner.

I let out a yell and crash right into Matthew. We both go flying, toppling to the floor in a tumble of elbows and kneecaps. It hurts but mostly I’m landing on Matthew so that’s okay.

We roll apart and I hear him call out in pain. I get right back up to my feet, knife in hand, a few metres away from him, far from the back door now and with Matthew blocking the front. I hear Manchee whimpering in the dark.

I also hear some Noise rising from across the village road in the direkshun of the meeting hall but there ain’t time to think about that now.

“I’m not afraid to kill you,” I say, tho I totally am but I’m hoping my Noise and his Noise are now so rackety and revved up that he won’t be able to make any sense from it.

“That makes two of us then,” he says, lunging for his machete. It don’t come out first tug, or the second. I take the chance to jump back into the dark, looking for Manchee.

“Manchee?” I say, frantically looking behind the sheaves and the piles of fruit baskets. I can still hear Matthew grunting to get his machete outta the floor and the ruckus from the town is growing louder.

“Todd?” I hear from deep in the darkness.

It’s coming from beside the silage rolls, down a little nook that opens up next to them back to the wall. “Manchee?” I call, sticking my head down it.

I look back real quick.

With a heave, Matthew gets his machete outta the floor.

“Todd?” Manchee says, confused and scared. “Todd?”

And here comes Matthew, coming on in slow steps, like he no longer has to hurry, his Noise reaching forward in a wave that don’t brook no argument.

I have no choice. I wedge myself back into the nook and hold out my knife.

“I’ll leave,” I say, my voice rising. “Just let me get my dog and we’ll leave.”

“Too late for that,” Matthew says, getting closer.

“You don’t wanna do this. I can tell.”

“Shut yer mouth.”

“Please,” I say, waving the knife. “I don’t wanna hurt you.”

“Do I look concerned, boy?”

Closer, closer, step by step.

There’s a bang outside somewhere, off in the distance. People really are running and shouting now but neither of us look.

I press myself back into the little nook but it’s really not wide enough for me. I glance round, seeing where escape might lie.

I don’t find nothing much.

My knife’s gonna have to do it. It’s gonna have to act, even if it is against a machete.

“Todd?” I hear behind me.

“Don’t worry, Manchee,” I say. “It’s gonna be all right.”

And who knows what a dog believes?

Matthew’s almost on us now.

I grip my knife.

Matthew stops a metre from me, so close I can see his eyes glinting in the dark.

“Jessica,” he says.

He raises his machete above his head.

I flinch back, knife up, steeling myself–

But he pauses–

He pauses–

In a way I reckernize–

And that’s enough–

With a quick prayer that it ain’t the same stuff from the bridge, I swing my knife in an arc to my side, slicing right thru (thank you thank you) the ropes holding up the silage rolls, cutting the first lot clean away. The other ropes snap right quick from the sudden shift in weight and I cover my head and press myself away as the silage rolls start to tumble.

I hear thumps and clumps and an “oof” from Matthew and I look up and he’s buried in silage rolls, his arm out to one side, the machete dropped. I step forward and kick it away, then turn to find Manchee.

He’s back in a dark corner behind the now-fallen rolls. I race over to him.

“Todd?” he says when I get close. “Tail, Todd?”

“Manchee?” It’s dark so I have to squat down next to him to see. His tail’s two thirds shorter than it used to be, blood everywhere, but God bless him, still trying to wag.

“Ow, Todd?”