Zymose: An enzyme, occurring in yeast and in the digestive juices of animals, that causes the inversion of cane sugar into invert sugar.
First: Preceding all others of a series or kind the ordinal of one earliest as the first day of a month the first year of a reign
Lapp: Also called Laplander – a member of a Finnic people of northern Norway, Sweden, Finland, and adjacent regions.
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‘Steady now son, hold that position, follow him with a firm eye, caress the gun, cradle it, not too tight but not too loose. When you’re sure…take the shot.’
The whip-crack of the gun ripples across the snow, humming as the pellets inscribe a full stop at the end of the caribou’s life. The boy lowers the weapon, his shoulder hurting from where the butt had jerked backwards. His fingers tremble and any joy he should be feeling is hollow as a rifle’s chamber, as though an emptiness had suddenly been awakened inside of him.
Looking up at his father, he sees the crease lines of a smile beneath the man’s frost-covered stubble.
‘You did good lad,’ says the man, putting his hand on the boy’s shoulder. ‘Your first caribou… Wait ‘til your mother hears of this!’
‘Dad, no, it’s fine, honestly,’ says the boy, embarrassed, ‘can’t we just say you killed it?’
His father looks at him curiously, a mixture of anger and sad resignation etched into the crease lines of his forehead, four short, horizontal lines you could compose upon. His ruddy cheeks flush rosy as holly bush berries, letting out a huff of dissatisfaction swept away by the wind.
‘Ok Hurman, we won’t tell your mother.’
‘Promise?’
‘On my honour as a Lapp!’ grins Hurman’s father, ‘besides, I wouldn’t be much of a Lapp if I didn’t try to claim as many caribou kills as possible, would I?’
His throaty guffaw echoed like another gunshot, short, sharp and loud. The white blur of a hare ducks into the overgrowth, probably saw what happened to the caribou.
Hurman and his father slowly approach the caribou. It lies silently, stewing in a pool of dark, steaming blood that had dyed the snow around it a vibrant strawberry pink. The creature was dead, bled out by a single bullet. Most impressive declares Hurman’s father, but Hurman doesn’t think so.
The pair work quickly, draining the blood and gutting the internal organs. They keep the tasty ones – the slippery bean-shaped kidney, the grey disc of the liver – still juicy, still warm. The rest they toss to one side in a slobbering heap, let the wolves have theirs, says Hurman’s father.
Still feeling queasy and with his knife deep inside the caribou’s belly, Hurman nicks the creature’s stomach and a flood of partially digested berries, seeds and vegetation spill out all over his hands. The stomach acid, rich with corrupting zymoses, stings Hurman’s skin and he yelps in pain, a sickly sweet smell filling his nostrils.
‘Put your hands in the snow!’ yells his father, sharply.
Hurman pushes both hands deep into an envelope of snow and screams loudly as the acid is slowly and painfully neutralised.
Pulling them out, Hurman’s hands are covered in dark purple scars, like the reflection of lightning rippling on the surface of water. The pain flares like a lit match, even the unscarred skin isn’t left untouched, stinging badly, the agony throbbing in time with the pulsing of his heart. The agony drip dropping like the tears of happiness on his cheeks. He’ll never hold another gun again.
Stories On The Sofa 