One Less
By Amy Logan
It was getting dark. The mourning doves were softly cooing in the big fir tree at the edge of the farm. Laney shivered even though the night was still warm, the sun’s warmth radiating off the ribbed metal of the chicken house walls. She never liked doing the night chores alone, but sometimes it was necessary, like getting a couple of stitches, or a shot from the doctor. She didn't like to do it, but she could.
You had to wait until dark for the chickens to finally settle down to roost. The long summer days were never long enough for a free range chicken; there were too many bugs to eat, too deep of sand to dust off in and too much shade to lounge in when the noon sun rose high in the sky. At dusk, the chickens got their second wind, and pecked and scratched vigorously, as if this would be their last chance, as if the coming darkness would not be replaced by dawn in a few hours.
For one chicken, it had been her last. That was why Laney hesitated to lift the eye hook on the chicken house door. She had found the chicken in the sand of the coop, neck torsioned upward, fleet splayed, her pink eyelids piled on top of her closed eyes in rosy wrinkles. The chicken was dead, passed on, moved on, deceased, whatever you wanted to call it. It was a big red one, one of the first Laney had raised from a chick from the hardware store. There had been Ariel, Princess, Snow White, Cinderella, but the red one had been the friendliest. She followed Laney around, followed anyone around who would listen to her lengthy chicken talks. What did Red talk about all that time? What could a chicken possibly have to say? How many bugs she had caught that day, the local grasshopper crop, how egg production was coming? Well, whatever it was Red had a say in it and had said it. And then she was dead.
It appeared she had died suddenly, in midstride, with one leg out in front of the other, suddenly keeled over. That was good. No hospitals, no pain, no obvious infirmity, just dead. Like that. She may have died in mid-sentence for all Laney knew, only the other chickens who may have been present could attest to that.
Laney was somewhat used to death, she did live on a farm. She was used to tiny mice drowning in the livestock's water, witnessed tiny birds that had not survived a nest fall or a deadly encounter with the farm cat. But a chicken was different. They were her chickens, and their demise was somehow bigger and more important than that of a tiny mouse or bird. But Laney had treated them well. Red had had a good life, a long life by chicken standards, and could not have seen what was coming.
Every night Laney tucked in her birds. She did a thorough head count to make sure everyone had found their way back to the coop. Sometimes the dusk took a chicken by surprise, and they went to sleep just about anywhere. Roosting on the handle of the lawnmower, on a bicycle handlebar, even on the workbench vice. When this happened Laney would cluck softly around each building and they would answer, softly in the darkness so Laney could find them. She would softly pick up the lady and carry her back into the coop where she would be safe for the night. She was their shepherd, if chickens had such a thing. She watched over them.
So tonight the head count was reduced by one. One less chicken to count, to watch over, to see grow old, to help off the high perch in the morning. One less. It was a part of life, of the chicken’s, and now of Laney's.
It was dark. Laney took in a soft breath and opened the door.
THE END
Author Bio: Amy B. Logan holds a BA from Eastern Washington University. Her work has been published both standalone and within anthologies in the United States, India, and Australia. When she is not reading or writing, she enjoys life with her family in Eastern Washington, and in collecting things both old and new. Each thing holds a story.