A Compilation Of Short Stories

Coyote

Trigger Warning(s): Gun Use

A large coyote stared out into the thin forest it called home. The pine and cedar trees swayed in the heavy winds. The underbrush was lush and small creatures scurried to and fro under its safe cover. The rising sun shined golden light over the land, casting eerie shadows behind anything that blocked its rays. The coyote knew it should have escaped into the forest, away from the human city behind it. But instead it just stared. It did not know why. It just stood there silently.

As the sun rose higher, the human city began to come to life. Cars vroomed, people walked the streets, and all the other human ruckus that went on during the day began. But alas, the coyote still did not budge. It had no will to go back into the woodland.

The coyote stayed in that same spot until midday. It did not want to return to the thin forest it called home, but eventually something made its mind up for it. A gun shot rang out from behind the coyote. The shot did not hit the canine, but it finally caused it to dash into the trees and away from the city. It bolted through the thick undergrowth of the forest, and eventually hunkered down in it to take cover. A mouse scurried off from the spot the coyote was in, and then everything became dead silent; not a branch swayed, not a creature scurried. The only thing that made a sound was the coyote's heartbeat in its ears. A final gunshot was fired, then the footsteps of the human who fired it grew quieter and quieter until they were inaudible. The coyote looked up through the brush, afraid to make a single sound. The human was gone.

The coyote finally stood back up. The dry pine needles covering the forest floor crackled under its paws. It panted, grass and sticks clinging to its beige and gray pelt. The sounds of the city echoed in the distance, but there were otherwise no sounds from the far away place. Despite what had just happened to the coyote, it still craved to go back to the city. It inched closer to the edge of the forest, closer and closer until it arrived at the edge of the underbrush where it could observe but still stay hidden.

It peered out of the weeds to see several people outside of one of the buildings. Three human pups ran around the open yard, two adult humans watching their every move. The coyote sat in the dense cover, watching them. The small humans chased each other all day until the sun began to set again, when one of the larger humans told the pups to go inside their den.

As soon as the pups were out of the yard, the coyote crawled out from the trees. It slowly crawled around the house to where the humans had been running. It smelled heavily of them and small human tracks were left in the muddied yard. The coyote peeked into the den through a window to see the small humans still bursting with energy. One of the adult humans tried to calm the pups down with little success, but the other was nowhere to be found.

The coyote inched to the front of the den. It had a large, brown door covering the entrance, and a mysterious light shone from above the entrance across the patch of yard in front of the den. The coyote crouched around the front of the den to a large, metal object. The coyote sniffed the object. It seemed hollow inside, and the smell of meat and rotten fruit came from inside it. The coyote nudged the object onto its side, causing it to fall over with a load crash and the lid covering the top to fly off. The coyote snuck around to the opening of the metal object. A raccoon ran out from the inside of the object, an apple core in hand. It hissed at the coyote, then climbed up a nearby tree to safety. The coyote stuck its head inside the object, smelling around for food. Most of the things in the hollow object were not food, and a lot of what was food smelled rotten. But after some scrounging, the coyote picked a piece of pork fat from the object.

Suddenly, the coyote heard a loud slam from outside the object. It lifted its head to find the den's door open, with the light from inside creating the silhouette of a large human. The human walked out the door and down the steps, a large gun in hand. The coyote instinctually began to run, pork fat still in its mouth. It sprinted back towards the woods as fast as its legs could go. The human pointed the gun at the coyote, but did not shoot.

The coyote ducked into the brush of the forest with little more than a backwards glance. It continued to run until it could run no more. Finally, with the house and man with the gun out of sight, the coyote laid down in the moonlit brush. The nightly insect sounds and wooded scents of the forest returned to coyot, almost as if the forest were welcoming it back. The coyote ate the little food it had procured from the hollow human object in a few small bites then curled into a ball, its paws under its body and its tail over its nose. It quickly drifted off to sleep.

It was sunrise when the coyote woke up again. It stood up, stretching its legs. The coyote's whole body hurt after the night of running. The coyote had the urge to return to the city again and see what was left of last night's events, but it decided not to. It was too risky and gave too little reward. It was hard to resist the urge, but after what had happened the previous night, for the first time ever the coyote was more than happy to stay in the forest.