horse
by Bobby Fischer
When I was thirteen I found a horse skeleton in Shark River Park. My sister pointed it out. It was late Fall edging on Winter and a bleached white set of ribs reached like slender fingers out of the mud and vines just off the main trail. She didn't say anything, just pointed. I guess it was scary for her, these huge bones. And I guess I'm a bad older sister because I let it scare her. She walked home then, either because she was scared or because it was getting dark early and she was only nine. I felt better when I was alone. When it was just me, the early December air, a setting sun, and this horse skeleton.
How long does it take a horse to decompose. How many joggers had passed this decaying animal this summer, pinching their noses and keeping their eyes on the trail ahead. Where were the park rangers. Whose horse was it. Were there wild horses in New Jersey. Or worse, had this horse died or been killed somewhere else and someone had transferred her body here, placing it in the woods, reassembled in horse-shape. Was this even possible. And if so, why would anyone do this.
I stepped from the trail toward the skeleton. The mud had frozen and felt like concrete under my boots. I began to strip the brittle twining vines from the bones. My hands were long numb and as the dead vines cracked I felt it all through my body. Their sharp edges tore at my palms, scraping skin away, leaving raw patches and blood blisters.
I found out a couple of years later that I was allergic to horses. We went on a horseback ride through the desert on a family trip to the southwest. Village Creek in Arkansas. During the ride all I could think was, This is a skeleton. Beneath leathery hide and thick muscle there is bone. There is always bone. Life is built on a structure of bones. When life is gone only structure remains. No one knew I was allergic beforehand. When the ride was over, everyone was shocked by my face, including me. I was swollen purple, crying. My nose running. My hands were shaking and tearing at my skin, scratching. I had blood under my fingernails for the rest of the vacation.
Only slim shafts of moonlight dropped through the trees. I didn't notice that the night had gone full dark. I had taken my jacket off. Cold sweat dripped down my neck and back and pooled in all the places it could pool. Sharp edges of vines and bark scratched deep lines into my arms. The late Fall wind came in like papercuts, but the form of the skeleton revealed itself more and more. In the far distance, cars on the highway made shushing sounds at me.
I was breathing too hard, almost hyperventilating. My hands had become flaps of skin as red with blood as pink with flesh. The skull revealed itself. It was the color of moonlight, expressionless without eyes but still asking me questions. What makes you so special, this horse said. This structure of a horse. My vision began to close. Yellow dots stabbed through my eyes. I tried blinking them away but only blinked out the remaining moonlight.
My father's arms wrapped around me, pulling me away and lifting me into the air. I realized then that his voice had been in the distance, getting louder for sometime. My name on his tongue. I floated back to my father's car, weightless in his arms. My sister ran alongside, trying to keep up but stealing terrified glances backward at the structure.
A week later, my hands bandaged, I returned there with my eighth grade boyfriend. I wanted to kiss him by the horse skeleton, but it wasn't there anymore. Someone, a park ranger maybe, had taken it away.
Anyway. When I was thirteen, I found a horse skeleton in Shark River Park.
Bobby Fischer is a teacher living in suburban New Jersey.