Cows by Matthew Stokoe Page B

shine. There was cleanness and order and warmth and companionship.
    Steven had made his dream real. Lucy was pregnant and eventually there would be a child, and with it would come the family he had seen night after night on TV. He would have to get another dog.
    Although he was still prone to the great wretched comparison of lives—his and the rest of the world—he felt at times superior to other men. They were blessed with happiness from birth, but he had had to force his into being with the strength of his own hands and will. And when he padded through the flat in the early morning, savoring the completeness of his satisfaction, he knew he had crafted well enough to be worthy of TV.
    But things did not stay that way. As time passed he became less sure of himself.
    It started three weeks after the Hagbeast’s death—a nagging anxiety that daily became more definite. At first he dismissed it as a reaction to sudden change, but the unease grew until each morning was a dreaded thing, bringing as it did a fresh increment of fear. The confidence of the first weeks left him and an impotent knowledge of the thousand massing things that could destroy his new life took its place.
    His will alone maintained the world within the flat, and the strain of resisting its collapse became unbearable. So many things could happen—Lucy might crack irreparably, the building might fall, he might wake one day to find he simply could not support his new freedom. And money … The rebirth of the flat required funds and he had not been to the plant since that night with the pliers. It was too much for a weak man.
    But he had been strong before. He had had the strength to kill his mother.
    It took a week of sniveling through early-morning hours until he understood what he needed. A death. Killing. Killing had given him the strength to start things and he needed more of it to continue. He needed another blood-burning injection of certainty. He needed what Cripps had shown him.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

    S teven left very early for the plant, before the streets filled. Left while the sky was still an orange-scummed blackness so that the bus would be empty. He felt flayed, as though every paranoid receptor he possessed was trained on the gulf between himself and others. His brief escape from inferiority only intensified the pain of his return.
    He made it, but it was hard. He kept his eyes closed and pushed himself tight into a corner of the dirty vinyl bench at the back of the bus. He counted stops until it was time to dash into the coolness of the dawning city. Trash cans in an alley at the side of the plant hid him until the gates opened, and then he made another dash.
    Inside, back at the grinder, it was better. The process hall, with all its ghastly content, held some degree of familiarity that made the world easier to bear. A month’s absence seemed to matter to no one. He clocked in as usual and was assigned as usual, sat on his stool and humped meat as usual. Once, far down the hall, Cripps stuck his head out of the slaughter room, looked straight at him and smiled, nodded, then disappeared again.
    At lunchtime the Guernsey pressed its face against the ventilation grille and spoke to Steven.
    “You’re back, man. We been waiting a long time and I gotta say our faith was getting shaky.”
    “What faith? I told you I wouldn’t do it.”
    “Well, us cows got that old intuition, we knew you’d change your mind.”
    “Who says I’ve changed it? Maybe I’m back because I need the money.”
    “Sure, dude. And maybe I take it up the ass. We saw you hiding out there at the side of the plant this morning, twitching and jumping. Cold turkey, man.”
    “Bullshit.”
    “That supposed to be funny?”
    “What do you mean?”
    “Forget it … You can’t kill without getting infected. It don’t have the effect Cripps says, but it gets under your skin in other ways. We warned you.”
    The Guernsey’s voice got harsh and Steven saw the muscles of