Help! A Bear Is Eating Me! by Mykle Hansen Page A

Baumer’s pathetic thigh. I choke back the urge to vomit; mustn’t ruin the paint.
    And what’s that behind them, piled high in the cargo area and the folded forward back seats? Piles of multicolored fur, some claws, some heads, all sticky with gore. It’s a big pile of dead bloody bears, brown and black. On the top of the pile is a baby black bear no larger than a two-year-old child, its small innocent bear face twisted into a death-snarl of agony. It wears leather motorcycle clothes and cracked reflective sunglasses. It’s Bomber. Baumer killed Bomber!
    Clutching the roof rack with my hands, I smash my bionic bear feet through the windshield. Edna and Frank scream as the car spins out of control, slides off the road and comes to a precarious stop on the edge of a steep ravine. Frank jumps out of the car wielding a shotgun, but I’m faster. Before he can aim I leap, somersault and land on him, slashing his face off with my bear claws. “You killed Bomber!” I scream. He shoots wild, unable to see, but then I am upon him, biting his hands — he’s even got my fucking Rolex! — until he drops the gun. I drag him to the car, remove his suede chukka boot and begin to eat his delicious almond-scented foot.
    But then out of the car leaps Wagner, grown now to the size of a huge husky, clutching the chewed up, slobbered-upon, tooth-perforated remains of my Rover’s passenger right-hand armrest in his mouth. Fucking dog! I run to kick him but he leaps up and locks his jaw onto my arm, simultaneously wagging his tail and blinking at me with those cute puppy dog eyes. I hate that! I gouge his eye with my other thumb and he yelps.
    Edna, standing beside us, complains: “Marv, be gentle with Wagner! He’s just playing.” Now blood streams from my forearm as Wagner scurries behind Edna’s feet, chewing innocently on the passenger-side airbag.
    “You stupid cow! You useless bag of tits!” I scream. “Your damn dog ate my car! Your damn boyfriend killed my bear! All you do is ruin everything! With your complaining and your condescending, your whining and your tittering, and your not ever dying!”
    Edna looks sad and regretful. Wagner, too, is curled up on the ground with his paw over his nose, avoiding my gaze. “Oh Marv,” she sobs, “I’m sorry, Sweet-ums.”
    “You ought to be sorry! You were supposed to die years ago! You have a congenital heart defect! I wouldn’t have married you if I thought you’d live so goddamn long!”
    “I didn’t mean to ruin your weekend, honey.” “Well you did a bang-up job, I gotta say. Spilling bear bait all over me, shooting me in the hip, not dying … Frankie … how do you do it? What’s your secret?”
    “I’ll just die now,” sniffles Edna contritely.
    “Oh I wish . That’s what you always say.”
    “You’re going to have to learn to take care of yourself sooner or later, Marv.”
    “Oh please. You sound like Dad now.”
    “Sorry, pudding. Okay, I’m dying. Bye.” And then she dies — just falls over like a bag of groceries, lands face flat in the mud. Wagner whimpers and licks her, but she doesn’t move. She’s dead.
    Wow. That was easy. It never occurred to me to just ask. (Note to self: read up on Power of Asking.) I look to pick up the shotgun, but it’s gone, and Baumer’s gone, and now Edna and Wagner are gone too. Good riddance! I walk to the Rover, my ticket to freedom, I put my hand on the drivers’ side door latch … but now I’m really craving , actually, some nuts and some berries. I haven’t had nuts and berries in weeks. And now that I’m free from the cacophony of stink that I’ve wallowed in for days, I can actually smell something ever so slightly nutty around here someplace. Mmmmmm. Nuts.
    So I follow my nose into the forest, which is just lovely to traverse when you’ve got bear feet, inside Armani slacks and Prada loafers. Finally, I’m looking my best again. I look fantastic, sexy and clean. And ahead through the boughs of