"Where should I put this thing?" Luta Su, the catahoula leopard dog, held the rabbit's left rear leg in her mouth. Much of the blood drained, the leg was becoming cold and stiff. Strangely enough, the leg did not object.
The reader should note here that Luta did not mumble nor slur as would be expected in such a situation, a situation in which one of our beloved protagonists has a small animal's appendage in her mouth. It should be further noted that this is only a loose translation and a report of the proceeding events. Many mumbles, slurs, growls and whimpers could not, or would not, be translated. I beg your pardon.
"Well, in your belly, of course." said Bella, the Shiba Inu. She sat nearby in the shade of a black elderberry, her plush red tail swiping once every twenty seconds to discourage the carpenter ants.
"What is your deal lady?" shouted ant 43. "I got a family to feed!" This was loud for an ant. I'm sure you can imagine.
"The LEG?! Gross. Maybe I should just bury it."
"Please, darling. I know you get to sleep inside every night and your human has decided it's necessary to soften your food, but leave the domestication with him. You are with me today."
"Ahem. Excuse me, but I just couldn't help but overhear," The rabbit, halfway consumed and in five to six pieces, simply could not help himself. Despite no longer retaining any physical dexterity, he nudged himself into the conversation.
Yet again, a note to the reader: I am, and will continue to remain, unapologetic about reporting dialogue from a dead rabbit. Again, I am merely reporting the events here. As any good dialogue pushes any good story, I am compelled to include each occurrence of spoken word, including speech blanketed in the raunchy aroma of death. (Directors Cut Bonus Note: most rabbits speak in a soggy, dense, smaze of Ulster English, an archaic dialect spoken otherwise in northern Ireland. As you can imagine, I caught every fifth-to-sixth word. I surmised the rest, naturally.)
"I would have to agree with the red fellow I'm afraid," continued the rabbit.
"I'm a woman," corrected Bella. "And my name is, well, it's complicated. But you can call me Bella."
"Err, sorry about that," said the rabbit. "Terribly embarrassing. Please forgive me Bella. You see, it seems the tall one has consumed my eyes and I'm going off of smell, hearing and memory of you both chasing me. And you weren't saying much then. Just reacting. I'm sorry, and your name is?"
"I'm Luta Su." offered the catahoula. "And yes, your eyes were delicious, I must say."
"Oh well, please. You don't have to. Well, thank you. Thank you very much," replied the rabbit. "As I was saying, I tend to agree with Bella. Eating the hind legs of your kill, my hind legs in fact, well that seems like an important step. Our culture anymore is quick to wolf-down (at this phrase both Luta and Bella noticeably cringed) the eyes, to slurp the tasty bits, to find the candy and run. Well, what happened to the ones who prefer the big bones and taught sinew? And the history? Those legs are powerful and wonderful, well, they were, and they have stories to tell. If only legs could talk."
Everyone had a good laugh at that. "You silly bastard," said ant 756. "If legs could talk! What a shithead you are!"
"I know I probably should have saved your eyes for last," Luta dropped the rabbit's leg and sat down. One could say she appeared tense. Perhaps, defensive. "But I get excited. You know, lost in the moment. And then these legs, well, I mean. Well, something will eat them, right?" Bella obliterated sixteen ants with her tail before they could raise their hands.
Luta continued, "And I'm sorry, but history is just so boring." She remembered the way her human made his eyes when she would not eat her food without him softening it first. She tried to do the same with her eyes now.
Final note to the reader: The wind really spoke up here, spewing an endless string of obscenities and counterpoints. The dude can be a hyper-opinionated asshole. In the interest of protecting our austerity, I left his tirade out. You'll thank me later.
"Darling," said Bella. "This isn't about entertaining you." She snapped emphasis on the end of her sentence, emphasis similar to a sparrow shaking the last drops of water from her wings after a bath. "This isn't about pure consumption and a filling of that which is empty. This isn't about satiation. This is about love. Loving your body and what you put in it. Loving each bite. Loving this rabbit and even his legs. From love comes respect and gratitude. From love comes appreciation, acceptance and true, full-body nourishment. While it can be highly engaging and it can whisk you away, food is not entertainment. It is not a means to an end. Although some would lead you to think differently, it is not a drug. Food is a gift from the earth and that gift must be cherished. Has everyone forgotten that we must love our food with our hearts and our minds, not only our bellies?"
"Well put my dear," said the rabbit. If he had tear ducts left he would surely have dropped a couple of tear turds. "All true. And your attitude toward history, my dear Luta?" (He kept his tone more like a well-fed hyena; still tricky, still alarming, but also gregariously drunk and approachable) "Well, it is understandable, I suppose. Too many see history through the rather colorless lenses of organization and chapters and review questions. There are not enough true storytellers anymore, not enough magical creatures adept at bringing you to the edge of your seat, those practiced in the weave of the vivid, those who can pull you into another dimension by combining language, movement, timing and awareness into a powerful knowledge-composing instrument. History should be a good story told, a collection of fortunate or unfortunate events stitched together by the needle of curiosity and compassion, crafted into a quilt of truth, family, tears and laughter. History, my friend, is the grandmother of life. If you are patient, if you dare practice the lost art of listening, she may tell you a story you could never forget."
"The lost art of listening?" Luta asked. She was already halfway done with the leg. She still was not mumbling.
"Oh god, the listening snob?" said ant 193. She said this while casually carrying a rock twenty-five times her weight, backwards and vertically up the trunk of a spruce tree. "The one with the biggest ears and all the patience and reciprocal energies and blah blah blah? Please, don't get him started." The ant paused, she shifted the enormity of her load, she felt an opportunity. "But if you have a second, have you heard much about structural mechanics? Those humans are really mucking things up. Their shelters will last maayyyyybe a century or so. Tops. Not one of us believes they built the pyramids. We'd be willing to work out some kind of consulting rate if you could put in a word for us? Or, we could give you some information on that shady little elderberry you keep hanging out by. Did you know the berries and flowers are edible but the leaves are toxic? My queen says that you should never– "
Bella's tail again annihilated our tiny insect's dialogue section. No one wrote down their cell number. Hopefully, we can find them on Facebook.
"Done!" Luta stood as she finished and her belly made itself know in the space around her. It shoved molecules, knocked them down for their lunch money.
"What if there were regular listening and food classes starting in kindergarten? Could you imagine?" The rabbit now spoke through a thick layer of bile and other enzymes, through a stomach wall, skeletal muscle, ribs and a thin layer of skin and hair.
"Wait," said Luta, as they began their journey home. "Did you hear something?"
"Not a thing," replied Bella. She knew the young catahoula had had enough lessons for the day. "We better get home. Oh, and speaking of home, I'm sure you'll have worms after eating that guy. Your human is going to be pissed."
A worm in the near future almost objected, wanted to say something, but he hadn't really been listening.