Print This Post
Way longer than I expected, the donation line at the zoo, people holding pet carriers full of guinea pigs, ducks, and ahead of me, some Cletus or Merle wearing a Lynyrd Skynyrd hat, frayed rope in hand, leading a haggard pony. A girl clings to her father, and with her other arm, hugs a ferret against her Labubu shirt, her face pink and shiny from tears. When his hamsters won’t stop squealing, a hipster with a Viking beard ring shakes their cage, tossing the rodents around like popcorn. An airplane flies past and doesn’t crash. Nobody notices.
On a gigantic billboard, a man and woman cradle smiling Disneyfied gerbils, and the sign reads: “Help the zoo mimic the natural food chain. Donate unwanted pets to provide meat for our carnivorous predators.”
Me, I’m meat, and man, am I ready to be eaten. I no longer care to live in this world of fascism, war, and genocide. My brothers, they cared. And what reward did their humanitarian work get them? American taxpayer-funded F-15s bombing the hospital where they were treating children. I can’t stand reality’s shitshow anymore. So here I am alone, without a family to donate me, nobody to care if I’m dead.
Finally, after for-friggin-ever, I near the end of the line, and the intake people escort the haggard pony off to become a lion meal or whatever.
A Napoleon Dynamite-looking nerd in overalls clenches a clipboard, zoo logo on his chest, clicking a ballpoint pen. “Good afternoon, sir. What have you brought to donate?”
“Table for one,” I say. “Just me.”
“Just you what?”
“I’m donating myself. If it’s all the same to you, I’d prefer you feed me to the wolves.”
Outrage on his face. Shock, I tell you. He spews a bunch of crap about never offering dogs or cats or people to the predators, as if we’re more important than the rest of the food chain. Guess they don’t want the bad PR from an anaconda swallowing the family dog or folks carting in their drunken uncle in a wheelbarrow to dump into the shark tank.
“Look,” I say, “one way or the other, I’m done. Fuck this bullshit world. Stick a fork in me.”
The Viking hipster snickers.
Napoleon Dynamite simmers down, takes on the soothing voice of a therapist trying to talk a hand grenade out of jumping off a roof, and suggests I call a suicide hotline.
Screw that.
I wander the zoo and watch tigers snarf on donated bunny wabbits. Chickens freak out and splash around the shallows of a crocodile or alligator enclosure—damned if I know which. Putting on a peep show in front of a polar bear’s faux Arctic pen, a couple makes out, oblivious to the ivory-colored behemoth, maw all scarlet, snacking on panicking chinchillas. Afternoon wears on into evening, and the sun falls from the heavens like rotten fruit. Closing time.
Nobody notices when I squirrel myself away in the restroom.
Once it’s dark and everyone’s gone, I sneak out. Nighttime at the zoo is loud with animal calls: monkeys howling, lions roaring, hyenas laughing at some sick joke. I slink past a guard who’s masturbating while he watches donkeys mate, and I creep toward the wolf habitat.
The pack’s bloody, finishing off a carcass with the donated pony’s markings. Lucky pinto bastard. Shaky from giddy apprehension, I climb the fence. The wolves have a sprawling meadow, space to run, but it must suck compared to the freedom of the Alaskan tundra or wherever they’re from. I break a branch off a dead tree and scrape my wrist. Blood seeps from the wound. Weak sauce, not a savage cut, meaning I won’t bleed out. Bummer. Anyway, I’d rather the wolves do the deed so my death will serve a purpose by feeding the pack. I smear red on my face and neck, chumming myself for wolf jaws, and put on my best Roy Scheider voice. “Chow time, puppies. Come get me.”
Moonlight shimmering in their eyes, the entire pack sniffs the air. Primal fear makes me go all shaky butterflies caught in headlights, but I ignore that shit. This is why I’m here.
The wolves don’t attack. Are their bellies full from devouring the pony? I charge the pack to rile them up, but they scatter, meek as domesticated pups, and I chase them to and fro, fro and to, until I wear myself out and collapse in the grass. Winded and sweaty, I peel off my shirt and paint myself with wrist blood. Rare meat, that’s me.
A eucalyptus tree sways in the breeze, blocks the moonlight, the rustling leaves like rain drowning my slowing heartbeat.
From across the meadow, a wolf lopes over and halts a few feet away to gaze at me, predator recognizing predator.
I lie back, arms spread in a servile posture, all Jesus-on-the-cross buffet, and shut my eyes. The wolf approaches. I feel it from the electrical charge of close bodies, hear the breathing, smell the musky fur and pony blood. It curls up beside me, its coat soft against my skin. With its tongue, the wolf sandpapers my bloody torso, then my bleeding wrist, those teeth so near.
Am I really ready to die?
But no, the wolf gently cleans my wound, and I remember Mom scrubbing behind my ears with a washcloth and sculpting a bubble bath beard onto my chin. Another wolf lies on my other side. And another. Surrounding me, like my brothers when we were little, camped out under warm blankets with a flashlight, reading comics. The pack cleans each other, licking off pony blood, and they clean me, licking off my blood. I try not to squirm, try not to giggle, but man, does it tickle.
==========
AUTHOR BIO:
Matt Hollingsworth is a neurodivergent human and award-winning color artist for Marvel, DC, and Image Comics. His prose has been nominated for Best of the Net, The InkMark Award, and Ellen Datlow’s The Best Horror of the Year and has appeared or is forthcoming in Interzone, Tales to Terrify, Uncharted, Fictive Dream, and Bourbon Penn.
Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/matthollingsworth.com
==========
WHY WE CHOSE TO PUBLISH “The Compassion of Predators”:
In his original submission, author Matt Hollingsworth added a content advisory for suicidal ideation. The piece certainly contains that, and normally it’s a topic we prefer not to publish.
However, Matt gave it a humorous twist that for us overcame any objections we might have had. It’s the well-crafted surprise at the end that turns this piece around and redeems an otherwise dark theme.
What a great idea–superior story from beginning to end. I love vibrant writing and piquant content, hard to find in many journals!