Christopher Allen
1. THE DISPATCHTurtle
Our task is to find food in our nature. My older brother and I are assigned to the same tent—because of my secret. I collect berries, but my brother wants meat. A box turtle has made the mistake of being seen, getting caught. My brother had a big breakfast, so it’s safe for now. He’s 15, the turtle probably 20 judging by its ridges, a long time to lope around in a forest full of Boy Scouts. My brother came because his friends Terry and Jay are here. Jay just got out of juvey. I keep the turtle in a pen I made of bark. I wouldn’t know how to eat the turtle. On a Boy Scout survival weekend you can eat dandelions, blackberries, nettle, elderberry and Bolete mushrooms, which you can find under pine trees. And turtle, my brother says, munching on the granola bar he sneaked, says he’ll kill me if I tell.
When the troop’s campfire dies down my brother says we have to go hunting because survivors hunt at night. We slip into the trees with Terry and Jay, who smuggled in a flashlight. The three of them move fast, but I keep up. What are we hunting? I say when we come to a clearing. My brother stops, laughs and says You, you little bed-wetter in a forest-whisper but loud enough for Terry and Jay to echo bed-wetter, bed-wetter. It’s my worst secret, rage my worst impulse, me against three. Did you know that a punch to the face feels dull? Like you’re just meat? Death must be like this. The next day when I kill the turtle—no one here is hungry but me—I throw it against a tree again and again until its guts ooze out its back.
2. BUREAU INVENTORYMobile
Earbuds
Very bad airplane wine
A pen
An old journal
Note: Unfortunately, there's not much room on an airplane foldaway tray. I don't have a desk or a bookshelf.
3. BIOGRAPHYChristopher Allen is the author of the flash fiction collection Other Household Toxins. His work has appeared in The Best Small Fictions, Booth, Indiana Review, Split Lip Magazine and lots of other really good places. Allen is a nomad and the editor-in-chief of SmokeLong Quarterly.