By Dave Kavanaugh
The tortoise enjoyed a quiet life in the junkyard. The sun would rise and he would poke his head out from his protective home and into the light. He wandered on his typical paths through the maze of rusted car parts, broken furniture, tattered cloth. He climbed and slid and tumbled over mounds of yellowed paper, scattered bones, broken appliances.
He did not care for the broken things, though occasionally they provided shade or a hiding place from circling vultures. What he really was after was found beneath the surface of the trash. With a flick of his beak and a stretch of his wrinkled neck, he could overturn a hubcap or a bit of newspaper and reveal a writhing feast: Wriggling grubs, fat purple worms, carpets of wrestling beetles, centipedes, pill bugs. He snatched them up greedily, chewing and swallowing while the bugs still squirmed so that his belly felt robust and alive. He especially liked biting earthworms in two and watching rich brown soil ooze from the severed halves.
There were other kinds of food in the junkyard, too. Tiny forests of mushrooms, fermented berries, sweet husks of melons and gourds, sugary black banana peels, minty grass that grew along the rocky edges of the roads that ran like veins through the trashscape. He searched for these first thing in the morning, before raccoons and the other scavengers arrived. He would snack on wounded moths if he could find them, lazy spiders, lost crickets, even a baby mouse if he were really lucky.
It was a good life for a tortoise, though the junkyard was not without danger. The talons of a dozen different birds had decorated his shell over the years. The tiny claws of raccoons and foxes had chipped away at the seam where his shell met his breastplate, but none had ever been able to pry them apart. He was a survivor.
The worst predator had no claws. Instead of footprints, it left in its wake twin lines of trampled dust. This predator roared like a wounded dog, rumbled like thunder, groaned like bending bone. Every morning and every afternoon, it prowled the junkyard. Its eyes were dirty glass. Its shell was almost like a turtle’s, heavy and protective, but this shell could tip backward and spill out a load of trash.
He quickly learned to avoid the dump truck. He knew its schedule and could elude most passings, but sometimes the truck would appear unexpectedly and he was forced to crawl to the edge of the road and curl up tightly in his shell. After the cloud of the dust and the storm of sound passed, he would wait for several minutes before cautiously moving on.
He walked, he ate, he hid. He spent the nights burrowed beneath the cool sand. And the decades ticked by as the trash rose, rotted, rose again.
The older he got, the less time he spent searching for mates. Once, he tried mating with a broken stereo, but the experience left him feeling empty and isolated, and he had not repeated it.
One hot day with a sultry sun and a parched blue sky, he was in a corner of the junkyard he rarely visited. The truck had come there the night before and the scent of mildew and rotten meat had woken him early. He made his way vigilantly to the source of the smell and spied a bunch of grapes on a heap of cardboard. Bloated, black, sparkling like treasure. Most were dusted with white mold, but a few were glistening and perfect, their skin stretched to bursting. Seeing no competitors around, he hurried forward toward the lane that separated him from the fruit.
The tortoise felt young again as he advanced across the gravel in the certain assurance of a succulent meal. Perhaps that was why he did not feel the immediate onset of fear when the sound of the truck came to his ears from down the alley.
He did not take his gaze from the grapes, but the noise grew louder and soon the rising cloud of the dust could no longer be ignored. He panicked, unsure of whether to turn back or scurry forward.
He continued forward, feet racing over the gravel. The clamor of the truck was deafening. He stopped halfway across the road, heart racing, breath hissing, then turned and slipped as he crawled back the way he had come.
The truck swerved into view and barreled toward him. He strained every muscle as he charged. Pebbles scraped along his breastplate. The wheels were nearing. The groans of the engine howled in his ears.
At the last second, his body stopped obeying the urging of his mind, and even as his neck craned forward and his front legs tore at the gravel, his shell tightened, squeezing on his limbs and pinching his tail.
The wheel passed over his shell with a little pop, but that was lost in the crunching of the gravel. The truck passed on down the lane.
He did not die right away. The back half of his body was crushed, but he found that he could move his head from side to side. This he did for the rest of the afternoon. Back and forth, eyes unfocused. He could no longer smell the grapes.
When the sun went down, his head drooped to the road and he stopped moving altogether.
Next morning, his corpse was crawling with little worms and ants. For lunch, a bird took his eyes. For an afternoon snack, a raccoon pried apart what remained of his shell and slurped down each morsel of meat before licking clean the jagged scraps.
By the time the dump truck rumbled past that evening, he was just another scrap of garbage in the road.
Enjoyed this. Well done.
This is a smart story.
Wonderful story. Great tension. The circle of.
Very well done.
Very well written but I’m crying and going to go visit my tortoise now.
Vivid details and they help make it a truly wonderful story, though with a tragic ending. It’s the story of life for all of us. Poking through the detritus of life, looking for edibles, then food for the worms at the end.
Did I mention the details? Loved this turtle’s eye view of the world.
So sad! This is the kind of story that gives me a knot in my stomach as I realise where it’s going. Even so (or especially so) it’s a solid well-written piece!
This lost me, I’m afraid. Tortoises don’t eat meat – insects maybe, but not baby mice. Plus I prefer stories with at least the hope of redemption…
Many tortoises are herbivores, but certain species (like the red-footed tortoise) are omnivores. Meat is not their main food source, but they’ll take it when they find it, and some sources recommend giving it as a food supplement to tortoise pets. If you have the stomach for it, you can search “tortoise eating meat” to find images of them eating mice, lizards, and more.
I can understand disliking the sad ending though. It’s not for everyone.
Excellent execution of a complex genre. Concise but full of emotion. Bravo!
Sad things are worth reading. The author demonstrates deep pathos and technical control over his craft.
I very much enjoyed this. The details and language are beautiful. A sad end for the tortoise yes, but we all end up on the scrapheap in the end right? A sad end for the broken stereo too come to think of it. Hoping to see more in the future.
Dave, this is so sad! And kind of gross, but beautifully written as always. A bit of nitty-gritty look at the circle of life.
Very sad but beautifully written!
Poor tortoise! I’m so sad. Well written and it depicts an excellent and detailed picture of the events that occurred. A dump has never been so beautifully described. Still, poor poor tortoise.