Shooting PheasantsShooting Pheasantsby Joshua AllenOlan raised his shotgun in what would have been seen by anobjective observer as a blur of fast motion, a glint of bluedsteel. The wheat swayed; the bird swayed with it. Heat, noiseand light turned into blood, feathers and smoke. Olan, alone inthe field, retrieved the bird without comment. He trekked to thefar end of the field, reloading a red shotgun shell into thewarm barrel of his gun, dropping the spent cartridge into one ofthe many pockets of his elaborate hunting vest. The bird,stuffed into the large pouch on the back of his vest, kickedwithout conviction; it was dead. It emitted a half-heartedsquawk when Olan bent to pick a grain of wheat from a low stalk.Olan moved a few yards south and went back into the rows ofthe wheat field, dragging his heavy boots through dew and mud.At the other end, Olan could see his car, a blue Saturn, waitingpatiently. A mechanical sound, a rhythmic pulse, drifted throughthe trees from the hard-packed dirt road on the other side. Olanwalked to the tree line, resting his shotgun in the crook of his

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arm so it was aimed in a harmless direction. He rested his freehand on a fence post.A silver bicycle was passing towards him. It was a long-distance bike. Its trundler, a middle-aged man, wore Spandexclothing wet with sweat in the usual places. His breathingsounded like that of a man who had come a long way, and stillhad a long way to go. Olan gave the stranger a wave as heapproached, bypassing the normal lines of small talk out ofrespect for the man's dedicated laboring. The stranger nodded inreturn, too tired even to lift a hand. No other sound except thesteady pulse of a well-oiled chain driving the gears of anexpensive bicycle passed through the field or beyond. A thoughtoccurred to Olan, but a breeze took it like milkweed spores intothe atmosphere. The wheat swayed, the clouds subdued the sun foronly a second.In a blur of blued steel and polished walnut, Olan whippedthe shotgun to his shoulder and fired a single shot. The blastreverberated across the plains, answered by nothing.When the sound cleared, a bird whistled above him in thetrees. This was followed by the sort of utter silence thatoccurs in a theatre as the lights dim and the curtain rises.Olan turned, already reloading his shotgun, snatching the spentshell from midair when it ejected and putting it in the pocket

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of his jeans. He moved down a few yards south, and proceededacross the field, then back; he saw nothing move except thewheat.He popped his shotgun open, caught the unspent shell andslipped it into one of the elastic loops on his vest. At hiscar, he placed the shotgun in the trunk and retrieved his Buckknife. He spilled the pheasant's guts into the grass in theditch by the trees. He was methodical and patient as he dressedthe bird--the mark of a man who has performed the task countlesstimes. He even picked some of the shot from the pheasant'sbreast with the tip of his knife. He washed the feathers andblood from his hands with water he kept in a canteen he hadpurchased at a military surplus store. He took a drink of thelukewarm water. Olan's car was an oven; the temperature for awinter day was unusual, but the weather channel predicted snowlater that night. The layer of sweat on his forehead began todry to a patina of salt as he waited in his car for the airconditioner to reach the cooling level. He backed the car outfrom the entrance to the game preserve, which was just a wheatfield at the edge of a forest, and drove down the right side ofthe road to avoid the bicycle. It lay there in a silver shimmer,like a complicated puddle of mercury, with only one small, redblemish. You wouldn't want to nudge such a delicate balance as