Bored bear

What if I was a bear?

What if I was a bear who didn't like to hibernate?

What if I liked to hang out after all those other bears bitched out and went to sleep for months at a time? What would I do?

Well, I'd be cold. I'd be lonely. I'd be bored. I would be a bored bear.

I would walk around from time to time, feeling my way through the blustery forest, shaking snow off my fur coat. Wondering where the fish have gone. Also wondering where the water went? And why do I keep slipping on the bottom of where the river used to be?

I'd talk to squirrels. Squirrels would still hang out. We'd be able to play tag in the woods and I would never win. Because I'm a bear, but more importantly, they're squirrels. Squirrels don't lose in tag. Especially not to bears. I try. I try to become friends with them. But they're so pesky and annoying. All they do is run around forgetting where they put their shit. And it's like, I'm here to help, you know? That tree, with  the branches that split into two like a wishbone and the one that has those odd shaped leaves in the spring time, you buried them up against the north edge of that tree. Why the hell are you so confused? You need more brain.

I need better friends. These squirrels are assholes. All my friends are hibernating. I swear I have friends in the summer. And I'm the oldest of my siblings. We go on hunts together and I always get the most salmon. That shit is delicious. It's funny because I don't think they know how bad we eat them. The other salmons will laugh as their friends get caught, as if they're expecting to see them later. Yet I tear into his backbone and then he stops moving and starts tasting all delicious.

But. Where are the fish? I'm hungry and the river has turned into this slippery odd wet basin. I need to get out of this forest.

Well, the forest I'm in must be pretty fricking big, because I've been searching for days. I don't even know if I'm seeing the same crap anymore. I can't tell whether the squirrels I run into can't recognize me or if they just are dumb and forget that there's a large bear roaming about in search of good times and a nice warm bath.

Oh yeah, and where the hell did the sun go? I remember times when it would be gone for a day. But like, seriously? It hasn't been there at all for weeks. This sucks. I'm cold and lonely and bored. I'm conelord. 

What is this? It seems there's a large path here in the forest that I've found. This man came down it riding some armored vehicle or something. So I hit him off the thing and it went crashing into a tree. The man ran away, so I took his vehicle and tried to mess with it. It was kinda heavy. I think I'm on the right track. I mean, that was exciting.

The cub in me wants to go wake everyone up. I can't stand being the only one awake. It's like that Will Smith movie. Yeah, the one with zombies. Except I don't have a dog.

A day or two passes. I come to a clearing! There's tons of nothing here! It's like the desert, but white and not warm. And there's no food. I don't usually survive this long if I don't get anything to eat. I tell myself that I'm going to die soon, but then I never die. A bunny passes by me. He says his name is Curtis. Seemed like a nice guy, but he wasn't in the mood for a friend.

I met a new friend today. His name's Dave. He's a scamp of a coyote who agreed to help me find food other than him as he was pressed down in my jaws. I relinquished him, and he actually seems like a nice guy. He owns about two acres of territory, as marked off by his piss. I try to explain to him that this means nothing to bears, as we could easily devour him and make his digested corpse our territorial boundary. He doesn't seem to get it. He likes to fish, though he's not very good at it. Dave and I go around to more of the old river, and it's still all weird and wet and dry. Dave explains to me that this is ice, and that this happens every winter. It's actually the old water, just consolidated. It huddles for warmth and lies still. Like my family did. 

It's pretty cool watching Dave hunt. He runs really fast, like he's giving a lot of effort. I just kind of kill the killable things around me. But Dave gets me food in exchange for protection. From what, I don't know. There's nothing out here except dumb rabbits and dumber squirrels. I tell him we should look for something more exciting than the clearing. It's a big world out there, I wanna take in as much of it as I can. Dave and I head to this old edifice located down a ways from the clearing we found. There's some fenced in cows laying out in the snow. So Dave and I kill one of them. Her name was Edna. She said that before she died she had wanted to have a calf, but never got the opportunity to bear (LOL) a child. Sorry Edna, you were pretty damn delicious.

About halfway through Edna's torso, this old guy came out with a cannon of some sort. He shot it at us and it hit me in the leg. I was like "Ow!" but he leaned up to shoot it again, so Dave and I ran off, mouths red and tummies full.

Dave told me a super depressing story about his mom. Apparently she died while trying to teach her litter how to catch stuff. She got hit by one of those armored vehicle and got like, really killed. Dave told me he's never messed with any of 'em since. I told Dave that what we had done that night could serve as revenge for his mom. He didn't seem too satisfied.

Dave ate Curtis today. I was just about to tell him not to eat Curtis because Curtis had seemed pretty nice, but then I saw a deer running far off over the hillside, and I mean, how often do you see those things running around? Curtis seemed pissed at me. Well, disappointed really. He knew he had somethin' like it coming. Dave's a nice guy, but he should really use more discretion when he goes and eats things. Curtis' little brother saw him and got really upset. I told Curtis' little brother, Tony, that he'd be all right. Tony didn't buy it, smart little fella, and ran away.

Dave and I left the farm that week. We found more paths, apparently they're called roads if they're made of cement and let those vehicles, cars, run on them. So we kept walking down this one road and a bunch of vehicles passed us. Every time one did, Dave got super freaked out. It was hysterical. He began to howl, like at his mom or something.

It snowed a ton today. I couldn't keep shaking it off my coat fast enough. Dave got really cold and died. I tried to tell him he'd be okay. But he said it was his time to go anyway. He could've told me. I'm a little bummed, because now I don't know how the hell to get back to the forest. Wish I could ask Curtis for directions. Thanks a lot, Dave.

I just kind of turned around and started walking the other way. Now it's like all these vehicles stop and yell at me. At first it kinda freaked me out, but now I just yell back, "hey! you go away, vehicle!" I tried asking one for directions, but the female man's face just got really terrified and she made the thing trample my foot. I had to take a nap after that. That hurt a lot.

The weather got kind of not so cold today. The snow even started to turn into water a little bit. I found the farm that I stayed at, but I don't think it's a very good idea to stay here a while if I don't want the man with the cannon to hit me again. For the record, his vehicle was still beat up. Cool. Wonder if he knew it was me.

I found the clearing today, and I realized it's been too long since I've eaten. I'm starting to get more energy everyday. But at the same time, I feel hungrier. So that sucks. I saw Tony today, he didn't recognize me. Little runt. I decided to let him live though it killed me not to eat any food.

Maybe I should've eaten Tony. I'm starting to get dizzy. I need to eat something. The sun's been  out a couple times in the last few days. It seems like everyone will be getting up soon. I need to find my back. I find my way to the clearing. Now it's sort of a dead brownish yellowish color with some white snow splotches drooped in here and there. I try eating the snow, and that does nothing for me. I try eating the dirt, but I cough it up. Dumb idea.

Eff it. I'm just going to die here. I can't find my forest. I'm going to sleep now.

...zZz...

If bears go to heaven, this sucks. It's hot. The grass is green. The sky is gray. It's raining. I stagger to my feet. I'm in the clearing. I just.. slept? Ahh, darn it. I will have to go home now.

I found the forest today. At least it's a forest. I don't know where else it could go. I still haven't seen any other bears yet. They certainly have to be up by now, don't they? Yeah. They'll be up.

I walk deeper into this forest and come across that road where that guys vehicle got messed up. Almost home! I can practically smell the salmon. I run back to the territory where me and all my friends mess around. The first bear I see is Nellie. She's my best friend. I scream at her from thirty yards away. She doesn't recognize me. I walk up to her. "Hey Nellie, it's me! I'm up!"

She looks at me. "Who are you?"

I slash her face. Bears are dumb.

--Eliot Sill