I Read that Pigs Scream Like People — Zoe Younessian
It happened after Bill’s farmhand went missing for the last time. Ma suggested that Palmer take his place, and Palmer didn’t hesitate to agree. He hated pigs but he hated the boy who came before him even more: a fool he’d watched stumble through his neighbor’s fields, who got lost periodically and wore a cherry-red flannel that marked him like a searchlight. Now he’d wandered off for good. Palmer smiled at the thought. On his first day at the job, when Bill handed him two buckets of scraps and a key to the pigsty, he’d felt his heart flutter in his throat with something like satisfaction, though Bill had only rolled his eyes.
“Don’t get lost,” Bill had said. Palmer cheerily assured him that he wouldn’t. Yet now, standing at the pigsty doors, he almost wished he had. The room smelled worse than he could’ve imagined, and mountains of hay piled against the wall prevented any light from trickling through. Dozens of pigs erupted from the darkness at his entrance. Palmer met their beady gazes and shuddered. He pulled the doors closed behind him.
In the grand scheme of things, it didn’t make sense that Palmer disliked pigs this much. Some of his earliest memories were of Bill’s pork: the smell of his bacon on Ma’s stove, the plate of ribs on their kitchen table, Palmer and his brothers descending on it, ripping into it, unstringing the dripping crimson sinews from the flesh. What a shame the animals themselves were so vile, Palmer thought. He loved the taste.
It was this taste that Palmer tried to recall as he trudged deeper into the filth of the pigsty. In the blackness, the boy could only guess where the trough was. As Palmer walked forward, the bodies of the pigs cloaked his feet, prodding him at every step he took. He raised a leg to kick them away.
Then all at once Palmer found himself at his knees. He retched. He felt nudges from every direction, scraps puddling around his feet. His fingers curled into something soft. When he raised it to his face, and the pigs parted for a moment from his hands, and his eyes had finished adjusting to the dark, he caught a glimpse of cherry red.
That fool. That stupid boy. Palmer didn’t understand how such a small person could even get past the pigs to leave his flannel there. They crowded all around him now, filthy masses that moved and seemed to talk, ramming their faces against the soft of his body until he yelped. No one would be able to hear him over the squeals of the animals. Palmer groaned. How could they be so desperate for food so disgusting? It reminded him of something he’d read once: that pigs were smart creatures, that they could adapt to eat anything. That they learn to love the taste.
Zoe Younessian is a writer from Connecticut. She hopes you have a great day.