Tempered Magazine December 2013 // January 2014 // Issue 01 | Page 7

HEIRLOOM
By Sara Graybeal

My daddy was a hunter. He kept

branches and hurled pecans at

a rifle on the top shelf of his closet

each other across the yard. “You

and on the day after Thanksgiving

got me! You got me!” we cried

every year he took it down and

when hit, clutching our bellies and

wiped the dust away with a rag.

imagining our intestines spilling

Maurice and Sandrey and Kayle

through our fingers.

and I sat on the floor in front of him,
cross-legged, always the same
question: “Can we go with you this
year, Daddy?”

Daddy came home somber, as if
he’d spent the afternoon in church.
Parading around the truck, we
shouted, “Didja kill ‘em, Daddy?

We watched him from the front

Were they real bloody? Didja bring

porch as he slid the gun and the

any home?”

box of bullets into the passenger
seat and climbed into the truck.
We watched him grind down the
driveway, pull onto the pavement,
and speed up. Then we played
Pirates and Cowboys and Alien
Invasion, whittled guns out of tree

Some days he said, “I gave the
meat to Ms. Lucy, boys, for letting
me hunt in her woods.” Other days:
“Tell you the truth, I didn’t hit a darn
thing.” In all those years, we never
tried a bite of our daddy’s kill.

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