Coyote by Corey Bryan

It is incredibly easy to drive a hundred miles an hour. It takes three things. There should
be no car in front of you. There should be an unbelievable amount of trees to your right.
So thick that when you look out the passenger window it looks black. Lastly, there
should be a girl named Chloe that you are driving toward. It is incredibly easy to drive a
hundred miles an hour and so I did it. It felt like sitting. It felt like nothing at all.

When I was a child and we would be driving for a very long time on the highway I would
look out the window often. It was fun to look out the window on the highway. The grass
somehow stays the same shade of green even when you cross state lines. Mundanity is
good because it can be broken up. For example, there is a lot of the same green grass
along the side of the highway, but fewer white crosses. Seeing one is exciting even
though it means people died there. It means that people died there and believed in God.
Or their families believed in God. Either way, the crosses were usually very white.

It was more public than a graveyard. I do not have a lot of thoughts about Death.
Sometimes he just finds you and grabs you by the throat until you can’t breathe. His grip
only relaxes if you begin to think about him. Death is a man. Death is vain, too, inserting
himself everywhere. Like Chloe inserting herself in my thoughts on a monotonous six
hour drive. Only Death is cold, and Chloe is warm. She is socks put on right out of the
dryer. Tossed with a lavender dryer sheet.

There is power in a thought. I thought about Death and He arrived. I didn’t mean to think
about Him just as I did not mean to hit the coyote in the left lane on I-20. It just

happened and once you start you cannot stop. I flew into its side at one hundred miles
and hour and it died with a sharp yap. He was going zero miles and hour. I gave him
everything I had, at least. It is much harder to stop going a hundred miles an hour than it
is to start. Somehow, I did not panic. I did not slam the brakes but gently eased them to
the floor, like lowering a heavy piece of furniture. The hood of the car was crunched
from the weight of his small body. One car flew past. Everything looks faster when
you’re standing still. The car looked like a white rope before it shrunk down to a speck
on the horizon. The sound of it shocked my ear drums as I got out of the car onto the
left shoulder. I was frozen with fear and I understood then that the coyote was very
brave.

When there is nothing for your body to do your brain will make it up. There was nothing
left for the coyote’s body. The lower half of it rested in the grass meadow of the median.
The other half hung across the deep yellow line of paint, tongue lolling onto the asphalt.
His brain, with all its internal organs decimated, said, “Open your eyes! Open them! It’s
the last time we ever will.” So he did. There was no blood that I could see. There was no
blood the coyote could see either.
The back half of the coyote looked like a still life painting. It did not belong in the same
world as cars or highways. I grabbed the haunches and was struck with the sensation of
desecration. I pulled anyway. It was one of the few things my brain could think of. The
tall grass lapped at the bright brown fur. The grass was yellow with autumn and I could
not tell where his body ended and the grass began. I pulled until his chin rested fully in

the small meadow. His body was warm still. I sat crossed legged in the grass beside
him and did the only thing I could do. Call Chloe.

I thought to name the Coyote. So I did. Coyote’s eyes were wide open. They were so
brown they were black. The thin film on them held light within each eyeball. The clouds
moved in miniature across them. I couldn’t see fear in them. Maybe he never saw me
coming. That would be best I think. The phone stopped ringing and Chloe answered.
She didn’t say anything.

“Hello.”

“What happened.”

“I am here on the side of the road with Coyote,” I said. I held the phone close to my ear.
The cars were so loud. My left hand was in his fur. “My hand is in his fur. There isn’t any
blood.”

“Is Coyote a coyote?” she asked. Her voice was honey. I put the phone on speaker in
case there was anything left inside his head to hear it.

“He was.”

“That’s semantics.”

“That’s life.”

“That’s death.”

“I miss you.” I had not realized I was crying. My eyes were wet and the clouds in
Coyote’s eyes began to look like mushrooms. And suddenly I knew he was dead. I
hadn’t known it before. Not really. I couldn’t build him a small white cross, even if I
wanted to. I took a deep and desperate breath. I had been underwater until this
moment. “I didn’t mean to do it.”

“I know you didn’t.”

“There’s nothing to be done.”

“Are his eyes open?”

“They are.”

“Close them,” she said. So I did. It was the only thing to do. “Now come home.” The
phone disconnected and I walked back to the car. From the rearview mirror, Coyote was
sleeping. The clouds above moved slowly behind his eyelids. I pulled onto the highway

and looked back one more time. I could not tell where his body ended, and the waving
grass began.

C.W. Bryan is a student at Georgia State University. He lives in Atlanta, GA where he writes poetry, nonfiction and short fiction. He is currently writing his weekly series, Poetry is Plagiarism, with Sam Kilkenny at poetryispretentious.com. His debut chapbook Celine was published with Bottlecap Press in 2023.