When the coyote galloped into the men’s wear section of the department store in the new mall, I had a feeling that the day was going to circumvent the norm. Call it a hunch. It galloped in, looked me in the eyes, yipped, and bounced past me. Then it hopped on the escalator and headed up to the second floor.
Normally, I wouldn’t be caught dead in this department store – I mean – I was part of the group that protested the construction of the new part of the building. My friend Steve and I were the ones who had chained ourselves to the trees that needed to be torn down. But my curiosity got the best of me. Maybe all those stories I have been reading lately about Zen Monks started to balance me. Who knows?
It was the day after Thanksgiving and I was on my way home from the coffee shop. The crowds, gathered around the enhanced entrance of our new mall., I noticed, were unusually thick. They were buzzing with a sense of heightened shopping awareness that was hard to ignore.
Like I said, maybe it was all those stories about Zen Monks. My anger at this massive— arguably architechecturally unappealing— building being built directly on the tree-lined path that I used to ride my bike on almost completely vanished. My anger vanished and it was replaced by a mild curiosity. If all those people liked it, then why couldn’t I?
Either way, I strode into the mall with an invigorating sense of fresh discovery, and I walked down the wide hall to the new department store.
The space! The staircases! I ended up in the men’s wear section. I was trying to ascertain the latest fashion trends so I would know what to look for at the thrift stores where I actually shopped. Here’s what I learned- the new black is black- and too expensive for me. I decided to see if they had a gadget section. I – like everyone I suppose – like me some gadgets.
There was an open area around the base of the escalator laden with fake plants, signs telling of sales, and a directory, which I headed towards.
That’s when the coyote ran past me. It was tan and grey, majestic and natural, bounding with the grace and ease of a dynamic musculature, and it seemed completely out of place. It was all curves and fluidity in a place of sharp angles and lines. Its eyes were a blue-grey. Its yip was less than a bark and more of a siren. It seemed lost, and confused, yet guided by the instinct to run.
It bound up the empty escalator, leaving a wake of dazed shoppers in its path. I heard footsteps like people were running after it. I ran up the escalator before the footsteps reached me.
At the top was a wide area similar to the one at the bottom, leading to house wares or the ‘linens’ section of the store. The wake of dazed shoppers and the occasional scream led me to believe the coyote had made its way to the corner– to the field of beds that composed the ‘bed’ section. I ran past the frightened shoppers and mothers and children and saw the coyote on the furthest bed. I made my way over, joined by some curious strangers, two of the mall’s security guards and six or seven of the department store’s workers, who had noticed the excitement.
The bed the coyote sat on was a king-sized four-post job. The posts were carved with elegant, but not gaudy, flourishes. It was the nicest bed in the lot, I thought. This coyote had some taste.
A loose circle of people formed. The coyote stood on the bed watching all of us, not growling, but definitely in a defensive stance. A security guard appeared next to me breathing hard. He said something unintelligible into his walkie-talkie, and then the walkie-talkie squawked something unintelligible back. I noticed the circle drawing a little closer. The coyote let out a low growl.
“Everyone just take it easy.” I said in as calm a voice as I could muster. “Let’s just all take a coupl’a steps back and keep our distance… okay….”
Everyone took a step back. I had learned a long time ago to speak up first. Those who spoke up first were often considered the ‘leader’. There were people starting to show up along the perimeter of the circle. I turned to the security guard next to me and pointed. “You should have someone keep those people back.”
He turned and looked at the approaching people. They were many in number. They were curious, as people are want to be. He turned to me, nodded his head, and walked off, squawking into his walkie-talkie and waving his arms at the gathering crowds. I asked the guy next to me, some random guy in a suit, if he had a phone that I could borrow. He reached into his breast pocket and handed me a little phone, which I flicked open and dialed.
I needed Steve. He lived only two blocks away. He would totally know what to do, I thought. He answered on the third ring. “Steve. I don’t know how to explain this, but I’m on the second floor of the new department store in the mall, in the corner near the beds. There is a very flammable situation that requires your special touch. There is a coyote in the mall, Steve.”
“Is this a joke?”
“I wish man… listen… things are very tense and there is an animal that needs help. There are suits and me and security guards and I’m sure the cops are on the way. There are no friendlies Steve, I repeat, no friendlies, and I am surrounded. I need help.”
Steve must have got the point, because he said, quickly, “Hold ‘em off. I’m on my way.” and hung up the phone.
I kept the phone up to my ear. I think the whole phone thing went with the whole ‘guy in charge’ image that I was creating.
When I looked at the coyote it looked right at me. It had a pleading look in its eye. Maybe it was my imagination. It had stopped growling but was looking intently at me, then, at everything around it, then at me again.
The loose group of people around the coyote–which I informally commanded– seemed dazed. We all had instinctually run here, but now what? The circle had once again, as circles will, begun to tighten up. “Hey… come on folks… “ I said… “Let’s step back.”
Just as we all took a step back two uniform police officers ran up to us with their guns drawn. Oh jeez, I thought. One of them said, “Who’s in charge here?”
Everyone looked at me. The cops asked me what was going on.
Once again I mustered the calmest voice I could. “I think this coyote wandered in here off the streets. I think it’s just as scared of us, as some of us are of it. I think those guns are raising the level of excitation to a dangerous level… the coyote is cornered.”
The two officers looked at me, then at the coyote, then at each other. They slowly holstered their weapons. It seemed everyone breathed a sigh of relief. Even the coyote circled once on the bed, sat down, and let out a little yelp, as if it were happy with the way things were progressing.
The police officers conferred, squawked into their squeakers, and one of them headed over towards me. I put the phone up to my ear and faked talking into it. “Yup… uh-huh… that’s right…” When the cop reached me I acknowledged him with my eyes, but I held up my finger politely to tell him that I was on the phone. “Yes… I understand.” I said.
I clicked shut the phone and looked up at the officer, happy he wasn’t the one who arrested me just last year. “We’ve called animal control.,” he said.
“Good… but I have orders that this animal is not to be harmed…. in any way.”
“Well… I understand that… but this is a wild animal. If it starts to…
Just then the phone I was holding rang, effectively cutting the police officer off. I answered it and a voice asked for Harold. I held up my hand to the cop indicating that the call was important and started jabbering away. “Yes… I understand… well the situation appears very stable now….” The cop looked somewhat annoyed and drifted away toward his partner. The voice that asked for Harold hung up confused. I was really getting into my role. I wondered just how far I could go… just what I could get all the people around us and the police to do at my mere suggestion. I continued jabbering away importantly into the telephone and started pacing a bit, like I imagine real people do in times of stress.
I thought I deserved an Oscar. I began to think I had a career in the theater. I began to see myself on stage playing the part of myself in ‘coyote’ the play.
The media showed up and I had to hop out of my head and be involved. Two camera people, four or five support folks with lights and wires, and two anchor people, which I recognized from the teevee.
The security guards had been doing a real good job keeping the perimeter secure, despite the ever-growing crowd. The cops had formed an inner perimeter; an inner circle of the people who had been here at the beginning of the event.
The outer group parted like an infamous sea to let the media people through, but they had been stopped at the outer edge of the inner circle. The camera people wielded their cameras like bazookas.
The media people and the cops conferred, they looked over at me and I walked over to them. “You can set up here, but no lights, you got it… bright lights will spook him… or her… “ I looked directly at the guys with the cameras, and their support crew. “You guys got that?”
They nodded. One of the news people, the woman from channel five, looked at me like she recognized me. She had interviewed me while I was chained to one of the trees last year. I moved away quickly.
I went and stood as close to the coyote as anyone had dared, and I stood looking into her eyes… from here I was pretty sure it was a her. And she was beautiful… It let out a little moan as we looked at each other, and I said, in a calm voice, “Everything’s going to be okay friend… everything’s going to be just fine…” and I repeated those phrases over and over to the coyote and myself like a mantra. I heard the news people start schpieling behind me. I stood there and chanted and wondered when my cover would be blown, staring into the coyote’s deep blue-grey eyes.
Many moments passed in this manner.
“Everything’s going to be just fine friend… everything’s going to be just fine.”
A man showed up demanding to know, “What the hell was going on?”
Apparently he was the store manager. He demanded to know what was going on and I’m not sure what else. I didn’t turn around. I heard him talking to the cops and I heard him saying “Who? Who the hell is he!?”
It would appear the time for action is nigh I thought to myself. I flicked open the phone and put it to my ear again.
I felt a tap on my shoulder and turned around, pretending that I was listening hard, amidst a conversation, on the phone. The Head Mucky-muck started to say something but I silenced him by holding my finger up and going “Yeah.. I understand.” into the phone. We all turned as my friend Steve caused his usual commotion barreling through the expanse of the outer crowds. All six foot eight of him. He had nine or ten people following close behind. His head of flaming red hair led everyone like a torch. “Yoo-hoo!” I called. “Ste-eve… over he-eeere!”
At the same time, from the left, came, in a flurry, two more police officers, and two white lab-coat wearing animal control officers. One of the animal control people had a big net, and the other had a steel box, which, I assumed contained a tranquilizer gun. The Mucky-muck started asking who I was again and I held up my finger, effectively silencing him once again. I started talking into the phone, reciting loose bits of poems.
Steve made his way through the crowd and was now circumventing, to the right, the media circus. We made eye connection and I held up my hand flat, then I pointed to the coyote. We needed a wall right there.
The animal control people started setting up an area to the left. They opened their box and started assembling their gun.
The Mucky-muck started to scream that I should be arrested. Steve and the five women and four men with him formed a human wall around the coyote, facing out. They locked arms and looked straight ahead, determined. I turned to the left and said “Hey Harold! Here’s your phone.” and I tossed the phone to a still dazed Harold. The police officer, who had his handcuffs out, started to rapidly approach me. “Everything’s under control now officer. You can pull your men back!”, I said, and then I laughed heartily. He grabbed my arms, pulled them behind my back and cuffed me.
One of the other police officers came to help lead me away, but I went calmly and quietly. Behind me the scene started to turn uproarious, with the Mucky-muck yelling and the teevee people trying to narrate the action to the public. I noticed they were taking me around to the left, past the animal control people, who now had their tranquilizer gun out, but could not get a clear shot. As we walked past I surged all my energy and leaned to the left, knocking myself and both officers down into the guy with the gun, which fell out of his hand, bounced on the ground, and went off.
As I struggled with the police officers, who were now determinedly using force to pin me down, I saw the Mucky-muck grab his shoulder and fall to the ground with a dazed look on his face. “Bulls eye.” I said.
Then I did what I do whenever I get arrested. I started loudly reciting the Declaration of Independence. One officer leaned heavily on my back and the other smooshed my head into the floor with the full weight of his body. The carpet smelled like chemicals.
Just before I lost consciousness I heard the coyote howl.
—–
By the time I was released the situation had calmed down. The Department Store, anxious to avoid a riot, had let the ‘protesters’ protect the coyote, and the sense of tension lifted. In a way it was good for sales. Everyone came by to have a look at ‘the doggie’, as Steve called her, shopping while they did.
We ‘protesters’ kept a constant vigil. We called the local Native American Tribe, the Abenakis, for advice, and three of the Elders came by to speak with us. They thought we were doing a good job, but were about as perplexed by the situation as we were. The coyote figures heavily in creation myth, in history, but not in prophecy. “If it was a white Buffalo we would know just what to do!” one of them had said to me. They did do a cleansing ceremony for the space, and that seemed to calm the energy of the area down even more.
And they did say to be careful. The coyote is a legendary trickster.
But there was nothing tricky about Tara, as she came to be called. Nothing tricky as far as I could see. I ended up ‘taking charge’ of the night shift, along with five of six others, and the constant two or three security guards Filene’s insisted upon. I wrote mostly— I’m working on another novel— while the others did homework or read or slept. And I slept too. Eventually every night at two or so I would drift off… trying to catch up with that place where my dreams roam.
By the second week in December we were all pretty friendly; the security guards, The Department Store folks, (even Mr. Mucky-muck!) and us ‘protesters… and of course Tara. She allowed everyone to approach her, to change her water or feed her or clean her sandbox… and she even let me sit on the bed a few times. She would look at me with those pleading eyes and I would go over and sit while she stretched her head toward me so that I would pet her.
She would whine softly and I would look into her eyes and wonder why she was here… wonder what meaning lay behind her actions… Was this a sign of the ‘end’ that people like to talk about. Or was she just a hint at a new beginning?
The week before Christmas Tara started following me when I went anywhere, like to the bathroom. And she would follow me all around the store, with the security guards always following behind. In the mornings when I left she would whine and moan when I went to leave. Steve, who was ’in charge’ of the day shift, said that maybe I had found my other. He said that maybe this coyote and I were twins, split only at the soul, and as I sat looking into her blue-grey eyes— eyes that were the color of winter skies— sometimes I would think the same thing.
Tomorrow is Christmas and Steve and I are the only ones who are going to watch Tara, besides the requisite security guards… but even they are in on the plan. We had all been thinking about what kind of present to get her… I mean… a bone just didn’t seem to cut it… so we all came up with this plan. We are going to see if Tara will follow me… through house wares, down the escalator, through men’s wear, and out, through the emergency exit, to the street. Steve said he would park his pick-up truck right outside and drive us both into the hills. He said he knew a perfect spot. A spot where we could both run free.