Beefy's Story: Part 2
#3 of Beefy the Bull's Story
Beefy's Story: Part 2
By: Beefy the Bull
Picking up shortly after we left off.
This story is Beefy's, from his point of view. Unfortunately a lot (not all thankfully) of this installment of the story is based on real life events. It's only as harsh as real life. No further warnings.
The world felt black. Nothing mattered to me at all, what was I suppose to do in a situation like this? I walked to class on auto-pilot, simply following the same routine that I had every day before. I looked through the mass of students, and saw nothing, they were just faceless creatures to me. They meant nothing, the world meant nothing- I quickly returned to the state of cynical nihilism. I was a mess and angry at the world -and myself- I looked down on the other students, living vain and commercial lives, they were nothing but hollow automatons. I didn't know what to do, or what was happening to me, but it was clear that something was wrong with me inside, and that in some way I was mentally inferior to the other students. There were so many things I just hadn't grasped until now. How many more things was I missing?
When I found hamburger on the menu at the school cafeteria, I felt my anger at the world transform to malice, pure and un-adultered hate. I had seen it a hundred times before, but I didn't know what it was, just some type of meat. But something within blocked my rage, my sorrow transformed it.
I wanted to destroy everything.
I semi-controlled my outburst and only threw over a stand-alone chip rack, scattering humans and sending bags of potato chips across the floor. I shouted at all those in line in the serving-room.
" I suppose you'd eat me too?" I tried to prevent the tears from rolling down my face, each one a sign of weakness. I kicked the fallen chip rack across the room and stormed out. I got suspended for three days for the outburst, but I didn't care. I didn't care about anything; but I cared about everything. I just wanted to be a good quiet calf, and read my books. Why did things have to be like this?
Someone from the school administration had arranged for me a job, I guess they decided distracting me would keep me out of 'trouble'. It was on the outskirts of the city, a night job at a shipping warehouse, moving crates about the warehouse for shipping the next day. It was a simple job, with low pay and not many demands, but I worked hard none the less. I liked the solitude, the only being in the massive warehouse. I spent almost all of my time at work or school, the small amount of free time I had was used reading books, or walking around the warehouse district, looking for cool things to play with. You could find cool things in the trash, if you looked around. I found all sorts of strange junk, and would take it to a fort I built of old crates, fallen logs and shipping pallets. It was hidden in a section of woods that was undeveloped and surrounded by the old industrial buildings.
But soon for me schooling was over, the school graduation party was the last time I saw all the students, the ones I hated and the ones I liked. Jack joined the army after graduation, and I never saw him again, though I grudgingly admitted to myself that I still had feelings for him.
I walked out the front doors of the school and into the darkness- left to my own devices for the rest of my life. I moved back to the farm with Aunty and Uncle and continued to work in the warehouse at night, by myself, and slept in my room during the day. But the farm was struggling, and Aunty and Uncle were in debt. I tried to help them financially as much as possible with all the money I made, but ultimately it wasn't enough. The farm was sold, and I had to leave the home I had known for so long. I was given the option of moving out of state with them, or staying and trying to live on my own. I chose to go with them, and move to the big city, with its lights and buzz of activity. I felt so hopeful for the first time in years! I could start over, a new home, a new job, and new people that didn't know my shameful past. I decided I would put my past behind me, and chose not to remember ever again the things that happened before I graduated from school. I would let that fade in to the dark, and it would be lost to me.
But things didn't work out at all. We couldn't afford a house so we ended up living in a trailer in the dredges of the city's outskirts. We were still in debt, and I took up the only job I could get at the time, working in a factory- also at night, running a lathe. At first it was fun standing in the dark factory, surrounded by giant machines, silent as if they slept, while I worked the nights away under a bulb that flickered every time the machine's electric actuators moved. It started off simple, watch the machine, if it breaks, or there's a problem stop it, and check the all parts with a gage. Pack them nicely, and go home at five in the morning- no over time.
And that was what I did, as usual I worked a hard as I could, and put in the best effort I could at all times. and at five I would walk home to the trailer and enter quietly, as not to wake the sleeping aunt and uncle. I stepped in slowly, because the squeaky and weak suspension shifted under my weight despite the jacks holding the trailer up. The trailer was a dumpy old affair, it was about forty feet long and eight wide, with a small bedroom in back, and a miny bathroom in the middle. The bathroom was a joke- the shower cube was about two and a half feet square, I simply couldn't fit in it properly, if I squeezed in my head hit the ceiling, I couldn't move, and the door wouldn't close properly. All the functions of the room were just too small for me. The front of the trailer had a small kitchenette and a 'living-room'. More like an eight by eight area with table and chairs, and a couch. Aunty and Uncle slept in the bedroom in back, and I slept on the floor of the kitchenette, and my cousin that was living with us slept on the couch. It was difficult because Uncle would get up for work in the morning and Aunty would wake up my cousin and all in all it was hard to sleep with someone making coffee and cooking in your bed. I didn't get much sleep, sometimes only a few hours a day. Work got harder, the boss wanted me to do more work, and better. Always more, always better, never for more pay. He was a short-tempered man, who had no qualms with degrading his employees if he was mad. But he was always mad at something, it was a lose- lose situation with him- he couldn't be pleased, and many times the things he would call me to yell at me about were not my fault, but he wouldn't listen. Everything I had to say was just an 'excuse'. I was so depressed about work became anxious before bed time every night, because I knew when I woke up I would have to go to work. When I woke in the mornings, I would groan in misery- work. The first thing that passed through my mind was that I should kill myself, as that would be better than going back to that hell. And it was literally a hell- there was no heating or air conditioning in the factory floor, it was either dripping hot and humid, or so cold that I had to wrap myself up with extra clothes. Soon I started watching multiple machines, and they were loud, one had to shout to be heard over the machines even when standing right next to someone. Oil covered everything, the machines sprayed it all over indiscriminately, it burned my eyes every day when I went home and washed it out of my fur.
I listened to metal a lot more, but ultimately it didn't help out, but rather its depressing songs of death misery and suffering only put me in to a darker and darker place. Soon it was to the point when I returned from work, I would sit in the chained off storage yard and listen to the most depressing of songs over and over, wishing I didn't exist. It didn't help that the memories I willed in to the dark deep chose to surface again, and haunt me with all my past failings and pains.
Slowly the thought of suicide became more appealing. Anything to not feel like this. I was stuck, I had no money, no resources, I was physically, emotionally, and spiritually exhausted. What the hell was the point of this existence? Why go on? I started to think of ideal ways to kill myself. Finally I decided to hang myself, under a bridge that ran through a wash in the industrial center. One afternoon as night fell I stood on a ledge, and tied a stout rope around a large pipe that ran under the length of the bridge, and placed my head in the noose. I could end it all. The rope tightened around my neck, and a choking feeling set in, and I admit it was terrifying- this could be the end. I found I couldn't do it, I simply stood there on the ledge with the noose around my neck, thinking about the consequences. Aunty and Uncle wouldn't understand, they would be so sad. I was having doubts about God, what if I was wrong, and God existed, and I would go to hell for suicide? It was scary and painful experience. I pulled the noose off after an hour or so, and cut my rope down, and went home wishing I didn't exist.
Things didn't get any better, at work or at home. I had no friends, I was still paid minimum wage, I was still a sexual deviant, and still depressed.
I attempted suicide several more times, but long story short, I had been convinced that it was selfish to commit suicide, and I couldn't bring myself to do anything selfish. I simply didn't deserve the release of death. I wasn't worth it.
Selfish I am not, for myself I live not, exist I do to serve.
-Was the line I reminded myself of over and over. It was a black and dark world, devoid of color, warmth and purpose. I merely went through the motions, I was waiting to die. I wanted my family to hate me, to want me to die, so I could in peace. Sometimes I thought of telling Aunty and Uncle I was a faggot just so they would hate me.
But I couldn't take it much more. I was already in my twenty-first year and fast on my way to becoming an alcoholic, I had to have strong, high-proof hard liquor to make it through the day. I was a mess, sleeping about four hours a day, working sixty hours a week, making little money and keeping less. I started to have rampant suicidal thoughts, everything, every day, was about death. Everything I looked at, I thought of ways I could kill myself with it. A tree or pole was a good place to be hung. A sharp object or glass good for cutting veins. An intersection or highway a great place to play dodge-car. High places could be jumped from. If only I had a gun.
No one cared, or even knew apparently. One day Uncle took me aside and told me it was ok to be 'a little blue sometimes' , and that I should buck up... a little blue? sometimes? I hadn't smiled in a decade. It only made me more depressed to hear from him those words. I wanted to impress him, for him to care about me, but he didn't even know what was happening.
I started to become less effective at work, I was traumatized from my boss, yelling at me and putting me down for things he told me to do, no matter what I did, it was wrong, and I was in some way punished for it. The boss would tell me to do something in a very particular way at the beginning of shift and then at the end of shift he would explode and yell at me, threatening to fire me, and belittle me for doing exactly what he had told me to only ten hours before. And it happened over and over and over until I was scared to go to work.
Then I finally lost the job, my boss yelled at me and kicked me out, after years of dedicated work. I had nothing now. I had worked so hard and had not a damn thing to show for it. I was worse off than when I started, now I was not only broke, alone and depressed, but I was unable to function at a job for fear of making some mistake. I spent months unemployed sitting around the trailer, unable to find worth in myself, or trust my abilities. I was a mess of unstable emotions, so many ideas flashing through my mind. Suicide, run, stay, hate , fear, loss, hope.... I had to do something different, there was a feeling inside that begged for change, I couldn't do things like I was any longer. I made a decision, and stuck to it this once.
I packed my few things in a ratty duffle bag, and told Aunty and Uncle I was leaving. They protested some, but ultimately let me go, I had to be a bull now, and it was time to set off on my own. As bad as they treated me sometimes, and as angry at them as I was, I loved Aunty and Uncle. I hugged them both goodbye, and walked out of the park with my bag on my back, and only looked back once to see them watching me leave. It wasn't easy, but nothing had been easy in a long time.
And so I set out on my own, looking for something better. I had no real direction, no real plan. I gave myself an ultimatum- I told myself, this was the week that would change my life, or end it. If I couldn't find my way by the week end I would stand in front of a freight train. Period.
It was midnight two days later as I walked across the train cargo loading platform, and seated myself on a crate next to the tracks, with no real idea as what to do. I looked down to my hooves and saw a single page of a newspaper, and picking it up I found it was a help wanted section, the paper was two weeks old, but that didn't matter, I scanned the single page, then flipped it over. Near the bottom of the page was an advertisement that stood out to me.
"Wanted: Beings of free spirit, willing to do whatever necessary to live. Job Description: Rewarding and adventurous life, resource redistribution and maintenance or mechanical work. Will train and board. Military Training or experience, or Non-human a plus." It was followed by contact info and it had an address:
"Pier C, Drayton, TX."
Smiling I folded up the paper in to a square and put it in my pocket. I was going to Texas.