Gnawing on Bones (rev)

Gnawing on Bones
(Word count: 273)

Slivers of moonlight fell through gaps in the barn’s roof and cut across a pig's carcass, illuminating a ghoulish scene.  Wet munching sounds thrummed from the pale-pink body.

A noise from the main house startled the glutton, who raised her head from inside the pig's chest. She'd been gnawing on a particularly lovely rib bone.  She quietly licked blood from her incisors and scratched at fleas.

The heavy tread of the farmer's boots crunched on the path outside.  With an outraged hiss, she skittered nimbly through the dark into her nest behind an old, flat tire.

The door to the barn screeched open on rusty hinges.  The farmer entered and walked into the abattoir, pushing through hanging coils of sausages as he searched. 

She quivered.

The man stumbled over the pig's remains and let loose a foul stream of expletives. 

She burrowed deeper into the old ripped flannel shirt that lined her nest, and rolled herself into a ball.

The beam from his flashlight flickered through the shadows and then glared into her hidey-hole; she blinked at the painful light.  A huge, hairy hand reached in, gripped the back of her neck, and ripped her from safety.  He shook her and she felt her bones dance and scrape together in a macabre jig. 

He dragged her out of the barn and up to the house.

She growled through her teeth and tried to get away - back to her bones.  At the door, he gave her one last shake and tossed her through, onto the floor. 

"Now get cleaned up and help your mother make supper or I'll chain you up again."