It’s the day before Thanksgiving, the worst day to be a turkey. Currently, I’m working part-time at the Foraker Farm in Palmer. The people are nice. My job is to take care of the turkeys and get them fattened up for Thanksgiving. Now, that, normally, shouldn’t be a big deal. However, I have bonded with this turkey that I named Giblet. Tomorrow, I imagine myself in the middle of a decorated Thanksgiving table, white booties covering my feet and stuffed with pieces of bread.
Why would anyone want to eat a beautiful turkey like me? My body is perfectly round from visiting the trough so many times a day. The beautiful feathers covering me are a mixture of browns and blacks with a few flecks of whites here and there. In back, there are even more colored feathers fanned out like a neutral colored rainbow. Last summer I was named the Fattest Turkey in the state fair, and my name appeared in the local paper. Now I stand by my trough, pieces of feed surround me and I can’t help but to shake my head as I peck the seeds. The feed lost its taste long ago, but I eat anyway this is going to be my last meal ever.
Out of the thirteen original turkeys on the Allen farm, only two remain: me and Porky. As I peck at seeds, Porky circles the rusty wire fence making a clipped gobbling sound, his wrinkly red neck stretched out as if the metal blade of the ax is going to cut into his neck at any second. Tiny white feathers leap out of his body as he walks, floating down and disappearing onto the snow. I look at Porky with disgust, despite his name, Porky is skinny. His body is oval in shape, he is more like a chicken then a actual turkey. He hasn’t visited the trough all day! If only Porky would have eaten more, maybe he would be the one chosen for Thanksgiving dinner instead of me.
127 our experts are availableright now
As the sun begins to cast a blazing red shadow on the barn, I notice Porky has stopped gobbling and now is standing next to me at the trough.
“Porky,” I gobble. Now he chooses to eat, “Are you going to eat or just stand there, because I’m hungry.”
“We can still escape,” Porky says ignoring me, “Through that hole in the fence. I’ll show you”
Hole? I don’t remember a hole, but I follow Porky to the far left corner of the fence anyway. When we get there, I sigh. I couldn’t have fit through the hole even as a young turkey.
“Porky, look at the hole, not even you can fit! Besides, why do you want to escape, I am the one that’s going to be the Thanksgiving turkey” I gobble as gently as possible.
“Come on Giblet, the hole is huge, you can fit in it if you try!” Porky flaps his wings and twirls around.
“Porky, its useless I am going to be Thanksgiving dinner and who knows what’ll happen to you, you’ll probably end up as pig feed or something. This may seem harsh, Porky, but give up.”
“Being the prettiest, fattest bird must make you dumb because I am going to be the one who is Thanksgiving dinner, since you are such a -”
Porky never gets a chance to tell me what I am because the air is cut by the sound of chanting: “Turkey! Turkey! Turkey!”
Porky and I both see Mr. Allen making his way over arms slowly rocking from side to side as his black boots smack against the frozen ground. He wears a black vest with red buttons down the side. Suddenly, I feel exhausted from eating, without moving away from the hole in the fence, I let my self plop to the ground; eyes looking anywhere but at Mr. Allen.
At the same time, I see Porky wriggle through the hole, the teeth of the fence cutting through his feathers. Porky runs towards the woods as tiny white feathers follow in his wake. Mr. Allen walks slowly, but still catches up to Porky before he hits the edge of the woods (Even skinny turkeys are slow runners). Porky, strangled between Mr. Allen’s side and left arm, pecks at Mr. Allen his tiny, sapling legs still moving back and forth as he is carried off into the big, black shed.
Finally, legs swaying like trees in the wind, I lift myself up and proceed back to the trough, I pick up a stray seed and crunch it between by beak. I guess being the Fattest Turkey does pay.
