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by Richard Brautigan
The night was cool and the stars were red. I walked down by the Watermelon Works. That's where we process the watermelons into sugar. We take the juice from the watermelons and cook it down until there's nothing left but sugar, and then we work it into the shape of this thing that we have: our lives.
I sat down on a couch by the river. Pauline had gotten me thinking about the tigers. I sat there and thought about them, how they killed and ate my parents.
We lived together in a shack by the river. My father raised watermelons and my mother baked bread. I was going to school.
I was nine years old and having trouble with arithmetic.
One morning the tigers came in while we were eating breakfast and before my father could grab a weapon they killed him and they killed my mother. My parents didn't even have time to say anything before they were dead. I was still holding the spoon from the mush I was eating.
"Don't be afraid," one of the tigers said. "We're not going to hurt you. We don't hurt children, just sit there where you are and we'll tell you a story."
One of the tigers started eating my mother. He bit her arm off and started chewing on it. "What kind of story would you like to hear? I know a good story about a rabbit."
"I don't want to hear a story," I said.
"OK," the tiger said, and he took a bite out of my father.
I sat there for a long time with the spoon in my hand, and then I put it down.
"Those were my folks," I said, finally.
"We're sorry," one of the tigers said. "We really are."
"Yeah," the other tiger said. "We wouldn't do this if we didn't have to, if we weren't absolutely forced to. But this is the only way we can keep alive."
"We're just like you," the other tiger said. "We speak the same language you do. We think the same thoughts, but we're tigers."
"You could help me with my arithmetic," I said.
"What's that?" one of the tigers said.
"My arithmetic."
"Oh, your arithmetic."
"Yeah."
"What do you want to know?" one of the tigers said.
"What's nine times nine?"
"Eighty-one," a tiger said.
"What's eight times eight?"
"Fifty-six," a tiger said.
I asked them half a dozen other questions: six times six, seven times four, etc. I was having a lot of trouble with arithmetic.
Finally the tigers got bored with my questions and told me to go away.
"OK," I said. "I'll go outside."
"Don't go too far," one of the tigers said. "We don't want anyone to come up here and kill us."
"OK."
They both went back to eating my parents. I went outside and sat down by the river. "I'm an orphan," I said.
I could see a trout in the river. He swam directly at me and then he stopped right where the river ends and the land begins.
He stared at me.
"What do you know about anything?" I said to the trout.
That was before I went to live at iDEATH.
After about an hour or so the tigers came outside and stretched and yawned.
"It's a nice day," one of the tigers said.
"Yeah," the other tiger said. "Beautiful."
"We're awfully sorry we had to kill your parents and eat them. Please try to understand. We tigers are not evil. This is just a thing we have to do."
"All right," I said. "And thanks for helping me with my arithmetic."
"Think nothing of it."
The tigers left.
I went over to ideath and told Charley that the tigers had eaten my parents.
"What a shame," he said.
"The tigers are so nice. Why do they have to go and do things like that?" I said.
"They can't help themselves," Charley said. "I like the tigers, too. I've had a lot of good conversations with them. They're very nice and have a good way of stating things, but we're going to have to get rid of them. Soon."
"One of them helped me with my arithmetic."
"They're very helpful," Charley said. "But they're dangerous. What are you going to do now?"
"I don't know," I said.
"How would you like to stay here at ideath?" Charley said.
"That sounds good," I said.
"Fine. Then it's settled," Charley said.
That night I went back to the shack and set fire to it. I didn't take anything with me and went to live at ideath. That was twenty years ago, though it seems like it was only yesterday: What's eight times eight?
Richard Brautigan
In Watermelon Sugar
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