Suit Yourself or Shoot Yourself.

I worked in Bulgaria in 2022, down in the badlands 40km south of Yambol, it's not too far from the Turkish border. It was the middle of summer so I would get attacked most days as I was harvesting almonds by big black horse flies.

They would land on the back of my neck and as they must have felt safe knowing both my hands were occupied with the tool that I was using to knock down the almonds, they could usually get a good suck In, from my blood, before I felt the stinging bite, dropped the tool and swatted one or more of them away. Cursing them in my native tongue. I was new meat. If I let one of them land on me for maybe five seconds blood would be running in a red stream down my neck, face or hands.

I told my boss and she just laughed. She was a formidable size with a tightly wound, barely contained hysterical rage. She lived alone on the next property nearby with her many animals and when I asked her what she did after work she said "I'm a fucking alcoholic." With a grim smile. I didn't ask her again.

The job was pretty easy and I had soon negotiated new hours. I now started work at daybreak around 6am. This meant that I got there before the flies and I was done with labouring around lunch time. My boss would bring me food every couple of days. Usually vegetables, some eggs and maybe some fresh yogurt which I mixed with wild honey from the beehives and this was probably my favourite thing for breakfast along with an espresso done in an Italian coffee maker on the hob. I found some mystery meat in the cellar of the house once when I was hungry. It was in unmarked cans; pink and gelatanious, the closest thing I could compare it to would be homemade corn beef. I asked the boss and she said "yes beef" that was the only information I could get out of her. She lived in her own place with her animals down the road.

After maybe four weeks working like this, the boss announced to me that I would be joined by a new worker, Mike, from Berlin. I just thought that it sounded like another mouth to feed.

Sure enough he turned up and he was from Austin Texas and an artist. A skinny hipster type with a bushy beard. I welcomed him to the guest house and it was pitch black night outside. The boss had picked him up from the airport and had made her excuses and left which left him and me to get to know each others public faces. Mask to mask metaphorically speaking. He was actually OK and it turned out he was a musician. I was amazed by how many bags he had on him. About three decent sized valises and a rucksack. It wasn't long before he was striding around the guesthouse looking for a place to set up his computers(plural) so that he could, in his words; "start working" I smiled along and went to my room as I had to get up at first light.

The next morning I poked my head into the living room and saw a laptop, various electronic boxes and devices plus loads of cables. It looked like organised chaos in there 

My new American mate was nowhere to be found so I went to work alone. I did the almonds and brought home a large brown paper sack full. When I got back he was limping around the kitchen and when I asked him what was wrong he showed me his slightly off colour big toe and said he had stubbed it on the side of the shower last night. I rolled my eyes on the way to my room and when I'd had a shower and got changed I came into the kitchen to fix some lunch. We ate together and Mike said he was recording an album on his laptop under the name "The Maybelline Wolves" I tried to not laugh out loud at the name but couldn't help giggling as I turned my back on him.

I started cutting up the white sheep cheese to make a sandwich, "Is there something funny man?" He asked as I was now laughing so hard I could feel urine threatening to leak out of me,

"How's the toe?" I managed to get out before doubling over in tears"THE MAYBELLINE WOLVES! Thats a classic mate thanks!" 

"You asshole!" He hissed and stormed into his music room, slamming the door as he did so.

I gave him half an hour to calm down before I went I to see him. "Can we talk Mike?" I asked

"I suppose" he said back in an unamused kind of way

"Mike, listen to me. You seem like a nice enough guy, but down here in the Bulgarian badlands no one gives a fuck. There are thousands of feral dogs in Bulgaria and a lot of them live down here . They have to fight with the local wildlife, meaning wolves and jackals just to stay alive. They have no friends in the human population either and farmers will shoot them, trap them or throw down poisoned meat to annihilate them. They are the outlaws of the animal kingdom. Once not far from here, in a small village a few years ago, an English lady and her disabled husband bought a house cheap for a few thousand Euros. They had an Alsatian dog, a male, who was a few years old. The woman adored this dog and it followed her everywhere until one day. She left her husband in the house just after breakfast time and walked to the local shops by the village square. Something didn't feel right that day. There seemed to be no one about which was strange. The birds were quiet and the whole village seemed deserted. Then she heard it! A low series of growls and snarls. She turned round and there was a pack of maybe fifteen feral dogs, starving and slavering their ribs poking through their fur like xylophones. She screamed and dropped her empty shopping basket as her Alsatian dog "Rudy" shit himself and ran off howling in terror. Then they surrounded her and slowly came together like a tightening noose. She was by now frantically trying to stay alive. She kicked out at one but another dog would bite her exposed flank, pretty soon she was severely bitten and bloody and she had dropped to her knees. That's when the Alpha of the pack took her. He was the largest animal of the group; an off white monster with perfect jaws. He clamped his yellow teeth around her windpipe and writhed from side to side until her neck was opened and she knew that she was dying. She tried in vain to protect her ripped open throat and face but her fingers ended up getting mangled up in the ferocity of the dogs machine like impulses, it's genetic code had ordered the kill from some savage ancestral command. When the locals eventually rescued her, she was gurgling blood and didn't make it to hospital."

Mike looked sceptical and suspicious.

"Is that true because I'm going to Google it?"

"Be my guest." I said and went to chop some firewood.