Herald stood at the refrigerator door, palpating the egg he had just taken from the carton.  He had made the carton himself from wood pulp and old newspapers.  He also farmed the egg himself, from his chickens that he had out back in the chicken coop, which was a little shack that he had built especially for the hens.  Herald was proud of his industrious nature and felt close to his work.  He continued to feel the egg.  Something was off.  It was heavy.  He shifted it from one hand to the other, letting it drop a little into each palm, feeling how it hit the hand.  He had collected the eggs that morning and was afraid he had let them sit out in the coop too long; he had been sick all week and today was the first day that he had been able to get out of bed.  He still had a bit of a wheeze, and when he started moving anywhere he got vertigo.  Standing hunched in the refrigerator as it blew cool air on him made him feel good, and it bit back the fever that was coming.

The egg was off.  Herald didn’t want another incident with Lois.  She refused to even step foot in the coop.  Said the little chicks reminded her of that syrupy little body cracked into the pan, already hot so it sizzled.

Better make breakfast myself tomorrow.  He put the egg back in the carton, which felt flimsy with use.  Five eggs?  There should be more than that.  Herald walked to the foot of the stairs, once gliding his hand along the wall to keep balance.  There was a light on still.  Lois hadn’t gone to sleep. “Lois.”  He called up to her.

No response.

“Lois.”  He didn’t feel like going upstairs.  If he did, he wouldn’t have the energy to come back down.  “Lois, are you up there?”

“Yes, what?”  She was annoyed.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m getting ready for bed.  I was brushing my teeth.  What do you want?  Can I have some privacy, please?”

“I was wondering if you had done anything with any of the eggs.”

No response.

“Lois?”

“You know I wouldn’t have anything to do with the eggs.  I’m in the bathroom, can I have some privacy?”

“Huh.”  Five eggs.  Herald had collected the eggs that morning despite the sweltering heat and his fever.  He knew he didn’t count the eggs, but it had seemed enough.  Herald walked back to the kitchen and looked out the window into the blue black: the coop a dark lump that he could almost make out.  Maybe a breath of fresh air would be good for him, cool his nerves.  He opened the back door and a hot mist lapped onto him, gushing in from outside.  It was humid.  Herald pushed out into the night like it was some viscous pudding that had been sitting on the radiator for weeks, steaming and putrid.  His tongue swelled up in the back of his mouth, preparing for vomit that he fought back.  He swallowed hard, his adam’s apple clicking with the tendons in his neck.  He was more than halfway there.  It wasn’t a big yard, but he thought that pacing himself, setting goals along the way, would help him across it.  He looked back at the house.  He could see Lois’s silhouette: she was combing her hair, clearly having taken a shower to cool herself from the humid night.  Herald thought that when he got back inside he should make sure to close all of the windows.  Fucking coop.  When he made it to the coop, he leaned up against it and set his head on the steady wall.  To get the world to stop from spinning.

Inside the coop was even darker and hotter.  The hens lightly clucked at Herald as he walked by if they were awake.  He checked for eggs.  Nothing.  Except under one chicken he felt something.  It felt like the hot mess of a broken egg and he pulled out his fingers expecting to have crushed egg all over them, but instead it was this strange dark substance that was solid.  He touched it with his other hand.  It was rubber like from a balloon.  He knew what this meant; he had seen this before.  Herald stormed out of the coop and hurried to the house, the sick and nausea gone from urgency.  He opened the door to the house and the cool invigorated him, pushed him forward and up the stairs to the bedroom where Lois was.

“Good God, Herald, you’ve sweat through your shirt.  What have you been doing?”

Herald didn’t look at his wife who was standing behind him as he threw open the closet.  He dug through the clothes to the back, where the shotgun was.  It was hard and cool from sitting back there.  The cool of the metal stung through him like adrenaline.  His fingers traced along the wood stock where there was a deep groove.

The groove was from one of his first hunting trips with the gun.  He and his brother were out hunting pheasant when he had been charged by a buck that seemed to come out of nowhere.  Herald had defended himself by hitting the buck in the antlers with the butt of the gun as it ran past, a strange reaction for a hunter to have with a firearm.  The buck took the blow and headed back into the forest.  Herald had defended his ground.  His brother was remiss that he hadn’t shot the animal, but Herald preferred the gut animalism of his reaction.  He loved that gun.

He pulled out a box of shells from his sock drawer in the dresser he shared with Lois.

“Herald, what’s wrong?  Why do you have the gun?”

Herald opened the box and loaded the three shells that he had.  “Lois, it’s important that you stay inside.”

“Why Herald?  Herald?  Please, tell me Herald.  What’s wrong?”  Lois was shaking.

Herald stood at the door about to head out.  He was sopping wet from sweat, his face almost violet from exertion.  He seemed delirious from fever.  He turned to her, and in a clear, sober voice, he said, “The hobo clowns are back,” and disappeared down the stairs and back into the night.