T-Man is shouting but Simon can barely hear him. All he can hear is the woosh of the wings, the snap of his wrists as the goose jerks right and left, the sharp edge of his own breathing as he tries not to fall back in the carpet of goose shit.

It quits struggling. The wings drop down and Simon staggers to his feet.

“Is it dead?” asks T-Man, looking out from behind one of the battered ornamental trees planted next to the lake.

“I don’t know,” says Simon.

He turns the limp goose in his hands. His knuckles are skinned and raw.

It beats its wings once and rides up above Simon’s head. The sun is weak over the lake and the spread wings block it out. Simon sees the sky go dark and the world emerges as a thin light through the flexed guard feathers trailing along the edge of the goose’s wing, filtered through some terrible, rearing angel.

Simon steps back and the goose dives at his head with a hiss like the breaking of water on rock. Simon tries to raise his hands to fend it off without letting go, but the wings sweep in from the sides. He raises his elbows but can’t keep them high enough. The goose knocks him in the ear with its wing. His head spins and his ear feels hot. He takes another step back and the goose hits him on the other side of his head.

“Aw shit!”

He hears T-Man laughing and yelling but the words are lost on the far side of the goose’s wings around his head like a violent blanket.

Simon pivots around but the wings keep beating him from the sides. The goose’s neck whips this way and that. Simon tries to tuck his chin in and bring his ears below the grade of his hunched shoulders. The goose’s head looms, its neck uncoiling like a cobra and he feels a sharp sting on his cheek.

He throws his head back and sees the wing coming at him level, a feathered tide sweeping across his vision. Simon tries to dodge but is too slow.

The ridge of the wing catches him on the bridge of his nose. The pain sears up and across his forehead and tears cloud his eyes.

“Damn it! Fuckin die!” he shouts as he turns and whips his arms out. With his eyes closed he steps back and swings the goose away from his body and slams it on the ground. Simon lifts his arms and swings the goose in an arc over his head and onto the ground again. He raises it up once more but his feet slip and they both go down.