As soon as the sun disappeared below the horizon a family of raccoons scampered from the safety of their burrow on the endless search for food.

The mother raccoon keeps an eye out for predators while her two youngsters dig for worms and grubs whilst the male raccoon runs over to a nearby creek in the hope of catching a fish or two to feed his hungry brood.

After ten minutes the father raccoon grows increasingly frustrated when he fails to catch anything but then he suddenly remembers a spot downstream where he caught a huge catfish a while back.

But to get there he has to cross a gravel road , he has traversed this road on many occasions but this time the little rascal is in mortal danger.

Just as he stepped onto the road a pickup truck travelling at speed hits the tiny creature killing him instantly.

The raccoon is one of man animals that will killed on the roads across america today, roadkill on a massive scale.

58 year old Myron Oxenford has been employed at Bilford county Mississippi for just on forty years and he takes great pride in his job.

Every day except for the lords day he drives his pickup around the county scraping roadkill from the streets and depositing them to the side so other animals don’t get killed as they eat the kill.

Myron is a big man who some say resembles Kenny Rogers having a very bad day.

Today Myron is is a good mood as he picks up his keys for another day of keeping the streets of Bilford county clean and tidy and even though he probably wont admit Myron has a strange fixation for roadkill.

An hour into his shift Myron is cruising down a backwater road when he spots a dead raccoon in the middle of the road fifty yards ahead.

The raccoon is still relatively fresh and its skin is undamaged perfect for Myron’s weird hobby.

He is an amateur taxidermist and this critter will give him hours of stuffing pleasure.

At 3.30 pm Myron heads home with another collection of animals to keep him fed for weeks.

Most of them are to mangled to be stuffed and mounted except for the raccoon who looks like it could still be alive if not for a broken neck.

Myron skins the motley crew of squirrel, rattlesnake,gopher and groundhog and chops the meat into bite size pieces and throws it into a huge pot along with a few cups of broth and salt and pepper.

As he waits for his meal to cook Myron places the unfortunate raccoon’s pelt onto an armature stand and begins to stuff it with materid’s that are supposed to bring life back to dead animal but Myron’s taxidermy skills are below par so now the raccoon resembles a misshapen creature from an Edgar Allen Poe novel.

After decades of drinking over proof moonshine Myron brain has turned to mush and now he believes that if he talks to all the stuffed animals that decorate his cabin that one day they will all come back to life and run back into the woods alive and kicking.

So he always leaves a window open in case that day eventuates.

What Myron doesn’t know is that for a few months a tiny field mouse has been coming into his bedroom while he sleeps and has been drinking the pools of drool that collect on his pillow every night

Homer Simpson himself would be proud at the amount of saliva that dribbles and the mouse takes great joy in drinking the liquid and running out into the living room feeding the precious fluid into the mouths of the stuffed and mounted animals that sit on shelves and in particular the rodent feeds a bald eagle and cougar that sit on top of a mantle piece.

After indulging in a few too many jars of moonshine Myron wakes with a throbbing headache and a mouth dryer than the Saraha Desert.

So Myron drinks another jar to keep the gremlins at bay then after a shower he feels healthy enough to go about another day.

He grabs a glass of water before leaving the house but stops in his tracks and stares long and hard at the bald eagle on the mantle piece that he stuffed and mounted a few months ago.

His eyes must be playing tricks but he could have sworn that the eagle moved its wings a second ago but Myron has a laugh when he feels the breeze coming in the open window so he closes it and goes off to work.

26 year old Sally Nulksteader is out enjoying an early morning run along a back road grateful for an opportunity to get out in the sun while her husband Brett looks after their twin boys who turned one back in July.

Her track shoes hit the road hard as Sally runs around a bend but she doesn’t hear anything but the soothing sound coming from her ear bubs.

Sadly She will never touch her boys or hear their laughter ever again.

Myron is still feeling a little queasy as he drives a too fast around a sweeping bend.

His eyes widen is dread when he notices the lady running on the side of the road and he screams in horror when he feels her body under the wheels of his pickup.

‘Holy fucking shit’ Myron whispers not quite believing what has just happened.

He can still taste the alcohol on his breath and knows that he would be well and truly over the limit so he puts his foot down to flee the scene.

But than a voice whispers in his ear ‘What are you doing Myron? I prime piece of roadkill is there for the taking so go back and take it home and it will become your masterpiece’

Myron slams on his brakes reverses back and throws Sally Nulksteader’s body in the back of his pickup.

And to give himself an alibi he calls his boss and tells him that he has the flu and will spend the day in bed.

Myron spends an hour carefully removing the skin from the body of his first human display item.

He drapes the skin over an armature stand and leaves it to dry while he cuts her flesh from her bones and throws the tidbits into the pot with a few carrots and onions .

The unused meat in placed in sterilized jars and placed in his pantry where it will come in handy when the cold weather hits.

After eating his first meal of human flesh Myron grabs a jar of moonshine and goes into his room for an afternoon nap.

After waiting an hour to make sure it is safe the rejuvenated eagle swoops down from the mantle piece and begins to rip pieces of meat from the human skeleton littering the living room floor.

As the eagle eats gaining strength with every bite the cougar stays in place because it has another victim in mind.

A few hours later Myron staggers from his bedroom with the taste of human flesh still in his mouth and he is eager for another meal.

Then from its perch on the mantle piece the cougar springs down knocking Myron to the floor.

The big cat could just bite the back of its victims neck killing it instantly but the cougar wants this human to suffer so all it does in sit on the stunned man.

The eagle swoops down and using a piece of sinew it sews Myron’s mouth closed and ties his hands behind his back.

Then the raptor tears both eyeballs from their sockets and swallows them whole.

Myron writhes on the floor in agony as the raptor and cougar begin to feed.

The pair eat slowly at first but the blood soon awakens their taste buds and they get down to business ripping Myron apart eating him alive.

The amateur taxidermist screams in silent agony as the animals that he stuffed and mounted months ago finally put him out of his misery.

Now Myron Oxenford is the one who is well and truly stuffed.

THE END.

Thanks for taking the time to read my stories and please if you have the means could you make a donation so that i can finally reach my goal of becoming a fulltime writer. Thanks again Steven.