It is New Year’s Eve. There is a hambone in the peas and a badger hide on the wall and a four-year-old who wants to show me a couple of coots’ feet in a Ziploc baggie. Tucking them into his jacket pocket and heading to the door, he announces, “I’m going back out with the boys,” by which he means the men, inspecting a wild boar hung to dry. How did I get here? A city girl, also vegetarian. The fawn skull on the stoop goes poof into a dog’s stomach when no one’s looking. The other dog wears a shock collar and the women of other men wear maternity jeans, and the sac of eggs that spills out of a catfish into the sink is tapioca to me, is the bulb of bulbs atop One Times Square. Conversation around the dinner table comes to cuts of meat, and when I ask my partner what rabbit tastes like, he answers, “Tastes like rabbit.” He doesn’t know that in my version I add “my love” to tenderize what he said. And yes I know what that word means. It means countdown to happy. His hand on my thigh, grounding me. The rest is gravy.