I can feel Thor Gundersen’s eyes on me while I butcher a hog. He was a tall lanky man. His face reminded me of a skull laid bare. With his sunk in eyes and sharp features. He watched me intently as he was perched on the porch of my shop.

“You’re very skilled with a blade, Mr. Bauer. Very efficient.” Thor’s voice had a Norwegian lilt to it as he complimented me. Though I feel like his compliment was more towards the fact that I knew how to use a blade, and not how I was using it for at the moment.

“There’s no pride in wastefulness, Here Swede.” I begin to explain to him. My voice not hiding my German ancestry, as I continue with my work. “Only sin. We must use all. Even this.” I kick the wooden bucket that was filled with the undesirables. The organs, intestines, the scraps and fats. Looking over at Swede, I give him a firm nod. “A good butcher does not waste lives.”

Swede nods back to me, as he looks deep in thought. “Mm. Jah. Hmm.” He hops down from his perch, and walks around me until he stands at the head of the butcher table, continuing to eye my work. “It's a shame, what happened to your friend, Dieter Schmidt.” When Thor spoke, his face showed sympathy but, his words were lacking sincerity. Like he was poking at an already agitated hornet’s nest to see what would happen.

“It is not fair.” I can’t help but feel agitated as I stop what I am doing and look in Swede’s eyes intensely. “We come here for better lives. We work hard.” I say simply with a bitterness before I continue my work. Pealing back the pig’s skin. “And his life is taken for no reason, because of a filthy whοre.”

“Yeah, I agree. A useless end.” Thor smiles flatly as he takes a deep breath. “A needless, sinful squandering of a production of life.”

Glancing back at him, I let out a grunt. “Yeah.”