E.P. Rains

My mother stuffed her plump hands into two pink checkered oven mitts and leaned her face into the orange glow of the oven coils. She reached her arms inside the gaping beast and pulled out three steaming TV dinners. I peered at her over the dog-eared pages of my storybook.

“Baby,” she sighed as she stirred the glistening green peas in one of the metal tins, “would you go fetch your brother please?”

“Momma,” I groaned, “I’m at a real good part.”

 She raised her hand toward me in a dismissive way that begged no more arguing.

  I slapped my book down beside me and pried my thick legs off of the couch. The sweat pooling beneath each knee made a suction cup noise. The summer heat drew its arms around me like a wet wool sweater, suffocating and damp. I opened the back door and padded onto the porch with bare feet. My brother was nowhere to be seen from the garden to the neighbor’s green fence.

“Jeremiah!” I hollered between cupped hands.

My voice echoed back through the skinny pine trees that peppered the yard. I pulled my sagging jeans up around my hips and trotted down the four splintering stairs. I carefully stepped around brambles, approached the tree line, and peered into the forest. Mangled decaying branches poked out between popcorn trees and saplings that had been sheltered from the last hurricane.

The summer sun swung low in the sky behind my head, just high enough to cast long shadows in the heat of the dying day. The katydids began their music, and I knew the streetlights would flicker on soon.

“Jeremiah, are you in there?”

A smacking sound followed by boyish laughter responded to me. 

I lifted my arm up and pushed a winding vine out of my vision. I stepped onto the slimy mix of leaves and dirt that coated the forest floor. A small foot worn path was marked only by orange spray paint marks that wound around the tree trunks.

I picked up a sturdy stick and followed the deep imprints made by my brother, pushing spiderwebs and prickly plants out of my wake. I heard the smack again and laughter. Darkness began to clamp down on the trees and I could feel the stagnant nighttime air part around me as I walked. 

I found the clearing around a little pregnant stream that was bubbling as it lazed through the muddy canyon it created in the ground. My brother stooped over the water, his pants turned up at the ends but soaking wet from the flood parting around him. He held a broken oar in one hand as he fished deep in the muck with the other. His vertebrae poked up from his bent back like the bumps on an alligator’s back.

I watched silently as he laid hold to something and ripped it, dripping, from the water. A slippery toad thrashed in Jeremiah’s hands as he curled his fingers around its fat belly. He thrust the frog in front of him, eye level, and raised the oar back to his ear. The frightened creature squirmed fruitlessly. My throat went dry as Jeremiah threw the toad up into the air and pulled his paddle back to whack it.

“Hey!” I yelled, startling the dark birds perched high above me.

His head whipped towards me as the toad tumbled through the air. It somersaulted once, twice, three times before landing back in the water with a splash. Jeremiah’s wispy mustached lip curled, revealing white teeth that shone in the darkness. I released a breath that I didn’t know I was holding.

“What’d you do that for?” He threw the oar into the woods with force.

“Time for supper. Momma wants you.”

Jeremiah growled beneath his breath. He stomped out of the water, unrolling his drenched pants on the shore. He glared at me, not saying a word more. He pushed back through the woods, leaving me alone..

I tiptoed over to the edge of the water and peered down. I crouched, bringing my face to the surface. I could faintly see the reflection of the treetops above me and the outline of my head. A lumpy shape bobbed to the top of the water. I wetted my lips and stared intensely, reaching out to brush the wart covered skin with my fingertip. The toad didn’t swim way from me and I felt hot tears well up in my eyes.

I gently pulled the floating toad to the edge of the water and tapped it with my palm. I sat back on my haunches and stared out into the murky woods, feeling animal eyes watch my vigil cautiously. An owl crooned sorrowfully, and a tear slid down the side of my face. I cradled the lifeless toad to my chest like a baby. The small body left a dark, wet imprint on my shirt.

“I’m sorry,” I sniffled and wiped my runny nose on the inside collar of my shirt.

My mother always taught me never to speak ill of the dead, even though his cold, bumpy skin against my arm turned my stomach. I held the toad in one hand and scooped a hole into the wet dirt with my other. I laid the toad carefully into the hole. His legs lolled from side to side like a puppet.

“Lord,” I clasped my dirty hand in my clean one, “please accept this toad and give him lots of flies. He ain’t deserve what Jeremiah did, you know that too…”

As I cracked my eyelids, I noticed slight movement in my forest grave before the toad violently rolled over. I watched in amazement as he leapt from his stupor and fled the hole, scurrying this way and that. His legs bunched up underneath him and he flew back into the water where he came from with a flop.

I hopped to my feet and shook my head in disbelief, “hallelujah!”

I could hear voices and racket coming from the direction of the trailer. My mother banged on the back of a dented pot with a wooden spoon and yelled my full name. I wiped my hands on the leg of my jeans and jogged quickly back down the path to the house.

“Where have you been, child?” My mother’s wide frame with hands on hips filled the doorway as I pried through the bushes.

“I been out raising the dead.”

She grabbed my arm as I walked past and looked at me with soft scrutiny, “well make sure to wash your hands if you been touching dead things.”