As a Thief in the Night by Chuck Crabbe

its edge, leaning forward and intently looking down into something on the coffee table in front of them. As he swung forward he saw a glass of water that sat by itself on the unevenly stained wood. His swing stopped, and he too leaned forward. On the water's surface a strange white liquid moved, as if it were a cloud searching for its own shape. 
    Then Ezra moved as one moves in a dream, without cause or reason. His eyes took the place of hers and slipped down into the water. Serpentine and murky, the substance sunk into a white desert at the bottom of the glass, reached out with an alien hand, formed faces, trees, fish, and a future, too, as it let the slow force of its will dissolve into the water's permissive constitution.
    Without an answer to what he had seen, he found himself on his swing again, and everything suddenly became common. An old black woman, whom Ezra immediately recognized as the maid he had often heard about, was tending to a pot that hung above the fire.  She hummed to herself as she stirred, and the girls spoke quietly to each other on the couch, apparently waiting for whatever was cooking. The woman was heavy. Beneath the folds of her dress and apron her hips and butt stuck out prominently. Her plump wrists and hands strained against the cuffs of her blouse as she stirred, and heavy beads of perspiration ran down her dark forehead from the white bandana she wore to tie her graying hair back. Looking over her shoulder, she seemed to be asking his mother a casual question, but though her lips moved, as did his mother's to respond, he could not hear what was said.
    Tituba (for suddenly he remembered her name) tapped the side of the pot a few times with a wooden spoon and then removed it from its hook above the fire. Taking care not to burn herself, she held the pot away from her body, carried it to a place beside the couch, and placed it on the wooden floor. Ezra was struck with great concern that the pot would immediately burn through the floor and called out to them to lift it up, but again his words were swallowed by the peculiar ether that belongs to dreams.
    Leaving the pot where it was, the old woman walked directly over to Olyvia, who looked to be twelve or thirteen years old, took her by the hand, and led her over to it. Looking into the pot's contents together the woman seemed to be offering Olyvia instructions, at which point Olyvia reached under her skirt, pulled her underwear down, squatted over the pot, and urinated into it. Scooping the pot up from under the girl, Tituba quickly took it back to the fire, stirred again briefly, and returned seconds later with a completed cake sitting neatly inside it. Just as Ezra had warned them, in the spot where the pot had originally been placed, a black circle had been burned into the floor. Tituba now stood inside of this circle, which suddenly expanded, called a large dog into the room, laid down the cake in front of it, and quietly watched the dog devour it, pot and all.
    Ezra found his hand under Tituba's. She ran it along the goat's head and neck as if she were teaching him how to pet it appropriately. Behind him he heard his mother's window rattle in the wind, stop briefly, then rattle again. Over and over again she ran his hand over the animal's black fur. Leaning closer to him she began to hum in his ear, and for the first time the element of sound entered the dream. The song she hummed was familiar, and perhaps he could have placed it had his efforts at recognition not been overwhelmed by the anxiety he felt at seeing his hand trapped by her hand against the animal. "Yes boy, ya see that is how," she whispered, her voice raspy with age. "Boy, Tituba be speakin' to ya now.   She's askin' in plain language now. Do you see that is how?"
    "I see," he answered meekly.
    "Ya see, do ya? Whatcha see, boy? Tell Tituba then." 
    "That's the way to treat it."
    She laughed at him. "Nah, boy," she went on, her voice filling with what felt like malice. "Ya