to push a door open since my last
confession. It is like a different world when we get out of Miss Little’s yard
and onto the tracks. This is what we see from Abigail May’s yard anyway, this
bleak and dangerous timber and rail that eventually leads to the trestle bridge
and after that it goes clear across the United States of America or at least to
the next town.
Our
legs itch so we stop to scratch and go on and on about the kitties and my pink
pom-pom. Abigail is crying and I am too a little and I didn’t know. Those
little kitties are alive, but I still don’t have them back. And crazy Miss
Little, all we know she is cooking them one by one and eating them for dinner.
But
my neck is stretching as I look at the back fence leading to Easy’s house. He’s
that close. Maybe.
So
I take off running, holding my cast which itches all the time but doesn’t knock
me off balance as much as it used to. Abigail is behind me sniffing while she
runs, and she passes me up and reaches the gate and we pull it wide and a big
German Shepherd comes running and I pull Abigail back and shut the gate and
click the latch and the dog hits the wood and it looks like it’s coming open,
but the latch holds.
“Saints
and mercy,” I cry, wanting to yell at Abigail, but I can’t, I’m just so glad
she’s alive.
Abigail
May is really crying now but I know she cries easy but she doesn’t give up,
it’s just she’s so small she has to cry to let the steam off so she can go
again.
“Neighbors,”
she says. Just that. And she takes off running and me too so we can get away
from Easy’s fiercesome dog.
So
we open the tall wooden gate at the next house and look first and no dog, just
a yard with not much grass cause this is Scutter and they don’t grow grass over
here I guess. So with that dog of Easy’s running the fence and barking we walk
quickly through this yard and get out soon as we can and go around the front of
Easy’s tired looking house and up on his porch with the creaky steps and we
knock on his beat to death door.
Cap
opens the door. He’s holding a plate of noodles with no sauce at all, just bare
noodles. He has one partway out of his mouth and he sucks it up. He is looking
at me and Abigail and it’s probably almost a surprised look but he never seems
to be excited, not even when he was looking ready to catch that shirt filled
with cats Disbro nearly dropped from the trestle bridge.
He
is a tall boy, and wearing blue jeans and one of those shirts him and Easy
wear, sleeves torn off. His feet are bare and if you look back up on top his
head is shaved and that’s pretty different.
He is skinny so it’s
good to see him eating I guess. The house behind him is dark and it smells like
Granma’s cellar some.
“Your
dog is me-ean,” Abigail says.
“Yeah,”
he says and laughs a little, but it’s not the laugh you do when something is
really funny, more like ‘what are you doing here?’
I
am not expecting Easy to pull Cap back and step in front. He really can’t believe
his eyes. Well I can’t either. I haven’t seen him for days and days, no sign of
him at all. But it’s the worst. His head is shaved like Cap’s, and it’s all
right, just different.
But
his eyes, well one is bruised around it. He has no shirt, but tape around his
ribs, and his arm is wrapped, and his shoulder is blue and cuts and scrapes,
red lines of broken skin.
“Oh,”
I say. I put my good hand over my mouth. Cause his hands are the worst,
knuckles split and red.
“Why
did you come here?” Easy says, and it’s worse than anything. He is not happy to
see me at all. Not at all. He is angry. I have not seen him angry before, not
even when Disbro took the kittens. Not even when Ricky hit him. I didn’t think
he could ever be angry. But he is angry now. At me.
He
comes on the porch and pulls the door some, but Cap stops him from closing it,
but he’s a little bigger than Cap, a little heavier and bossier, and he pushes
Cap back
confession. It is like a different world when we get out of Miss Little’s yard
and onto the tracks. This is what we see from Abigail May’s yard anyway, this
bleak and dangerous timber and rail that eventually leads to the trestle bridge
and after that it goes clear across the United States of America or at least to
the next town.
Our
legs itch so we stop to scratch and go on and on about the kitties and my pink
pom-pom. Abigail is crying and I am too a little and I didn’t know. Those
little kitties are alive, but I still don’t have them back. And crazy Miss
Little, all we know she is cooking them one by one and eating them for dinner.
But
my neck is stretching as I look at the back fence leading to Easy’s house. He’s
that close. Maybe.
So
I take off running, holding my cast which itches all the time but doesn’t knock
me off balance as much as it used to. Abigail is behind me sniffing while she
runs, and she passes me up and reaches the gate and we pull it wide and a big
German Shepherd comes running and I pull Abigail back and shut the gate and
click the latch and the dog hits the wood and it looks like it’s coming open,
but the latch holds.
“Saints
and mercy,” I cry, wanting to yell at Abigail, but I can’t, I’m just so glad
she’s alive.
Abigail
May is really crying now but I know she cries easy but she doesn’t give up,
it’s just she’s so small she has to cry to let the steam off so she can go
again.
“Neighbors,”
she says. Just that. And she takes off running and me too so we can get away
from Easy’s fiercesome dog.
So
we open the tall wooden gate at the next house and look first and no dog, just
a yard with not much grass cause this is Scutter and they don’t grow grass over
here I guess. So with that dog of Easy’s running the fence and barking we walk
quickly through this yard and get out soon as we can and go around the front of
Easy’s tired looking house and up on his porch with the creaky steps and we
knock on his beat to death door.
Cap
opens the door. He’s holding a plate of noodles with no sauce at all, just bare
noodles. He has one partway out of his mouth and he sucks it up. He is looking
at me and Abigail and it’s probably almost a surprised look but he never seems
to be excited, not even when he was looking ready to catch that shirt filled
with cats Disbro nearly dropped from the trestle bridge.
He
is a tall boy, and wearing blue jeans and one of those shirts him and Easy
wear, sleeves torn off. His feet are bare and if you look back up on top his
head is shaved and that’s pretty different.
He is skinny so it’s
good to see him eating I guess. The house behind him is dark and it smells like
Granma’s cellar some.
“Your
dog is me-ean,” Abigail says.
“Yeah,”
he says and laughs a little, but it’s not the laugh you do when something is
really funny, more like ‘what are you doing here?’
I
am not expecting Easy to pull Cap back and step in front. He really can’t believe
his eyes. Well I can’t either. I haven’t seen him for days and days, no sign of
him at all. But it’s the worst. His head is shaved like Cap’s, and it’s all
right, just different.
But
his eyes, well one is bruised around it. He has no shirt, but tape around his
ribs, and his arm is wrapped, and his shoulder is blue and cuts and scrapes,
red lines of broken skin.
“Oh,”
I say. I put my good hand over my mouth. Cause his hands are the worst,
knuckles split and red.
“Why
did you come here?” Easy says, and it’s worse than anything. He is not happy to
see me at all. Not at all. He is angry. I have not seen him angry before, not
even when Disbro took the kittens. Not even when Ricky hit him. I didn’t think
he could ever be angry. But he is angry now. At me.
He
comes on the porch and pulls the door some, but Cap stops him from closing it,
but he’s a little bigger than Cap, a little heavier and bossier, and he pushes
Cap back
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