myself.
S ATURDAY , A UGUST 2, 2025
We had a target practice today, and for the first time since I killed the dog, we found another corpse. We all saw it this time—an old woman, naked, maggoty, half-eaten, and beyond disgusting.
That did it for Aura Moss. She says she won’t do any more target shooting. Not ever. I tried talking to her, but she says it’s the men’s job to protect us anyway. She says women shouldn’t have to practice with guns.
“What if you have to protect your younger sisters and brothers?” I asked her. She has to babysit them often enough.
“I already know enough to do that,” she said.
“You get rusty without practice,” I said.
“I’m not going out again,” she insisted. “It’s none of your business. I don’t have to go!”
I couldn’t move her. She was afraid, and that made her defensive. Dad said I should have waited until the memory of the corpse faded, then tried to convince her. He’s right, I guess. It’s the Moss attitude that gets me. Richard Moss lets his wives and daughters pull things like this. He works them like slaves in his gardens and rabbit raising operation and around the house, but he lets them pretend they’re “ladies” when it comes to any community effort. If they don’t want to do their part, he always backs them up. This is dangerous and stupid. It’s a breeding ground for resentment. No Moss woman has ever stood a watch. I’m not the only one who’s noticed.
The two oldest Payne kids went with us for the first time. Bad luck for them. They weren’t scared off, though. Doyle and Margaret. There’s a toughness to them. They’re all right. Their uncle Wardell Parrish hadn’t wanted them to go. He had made nasty comments about Dad’s ego, about private armies and vigilantes, and about his taxes—how he had paid enough in his life to have a right to depend on the police to protect him. Blah, blah, blah. He’s a strange, solitary, whiny man. I’ve heard that he used to be wealthy. Dad agrees with me that he can’t be trusted. But he’s not Doyle and Margaret’s father, and their mother Rosalee Payne doesn’t like anyone telling her how to raise her five kids. The only power she has in the world is her authority over her children and her money. She does have a little money, inherited from her parents. Her brother has somehow lost his. So his trying to tell her what to do or what she shouldn’t let her kids do was a dumb move. He should have known better—though for the kids’ sake, I’m glad he didn’t.
My brother Keith begged to go with us as usual. He’ll turn thirteen in a few days—August 14—and the thought of waiting two more years until he’s 15 must seem impossible to him. I understand that. Waiting is terrible. Waiting to be older is worse than other kinds of waiting because there’s nothing you can do to make it happen faster. Poor Keith. Poor me.
At least Dad lets Keith shoot at birds and squirrels with the family BB gun, but Keith still complains. “It’s not fair,” he said today for the twentieth or thirtieth time. “Lauren’s a girl and you let her go. You always let her do things. I could learn to help you guard and scare off robbers…” He had once made the mistake of offering to help “shoot robbers” instead of scaring them off, and Dad all but preached him a sermon. Dad almost never hits us, but he can be scary without lifting a finger.
Keith didn’t go today, of course. And our practice went all right until we found the corpse. We didn’t see any dogs this time. Most upsetting to me, though, there were a few more rag, stick, cardboard, and palm frond shacks along the way into the hills along River Street. There always seem to be more. They’ve never bothered us beyond begging and cursing, but they always stare so. It gets harder to ride past them. They’re living skeletons, some of them. Skin and bones and a few teeth. They eat whatever they can find up there.
Sometimes I dream about the
S ATURDAY , A UGUST 2, 2025
We had a target practice today, and for the first time since I killed the dog, we found another corpse. We all saw it this time—an old woman, naked, maggoty, half-eaten, and beyond disgusting.
That did it for Aura Moss. She says she won’t do any more target shooting. Not ever. I tried talking to her, but she says it’s the men’s job to protect us anyway. She says women shouldn’t have to practice with guns.
“What if you have to protect your younger sisters and brothers?” I asked her. She has to babysit them often enough.
“I already know enough to do that,” she said.
“You get rusty without practice,” I said.
“I’m not going out again,” she insisted. “It’s none of your business. I don’t have to go!”
I couldn’t move her. She was afraid, and that made her defensive. Dad said I should have waited until the memory of the corpse faded, then tried to convince her. He’s right, I guess. It’s the Moss attitude that gets me. Richard Moss lets his wives and daughters pull things like this. He works them like slaves in his gardens and rabbit raising operation and around the house, but he lets them pretend they’re “ladies” when it comes to any community effort. If they don’t want to do their part, he always backs them up. This is dangerous and stupid. It’s a breeding ground for resentment. No Moss woman has ever stood a watch. I’m not the only one who’s noticed.
The two oldest Payne kids went with us for the first time. Bad luck for them. They weren’t scared off, though. Doyle and Margaret. There’s a toughness to them. They’re all right. Their uncle Wardell Parrish hadn’t wanted them to go. He had made nasty comments about Dad’s ego, about private armies and vigilantes, and about his taxes—how he had paid enough in his life to have a right to depend on the police to protect him. Blah, blah, blah. He’s a strange, solitary, whiny man. I’ve heard that he used to be wealthy. Dad agrees with me that he can’t be trusted. But he’s not Doyle and Margaret’s father, and their mother Rosalee Payne doesn’t like anyone telling her how to raise her five kids. The only power she has in the world is her authority over her children and her money. She does have a little money, inherited from her parents. Her brother has somehow lost his. So his trying to tell her what to do or what she shouldn’t let her kids do was a dumb move. He should have known better—though for the kids’ sake, I’m glad he didn’t.
My brother Keith begged to go with us as usual. He’ll turn thirteen in a few days—August 14—and the thought of waiting two more years until he’s 15 must seem impossible to him. I understand that. Waiting is terrible. Waiting to be older is worse than other kinds of waiting because there’s nothing you can do to make it happen faster. Poor Keith. Poor me.
At least Dad lets Keith shoot at birds and squirrels with the family BB gun, but Keith still complains. “It’s not fair,” he said today for the twentieth or thirtieth time. “Lauren’s a girl and you let her go. You always let her do things. I could learn to help you guard and scare off robbers…” He had once made the mistake of offering to help “shoot robbers” instead of scaring them off, and Dad all but preached him a sermon. Dad almost never hits us, but he can be scary without lifting a finger.
Keith didn’t go today, of course. And our practice went all right until we found the corpse. We didn’t see any dogs this time. Most upsetting to me, though, there were a few more rag, stick, cardboard, and palm frond shacks along the way into the hills along River Street. There always seem to be more. They’ve never bothered us beyond begging and cursing, but they always stare so. It gets harder to ride past them. They’re living skeletons, some of them. Skin and bones and a few teeth. They eat whatever they can find up there.
Sometimes I dream about the
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