Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward

beside him. “Y’all coming home with me.”
    â€œAw shit,” Big Henry breathes.
    â€œWe ain’t going nowhere.” Skeetah unlashes his arms and they come whipping out from his sides, and his voice is loud, and he’s like those little firecrackers we get on the Fourth of July that throw out sparks from all sides and jump in bright acid leaps across the hard dirt yard. “First of all, me and Esch done walked all around this field and watched the house for damn near an hour. Ain’t nobody home, and all they got is a puppy on the other side of the house, over by that driveway. And I know what I need and I know where it’s at. And it ain’t like you won’t get nothing out of this. If my dogs live, I can make eight hundred dollars off them. Eight hundred dollars. Do you know what we can do with eight hundred dollars? You won’t need to beg Daddy for the rest of the money for basketball camp week after next, and you won’t have to stress over playing good enough in the summer league to get one of those scholarships for it either. I know you want to go, just like you know Daddy don’t have it.” Skeetah fizzles, his hands down by his side. Now he’s just trailing bitter, sulfurous smoke. “You ain’t the parent,” he mutters.
    â€œThis is stupid,” Big Henry says.
    â€œI’m the fastest,” Junior says as he yanks on Randall’s arm.
    â€œShut up, Junior,” I say.
    Randall pulls Junior to him and puts his hand on his head the same way I put mine on Skeet’s when he was wiping off the blood. Junior quiets, turns to face us, and Randall’s arm is around his neck like a scarf. Junior’s still smiling; he still thinks he’s about to run with us.
    â€œYou ain’t running nowhere, Junior.” Junior’s face pulls. Randall’s arms cradle him by the chest. Randall looks down at Junior’s head, wipes away moss caught in his hair. “You’d do that for me?” Randall speaks to Junior’s head, so at first I don’t know who he’s talking to, and then I remember Skeet, who is nodding next to me now. With each dip of Skeetah’s head, sweat drips unimpeded from his crown, past his strong nose, his downy upper lip, to fall from his chin like a weak summer sprinkle.
    â€œYes,” Skeetah says, still nodding. “Yes.”
    Skeetah sketches the plan. It is what makes him so good with dogs, with China, I think, the way he can take rotten boards and make them a kennel, make a squirrel barbecue, make ripped tile a floor.
    â€œYou too big to be out there in that field.”
    â€œWasn’t going to go anyway,” says Big Henry. Skeetah shrugs.
    â€œSo you stay here in the woods with Junior. Shut up, Junior. This is serious. You ever heard of Hansel and Gretel? Well, that’s who own that house, and they want to fatten you up like a little pig and eat you. So shut up and stay in the woods with Big Henry. And if you sneak out like you did last night—shut up, Junior, I saw you—I’m going to catch you and whip you. That’s if the white people don’t eat you first.”
    â€œYou want me to help you get in the barn?” Randall asks.
    â€œNo, I don’t need no help. Besides, you too tall. You going to be at the edge of the field, right by the fence, and keep watch on the whole field. You see anything, you whistle.”
    â€œWhat about Esch?” Randall says.
    â€œEsch going to be in the middle of the field, laying down by them stumps right there: she got a better shot of the driveway than you ’cause she going to be closer. If she see something, she going to whistle. And loud, Esch. No baby whistles.”
    â€œI knew how to whistle with my fingers in my mouth before you did, Skeet,” I say.
    â€œI know,” he says. He glances at me when he says it, and he and I both know that he is telling the truth. “Well, all right.