peace.
Still, we have food and shelter. One visit gains a ham steak or a sack of wheat, one a withered bundle of corn; corn that makes my stomach retch ‘cause it carries the lingering taste of miner sweat.
*
A week later, just after my fifteenth birthday, Mamma’s coughing stops. Her eyes go dull and stare off into another world. Her lips part, just a little, like she’s in the midst of a gasp from what she sees.
Becca doesn’t even seem to notice the death. I sense the loss like a hole in the air. Something’s gone missing. I wonder at the silence and study Mamma’s still face, wide eyes circled with blue and purple rings, cheeks drawn in from hunger and sickness. But she’s at peace now.
She’s saved.
I drag the body out into the snowdrifts, as far away from our shack as I can muster. I put her in a thicket of trees, where the green seems to still have a voice in the branches, and try not to think about the beasts that’ll soon be gathering. There’s no way of burying her; the ground is a solid rock of ice beneath us.
I kneel beside her and want desperately to weep. My throat tightens and my head aches. Everything hurts inside. But I have no way of releasing it. I’m locked up and hard as stone.
“I’m sorry, Mamma,” I whisper to the shell in front of me. I take her hand. It could belong to a glass doll. There’s no life there anymore.
So I gather rocks, one by one, and set them over her, trying my best to protect her from the birds, the beasts, keep her safe as much as I can now. I pile the dark stones gently on her stomach, her arms, and over her face, until she becomes one with the mountain.
I stand and study my work, feeling like the rocks are on me instead, then I leave the body for the forest and ice.
*
Time passes in a blur, and I become aware of names.
Jack, Ben, James, Robert…They sound so normal. Like you might hear them and smile a hello.
But I hear them and cringe. Especially at one in particular: Hunt. The man who came with the cloud of darkness that very first day. He always eyes me like he has ideas.
I see him ahead, making his way toward us, up the path, and I clench my jaw to hold in the shaking that fills me. It’s been a few weeks since he visited last; I was almost comfortable again. The other men aren’t like Hunt. Yes, I hate them, but the hate keeps me safe. This man I can’t hate enough.
“Well, if it ain’t my peach,” he says as he stops in front of me.
My insides churn and I look down. I’m a coward, but I can’t help it. His eyes say too much about the evil inside him. I can’t let them connect with mine.
“You’re lookin’ softer each day, little one. And your sister is only lookin’ thinner. Best tell her to eat more or the men’ll be movin’ on to you sooner than you’d like.”
“Just go,” I say, feeling small and terrified by his words.
“They’re sayin’ she’s a witch, you know.” He looks at the door of the shack to where Becca now stands, and a smile grows on his face. “All those crazy mutterings she blathers are makin’ them nervous. Ben’s lost chunks of his hair, and James swears he saw her in the mines one night like a ghost.” He laughs low, almost like a growl. “Fools. They think she’s prayin’ to God to curse ‘em, or somethin’.”
The idea gives me strength. “Not a bad idea,” I say, wishing Becca really was a witch. Wishing I was.
I walk away, letting him finish what he came for.
But that night I ask the wind to howl through the tunnels and scare the men away, I ask the ice to come to them in the night, so they’ll wake to find their fingers and toes frozen off. And for the first time in a while, I sleep soundly.
*
A few weeks later Hunt comes again. There’s only two men now, besides him, who dare come to the witch for a respite. The food is dwindling, but my spirits are higher. Even Becca seems to be emerging from her sad world a little.
We’re probably just getting
Still, we have food and shelter. One visit gains a ham steak or a sack of wheat, one a withered bundle of corn; corn that makes my stomach retch ‘cause it carries the lingering taste of miner sweat.
*
A week later, just after my fifteenth birthday, Mamma’s coughing stops. Her eyes go dull and stare off into another world. Her lips part, just a little, like she’s in the midst of a gasp from what she sees.
Becca doesn’t even seem to notice the death. I sense the loss like a hole in the air. Something’s gone missing. I wonder at the silence and study Mamma’s still face, wide eyes circled with blue and purple rings, cheeks drawn in from hunger and sickness. But she’s at peace now.
She’s saved.
I drag the body out into the snowdrifts, as far away from our shack as I can muster. I put her in a thicket of trees, where the green seems to still have a voice in the branches, and try not to think about the beasts that’ll soon be gathering. There’s no way of burying her; the ground is a solid rock of ice beneath us.
I kneel beside her and want desperately to weep. My throat tightens and my head aches. Everything hurts inside. But I have no way of releasing it. I’m locked up and hard as stone.
“I’m sorry, Mamma,” I whisper to the shell in front of me. I take her hand. It could belong to a glass doll. There’s no life there anymore.
So I gather rocks, one by one, and set them over her, trying my best to protect her from the birds, the beasts, keep her safe as much as I can now. I pile the dark stones gently on her stomach, her arms, and over her face, until she becomes one with the mountain.
I stand and study my work, feeling like the rocks are on me instead, then I leave the body for the forest and ice.
*
Time passes in a blur, and I become aware of names.
Jack, Ben, James, Robert…They sound so normal. Like you might hear them and smile a hello.
But I hear them and cringe. Especially at one in particular: Hunt. The man who came with the cloud of darkness that very first day. He always eyes me like he has ideas.
I see him ahead, making his way toward us, up the path, and I clench my jaw to hold in the shaking that fills me. It’s been a few weeks since he visited last; I was almost comfortable again. The other men aren’t like Hunt. Yes, I hate them, but the hate keeps me safe. This man I can’t hate enough.
“Well, if it ain’t my peach,” he says as he stops in front of me.
My insides churn and I look down. I’m a coward, but I can’t help it. His eyes say too much about the evil inside him. I can’t let them connect with mine.
“You’re lookin’ softer each day, little one. And your sister is only lookin’ thinner. Best tell her to eat more or the men’ll be movin’ on to you sooner than you’d like.”
“Just go,” I say, feeling small and terrified by his words.
“They’re sayin’ she’s a witch, you know.” He looks at the door of the shack to where Becca now stands, and a smile grows on his face. “All those crazy mutterings she blathers are makin’ them nervous. Ben’s lost chunks of his hair, and James swears he saw her in the mines one night like a ghost.” He laughs low, almost like a growl. “Fools. They think she’s prayin’ to God to curse ‘em, or somethin’.”
The idea gives me strength. “Not a bad idea,” I say, wishing Becca really was a witch. Wishing I was.
I walk away, letting him finish what he came for.
But that night I ask the wind to howl through the tunnels and scare the men away, I ask the ice to come to them in the night, so they’ll wake to find their fingers and toes frozen off. And for the first time in a while, I sleep soundly.
*
A few weeks later Hunt comes again. There’s only two men now, besides him, who dare come to the witch for a respite. The food is dwindling, but my spirits are higher. Even Becca seems to be emerging from her sad world a little.
We’re probably just getting
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