Just Beneath the Surface
A blade of grass stuck to her bare shin. She brushed it away as she leaned over to unlace her hiking boots at the door. It left green residue on her skin with the sweat and dirt from the walk. The dogs tore through the apartment, upheaving the rugs in their haste to reach the kitchen. She shook the plastic container, not to tease, but in contemplation, before filling the bowls.
The dogs were siblings, mutts, four years old, and dumb. She watched them a moment with her hands on her hips then tried to gently push the yellow one, nudge it and distract it, but it snarled at her and ate until it vomited and then ate the unchewed kibble a second time. The black one was more sensible, ate, rooted around for crumbs, then slept.
She flopped on the sofa, licked her thumb and rubbed the green stain but only seemed to spread it. Perhaps it was the shadow of a vein. She started to pull her leg up when the yellow dog bound into her lap, too large for it to be sweet.
They went out again before dinner. They walked down the path, followed the creek and stopped at the edge of the wood
s to relieve themselves. Then they waited, snuffling through the wet grass, pulling at their leashes, and her leaning over to rub the stain.
The stain didn’t seem to be a stain but a splinter. The blade of grass just beneath one translucent layer of skin. Finally, the dogs began to bark, the black one standing behind her, the yellow one lurching. Calmly she unclipped its leash and it bolted after a flash of green eyes.
She turned towards home, giving the black dog’s leash a tug until it followed, first distracted, then happy to lead the way. She boiled rice with a packet of gravy mix and shared this with the dog, then spent the evening squeezing and picking the splinter that only seemed to dig in deeper and spread while the black dog slept.
Mulberries
Fallen mulberries smeared the hot sidewalk. Deep purple stains spotted with white pulp. At first she tried to avoid them, not wanting to stain the white rubber of her shoes but soon took pleasure in bursting the dark berries with each step. When she looked up from this game, blinking in the haze of summer sun, she did not recognize the brick apartments or empty lot beside her. She had gone over the train tracks, passed the corner store - lost in her head again.
She turned back, rubbing the two quarters together in her pocket, liking their little scraping sounds. Meat bees settled into the wet mess left in her wake on the sidewalk.
Her path was blocked when the safety arm lowered over the tracks, bells chiming in warning. The sudden wind caught her hair in a burst and the long strands stuck in her sweat. The cars passed hypnotically, a kaleidoscope of graffiti, casting shadows. And she waited. But they continued to pass a long while, then eventually slowed, then finally stopped altogether.
She looked towards the end of the train, curving around the bend where it vanished from sight. The machine radiated heat. The closest coupler was rusted and shimmering. She looked behind her, then waited again. It did not move.
She approached the train, ducking under the safety arm and looked more closely at the space between the shadows of the cars. It still did not move.
Cautiously, she crouched and scooted forward but the scalding rail made her yelp and hop forward to squat under the coupler.
“Girl!” Someone shouted, and she looked behind her at a woman who had gotten out of her car. “Get out of there!” The metal groaned and shifted, the coupler clanked, and the girl screamed, clamoring under the thick wires and over the second rail, as the train began to inch forward again. “Stupid kid!” The woman shouted, lying on her belly and staring at her from the other side of the tracks.
Early Summer
It was abnormally warm for the beginning of June. The sky that day had been filled with smoke and dust, but the creek still retained a bit of spring chill, especially at night. She dipped her head under the water and surfaced, gasping. Beyond the water, her brother’s flashlight swung around and blinded her. “Cold?” He laughed.
She adjusted the mesh laundry bag wrapped around her wrist. “No. It’s pretty nice.” She lied. The light skittered across the black surface of the waterhole, only half a dozen feet deep, but the pressing night made it seem bottomless. She took a breath and dove again. Her fingers skimmed through the clay and stone until she felt the cold insect-like body of a crawdad and pushed it into the sack.
“What are you doing?” She asked when she surfaced.
“Grabbing some blackberries.”
In the dim navy-blue night she could see the white blossoms luminescent against the great crop of blackberry bushes. Her brother squatted in the back of his pickup. “Huh.” She went under again, turning up another three. “I’m surprised any are ripe.” He held the flashlight under his arm and leaned over the wheel well. At the end of July they would back straight into the bush and grab handfuls at a time, but for now he picked carefully between the flowers.
The summer loomed over them.
“Yeah. Me too.” He said. “What about you?”
“Got a few. Small ones.” She dove without waiting for a reply.
They stayed out until one in the morning, until he started to complain about the mosquitoes, and she began to shiver. She tossed the squirming sack of crawdads in the truck bed beside the bucket of blackberries and took the offered towel.
“What are you going to major in?”
“I don’t know.” They stood in the dark while she toweled off and put a t-shirt over her bathing suit.
“When are you going to leave?”
“Later, after the summer.”