The Collection

And then his mother ran out, her hands bloody, a look of abject terror on her face.

Cal cringed, but she dashed past him, rushing around the side of the garage. He saw her take from the side yard two long eight-by-fours. She dragged the boards to the back of the house, and he heard the slow regular sound of wood being sawed. He stood there unmoving. The sawing stopped a few minutes later, and he heard the irregular whipcrack of hammer against nail.

She was constructing a cross.

He wanted to leave, to run, but something held him back. He stood, then sat alone in the front of the house listening to the sound of the hammer, as around him neighborhood life went on as normal. He was still sitting there when he heard the back door slam and saw through the front windows of the house his mother carrying the cross down the hall to The Sanctuary.

It hit him then, what was going to happen to him, and he quickly jumped to his feet. He was not going to let her have him. He would run if necessary, fight if he had to.

Bocephus barked once, loudly, a short harsh yelp that was immediately cut off.

Then there was silence.

'Bocephus!' Cal yelled. He ran into the house, down the hall.

The dog was already splayed on the cross, all four legs stretched in a pose of crucifixion, long nails protruding from his paws.

His mother dropped the hammer, and fell to her knees. There were tears rolling down her cheeks, but she was not sobbing. She began to pray. 'Bless this house, bless our feet, good food, good meat, good God, let's eat. Blessed are the meek. Blessed are the peacemakers. In the name of the Fa­ther, the Daughter, and the Holy Dog, Amen.' She genu­flected first toward Father, then toward Chrissie, then toward Bocephus.

Cal remained standing. She was gone, far gone, crazy, and he realized now that the only option open to him was to contact the authorities and turn her in. His insides felt stiff and sore and he had a pounding headache. Father might think his decision blasphemous, but Chrissie probably would not, and she sat at God's side as well.

His mother left The Sanctuary and returned a few mo­ments later, dragging the boy's mutilated body. She threw it into the pit and set it afire. Though the fan was on, The Sanc­tuary was filled with a black foul-smelling smoke, and Cal staggered into the bedroom, taking huge gulps of the fresh air. In his head he could hear the maddening drip drip drip of the blood into the altar bowl.

Maybe he should kill her.

'Cal.'

Chrissie's voice, still little more than a whisper, sounded clear and smooth through the smoke and din. He wanted to go back into The Sanctuary and talk to her but could not bring himself to do it.

'No,' Chrissie whispered, and she said the word again. 'Nooooo.'

No? What did that mean?

But he knew what it meant. Chrissie had changed her mind. Maybe she had talked to Father, maybe she had talked to God, but she no longer wanted him to kill their mother, and she obviously did not want him to turn their mother in.

But what could he do?

'No,' Chrissie whispered.

He ran out of the house and dropped onto the grass of the lawn outside, the cool wet grass which felt so fresh and new beneath his hot cheek.

Todd Mac Vicar from down the street rolled by on his Big Wheel. 'What's the matter with you?' he asked. His voice was filled with disgust.

And Cal felt The Rage come over him. He knew it was happening, and he didn't want it to happen, but an unbridled hatred of Todd filled him from within, and he knew that nothing would abate this anger and hate save the boy's death. Thoughts of Todd's head, bloodied and smashed on the sidewalk, brought to his voice the coolness he needed. 'Come here,' he said. 'I want to show you something in the garage.'

He hoped his mother had not disposed of the shovel.

Cal stood in the center of The Sanctuary. He was crying, filled with a sadness and remorse he hadn't known he could experience. Behind him, Todd Mac Vicar's body burned in the pit, and he thought the smoke smelled clean, pure.

He looked down at his mother.

'You have no choice,' she sobbed. 'I must pay. I must die for your sins.' She stretched a trembling hand against the crossbeam, palm outward. Her fingers twitched nerv­ously.

Cal pressed the point of the nail against the lined skin, drawing back the hammer.

The voices in his head offered encouragement:

'You have no choice.' His father.

'You must.' Chrissie.

He swung the hammer hard and flinched as his mother screamed, the nail impaling her palm to the wood. Warm red blood streamed downward.

This was crazy, he thought. This was wrong. This wasn't what he was supposed to do. But as he looked up, he thought he saw approval in Chrissie's running, clouded eyes, in his father's dry, empty sockets.

He swung the hammer again.

And again.

By the time he finished the last foot and propped the cross up next to Bocephus, he was already feeling better, pu­rified, cleansed, as if he was an innocent newborn, free from all guilt.

He sank gratefully to his knees.

'Our Mother,' he said, 'who art in heaven ...'

The Woods Be Dark

'The Woods Be Dark' was written in the mid-1980s for a creative writing class. At the time, I was under the spell of William Faulkner and turning out a slew of interconnected Southern Gothic stories all set in the same rural county. I lived in California, had never been anywhere near the South, didn't even know any­one from the South-but, arrogant and self-important jerk that I was, I didn't let that stop me.

Momma let the dishes set after supper instead of washing them and came out on the porch with us. She kicked Junior off of the rocker and took it for herself, just sitting there rocking and staring out at Old Man Crawford's trawler out there on the lake. It was one of them humid July nights and the dragonflies and the bloodsuckers was all hanging around the porchlight looking for a good arm to land on. Petey was up with a magazine, running around trying to kill all the bugs he could.

Momma was out on the porch with us because Robert hadn't come home before dark like he'd promised and she was waiting up for him. She pretended it wasn't no big deal. She sat there and talked to us, laughing and joking and telling stories about when she was our age, but I could tell from the expression on her face that she was thinking about Daddy.

I was standing off by the side of the railing, away from the door, by myself, trying to loosen my dress from where it'd caught on a nail. I was listening to Momma tell about the time the brakes went out on her at Cook's Trail and she had to swerve into the river to keep from smashing into a tree when I heard a low kind of rustling sound coming from the path on the side of the house. I scooted next to Momma on the rocker. 'What is it, Beth?' she asked.

I didn't say nothing. Then I heard the sound again, only this time all of them heard it. Momma stood up. Her face was white. She walked to the railing where I'd been stand­ing and looked off toward the path. We stood around her, holding on to parts of her skirt.

Petey saw it first. 'It's Robert!' he called. He pointed off to where the path met the woods.

Sure enough, Robert was coming out of the woods across the clearing carrying a whole lineful of fish. I heard Momma's breath start to relax when she saw it was Robert, but then she pulled it all in like someone'd hit her. Robert was kind of staggering across the clearing, weaving like he was drunk or something.

But we all knew he wasn't drunk.