Hornets and Others

'I'm a-comin' t' save ya!'

By now she was well past the gigglin' and glass tinklin' and into the Mammy-yellin' stage—but she really started t' yell when I made my way out of there. First I ripped off the cord 'tween Mammy and me—did a nice neat job o' pullin' it apart in the middle and tied it off on both the wriggly ends so's not to make a mess. That was a bit of a chore with my flipper hands and all, but I managed it. Then I began a' swimmin', paddlin' right for the hole where that pokin' weapon had been. Nothin' there now, and I saw the spot leadin' out and went for it. Dove right through with my hands out in front of me makin' a wedge, and closed my big eyes and whoosh! if that sac didn't break easy as I hoped, carrying me along for a ways before things began to dry out. Then I had to claw my way along. Not too far, which was good for me and Mammy, since she was a yellin' somethin' fierce by this time.

Things began to get lighter, and I waited for the fuzzy light to hit me, the color of the Moon a-cheese, but instead there was just a couple of flaps in front of me which I pushed apart and whoa!—there was no fuzzy light a'tall but somethin' that hurt my eyes fierce, like a burnin' itself!

I didn't let that stop me, though, or the little coughin' fit I had while my lungs filled up with what must have been air. The sounds were way clear now, with Mammy screamin' like the devil and the man I'd heard a-moanin'. I pulled my part of the cord out after me and kept on movin' while my eyes got used to the grand and glorious light o' the world, nothin' like the soft fuzzy light I'd expected but sharp as anything. And the colors! The reddest red you'd ever imagine, all around me and wet.

And there, suddenly, out the window of Mammy's room, floatin' in the black night that wasn't fuzzy a'tall, was the Moon a-cheese itself, which I got a good look at as my eyes began to focus sharp.

Then I dropped to Mammy's bed—

And there was a six-gun, laying right there beside me, and the man who'd hurt Mammy a-whimperin' and crouchin' in the corner, his pants around his ankles and his other-gun, like Mammy's talked about in the song, just as sad and droopy as could be.

So I worked up all my strength, and lifted Mammy's gun in my flipper hands, holding it on the bed and wrapping my flipper feet around it and aiming it real true, just like my Pappy would, and pulled the trigger twice, and I done shot that feller through the heart, then through the liver, and watched him drop dead t' the floor.

'I saved you, Mammy! I saved you!' I cried in little bubble farts. And then I turned smiling with my tiny mouth and looked at my Mammy for the first time ever.

She was a-layin' there on the pillows of her bed pale as ghosts must be, pale as dust, her eyes big and drained. She lifted a weak finger, layin' there in a pool of blood around her middle like she was, where I'd come a- swimmin' out, and she pointed at me.

'Mammy!' I burbled happily.

I waited for her to smile, but instead her lips curled into a sneer and she screamed in a hateful way:

'You little bastard! I knowed you'd be a boy when you popped! Felt you like a disease inside o' me!'

She got real weak then, and her hand lowered to the bed—but then the rage crawled back up into her face and she hissed: 'I would've killed you too when you came out natural! Just like I killed any man who ever come near me!'

'But Mammy—!' I said.

Her eyes got all big and wild then, and she pointed to her still-distended belly. 'Just like I killed your pappy, that sonofabitch Will Bonney who did this to me!'

I looked down at my own other-gun, which was so itsy it didn't look like it could hurt nobody at no time.

'Mammy—!'

'I'll shoot you through the heart and liver yet! Just like I shot 'em all!'

She began to sing then, in a kind of gigglin', croaky voice, a song I'd never heard a'fore:

So if you're six feet under

And dancing down below,

Be sure to look up Billy Bonney

Be sure to say hello!

She reached down for the six-gun, but before she could grab it she suddenly got to bein' real weak again. She lay back on the bed and fainted. And that was all the time I needed.

Didn't take me long to get fixed up again. The cord healed up pretty good, as I took my time getting the two ends to match up just right. I managed to get the hole I'd made closed, though I'll have to see how much good that does me, since the floatin' sac's gone. I figure the cord's the important thing, since the whiff I got of air while I was out didn't seem to hurt me none, and my lungs, small as they is, seem to be workin' okay.

Figure I can hole up in here as long as I need to.

Heck, who needs it out there anyway—I can wait to see flowers and bees and barkin' dogs, and that little peek I got o' the Moon convinced me it ain't made a-cheese, after all. Looked all wrinkly and dusty-cold to me.

She ain't gonna make me dance down below.

And o' course I got this here six-gun with four more bullets in it—and if she comes in after me I know how to use it.

Stars

Dancing along the edge of night, Donald brought the stars into his room:

These are the suns of endless night—

These are the burning orbs so bright—

These are the things that fill my sight—

STARS!

Standing on his bed, hands raised in benediction, he watched the night swirl into his room, shouted in joy as it vortexed in through the bars of the open window and around him: light upon shining light of stars, twinkling diamonds, heavenly choirs of suns, whirling, flying in exultation and the exuberant wash of heavens around him—

Outside in the hallway came voices.

The rattling turn of the doorknob, the key in the lock—

'Shoo!' Donald shouted.

Through the barred window, the stars rushed out, sucking back up into the near-dawning world.

The window closed and locked.

Donald jumped down upon his bed and into the covers. The key clattered; the doorknob turned.

They came in to find his pillowed tears, and sleeping form.

Wednesday was Dr. Smith day.

'How are we?' Dr. Smith asked, holding her clipboard.

Donald in his chair: knees pulled up, holding his ankles. He looked at the floor, the wall, anything else.

'Are you sleeping well, Donald?'

She thinks she is so sweet, Donald thought. She thinks she knows. I won't look at her, and then she'll go away.

'Donald? We'll be here a long time, if you continue this way.'

She's not sweet.