Running on Red Dog Road

were settling in to the third week at Uncle Teel’s house. It was kind of like a vacation, except for him being so sick and all. When Vonnie and I were getting along good, we played jacks on the porch. When we got bored with jacks, we gathered wild teaberries. The little berries, similar to blueberries in size, were reddish pink and grew in clusters on an evergreen plant close to the ground. Teaberries are good to eat, but other than teaberry gum, I didn’t know much else they were good for until I saw Grandma pound the leaves with a glass jar and steep them in hot water to make tea. She said the leaves, called wintergreen by some, were known to relieve pains and aches and she thought that would soothe Uncle Teel.

I’d try to remember that the next time Vonnie and old Wishbone gave me a headache.

Vonnie and I discovered a trail that disappeared into the thick of the woods and looped back to join the road, and we’d started walking around the circle every afternoon before supper. Grandma said she felt like getting out of the house a little, so she came with us, and besides, she wanted to see where we were traipsing off to every day.

We didn’t see any signs of people most of the way, but there were a couple of houses that looked as if they had grown right up from the dirt, got tired of the struggle, and leaned against the mountain for support. The first house had pink flowers planted in lard cans lined up along the porch railing. Glass bottles hung from every branch of one tree, turning the whole thing into chimes when the breeze came through. Grandma said some thought the bottles caught evil spirits and trapped them inside, but she didn’t believe that foolishness. Gourds made into birdhouses were suspended from branches of another tree. The other house was squalid, the air around it heavy with the disappointments of life. A rusted car was propped up on cinder blocks and an old tricycle lay turned over in the dirt. I saw a dingy curtain move as we passed. We heard a dog bark a few times, but we never saw it. Grandma reached down and picked up a good-sized stick just in case.

We heard singing before we could tell where it was coming from. The hymn was “ ’Tis So Sweet to Trust in Jesus.” Grandma thought it might be from a church we could go to while we were there, so we followed the music down an overgrown path to a small building that was not quite a house and not quite a church. The door was closed and no one was around. A sign on a tree nearby warned KEEP AWAY—SURVIVORS WILL BE SHOT, but the door to the building had ALL TRUE BELIEVERS WELCOME painted on it in the same writing.

Grandma decided to believe the sign on the door.

I hoped she was right.

We walked around to the side and peered into a window. Several narrow slats missing from the closed shutters allowed us to view what was going on inside without being seen. A man stood swaying in front of a few rows of benches lining the back wall, an open Bible in one hand and a snake coiled around the other.

The man was Tolerable Thigpen.

I was on the edge of saying something when Grandma pressed her finger to her mouth, motioning me to be quiet.

There were probably ten or twelve people in the room. They came forward one by one as the spirit moved them, reaching deep into the box and bringing forth a snake. Several of the worshipers began to move, shuffling their feet and turning in circles as they let the snakes crawl over their bodies. I looked for fear in their eyes and found none.

A woman handed her baby to the man standing next to her and walked to the front as if in a trance. She stood with arms outstretched, her face lifted to the heavens in ecstasy. Her hair, so light I could see the blue of her dress through it, came past her waist.

Tolerable Thigpen spoke to her and she dipped her chin in a nod.

He pulled a good-sized copperhead from a bag and draped it around her neck. I thought of the colored picture of Eve and the serpent in Grandpa’s Bible. The snake lifted and looked her in the eye. She held the gaze for a heartbeat, then fell into a heap on the floor. Not a soul moved to help her. The snake slithered across her motionless body. All of a sudden the woman began to shake and tremble and roll around. I heard the singing start up again, just one voice this time, high and quivering, shaping the words into prayers and lifting them over the little congregation.

’Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus,

And to take him at his word,

Just to rest upon his promise,

And to know, Thus saith the Lord.

Jesus, Jesus, how I trust him

How I’ve proved him o’er and o’er.

Jesus, Jesus, precious Jesus

O for grace to trust him more.

I’m so glad I learned to trust him

Precious Jesus, Savior, Friend.

And I know that thou art with me

Will be with me to the end.

The snake coiled next to the makeshift pulpit. A large man, red faced and sweating, reached toward its head to pick it up. The snake’s tongue flicked out to taste the smell of its foe before it struck. The man jerked back, stumbling over the box that held the snakes.

I didn’t get to see if anybody got bit, because Grandma yanked us away from the window, Vonnie by one hand and me by the other. She was walking so fast my feet only hit the ground every other step.

“Those people are snake handlers. Sometimes they drink poison, strychnine, I’ve