Read Online Fresh Eggs by Rob Levandoski - Free Book Online Page A

travels back to the intellectual drivel of his art student days. “It’s what the Hindus call karma. It’s our destiny. What we are and what we do. Eggs are our karma.”
    â€œChicken jail,” Rhea says as Captain Bates hops up on Miss Lucky Pants’ back and flaps his wings. “That’s what we do. We run a chicken jail.”
    Calvin stops playing with his daughter’s hair, to keep himself from yanking it. “People need eggs. We produce eggs. It’s a good thing, Rhea. Something to be proud of.”
    â€œI’m proud I saved Miss Lucky Pants from the chicken shit.”
    Calvin’s face needs wiping again. “I’m proud you did, too. But we can’t make pets out of all the old hens. We’d lose the farm. So we do what we gotta do, pumpkin seed. You and me.”
    Rhea scratches between her nippie nips. “You and me, pumpkin seed,” she says.
    Calvin looks at the empty end of the picnic table. He wants Jeanie to be sitting there, reading a book, eating an apple, curling her hair around her finger, just being alive. “That’s right. You and me. And you are going to be six years old in a couple of weeks. Old enough for a few outside chores.”
    And so Calvin tells Rhea that Captain Bates and the Buff Orpingtons are going to be her responsibility from now on. She’s going to start feeding them; gathering the eggs, washing off the poop and putting them in cartons in the refrigerator; making sure the chicken coop door is closed and latched at night. “But remember, Rhea,” he says, shaking his finger at her nose, “the Orpingtons are not pets. We take care of them for the eggs and we sell the eggs because we need the money. We don’t play with them or give them names.”
    â€œCaptain Bates has a name,” she says. “Miss Lucky Pants has a name.”
    â€œIt would be better if they didn’t.” Calvin takes Rhea by the chin and turns her face toward his. She has Jeanie’s brown eyes, too, and her always questioning eyebrows. “It’s a deal then?”
    â€œOkay,” she says, “but if they have chicks I’m not going to cut off their beaks or look up their butts.”
    Calvin tells her that there won’t be any Orpington chicks, that when those hens get old and die off, that’s going to be the end of the brown egg business, that the FRESH EGGS sign is coming down for good.
    On Saturday they drive to the cemetery in Tuttwyler. They walk across the thick grass to Jeanie’s grave. Calvin is still amazed at how well the wild strawberries are doing. He didn’t expect that pot of scraggly vines to survive. But the roots took hold and that one plant has turned into three. They find exactly three ripe berries to eat, one for Rhea, one for him, one for Jeanie.

Nine
    Flies are already banging into the window when Rhea wakes. The stench of 300,000 Leghorns is oozing in. Rhea Cassowary stretches and yawns. She pulls up her Holly Hobby nightgown and feels between her nippie nips. There’s another feather growing.
    She bites down on her tongue and plucks it. And looks at it. White. Silky. Delicate. Sharp as a pin, too. Rolling onto her stomach, Rhea worms her body over the edge of the bed until she can reach the Nestlé’s Quik can on her toy shelves. The can already has several of the little feathers in it. She drops the new feather inside and pounds down the lid. Later today she’ll be celebrating her sixth birthday. Until then it’ll be just another day. She squeaks into the bathroom, pees, and brushes her teeth. She puts on her dirty jeans and a clean tee shirt and goes downstairs. “Daddy? Biscuit?”
    Neither answer. Neither are there. Nor are the cats. She plans to have a bowl of Rice Krispies for breakfast but sees the box of Hostess donuts on the table and decides to have one of those instead. When the donut is gone, and the powdered sugar brushed on the