sitting in the middle of the kitchen table.
Penny–
Have gone to the font to the grocery store with
Today and the baby.Please shuck
the corn-its in the garage.(Do it
in the garage so that you don’t
maka a miss!)
–mom
Penny loved fresh corn on the cob. Grabbing a clean bowl from a cabinet, another cookie, and her glass of juice, she headed for the garage.
She walked through the laundry room, flicking on lights as she went. Mr. Cat’s bowl was full of food, and ants were starting to circle it. He hadn’t been home for days now.
The garage was dark and cool, and smelled strongly of gasoline and sawdust. She shucked the corn easily, daydreaming. There was something so soothing about shucking corn. Pulling back piece after piece of crisp green husk to reveal the tender golden corn inside. Penny liked to imagine sometimes that the corn cobs were pretty little dancers and that the husks were their elaborate costumes, their fancy tutus. She pulled a husk down halfway around an ear so that it looked like a girl with a skirt.
“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen,” she said, mimicking an emcee. “Welcome to the corn ballet!”
The corn ballerina gave a rousing performance until Penny grew tired of the game and pulled off the husk. She tossed the perfect yellow ear into the bowl with the others.
Penny reached into the sack and pulled out another ear of corn, picking up the cookie with her other hand. She stuffed it whole into her mouth while she methodically ripped off the husks, staring dreamily into space. The corn felt a little squishy and smelled bad, rancid, so she looked down, expecting to see rotten corn. She saw something very different.
A dead rat was cradled perfectly in a spiral of corn husk, with green leaves artfully arranged around its dead body.
Penny started to shake. The rat’s eyes were open, the vicious little teeth bared angrily. Its brown-gray fur was soaked with something. She held her fingers up to her face, crumbs falling from her mouth. Her fingers were wet with blood.
She flung the rat away from her, hard. It hit the garage door with a dull thump and slid to the cold cement floor, leaving a bloody mark on the door. Penny fell to her knees, choking on the cookie,coughing it out whole, hysterical, and then she felt that familiar horrible feeling in her chest, the way everything went tight, her stomach churning, her fingers tingling, and she couldn’t seem to catch her breath, there was no air and—
“Penny?” a voice said.
She flinched at the sound, whirling around.
“You okay, sweetie?”
Her dad, wearing his lab coat, was standing in the doorway.
That night, after dinner, Penny went looking for Teddy.
She found herself doing this often lately, keeping track of him. She had always been the one to keep an eye on him, but now there seemed even greater reason to make sure her little brother was safe. Especially after what had happened that afternoon.
Her father had stared at the blood-soaked rat for a long time before he said, in a curiously flat voice, “Looks like it just crawled in here to die. They come up when the creek’s dry.”
“It was
in the corn,
Dad!” Penny had insisted, white-faced and shaking.
“It was probably just hungry, and I’m sure thatcorn smelled pretty good.”
Still, she couldn’t help but remember the way he’d eyed the lock on the garage door, and so she went through the laundry room, opened the door to the garage, and there was Teddy, sitting in the middle of the concrete floor, feeding Tom Ten.
On Mockingbird Lane all the box turtles caught and released were traditionally named Tom. Every once in a while, an empty shell would turn up in the woods with a painted number denoting which Tom it had been.
Teddy was hand-feeding the turtle little bits of lettuce. Tom Ten had been quite snappish when they’d first brought him home and put him in his new cardboard box with some grass. But as the days went by, he had grown bolder, and he would now
Penny–
Have gone to the font to the grocery store with
Today and the baby.Please shuck
the corn-its in the garage.(Do it
in the garage so that you don’t
maka a miss!)
–mom
Penny loved fresh corn on the cob. Grabbing a clean bowl from a cabinet, another cookie, and her glass of juice, she headed for the garage.
She walked through the laundry room, flicking on lights as she went. Mr. Cat’s bowl was full of food, and ants were starting to circle it. He hadn’t been home for days now.
The garage was dark and cool, and smelled strongly of gasoline and sawdust. She shucked the corn easily, daydreaming. There was something so soothing about shucking corn. Pulling back piece after piece of crisp green husk to reveal the tender golden corn inside. Penny liked to imagine sometimes that the corn cobs were pretty little dancers and that the husks were their elaborate costumes, their fancy tutus. She pulled a husk down halfway around an ear so that it looked like a girl with a skirt.
“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen,” she said, mimicking an emcee. “Welcome to the corn ballet!”
The corn ballerina gave a rousing performance until Penny grew tired of the game and pulled off the husk. She tossed the perfect yellow ear into the bowl with the others.
Penny reached into the sack and pulled out another ear of corn, picking up the cookie with her other hand. She stuffed it whole into her mouth while she methodically ripped off the husks, staring dreamily into space. The corn felt a little squishy and smelled bad, rancid, so she looked down, expecting to see rotten corn. She saw something very different.
A dead rat was cradled perfectly in a spiral of corn husk, with green leaves artfully arranged around its dead body.
Penny started to shake. The rat’s eyes were open, the vicious little teeth bared angrily. Its brown-gray fur was soaked with something. She held her fingers up to her face, crumbs falling from her mouth. Her fingers were wet with blood.
She flung the rat away from her, hard. It hit the garage door with a dull thump and slid to the cold cement floor, leaving a bloody mark on the door. Penny fell to her knees, choking on the cookie,coughing it out whole, hysterical, and then she felt that familiar horrible feeling in her chest, the way everything went tight, her stomach churning, her fingers tingling, and she couldn’t seem to catch her breath, there was no air and—
“Penny?” a voice said.
She flinched at the sound, whirling around.
“You okay, sweetie?”
Her dad, wearing his lab coat, was standing in the doorway.
That night, after dinner, Penny went looking for Teddy.
She found herself doing this often lately, keeping track of him. She had always been the one to keep an eye on him, but now there seemed even greater reason to make sure her little brother was safe. Especially after what had happened that afternoon.
Her father had stared at the blood-soaked rat for a long time before he said, in a curiously flat voice, “Looks like it just crawled in here to die. They come up when the creek’s dry.”
“It was
in the corn,
Dad!” Penny had insisted, white-faced and shaking.
“It was probably just hungry, and I’m sure thatcorn smelled pretty good.”
Still, she couldn’t help but remember the way he’d eyed the lock on the garage door, and so she went through the laundry room, opened the door to the garage, and there was Teddy, sitting in the middle of the concrete floor, feeding Tom Ten.
On Mockingbird Lane all the box turtles caught and released were traditionally named Tom. Every once in a while, an empty shell would turn up in the woods with a painted number denoting which Tom it had been.
Teddy was hand-feeding the turtle little bits of lettuce. Tom Ten had been quite snappish when they’d first brought him home and put him in his new cardboard box with some grass. But as the days went by, he had grown bolder, and he would now
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