Caleb is beside himself with worry. Another killing spree. At four, he has seen it all. Molly's swollen belly is drooping. She is restless; panting, pacing, shivering, refusing food. Little’uns pressing to come out. Granny marches in ankle-length Sears catalogue cotton housedress and flea-bit army boots, dragging the hosepipe to the water barrel. She is fix'n for a whelping. The possum stew and batch of moonshine left on the potbelly to slow burn. In the hey of the sweltering afternoon, Caleb tracks Molly crawling through clumps of bindweed and thistle, under the roughhewn clapboard porch to her nesting spot. He follows on knees, elbows, and palms, only slightly grazed —his skin still wrinkled and raw from wading through the tangled maze of roots in the mangrove swamp digging for carp fingerlings; chubby little fingers clamoring to hold on to the slippery silver fry. Granny refusing to let him out until the bucket was full; his heat rash blistering from fright each time she wrenches the bucket to check the tally—as he maneuvers with skill around brown recluse spiders and water moccasins, nestling in the insect swell and wood rot close to the dog. Granny is stomping like thunder along the fetid slough, jabbing long canes into recessed hiding spots, hollering for the boy and dog. The rifled burrows lay bare discarded and decomposing critters. Seasons of doing and undoing. At the far end of the slough well beyond Granny’s reach, Molly's soft panting muffles the outside world. The air beneath the ramshackle porch is stale and cool. Time slows. Caleb nibbles on found bits of dried pawpaw and maypop fruit. The twisted eel knot inside his belly slowly unfurling. Whispers and coos let slip. The space between boy and dog floats like dandelion puff. The afternoon sun bends low, light all but disappearing. In the black maw of night, the pups squeeze out one after the next, squirming, warm, and velvety. Caleb nuzzles in with the brood, falling into a deep newborn sleep. Days slide by, dreaming and suckling. The bitch grooming her offspring indiscriminately, teats flowing a-plenty. Thick downy pigmented hair sprouts all over Caleb's body. He grows small, curling like a cashew, exchanging low-pitched squeals and grunts with his canine siblings. He is soon indistinguishable from his littermates. Content. When Granny discovers the scruffy pack, they are yanked out; all the fuzzy ones culled.
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