~the shimmering water~ ~& looking for fishes~ ~in the oil stains of life~ ~these children find themselves~ ~momma’s rain~ ~excerpt~chapter five~ ~children in a crossfire~ The next morning Daddy had to go get paid and see if he could get some more roof jobs, so Timmy got to stay home. Momma had a surprise for the children after Daddy left. In the move from Garfield Street she had discovered a box of dry cereal she had forgotten about. She usually couldn’t afford to buy dry cereal but, in this case, she had found it and there was even milk and sugar to put on it. Timmy joined his siblings around the table, where Momma fixed them up with an assortment of bowls and cups full of cereal. Everyone began to chow down ... everyone, that is, except Timmy. Momma was across the room at the stove, pouring herself a cup of coffee. Jerry and Peter were on each side of Timmy at the table. “You guys better watch out,” he warned, “I think there’s something moving in the cereal.” Momma overheard him and approached the table. Jerry and Peter hurriedly tossed aside their spoons, picked up their bowls and gulped the cereal down. “Put those bowls down!” Momma ordered. “What’s wrong, Timmy?” He pointed at his bowl. Momma used his spoon to sift through the milk and cereal. “Oh God, it’s weevils!” “Come here, you two!” Momma grabbed Jerry and Peter by the napes of their necks and dragged them to the bathroom. She bent them, one at a time, over the toilet and told them to stick their fingers down their throats and throw up those weevils. There followed a whole lot of gagging but no vomit. Momma stuck her own finger down their throats and got the job done. So much for cold cereal. They were out of milk and sugar now, so Momma fell back to plan B which was oatmeal (Timmy hates oatmeal) with commodity butter. The oatmeal tasted funny and Timmy told Momma as much. “Oh, stop it!” she said angrily, “You just think it tastes funny because of the weevils. Sometimes you’re so finicky. We’re not rich, you know. We eat what there is to eat.” Jerry and Peter were staring into their bowls. This time they agreed with Timmy. “Damn it! That’s enough!” Momma was mad now. “You three eat that oatmeal right now! I don’t want to hear another word until it’s all gone!” The boys gagged the oatmeal down. A little while later no one needed to use their fingers. They were all puking rivers. Timmy made it to the toilet but Jerry and Peter lost theirs on the way. Momma pulled their T-shirts over their heads and used them as rags to wipe up the mess. She glanced at Jerry in disdain. “Go get another shirt and cover up those skinny bones. People will think I don’t feed you. I swear, you must have a tapeworm!” After the vomit was cleaned up, Momma got the jar with the oatmeal in it. She twisted off the lid and gave it a good long sniff. “It’s kerosene,” she closed her eyes and said. “I’ll have to go to a phone booth and call the hospital. That jar had kerosene in it. Your Daddy used it to clean his putty knives and paint brushes. I thought, since it was glass, I could just soak it for a bit, clean it out with ajax, and keep the oatmeal in it.” Timmy sat there staring at her, thinking to himself, ‘Now we’re gonna die.’ Momma rummaged around in her purse and finally came up with a couple of nickels. She patted him on the shoulder. “You keep an eye on the kids. I’m going down to make the phone call. I’ll be right back.” Out the door she went. Sometimes she was like a mini-tornado. Timmy glanced at Jerry. He was so skinny that, when he got sick, Timmy just knew there was no way he would survive. He did though; they all did. The poison control people told Momma to give everyone who ate the kerosene oatmeal some soup or something and, if we couldn’t keep it down or became any weirder than usual, she should bring us to the Emergency Room at Denver General Hospital to be checked out. Momma didn’t drive and had just spent her last two nickels on the phone call. She held a hand over her mouth when she returned from making the phone call. Timmy recognized the pain in her eyes. He knew she was suffering from one of her terrible toothaches. Her teeth were all rotten. She took a bunch of aspirins and crunched them up with a spoon, then poked them into the holes in her teeth. Sometimes her face would swell up so bad Timmy thought Daddy had beaten her up again. If he said anything to her about it, she generally told him to mind his own business. He didn’t have the courage to tell her he felt like she was his business. She already knew that anyway. Momma wore her pain and wore it well. Still, Timmy was afraid one day it would wear her out. She and the children survived the day, each and every one of them. Momma watered down some commodity tomato paste and called it tomato soup. Still sick from the oatmeal fiasco, Timmy felt too yucky to argue. She had done the same thing in the past with catsup/ketchup. It just didn’t amount to soup/soup, and no crackers. “Tomatoes is tomatoes,” she would say in a feigned light air. Timmy wondered what real tomato soup tasted like or if there was any such thing. Thoughts like that made him feel guilty. Momma always did her best. wordwulf queloquepasa/wordwulf Inquiries: wordwulf@gmail & bar publishing barpublishing1@yahoo ©2014 graphic artwork music & words conceived by & property of tom (WordWulf) sterner 2014© ~also available at Amazon &~ ~momma’s rain @ smashwords~
Posted on: Mon, 10 Mar 2014 17:58:11 +0000
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