Shirley A. Martin

Hidden in a toolbox, in the rafters of his four-car garage, was an envelope full of pictures taken by a private detective...They were pictures of a scrawny, boyish looking nine year old with a wide mouth and a tangle of brown hair...Her eyes were oblong and deep set, their color hidden from the camera by the slant of the sun. The angles and planes of her face were oddly beautiful just then, in that moment, frozen on Kodak paper. A hint of the woman she would someday become.

She could see now that some of the grime that covered him was blood. He looked to be six or seven years old. His ribs were showing and his belly sunk in towards his spine, leaving a hollow above his hips.

What are you?' She asked. He shot her a brief glance and looked away. He stared at the scenery of the pastures and distant rows of trees. She knew he was not going to answer the question. In the brightening daylight, she could see that most of the blood on him was restricted to his mouth and hands. It dawned on her that it wasn't his blood, but the blood of something he had caught and eaten.

She didn't pick her way over the terrain like she was afraid of slipping on the ice...She glided over it with long confident strides. Her hands were in her vest pockets. Her eyes were Susannah.

Sally's head plopped into the shallow water and rolled face up. For a while, the changing shades of pinks and oranges reflected across the surface of her dead eyes.

He was naked as a jaybird and covered in filth. He moved towards her with the same eerie grace that he had scaled the side of the barn, stopping to sniff the wind and look suspiciously around...His eyes were not yellow now; they were as black as his hair.