A Bird on Water Street by Elizabeth O. Dulemba

Author:Elizabeth O. Dulemba
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Sourcebooks
Published: 2019-10-04T15:26:28+00:00

Great-Grandma Harmon told the Jack Tales while Mom and Livvy shelled peas or shucked corn. They wouldn’t stop as long as the stories didn’t, so Great-Grandma told story after story, one leading into another. Mom knew them all by heart and she told them in a thick mountain drawl.

My favorite was “Jack and the Robbers.” It was about Jack, of course, and an ox, a donkey, a hound dog, a cat, and a rooster who all end up riding on top of each other like a pyramid. They come across the lair of some highway robbers and wait for ’em to return from thievin’. Jack and the animals scare them robbers so bad that they end up chasing ’em off—so they get to eat their vittles and keep their loot too!

Mom also told us “Jack and the Bean Tree”—the Appalachian version of “Jack and the Beanstalk”—and “Sop Doll,” about a bunch of witches. Dad and I cheered and clapped when Mom was too tired to tell anymore.

Course, by then, we’d been listenin’ to her hillbilly drawl so long that we were talking that way too, crackin’ each other up.

“Let’s jes set up a bed he’ar on the floor,” Dad said.

“That’s a right fine idea,” Mom replied.

“I sure is tir’d,” I said. “Ma, I got me a hankerin’ to snack on some o’ yer corn pone. They any left?”

“Law’ no, I gave it to the pigs. They hain’t had nothin’ but leather britches and cornhusks since fall. I figgered to give ’em a treat.”

“Well that were plum good of ye,” I said. “But I sure is hungry. Maybe I’ll go outside and chew on a tyre.”

“You leave my wagon alone, y’hear?” Dad said. “It done nuthin’ to ye.”

We were in tears, laughing so hard. But all that talk of corn pone really did make me hungry, and Mom had some cornbread left over in the kitchen. I danced across the cold floor and raced back with a piece of cornbread, which I shoveled down too fast to taste.

It was too cold to sleep in our bedrooms, so we stoked the fire and piled the blankets and pillows into made-up beds on the floor. We’d just settled in to sleep when the power came back on. The whir of the heater smothered the sound of the crackling fire, and lights popped on like camera flashes.

I squinted and blinked against the sudden glare. Mom frowned.

Dad got up, turned off all the lights, turned the heat down, and came back to the den with a wide grin on his face. “Make some room fer yuh pa ther’.”

I fell asleep wishing things could stay just like this, happy and warm.

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