Dirty Chick by Antonia Murphy

Author:Antonia Murphy
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2015-01-09T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TEN

HEAVY BREATHING

We weren’t the only ones with lamb trouble. All the families in Purua adopted baby animals for Calf Club Day, and challenges inevitably arose. Autumn’s daughter Nova chose a pale gray lamb named Cardigan, and when they went out to feed her one morning, they found her dead. No one knew why. She was just too weak to make it through the night.

“Those girls must feel so awful!” Rebecca crooned when she heard the news. “Let’s invite them to breakfast, so we can try to cheer them up.”

Like most displaced New Yorkers, Rebecca had spent much of her time with us bemoaning the lack of bagels in New Zealand. Never mind the world-class scenery and the pageantry of exotic birds in these islands. What Rebecca needed most was a sesame bagel with a schmear. We decided to try baking our own, and on Sunday we invited Autumn, Patrice, and their children over for a taste.

“What’s that?” Maris asked when the first tray of bagels came out of the oven. We’d made sesame, garlic, and everything bagels. Plump and steaming on the cookie sheet, they looked like a taste of home.

Rebecca went pale. “You’ve never seen a bagel before? They’re only the best thing ever!”

“Why does it have a hole in it?” Nova wanted to know.

“Stop asking so many questions,” Autumn ordered. “Why don’t we show Antonia what you brought?” She reached for her bag and pulled out a tablet.

“Ooo, pictures?” We gathered round the tablet, anticipating photos of smiling children and lambs.

“We made a movie,” Maris mumbled, looking up at me with big, dark eyes. Nova just smiled.

Autumn hit the Play button.

On the screen, Maris was bustling about the kitchen pretending to make supper for her family. She opened a recipe book, stirred something in a pot, tasted and seasoned her soup. Carelessly, she wiped her hands on her apron and turned back to her recipe.

And then an ominous soundtrack began. Behind Maris’s back, the pantry door began to move. A slender white hand reached out, sliding the pantry open and reaching for Maris’s neck.

In the following scene, Maris lay broken on the floor. Her throat was slashed, blood oozing from the side of her mouth. The camera zoomed in on her neck, showing flaps of skin peeling back from the open wound.

In the final scene, the body was gone. Autumn came home, hanging up her coat and moving to the kitchen, not noticing the blood that dripped from the walls. The pot was still simmering on the stove. Autumn took a spoon and tasted. “What a marvelous stew!” she exclaimed. “It’s so rich and meaty!” Then: “I wonder where Maris is?”

The movie ended. Peter gave an uncomfortable cough-laugh.

“Oh, wow,” Rebecca stammered, pushing her bagel away.

“They’re really enjoying that theater blood you gave them,” Autumn explained.

“And you’re doing such a great job!” I cheered the girls. Since no one had much of an appetite for bagels anymore, I decided to change the subject. “I hear Cardigan didn’t do so well,” I told Nova sympathetically.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.