The Book of Polly by Kathy Hepinstall

Author:Kathy Hepinstall
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2017-01-11T15:38:30+00:00

Polly tried to make nice again during the second course, politely asking the children how their classes were going.

The boy and the girl shrugged in unison, Polly’s least favorite gesture on earth. Mrs. Burrell jumped in eagerly. “Oh, they’re so modest!” she shrieked. “They both got green ribbons for the poem they wrote together! They’re naturals, just like their father.”

The twins looked bored. They had barely eaten their salad and hadn’t touched their crawfish. Mr. Tornello was stirring the rice and sauce around on his plate.

Polly simply stared at Mrs. Burrell and I marveled at my mother’s complete refusal to acknowledge social cues. But the fence outside was not getting any younger. It was buckling under the moonlight as we spoke, the bright eyes of varmints peeking through the cracks, bully grass sending over its shooters. . . .

“LET’S HEAR IT!” I said heartily, as my mother nearly jumped. “The poem, I mean.”

“Come on, kids,” Mrs. Burrell urged. “Tell them your sweet poem.”

“No,” the boy said.

“Tell us the poem and you’ll get candy corn for dessert!”

Polly bristled. She had her special strawberry pie sitting in the refrigerator, something no store-bought candy could measure up to, but she held her tongue.

The twins stared at each other, candy in their pupils. And they began.

Old cat, old cat sitting on the fence

You have one eye . . .

“That’s my cat!” Mr. Tornello exclaimed. “That’s Marty!” He seemed oddly thrilled that a poem had been written about his zero-personality cat.

Sometimes you sigh

And you are bald in places

And we make funny faces.

You are going to die.

Mrs. Burrell began clapping. Mystified, Polly and I joined in the applause, which petered out quickly.

“Well,” Mr. Tornello huffed, “that was pretty good until you killed him.”

Polly had an odd glint in her eye, a glint of suddenly found opportunity, and I soon discovered the context.

“Speaking of the fence . . .” She leaned forward, ready to make her pitch. “As you know, our common fence has seen better days. It’s rickety and rotten and there’s that hole on your side, Darcie, that is propped up with that plywood slab for going on two years.”

Mr. Tornello was staring hungrily at the twins’ plates. Madison moved her plate over to him and he ducked his head and began inhaling more crawfish.

“Marty almost fell off in the wind yesterday,” he mumbled. “Fence was moving like a snake.”

“It’s funny you brought up the fence,” Mrs. Burrell said. “My husband and I were looking over our closing papers because we were thinking of refinancing. And we were taking a look at the plat map . . .”

Polly’s eyes darkened.

“. . . and you know something? The fence is wrong.”

“What do you mean, wrong?” Polly snapped.

Mr. Tornello had graduated over to the boy twin’s plate and was burrowing into it as though his frail wife had not cooked him a meal in fifteen years and he’d been subsisting on cat food. His ravenous eating did nothing to break the sudden tension in the air.

“According to the map,” Mrs.

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