August 9, 2011
Little Bastard
Then she asked, “Could you play a hymn for me at my visitation? It would make my mama so proud.”
“Suppertime.”
“I’ll play ‘Suppertime’ at your funeral,” I told her. “I promise. But not to make your mama proud. I’ll play it for the same reason we always played it.”
“You’re something, Mister,” she said, fading in and out of grownup words.
She tugged on my collar.
“If you ain’t the Devil then I reckon the Devil best be afraid of you,” she whispered in my face.
“That’s a fine line right there,” I explained. “But I can handle that little bastard.”
comments
Wonderfully quiet. Lots of interesting work being done by that one word “grownup.”