yachiru

In winter we hunt mermaids. As our fathers and our father's fathers have done, passing along their secret hunting grounds like an echo of genetic memory.

I wonder that the same isn't so for the creatures we hunt. Instinct alone should have guided them to better hibernating locations yet daughter after daughter is born, only to die inside their winter homes.

Perhaps something inside each is a cruel spirit, each whispers to each; safe here, safe here.

I know their hearts are tough. Usually the dogs won't even eat them. I know which parts are tender and which are bitter. I know how to crack bones for soup and how delicately sharp the knife must be to remove the scales without damaging them.

My daughter makes necklaces, sells them to tourists.

Look at how beautiful, my daughter tells them. Don't you want to be beautiful too?

Ma started to turn to stone around October. Or at least that's what she remembers.

She never was a moveable sort of woman. All I remember as a kid is her in that lumberjack shirt sitting on the porch, watching the treeline like Pa was gonna come back through carrying his old sack and some fresh rabbits to skin.

She's what you'd call a handsome woman. Still got a full head of hair though it's mostly white instead of black.

I checked in on her as a good son should. Brought her to church until she fell out with Doris over her extensions and how they shamed Jesus in the house of the Lord. Sherrif Bean said as long as she never went near the church again he wouldn't arrest her for assault.

She sure was mad about it. Talked about calling a lawyer and suing the Catholic Church.

Then the priest started calling her on Saturday night to discuss scripture and she settled down okay.

That's how I knew something was wrong. He called me one morning and said, Jim, you gotta get out here, your mom is real sick.

I dunno what I expected. Maybe that she'd fallen or broken something. Maybe that old rotwood swing she kept sitting on broke into a million pieces and she was all cut up.

Strange thoughts come to you when you're driving over to something like that. I had some and more.

When I got there, I saw maybe a half a dozen trucks in her driveway. All I could think was she's dead. And I felt an awful kind of relief. She was gone and one day I would forget her and she'd be really gone.

Got that sour feeling in my stomach. That guilt filling me right up.

I found them all standing around the porch. The Sherriff, the priest, Daryl from down at the Qwick E, and a couple of farmers.

"Is she possessed?" I heard Earl yell.

I figured she was alive then if she was givin' them hell.

The priest, he held up his hands. "I'm sure she has an explanation. A non-demonic explanation."

At that point, I had to step in. Ma could be mean but she weren't no minion of satan.

I pushed past them old boys and saw Ma sitting in that same spot. She looked fine. Almost happy. For a woman of her temperament.

Then I saw what they were staring at. Her right foot, it was pure stone. Quartz, all marbled in the middle. Some tools were around the stone. Bits of cheap metal where they'd probably tried to chip away at it.

"Ma," I said. "You stop this right now."

I knew she'd made up her mind and you couldn't move Ma when she had a notion. But I tried. I can tell the Lord I tried. I used my most stern voice. The one I use to shoo varmints from the shed.

She blinked and gave me an almost smile.

"I don't know what you're talking about, son."

Then she hummed. Hummed! She hummed a Dolly Parton song right at me.

Me and the boys tried pulling her up then. She kept complaining that Derry was copping a feel but he weren't. His hands were as respectable as pie on her lower legs.

She wouldn't budge. More people came over and we all tried all sorts of different things. Even that one with the mayonnaise. Ruined an entirely good jar of mayo on that one.

Ma was a mountain. The more we tried, the harder she stuck. She'd made up her mind and the stone followed, inching up her legs and arms.

At first, people cared. Or at least pretended to. Mostly they came to gawk at her and watch robins rest on her shoulders.

After a while, even the preacher stopped coming.

Only her eyes were left.

They were still looking at that forest, waiting.

"He ain't never coming back," I told her. "Not even if you turn into one of those gargoyles with the wings and claws."

The stone moved over her eyes, turning them gray and then a milky white.

"I'll take care of your place," I said.

"I know you're particular about how you sort the pantry. Might get a dog, though. Been a while since we had one."

I lit my cigarette, staring out at the same woods Ma was.

"Remember when we had George? Cute little bastard. Pa got him for me when I turned five. Said every boy should have a dog. Remember how mad you were that he hadn't asked you first?"

Her face had turned so red. I thought she'd explode for sure.

I knelt down at her feet, spreading some birdseed around for the robins that lived on her body.

"I wonder why he took George when he left?" I asked. "I wonder why he took him and not me?"

Her eyes closed. Some of the birds perched on her shoulders started to call out. It sounded like sobbing.