by Cathie Beck

Created on: September 10, 2009   Last Updated: September 12, 2009

One afternoon, the whole lot of us walked to the park: my pregnant sisters, me, my kids and my mom. One of my kids was cranky and started screaming so my mom grabbed her and marched to the far side of the playground. She plopped them both down in one of those leather swings, the kind that make a 'U' at the bottom, and she took the baby, who by then was red-onion-faced, kicking and screaming, and she forced her clenched fingers around the chains, which made the baby screech louder. But my mom calmly pushed the ground away with her foot, the real one not the wooden one and started swinging.

Are you awake? I said to the dark.

Yes, she said.

Soon she and the baby were swinging pretty high, I picked up. It quieted the baby and it was sort of fun to watch them: You didn't know why you watched it, but you did. You couldn't help it. My mom had thick reddish-brown hair, and it flapped against her face, blinding her for a second, then it spread up and out like a crown behind her head. It sort of hypnotized the baby.

In the meantime, everyone else was playing kickball, including the two pregnant sisters.

I took a break from the story, and listened to hear Denise breathing. My eyes had adjusted to the dark just enough to see her lying with her eyes closed. I saw that there were no sheets on the bed.

So I was sitting there watching my mom and baby swinging higher and higher and I was holding my other kid on my lap, and there was this blood-curdling, 'YEEEAAAggghhh! screech behind my back, I told her. The kid I was holding and I both looked away from my mom and we saw this cream-colored thing. It was a wooden half-leg. My mom's leg. Actually, it was her leg with a bobby sock and penny-loafer on the end. We watched it sail over our heads; then it crashed into a bush at the curb.

In the near-dark I saw Denise's cheeks move slightly with a tiny smile.

But that's not the story, I said to her and I saw her waiting.

My mom's was screaming, 'Somebody get my damn leg!' And 'One of you girls help me!' The baby was gripping the swing's chains. My mom couldn't get out of the swing; she had this one flaccid pant leg hanging down in front of her.

A little black boy had been trying to balance himself in the middle of a teeter-totter. He saw the leg, but you could tell it wasn't computing for him. His jaw was all hanging loose and his eyes were bugged out like saucers.

One of my pregnant sisters wrapped herself around one of the swing-set poles, bent double from laughter. She had a weak

• 1
• 2
• Next Page >>