TROUT BREATH

At 5:02 p.m. a tiny silver bell rang. Theldon Ramsey turned his head and looked. 'Time for supper, Theldon!' his mother shouted. She was a long distance from Theldon and therefore could barely see him. He was a small dark spot in her eyes. 

Theldon was sitting on a fallen log when the tiny silver bell rang. He had very good hearing, but even had he not, he probably could have heard the bell anyway since his mother was known to ring it very loudly, her expert wrist action causing the ringer in the bell to clang furiously against the insides. She was a really good bell-ringer. 

Theldon got up off the log and started running toward home. He knew that by the time he got there his mother would be inside, setting the food on the table and once he entered would say, 'Theldon, go wash your hands, make sure you wash good.' She said this every time he came in for dinner. It was like the bell ringing in his head. 

As he scrubbed his hands and cleaned out his fingernails and removed all evidence of dirt from the creases in his palms, Theldon thought of what it would be like to fly. 

The thought vanished once he turned off the water and started drying his hands. Poof, went the thought.

Theldon and his mother then sat at the table, on which were displayed dishes of food. They ate about half of it, then Theldon’s mother put it all away after they were done.

'That was good,' Theldon told his mother, then went back outside and headed for the fallen log. 

'Be in before dark, Theldon,' she said. And she watched him run out the door with a slam. 

He was about a hundred yards from the house. There was less light now. Theldon sat on the fallen log and started looking for crawly creatures. He picked off some of the dead or dying bark and dug stuff out. He saw a crawly creature and held it in his hand up to the fading light. The crawly creature did its thing on his palm. Theldon made it stay there when it headed toward one of the edges. He poked at its head and made it turn the other way. Theldon kept doing this, making the crawly creature go back and forth and round and round on his palm. His hands were dirty again. 

Soon Theldon noticed that the light was fading fast. He let the crawly creature go to the ground. It went under some grass and seemed to disappear. Theldon got up and went back home. 

When he got in, he went to wash his hands again, this time without his mother’s urging, for she was asleep on the couch, the TV running. Just as he was turning toward the bathroom, he stopped and looked at his mother. Her head was thrown back and her mouth was open. She wasn’t snoring, but she was definitely asleep. Theldon watched her for a moment and wondered if she was dreaming. Just then he thought he heard a sound outside and turned to look. He heard it again; it was a sound he had never heard before. It wasn’t the tiny silver bell. It was something else, something much more important, but it was a thing he couldn’t define. This time it was something he couldn’t possibly resist.

© 2023 Jeffrey S. Callico