“That’s enough,” my father said, and led us away
The circus disappeared, and within a week, my brother and his friends were dead. Tommy got his hand caught in the garbage disposal at the restaurant he worked after school. As it chewed his arm, they thought the pain was making him delusional because he was screaming about the lion’s teeth. He bled out before the ambulance got there.
James fell off a ladder while he was helping his father patch their roof. The fall severed his spinal cord.
Frankie died the most horribly of all. He wrecked around Johnson’s Bend one night and his car caught on fire. Rescuers said they’d never forget his screams. I figured he’s still screaming and burning in the place he went.
I dreamed about the old woman every night. She said, “Your crime is silence. You stood quietly and let evil reign. Thus, sealed your fate.”
One morning, my tongue felt funny. When I peered in the mirror, it looked like a piece of bark was attached to it. It felt like bark, too.
Mom was still in her room, so I didn’t bother her. I somehow knew it was my time. I went to the woods behind our house.
My steps grew heavier as I walked, and I could barely drag my feet through the leaves. When I looked down, my legs no longer looked human. They were forming into a tree trunk. Roots curled from my toes and spiked into the ground. I raised my hand to feel my tongue and my arm froze there. Bark raced down it, falling in place like Legos connecting, covering what was human.
With no surprise, I saw the girl walk out of the woods.
“I know it wasn’t your fault,” she said. “I begged my Babba for mercy. She said you must learn a lesson. You will be a tree until you grow and mature enough to bear fruit. When the first apple falls from your tree, you will be human again. I hope you will always stand up for yourself and others after that.”
It took three years, but I am still thankful for that lesson.
