“They’re still not moving,” he said.
Thomas was starving. He’d just sat down to eat a bowl of Ma’s chili when Moses went silent. That in itself was weird. The dog never stopped barking unless someone went out and shot whatever animal was giving him hell. Pa was out there smoking, but Thomas hadn’t heard his father’s shotgun. It was strange, but not alarming, so he’d raised his spoon and smiled in anticipation of the big bite of Ma’s best making its way into his belly. He’d worked hard all day and couldn’t wait to dig in.
That was when Pa crashed through the door. He was different. His eyes were bloodshot, and drool ran down his mouth. He swung out with his hands frantically, like he desperately needed to grab hold of something. Pa’s fingers found a handful of Ma’s hair, and Thomas fell out of his seat and landed on the floor in time to see something leap from his father’s head onto his mother’s.
Then she changed too.
His first instinct had been to protect his mom. Thomas grabbed the fireplace poker with every intention of swinging it at his dad, but then Ma howled, raked fingernails at her scalp, and Thomas knew he needed to get out of the house before whatever was happening to them reached him too.
Using the pile of firewood alongside the house as a step stool, Thomas climbed up onto the roof, like he did so many other nights when Pa took to drinking and showed his angry side. It was his private place to lie beneath the stars and wonder what it would be like to run away with the kids who often came to Stonewall Forge for the many conferences held there. He often thought about what life would be like in other places like Florida, California, or even Hawaii.
This time, he lay there because he had no other choice. He was afraid to climb down. With his ear to the tin roof, he heard his parents thrashing around in the house below. Moses was gone. At least he thought he was. He hadn’t seen the dog since earlier that evening.
Even when he heard his parents leave the house and wander out into the woods, he remained on that roof. He stayed there all through the next day, baking beneath the slivers of sun that pushed through the forest ceiling. He imagined himself looking like a zebra now, striped with sunburn and the pale skin that avoided the rays.
By the time Thomas was brave enough to leave the roof, the chili was dry, crusted over, and covered with flies. Ma had prepared broccoli too, as she claimed a growing boy always needed a green vegetable with supper. Every day. No exceptions. Nothing reeked like old broccoli. It was one of the reasons he hated the stuff. It tasted fine, but he couldn’t help thinking his insides would stink like the garbage always did when he took it out the day after eating it.
His stomach growled with hunger, but he gagged from the stench.
Thomas was standing next to the dining room table when Moses came back. The dog walked into the house and stood by the door, staring up at Thomas the way he always did when he was expecting a treat.
“Moses?” Thomas asked.
The dog was filthy like it’d had a hell of a night. Its tongue lolled out and its eyes were bloodshot. It was the animal version of Pa, only the dog wasn’t thrashing around and chasing after him the way his father had the night before.
“Moses,” Thomas repeated. “You okay, boy?”
He knew the dog wasn’t but standing there in silence didn’t seem right. Moses didn’t respond, but something on its fur did. Thomas realized each time he spoke, Moses’s fur twitched. It shifted. Moved as if its fur were a forest full of birds about to take flight. Thomas had spent many of his days up on the roof watching birds and wishing he could hit the sky and never come back. He knew a dog’s fur should never move that way.
When he backed up a few steps, the dog didn’t follow. He retreated slowly, quietly, making every effort not to spook the dog. This strategy seemed to work. Moses didn’t budge. He stood by the door, his chest heaving with heavy breath, and his tongue twitched every few seconds. It was the fur holding Thomas’s attention. It reminded Thomas of snakes now, the hair slithering and searching, trying to locate him.
If he could reach the bathroom, he could lock himself inside and use the window to climb out and directly onto the roof. He’d done it before. With his boot in the window frame, he could launch himself up. Moses could never follow him up there.
Closing his eyes for only a second, he fought with the realization he’d be back up there, starving and dying of thirst, safe from whatever was happening below but suffering the elements. He needed food and water. Realizing he’d have to deal with the immediate threat first, he decided it was better on the roof.
He continued to move back slowly, and he was getting closer to the bathroom door when his boot touched a floor panel that always squeaked. The sound might as well have been a scream because Moses turned his head toward him, and as he did, his fur shifted that way too.
With only one bark to serve as a warning, Moses leaped onto the table and bolted toward Thomas.
Thomas turned, ran, and dove into the bathroom, kicking the door shut behind him. The dog hit the door so hard Thomas thought it would explode inward. It cracked but didn’t shatter, but Moses wasn’t about to give up. Whatever had driven the dog mad wanted inside the room, and Thomas knew each strike against the wooden entryway was one closer to the dog reaching him.
The boy climbed through the window and was halfway through the frame when he noticed the other animals in the woods surrounding the house.
They watched.
They waited.
They listened.
Moses continued to ram the door behind him. Thomas ignored the other animals and reached for the roof. His hands gripped the gutter, and it threatened to come apart in his hands. He’d never had to make this climb in such a hurry. The flimsy metal bent in his hand and broke apart.
A piece of the gutter clattered against the ground, its tinny material making a hollow clack as it struck the dirt.
It was like a gun blast to start the race. The animals in the woods shot forward.
Thomas had no time to look at them, but he could hear their paws pummeling the forest floor, pitter-pattering as they scurried toward the house, hellbent on reaching their prey.
Him.
Thomas dug into the roof and hoisted his body up and over the lip at the side of the house. His body rolled across the flat surface as what might have been a wolf leaped and snapped its jaw only a foot away from his leg. Remembering the sight of the dog’s fur, he dragged himself farther from the edge, making sure nothing could leap high enough to reach him.
That had been earlier in the day, and he’d lain there on that roof for hours, wondering what would kill him first. Would it be the hunger and thirst? Or would he become desperate enough to leave his hiding spot and venture down into the house again only to be attacked by one of the rabid beasts?
He’d decided on the hunger and thirst because nothing was going to make him leave this roof.
That was until he heard the gunshot. Then another and another. It sounded like it was coming from Stonewall Forge, or at least from that direction. Someone was fighting back, and that gave him a moment of bravery, long enough to crawl to the edge of the roof and look down to see if the animals were still surrounding his house.
It was pitch black out there, but he knew they were gone. He could see the tree line bathed in soft blue moonlight, and there was nothing out there. He fell forward onto his chest and let his arm dangle over the edge of the roof.
With a quick jerk, he pulled his arm away, remembering the wolf that had leaped at him and the fury with which Moses had bounded over the dining room table. Like the time he got to go out on his uncle’s boat down in Fort Lauderdale, and he let his hand dangle off the edge until his uncle warned him sharks can jump, he thought twice about being so daring.