Caught in the Flotsam

Andrea Linebaugh

Mary could get feisty, as Honey Boy was about to find out. She drew back and threw a cob of mud at him full force. Her dirty cotton dress swirled around her dirty knees.

“Flax Head! I ain’t fixin’ ta toss wit’ no girl taday.”

Honey Boy tossed his head. “Huh. I ain’t fixin ta.” He ran, frayed hems dragging between the cobbles.

Mary chased him passed row homes until he ran across the bridge.

Honey Boy stood on the other side. Mary was not permitted to cross. She lifted a foot to take the first forbidden step.

“Flax Head, don’t you be doin’ it girl! I be comin’ beck tomorra. We cud’t play what you want dis time.” Honey Boy could yell all he wanted; onto the bridge she came.

One defiant step at a time. She looked over the edge to the water churning through the narrow passage. A tangle of branches had caught on a fallen tree. In the mass, Mary spied a naked little doll in the twigs.

“Look, Honey Boy, a doll.” She cooed, “I want to get it.”

“Well you cain’t, you hide be tanned! You tell you paw. He ken go down there. What you be wantin’ that for anyway? You got live dolls at home an’ you din’t care ‘bout dem.”

“My brothers ain’t dolls. A doll don’t scream or piss. I don’t want to wash its nappies. I want to hold it. I can’t tell Papa. He’ll know I was on the bridge. I couldn’t have seen that twig pile from the road.”

“Jes’ tell him I seen it, Flax Head girl!”

“There HAS to be a way!”

“Dat Doll gon’ get washed to Kingdom Come if rain be comin’. I ken tie a rope to ma wais’ an’ go git it.”

“NO!! It’s MY DOLL! Tie a rope to ME!”

“You cain’t. You Paw gon’ wop you if you do.”

“Who’s goin’ to tell him, HONEY BOY!”

Honey Boy tied her off, lowering her down the bank. Mary was nimble, determined. She climbed along the length of the fallen tree, carefully choosing her foot falls.

She reached the branches just above the doll. Below her in the froth lay a naked baby, bloated and blue. Its eyes wide to the clouds, staring into the gloomy sky.

“Oh, no,” Mary whispered. One hand to her mouth, the other to her heart.

She situated her weight to free both arms and reached to the infant below. Pulling the tiny, dripping infant to her chest, Mary began to cry. She held it close, rocking it, sobbing into its wobbly neck and then howling into the air until a sob closed her throat. There she sat. On a fallen tree. Over a rushing stream. Tied to a bridge. Holding a naked and dripping drowned baby. Wailing to the heavens. Keening it home.