Letting Go (Short Story‪)‬

IMAGINE A JUNE AFTERNOON, pockets of pitch bubbling on the long, winding road, a child walking swiftly, his thermos banging around in a metal lunch pan. A frog splashes in a roadside puddle. The boy stops, drops a pebble to scare the frog, but the frog doesn't move. He tires of the attempt as soon as he starts and moves on. A German shepherd, ears pointed, thick coat a glistening black, barks while running along a fence, forgetting in its anxiety that there is no way out. The child, long accustomed to the rumblings behind the fence, looks but shows no fear. Imagine one last hill and then a flattening road, three more houses set far back from the road, and then the slight rise of his coconut tree-lined driveway. His dogs, a tame German shepherd and a mongrel, don't bark, but sniff his hands and shoes. Their tails wag ferociously in happiness at his arrival. The boy walks up the hill, lingers by the open garage door, but continues instead around the side of the house to enter through the kitchen, where he hopes a glass of water awaits. There is no one in the kitchen, no ready glass of water, no crackers with jam or cheese. A pot bubbles, the pale yellow chicken soup spilling down its sides. In the sink, he sees peeled yam skin, flecks of dirt that fell from the yam, sweet potato skin, the crisp outer layer of an onion. He takes a cup and pours his own water, drinks, and looks left and right before deciding to take the stairs to his room. From the window he sees her, sitting on a boulder under the pimento tree. Her shoulders are heaving. Had he looked to the right of the house when he walked up the hill, he would have seen her there. But he hadn't. He walks back down the stairs, turns off the flame under the bubbling pot, and steps into the June sunshine to console her. She is holding his sister's doll and talking to someone he cannot see. She doesn't see him there. He tries to take the doll and she looks at him as if he's new to her. "Come," he says, and he holds her by the hand as he leads her back inside. Imagine a June afternoon, a boy, eleven years old, short, stirring a pot of soup, sprinkling salt and black pepper, rinsing a red scotch bonnet pepper and dropping it in, too. He's seen his mother do this to add some flavor. He sips a bit from a spoon and stirs again. He watches the pot, cuts the yam and tastes to see if it is done. He stirs the pot one last time, turns out the flame and waits for his father, who generally comes home after the night has come. The girl, the domestic helper who has been with the family for only three weeks, sits on the steps and stares. She speaks occasionally to someone he still cannot see. He holds her hand and she lets him. He prefers not to let her go. He knows already that it will only be a matter of time before another girl comes to take her place.