On the way up to the rock something caught Laura’s eye in the woods, prisms of light filtering down through the trees. The way they moved along the ground when the wind blew, she always ran off after them, arms outstretched and head thrown back to let them play across her face. I didn’t like her drifting too far out of sight, but when I wanted my twin I could call her back without words. I didn’t question how it was possible. I remembered a time when we were smaller that we didn’t need to speak at all. I could read the set of her mouth and the line of her shoulders and know what she wanted to say.
I went on to the rock, but when I stepped into the clearing I stopped in my tracks. In the place where I usually sat there was a snake. I walked closer for a better look. He wasn’t long but he was fat, a lazy S shape soaking up the heat. I had seen snakes before but this was the prettiest, sun shining on his banded back, patterned with rounded spots. When I hunkered down, he lifted the coppery-red triangle of his head. My heart thudded. I stretched out on my belly to look him in the face. Staring into his eyes, it seemed he knew everything about me. I thought if he could speak, he would call me by name.
Slowly the snake began to coil, scales undulating like magic. I wanted to show Laura, because back then my sister and I shared everything. “Laura, come and see!” I shouted, reaching out for the snake. Just as Laura came into the clearing, he shot up and bit me on the back of the hand. I saw the plush pink lining of his throat, the thin black line of his tongue. Then I felt the pain, hot and fiery, shooting up my arm. I was surprised, but I didn’t feel betrayed. I should have known that he was untouchable.
I woke the next day with a headache, hand bloated and bruised nearly black. The stiffness worked its way up my arm to the shoulder and the throbbing lasted for weeks, but it wasn’t all that bad. I couldn’t find the words to tell Laura, but there was something good about it, driving out the other aches inside that vexed me all the time. When I got better I thought that copperhead might have turned me into what he was, like vampires and werewolves do. The idea didn’t trouble me. I almost wished it would happen.
LAURA
I’ve had a long time to think about what made Mama how she was. I know now she never was like other mamas, but them last two years with her was harder. I figure it had something to do with that day in town when me and Johnny was six. It was the only time we ever left the mountain with her. We’d walk to the bottom of it selling ginseng, but she always made us hide in the weeds. The fat man leaned over the rail of his porch and counted the money down into her hand. She never set foot on his steps that I can remember. Sometimes we rode up and down the dirt road in the back of Mr. Barnett’s truck with the wind in our hair, but she wouldn’t let him take us anywhere else. I never wanted to go off the mountain anyway. I seen Mama’s fear of whatever was down there. I figured out she was trying to hide us from something dangerous. Johnny probably did, too. But he was different than me. He always wondered what else there was to see.
It took until we was six for Mama to give in. The leaves had fell and she was building fires in the stove. That meant it was time for Mr. Barnett to go to the co-op. Mama gave him money and he brung things back for us. Mr. Barnett was our good friend. Mama didn’t talk to him much, but I could tell he didn’t make her nervous. Not like that Cotter man we bought fresh milk from up the mountain. His wife would stand at the door with her arms crossed and look down at our dirty feet. Mama would hand over the money and take the milk fast as she could. Mostly we had powdered milk. That’s one thing she bought before winter. Powdered milk, flour, sugar, and cornmeal in big sacks. That year, when it was time for Mr. Barnett to go to the co-op, Johnny begged Mama for us to go with him. She said no at first but he started to cry. Worried as Mama was, she loved Johnny more. I believe it hurt her to deny him anything he wanted so bad.
Mama wouldn’t let us go by ourselves with Mr. Barnett so we all piled in the truck together, me and Johnny crowded between Mr. Barnett and Mama. Mr. Barnett smelled like liniment and dampish flannel. I liked riding in his truck with the heater blowing on my face. Mr. Barnett must have seen Mama shaking. He said, “You remember where the co-op is, honey. It’s in Slop Creek, not all the way to town. They won’t be many there this time of morning.” He put his big hand on top of my head. “These younguns need to see a little piece of the countryside anyhow. Don’t you?” I nodded, even though I didn’t really think so. I was nervous when Mr. Barnett first turned his truck right at the bottom of the mountain, but after a while I got excited. There was long fields with pinwheels of hay and silos and bridges over rolling water. I looked out the back window and seen the mountain getting left behind. But I still felt safe. Johnny and Mama was with me.
Then we was at the co-op and it was the most people I ever seen in one place. I stood still with Johnny, watching the men with caps and coveralls on, buying things for their farms. The lights there was a dirty color and sometimes they buzzed and blinked. There was heavy sacks stacked nearly to the ceiling and people rolled them out on long carts. I stayed close to Mama’s legs. After she paid, Mr. Barnett bought me and Johnny a bag of candy. We stood in the parking lot sucking peppermint while he helped Mama load the truck. A man got out of the car beside us and stopped to light a cigarette. When he seen Mama his eyebrows flew up. Then they growed together like he was angry.
“Hey there,” he said to Mama. I felt Johnny’s body get stiff beside me. Mama put a sack of flour in the truck like she didn’t hear.
“I said hey there, gal.” The man’s voice was loud and ugly. “You going to let on like you don’t know me?” Mama lifted her face then and looked at him. The red spots went out of her cheeks. “It’s been a long time,” the man said, “but I knowed it was you the minute I seen all that damn hair.”
Mama stared. It was like she couldn’t move. Mr. Barnett put down his dog feed and stepped toward the man. I knowed Mr. Barnett would protect Mama.
“What’s wrong, Myra?” the man asked. The way he grinned at her made me feel funny. “Do I look too much like my brother?” Mama didn’t say anything. He turned his mean eyes on me and Johnny, like he just noticed us. His face got white as Mama’s. “What’s this?” he said in a different voice. “Are these your younguns?”
“Get on in the truck, honey,” Mr. Barnett said to Mama. Then he looked at me and Johnny and said, “Y’uns, too.”
“If I recall, you was a churchgoing girl, Myra,” the man said. He stepped toward the truck and it was like Mama woke up from a dream. She opened the passenger door and got in fast, just as me and Johnny was climbing in the driver’s side. Mr. Barnett said, “Watch it there, feller,” but the man kept on coming. I squeezed close to Mama. She was pressed up against the window staring straight ahead.
“You ever read that part in the Bible,” the man asked as Mr. Barnett got in behind the wheel, “that says your sins will find you out?” Mr. Barnett pulled the door shut but I could still hear the man’s voice. “I know what you done!” he hollered, slapping the hood as Mr. Barnett backed out of the parking lot. “I know what you done to my brother!”
Looking back, it don’t make sense about that man being at the co-op the first time Mama ever let us off the mountain. She probably figured it was the Lord punishing her, but I don’t think He works that way. Sometimes the world is just hard to understand. I don’t believe it was seeing that man that ruint Mama. I think it was her worst fear coming true, of that man seeing Johnny and me. On the way back from the co-op she whispered, “I knew better.” It was the last words she spoke for a long time. After that, I never wanted to leave the mountain again. I seen what she had tried to hide us from.