The Grove

After the funeral, I took Zac to a small grove in town, one with trees perfect for climbing. Local legends said that the first tree in the grove was actually a ladder which had been left out too long. The wood took root in the soil, rejuvenated, and now all its descendants were trees with branches arranged like steps. It probably wasn’t true, but it was a good story.

When we first moved to the town, Zac would see the grove and get all excited. He’d run as fast as his little legs would carry him, then start climbing the tallest tree in the grove. He usually got about ten feet off the ground before he’d stop dead in his tracks and say, “I want to come down, Daddy, I’m scared,” and I’d oblige by reaching up to help him down.

Today, as we entered the grove and I let go of his hand, he trudged along somberly with his head hung low. He crossed the grove and sat on the roots of the tallest tree, both cheeks resting on his palms and elbows supported on his knees.

“Dad… did you really call Miss Keren a traitor?”

The question stung me to my core, as did the look in his eyes, which was both curious and judgmental.

“I did,” I said. “I’m sorry, but I did.”

“Why?” he asked me.

“I… I thought that if I did, Mr. Maganti might let her go.”

He gave a most puzzled expression. “That makes no sense, Dad.”

I sighed. “In hindsight, I guess it doesn’t.”

“What’s hindsight.”

I strongly resisted the urge to break the tension of the moment by telling him that hindsight is when you look too long at a woman’s posterior. Instead I simply answered, “It’s when you look back at things that happened in the past.”

“Oh.”

He said nothing more, but merely sat in melancholy silence.

I approached him and looked up at the branches above. “You don’t want to try to climb today?”

“No,” he said, not looking up from the ground.

“Why not?” I asked. “You’ve got a day off from school.”

He slowly exhaled, “I don’t want to…”

I understood his sorrow, but it wasn’t good to dwell in sadness too long, especially in his case. If he remained like this, wrapped up in his depression for too long, eventually his sorrow would turn into anger and he’d start acting out.

“Well… I’m going to climb it,” I said.

He looked up at me with incredulity, “You are?”

“Yes. To the top.” I stepped toward the tree and took hold of a branch.

“You’re too fat,” he said with a chuckle. “The branches will break.”

“Nonsense!” I said, patting my hand on my gut. “This isn’t fat this is… table muscle. The tree will hold me just fine. Heck, I bet with my long arms and legs I can climb to the top before you can.”

“Nuh uh!” he protested, fighting the smile trying to conquer his face.

“No, really, I’ll bet on it.” I took hold of another branch in my opposite hand. “I bet I can climb to the top before you can.”

“What do you bet?” he asked.

“Well… how about this. If you win, I have to buy you a new toy boat. If I win… umm… you have to clean the dishes for me tonight.”

One temptation I knew my boy had trouble resisting was gambling. There was a time when his eagerness to make bets worried me, but Benji explained to me that all of life is a gamble, and if we don’t take the gamble every now and then we won’t get anywhere.

I could see by Zac’s face that the thrill of a bet had won the debate within his mind. “Spit-shake on it.” He spat in the palm of his hand and offered it to me.

I spat into the palm of my hand and shook his, the sticky saliva oozing between our fingers.

As soon as his hand slipped from mine, he jumped into the tree and started to climb at an alarmingly-fast pace. A gentle breeze rustled the leaves as I started my own ascent, trying to keep up with him.

While I did have the advantage of longer limbs, Zac’s body was simply lighter than mine, and thus his climb required far less effort and strain. Even so, for every two or three steps he took to bring himself higher in the tree, I could pull myself up once and keep up with him.

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I quickly ran into the next problem. While he could squeeze through the narrow spaces between the branches easily, I had to find larger gaps to move through when the tree’s limbs blocked my way. He kicked a cluster of leaves on his way up, and three acorns pelted my face.

“Enemy at the gates!” he said. “Throw everything we have at them!” Zac kicked another cluster of leaves and more acorns hailed down upon my face, forcing me to look away.

“Your defenses will never hold!” I said in an overly-dramatic voice. “I shall reach the summit before you!”

I squeezed past him up the trunk of the tree and he bumped me with his shoulder. “Begone, fiend!” he cried.

“Never! This tower is mine!” I said, grabbing a handful of leaves and tossing them at his face.

The wind picked up a little stronger and the tree-top above us started to sway. The air felt cool and humid, and when I looked off to the west I saw dark clouds rolling in over the horizon. Climbing the tallest tree in the grove no longer seemed like the best idea.

Rolling thunder in the distance confirmed my fears.

“Zac, I think we should go back down,” I said.

“Why? Because I’m winning?” he chuckled.

“No… Zac, I want to go down. Daddy is scared.” I started my descent and glanced up to see that he was following suit.

“I still win, right?” he said. “Because you got scared first?”

“Yes, you win,” I said. “I’ll buy you a new toy boat.”

The second my boots touched the ground a hiss caused my bones to try to jump through my skin. I whirled my head around and spotted the source.

It was a snake with jet black scales and a mouth big enough to swallow my head. Its long body stretched out into the distance, hidden in the tall grass. But as I watched it the serpent lifted its head, peering at me with those yellow eyes.

“Stay in the tree,” I told Zac. My eyes never left the snake’s as I reached for the silver-edge on my back. When my fingers touched the hilt, the snake hissed again, showing its long fangs and the gaping pit of darkness in it’s throat. I stepped back, my hands trembling as they struggled to get my silver-edge out.

Zac jumped down from the tree, causing the snake to recoil from him and hiss yet again. He faced the serpent, opened his mouth, and hissed back.

“What are you doing?” I snapped.

“Helping,” he said, drawing closer to the snake.

“Don’t!” I tried to snatch his arm and pull him away from the black-scaled serpent, but he slipped through my grip and continued his approach.

His eyes locked with the snake’s, and there was no hint of fear in his demeanor. The snake leaned its head back, moving away from him. Its coils slithered to and fro behind it, causing the grass to sway.

“Zac!” I caught his arm again, this time holding a little tighter. “Don’t!”

He shoved my hand away with strength I didn’t expect from someone so small. Once he was free, he advanced on the serpent again. The snake turned and slithered away, disappearing into the distance.

Zac looked back at me over his shoulder. “Snakes do what I tell them to do.”

I stared blankly at him for a moment, not sure how to respond to that claim or what I had just seen.

The Great Serpent.

“I see…” I finally said. “How long have you known that?”

Zac shrugged. “I don’t know… I saw a snake at recess once and talked it away.”

A heavy weight pulled on my heart, and I prayed this wasn’t a sign that memories of his former life were returning to him. “Do you… umm… do you know why snakes listen to you?”

Zac shrugged. “Nope. They just do.”

“Have you ever told anyone else about this?”

“Just Emma,” he said.

“Emma? Who’s Emma?”

“My friend from school.”

“Oh… Is she the little red-haired girl?”

“No, that’s Olive. Emma is the girl who always wears pink ribbons.”

I scratched my beard and gave a slow nod. “And she didn’t tell anyone else?”

“No,” he said. “She pinky-swore not to.”

I swallowed my laughter at his simple explanation. As if children are the best keepers of secrets just because they “pinky-swore.” Then again, he’d successfully kept this a secret from me, and even if Emma had shared the secret with anyone else none but the most gullible of children were likely to believe her.

Keeping my tone as friendly as I could, I asked, “So, why didn’t you tell me you could do that?”

“Because Emma and I promised not to tell anyone else,” he said, giving me a look like this was the most obvious answer ever and I was stupid for asking.

I gave my forehead a light slap. “Oh, right! Silly me. So, if snakes listen to what you tell them… what did you tell that snake?”

Zac looked off into the direction where the snake disappeared. “To leave and never come back.”

I nodded. “Well, that’s good. But what if he bites someone else?”

“She.”

“What?”

“The snake was a she. A girl.”

I didn’t even want to ask how exactly he knew that. The very thought was too creepy to approach. “Fine, what if she bites someone else?”

“Whoever she bites will die.”

He showed no hint of emotion when he answered the question, merely stating it as a fact. His eyes were distant and cold, the same way they were when he told me Avery was going to die.

Trying to get some empathy from him for people he’d never met who might suffer that serpent’s bite, I said, “What if it bites someone’s teacher?”

A hint of sorrow pushed his eyebrows together. “Then some people will be sad. But their teacher will never leave them.” He tapped his chest with his palm. “She’ll be here.”

I have long heard that it is a father’s job to help his children come to grips with the harshness and cruelty of this world, and even to help them understand death so that they will not live in fear of it. I thought I’d done well in teaching him about how the ones we love live on in us after we die. But, at that moment, I wondered if my words had turned his heart cold toward the dead.

Part of me wanted to ask him then and there about his strange abilities. I wanted to know how he figured out he could poison people, like he did to Avery, and how exactly it worked. But I feared the questions he might ask me in return, such as the simple, horrible question I’d feared since he first started to talk:

“Why am I different?”