Best Laid Plans

I’m not gonna lie. I was a little ambitious with my concept for this week’s blog post. It requires some additional research and it’s not quite ready. So, I thought I’d share a short piece of fiction this week, if that’s okay. I promise I’ll have my shit together next week.

"Best Laid Plans"

Sometimes, my sister was dumber than a sack of biscuits. I mean, who on Earth would try to climb a big ol’ tree in church clothes? I nearly peed myself laughin' when her foot slipped and she fell on her butt and slid right into the creek. Molly started giggling and couldn’t get her footing. I helped her out and managed to keep my cast dry. Thank goodness she kept the bag from falling in the creek. That woulda been a disaster.

“Mama told you to change clothes after mass! She’s gonna kill you, then I won’t have nobody to help me.” I slung the bag over my shoulder and tried to work out how the heck I was gonna get up that tree with one arm.

“Please, Mickey, you can’t let Mama wring my neck when we get home!”

Molly’d gotten herself into this mess, but there weren’t nothin’ for it. Ruining her church clothes and best shoes was enough to land her in her room for the rest of the weekend. I came up with a whopper. I’d tell Mama I had talked Molly into not changing clothes and had pushed her into the creek. My butt could take a switchin’ better than Molly’s. Father Donnelly would make me say a bunch of Our Fathers and Hail Marys ‘cause of the lie, but I didn’t really have no choice. Molly took off her dress and shoes and we laid them on a rock to dry in the sun. I gave her my favorite Star Wars t-shirt to wear, the one with R2-D2 on it.

We’d been draggin’ wood to the creek since the day school let out and every bit of lumber in the neighborhood that nobody would miss was piled up at the base of that tree. Molly held the bag open and I dug out a hammer, a saw, some nails, and our daddy’s leather gloves. Daddy didn’t know we had his stuff, but we figured as long as we put them back before he noticed, we’d be all right. Besides, once he saw what we’d built, he’d be too amazed to get mad.

I got the worst of it, but both of us must have looked pretty bad ‘cause Daddy didn’t say a word about us taking his tools and Mama went down to the library and got us a stack of Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew. Molly had to turn the pages and read to me ‘cause I couldn’t use either one of my hands and my eyes were swollen shut. I had to help her with the big words and it took her so long to finish a chapter I fell asleep some. I never had to tell my fib and Mama never asked about the dress or the shoes. Far as I know, they’re still on that rock. They gotta be ruined now, though. It rained all that week. Turns out we woulda been stuck inside anyway.