Stitches

Hollow Bones

We first met The Collector when I was thirteen and a half, the day after Pa drank two bottles of tequila and popped Clover so hard, her front teeth fell into the chicken soup. When she fainted from shock and pain, I took over supper duty. I added some sage, the herb of my namesake, and boiled the broth on the stovetop without even fishing out Clover's incisors, letting the aroma of comfort and blood fill the air. There was a part of me that hoped those teeth might come to life in Pa's belly and eat home from the inside out. Trent hadn't grown big enough to merit any beatings yet, but by next year, he'd be the age Clover and I were when we first encountered Pa's wrath. So, while Pa guzzled a steaming bowl, I imagined those incisors going to work on his innards.
Pa are every bit of dinner, leaving us nothing. He always ate like he was starving, but couldn't gain a pound. He'd never been a very stout man, and had become even thinner over the months since Ma's absence, frail and hollow-boned like a bird. But he was still as mean as a feral bobcat when he drank.
He cussed at me till I handed of the keys. From the pictures window, I watched him swerve down the dirt road in his Chevy truck, kicking up weeds and grass as his tires spun this way and that. Just before following the curve through the magnolia trees and vanishing from sight, he dipped his head out the window and spewed up his supper.
I remember thinking what a waste of food that was, and that my high hopes for Clover's teeth had been for nothing. The sun set over the trees, bringing shadows to life, Pa was to gone all night. My sister did her best to entertain us, despite the gray bruise that swelled foe her mouth and chin until it looked like a rotten plum. She insisted on making treats and having a slumber party.
The inside of our cupboards and fridge had more cobwebs than food, but we always made do. Before our Ma disappeared a few months earlier, she taught us how to make gingerbread without eggs and homemade coca with chi slat bar and water. I used to watch her hands as she stirred and folded and whipped, bending the ingredients to her will. Those same hands that were rough from hours spent tending the garden, yet still had a soft touch when someone was sad or hurt.