Words Like Coins

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First came drought. Then rats. Now it’s pecksies. Jami spoke into the darkness of the bedroom.

And that’s why you’re afraid to get out of the bed to get a drink of water? Mirrifen asked. Her sister-in-law’s restless tossing in the bed they now shared had wakened the older woman.

No, Jami said, with a strangled laugh. It’s why I’m afraid to get out of bed and go to the backhouse. She shivered. I can hear rats squeaking in the kitchen. Where rats go, pecksies follow.

I’ve never even seen a pecksie.

Well, I have! Lots of them, when I was little. And I saw one today. It was under the front steps, staring at me with its horrid yellow eyes. But when I crouched down to see it, it was gone!

Mirrifen sighed. I’ll light a lamp, and go with you.

Swinging her feet out of the bed and onto the floor in the dark still put a shiver up her spine. Mirrifen wasn’t sure she believed in pecksies but she did, emphatically, believe in rats. She tiptoed out to the banked fire in the kitchen hearth and lit the lamp from its embers. The moving flame painted shifting rat-shadows in every corner. The night before last, Jami had stepped on a rat when she got out of bed for water. Jami’s feet were already swollen from her pregnancy. A rat bite could have crippled her. Mirrifen hurried back to the bedroom. Come on. I’ll walk you to the backhouse.

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