Screaming Monkey Day

It was one of those screaming monkey kind of days. You know the kind I'm talking about. The kind of day when even the air seems charged with something that makes sounds crackle, colors explode, and emotions simmer just below the boiling point. All it takes is that one last little thing for all hell to break loose. Tommy was that last little thing.

I was watching him from the corner of my eye, and I knew he couldn't hold himself back for very much longer. He took a deep breath, plastered an innocent look on his face and said, just loud enough to be heard, "Well, I guess that's the last time I'll ever take the shortcut across Old Lady Hadley's place." All sound was suspended, all motion ceased, and I dont think any of us even dared to breath for fear of directing attention away from Tommy and focusing it on ourselves. "Gawd almighty!! Why can't he keep his big stupid mouth shut?!" I wondered to myself as I waited for the fearsome visage to swing slowly around to settle it's savage countenance on him. All he'd had to do was finish eating his supper and get outside. But not Tommy! He just had to toss powder in the fire to watch the explosion.

And what an explosion! Veins bulging on the forehead, crimson flushing from neck to hairline, white of eyeballs flashing! Why the very hair on the back of my neck stood to attention at the sight. And that standing up hair was the only thing that moved around the dinner table.

Finally the sound of a long ragged indrawn torrent of air was heard, then the split second of silence before we knew the words would begin to crash and thunder around us at the almighty power of righteous indignation being unleashed. Yeah, this was going to have some serious fallout. We were all going to be washed away by this one. Damn Tommy!!

"Just exactly what do you mean by that statement, Thomas?" The words were not shouted, but even more frightening, they were delivered carefully, like glass shards being ground out between clenched teeth, gritted out between lips clamped so tightly together they resembled nothing so much as a couple of dead slugs, all white and crinkly. Even Tommy was frozen by this new development.

No wall resounding shout of distinctly chopped syllables, no Southern-Baptist-preacher-arm waving, no prancing, dancing around, which had always reminded us of a Kentucky Derby animal just before the gate flew open. No, none of the normal occurrences, just this quiet whisper of pure, powerful, white-hot, steel-cold rage. Thank God it was directed at someone besides me!

The look of innocence on Tommy's face faltered for a split second. Just for the space of an eyeblink I saw the uncertainty and fear behind his bravado. He swallowed quickly and opened his mouth to make his explanation, when he was interrupted by another low, growing, grinding statement from the horrible harridan who had been, until a few moments ago, our loving mother. "Whatever is about to come out of your mouth Thomas, be absolutely certain that it is the God's honest truth."

That fantastic flashing searchlight beam of her eyes never wavered in their piercing scrutiny of Tommy's face. Tommy opened his mouth again and then...NOTHING!! Not one sound, not a single word came out. He was flapping his gums like laundry on a line, but he wasn't making any noise. I wasn't sure if this was a new trick of his, or if maybe he had been struck dumb. I had heard of people who had known someone who had been 'struck dumb', but I never had actually seen it happen until now.

It seemed like the effort he was making to talk was wearing on Tommy something fierce. His face was turning red, sweat beads were popping out on his upper lip, and the wild look in his eyes was something to behold. "My Gawd!" I thought, "Tommy has done been struck dumb for all those times he lied to Mama." A small secret little space way down deep in my heart was just the least bit thrilled with this new development. What a red-letter day this was turning out to be!

All of a sudden I realized that Mama's foot had started to move. Up and down, up and down. Her toes were tapping out a rhythm that seemed to accelerate with every passing second. TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP. Faster and faster that foot tapped, and the faster it went, the more the look on Tommy's face changed to all out terror. He seemed to know a little sooner than the rest of us, that the quiet before the storm had just passed, and hold-on-to-your-garter, Lucy, cause here comes the hurricane!!

With about the seventh TAP! of Mama's foot, that frighteningly quiet, deliberately soft spoken stranger was gone, and in her place was the ranting, raving, arm-slinging, floor pawing, screaming lunatic that we all knew so well. Mama was back with a vengence!

I began to pray, 'God if you will please just protect the rest of us, I promise you we will never do anything bad again. Sorry about Tommy, but I think he's a goner. Just please protect the rest of us. Thank you God." We both knew this was just an empty promise, but I made it anyway. I was desperate.

Three days!! Turns out that's all Tommy got for his punishment. All that calamity at the supper table, and just three days of not being able to go to his friend Able's house after school was whole sentence. 'Course two of those days were a Saturday and Sunday, so I guess it was a good enough punishment. Tommy wasn't no more struck dumb than I was. He just used that trick to get Mama's attention off his crime and directed toward the only thing she got more fired up about than us being bad. That was us being sick.

My oh my, she could whip out the Epsom's Salt, Vicks Vaporub, or the Pine tar and turpentine mix that was in the dark brown bottle on the shelf in the kitchen, and she could cure just about anything from the green apple bellyache to the springtime hacking cough. I have to admit, Tommy was a pure genius for acting like he couldn't talk. Mama was on him like a duck on a June bug. She nearly choked the life clean out of him feeling the muscles in his throat for any 'bindin' up' or 'closin' off'. Then she nearly knocked him plumb out by whacking and thumping on his chest and back to see if there was any sign of 'fluids backin' up'. When she was finally satisfied that all the muscles and fluids were where they should be and were flowing, or soft and pliable, she gave him the 'this will cure anythin' I might have missed' dose of pine tar and turpentine that made his eyes water and his nose burn something awful.

Then she leaned her face down 'till she was staring him eyeball to tear-filled eyeball and said, "Whatever you did at Miz Hadley's place, you're going to go tell her you are sorry, and then for three whole days you are not going to play with that Able Stanley Simz. You hear me, young man?" Tommy nodded his head up and down twice, holding eye contact with her the whole time, and trying not to giggle when Mamam said Able's entire name, because his initals spelled 'ass' and Tommy always thought about that when anyone said, "Able Stanley Simz."

Mama held his gaze for the space of three long heartbeats before she raised up to her full height, turned her back to him, and began to leave the room. She took two steps away, and then scared the be-jesus out of Tommy when she said, "Put that thing back in you mouth before I yank it right out of your head!" How she knew that Tommy had poked his tongue out at her, I'll never know, but he nearly swallowed the thing trying to get it back inside his gaping mouth before she could turn around and catch him.

We knew this is everything that happened because when Tommy was getting eyeballed by the quite scary stranger Mama, we sneaked, quite as mice, away from the table, and slunk out the front door. We didn't want to catch any stray bolts from that fearsome storm breaking in the dining room! We were hunkering down on the side porch, under the window sill, listening to the noise and popping up for a look whenever we could screw our courage enough to chance being accidently spied by Mama.

Anyway, the end of the matter was, Tommy couldn't play with Able for three days, and he had found a surefire way to get Mama sidetracked when she was giving him what for.