Personal Narrative-The Boston Boy

Walking up the drive towards the cottage, Sam thought about just how freakish it would be to be chased by a half-naked, bearded man. That sight seemed fitting to Sam, and enough of a scare to not bother the boys’ mothers. As he hobbled his way towards where the front door should have been, nursing what he thought to be a pulled hamstring, Sam took a moment to reflect on the splattering of eggs. The yellow yokes harshly contrasted the deep blackness of the wood shingles. He found the empty carton cast haphazardly next to the blank spot in the rock border. The Boston boy, having used the last of the eggs, decided to instead throw a rock in an effort to impress his new friends. Sam found his jeans, a t-shirt, and his tan Carhartt work jacket.
Always a hunter, his eyes were tuned to recognize distant motion. The snow hadn’t reached town yet, and the boughs and needles remained clear and lush. The deep and varying greens of the wall of pine was stark against the blue of the midafternoon sky. There wasn’t a single cloud. It was a beautiful, blue bird day. Pulling into the handicapped spot in front of Nails n’ Screws, Sam looked at his hands. Only now did he realize his body was still caked with mud. His hands a dusty brown, his body moving strangely under its new exoskeleton. The dirt under his fingernails was black, clay based. Walking inside, he tried rubbing his hands on his jeans to clean them, but instead only left behind dirty streaks. Great, Sam thought as he wove his way through the store with a slight limp, searching for reinforced hinges. In the power tool aisle, Sam watched as a mother quickly guided her daughter back the way they came, down the aisle away from him. What’s her problem? Sam thought to himself, it’s only
“Right, well if you are in, and need a friend, I can come by. Just a call away, Bud.” With that, Sam smiled, rolled up his window and pulled out into the parking lot. As he turned down Main Street and entered the highway, Sam reached into his shirt and wrapped his fingers around Maggie’s pendant. Opening his hand, he stared intently at the pure white. “What a strange man, don’t you think, little lamb?”

Inside the cottage, Maggie sat at the table. The cigarette still hung loosely from her fingers. Her skin had browned and grown tight around her bones as it dried with age. Her head had shrunk considerably, the empty sockets of her eyes receding deep within. Maggie’s stomach, where the Coroner had crudely sewn her back together, had pulled apart at the stiches leaving gaping diagonal crevices. The wedding dress they buried her in was wrinkled. Her hair, while wiry, laid neatly groomed. Sam, having taken her brush from the bathroom, had done it before