one stitch and one moment

Did you ever know a minute that felt like a day? Have you ever had a moment swell up so big that it seemed to swallow the moment before and the moment after too?

See, while most of you have been having breakfast when you should, and supper when you should and sleeping through the night, just like you should, I’ve been stuck here in this one awful moment and it’s the moment I learned Pilot was gone. He ran off sometime in the night and every minute he stays gone I feel more sure he won’t be comin’ back.

My mama used to say bad things come in threes. I know that because Aunt Kitty’s always saying to me, “Now you’re mama always said bad things come in threes”– she says that right before she says, “but I always told her, ‘Katy, that’s just horse puckey. Bad things come and go, and counting ‘em up won’t make ‘em come or go any faster.’”

Still, I think my mama may have been on to something. If I’d've been counting, maybe I’d have taken more care.

The first thing came in the night, a peel of sirens that drew near and then faded, but was enough to stir Pilot and have him wet-nosing me till I let him outside. In the morning we woke to a red sunrise and smoke so thick you could taste it. Ben took out the truck and returned an hour later to say the fire was out on government land and should be out before it caused much trouble.

He barely had a toe to ground when Miss Julia from across the creek came high-tailin’ it up the road. She was hollerin’ and bawlin’ out the window and for a minute I thought all my prayers had been answered and that boy Ezekiel had up and died. I had just a moment to feel a smidgeon of regret before I realized that wasn’t it at all. “Cougar!” she was yelling. Then something about “My goats!” Well, Ben was quicker to catch on than me and he had his rifle and was climbing back in the truck about the time I puzzled out her words.

I guess it was the cougar that got me wondering about Pilot, and it was Wilbur whining and walking in circles around my legs that got me worrying. I still hadn’t tracked him down when Ben returned to tell us we better stick close to the house for a few days, seeing as how that cougar was gone by the time he got there. Miss Julia’s husband, Curtis, was away for the week, and that boy was nowhere to be found, so Ben was heading back straightaway to bury the goat the cougar got.

I’ve hollered for Pilot and I’ve walked circles around the house, but Ben won’t let me wander farther while there’s a cougar nearby. He’s done some poking around too, and drove up the hill aways to ask our neighbors to be on the lookout. Aunt Kitty’s done her share of whistling, but about the time the sun was set to disappear behind the hills she came out on the porch and told me to come inside. Food doesn’t hold much appeal when you’re missing someone and soon enough Aunt Kitty dismissed me from dinner. I poked my head out the window and called again.

“Tevis, dear, come sit,” Aunt Kitty said. Sit! How does a person make her body be still when her mind is a frenzy?

“Can’t,” I said.

“You can,” said Aunt Kitty. “Come here.” She patted her hand on the sofa beside her. She was pulling out my needles and yarn. They’d been away since my birthday.

I sat beside her, and she began to sing while I worked,

“In through the front door

around the back

peek through the window

and out pops Jack!”

My hands couldn’t quite keep up with my head, but they made a great effort.