Netti, what is a dingleberry, exactly? My little sister asked me. I didn't know, but I wasn't going to tell her that. Dingle sounded like jingle.

Some kind of bell shaped berry, I said.

I don't think so, she said. That's not what it sounded like to me, the way he said it.

Who said it?

Nobody. Dad.

Dad said what?

I asked him to play Chinese checkers with me and he said, I'd rather lick the dingleberries from the cat’s ass.

He was just joking, I told her. But what she said put a picture of him in my head, him lying on the sofa, staring at the white popcorn ceiling. Our fat gray cat curled up on his stomach.

They'd put us outside because he said he needed time alone with Mom. Which meant sex. The thing that really sucked was that I never knew how long the sex would be, and if we came before he was done he said we did it on purpose, but if we were back late we'd get in trouble because Mom worried about us.

So I had to think of something good to do. The last time, I'd brought us home too early. When I went in to check they were doing it on Siri’s bed. Mom's face was pressed against the pink pillowcase, and he was grunting. Her hair was pulled back with Siri's purple ponytail holder. I got it good that time. Dad said I interrupted them on purpose.

We walked along the dirt path with our jeans rolled up past our knees. Siri's calves were more scuffed than her tennis shoes. Put your pant legs down till we get there, I told her and she obeyed.

I was taking her to the creek. Some nights we could get there just when the sun glanced down on the water. I'd point up at the pink puffy sky. I'd say something powerful, like Behold the Bleeding Clouds. Sometimes Siri would gasp. Or hold her breath. We'd dip our feet in the cold water and fill our pockets with wet pebbles. It was a feeling hard to put into words. Like a dream curtain fell over you. It was the shimmering, we called it. Because you'd feel like you were inside the glimmering on top of the water, and kind of floaty, but not scared.

But today the creek was foamy, and it smelled of sewage. Put your shoes back on, I told Siri when she started to wiggle out of them.

What's all those bubbles? she asked me.

Soap, I said.

I couldn't decide whether to stay or go. If we stayed we could see the sunset, but the mosquitoes would come out and bite us. I decided to stay.

Behold, I said when the water turned pink, The Wine-Dark Sea.

Siri scowled. It isn't a sea, she said, and it doesn't look like wine.

Let's go home, then, I said.

We could take a bubble bath, Netti, she said.

No way. It smells like shit.

Siri knelt behind her favorite big rock and started digging for earthworms. It was past time for tadpoles. We liked collecting things out by the creek. The tadpoles hatched into little jumping toads. You couldn't keep them, they jumped too high, but you could catch one in your hands and hold it for a few minutes.

Hey look Netti! Look what I found!

Siri held a big fat frog up to my nose. It was the palest, prettiest green, bright like a firefly's wings. Its eyes were yellow.

Wow, I said.

There's more! Look Nettie there's more.

I'd never seen frogs like that before, but all kinds of animals came out sometimes after the floods.

What kind of toad is it? she asked.

I don't know. But it isn't a toad, I told her, it's a frog.

Siri grinned and lifted the frog up high over her head. Then she threw it against the big rock. Before I had time to say anything, she grabbed a stone as big as her fist and smashed the green frog. Its guts spilled all over.

What are you doing? You can't do that!

These frogs weren't like the toads. They were slow. She caught another and threw it into the foamy waters.

I said stop it now!

She looked up at me. Her eyes were like flat Coca-cola. His eyes.

I don't have to, she said. I'm the boss of my own brain.

I hate you when you do bad like that, I said.

That usually got to her but it didn't this time. She went looking for another.

I'm going to mass murder all these stupid frogs, Netti, she said.

I didn't stop her. I didn't even care, right then. It seemed an okay way to fill up the long dirty time.

Claudia Smith's stories have most recently appeared online in Zacatecas: A Review of Contemporary Word, Eyeshot, Opium, Inkburns, Pindeldyboz, Word Riot, Pig Iron Malt, Hobart, The Salt River Review and others. She has stories forthcoming online in The Mississippi Review and Pindeldyboz. She lives in Austin, Texas with her husband Nathen Hinson, two shaggy dogs and two pretty cats.

This piece was first published in INK POT #4 - 2004, a literary journal.

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