This River Awakens Read Online Free PDF Page B

God.’ Mother lurched up from her chair, sending it toppling backwards. ‘A rat.’
    Grey and round, the rat paused to look up at us, lifting one paw. I sat in my chair, staring at it. Its smooth fur looked soft, and its black eyes glistened like tiny marbles. Then it moved down the hall.
    Her face pale, Mother jerked a step forward, then shouted: ‘Jim! There’s a rat!’
    Outside, the clanging stopped. Then heavy boots thumped up the porch steps and the screen door flew open. Father stood in the doorway, seeming to fill it. In one hand was the mallet. His gaze fixed on something down the hallway, beyond our line of sight. Expressionless, he strode forward.
    I leapt from my chair. Three fast steps carried me into the hallway. Near the basement door stood Father, his arm raised, the mallet high in the air above him. There was a sudden scampering at his feet, then the rat leapt past him, half climbing the wall as it ran. I froze. It had been so fat, it had looked so slow. Now it moved, and it was fast, coming straight down the hallway and darting past me before I could even react.
    I whirled around just as Mother, still in the dining room, let out a scream.
    Father wheeled and came lumbering towards me. Stepping to one side to let him pass, I said, ‘In the dining room.’
    Mother stood beside the dinner table. Up on their chairs, Tanya and William stared into the living room, their eyes wide and faces flushed. Debbie leaned against a wall, her arms crossed, her expression closed and her face white.
    ‘It went into the living room, Jim,’ Mother said, her voice taut. ‘Under the couch.’
    He pushed past her and entered the living room, walking slowly, the mallet ready in his hand.
    When the rat made its dash across the centre of the floor, Father was ready. With a quickness that surprised me, he whirled and swung down. The floor shook, and then there was silence.
    I gaped. A new colour had come to the living room, startlingly bright. It stood out in tiny spots on the couch and the chairs, on the lampshade and the curtains. It spattered my father’s forearms, his coveralls, his face.
    The rat’s mangled body twitched in the centre of the room, intestines lying pink and wet beside it. All on the new rug.
    Behind me, Mother bolted for the kitchen, where she threw up in the sink.
    ‘Yuck,’ Debbie said.
    I stared at Father until he looked at me. ‘Where did all that blood come from?’
    His answering grin was strange. He slowly straightened, the mallet hanging limp and glistening in his hand.
    Debbie laughed. ‘Where d’you think, dummy?’
    I shook my head. There was too much of it. There had to be. It was just a rat. ‘But it was just a rat. Rats don’t have…’
    Father walked past me, holding his arms out to either side. ‘You’d be surprised,’ he said as he walked into the kitchen.
    I crouched down beside the rat. ‘It’s still alive,’ I whispered.
    Debbie glanced at it, then away. ‘Nerves,’ she said.
    ‘No way. It’s blinking at me.’
    My sister came close, kneeling down. I heard her gasp. ‘What’s that coming out of its mouth?’
    I bent closer. ‘Huh?’
    ‘That!’ Debbie pointed. ‘Crawling out of its mouth!’
    ‘Oh, that’s its tongue.’
    Gagging, Debbie ran into the kitchen.
    I looked back at the eyes, but they had already glazed over. The excitement I had felt now faded. I stared hard into those eyes, wondering what it would be like to watch the darkness closing in from all sides, and the light glittering inside dimming, winking fitfully, then vanishing. I felt like crying.

CHAPTER TWO
    I
    It was Saturday, and the sun beat down with a force that made the ice flowing down the river crack and shatter like buried thunder. I left the house and strode the gloomy length of the driveway. The machinery squatting along the edges seemed almost threatening, as if the shadowy darkness had leaked from their blackened, seized insides.
    I emerged into sunlight at the driveway’s end. My