The mulberries were black and bursting when I opened the door for the first time in seven weeks. Mornings brought the most temptation, when my stomach whined like the siren in the center of town on the day the hushworms fell.
There were twelve windows in the house, but I could only watch the berries ripen out of ten of them. Daddy’s room was off limits since the morning I heard his window screech open and his strangled yell. He had the best view of the mulberry tree. The branches nearly brushed the window. The berries were milky white and hard as stones then, but they must’ve looked tasty enough for him to try.
I snuck to his door and listened to his gurgling. The hushworm slurped across the floor inside and jiggled the door. I found a belt and tied the doorknob to the staircase railing, tight as I could pull. After a while, the jiggling stopped and Daddy started to stink.
The second-best view of the mulberry tree was by the living room window, where the berries hung over the overgrown yard. A strip of grass was lower than the rest. The handles of the push mower rose from the weeds. My brother’s grass-stained sneakers poked out, his shins all bone.
Down in the living room, I counted each berry on the tree til I lost count and had to start over. I rolled the last three pebbles of dry cat food over my tongue, letting the meaty juices run down my throat. I scraped the inside of the paper bag and sucked out the orange dust lodged under my long fingernails.
Three days later, I opened the front door. The cul-de-sac was silent, except for Mrs. Bobkin’s bones rattling in the hot breeze. She had been checking her mailbox when the hushworms fell. I waded through the weeds, waist high in parts, avoiding my brother’s legs.
I teetered on my tiptoes to reach the mulberries, snagging handfuls and shoving them into my mouth, nearly choking on my fist in my rush for their bittersweet crunch. Dark juice streamed down my neck.
Plop.
Something cold and gloopy landed on my shoulder.
I tore it off and chucked it into the weeds. Invisible, it rolled through the grass, pressing the blades flat, and came to a rest.
A pause.
It sprang back into the air. The grass popped back up. I stood stiff and listened.
Splat.
It hit the back of my head.
I clawed at the hushworm, but its feelers were already probing my ears, piercing my eardrums. It rolled over my forehead, frozen slime oozing over my eyes.
Everything went white.
Two more feelers shot up my nose and freezer-burned my sinuses. It pried my lips open, the coldness shooting up the roof of my mouth like an ice cream headache.
I gagged.
It burrowed down my throat, my neck bulging, and flopped into my stomach.
I was full.
Tif Robinette was raised in a fundamentalist sect in Appalachia, homeschooled along with her eight younger siblings. She now lives with her partner and critters in an off-grid tiny home she built in the mountains of northern California. She writes folk horror and American gothic novels, short stories, and screenplays. She is represented by Sam Edenborough at Greyhound Literary. Follow her here. Read more.