Blackberries Got No Thorns

With an outraged scream she covered the ten feet to MaryAllen seemingly in one step, grasped the girl's dress at the bodice and stripped it from her in one wrenching movement.

Sissy stood nude and terrified in the chill winter air as her vengeful mother paced deliberately around her and came to a spraddle legged stop in front of her. The girl covered her breasts and crotch with her hands and began to tremble as she looked mutely at her mother.

'Who's is it?' Sarah demanded, her face growing darker than usual and her eyes stabbing at MaryAllen.

MaryAllen was too terrified to answer. She gazed mutely at her mother through half lidded eyes heavy with cold and shock.

Sarah saw her girl child through a red blur. She felt herself puff up with a rage she could not control and heard herself scream.

'Who's bastard yew carryin? Who's bin beddin yew?'

As the words came out she raised both fists and brought them crashing down on Sissy's shoulders and the girl slumped to her knees. Sarah raised her arms again to deliver another blow but her wrists were caught and held aloft by Web. She strained to bring her arms down, but could not prevail against his strength.

'Leave me be!' she panted, her breath growing short from the band that was tightening across her chest.

Web's grip was unrelenting. She could see his eyes like two black jewels coming in and out of focus through a fog. She aimed a kick at his crotch but he brushed it off and the will went out of her as the fog got thicker. The pain hit her chest like slamming into the end of a fence post and the fog took a reddish hue. Web's face hovered above her and she realized she had fallen to the ground.

'Yore bastard,' she mumbled thickly. 'Mah pills.'

Web saw the knowledge through the pain in his mother's eyes and also heard death working in her labored breathing. He got up slowly, walked to the back steps, turned for a long moment to see Sarah laying on the cold ground clutching at her chest with a naked MaryAllen kneeling in delirium an arms length away. He walked slowly into the bedroom, dropped the pills in his pocket, and turned to the front window to watch the tableau in the yard.