by Sonya Lee
*****
I was eleven years old the first time I noticed I was different. My mother would always admonish me when I thought bad thoughts, which wasn't very often.
I had a happy life during that time. I grew up on a farm and my dad was a farmer by trade. We grew corn and all other manner of vegetables. I remember the corn most of all because the stalks would grow so high that they’d block my view when Rex and I would go on our long walks together. At other times when I'd ride my horse Dixie, he’d trail behind me and I'd lose him because the stalks had gotten so high. Rex was my dog, my parents adopted him for me when he was a pup.
I had a very solitary childhood living on a farm. I didn’t attend public schools during that time in my life, my parents had chosen to home school me. I didn't have any friends but I had my parents, my dog Rex, my horse Dixie and my imaginary friend Terrie.
My normal summer days were spent doing a multitude of things. My day generally began with a Karate lesson with my father. I was such a tiny thing and my dad said it was a good thing to be able to defend yourself. He had taken Karate lessons all his life and since he didn’t have a son to pass the tradition down to, he chose to pass it down through me. We would meet in one of the rooms in the basement, across from his office.
Our basement was a curious thing to me. I was never allowed in my father’s office, so I had no idea what it looked like during that time. The room where I practiced my Karate lessons was another story all together. The floors of our practice room were padded and there were all manner of weapons hanging from the walls. I learned to use the sword, poles, and to shoot an arrow among other weapons in the very confines of our basement.
I would follow my Karate lessons with a lesson on meditation with my mother. She said the mind and body often worked as one and they needed to be in tune with one another to work more effectively together. My mother taught me to clear my mind of any thoughts and become a blank slate. She said sometimes going blank would ease my mind and calm my spirit. After I meditated with my mother I would take a walk with Rex.
On this particular day, after I had completed my lessons, Rex and I were taking our normal stroll through the fields. I meandered along at a cozy pace as Rex chased butterflies every so often through the field.
The sun was shining brightly overhead. The weather was a nice breezy eighty-three degrees. My father was letting the field in front of our house rest as he liked to say. He would replant that particular field in the fall. The grass had grown up to my knees and my father planned on cutting it down the following day.
Rex and I never had a particular destination in mind when we walked, we just followed our feet until we found something interesting to observe. I was really into science at that time and I could picture myself being a scientist one day. So as I walked the farm with Rex, I would take the time to observe everything around me.
As we were walking, something caught Rex's attention and he bolted in the direction of our neighbor's farm. I had stopped to observe a butterfly that was flitting from one spot to another so my response was a little slow in responding to his sudden absence. When he started barking, I realized he had taken off and I began to call for him.
I followed the sounds of his bark until I realized I was almost at the edge of our land. I had never strayed off of our land at the behest of my parents but I couldn't get Rex to come back to me. I followed behind him yelling for him to come back. He finally stopped in the middle of the field not quite on our neighbor’s land but close enough. He continued to bark loudly and jump up and down.
When I arrived at his location I was still trying to catch my breath from the mad dash to stop him. I hadn’t noticed what had caught his attention. He began to whimper moving closer to something I hadn’t seen. His whimpers touched a chord in me and I began to move closer to him when I noticed a bare leg. I jumped back, it frightened me so badly. Thoughts of dead bodies in a field flew through my head and I began to scan the area for more of them. Finding nothing else around me, I peered at it once again.
When I noticed it wasn't moving I tried to move closer, but Rex began to whine and he pushed at the leg. The leg began to move. I was so scared, I froze in my spot. I didn't know what to do. My mind began to race with questions. What was a leg doing in our field? And why was it still moving? I wondered, still not understanding what was happening. The little boy’s whispered plea broke my concentration.
"Help me," said the little boy.
The sound of his voice sent a shiver down my spine, it sounded so small and scared in that gigantic field. I glanced around me expecting to see someone running towards me at any moment. When no monsters appeared, I tried once again to move closer and that's when I saw his hand. It peeked out from under the grass and it was caked with what looked like dried blood. I stepped closer and the rest of his body was revealed to me.
He was trying to move but wasn't able to. I was in the process of stepping closer to him to get a better look when I heard my father calling my name.
I jumped at the intensity with which he had called me. I hadn't noticed just how quiet the world had gotten around me. I turned toward the direction of my father's voice and I started yelling for him.
"Dad, there's someone here and he's hurt." He must not have heard or seen me because he started screaming my name again. Then I heard my mother screaming my name as well. I started jumping up and down and Rex began barking fiercely.
My parents must have heard Rex barking because they began to move in our direction. Rex started barking even louder.
"Mom, dad, we're over here! There's someone over here and he's hurt!" I screamed. It seemed to take them a lifetime to get to our location. When they finally arrived I pointed to the boy lying in the field. "A boy's hurt. Rex found him lying over there."
My parents froze in their spots when they spotted the little boy.
"Agnes step away from him. You didn't touch him, did you?" asked my father anxiously.
"No, Rex wouldn't let me get anywhere near him," I replied.
My mother grabbed me and pulled me towards her, hugging me to her, checking me for injuries.
“Mom, I’m okay,” I say, trying t wriggle out of her embrace.
"Mary, take Agnes back to the house," said my father looking at my mother.
"Come on Agnes, your father will help the little boy. He’ll be okay," said my mother turning me away from the scene. She walked quickly back to the house dragging me in her wake. I could hear my father and Rex not far behind us.
Two sets of eyes followed our departure from the field that day. We were unaware of being watched as we made our way back to our house. I would see those two sets of eyes for the first and last time later on that night.
