Brownorangestripe, his gnarled orangutan fingers shuffling along a supporting branch, ascended with his two doe eyed charges. The exchange had been brief and for the most part pleasant, despite the unexplained presence of Loudfartsmallturd, one of his brood mates.
Still, Speaksoffood lingered a moment watching the two little ones fade into the treetop greenery. Finally, placing a hand on her belly, swollen with a sibling for the adventuring youths, she began shuffling over the stony ground towards the river and the rest of her clan.
With a glance towards the canopy where Brownorangestripe had disappeared, Loudfartsmallturd brought himself to his full height and let loose a staccato series of grunts at Speaksoffood, ending in a jungle stilling shriek.
“Lupatria!” The interloper cried, stepping from the pillared courtyard, his toga flaring as he exited the arch’s shadow into the wind of the street.
The plain was empty, Jude’s yell having vacated it of even bird song. Marion braced on the wooden bench and held what grip she had on the horses, muttering in soothing tones as Penny worked at lashing their harnesses. Thomas turned a fierce eye on Jude, but at a word from Penny, kept his position in the wagon.
After a moment Jude moved forward and once again began his trumpeting.
“Ya’ll figure you can run this show?”
“I have no interest in this conversation, Jude.”
“You think you can just get what you want!?”
Penny’s hands goaded the rawhide into place.
“You hear me, harlot?”
“This ain’t going to make the judge see any different, Jude, and this sure ain’t helping Joseph in the least.”
“You keep this up, Harlot, and somethin’s gonna happen!” Jude shouted.
The horses bucked and a rag doll, which Elizabeth must have left on the wooden bench, tumbled to the ground. Jude moved forward, but Thomas, with a calming word to Penny, stood down from the wagon.
I step from the car and BabyDaddy’s brother slams the door.
“Thanks?” I say, bending over to retrieve the spilled Yu-Gi-Oh! cards.
Having collected them, I pull the door open against the resistance of the interloper’s thigh. Opopanax, having finished depositing the kid’s car seats in the trunk, returns and props herself within the door’s arc to prevent its closing.
“You think you’re so smart, you won’t get away with this, things are going to get a lot harder from here on, things are going to happen.” He rants.
Opopanax waves me into the car, but for a moment I beg off.
“What? What exactly is going to happen?” I ask.
After a moment without an answer, I re-ask.
Still no response, and at a second coaxing from Opopanax I take my place in the backseat of our two-door hatchback.
Opopanax settled in and closed the door while BD’s brother assailed us with a storm of “cunts”, still unable to come up with any sort of meaningful dialogue beyond shouting down a pregnant woman through her car window.
It is then that he realized that May had located Opop’s phone and was capturing the altercation on video. His hand shot through the gap, clutching for the phone, even managing to briefly ensnare it. Opopanax moved quickly though, snatched back the phone before it cleared the car and transfered it to her distant hand. Eventually she was forced to toss it into the back seat.
Realizing his losing battle, BD’s brother changed tact. Locking his fingers around Opop's wrist he attempted to drag her out the half-open window.
Wrenching free of his grip, she urged May to exit the driveway. Reversing to the outer most cusp, we were held by oncoming traffic. BD’s brother took position in front of the car, a chorus of adjectives stapled to his repeated mantra of “cunt” breaking up long verses of threat against our persons and property.
For a moment Marion considers cracking the reins.
Finally, there’s a break and we slide into the flow of traffic. Taking stock, we regroup and make our appeal to the authorities.
