Like an Engine Block with Hair

(Excerpted from The Pultenham County Sketchbook, by Tom Andrews)

“He done kicked Tiny!” 'Possey Pettigrew shouted at us all through the open door and the spit was nearly flying out his mouth and that uneven, kitchen shear-chopped set of blond bangs of his flopped against his forehead as his too-big head bobbled around on his skinny shoulders. “He done kicked Tiny! Git! C'mon!”

'Possey had a voice like someone had his 'bits in a stranglehold with pliers or maybe one of those grabbers that you use for pullin' cannin' jars outten the boilin' water. Could you see it? Steamin' hot cannin' jar grabbers right 'roun' his 'bits? That's his voice, though, so's you get the idee'.

Screaming and hollerin' in the yard by the barn meant that sure as shit there was something goin' on and it probably meant Tiny done got hisself kicked. Kicked hard and square in the man apples if I was gonna' guess, 'cause it was a strained hollerin' and I was sure that I knew that feelin'. Only I wasn't sure of how worse it would be from a horse.

Tiny was never too bright and he would do dumb things like spendin' his whole month of June's allowance on ice cream sandwiches from the fillin' station down by the crossroads and then getting sick and throwin' up that same whole month's worth of those ice cream sandwiches in the ditch out back of the fillin' station. Dumb kid. Dumb as the box of rock like my brother used to say, 'cept dumb as the box of rocks that you threw out the window cause it was too dumb. I never knew what that meant, to be tellin' the truth.

So not too bright Tiny got hisself kicked square in the forehead by that shoed mule, and it left a little c-shaped crack that bled a whole lot and Tiny was even dumber than he ever had been and his sister Annabel had to watch out for him ever after that point. Well, after he got back from the hospital in Cotton City that is.

Tiny didn't go spending his whole month's allowance on ice cream sandwiches no more. He just sat around the parlor and watched the dust specks float around in the sunlight and maybe heard that shoutin' still in his memory if he got anymore memory left if that mule didn't kick it all outta' his head.

“He done kicked Tiny! Git! C'mon!”