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 ^{(it's beta!)}

An Introduction

I had two things in mind when writing this piece, and neither of them showed up after the piece was complete. One was to make something William Faulkner-esque, because I have a crush on him right now. The other was to match, or at least take influence from the style of Burning Sands. In order to accomplish the latter, I read every single one of her pieces a few times over. I think I have it down, the way she spaces out her lines, her voice, her memorable phrases. But when I wrote it that way, it seemed a bit forced, and I realized this would be best if I just wrote it the most natural way possible. So Merry Christmas, B_S, this is dedicated to you. You are the rabbit.

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After the storms, we pushed through the rubble of our house and looked out at the destruction of our farmland. For miles, nothing but crops that had been violently strewn across the ground. A battlefield of nature against nature. The sky was a mass of mountainous clouds, colored an eerily peaceful shade of orange.

Vera stood at my side, speechlessly contemplating the carnage. She clasped my hand instinctively, the lines in her face seemed to grow deeper. My son John stood behind me, calculating the damage.

“You sure it was forty days, pap?” said John.

My son's voice sounded like rain. Everything sounded like rain.

“I assumed, that's all I could do. No tellin' for sure. Could hardly remember what daylight looked like.”

Vera was shaking, trying to stifle sobs.

“John, we've got work to do,” I said.

“Yessir.”

But he didn't move at all, and there was a period of absolute silence before Vera broke into tears.

“...Linda... oh god...” she sobbed.

A bewildered rabbit appeared out from under a broad leaf about twelve feet away. I followed it with my eyes as it scampered in various directions.

“Linda...”

I let go of my wife and moved slowly toward the rabbit. It seemed unafraid of me, watching me with twitching ears. I picked up an ear of corn and held it out toward the rabbit. It cautiously nibbled on the corn from my hand. I dropped the ear and looked back.

John was comforting Vera; her sobs were receding now, and her steadfast demeanor was slowly returning.

“Pap, how much d'you reckon we have in storage?”

“Barely enough for supper tonight. Think we could stew us up some rabbit? Be nice to eat somethin' fresh, finally.”

“What rabbit pappy? Nothin' survived them storms, I don't think, 'cept us. Well... not all of us I guess.”

A short pause that was long.

“Din't you see it?”

I looked back, but the rabbit was gone.

“A minute ago there was a rabbit. I was feedin' it.”

John shook his head slowly.

“Well... I'd better see what I can make for supper...” sniffed Vera in an unnaturally hoarse and high-pitched voice. She made her way back down into the abyss of our cellar, and I stared hopefully back at the wind torn sea of plants, imagining the one rabbit who had survived. And plus it got some corn out of the ordeal.