My arms were scratched raw. I’d been at it for ages. I’d been up on the tussocks of the bank trying to reach the berries at the very top and a wasp had stung me and it didn’t half hurt. That was when I decided I’d got enough and went back along the lane to the house.
I proudly handed over the small container of fruits. Plump and black they were, ripe and juicy.
“Well,” said Gran, “if I eke them out with an apple or two, we might just get enough for a tart. There’s not enough for jam…”
You couldn’t impress Gran.
“Here, let’s see that sting.” She cut an onion open and tied it onto the sore part with a pudding cloth. “There, you’ll be right as rain,” she said.
Gran began to pick through the blackberries and toss the odd one or two to our spaniel Slurry, whose habit it was to lie on the rag-mat in front of the range, gratefully gobbling up anything that came his way.
“Why are you doing that if there isn’t enough?” I protested.
“The devil’s in them,” she said. “It’s nearly October. Look.”
She picked out a huge berry and showed it to me. A little white wriggly thing was poking its way out.
“Maggots,” she said. Slurry snaffled it, maggot and all. “Flies lay their eggs in them and then maggots hatch. I’ll steep them a while in a vinegar solution.”
“Do wasps lay eggs too?” I half expected to see maggots dripping out from the oniony cloth on my arm.
“Don’t worry, a sting isn’t like that,” she said, “but yes they do – some wasps lay inside a living host and then the young eat the host.” Gran’s eyes went big and round and she came at my throat with blackberry stained fingers.
I squealed and giggled like anything.
A smell of sugar was in the air. I could taste it on my lips as Gran layered up apples and blackberries into the pie dish. I dipped my finger into the canister and licked. “My friend Kathleen says they eat the host in church on Sundays, Gran.”
“Not that kind of host,” said Gran, moving the sugar to her other side. “The one they eat’s not a body. Well, it’s not really a body. It’s a wafer — like a biscuit.”
I thought I’d like to go to a church where they ate biscuits. They didn’t do that in our church. It was even frowned on to eat sweets, though the sermon went on for hours.
“Jimmy McAleish said worms eat you when you die, Gran. They don’t really, do they?”
“That lad wants a taste of his own medicine, so he does.”
“So they don’t then?”
“Well, not worms. Not like worms you see in the garden.”
“Is it maggots then?”
“No, it’s just your own worms…”
“But I don’t have worms, Gran, and Slurry gets wormed every year.”
“Worms just means bacteria and stuff. In olden days anything that seemed evil used to get called a worm, dragons, snakes, eels — anything. That’s why they say, ‘the devil’s in the blackberries,’ too. It’s nothing to do with the devil. It just means they’ve gone bad.”
“Oh.”
So, I got my own back on that Jimmy McAleish. I gave him one of my tomato sandwiches at lunchtime in school — the one I’d put worms in. You should’ve heard him squealing like a girl when he saw half a worm wriggling out of the bread. But I told him not to worry, “We’ve all got our own worms anyway, Jimmy. Surely a wheen more won’t hurt you.”
The Headmaster telephoned Mammy. She didn’t know what’d got into me lately but Granny just winked at me. “It’ll ’ve been the devil,” she said.
Oonah V Joslin lives in Northumberland, England. Winner of Micro Horror Prizes 2007 and 2008. Most read in EDF, Jan 2008. Guest judge in the Shine Journal 2008 Poetry Competition. Bewildering Stories Quarterly 4 2007 and 1 and 2 in 2008. She has had work published in Bewildering Stories, Twisted Tongue, Static Movement, 13 Human Souls, Back Hand Stories and The Pygmygiant, Lit Bits, The Linnet’s Wings, The Ranfurly Review and Boston Literary Magazine. The list is growing every month which pleases her immensely! Oonah is also Managing Editor of Every Day Poets. You can link to work, follow up-dates and contact Oonah at http://www.writewords.org.uk/oonah/ or http://www.oonahs.blogspot.com. She thanks all of you who take the time to read and comment.
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20 Responses to “THE DEVIL'S WITHIN • by Oonah V Joslin”
Comments
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September 30th, 2009 at 2:26 am
LOL, good one Oonah!
September 30th, 2009 at 4:50 am
Excellent! As usual, Oonah. Feel-able, taste-able, see-able descriptions. As usual. Wry humor. Very real people. And a nifty little twist at the end. All Oona Joslin trademarks. Can I give it a six? No? Well, a five then. All the way.
September 30th, 2009 at 5:17 am
“Wry humor. Very real people. And a nifty little twist at the end. All Oona Joslin trademarks.”
Can I quote you? I like that
Thanks Findy too
September 30th, 2009 at 5:47 am
Good characters, nice ending. But I didn’t really like it – seemed more like a “slice of life” than a story. This would make a good scene somewhere in the middle of a novel, but not standing alone.
September 30th, 2009 at 6:29 am
Loved this Oonah. Great description of the relationship between grandma and girl.
I could smell that pie cooking from here.
What’s wrong with a slice from life, Jim? This story has a beginning, middle and very pleasing end.
September 30th, 2009 at 6:36 am
Gran was interesting. Her speech was as country as a turnip green, but in fact she was quite “book smart,” too. I’ll have to try out some of her homemade remedies.
–John
September 30th, 2009 at 6:52 am
Beautiful!
September 30th, 2009 at 7:03 am
Good story. I liked Gran’s character too. I likwd how the narrator got back at Jimmy too.
September 30th, 2009 at 7:24 am
Nice one, Oonah! Enjoyed it.
September 30th, 2009 at 7:49 am
To answer Jennifer, if you like “slice of life” pieces, that’s fine for you. I grew up reading Golden Age Science Fiction, and my reading (and writing) tastes are VERY plot-centric. Even for flash fiction, I like to see a strong plot … I consider that first, only then do I look at characterization, beautiful writing, and such. I know not everyone agrees with me, and that’s fine, but my comments are based on what I like and don’t like. Feel free to disagree with me (but I doubt if I’ll change my mind
).
September 30th, 2009 at 8:23 am
Good ending, life-like characters, and I learned something about worms.
September 30th, 2009 at 9:22 am
Jimmy should’ve known better than take those two on!
September 30th, 2009 at 12:32 pm
I want to be a Gran like that…I *had* a Gran like that!
Really enjoyed this, Oonah!
September 30th, 2009 at 1:45 pm
Thank you all for reading and commenting so kindly. I always appreciate your comments.
September 30th, 2009 at 6:36 pm
This reminds me of weekends at my granny’s when she was bottling up jellies for the coming winter. Strawberry, Pear, and Fig preserves. Yum-Yum!
Nice write!
October 1st, 2009 at 1:08 am
Glad it revived a pleasant memory, Mickey.
October 1st, 2009 at 7:54 am
Ah, Jaysus.
It’s gone to worms so it has.
Nice one, Surface.
Sean
October 1st, 2009 at 1:16 pm
Great read. Well written.
Laurence
October 2nd, 2009 at 5:18 am
Just perfect! A great read.
Cheers
Mark
October 3rd, 2009 at 5:21 pm
This one drew me in and kept me there. Good real voices-it felt like real people.