When the rain passes, it still showers in the forest. Raindrops, like heavy tears, roll from leaf to leaf before splattering to the ground, and in the still of the evening, when even wild animals seek shelter, the sound of water pitter pattering in the forest could give the impression that the trees were talking.
Eight year old Amoy sat on a couch in the gallery, feet folded beneath her, reading book in hand, peering at the text as evening shadows gathered around her. The sun was slipping behind the hills though you could hardly tell for the clouds, but Amoy knew the day’s light was waning because looming shadows reached out to turn the book’s pages for her.
It was growing dark outside, but she stayed put in the galley because there were monsters lurking inside. Smothering shadows, they loomed thick and black with sooty hands that stretched from beneath her bed, or they lurked in the corners of the kitchen or behind her mother’s curtains, threatening to reach out and choke her. She preferred to brave the darkness outside for as long as she could. Her mother would be home soon.
A cold wind blew and she shuddered. Sand flies or mosquitoes, she couldn't quite tell which, bit her. She slapped her skin, tucked her feet in further, and returned to the pages of her book, even as the words floated like an alphabet soup before her eyes.
It was getting darker, and now frogs were lending their throaty song to the evening's melody.
Maybe she should go inside. She instantly swatted the thought away. There could be snakes inside, and what could she do if she faced one all by herself?
Last week, they found a snake coiled beneath her bed, like cock set, snug, asleep, head tucked beneath its tail, dreaming.
Amoy's flesh crawled at the memory. The snake had spent the night before with her in her bed among her sheets. She had awoken that night at the sound of a thump and had seen the tail slipping away beneath her sheets, but as accustomed as she was to oversized lizards and spiders, she had dismissed the snake and gone back to sleep until the following day when they had found it while cleaning.
She drew in a deep breath. When the rains fall in the forest, there is usually a sweet, clean scent in the air: the scent of portugal rind, of ripe mangoes and guava, of cool rainwater. She inhaled deeply, trying to force herself to think of fruits and not snakeskin. Her mother would be home soon.
In the distance, street lights came on. Sitting in the gallery, Amoy could also see the lights in the windows of their neighbors’ houses across the hills. Their neighbors all had electricity, but there were no light switches in Amoy's home on the edge of the forest. Her family relied on kerosene lamps and tiny flames which played games with dancing shadows.
Amoy thought again of the snake, wondered if there was one under her couch, and scooted inside, into the cottony blackness, heart thumping, in a desperate race before the last sliver of sunshine disappeared to grab the house lamp, just in case her mother did not get home on time.
She carried the lamp carefully to the living room table and, fingers trembling, struck a match. The match box was soft. There was a quick flare and the flame petered out. She tried again and this time held the match to the wick. The flame petered out again. The third time, Amoy pinched the wick the way she had seen her mother do it, wiping off the sooty layer on the top. The flame leapt from the match to the wick and shadows danced across the wall.
Somewhere in the recesses of the house, a mabuya lizard screeched. Amoy jumped, recovered, and whispered, "Mummy, please come home soon."
She sighed, relieved, when she heard the familiar scraping on the door. Bella, the family dog, was trying to get inside. She opened the door quickly, throwing her arms around the dog, and caring little when Bella shook wet fur all over her.
A little more confident in Bella’s company, Amoy moved with her book closer to the lamp, pulling her chair in on the table, pressing her fingers beneath the words and reading out loud to drown the sounds of the forest.
When rain passes, it still showers in the forest. Raindrops, like heavy tears, roll from leaf to leaf before splattering to the ground, and in the still of the evening, when even the wild animals sought shelter, the sound of water pitter pattering in the forest could give the impression that the trees were talking. And it didn't help Amoy much that her mother had taught her that little douen children lurked, nameless, faceless, eyeless, with huge straw hats and feet turned backwards, waiting to take children deep into the belly of the forest when there were no adults around.
Wings flapped above her head. She screeched and ducked. It was a bat. Her mother had left a bunch of figs to ripen in the kitchen and they always attracted bats. She usually didn't mind when the adults were home, but now that she was by herself, Amoy wanted to run out into the streets.
She'd heard that bats had special vision in the night, x-ray vision, so they wouldn't hit people, but she'd also heard enough bats thumping around to dispute that theory. And then what if she moved suddenly just as a bat was approaching, wouldn't they collide? Swallowing the lump in her throat, she hugged Bella close.
Amoy hated her countryside home. It was cold. It was lonely. They had no electricity or access to any modern amenities. It was a little, old house which they shared with snakes, termites, and rats, huge spiders, wasps, and bats, and there were always huge toads lurking outside. She hated it, and she resolved that once she was all grown, she would move into the city and never return.
She touched her cheeks. It was wet with tears. She didn't even know when they had started flowing, but now that they were out, she examined them like the child who had taken a tumble, had a delayed reaction and was only just aware that he was bleeding.
And so, her lips started to tremble and then she started to scream, mouth open wide, wide and bawling. She was holding her belly and screaming: screaming so that a snake would think twice before crawling under her bed again; screaming so that a mouse would think twice before chipping up paper and thinking to make a nest for its young among her clothes again; screaming so that a tarantula spider would think twice before crawling across her walls again; screaming so that the shadows would think twice before dancing with the flames again; screaming so that douens would think twice, soucouyants would think twice, the bat would think twice before flying in to pluck another fig again.
She was screaming because she did not want to be left home alone and unprotected in a little house on the edge of a forest where when the rains fell, the trees talked. And so she screamed until her insides felt raw and empty. And when she stopped to catch a breath, she heard the familiar click-clock of her mother's heels outside.