The tv was on from the night before and some anchor-de-jour was preaching h1n1 into the morning gloom. Ronnie pulled her old nighty over her new balloon belly, and walked down the stairs into the living room.
"Ya know, my boy ain't gonna want no pig baby," Annette said from her rocker. There was a quilt draped over her lap and underneath two spindly branches for legs tapped anxiously against the floor.
"Annette I've got to get the shot, it's for the baby," Ronnie let out with more energy than she thought she had.
"I heard that pigs don't need the shot," she said without hesitating. Ronnie knew Annette stayed in the chair all night just for Ronnie to wake up.
"That's okay. I'm leaving." She said and she turned back the upstairs to get ready.
"What da ya got en that red shirt, a basketball?" Nurse Pritchard asked as she slipped the needle into her arm.
"Feels like it," Ronnie said as she winced a slow breath.
"Ah don't worry hun. Frank came out like a lawnmower in the weeds. Damn near broke the mold with that one."
Mold. Ronnie stood up and heaved. Ronnie worked at the local supermarket/gas station. Earlier that week, she had to suck out the gelatinous mold that thrived in the cold-sweat of the coolers with a vacuum. It looked like chicken fat with gangrene. She threw up again.
"Oh bless your sweetheart, you sure got somethin in ya now!" she said as she picked up the waste basket from the corner of the room and set it in Ronnie's out-stretched hands. Nurse Pritchard put a firm hand on her upper back, just shy of where Ronnie's brown leathery hair stuck against the short of her neck. Ronnie bletched three more times.
"Sweetheart are you going to be okay? That shot ain't supposed you sick," Mrs. Pritchard said as she leaned into Ronnie's eyes. "My god what happened to your eyes! Their yellow!"
"I just hate the shots, that's all. I get all worked up seein that needle comin' at me like a sucker on a skeeter. I ain't got that much in me, ya know?"
"Oh sweetie you got a lot more in ya now than you might think." Nurse Pritchard smiled as she walked away with the needle pointed up.
Ronnie eased down into the chair, numbly holding the trash can in front of her. It took Peanut a whole week to scrape up the $31 to get her there. Twenty five for the shot. Six for the diesel. But Peanut hadn't came; he had to be at the soccer fields by six to start the mowers. They couldn't afford the shot for the whole family, not even Annette, but the doctors had urged her and Peanut to get one for the baby. She stood up reluctantly and fell. She had gotten to her feet before Nurse Pritchard came back and she made her way out the exit of the steel door.
On her way home, Ronnie caught a glance of her eyes in the rearview. They really were yellow. She stared at them, swirling in the reflection, until she ran off the road and into the ditch. When she woke up, she felt like she was floating.
For a while, things were cold. What those things were, she did not know, because she couldn't see anything. She thought may be she was blind. Her eyes had been such a strange yellow, like a cat's eye in the dark.
Great scott, this is vivid and creepy. The dialogue is straight-up strange and excellent. Love the nurse "reassuring" her with that line about her baby coming out "like a lawnmower in the weeds." And that description of mold--"chicken fat with gangrene." This is a fresh and orginal start.
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