by Thelma Adams
Upstairs, in Sam’s room, Julia read BOMB, outstretched on his bed. With her muscles, golden cornrows, and robust features aglow, Julia resembled a Botticelli Diana of the Hunt, a flawless beauty perfectly able to shoot, skin, and flay a lesser animal, then wear its spotted pelt while still warm. As a vegan, she would censure the idea, but the image’s ferocity would secretly delight her.
From the next room accessible through an open door, the TV blared and Sam’s younger brother Max conversed unintelligibly with Wyle E. Coyote. Adjacent to Sam’s bed, under a homemade mobile of the sun and planets (oops, there were only seven), Belle knelt on a rocket- shaped area rug. She assembled a Lego Bionicle warrior piece by piece, occasionally consulting the diagram to her left. Sam sat on the foot of his bed, painting Julia’s toenails the color of Merlot.
“What’s that smell?” asked Belle, looking up.
“Nail polish?” Sam asked.
“That icky meaty smell,” said Belle. She looked skeptically at the Bionicle’s head. “It makes me want to hurl.”
“Need a bucket?” Sam asked.
“It’s the lamb,” Julia explained. “That’s what the alleged adults are eating.”
“Eew,” Belle gagged.
In the next room, beyond the connecting bath, Looney Tunes ka-bangs inspired Max’s gleeful laughter. The toddler had found his first vocation: demolitions expert.
“What is lamb, exactly?” Sam asked.
“Baby sheep,” Julia said, laying aside her magazine. “They slaughter them before they turn one year old, or before they lose their baby teeth.”
“So, downstairs our parents are eating dead baby?” Sam asked. [Read more…]
