Max Booth III - We Need to Do Something

“Who saw it last?” Mom asks.

“I fell asleep,” I whisper.

“We all fell asleep,” Dad says.

We spend the next minute staring at the empty floor.

“Shit,” Mom says.

“What?” I ask.

“Where did it go?”

“Like you said before. Maybe it went out the way it came.”

“Yeah. Maybe.”

Bobby holds his crotch, body trembling between us. “I gotta pee I gotta pee I gotta pee.”

“Pee in the tub,” Mom tells him. “It’s not safe.”

“Gross!” I cry out. “No! Do not pee in the tub.”

“I’m gonna pee all over you, Sis!”

“Mom! Don’t let him pee in the tub! Please…”

She sighs. “Okay. Hold on. Just… just hold on.”

She leans over the tub, peering around the bathroom. No snake in sight. “Do you see anything?” she asks Dad.

He hesitates, curses under his breath, then plops down to the floor. He crouches and walks around, scanning the room. Finally, he straightens back up and shakes his head. “It must have left while we were asleep.”

“Can I please pee now?”

Dad approaches the tub and helps Bobby out, who rushes over to the toilet and releases a long pleasurable moan as the urine splashes against the water. “I love peeing,” he sings, “I love peeing, ooooh I love to pee all day and all night…”

“Will you shut up?” I say, still in the tub. No way in hell am I ever getting out of this thing again.

“Watch me shake my booty, Sis! Watch me shake my booty!”

He indeed shakes his booty at me as he pees, no doubt spraying urine all over the floor next to the toilet. Eventually, thank god, the stream comes to an end, and he reaches down to flush.

Then he shrieks and tries to step away from the toilet, only to fall flat on his back.

Holding his wrist against his chest.

Body shaking.

Sobbing hysterically.

The rattlesnake slithers out from behind the toilet.

“ Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck, ” someone’s screaming, and I realize it’s all three of us, together, as a family.

Dad grabs Bobby by the shirt collar and drags him across the bathroom. Mom tries to help with his feet, but gets too close to the snake. It’s rising as if to attack again. She steps away, never taking her eyes off the thing. I stay in the bathtub. Sucking on my thumb like I’ve reverted to infancy. Rocking back and forth. Pathetic. Worthless. When the shit hits the fan, this is all the help I can provide.

Mom crouches, maintaining eye contact with the snake, looking like they’re in a surreal Old West flick and they’re about to draw down on each other. Dad watches those kinds of movies all the time when he’s drunk, which is always. Behind her, Bobby’s shrieking off the top of his lungs. Dad’s trying to inspect his wrist but Bobby won’t let go of it with his other hand.

The snake looks pissed and ready to kill anyone who crosses its path.

This isn’t happening this isn’t happening this isn’t happening.

Mom edges to the side, next to the sink, and in one quick motion picks up the trash can, flips it upside down, and brings it over the snake just as it strikes out at her, successfully trapping it inside. Random garbage spills out along the floor, including the empty bottle of mouthwash. For extra effect, she grabs the toilet tank lid and rests it on top of the can, weighing it down against the floor.

She turns away and hurries to Bobby. Dad’s hovering over him, paralyzed with fear. She brushes him away and takes control of the situation, snapping her fingers in front of Bobby’s eyes until he stops screaming and pays attention, confused and afraid but no longer hysterical.

“It got you?” she asks.

Bobby nods, frantic. “Uh-huh.”

“Let me see.”

“It huuuurrrts. ”

“Let me see, baby.”

Hesitating, he uncurls his uninjured hand and reveals the bite mark on his left wrist. Even from the bathtub I can spot the two puncture wounds. Thin lines of blood trickle out of them. Mom points at Dad and tells him to give her his belt.

“What? Why?”

“We need to make a tourniquet.”

Dad shakes his head. “No. We need to suck the poison out.”

“What?”

“That’s what they always do in movies. They suck the poison out.”

“…I think we need to prevent the poison from flowing to his heart. Take your belt off.”

“Venom!” Bobby shouts through his sobbing, and they both look down at him, confused. “Snakes have venom, not poison!”

Dad sighs and removes his belt, then hands it over to her. She wraps it around Bobby’s forearm and tightens it into place. The whole time Bobby’s screaming his head off and she’s trying to shush him as motherly as possible. My focus pinballs from my brother to the upside-down trash can across the bathroom. It keeps shaking, and inside the snake’s rattler hasn’t shut up. It doesn’t want us to forget it’s still here, ready to inject its venom into the rest of us the moment we give it a chance.

Dad kneels and grabs Bobby’s injured arm and pulls it toward his mouth. “We gotta suck the poison out—the venom. Otherwise he’s gonna die.”

When Dad says this, Bobby lets loose with another shriek. Mom stares at Dad, paralyzed with indecision, but he doesn’t wait for her approval. He brings the bite wound to his mouth and sucks down for several seconds, then grimaces and pulls away, gagging and spitting.

“Did you get it?” Mom asks. “Did you get it?”

“I don’t know.” Dad wipes his mouth, disgusted. “Maybe.”

He starts gagging again, prompting him to hurry to the sink and lower his face under the faucet. It doesn’t take long for him to choke on the water pouring down his throat. He gives up and rests his forehead against the wall, out of breath, wheezing.

Meanwhile, Bobby’s still groaning and writhing on the floor. Mom helps him to his feet and together they get into the tub with me. I try to scoot to the side and give them plenty of room, but two seconds of the faucet digging into my spine is all the motivation I need to relinquish my porcelain grave. Mom scoops up the blanket from the floor and spreads it along the tub, then helps Bobby sprawl across it.

“You’ll be safer here, baby.”

“It hurts. It huuurrrts. ”

“I know, baby. It’s going to be okay, it’s going to be okay.”

“Did Daddy get the venom out?”

“Yes. He got it all out. You’re going to be just fine.”

Dad starts pacing around the bathroom, fists at his side, jaw clenched, rambling. “That motherfucker… that fucking… that fucking motherfucker…” He points at the upside-down trash can with intense rage. “ You motherfucking motherfucker! ”

I fold my arms across my chest, barely dodging my father’s erratic movements. “Is Bobby going to be okay? Mom, is Bobby going to be okay?”

“He’s going to be just fine.” Mom smiles at a terrified Bobby. “Isn’t that right, baby? You’re going to be just fine, right?”

“Y-y-y-yes?”

Mom searches frantically through the various bathroom items scattered across the floor and counter until finding the tall bottle of peroxide. She unscrews the lid, tells Bobby it’s going to hurt, and splashes some of it along his arm without waiting for a response.

Bobby clutches the wound and wails.

Off in the corner, I’m hugging myself and trying not to cry, whispering, “This is all my fault this is all my fault this is all my fault—”

“Am I going to need to see a doctor?” Bobby asks.

“Sure, just to be safe,” Mom says. “Once we get out of here.”

“But what if that man shoots us?”

“…We don’t know what that was.”