Angel in the Dew

_______________________________________________
This story, Angel in the Dew, is flash fiction. Flash fiction is recognized by word count (under 1000 words) but maintains the elements of a complete story, i.e, plot development and character growth.

I had posted Angel in the Dew many months ago and I have always intended to edit and repost it. Angel in the Dew deserves another look.
_________________________________________________

Angel in the Dew

Angel Harish stood at the kitchen screen door looking past her back porch, past her yard into the garden. Dawn broke, and her husband of forty-five years went outside in the dew-covered grass and out into the vegetable garden. The wall phone rang, the yellow one that had been by the door for forty-five years.

“Angel, this is Connie. What’s he doing?”

She took her toothpick out of her toothless mouth. “Oh, George’s out there in them nasty coveralls again wearing no underwear and swaying back and forth so he can feel his junk. He thinks nobody can see him, him with his big belly and his stringy gray hair.”

“Angel, are you ready for me to call Madge?”

She thought about what Connie said. Yesterday evening, Angel had spit in the sink, and it rang louder than she thought it should. It sounded like, THPEW! George walked in on her. “You’re spitting again ain’t you,” George had said and folded his arms like a scolding parent. “You’ve been spitting around here for a week. You refuse to wear your teeth anymore, and you always got that goddamn toothpick in your caved-in mouth!”

He grabbed her thin shoulders and turned her to face him. “You’re going crazy, old woman. You wander around the house, spitting. They need to lock you up.” That had set her eyes aflame. She set her jaw firm and tilted her head up to him. “I asked you a long time ago to let me go to the dentist!”

That happened last night. Angel stared at the man’s back, standing out there in the early morning. She had a valid argument; she knew that. Those teeth hurt her mouth.

“I can’t stand the way he treats me! He has enough money!” Angel hitched, trying hard not to cry.

Connie said. “Hssssssss on him!”

“Huh?”

“Never mind. I must go, Angel. You be careful, sweetie. He’s about to pop. Madge and I will wait for your call. Bye.”

She eased the phone in the cradle on the wall and paused, frowning. The delicate pale skin under her arm hung loose. What was she on about with that hssssss?

“Help me! I’m snake bit!” he yelled from the garden.

Angel ran out onto the porch, let the screen door slap shut. She clutched the hem of her house dress and trotted out to him lying on the grass by the first row of tomatoes.

“Roll on your back, let me see!” Angel said.

George slung off his unlaced boot and jerked off his crusty sock.

“Where?” Angel asked.

“Right there on my ankle, you blind bitch!” George said.

“I don’t see anything, but I’ll get on the phone and get help here.”

When Angel stood and turned, a big Buick pulled into the driveway and stopped behind the white, wood-frame detached garage. Angel walked around to see who it was, and two women got out. Madge got out of the driver’s seat, her piled-high gray hair tinted blue, her thin frame, and her cigarette she always had between her two fingers. Connie pulled her chubby, curvy frame out of the passenger door with a grunt.

Angel met the two women at the garage, and Madge smiled that ever-present smile. She clutched and kissed Angel’s cheek. “Where is he?”

“He’s in the back at the garden. He said a snake had bitten him, but I didn’t see anything.”

Madge put her big black patent leather purse in the crook of her arm and her burning cigarette between her long fingers. She shook her head and took on a sour look as she stepped off toward the back. “Liar,” she said.

Connie, her reddish-gray hair in curls and wearing her cat glasses, fell in lockstep on Madge’s right side. They walked toward George as he lay in pain. His eyes widened. “Who are you?”

“It’s time for you to run along now, boy, SHOO!” Madge said and flicked her hand. George grabbed his left shoulder and raised from the ground eyes round.

“You know these women, George. You’ve met them,” Angel said, and she spat. THPEW! It landed by his face, and it boiled like acid. George grabbed his chest.

“Trouble Angel no more, man, HSSSSSS,” Connie said, and a snake bit his left arm. He clutched it.

They continued to walk toward him.

SHOO! Madge motioned.

George rolled up on his side, moaning in pain.

THPEW! Angel spat, and George clutched his chest.

HSSSSSS! Connie said, and the snake bit again.

The three women gathered around George in the wet dew watching George. His chest rose, his bulging eyes closed halfway, and he turned his head toward the grass and died.

Angel stood, looking at him for a minute. Someone clutched her shoulders and led her into her kitchen and sat her at the table. After he sat her, she watched him dial her phone. The handsome young neighbor man who had recently moved in made a call.

Later, a crowd gathered in her house, and a young lady leaned down to speak to her. “Auntie Angel, do you know who I am?”

“Of course, I do. You’re my grand-niece, Beth.”

Beth, nineteen and in college, long brown hair, smiling, said, “We worried about you. You’ve been muttering things. Do you remember what happened to Great Uncle George?”

“Did he die?” Angel asked.

“I’m very sorry, Auntie.” Beth said.

“I’m not,” Angel said. The crowd laughed. “Are Connie and Madge here?”

Beth’s father, Bryce, knelt. Bryce, forty, shaved clean, and dressed well. “Auntie Angel, we don’t know who Connie and Madge are. You’ve been mentioning them since we got here. No one here knows anything about them. Who are they?”

A smile of realization came over her face. She pulled Bryce’s lapel down close. “They’re good goddamn friends when you need them.”