The Girl Who Grabbed a Bullsnake

By Christa McCormick

       There’s no moon out and the midsummer sky is so clear that I can see the Milky Way. I love that name. The Milky Way. 

       I can just imagine an astronaut floating around in space with a glass of milk in his hand. All of a sudden he trips over a shooting star and his glass spills, breaking the liquid apart in a million white beads, speckled against the stellar sky. 

         “Would you look at those stars,” my Papa says as we walk together towards the rusted blue chevy truck. The air is cool and alive with the sound of singing crickets. He points to the summer triangle constellation, Vega, Deneb, Altair, before I swing into my seat. My Papa knows everything. 

         It’s 4 am during summer break, and you could search the whole world and not find another 8-year-old girl more excited to be going fishing with her father. 

He throws his fishing gear into the back of the truck. The floor of the cab is covered in old plastic soda bottles, leather gloves, and rusted tools. I play with the torn yellow leather seat and take in a deep breath while I wait. My lungs expand with the smell of dust, leather, and old fish guts. My heart is bouncing, dancing, singing ‘thumpity thump’. Thump. Thump. Thump! 

        My Papa slides into the driver's seat and takes a moment to satisfy a sleepy yawn. It starts out quiet, a silent O on his lips, and builds into a loud howl, like a wolf. It makes me giggle. 

       “You ready to go fisher-girl?” He says to me. There’s a wide grin under his silly red mustache. He’s always making up nicknames like that. Soccer-girl. Dancer-girl. Runner-girl. Fisher-girl. I know it’s goofy but it makes me feel like I can do anything. 

My arm hangs out of the window while we drive along the empty dirt roads, bumping and rattling over washboards and cattle guards. I like pushing my fingers together and catching the wind; swooping my arm about like a bird flying along the river bank. The air tastes sweet each time I can see the shimmering water through a break in the trees. 

Papa chatters as we drive to the super-secret fishing spot. He’s bustling with anticipation, talking about salmon. I don’t understand half of what he’s saying. It’s some sort of complaint about a fish with an extra fin that the game wardens don’t want you to keep. It doesn’t matter what he’s saying because his excitement bubbles over and splashes onto me. 

We get out of the truck and he fastens a canvas backpack with two long metal bars that rest against my shoulders to my back. 

My expression turns sober. I’m an explorer, preparing for a dangerous expedition through the rough and dangerous jungle. I don’t know if I’ll make it out alive, but the ancient ruins buried in the forest are waiting with secrets for me to uncover. It’s a mile walk from here to the river and my Papa points to the different animal tracks along the path. Every time we walk this way there’s something different to be seen. A family of deer. A cluster of horses. I don’t tell him about the tiger footprints I saw. I don’t want to frighten him. 

The river opens up before us. It's loud at first, wiggling through hanging tree branches and crashing over boulders. The air smells like wet leaves and I go running ahead, tossing my socks and shoes on the sandy shore. This is my favorite place in the world. It’s alive with the heartbeat of creatures large and small. It's savage and peaceful in a way that only nature can be.

       In the center of the river, the little whirlpools of water circle stray branches and long strands of red dirt. I’m supposed to be quiet but I run splashing into the water up to my knees. It doesn’t take long before the first fish jumps, plump and sparkling. I throw my arms open and twirl in the water, my hair falling around my shoulders like a rugged mane, wild and free as a river fish. 

       These are the days that I wish would last forever. It’s just me, my Papa, the River, and no one else in the whole world. 

He sets to work preparing his line, deliberate and focused. He’s gone quiet now, a hunter stalking his prey in the still green waters. I wander down the shore distracted by every snap of a twig and skittering of feet. Under the dim light of the rising sun, a shape moves across the waters, leaving a gentle ripple behind. A glossy dark head paddles by with a small stick in his mouth, too busy to stop and say hello. 

            On the rocky shore around the bend, I’m an entomologist. Balancing from one smooth stone under my bare feet to the next, making note of the sapphire blue dragonfly. There are other bugs too. Not so beautiful. Bugs with big gooey looking shells that they shed onto the rocks. Their awkward shapes and shiny wings captivate me with disgust. 

           Closer to the shore I’m a paleontologist. Here, the river turns the rocks smooth. Some of them are long and curved like the bones of a dinosaur. The sun is awake now, pressing down on my fair skin. It illuminates the speckled gray and tan stones on the shore and that's when I see it. My own living dinosaur. 

           The first glimpse is only a tail. Its scales are striped with brown and tan. A bolt of fear holds me in place until I can be certain there are no white buttons on its body. I nudge the rock beneath and it slithers an inch. It’s a Bullsnake. Bullsnakes are good, they eat Rattlesnakes. My eyes follow the snake’s body to its head where it’s obsidian beady eyes watch me. A mixture of terror and admiration flip together in my stomach. It moves again and the sense of danger tingling up my spine has me hypnotized with the creature. An urge strikes me and it’s more than I can resist. I know I must have this reptile as a pet. 

          The decision is instant and all-consuming. I run to my Papa, jumping over branches and hurtling through a stream of water to get there as quickly as I can. Out of breath, chest rattling, I explain my discovery.

          “Please help me catch it. I’m too frightened to grab it myself,” I beg him. My Papa laughs at my excitement and shakes his head. 

          “If you want the snake then you’re going to have to catch it yourself.” He then tilts back his pole and sends his hook back into the water, oblivious to my open-mouthed indignation. How could he possibly expect me to capture it myself? I just told him. I can’t. 

          “Daddy, please,” I draw out the word please and clasp my hands together, “It’s going to get away!” 

I want this snake more than I've ever wanted anything. I picture taking it home and setting it into a large wheelbarrow with lots of grass and sticks where I can watch it slither around for hours. My heartfelt cry is wasted upon my father and he simply repeats his condition that if I want it, I must do it myself. 

Fine. How hard can it be? I run back to the rocky shore. With a great sigh of relief, I see that the snake hasn’t moved. 

          “Alright now, you just say there,” I say out loud in nervous chatter and pause to take in a deep trembling breath. Reaching forward, my finger touches its slimy skin towards the tail. A yelp escapes me and I recoil my hand. Its body was both squishy and hardened with muscle at the same time. 

I’m breathing fast now and my heart clicks at the base of my throat. I think about going back and begging my father again to grab it. But the snake is moving, it would be gone when we got back. There’s a stone in my throat and my eyes grow hot with tears. My body vibrates with anger and I clench my fists. 

“If he’d just helped me then it wouldn’t get away!” I’m too close to crying now. And crying isn’t going to get this snake home. I growl deep in my throat before taking a sharp breath and forcing it all deep down. My hand jolts forward and takes hold of the tail. The wiggling startles me again and I let go. It streaks through the rocks now, trying to escape. I run after it and this time, when I take hold of it, I've already decided I won’t let go. 

I jerk the snake upward and hold it in front of me. A scream tears at my throat. It’s longer than I expected it to be. Over two feet in length with a thick wavy body. Its head begins to rise towards my arm in the shape of a U. I picture its teeth striking at my skin. Certain that it’s going to bite my arm, I shake my fist and the head falls back towards my feet in a straight line. But I don’t let go. 

I start walking back towards my Papa, slowly at first, watching every twitch of the snake’s muscles. The head moves again and I give it a blind shake. I’m not certain how long I can keep this up so I started moving faster. My legs are stiff and precise as I stumble around. I’m so busy keeping an eye on the snake, making sure he doesn’t bite me, that branches pull at my face and sharp rocks cut my feet. A long high pitched note reaches my ears and I realize it's coming from me. I decide that it doesn’t make any sense to be screaming. Only I can’t stop. Not while the live reptile is wriggling about between my fingers. 

“Papa!” I shout out as he comes into view. 

His expression transforms into shock when his eyes settle on the large snake dangling from my fist. “Oh, my goodness!” he exclaims, bouncing from one leg to the next. He jerks in a moment of confusion, deciding what to do. He drops his pole and goes running to the canvas bag. I hear a fizzing sound as he dumps out a two-liter bottle of soda and hustles it over to me. I give the snake a final rattle and its head slides through the opening. 

My papa jabs a few air holes into the bottle with his knife and spins the cap on. 

“You did it!” He laughs and catches his breath.

My cheeks are wet with tears and wipe them away with my sleeve. In a trembling voice, I tell him how afraid I was that it was going to bite me. There’s an edge of triumph to my story because I know he didn’t think I wouldn’t actually do it.

He nudges me and says, “I’m proud of you.” 

For the rest of the day, I keep the snake close. He’s not so scary from the inside of a soda bottle and I apologize to him for scaring him so badly. Later that day I’ll take my snake home and set up the wheel barrel just like I planned. Even the boys, my cousins who think they are so tough, will be scared to touch it. I’ll show them how I can grab the tail. Eventually, I’ll even be able to do it without screaming at all.

       As I sit there on the sandy beach and my Papa says “, one more cast,” there’s a feeling sitting in my chest. It’s wild and calm, loose and anchored. I never want to forget. I don’t know who I was ten minutes ago. I don’t know who I will be in ten years. But one thing I know; all my life I want to be the girl who grabbed the Bullsnake. Sure, I hollered every second that its rough membrane was touching me, but I held on anyway. And no one can take that away from me.