The day the mountain died

The Day the Mountain Died

  It was just me and Lillith on the farm when the mountain split and started spitting fumes. I was in the fields, tending to the spuds, plucking flowers and cropping the rats from between the rows the way them chimpanzees sift through each other’s fur for fleas when the ground started to shake and I swear to god I heard some ancient creature scream before all of a sudden the sky was as dark as night. It was a hot day in the middle of August. The sun was obnoxious, full of itself and glaring down at us. The old apple tree on the far side of the fields was withering away and I'd try to bring it back with some ammonia but god only knows half a liter of piss will hardly keep the damn thing alive. 

Anyways, the ground shook and some angry god was screeching from the underbellies of the earth when the mountain ruptured and all the smoke started pouring out. It was funny, because up until that moment I had always thought the rumors about the shrines were false, but once I’d seen that massive cloud go up I knew there had to be some truth to ‘em. The sprites were mad, tired, dogged down by the weight of the human world and finally they’d had enough. They must’ve mustered up their numbers and called upon the great mountain spirit to rectify what damages we had done down here in the valley…why, when Grandpappy first settled down here the land was lush and verdant. Now look at it. Brown and dusty, with spud flowers and soy bushes patterning the valley like a corduroy suit. Hell, I’d be pretty pissed too if the best of my home had been turned into a dust bowl. So I watched all hell break loose and i didn’t drop down to my knees to pray because I could tell it was too late. So, I simply watched, witnessed the mountain break. 

...

  I swear to god it was the end of the world. I was in the bedroom, trying to convince myself to fall back asleep after a particularly sweet dream about my old math professor Mr. Heinley when suddenly the ground started shaking and this terrible roaring came from somewhere outside. I rushed out the room in my PJ’s hollering for Pa to get back inside from the fields in case it was an earthquake or a tornado, but soon as I flung open the back door and saw what was rising into the sky my voice shrivelled up and my jaw dropped. An oily dark cloud was writhing from out the unseen lips of the old pyramid as me and the gang called it. We had built a hideaway by one of the shrines way back, when we were all still in school, with some of the trash that was lying around. Some of the older kids used to go up there to party between harvests, or classes, or whenever they could really, and the local government had been using the mountain as an illegal dumping ground for decades after the antidump laws passed for the river and wells. They said “If we can’t dump our waste in the water, we’ll just put it in the woods!” Sure enough, there was enough scrap metal plastic and trash debris that we made a whole castle! Arnie was in trade school for construction and Don had that old nail gun so we made it work. Three rooms and a fully functioning latrine! Shit, Momma used to tell us when we were really little that those shrines used to be real magical. She said there were even fairies or sprites that lived in them, and in the old days, before all the fields got plowed, when the city wasn’t even a village yet, folks would go to the mountain to pray and offer baby deer or roasted ducks or the occasional heifer. She told us the mountain used to be covered in flowers and forests, but since I was born it’s just been freckled by the many different colors of plastic that poke out from under the trees, and the south slope hasn’t been much to look at since that mudslide some three years back now. 

Anyways, when that mountain started belching smoke I knew it was only a matter of time before the fire came. It took a matter of minutes for the sky to go black, and I knew then that it was time to go to the cellar. I rushed back into the house and started grabbing cans and jars and bags of food and throwing them into baskets and hampers. I tried to call for Ma, but she must’ve been in town with the grandchildren, ‘cause I ain't see her at all before the sirens started going off. That whole day is a blur, now. I can hardly even remember. Seems like it might’ve been a nightmare I was waking into.

...

Lord almighty have mercy on our souls. I had the grandbabies with me at the supermarket. We were buying fodder and greens, for the cows’ dinner and for our dinner - respectively. I’d use some of the greens we grow at home in our garden, but the recipe I was looking at on pinterest called for a more colorful sort of chard than what I had growing, and anyways, all of our produce came out bitter and sour since that new manufacturing plant went up outside of town. Anyways, I had the babies with me and little Carl, sweet, precious little innocent Carl comes running in from outside where he was playing jacks with that old homeless man, with tears in his eyes and at first I thought maybe hobo joe had ripped him off of a couple dollars again but then I saw it through the windows.

“Momma, something’s happening to the sky!” Carl said with a whimper, and I grabbed his hand and pulled him with me over to the window. I saw a mean looking cloud, something like a picture out of an old story book illustrating a wrathful god wreaking vengeance on some pour toga’d folks. Well you can bet your first five dollars I grabbed my grandbabies and dumped a whole armsful of toiletries and non perishables in the cart and took off running. I ain’t no fool! I know a god-sent calamity when I see one! I done told the mayor time and time again he better put his wobbly little foot DOWN against all the litter and disrespect this valley endures! He just shrugged and sighed it all off. Well boohoo Mr. Morton, now what will you do!? Put us all at risk just for a couple extra bonuses, that fat bastard. 

Anywho, we ran fast as hell out of there. Grandmomma used to tell me about a time when she met the spirit of the mountain. He was actually the spirit of the valley, she would tell me, but he lived on the mountain because it was the highest point in the area. A righteous Throne. She always referred to him as he but really, it could take any form it wanted to. When she first saw it, it appeared to her as a blue bird. Then, it was a rock as large as a house! One day, it even came to her as a silver fish that leapt from the river. Grandmomma used to go up the slopes of his mountain and collect flowers and berries, back before all the dumping. 

Anyways I guess the spirit was mighty fond of her. Said she used to find herself dozing off in a bed of flowers, only to find herself dreaming elated dreams within the confines of one of the many shrines on the mountain side. She said she’d go up there in the early morning, and all the day through be followed by insects and deer and fauna of all sorts. They’d bring her berries and gemstones and flowers that she couldn’t find or name on her own, beautiful things she’d never had the pleasure of seeing anywhere else before! Magical offerings she would call ‘em. And She would stay up there for hours, until the wee hours of the day, when Grandpappy would start getting anxious about her. Well, he was anxious for good reason. One day grandmomma never came back down from the mountain. It was rumored she had made union with the spirit of the valley, and we would never hear from her again.

Well, that was back before all the poison and damage. That cloud went up and I knew it was all over. Only a matter of time I’d been saying all these years and now here it was, the day of reckoning. Judgement day! I collared the kids and we sped back to the farm house where I found Lillith scrambling to fit the larder into the cellar and Pa was out back just gaping at the damn thing. He looked at me and I’ll never forget what he said. He told me 

“You know something Marg, it look kinda like Grandmomma Geanie, don’t it,”

and I looked up at it and back at him and said boy, you lost your got damn mind, get inside the house before I lose it too, and that was that. We tucked ourselves into our cellar and we ain’t left since. Grady, the youngest snuck out once to see how it was a few weeks in and everything was coated in a thick, oily dust. When he come back down, he got sick, and passed a few days later. After that we knew it was only a matter of time, but how else to enjoy the last moments of our lives than with one another, in the comfort of our own home, or at least, what’s left of it?