21 May Something Made My Brother Different

Posted at 11:00h in Strange and Unexplained by CreepypastaStories.com 0 Comments

📅 Published on May 21, 2022

“Something Made My Brother Different”

Written by Eli Pope
Edited by Craig Groshek
Thumbnail Art by Craig Groshek
Narrated by N/A

Copyright Statement: Unless explicitly stated, all stories published on CreepypastaStories.com are the property of (and under copyright to) their respective authors, and may not be narrated or performed, adapted to film, television or audio mediums, republished in a print or electronic book, reposted on any other website, blog, or online platform, or otherwise monetized without the express written consent of its author(s).

🎧 Available Audio Adaptations: None Available

⏰ ESTIMATED READING TIME — 19 minutes

Rating: 10.00/10. From 1 vote.

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Chapter 1

I pulled up my shirt to study my back in the mirror. It stung. I couldn’t believe Wade could do this to me. If I’d held questions if this was only a game or real—I now knew as the pain and fear ripped through my body, it was real. I tried to keep as quiet as possible while I pulled my t-shirt over my head, but I felt like screaming. It burned so bad. An event no kid the age of nine should ever feel.

Wade had always grabbed a whip-like limb from old-lady Dobb’s rose bush every time we played the game “make war.” But dang it, he’d never actually hit me with it. His eyes looked so different today. He didn’t look like my brother anymore today. He looked more like an animal bent on stalking and killing me.

I finally got my shirt past my back and pulled my head through, quickly turning to see how badly he had wounded me. My eyes grew instantly into huge white balls of fright in the mirror’s reflection when I saw how big the whelps were—and deep red punctures oozing streams of my blood from their tiny holes in my flesh from the rose stem’s thorns. It was a good thing for Wade that my t-shirt was dark and not a white one. It was also fortunate for him I was no crying tattletale. Mom would certainly kill him if she saw what he’d done. I wasn’t sure I wanted to open the door and see my brother ever again. For the first time—he seriously scared the bejesus out of me. I was glad he was only four years older. If he was any bigger, I wouldn’t have been able to get away. I kicked at him like one of the girls at my school would kick wildly at the soccer ball, as if it were a rat attacking them. I ain’t afraid to admit it. Wade was full of the devil in his eyes today and he’d scared me shitless. I wondered now if he was hiding and afraid. Maybe he thought I’d tell Dad on him. He’d get his for sure if I did, and while I hated him right now, I still loved him too. After all, he was still my brother, and nothing would change that fact.

* * * * * *

I used to love going on the long car ride it took to see my grandma and grandpa—and Chad too, if he was visiting his grandparents. Chad was my age and we’d become friends over the years of us both visiting our families here. I’d spend the night at his place and he mine on summers we were here at the same time. He had a bigger sister Wade liked and we would razz him about her. “Wade and Marissa, sittin’ in a tree—K, I, S, S, I, N, G….” He hated us for it.

Dad always drove and Mom would sit in the front passenger seat. My spot was always behind my dad while Wade sat to my right. He always edged his way across the imaginary line my mom had declared was “no kid’s land” and we weren’t ever supposed to cross it. Wade always did, but he would mouth the words, “I’ll kick your tail bad when we get to grandma’s.” He would look over and finish with, “1, 2, 3, 4, it now the time to make war.”

I’m not sure how old I was when he dreamed the game up. I thought it would be fun, like playing army. But it never was. And today took the game to a brand-new level, one that made it seem more real, like the news clips about the war in Vietnam my dad watched nightly.

When we would visit, Dad always pulled onto the street right in front of our grandparent’s house and parked. Their house was across from the football practice field at the college. In the summer, there were all kinds of hiding places there, and the entire campus was our playground. If we made it back to grandma and grandpas by suppertime, we were free to roam the neighborhood.

The old Ford Galaxie 500 with a 390 cubic inch motor and cruise-0’-matic transmission was our vehicle to travel in. I didn’t know what all those things meant, but my dad told everybody who asked about it, so I figured it must be important and impressive. He sure ‘nuff wore a proud look with his chest puffed out as those words spilled from his mouth each time. He would always end the conversation with, “I’ll race you for pink slips anyday, sport.” I always wondered why he picked a brown one. I always thought it just looked like a big ole’ loud rumbly turd myself. But it sure ‘nuff would throw ya into the back seat when he mashed the pedal to the metal, roaring us down the highway. He’d say, “Boys, sometimes you have to just bully your way into traffic!” and Mom would usually answer with, “Harold! Don’t teach the boys such things! They’ll try that when they grow up and cause a wreck.” The momentum pushing me back always made me think of what my turds must feel like going from just floating on top of the water to swooshing down the toilet in an instant.

Anyway, the trip to the Ozarks with my brother was always mixed with fun—and not so. I always wished I would have been born first, four years before him instead of the other way it was, then I could be the one making the rules for “1, 2, 3, 4 make war.” He always said he would give me to the count of fifty—and then he was goin’ to old lady Dobb’s rose bush to pick his weapon of the longest branch he could find, and the prickliest thorns, for when he came huntin’ me. Part of me never believed he would really use it. Another part of me always thought he wanted me gone and outta his way, but today—I remember I took off running faster than all the other times before. It was something in his eyes, his tone, and even the way he smelled. When he opened his door and glared back at me before quietly saying, “You better run little brother, I’m whippin’ the tar outta you today—and I mean it.” I knew today would bring something new to the game, something I didn’t think I’d like. He laughed in a way that wasn’t funny and I could smell what I took as the odor of death coming from his mouth, as if its stink was tightly tied to each word he spoke. Wade’s eyes were blacker than coal too and his voice sounded like someone else’s—or something else. I knew one thing, and that was the fact I wasn’t going to wait to find out. I shot out from my seat in Dad’s big fast car like a bullet with diarrhea aiming for a place to splat, and I didn’t look back to see what followed.

I usually ran and dove under a big flowering bush next to the Calvary Temple church about halfway down the neighborhood from behind Grandma’s back porch. It gave great cover for me to see when he was coming down the grassy alley or the side road that cut across. The only problem was the fact Wade knew it was my favorite spot close enough I could catch my breath before heading to another safer place to hide. I stumbled onto a new place in Chad’s Grandma’s honeysuckle bushes today. I felt safe quick and close enough I wasn’t out of breath. I looked up at the back of Chad’s grandparent’s house to see if I could tell if he was home. I watched as his granddad stood at the window seemingly watching me and my brother. He stroked his beard and I sensed he knew I was just underneath him. I wondered if I was making him angry climbing under and into the center of the sweet-smelling cover I’d discovered. I kept watching the old man to see how he reacted. He never opened the window to yell at me or came to the door, so I deemed my new find a safe haven. Seems now in memory, I never did get to “make war,” I always spent my time trying to retreat and live through it. Wade would always say, “There ain’t no white flags so you can’t wave to surrender!” I was always the hunted and never the hunter; the price of being the younger, little brother, which is why I always wished I’d been born first. Things would sure ‘nuff be different if I had been. I wouldn’t be sitting here in my grandpa’s bathroom in near tears trying to figure out how I’m gonna clean the blood off without screaming out in pain or making a mess and giving away what happened then trying to explain it. I’m mad at Wade and scared of him, but I still don’t wanna get him in trouble. He’s my brother, even if he did get bitten by a rabid dog or something and maybe gotten infected with rabies. I’d heard how they had to put down animals like dogs when they got sick. I didn’t want Wade to be ‘put down.’ Of course, maybe, just maybe—he’d finally been bothered too much by me and wanted me to learn the lesson of leaving him be?

I just don’t know what to do.

“Tommy—what are doing in there? Are you feeling ill?” my mom questioned through the door. “Dad and I are ready to leave and head back home. I can’t leave without my hug from you! Wade is out here already, and we are all waiting on you….”

And there lies the quandary of the nine-year-old boy I am. Trapped in the toilet with blood oozing down my back as I looked at the small rips in my damp t-shirt, wondering what to do.

Chapter 2

I managed to sneak upstairs and change shirts while Mom was out in the living room waiting for my stomach to stop hurting. I told her I was in the middle of a painful poop. She always left me alone for several minutes after I dropped that line on her. At my age she didn’t want to hear about my poop any more than I wanted to tell her about it.

I bounced down the stairs hoping when she and Dad hugged me, they wouldn’t notice if I flinched or that they wouldn’t feel any dampness on my back from the bleeding. I eyed Wade and he gave me the look of— are you keeping quiet? He gave the appearance of being sorry and worried. The black emptiness that was in his eyes earlier seemed to have waned and been replaced by the friendly sparkle I usually saw in him.

As I watched our mom and dad drive off down the block—there was a moment when a chill replaced the pain previously giving the sensations tingling through my skin. I suddenly felt very alone and unsure. I scanned Chad’s house and a dark silhouette caught my attention. Is was the old man again, Granddad. He looked like he was really studying us or something. If he wasn’t such a nice old guy, seeing him up there looking at us would have probably creeped me out. I know Chad and him were like best friends, kind of like me and my grandpa.

My thoughts went back to the chill I felt before noticing ole Granddad up in the window again. Both of my grandparents loved my brother and I dearly but neither one, even together, would be able to save me. Not if Wade were ever to let whatever took him over earlier—were to come back again and try to hurt me. I’d be sunk—no, I might just be dead.

It then hit me as I glanced over at my brother as we all made our way up the steps to the front porch—we shared not only a room at our grandparent’s house, but a bed. A fear I hadn’t felt before—instantly overwhelmed me as it set in. I looked up at the window to our bedroom on the top floor. That shiver came back and caused me to trip going up the concrete steps. I glimpsed back to where the old neighbor had been at his window. Yep, still there watching us. Weird, because I’d never noticed him before this summer.

I think Wade saw into my heart in that moment as he looked at me. He may have actually felt the fearfulness within me. Grandma and Grandpa walked past the threshold into the living room and the screen door slammed shut with a loud thwack. Wade leaned in and lightly spoke, “Hey Tommy—” a moment of still silence passed between us before he cleared his throat and continued, “…little brother—I’m uh… you know… I’m… I’m sorry. I don’t know what got into me, but it… it… won’t happen… again. I promise.” Wade walked over toward the porch swing and leaned out looking at the neighbor’s house. I think he hoped to catch a glimpse of Chad’s sister, but he turned and said, “Wonder why ole man Grover is watching us these days? You ain’t been crawling under their bushes, have you?”

“No. He probably thinks you’re trying to peep on his granddaughter!” I thought about what Wade had said about never hurting me, it somehow felt he’d just made a promise he didn’t have the ability to keep. I was not put at ease no matter the quiet and assuring tone he spoke his apology in, but I answered nonetheless. “I know, Wade… but… but… you scared the willy bejesus outta me. You never acted like that before. I thought you was gonna kill me….”

“Come on, little brother, you know I wouldn’t ever hurt you….”

“But you did! I’ll show you my back when we get up to our room. Ain’t no dang joke, Wade! I’m bleeding even still!”

“Shhshhh—don’t let Grandma and Grandpa know. They’ll call Mom and Dad back and I’ll be in big trouble. We’ll have to go back home and miss our summer vacation here.”

“You ever try anything like that again… I swear… and … 1, 2, 3, 4 makin’ war— is over. I ain’t playin’ that game ever again.”

“Okay, okay. I get it.” He held out his hand in the starting position of our secret brother handshake and nodded at me to accept his assurance, “… the game was over for good, I promise.”

I reached over and began the sequence of the pact. I pulled away when we ended with the grip and thumbs touching, his hand feeling too warm to touch. I swear his palm felt bristled too, like a porcupine or… or what I’d imagine a wild dog’s paws would feel. I looked up at my brother and saw his eyes change colors so quickly I wondered if I’d imagined it. They flickered like shades being briskly pulled over the windows, blocking out the gleam of the sun making everything dark.

I crawled into bed later that night not knowing if I was lying next to my brother—or a new kind of monster that had taken over his body. I knew one thing and concentrated on it with all my will and might—I wasn’t going to fall asleep tonight. I didn’t want to wake up dead. I did snicker just a bit with my faux pas, but I was serious about it. I had great expectations on the birthday gift I’d been leaving Mom and Dad hints about, and I by golly wanted to live to enjoy it. A brand-new Schwinn bicycle with the sparkle silver banana seat and tall raised handlebars, hopefully in bright green. I wearily laid my head down letting it sink into the pillow for the long night ahead of me. I’m not sure I made it ten minutes before the dreams drew me back into the game—the game my brother tried to kill me in.

Chapter 3

Sundays were church days at home and at Grandma and Grandpa’s. After all, Grandpa was a retired Methodist preacher. I think when I woke up and realized I’d fallen asleep but lived through the night—I gave credit to my grandpa’s faith that kept my brother from becoming whatever evil thing he held inside and letting me live another day closer to my birthday and hopes of peddling in style down our street. I looked over and saw my brother coiled up on top of the rumpled covers like a pet dog. At first, I didn’t think anything about it, but it soon hit my brain like a box of rocks. Werewolves are like dogs, and they have dark eyes and bristly hair. They probably ball up like a pet dog when they sleep too.

Did my brother, Wade, somehow become a dog monster—or a werewolf? How would I know if he did? Where does a nine-year-old go in 1967 to find answers to those questions? Especially without sticking out like a sore thumb or looking like a lunatic.

I heard Wade snore or begin to howl or something just before there was the knock on our bedroom door. “Boys—breakfast is ready and then it’s time to dress for church. We’re on a tight schedule this morning so up and at ‘em!” I looked over at Wade and he never stirred. He was still curled tightly in a ball, making whimpering noises with short snorts or growls. His hands began pawing and twitching underneath the covers as if he were dreaming. I started to laugh because he looked like a dog chasing rabbits in a dream. What had gotten into him anyway? Is this what hormones and becoming a teenager brought?

My grandma’s voice was music to my ears. She was the best in the world and her smile could solve almost any problem in my world. Any except for this problem, that is.

It dawned on me in an instant. If Chad was next door yet, I could ask him about wolves and monsters and such. Chad’s granddad seemed to really like me. He always called me Skeezix. I held no clue why, but he did, and I wasn’t going to tell him any different. When I was at Chad’s house—Skeezix was my name. If there was ever an old person a kid could trust with asking crazy questions like werewolves and if they even lived here in this area—it was Chad’s granddad. He was like a retired explorer or safari hunter. Something like that. Funny thing—I didn’t even know his name. I just called him Granddad too.

After church, I would go next door and see if Chad was here for the summer yet. He may know what to do about my problem. It wouldn’t hurt asking anyways. After all, it could soon become his problem too.

* * * * * *

I’ll admit, I don’t normally listen to the preacher. I’m nine years old. I play with the pencil and paper on the back of the pew in front of me while my eyes wander around the room and count the old men whose eyes are closed in sleep. My grandma nudges me if she sees I’m about to join them in napping. But today was different. I heard words come from the preacher’s mouth I never expected. And since they were from the bible and a preacher, it had to be the truth. I remember it was from Genesis 49: something, I can’t remember the verse. It was about a guy named Benjamin being a ravenous wolf, tearing his prey apart in the morning and dividing the spoils at night. Something like that. Was God trying to tell me something through Preacher Gibson? I snapped my attention to my grandma’s face to see if she heard what I did. Her face never changed expression as if she either missed it, or it was not of importance to her. To me though—I was now thinking maybe Preacher Gibson knew Wade was becoming Benjamin and it renewed my fear. I didn’t want to be Benjamin’s prey and torn apart to be divided tonight. Whatever that meant I didn’t want any part of it. I leaned forward so I could look past my grandma and grandpa over to where Wade was sitting. Wade’s head leaned forward and turned slowly towards me as if a magnet were pulling him closer to the metal. His eyes were dark again and his whole body seemed tense and ruffled.

I quickly moved my gaze up to my grandparent’s faces to see if they were noticing what was happening. It was like I was the only one awake in this dream of nightmares. Everyone was blind to the vision I was seeing, mesmerized by the words coming from the pulpit.

Without warning, Wade’s body began shaking as his eyes grew narrow and red. The seams on his Sunday best clothes began slowly pulling apart as his body stretched and grew too thick to stay encased by the fabric.

I looked away in shock and fear. My eyes scanned my grandparent’s faces expecting them to recoil in horror, but they remained focused on the sermon which continued unmoved from the terrifying event taking place. I glanced across the large sanctuary from right and then back left searching for at least one other person aware of what I was witnessing. What was happening here? Why couldn’t anyone else including Preacher Gibson see the change my brother was going through?

Prodding my eyes to turn back towards Wade once more I fought my urge to jump up and run and that is when I saw something I could never unsee. It was the deciding moment that convinced me I wasn’t just imagining this. My brother’s nose began stretching longer and leaner making him look more like the grizzled German Shepard our neighbors owned and kept chained in their back yard. The beast that always scared me whenever I would play in our yard, believing he would snap free of the metal lead holding him at bay and then leap the meager four-foot chain-link fence to attack. I saw the identical stiff needle-like hairs beginning to poke out through Wade’s white collared shirt. Why was no one else seeing this? I saw his nostrils flare as if he were sniffing a scent in the air. He grinned slightly showing me his long white fangs that had grown to the point his mouth could no longer keep them hidden under his snarling lips while a low deep growl grew from a soft tone into the roar of a freight train.

I froze and couldn’t make myself move a muscle. Not an inch. My body so tensed it screamed with a throbbing, aching pain. The only movement I could sense within myself was a tiny flicker of my eyes humming in twitches. I was petrified. I couldn’t believe I sat in a room full of people—but I was all by myself facing a monster who was once nothing more than my older brother. I felt the air slowly exit my mouth from deep inside my lungs as if a vacuum sucked it away. I needed to gasp to draw in another replacement breath but mechanically I couldn’t force my body to cooperate. I was easy prey for Benjamin to tear and feed upon my terrified and rooted body. The surrounding audience still blindly focused on Preacher Gibson’s words rolling ominously from his tongue. I was living in a real-life-threatening horror movie moment and was frozen in an instant which seemed as if it were lasting my entire existence. Maybe it was. Maybe this was how it ends for me. And then the world stopped spinning. It happened like an unexpected explosion without the ground rumbling or shaking, only the surrounding sounds being stolen and transformed into the noise of hollow ringing echoing through my ears.

Wade’s Sunday clothes burst wide-open exposing bristled dark and sharp hairs flared up like needles poking up from grandma’s pin cushion. His eyes screamed anger and hunger and death and make no doubt—it was all focused on me. No one else in the entire room seemed to matter to my brother—only me. Not my grandma or grandpa, the preacher, or a single other member of the congregation—all me. There was a tension between us that could be cut with a knife.

What had I done to him to deserve this wrath he was greedy to deliver me? His teeth gleaming with steamy dripping anticipation as his lips quivered with the snarling sound of impending satisfaction of the kill. Our eyes locked briefly and in that simple moment I witnessed the hate-filled bright red pupils morph into the sadness of one brother about to kill the other with no reason other than an uncontrolled force from a monster hidden deep within. The monster starring me down was earlier disguised as someone I knew and loved. But now he’d lost his battle to be human and instead changed into a dark monstrous predator hungry with a desire to feed. He seemed to attempt squelching this unquenchable thirst, but was failing in his resolve to control the animal in control inside.

I knew my childhood was over. In a flood of mental pictures from my past, I watched my life from the beginning until now and then the future I’d never know. I saw my mom’s face looking at my ravaged body lying in a wooden box, prepared as well could be for her presentation. I heard my dad’s tears as they fell to the floor in a pool of anguish. The pain of realizing neither were there to save me from their first born turned predator. I pictured my brother, Wade’s smile as we played in the stock tank filled to the rim with ice-cold water from the outside spigot on that heat-soaked summer day last year. I saw it all as it flooded past in flickering moments of grief and happiness mixed into an eclectic stream of memories making up one’s humanity in life.

And then boom, like a lightbulb being shattered by a hammer, everything stopped. Lights out. My life froze in time to a sound that almost pained my ears deep into the meat of my brain. I looked up and over and witnessed my hand gripping my grandma’s hand tightly. My knuckles bright white, her fingers reddish pink from the pressure of my grip. My eyes then traveled over to see my grandpa’s expression never change, still focused on the pulpit as Preacher Gibson continued to speak from it. My eyes finally relinquished my fear and looked to my brother, searching to focus my last moment on his, I saw a sight I couldn’t believe. I cried instantly knowing life could never be the same after this day. Not for me and certainly not for Wade. It was my brother slouched motionless next to Grandpa, his hand loosely grasping the old frail one resting on Grandpa’s Sunday suit trousers. I thought he was asleep at first until I noticed the color of crimson red soaking his shirt, changing its innocent snow-white color into an angry but sad shade of red pooling in his lap. I tracked my vision upward to my brother’s face but stopped immediately at the sight of something that shouldn’t be there. A large hole where his heart should have been beating a to a pulse of the living but now only visible were fleshy bits of body matter oozing out with torn flesh shredded and gaping over the stained fabric of his shirt. I first looked back behind to see the people who sat there motionless, expecting their faces and attention to be glued to the preacher like moments before when I needed help. It was my grandparent’s neighbors. It was my friend Chad and his grandparents, staunch and motionless. The first thing that really caught my attention was the smug smile gleaming across Granddad’s wrinkled face. He wore a look of honor like a soldier who’d just saved his entire battalion single-handed. His lips began to form words, his tired and wrinkled mouth pushing them slowly out past a dried tongue.

“Skeezix! My young friend!”

My first thought was, did he not see what happened to my brother? Or what happened to me?

Granddad continued, “… I knew all along, Skeezix, yessir, there were signs—obvious signs—to a hunter like me. You got to know what you’re hunting and what implement or weapon to bring. I may be old, but I ain’t crazy. I can still recognize a Goddamned werewolf when I see one in the making. ‘Course, one has to be sure! Don’t want to make mistakes one you can’t take back!”

“You killed my brother, Granddad?”

“Don’t you worry son; he hadn’t feasted yet. I could tell that too. I believe you were gonna be his first kill, the first meal.”

“I don’t… I… um …” Time was kept at a halt, it seemed. Preacher Gibson’s sermon kept rattling through my ears now, beginning to rid itself from the loud clangs of bells ringing. Each word not needing me to focus on it to make out what was said. The congregation’s eyes and attention continued on as if me and Granddad’s family weren’t even in the room. “… I’m sorry for what I’m… I’m about to say, but… just what in hell is going on? You killed my fucking brother, Granddad!” I blurted out before I realized what I said, wanting to pull the word I’d heard my dad say when he was angry. I flinched expecting my grandmother’s hand to come swooping down hard from above and connecting across my cheek—which didn’t happen. She was still glued like the masses in the room to the other world running parallel to mine and Granddad’s.

“Your brother will return, Skeezix, I’m dang near positive. Seen it happen before!”

I glanced back to Wade’s slumped body, the blood pooled so much in his lap it ran down and was dripping to the floor from the pew. “I don’t think so this time, Granddad—he looks dead for sure, emptied completely of his blood.”

“Son, if a werewolf that hasn’t fully turned, or ravaged a victim and drank from its blood…” The old man cleared his throat before continuing. “… if you kill him with a pure silver bullet before he drinks from his prey—he will transform back to his previous human condition.” He chortled. “Don’t know how in hell it happens, boy—just know it does. Course, there ain’t no rule book explaining it, but mark my words, your brother is coming back.” His smile widened again with pride.

I turned away from Granddad, first noticing that Chad was also focused on the sermon and unaware of what was happening. I then looked toward the front of the church and that’s when I saw it. I squinted and leaned over my grandma, edging closer to make sure of what I was looking at. It was a slightly oval and tattered hole in the pew’s wooden back. It was splintered and appeared it went clean through the back directly in front of Wade, but the person sitting in the pew wasn’t slumped over or screaming in agony. Then I noticed it. There was a bible in the slot of the shelf that the hole was in, and I reached farther and grabbed it. It lifted it up and drew it in closer to investigate. Sure enough, I could see a shiny silver bullet that had penetrated the bible’s book cover and embedded in a crumpled ball of mangled shiny silver within the pages about halfway through. I looked back towards my brother and then Granddad who sat behind him. The old man smiled again and lifted the still smoking revolver to his mouth and blew what was left of the smoke my way.

Wade’s body began writhing a bit as I watched the wolf’s features fade back, morphing into the familiar flesh and form of the brother I knew before. I was about to question what may happen when the world righted itself and Grandma saw his bloody clothes and holy shirt, but when I looked again, Wade’s clothes were mended to perfection as if nothing ever happened. My brother’s eyes appeared to slowly focus on me, and a look of question formed across his face. He rubbed his chest where the bullet had passed but was now completely healed. He looked around and again stared back at me, “Hey, little brother, I must have eaten too many donuts this morning—I have heartburn like you wouldn’t believe.” He smiled at me with that old grin I didn’t realize I loved so much.

I replied, “Yeah, Wade, must be the donuts…” A smile swept across my lips and I turned back to Granddad and quietly whispered, “I’ll be jiggered… my brother is back… um… thank you… Granddad…I guess… I guess your shot saved us.”

“You bet, Skeezix—anytime!” and he smiled a huge grin as he faded back into his pew and the world all the others were living. I glimpsed around and saw everything was as it once was. I shook my head back and forth twice before I too joined the congregation listening to Preacher Gibson as he wrapped his Sunday sermon up with, “And let us pray….”