Hide and Seek
There once was a sweet old woman who lived in a cabin in the woods. One day, there was an impatient knock at her door. She hobbled over, undid the lock, and swung open the heavy wooden door. There was a nervous-looking man shifting from foot to foot. She smiled up at him and asked what she could do for him. He explained that a crazy woman was chasing him and asked if he could come inside. She was sympathetic and allowed him into her home.
She introduced herself as Mable and asked him to elaborate on his story, but he said that there was no time. The woman chasing him would be arriving at her door any moment and he really needed to hide. This was a red flag for Mable, but before she could question him further, there was another knock. She glanced at the door, and when she turned back around, the man was gone. Mable pulled a shotgun from under the bench by the door and propped it next to the doorframe. She cracked the door and peered out at the crazy woman. She had an aluminum baseball bat in her right hand, but other than this looked pretty normal to Mable. She kept her guard up nonetheless.
"How can I help you, hon?"
"I'm lookin' for a dangerous man. Have you seen anyone pass by?" Mable said she had not, but the woman persisted.
"I'm sure. I haven't seen anyone come around here. Mind if I ask why you're lookin' for such an individual?" Mable asked.
"He came to my door last night sayin' his car had broken down and asked to use my phone. I let him in, takin' pity on his situation. I left the room for a moment, and when I came back, he held a knife out and threatened to kill me if I didn't give him all of my valuables. I knocked the knife out of his hand and went after him. He ran out, but I grabbed my bat so I could chase him down and beat the fire out of him." The woman went on to describe the man just in case Mabel saw him. She'd turned white as a ghost during the retelling of events. The description perfectly matched the man she'd let into her home.
"He's currently hidin' in my home. I thought he seemed like a nice young man. I'm scared to face him alone. Will you please help me?" Mabel whispered to the woman. She agreed to help and they prepared a quick plan to hunt him down. "Honey, I told you I ain't seen no man here. You better get on to lookin'. Have a nice day now!" she said a bit louder.
The woman slipped inside and Mabel shut the door. Mabel clutched her shotgun and called out for him, asking where he'd gone. The woman held her baseball bat over her shoulder with a fierce grip and steely eyes. They crept quietly through each room of the house. As the woman with the bat stepped into Mable’s bedroom, the man jumped from behind the door with a knife. When he saw who it was, the shock on his face was visible. He recovered quickly and moved to jab at her, but she swung at his arm with the bat. There was an audible cracking noise, but he just smiled and dove at her again. She jumped back a bit and this time the bat bashed against the side of his head. The women quickly realized that the blow had killed him. The younger woman started to panic. She'd never killed someone before, and if she squinted her eyes and tilted her head, he looked a bit like her brother. It was part of the reason she let him into her home. And now he was dead.
“You said you wanted to ‘beat the fire out of him.’ Why're you tremblin’ now? Did you think a tickle match was gonna teach him a lesson? He was gonna kill me when I came back here. Come on now and help me drag him out back.” Mable patted her on the back and groaned as she bent to take up the man’s ankles. Outside, she handed the other woman a shovel and asked her to dig. They rolled him into his makeshift grave together. Mabel smiled, brushed the dirt from her hands, and said, "He'll be wonderful for my roses in the spring."
Author's Note: In the original story, a snake approaches a man and begs that he hide him because someone with a stick is chasing him. The man agrees to hide him in his sleeve, and when the pursuer asks him if he's seen the snake, he denies it. After, the snake threatens to attack him for his stupidity in trusting a snake. The man tricks the snake into looking another way so he can kill him.
I thought it was dumb of the man from the story to not ask why the man with the stick was chasing after the snake. Surely the snake had done something wrong if the man wanted it dead. So, in my story, my protagonist asks both the "snake" and the pursuer. I wanted my tricked person to be as innocent as possible to justify why she was tricked into this situation. I thought an old woman would play the part well. I thought she might need some help defending herself, so I brought in the second woman to assist her. I don't generally kill off my characters, especially if they're human. However, the snake died in the original story and I liked the dark turn it gave this story.
Bibliography: "The Nobleman Who Concealed a Snake in His Sleeve" from The Tooti Nameh or Tales of a Parrot by Ziya'al-Din Nakhshabi, link to the online reading.
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