Squish-Squash excerpt

Here's another little excerpt from another book. This one from the opening of Squish-Squash. 

Little five-year-old Billy is on an annual camping trip with his family in the Louisiana bayou. He and his mother are down by the river . . .

Mary turned and looked at Billy, who was still catching unsuspecting frogs and tossing them into the river.  Poor frogs.  She looked at the water, which had turned slightly darker with the setting of the sun.  She stared at the growing blackness of it.  She watched the ripples reflect off what was still left of the daylight.  She heard a kerplop and watched the ripples grow.  Billy had caught and tossed another frog.  Mary smiled to herself as she imagined the frogs cursing her precious son as he grabbed them, “But I just got out of there, you son of a biiiiitch!” Kerplop!

But her smile faded slightly as she stared at the water.  A feeling of foreboding had crept over her and was tracing its icy fingers along her spine.  Mary didn’t like the water much at night.  Not at all, actually.  During the daylight hours she could tolerate it.  It was fine when you could look around and see everything.  But at night, there were too many shadows.  Too many dark images.  Too many things lurked just below the surface.  One thing in particular frightened her: alligators.

Mary hated them.  She didn’t mind the camping in the swamps (not now anyway), but she loathed the gators.  Art had originally wanted to camp old-school style, with tents.  But Mary would have none of it.  She agreed to the bayou thing, even learned to like it, but he was pushing his luck.  He quickly realized this fact.  They purchased a camper, and there were no more discussions about it.  If her children were going to be camping where there is dangerous wildlife, they would at least be safe while they slept.

“Billy?” Mary called out when she lost sight of him.

“Yeah?”  His small head popped up from behind a bush down along the bank.

“Stay near me, okay?  It’s almost time to go up.  It’s getting too dark.”

She watched as he caught sight of another helpless amphibian and jumped for him.  She heard the water splash louder than it should have, and knew Billy had just soaked his feet—exactly the thing she had asked him not to.  But what the hell, they were camping, and it was still warm enough for him to dry off.

The water rippled at the base of the rock and Mary looked down at it.  It had taken on the appearance of oil, as the last of the sunlight vanished behind the tree line.  Oil and water, she thought, two substances that would never mix, but at times seemed so much alike.

If truth be known, Mary was afraid of the water.  She could sit around it, enjoy the beauty of it, but she could never get in it.  It was an unrealistic fear, she knew, but the fact that water, with all its life saving qualities, could be one of the deadliest elements on the planet, scared her to death.  The fact that the city she lived in was prone to flash floods didn’t help her fear, either.  Her friends constantly teased her because she lived in a house with a huge pool in the backyard, and was surrounded almost completely by water.  For years Mary told herself she was going to get over her aversion to water and actually learn to swim, but it was one of those things that had never come to fruition.

Kerplop!  Another frogapult.

Mary looked around at the darkened woods, then glanced at her watch.  She was surprised to find that it was nearly eight-thirty.  Time had a way of slipping by when you were in the grasp of the beauty of the bayou.

“Sorry, Billy, but the remaining frogs are going to have to fend for themselves the rest of the night.  Let’s go,” she called out as she stood.

Splash!

Mary heard the noise, knew it was different than the normal sound of a frog hitting the water.  It was louder.  Even louder than the simple slipping of a foot into the river.  There was something wrong about it.  Her motherly instincts kicked in immediately.  That earlier feeling of foreboding now raked its nails down her spine, tearing open her skin and ripping out her soul.

“Billy?” she said as she jumped off the rock and almost slipped in the mud at its base.  Oily ripples of the water reached out and jumped at her feet.  The ripples came to shore much faster than before.  These ripples were caused by something violent disturbing the water’s surface.  As if something had jumped in.

Or out! she thought.

“Billy!” she yelled.

The noise of splashing water came again, but this time from further out in the river, toward the middle—as if something were swimming away.

Mary allowed herself to forget about her own fears and step into the water up to her knees, desperately searching for her son who was nowhere to be seen.  The panic grew with each passing moment she didn’t find him, calling out his name in terror-filled breaths.

Something was wrong. Very wrong.  A mother knew.

Mary stepped back onto the riverbank and her foot hit something.  She bent over and picked it up.  It was one of Billy’s tennis shoes.

Her heart skipped a few beats.

The world around her began to spin.

Her lungs stopped producing the needed air supply.

She stood there, staring at the sneaker, her mind trying to comprehend the fact that it still contained her little boy’s foot.

“Billyyyyyyyy!” 

Billy heard his mother’s cries.  He heard his father’s cries.  Even his brother called out.  He knew they were looking for him.  He wanted to shout back to them so they would know where to look, but as hard as he tried, he couldn’t produce any sound.

It had happened so quickly.  His mom and dad had both warned him to be careful of alligators, but he hadn’t seen any, so his vigilance wavered.  He had just been reaching out for one more frog when the monster rose from the water.  He didn’t have time to shout out.  The jaws clamped around him so quickly and so tightly that he thought he was dead right away.

Billy felt himself being dragged into the river.  The pressure on the upper part of his legs was tremendous.  The jaws had a hold of him right at the top of his legs.  He even thought that, if it had been just a bit higher, the monster would have bitten off his pee-pee.

He swallowed so much water.  It tasted terrible.  Like dirt.  He choked and gagged as he tried to grab air from the surface, but each time he did, he was pulled under again.  Billy knew it was over.  He would never see his mom and dad or his big brother ever again.

Then there was the twisting.  He began to spin around and around and around in the water.  He was getting dizzy.  Right before the pressure grew to its most extreme, Billy heard crunching noises under the water.

Then he stopped spinning and floated to the surface again and drifted with the current.

Now, he could hear them calling out his name over and over again, but he couldn’t find his voice.  He had swallowed so much water and mud.

He was cold.  He hadn’t been wearing a T-shirt before, and now the monster had pulled his shorts off, too.  The water was chilly; it was making him shiver violently.  And the current was so strong that he had to fight to keep his head above the surface.  For some reason, he could only use his arms to try and stay up.  He drifted for a long while.  He felt himself bump into stuff in the river.  He swallowed more water.

Finally he stopped drifting.

Billy held onto the tangle of branches that caught him.  He waited.  He knew he should be feeling some sort of pain, but he didn’t.  He only felt the wet mud beneath him.  His lower torso was pressed deep into the mud by the strong current, sealing the large open wounds where his legs once were.

He cried softly as he listened to the night.  He listened to his name called out, so faint now.  He could barely hear it anymore.  He knew he should try to call back, but was unable.  He was suddenly so tired.  He fought to keep his eyes open.  His body was pushed deeper into the mud.

Darkness enveloped him, as Billy fell into merciful unconsciousness.

To find out what happens with Billy, check out the book HERE! 

Thank you!

Stay safe. Mask up. Protect others. 💓