The Swamp Monster

Frides was whooshed through the muddied waters of the marsh at speeds that weren't allowing him to kick back up to the surface. He couldn't open his eyes and see anything, it was all just loose mud. He reached out to try and grab something to stop himself but everything he ever got a hold of fell in with him. He Glowed two daggers and tried to stab them into the sides but there was no resistance. Thanks to his ability to feel his orientation he could feel the pressure pushing him up, down, sideways, and knew that this sink hole had complete control over him. He was running out of air clutching his throat. It had been thirty minutes and he didn't know if he could hold on any longer. As stupid as it sounded this was his end. Dying at the bottom of a swamp, in total darkness.

He thought of his family, his father, and mother and his sister...and his brother. Will he see him again now or his mother.

A middle aged man was on his hands and knees. He pulled up his over-all legs and was spreading out a tarp below their garden of catalpa trees. In spite of the water, he and his wife had been able to successfully grow a few rows of the trees. After he laid the tarp down and he was sure it was nice and even to his liking, he got up and took a look at the many catalpa worms that had gathered on this section of trees. He shook the tree, then the worms fall on the tarp. He looked up past the dried up swamp bed and saw mud bubbling out of the hill next to his home. The hill crumbled and transformed into mud and more and more muddy water started to pour out like a waterfall. He looked down and saw some of the worms had started to scoot off of the tarp and bent back down to scoot them more to the center near the base of the tree with the back of his hand. He snapped his head back up when he heard the sound of water rushing out as if someone had just uncorked a barrel.

"Hey I think you need to look at this!" He yelled back towards the cabin. He stepped over their short gardening fence to get a closer look. He walked over to the edge where the swamp used to start and bent forward.

"Look at what? What's going on? Is it a badger, again?" A woman yelled out through the door.

"No. I don't know?" he replied under his breath. As he bent forward a bit of sweat rolled down through whatever wisps of hair he had left on his head and past his forehead into his eye. The swamp had dried up over a year ago, yet he always felt like it was hot as hell, and it only stopped raining thirty seconds ago. At least that's the way it felt to him. He reached up and wiped away the pooling sweat above his eye.

Pew! Frides shots out of the side of the cliff and slid across the mud on his face.

"Whoa! I almost jumped out of my skin! I've never seen a swamp monster before." The man exclaimed while stepping backwards.

The man squinted his eyes and figured out it was just another person. In all of his years he had never seen a person shoot out of the side of his cliff. He had heard it might happen but he had never seen it. Travelers were known to try to cross the swamps unaware of the danger only to be sucked in only to resurface drowned covered in mud. He walked over to the edge and slipped down the dip and over to Frides.

When he was younger his father told him stories about the swamp monster swallowing people whole. "The swamp monster swallows up bad people because he likes the way they taste. Sometimes the swamp monster makes a mistake and spits them out. Not liking the taste." His father would say as they passed the swamps. He was to never go near them when his family up and moved from Oania.

"Are you okay?" The man grabbed Frides' arm and tried to lift him up.

Frides pulled his arm away, "I should have just died... I should be dead." Frides propped himself up on his knees and hung his head low. He sat for a second and not to process his near death experience like anyone else would, but to ask did he deserve to be alive?

"What are you yelling for?" A woman came out of the cottage and yelled across the porch ironically.

"Well Louseres, water was just shootin' out of the hill over there, then this boy came flyin' from outta nowhere." He attempted to help Frides up again.

"Don't call me that, Russoman. You remind me of my daddy when we'd gotten in big trouble." She winced at the thought of the many lashings she had earned as a child.

After hearing the couple bickering, Frides wiped the mud and gunk away from his eyes so he could make them out. The man lended Frides his hand and Frides accepted the gesture this time. Now with his eyes cleared, the man was exactly how he had imagined and he felt rightfully guilty for his earlier reaction. He was an older, lanky gentleman with not much grey hair left. His skin had been tanned from spending so many years in the sun, so he had a darker complexion than the people on the road although not by much. Frides assumed he was in the same general area. Over by the porch was, Louseres, a fit older woman with a face that drew you in. Her eyes were skeptical and her mouth was big enough to eat a pumpkin pie no a pumpkin whole.

"Are you okay boy? Louse, can you go in there and start a bath!?" The elder man yelled at the top of his lungs. Either he was unaware or unfazed by how close he was to Frides' ears because Frides lifted up his hands to his ears and it didn't stop the man from yelling another request.

"Do we have any of Marons' clothes left in the house!? He might fit those!?" Russoman called out.

"What? Do you want a bath for him or me to get him some clothes?" She rhetorically asked him and came back out to the porch and piled on "Give me a moment to start his bath damnit! Then I'll get him some clothes, Russoman!?"

He threw his hand at her as she walked back into the cabin. "You alright boy?" The elder man turned his attention back to Frides.

"Yeah I think so." Frides was incredibly embarrassed for having witnessed that exchange. "You don't have to do that I'll be fine."

"Listen, you are a lucky one. Most people that get sucked up by those swamps don't often make it out, and not alive. I don't know what you've been through. I know a mans journey is his own, but," He stopped himself short. "Besides, there are all sorts of sicknesses an outsider can get for swallowing a single drop of the water down here. Come on now, don't be stubborn."

Russo urged Frides and he reluctantly agreed and followed Russo to the cabin.

"Good. Now go around the side there and you'll see a shed pushed up against the house. My wife is getting you a bath in there. We will get your clothes cleaned up and give you something to wear, so leave'm outside."

Frides walked up to the shed and took off his clothes and slightly opened the door to the shed and peeked inside.

"Don't be shy, get in here quickly. You don't have nothing I've never seen before." Frides did as he was told still covering up his main bits. Louseres was standing on the side of a large wooden basin.

"Should I just get in here." Gesturing to the tub that she was standing next to.

"No! Come over here and stand in front of me." She commanded and once again he did as he was told and turned and stood shivering in front of Louseres. "Don't listen to half the stuff Russo says. As much as he doesn't want to admit it, he's having trouble with his memory and keeps forgetting that we don't have the water from the swamp to bathe with." She extended a small dry rag to him and he took it and looked down at it.

"What should I do with this?" He asked puzzled how he was going to use it to clean himself with no water.

"Since the swamp has dried up over here we can't go wild drawing baths for strangers. I'm going to pour this water over you. You can use that rag to wash the mud off."

"You guys don't have a plumbing system here?" His question welcomed by ice cold water dumped over his head.

"We did before the overflow was diverted to the crops, we all did. Don't forget to get your hair." Louseres continued scooping water over Frides with a ladle and he used it to wash the mud out of his hair. "Don't forget your ears, you don't want them to get infected." She repeated.

"Although her approach is blunt, she is very thoughtful." Frides thought as he finished cleaning out his ears for fear of another verbal thrashing.

"Okay that's enough. There're clothes and a towel to dry yourself off over by the steps." She walked up the stairs into the house and left him. "Make sure to clean off your feet before coming in my house."

"O-Okay. Saw that coming." He conceded under his breath.

TO BE CONTINUED...

Thanks for reading!