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The fox-hand.

- joneworlds@mailbox.org


When we got home from the funeral, Mother went into the kitchen to boil potatoes. I went upstairs to wash my shirt. I went to turn on the water, when I noticed to my shock that my hands had changed. My left hand had become a fox's head, and my right hand had turned to glass.


Scared, I began to hit the fox-hand with the glass-hand. The fox's head spoke to me.


"Stop. Why do you attack me?"


"It is because I am frightened by the change."


"And your other hand is of glass, why did you not think to strike that one with my body?"


"Because you are a beast, and liable to hurt me."


"I am your left hand. Go downstairs, and see what has happened."


When I came down into the kitchen, I saw that mother had chopped herself into a dozen small pieces. I began to weep. The fox-hand took pity on me.


"Gather all the pieces into the pail. Take them into the forest, and bring a shovel and three pieces of cloth. And I will tell you what to do."


I did as I was instructed. In a thicket of spruce trees, the fox-hand spoke again.


"Bury the neck and the right foot here under this tree. Take the other pieces back to the meadow, and arrange them evenly in three rows. Place a piece of cloth at the front of each row. Then return here, and wait for me." My hands became natural again, and again I did as I was instructed.


When my tasks were complete, I returned to the spruce. After three minutes, the fox appeared before me as a full and natural fox, and spoke to me once again.


"Do you wish to see Mother?"


"Yes, I would."


"See, for from her neck and foot has grown a computer. Can you read what it prints?"


The screen blinked, "All, that not is confronts whether against it or before it - it must be of those types, seeing will only this."


I frowned. "I do not understand the meaning."


"Go now to the meadow, and find Mother there."


I once more did as I was instructed. The pieces I had laid there were gone, and in their place were twenty-seven daffodil blooms. From the center of each bloom dangled a small wire, and upon the end of each wire was a glittery letter. I wrote them all down in my book.


And to this day, I have been re-arranging the letters on that grid, over and over, again and again. Striving to see a symbol, a message. But I cannot find it, and it has not been revealed to me.


The fox has not returned.


my gopherhole

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