Written by: BrittanieCharmintine

BLUE RIDGE MOUNTAINS, NORTH CAROLINA, USA

August 21, 4:00 PM

"Dagnabbit! Those sons of a bee sting are still there!"

The cabin door slammed in her wake, as Henrietta Bowman marched outside toting her shotgun, fed up with that damned monstrosity in the sky. Thing had to be filled to the brim with Federals fixin' to cart her off to one of those nursing homes. No one was going to inject her with mind-controlling drugs and turn her into a drooling zombie. Her grandson, who was always on her about livin' alone, was behind the whole thing, she was certain. There ain't nothin' worse than bein' betrayed by your own kin.

"You'll never take me alive, dammit!" She shook her fist at the metallic eyesore. "You hearin' me?"

She hesitated, waiting a breath for it to move off in surrender, but all she heard was the whistling of the wind through the trees. The interloper didn't budge one iota. Same as the past three-and-a-half-weeks, the circles of light on the black hull just blinked at her in some government code. That contraption up there was near as big as an oil spill across Alabama, and it swallowed up the sky. Twenty-six days without the sun or the stars! Her vegetable garden was sulking almost as bad as she was. And the critters were damned near as discombobulated as the plants, with owls hooting at noon and robins hunting at midnight.

For days she'd yelled at those trespassers till her throat was hoarse. She even tried shining her flashlight at 'em in Morse code, demanding they get the hell off her property, but they stayed as closed up as a coffin. Lord knows, sometimes, the only way to get your point across is with the business end of a shotgun.

Still, Henrietta planned on goin' to heaven when the Almighty took her, so she'd offer them Federals one last chance. "I'll shoot," she warned. "You'd better be flyin' south for the winter now."

She hadn't expected a reply, and she didn't get one. Some people think they don't need to pay you no mind if yer eighty-seven, but a shotgun is the Lord's equalizer. No matter how old you are, it works just as good.

Before firing, for good luck, Henrietta spat into a clump of brush, then squinted, pointing the barrel toward the underbelly of the aeroplane. At least it was a big target. No way could she miss, even being halfway blind.

Henrietta started to squeeze the trigger, when a large black jumble of feathers streaked across the sky, inches from her face.

"Arrgghh!" she cried, her old heart racing. She dropped the shotgun and windmilled her arms. Despite her efforts, she fell backward on her nether cheeks, and with such a bony keister, it smarted all to hell. "Ol' Chester, what you think you're doin', you bird brain? I could've shot you dead."

"Caw," Ol' Chester the crow said, landing on one of the rusty old antennas in the field that had been left behind by Chester, her ex, Ol' Chester's namesake. (Ol' Chester was his name because he reminded Henrietta of her ex due to his uncommunicative nature, not because he introduced himself that way). The only thing Chester ever planted was that damned antenna farm, just so he could talk to strangers on his HAM radio. Maybe the crow wasn't much of a conversationalist, but he was a better listener than the human Chester.

Oh, sure, her ex loved talking on that damned HAM radio like he was some lawman, but he didn't talk to her except when he made her sit there and listen as he talked her ear off about how the damned thing worked. For years she let him ramble on about ranges and repeaters and doohickeys and thingamabobs, but she had her limits, and eventually, whenever he brought up the subject, Henrietta's anger would flare, and she'd picture him six feet under with only a headstone to yak at.

"Caw yourself," Henrietta spat. "And no more sneaking up on me. Damn near gave me a heart attack!" She stood, brushing dirt and dried grasses off her tattered housedress. "Now shush yourself."

"Caw!"

"What about the word 'shush' ain't clear to you?"

"Caw caw."

She bit off a smile. That was another thing Ol' Chester had on his namesake—a better sense of humor. "You're just messin' with me now," she said, retrieving the shotgun, and getting in firing position. She held her breath and squeezed the trigger, bracing herself for the satisfying CHOOM!

But all she got was a disappointing click!

"Doggonnit!" She spat again, kicking at the dirt. She'd forgotten to clean the damned gun.

"Caw."

"Now yer just rubbin' it in," Henrietta said.

***

Those Federals wasn't going noplace fast, so Henrietta decided to take her sweet time cleaning her shotgun till it was good and done, rocking back and forth in her creaky old chair on her creaky old porch while Ol' Chester swooped onto the rail, his talons click click clicking on the wood. Immediately, he turned his attention to the peanuts she'd put out for him.

Peck, peck, peck.

"Sometimes I wonder if yer here for the nuts or for the nut," Henrietta teased.

"Caw." Peck, peck, peck.

"Thought so," Henrietta replied.

Henrietta emptied the barrel of the chamber and the magazine before grabbing the bore cleaner and drizzling some on the floss end of the boresnake. She sniffled at the kerosene smell, then ran the snake through the barrel. She'd cleaned her shotgun so many times over the years, she could've done it in her sleep.

Anger stung in Henrietta's gut like a sewing basket full of wasps. She ought to've known better than to let her shotgun go to all hell. Guns needed as much tending as a garden. You had to make sure when an intruder came, you were ready to clear them out.

"Caw." Ol' Chester jumped closer to the sack where she kept her supply of nuts.

"No more for you. You got to maintain your youthful figure if you're ever gonna attract a new honey," Henrietta said. Since Ol' Chester's mate had died last winter, he and Henrietta were both unattached. She made it her business to educate Ol' Chester and keep him company as she had a lot more experience with bein' alone. The real Chester flew the coop, leavin' her standin' on this very porch near thirty years ago now. Probably found himself someone else to do his laundry, cook his meals, and listen to him rambling. Bless her heart.

Good riddance, Henrietta liked to say.

Though sometimes in the cold of night, she remembered his big body lying beside hers, heating the sheets like a human bed warmer. When she shivered, he'd scoop her up in his arms and tell her, "Shimmy on over, darlin', I got enough heat for the pair of us."

"Caw."

Henrietta sniffed. "It's never too late when yer a crow. Plenty of birds in the sky, 'cept right now with that government monstrosity up there messin' with mother nature. Satisfied the shotgun was clean as a hound's tooth, she slowly hoisted herself out of the rocker, bones creaking and popping with the effort. "How's about we convince these hooligans and their flashy flying machine to move along?"

Ol' Chester cawed enthusiastically, kindred spirit that he was, and flew up to the rafters. "Caw, caw, caw."

"No way. I ain't going up on that roof."

"Caw, caw."

"Don't see hows it makes any difference a few feet closer."

"Caw!!!"

"Fine. We'll do it your way," she said, knowing the bird was right. Every little bit helped when you were communicatin' via shotgun.

She rolled some boxes of ammo in the hem of her housedress, then tucked her housedress into her panties, and slung the strap of her shotgun over her head. The strap crossed her chest, and the gun tugged up tightly against her back.

She climbed the rickety old ladder to the roof slower than usual, holding on so tight, the splintered wood bit into her wrinkled palms. The ladder wobbled with each step; the base rotted out from neglect. Her heart kicked like a steel-tipped boot against her chest. She should've found the time to build a new ladder, but that used to be Chester's job, and she hadn't felt much like it. Instead, he left her with a broken-down ladder and a broken-down heart. A rotten ladder was better than no ladder, so she climbed. Slowly. Old lady sweat, as acrid as mothballs, sprung to her brow and her dress clung to her back.

Ol' Chester was on the roof peak, hopping from foot to foot when she heaved herself over the edge, a huffing and a puffing. "Stop yer crowing, young man. You cheated with them there wings."

"Caw."

"Whatever makes you sleep at night," Henrietta said. "Criminy, this roof! I ought to've brought a broom!" It was covered edge to edge with spiderwebs, bird droppings, and dried out pine needles, thick as fleas on a farm dog. Still, there was a job to be done, so Henrietta lowered her bony behind onto the roof ridge and swung the gun back around front to load her up.

Once in shooting position, Henrietta aimed straight at that eerie blue "10" glowing at her from the center, racked the gun, and gave the intruders one last warning. "Git now," she said, "or I'll shoot." Knowing they'd ignore her, this time she just squeezed the trigger.

CHOOM! Pressure built in her ears, then for a moment, the world was as silent as a buzzard's supper.

Ol' Chester squawked and swooped off the roof. But the aeroplane? She didn't budge. Just sat there, looming like usual, not caring one bit about being shot at.

Although Henrietta couldn't tell if the slugs had hit their mark, she fired again and again, till the shotgun emptied, then she reloaded and kept at it till her butt ached, her back ached, her arms ached, and her belly ached.

Turned out tryin' to down a giant aeroplane with a shotgun was as useful as hollerin' down a well. Granny knew she was beat. Time to fire up some grub and figure up another plan.

***

Inside the cabin, light from the fireplace flickering against the smoke-blackened walls, Granny lifted the bowl to her mouth and slurped up the last of her soup. She offered a soggy carrot to Ol' Chester, who gobbled it up and flew to the mantel over the fireplace, jostling an old black-and-white photo of human Chester and Henrietta on their weddin' day. She kept the picture there, propped up against a taxidermy squirrel, as a reminder.

Of what, she wasn't sure anymore.

That she was once young with skin as smooth as boomtown silk?

That men were all cheaters who turned your life into a sorrowful country tune?

Or that maybe once someone had loved her?

It was that last one that bothered her the most. But that was a lifetime ago, and now she had bigger devils to send back to hell.

"Ol' Chester, you got any ideas?"

Ol' Chester only said, "Caw," then flew back to the table to see if there might be more scraps. She broke off a crust of bread, and he took it happily. Birds were way easier to please than men. Once he was sure there'd be nothing else comin' his way, Chester relocated to the opposite end of the cabin and perched himself atop Chester's old HAM radio.

Lord knew why he'd left it.

Henrietta slapped the table. "Well, ain't I as dumb as a box of rocks! Of course! I'll get those g-men on the horn and tell them what's what."

She blew off the thick layer of dust, and sneezed, housekeeping not being her forte. Silently, she thanked Chester for his endless ramblings about HAM radios and his logbook where his call sign and frequencies were written in the perfect penmanship of a schoolboy trained by nuns. Also, she spared a moment of gratitude for her keen memory when it came to anything prior to 1998. With the logbook on one side of the table and a tall whiskey on the other, Henrietta went to work bringing the old thing back to life.

She flipped a switch on the old transceiver. The tubes took a good five minutes to heat up, but then she heard distorted high-pitched voices yammering on like Alvin and the Chipmunks, about what she had no idea. Suddenly, the voices settled into something more humanlike. As she dialed into different frequencies, the chatter was all pretty similar:

"Does the military have a plan for alien invasions?"

"I wonder if they have tentacles?"

"I hope they have tentacles!"

"I hope them aliens beam me up!"

"They'll definitely beam you up, Arthur!"

Bunch of crazies talkin' about aliens. Henrietta dialed into a less busy frequency and pressed the button on the microphone. "C.Q. C.Q. CQ. This is WA4UDS," she said, using Chester's call sign. "Calling the Federals on that aeroplane. You'll never take me alive," Henrietta said, because this was the main point she wanted to get across.

No one replied. Crafty suckers, them Federals. They could probably hear her, but just in case they couldn't, she tried a different frequency. Henrietta cycled through, making her threat over and over.

For old time's sake, she dialed in on Chester's favorite frequency, and finally a voice answered, clear as mud, "Hensheets?" Adjusting the dial, the static cleared slightly.

"What's a damned hen sheet? Who is this?" she demanded.

"Henrietta?" the voice crackled through.

A snarl grew in her throat. They knew her name. She was right! They were after her. "I'm armed and dangerous. You better take your giant aeroplane and stick it up your—"

"Darlin'?" the voice interrupted.

A cold prickle went up her spine. She knew that voice. Holy Mother of God! "Chester? They got you?"

"What you talking about, woman?" Chester said.

"The Feds? You're up in that big aeroplane?"

"I'm in my cabin. Only two hoots and a holler away. You gone crazy? You think them aliens abducted me? I'm sure they'd find fitter humans to probe than me," Chester said.

"Aliens?" she spat. "No such thing. They're government agents come to take me to that home our grandson picked out for me."

"No one is taking you to no home," Chester said.

"How do you know? Did they tell you that?"

"Did who tell me?"

"The Feds."

"Caw," Ol' Chester interrupted.

"Shush now," Henrietta said.

"Someone there with you?" Chester said. There was an odd tone to the man's question. Like jealousy?

"Just Ol' Chester," Henrietta replied.

"You got another man named Chester?"

"Hell, no! Ol' Chester's a crow. And far better at talkin' than you ever were." It finally occurred to Henrietta that she wasn't quite used to speaking with humans after mostly talking to crows and squirrels and occasionally her plants when they weren't growin' right. And not just any human, but Chester, who never talked to anyone unless he was on this damned HAM radio.

Figured!

"You okay, darlin'? Those aliens didn't mind control you, did they?"

"No one's mind controlling me," Henrietta said, stomping her foot. She'd forgotten how damned frustrating this man was. "Where'd you come up with this alien obsession?" The line crackled, and she adjusted the dial a hair.

"You think human beings built up a ship that's two-thousand miles long?"

"How do you know how big it is?"

"I got the interweb."

The man was talking nonsense. "The interwhat?"

"The news. Look, darlin', I reckon we're livin' on borrowed time. Maybe we ought to stop arguin' and start—"

"Start what?"

"The making up part."

She remembered their "making up" interludes from long ago, and it was like lightning struck her lady parts, waking 'em up from a long winter's nap. "You think after thirty years you're gonna waltz back on into my life without even a how-de-do?"

"I'm hoping there'll be a lot of how-de-doing," he said. She could hear the smirk.

"We're near ninety years old, mister. And don't you got yourself a new woman?"

"Been no one but you, darlin'."

Against her better judgment, Henrietta's heart twisted. Such a traitorous organ. "Then why'd you leave?"

"You threw me out. Said I loved my HAM radio more than you."

"That's not how I remember it. But still, you didn't have to go just 'cause I said so."

"You had a shotgun pointed at my head."

"Does sound like me," Henrietta agreed, nodding her head.

"Caw."

"Shush, bird. I don't need the two of you teamin' up."

"Sounds like a smart bird," Chester said. "Besides, I left the HAM so you could call me back. Been waiting thirty years, and I'm not waiting a second longer. I'm headin' over."

"No, you ain't," Henrietta said. "I don't need protectin'. I got my shotgun all cleaned and ready to go."

"But I need protectin'. The news says this is an emergency, and I'm runnin' scared. This could be the end."

"We're old as mud. Any day could be the end."

"All the more reason to let bygones be gone."

"You come on over then," Henrietta said, eying the shotgun gleaming in the firelight, and she winked at the crow.

"I'm heading to my truck," Chester replied. "Over and out."

"Well, damn," Henrietta said to Ol' Chester. "Now alls I have to do is figure out whether to load up the shotgun again or put on another pot of soup."

She stood, bones complaining with a series of cracks, and massaged the small of her back. That old picture fluttered to the floor. She bent over, knees aching, scooped it up, and set it back in the squirrel's paws. Then she looked out the window to where the stars were supposed to be, held up her saggy arms and shouted, "Thank y'all! But now, git! I got company coming!"

Then she headed for the vegetable basket, plucked out a carrot and started chopping, a faint smile playing on her face.

<<<<< END >>>>>

Find more stories by BrittanieCharmintine on Wattpad.

Debra Goelz (BrittanieCharmintine) is a refugee from Hollywood where she served as a financial executive for companies like Jim Henson Productions and Universal Studios. 

After garnering over 13 million on-line reads on Wattpad, her YA fantasy, Mermaids and the Vampires Who Love Them, was published by Hachette Audio and released as a Chapters game. She lives in a magical redwood forest in rural Marin County and believes mermaids frolic nightly in her pond.