Gregory.

Boom. 

“One Mississippi … two Mississippi … three Mississippi.” 

A flash of lightning illuminated the cave, the bright blue rays breaking and scattering over the angular rocks.

Another growl of thunder shook the night air. 

“One Mississippi … two Mississippi … three.” 

The lightning crackled in the clouds; clouds that hung low over the trees with pregnant, black bellies.  The light tattoo of rain against the rocks became louder. 

Inside the cave, nestled against his mother, the child started to count once more. 

“One Mississippi … two Mississippi.” 

The lightning flashed in his dark eyes, and the roar of thunder matched the growl of hunger inside him. 

Oh, he was so hungry.

-

Mommy hated that word – “hungry”. 

“I don’t care what time it is, Gregory!” she would sob, “If you’re hungry, you need to tell Mommy, okay?” 

Sometimes, it made her cry.  She would cry and she would hold her belly and wrap it up with pieces of old shirts.  She was bleeding those times, bleeding from her belly, but she never told me why. 

Sometimes, I think Mommy bleeds for me.  Today was much the same. 

I sat by the edge of the cave, watching the rain fall from the roof, while Mommy wrapped her belly.  She usually sends me outside when she does this, because she doesn’t want me to see. 

“It’s icky to watch,” she would sigh, shooing me out the door with one hand, “Go play outside for a minute, I’ll be out in a few.”  But today was different.  The rocks outside the cave were slippery, so I couldn’t play on them. 

I reached one hand out and touched the cold, slick rock. 

“Mommy, why not?” 

I heard her shuffling in the back of the cave for a few seconds before she replied, “You could slip on them and hurt yourself, Greggy.” 

I pulled my hand back inside the cave.  “I’ll behave, Mommy.” 

That was one of the words Mommy liked – “behave”.  Mommy says that, if I behave enough, we might leave the cave and go back to the city.  I don’t remember the city, but Mommy says that was because I was a baby. 

“You were too tiny to remember anything, Greggy,” she had explained.  I asked her once to talk about the city, but she always got sad and stopped talking.