No Pain Like This Body by Harold Sonny Ladoo Read Free Book Online Page B

to kill the crickets like.
    Rama was crying and getting on inside the box; he was saying how he was getting wet.
    The light was shut inside the box, because when Balraj had closed the lid, he closed the light in. Ma gave her leaves to Nanny. She went into the kitchen and made another flam­beau. She came back and handed the light to Nanny. It was as if Ma didn’t want to have anything to do with the light.
    Balraj brought the banana leaves. This time he was more careful; they were not torn by the wind. Balraj handed the leaves to Ma. He climbed up on the ricebox. He stood on the lid, and Ma handed him the leaves. He began to push the leaves between the rafters and the needle grass. But he couldn’t fit the leaves properly, because the roof was too high. Nanny got a potato crate and handed it to Balraj. He took it and placed it on top of the ricebox. He stood on the crate in order to reach the roof easily. Balraj was working real fast. The water began to fall on the ricebox less and less. He was trying hard to cover the roof, but . . .
    â€œO God!” he shouted.
    Balraj jumped down from the ricebox. He fell on the ground and started to scream, bawling as if the life was com­ing out of him, getting on as if he was quarrelling with the wind and the rain. Ma and Nanny thought he saw an evil spirit; they began talking in Hindi right away, saying prayers and this kind of thing. Balraj was rolling in the water, keeping his hands high in the air. The rain was pouring and pouring and pouring down on Tola. Lightning flashed. Balraj told Ma and Nanny that his hands were on fire. The water came down from the roof and fell on the ricebox drip drip drip. Something fell from the roof tats; it fell harder than the water.
    Ma and Nanny moved closer to the ricebox with the flambeau. There were three of them. Full grown. Deadly. Moving fast. Faster. Running on the ricebox. They were black like rubber. The long legs were hurrying. Tails in the air. Mov­ing faster and faster. Fire stingers. The scorpions. Little but deadly; they kept running and running.
    â€œMove fast!” Ma shouted.
    Sunaree shifted.
    The scorpions were running down the sides of the ricebox. Nanny crushed one with the drum. Ma burnt another with the flambeau; it smelt bad. Some more fell on the ricebox. The scorpions were running down the sides of the box too fast. They couldn’t kill all of them. Ma took the flambeau and started to smoke them off the ricebox. She didn’t want them to go inside the box, because Rama was still inside the box. And the scorpions were running crazily all over the place; just running with their tails in the air. Some of them went under­neath the box. Others just crawled on the earth in the muddy water. Some went into the cracks of the earthen wall. A large black scorpion was climbing on Sunaree’s right foot. She jumped up, and it fell in the water again. She took the flute and pounded it to death; pounded it just as the rain was pounding the house, and the wind was pounding the light.
    Balraj was still bawling and rolling in the water. Rama too was screaming from inside the ricebox; screaming and saying how the scorpions were stinging him.
    Nanna reached same time.
    IV
    NANNA RAN splunk splunk into the house. Balraj was rolling in the water. He was bawling. Nanna had no time with Balraj; he just jumped over him and ran by the ricebox.
    Nanna didn’t say a word. He ran by the box. The light that Balraj had placed inside the ricebox was out, so Rama was in darkness. Water still fell from the roof on the ricebox. Nanna stretched his skinny hands and lifted the ricebox cover. The cover was heavy, and Nanna was an old man, but he just pulled the cover like nothing and opened the box.
    â€œShow me de light,” he said.
    Nanny leaned over the opened ricebox with the flambeau. Nanna saw two scorpions inside the box. “Hand me someting fast!” he shouted, as he climbed into the box.
    Nanny handed him