Catherine Buck

Two boys in the tall grasses. Send a dare. See the witch and the witch’s pup. Transformed from a cat. No, a deer. No, a bat. Your mother’s missing horse. 

She prayed black magic to take it away. Put it in her cauldron, put it in a basket, hid it in the woods and it 

came 

back. 

Cursed, it is. Cursed, this whole town unless someone sorts it out. 

You should have seen it, a monster, through the window, yes I did, with my own two eyes I did. You shut up, you weren’t brave enough. You’ve never been brave like me.

Her man, a drunk. Your dad, a drunk. You can’t trust them. I never let him near me. You messed up. Ah! Why would you hit me? Get off; leave me alone. I’ll run to that house now and show you exactly what I mean.

One boy moving with the wind, crouching under the window, poking his nose where it doesn’t belong. 

One boy alone in the woods.

Catherine Buck lives in Jersey City with her wife, pets, and many plants. She holds an MFA from Rutgers University Camden and is a 2025 Lambda Literary Fellow. Her fiction has appeared in Cotton Xenomorph, Bending Genres, Vestal Review, CRAFT Literary, and elsewhere. Read more at catherinebuck.com

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