A cold wind, a dark shadow, a sudden midnight certainty that something is not right.

From Snap Judgment's underground layer, your weight is over.

At long last, you're listening to spute.

Stay tuned. Eight years old, almost nine, working the farm all day.

Milking, bailing, hoeing.

But mostly, I'm getting everything ready so my dad knows he can trust me.

Until finally, finally, the truck pulls up to her house and a red-bearded man, leather gloves,

work boots, comes around with a clipboard. He hands it to my father. My father says he's going to

need to see him first before he's sounding anything. Well, all right, then. The driver ambles over,

slides open the back of the truck.

We see the wooden crate stat,

seven deep, one on top of the other.

And from the dark of the truck, you can hear, you can hear the sound.

Cheap, jeep, jeep, jeep.

The driver prized the lid off on the crates and we see him.

Dozens and dozens of yellow balls of fluff.

The driver reaches in and he grabs one of the tiny baby chicks.

I hold my hands out.

And he places her right in my open palms.

She fusses, cheap, cheap, indignant at being plucked from her sisters.

And she's beautiful.

I stroke a little back gently.

...