"Coalie exploded past me with a deliberate bump of her shoulder, I fell to the sand with a yelp. I got to my feet in time to see Coalie snatch up a huge snake, much longer than my entire body. She was growling, whipping her head so vigorously that her paws cleared the ground. The snake’s pale yellow belly flashed. I could hear its running ends snap like little whips. After a few seconds she threw the limp form to the ground, where it lay still. She growled at it, then grabbed it up again, shook it again, threw it down again.
She looked at me, panting—her black eyes glowed. Do you understand? Do you understand?
I got it. She picked the snake up and shook it again, then paused, watching me out of the corner of her eye. I stepped back. She dropped the snake. I approached the snake, and she let me look at it, but she wouldn’t let me touch it. I squatted beside the snake, my little hands to my chest, and we looked at it together. It didn’t have a mark on it. Its broad head seemed distorted, its gaping lower jaw was rubbery, as though it had no bones. I leaned toward the snake; Coalie groaned, a sound like a rusty nail being pried out of a dried plank. I leaned back into my squat. After a while we went elsewhere play. Coalie was a good teacher.
"
The title is a link to Mules' Days and the rest of this essay.
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