Libby
A. Smith
Libby A. Smith is a two-time winner of the Little Rock
Free Press' Literary Contest. Besides writing, she is
also a movie and stage actor in the Little Rock area,
including three appearances with The Weekend Theater and
La Petite Roche productions of "The Rocky Horror Show."
By day, she is an administrative
assistant for the state of Arkansas. She lives in Little
Rock with her three cats, where she's a member of the
Central Arkansas Speculative Fiction Writers Group.
Other stories have appeared in
Caliber Comic's "Negative Burn" and "Dominique: Protect
and Serve," Hanthercraft Publications' "Tandra" and "Dragonroc"
universe comics and website, and Shanda Fantasy Art's
"Atomic Mouse."
She also adapted The Rainbow
Bridge story to poetry form for counted cross stitch
designer Sue Hillis' design "The Story of the Rainbow
Bridge."
When I asked Libby how she would
classify The Newcomers she said, "Let's call it
country sci fi." That works for us. Suffice it to say
any alien should think twice before messing with Miss
Bea's Pyrex cookware.
THE NEWCOMERS
By Libby A. Smith
“Good
grief, Vern, wipe those dirty boots off before you
come a storming in on my clean floor,” Bea demanded.
She wiped her hands on the apron she perpetually wore
during waking hours.
“Miss Bea, I’m
sorry but it’s those newcomers….”
“I don’t care! Go
back out onto the back porch and wipe your feet.” She
pointed her right index finger at him, then at the
door. He muttered some not so fit-for-mixed-company
words under his breath, before going back out the
kitchen door. She could hear his feet scrapping across
the mat.
Bea found the
newcomers pleasant folk. Certainly more so than the
flatlanders who came up the mountain demanding songs
be sang over and over into highfalutin recording
thingamajigs with wax cylinders, family lineages be
detailed in little black notebooks, and moonshine
recipes divulged. Fact was, these small, thin, gray
people kept quiet. They never asked a question or
made a noise at all. Yet it was easy to figure what
they wanted seeing as it just sort of popped into a
body’s mind.
Not everyone had
taken as kindly to them as Bea. She couldn’t rightly
blame Constable Vernon Cotton for being a little on
the suspicious side. They’d landed smack dab on his
outhouse a few Sundays before, flattening it along
with the chicken coup. Seeing as neither Vern nor the
chickens were in residence at the time, Bea figured,
“No harm, no fowl.”
Vernon, however,
being a man, just couldn’t get over the loss of the
privy. He’d gone so far as to round up a posse armed
with shotguns, pellet guns, and Marcellus’
great-great-grandfather’s flintlock. Never had Bea
set her eyes upon such an unthreatening looking group
of sons-of-guns in her eighty some odd years.
Vern came back in
a much more civilized manner even if the fire in his
eyes betrayed his real feelings. “As I was trying to
explain...”
“Cap off, young
man!”
He yanked the hat
off his head with one hand, running the other across
his balding head. “Dang it, Miss Bea! Those
newcomers are all heading back into that flying ship
monstrosity!”
“And what
business is it of ours? Ain’t no law saying they
can’t all go back into their own home, get a little
shut eye.”
“Their home is
sitting on my outhouse! Smashed my chicken coup to
smithereens and then some.”
“Then maybe it’s
time you invested in some of that indoor plumbing,
Constable. And you haven’t had so much as a laying
hen since you started calling on the Widow Hopkins ten
years ago. Fact is, you ought to get hitched to her
while you are both spry enough to get up to marital
antics,” Bea said.
Vern grunted in
aggravation, pulling a chair out from the worn,
handmade wooden table, plopping down heavily. “Those
newcomers from God knows where in the sky appear to be
about to fly the coup!”
“You’ve had it in
for those poor fellows, or gals, or whatever they are
since they came.” Bea took a cup from her cabinet,
pouring coffee from the pot always warming on her wood
stove. “Fact is, the Good Book says something about
entertaining strangers for they might just be angels
from on high. Seeing as that flying contraption came
down from the sky, and that one fellow, or gal, took
such great interest in the church choir last Sunday,
I’m thinking they might be just that, angels.”
“Those creatures
aren’t angels, Miss Bea.” Vern took the offered cup,
sitting it down without taking a sip as he stood.
“Those are aliens! I saw a picture show when I was in
Little Rock a few years ago about how they come here
wanting to invade to take our water and women folk.”
“Aliens? Could
be. The choir thing didn’t work out so well, seeing
as they don’t seem to be able to make a sound. Never
seen the choir director so flustered and he’s the
easily flustered kind. I do reckon the preacher was
right when he said it improved our soprano section.
As for evil, judge not! You saw how much they love my
macaroni and cheese. Gobbled it right up like a drunk
with a bottle of moonshine on a Saturday night. Did
you know I made them a special batch? Delivered it
right up to that ship. Even put it in my good Pyrex
covered dish my Ma left me when she passed on to
Glory. Of course, I showed them how my name was
painted on the bottom so they’d know to return it to
me. Figured they might not know proper covered-dish
etiquette.”
“That’s just it,
Miss Bea, they’re taking things, not returning them.”
Vern put his cap back on, then rested his hand on the
pistol he always carried at his side. “I got
suspicious when I spotted one carrying Bob’s still
right out of the woods right up the ramp into that
oversized flying contraption. One had a load of books
from the schoolhouse. The laundry from Eliza… I mean
Widow Hopkin’s line. They even managed to get the
cross off the top of the Good Living Gospel of Jesus
Church. A regular parade of thievery. I tried
grabbing one of them when it ignored me, asking what
was going on. Pulled right out of my grasp!”
“You saying
they’re collecting things?”
“Yep. Just like
those flatlanders up here two summers ago did, only
those folks spoke out loud and offered us cash for
what they took. I doubt you’ll be getting that dish
back.”
Bea ran into her
living room, yanking her late Daddy’s hunting rifle
from its resting place above the mantle and extra
cartridges from their hiding place behind a sofa
cushion. Without so much as pausing, she rushed past
Vern. “What ya waiting for? Ain’t no excuse for not
returning a covered dish when a lady’s taken the time
to paint her name on the bottom!”
-The End-
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