Gotta Cross that Bridge

This short piece came out of a writing prompt exercise during the March 2021 Strong Land Writers Group session. The first instruction was - First sentence had to incorporate the words “Gotta cross that bridge” and the second instruction was the last word had to be “glass”.

“You gotta cross the bridge.”

  Milt shook his head. ”What’s my choice in it?”

  Dregs slapped Milt across the jaw, his rough, homemade ring gouged a shallow divot in the thin skin.

Neither one of them had more than poverty deer jerky, strip of sinew smoked over burning newspaper, window frames, fuck it, even smoldering tires would make do. 

  “None goddamnit.”

  Milt wiped away tears, leaned back on his heels, anything to avoid Dreg’s open-palmed slaps that made his ears ring in sharp pain. “Come with me? I can’t make it without you.”

  “One of us has to stay. Now git.”

  “What am I gonna tell Mama?”

  Dregs stole a glance behind them, towards the sun and smoke, might as well have been boiling blood, and just as thick. In a flare of panic he wondered just what boiling blood looked like. He took Milt in his arms, held him as close as bark wrapped around some old growth tree. “Tell her I loved you more than I loved myself. Just like she taught us.”

  He wiped away the blood on Milt’s throat where it streaked. “I’m sorry I hit you. You gotta go.”

  Milt bawled.

  “It ain’t serving a purpose other than slowing you. Please go. I’ll hit you again if you don’t.”

  Dregs kicked off the remnants of his shoes, knelt.

  Milt gripped Dreg’s shoulders as Dregs pulled the laces tight.

  “Now you get. Never look back. You swear to it.”

“I won’t. I won’t swear to it.”

  “When you get acrosst, stick to the trail till you can see the mill. There’s an ice house between the two sycamores. You know which ones they are?’

  “Them big ones?”

  “That’s right. You get in there and wait. Wait till you can’t hear nothing cracking and burning. Then come out, be careful as you can. Then get home.”

  “God I love you Dregs.” Milt turned, then wheeled back around, “I’ll tell Mama.” He ran.

  Dregs reaches for a cooper-colored bottle half-buried in pasty grit, set down by an unknown hand, when the world wasn’t turning on itself, cracked it over a piece of granite, then lowered himself against the hot sand. He squeezed his eyes shut against this world and imagined Milt running like wind and managed a smile. His last. His fingers gripped tight around a shard of glass.