Trembling With Fear 1/29/2023

The Song Within Her Throat, by Shelby Dollar

After hiking through groves of aspens and meadows dappled with pops of Indian paintbrush and delicate bluebells, the disappointment of their find hung between them—bloated and ready to burst. Nestled below the mountains, the cloudy-green lake lapped the rocky and barren shore. Clouds of gnats clotted the air and Miranda wrinkled her nose against the stench of sulfur. 

“This it?” she said, readjusting the strap of her heavy pack on her aching shoulder. 

 “Must be a bad algae bloom this year,” he sighed. “Sorry, no swimming babe.”  

“Should we just head back to the car?”

“And hike into the night?” he demanded. “No, we’ll just stay here like we planned.”

He planned, she corrected. For their cross-country road trip, this hike was at the bottom of her list. But when Jack got an idea in his head, he had to see it through—no matter the piss-poor planning or arguments—he would get his way. Miranda knew it. Jack knew it. 

“Might as well take a look around then,” she said, unbuckling her pack before slinging it off, not bothering to be careful.

Jack opened his mouth to scold but decided against it.  

Miranda descended to the shore, hiking boots kicking up tiny pebbles and clouds of dirt. Jack’s pocketknife in hand, she wove between boulders spotty with petaled lichen and clumps of lush moss. She ran her fingers over the porous stone, its smell earthy and damp from a hundred lifetimes of rain. It was tradition for them to carve “J+M” into the ridges of a towering fir or a crumbling rock to brand the world with their love, but the hike had soured her mood. She snatched a pebble and etched an “M” into its velvet surface. The letter looked good alone. Miranda smiled and chucked the stone into the lake before kicking off her boots.    

She dipped her feet into the brisk water, water bugs zig-zagging away on the cloudy-green surface. Miranda sighed and shut her eyes against the late afternoon sun as it beat against her cheeks and made her upper lip sweat. She could almost drift away, evaporate from her body and join the puffed clouds drifting across the blue sky. 

But the feeling of eyes lingered on the edges of her mind. She scanned the water for ripples, for the slow wake of a fin splitting water, or a stranger looming on the opposite shore—but there was nothing. It was quiet except for the tittering and chirping of black-hat chickadees in the trees. 

RIIIBBBBBACK

The croak bellowed through the air, and she jumped.

Just above the water were two amber eyes, the marbled sockets protruding from a small bronze-green head. The frog blinked, its wide and down-turned mouth still.  

“Guess I found my admirer,” she said. 

Miranda used to think that one day Jack would declare his love for her in a grand romantic and self-deprecating gesture that didn’t involve drunken, late-night arguments or threatening to call the cops. But his song would never match hers.     

The frog continued its song of rapid croaks, the rise and fall of its throat mesmerizing as pale skin swelled to a translucent bubble then deflated. In and out, her breathing began to match tempo, the consistent tide of bellows and trills enough to lull her.    

Ribback Riibback Ribback 

Chest heaving but not wanting to break the song, she kept pace.

Ribback Ribback Commback Commback 

“You gonna come back for dinner?” Jack called, his voice snapping her back to the shore. 

Her dinner of instant soup, nuts, and jerky was flavorless and salty on her tongue. The sun began to creep below the tree line, signaling more frogs to wake. Their reverberated melody made her heart pound, the octaves and tones worming into her ears like a warm itch she couldn’t scratch. Miranda coughed and rubbed her ear to squelch it. 

 “Just my allergies,” she said, trying to ignore the dozens of glinting eyes watching them from the glassy lake.  

“Told you not to get in the water,” he muttered. 

Miranda coughed again and popped an allergy pill, but relief didn’t come.  

Wide awake, she lay next to Jack in their claustrophobic cocoon of yellow nylon that stunk of sweat and chemicals. Three bottles of water did nothing to satiate her throat or calm her burning ears, but if she focused on the frogs, the warbling vibratos were almost comforting, reminding her of the low plucks and hums of a loose guitar string.    

Riiiibbbbback Riiiibbbbback Riiiibbbbback

She touched the puckered scar on her hip Jack had given her on the second day of their trip, the jagged “J” tender as she recalled his words: So I can find you, no matter what. She hated how those cuts made her feel like his north star, that her body was a beacon for him to find his way back to her.  

Miranda unfolded the tiny blade from between the screwdriver and nailfile in Jack’s pocketknife, savoring the weight of it in her palm. She wanted him to disappear. 

Riiiibbbbback Riiiibbbbback Payyyyyy baccckkk

He choked out a rumbling snore, but Miranda cut it short. She opened him from ear to ear, dark blood curtaining his throat. Gurgling, he snatched at her—but missed as Miranda stumbled out of the tent on legs that threatened to stretch and bend beneath her. 

She listened to the rhythmic crowing of the frogs, the water calling to her bones and pulling her forward as if her skin were embedded with a thousand tiny hooks.  Miranda crashed into the water, her skin soaking in the stagnant tang. Frogs leapt and careened, churning the lake that welcomed her without hesitation. She took another step, this time steady and sure. She opened her mouth, unable to contain the burning in her throat any longer and screamed. Slowly, it became another note in the night.