After Abel and Other Stories by Michal Lemberger

tight and I’m not breathing quite right. But I can’t walk into thewater to free the basket, because then I’ll be stuck in the same situation I was afraid of to begin with.
    I can’t make up my mind. Now we’re both stuck, the baby in the rushes and me just watching the little basket. It bumps into some reeds, which turns it so that it bumps into some more. Thankfully, the river makes a decision for me, because I see the basket start to edge out to where the current can take it.
    Once it’s past the rushes, I start to follow it. The current must be really comfortable, because the baby doesn’t cry at all. That makes me mad, because he never stopped crying at home, which was the reason we’re here in the first place.
    â€œWere you trying to get put out here?” I say, even though I know he can’t hear me, and that even if he could, he wouldn’t be able to answer.
    The water moves pretty slowly, so I walk along, not even needing to jog to keep up. It starts to get really boring. Nothing is happening. The basket doesn’t even get pulled into the middle of the river. It just knocks along the banks. Some mud has started to stick to the bottom and sides, which is hard to see because of all the tar, but I can tell, because it looks bumpier than before. Amma had been really careful with it. She had smoothed the pitch out with a giant leaf over and over. At the time, I didn’t understand why, but now I see that she must have thought the basket would float betterthat way.
    It doesn’t seem to be making a difference. The basket keeps floating along. I walk beside it. It floats. I walk. The sun is out for real now. The baby is probably nice and cool in the basket, but I’m getting hot. Flies keep buzzing around my ears and hair, so I spend a lot of time swatting them away. Now I’m bored and irritated. I start kicking pebbles as I walk. I even bend down to pick a few bigger rocks up so that I can throw them.
    I’m really good at throwing, and these rocks fit perfectly in my palm. I stop, point to where I want the rock to land in the water, pull my arm back, and fling it over my head. It lands far out in the river with a splash and sinks right away.
    I’m about to throw another one when I look around and see that the basket has floated up ahead of me. My chest tightens up again. I lost track of why I was here. Amma and Baba would be so mad if they saw me. I feel terrible and sprint to catch up. The basket hasn’t gone very far, but I drop the rest of the rocks out of my fist anyway. I can’t throw them while I’m walking, and I’m afraid I’ll fall behind again.
    It’s a good thing I do catch up, because the current starts to speed up a little. I can see bigger ripples on the surface of the water. The color changes, too. It’s always brown and muddy, but it’s darker now. The basket picksup speed. I’m loping along beside it now, which is better. Not so boring.
    That’s when the basket moves away from the bank. I have to run to keep up now. The basket tips from side to side more in the water. I get scared that it will tip so far that the baby will fall out, and then all of my Amma’s work will be for nothing. Worse than that, I’ll have to go back and tell her what happened, and she’ll get mad that I didn’t save him even though she knows that I can’t swim.
    All the rocking must be scary for the baby because he starts to cry. I look around, afraid that someone will hear and figure out that this is a Hebrew baby. Then they’d find me and know for sure. I stand on my tiptoes to look around, but there’s nothing to see. The river must have carried the basket, and me, along the shore far enough that we’ve reached a spot that’s completely empty. No houses, no roads, no people. It’s pretty here, with lots of trees. Their leaves hang over the ground and water, so I can walk in the