Heather(35)

“Today we’ll be doing something a little different. Holidays and celebrations are as much a part of our discussions of history and culture as battles and treaties, though the people writing your text books aren’t exactly doing you a service in that sense. Folklore is an important part of any place’s history,” she tells them. “Now, this isn’t exactly going to be on the AP exam in May but it is important to understand the stories a place can generate. So, every October in the seven years I’ve been teaching here I’ve set aside part of the lesson plan to talk about a fixture of local folklore: the Jersey Devil.”

The other kids let out theatrical groans.

You feel a sense of dread. You know the story, or at least you think you know the story. But the departure from routine makes you nervous. Miss Hamilton has a wink of mischief in her eye and you don’t like that either. You’d rather just continue yesterday’s lesson about the Mayan civilization. You’d rather be bent over your notes, scribbling away. But you have no excuse not to look at her. There’s a low gurgling in your guts that’s been persistent for days. A bubbling sensation that won’t go away no matter how many saltines or pieces of toast you eat. Today you’ve even tried no food at all, not giving your stomach anything to work away on in hope that it will go quiet. But this feels like a mistake too; your hunger pangs so loud that you know the kids sitting close to you can hear them. You cross your arms and hunch forward, waiting for Miss Hamilton to begin.

“There was a woman who lived in these woods long ago, before this territory was even a colony. Her name was Mother Leeds. Mother Leeds spent her days caring for her twelve children: washing clothes, heating food, filling up cups of water, scalding her hands as she scrubbed pots and pans. All this while her husband was off at the taverns drinking his wages away, almost never home to help, or when he was home he would take off his boots and pass out in his bed, leaving her to her endless work.”

You think of your mother, in the days before she left. Counting cans in the pantry. Staring out the windows.

“When Mother Leeds found out she was expecting her thirteenth child she was distraught. She didn’t know how they would afford to feed another mouth, how she could carry one more baby in her arms, how she would manage to wash even more diapers and cups and tend to more crying children in the night. She cried and cried and finally issued a curse. Let him be the devil!”

The other kids laugh at the way Miss Hamilton makes her voice solemn and deep for the curse, at the way she shakes her fist to the sky. But you feel your throat tighten. Your palms go hot and damp in your lap.

“Weeks and months passed. Mother Leeds grew larger, got more tired and worn out with the constant demands of her children, with dragging her husband out of the tavern or begging him for some of his wages so that they might eat that week. Even though she was pregnant she gave most of her food to her children, saving just a few spoonfuls of watery soup or porridge for herself a few times a day. She tallied up the days on a piece of wood and knew that soon, the baby would be here and her life would get even more difficult. The cabin they lived in more crowded. Her nights sleepless. She did so much cleaning and cooking that the skin on her hands was raw, the color of uncooked beef. Her feet swelled from the hours of standing at the stove or rocking babies so that she couldn’t wear her shoes anymore. When she needed to go outside she wrapped her feet in cloth.

“She went into labor on a stormy night. She had her oldest child, a girl of twelve, run through the woods to tell the midwife in town that Mother Leeds needed help. The midwife came, and so did Mother Leeds’s neighbors. Or the wives anyway. The women of the town the only ones who might ever drop off an extra loaf of bread or a pair of their children’s mended pants that they had outgrown. The women formed a circle around Mother Leeds as she writhed in pain. All the while the rain is thrashing at the cabin. They can feel the thunder grumble through the floorboards, and every few moments a bright bolt of lightning illuminates the room. Mother Leeds contorts on the floor, begging one of her friends to save her, to spare her. The pain is worse than with any of her other children, searing through her. The women have lit candles and the light makes their faces look strange and unfamiliar to Mother Leeds, these people she has known her entire life. They sing and chant and pray. They give her a spoon to bite down on when the pain peaks. She grips their hands and squeezes tight enough so that they ache.”

You bite the inside of your cheek, your breathing going shallow. You were right, you know this story, but have never heard it told like this before, so that you can see the women’s faces ghoulish in the candlelight. So that it makes you feel cold all over, your body still except for the constant roiling in your guts.

“Finally, the baby is born, and at first it looks like a normal child. The midwife places it in the arms of Mother Leeds while another woman wipes the sweat from her brow. But moments later, Mother Leeds has her head tipped back and her eyes closed in exhaustion. And the child begins to move from its swaddling blanket. The women are dumbstruck, think it is a trick of the light. But the baby morphs in front of their eyes and it isn’t a child after all, but a creature none of them had seen before. The head of a goat, bat’s wings, horns and hooves. And a devil’s forked tail. It screamed, a scream that made the women deaf to any sound that followed, and they clutched to one another as it began to fly around the small room. Finally it found its way up the chimney, out into the woods. The storm had gotten quiet by then, so they could hear the devil shrieking through the pines as it flew away.