This time both Brian and I chased after them. Even though they outnumbered us, they were enjoying the game of taunting1 us too much to make a stand. They rode down to the first switchback and got away.
"They'll be back," Brian said.
"What are we going to do?" I asked.
Brian sat thinking, then told me he had a plan. He found some rope under the house and led me up to a clearing in the hillside above Little Hobart Street. A few weeks earlier, Brian and I had dragged an old mattress2 up there because we were thinking of camping out. Brian explained how we could make a catapult, like the medieval ones we'd read about, by piling rocks on the mattress and rigging it with ropes looped over tree branches. We quickly assembled the contraption and tested it once, jerking back on the ropes at the count of three. It worked梐 minor3 avalanche4 of rocks rained onto the street below. It was, we were convinced, enough to kill Ernie Goad5 and his gang, which was what we fully6 intended to do: kill them and commandeer their bikes, leaving their bodies in the street as a warning to others.
We piled the rocks back on the mattress, rerigged the catapult, and waited. After a couple of minutes, Ernie and his gang reappeared at the switchback. Each of them rode one-handed and carried an egg-sized rock in his throwing hand. They were proceeding7 single file, like a Pawnee war party, a few feet apart. We couldn't get them all at once, so we aimed for Ernie, who was at the head of the pack.
When he came within range, Brian gave the word, and we jerked back on the ropes. The mattress shot forward, and our arsenal8 of rocks flew through the air. I heard them thud against Ernie's body and clatter9 on the road. He screamed and cursed as his bike skidded10. The kid behind Ernie ran into him, and they both fell. The other two turned around and sped off. Brian and I started hurling11 whatever rocks were at hand. Since they were downhill, we had a good line of fire and scored several direct hits, the rocks dinging off their bikes, nicking the paint and denting12 the fenders.
Then Brian yelled, "Charge!" and we came barreling down the hill. Ernie and his friend jumped back on their bikes and furiously pedaled off before we could reach them. As they disappeared around the bend, Brian and I did a victory dance in the rock-strewn street, giving our own war whoops14.
AS THE WEATHER warmed, a sort of rough beauty overtook the steep hillsides around Little Hobart Street. Jack15-in-the-pulpits and bleeding hearts sprouted16 wild. White Queen Anne's lace and purple phlox and big orange daylilies blossomed along the road. During the winter you could see abandoned cars and refrigerators and the shells of deserted17 houses in the woods, but in the spring the vines and weeds and moss18 grew over them, and in no time they disappeared altogether.
One benefit of summer was that each day we had more light to read by. Mom really piled up on books. She came home from the Welch public library every week or two with a pillowcase full of novels, biographies, and histories. She snuggled into bed with them, looking up from time to time, saying she was sorry, she knew she should be doing something more productive, but like Dad, she had her addictions20, and one of them was reading.
We all read, but I never had the feeling of togetherness I'd had in Battle Mountain when we all sat around in the depot21 with our books. In Welch, people drifted off to different corners of the house. Once night came, we kids all lay in our rope-and-cardboard beds, reading by flashlight or a candle we'd set on our wooden boxes, each of us creating our own little pool of dim light.
Lori was the most obsessive22 reader. Fantasy and science fiction dazzled her, especially The Lord of the Rings. When she wasn't reading, she was drawing orcs or hobbits. She tried to get everyone in the family to read the books. "They transport you to a different world," she'd say.
I didn't want to be transported to another world. My favorite books all involved people dealing23 with hardships. I loved The Grapes of Wrath24, Lord of the Flies, and especially A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. I thought Francie Nolan and I were practically identical, except that she had lived fifty years earlier in Brooklyn and her mother always kept the house clean. Francie Nolan's father sure reminded me of Dad. If Francie saw the good in her father, even though most people considered him a shiftless drunk, maybe I wasn't a complete fool for believing in mine. Or trying to believe in him. It was getting harder.
* * *One night that summer, when I was lying in bed and everyone else was asleep, I heard the front door open and the sound of someone muttering and stumbling around in the darkness. Dad had come home. I went into the living room, where he was sitting at the drafting table. I could see by the moonlight coming through the window that his face and hair were matted with blood. I asked him what had happened.
"I got in a fight with a mountain," he said. "and the mountain won."I looked at Mom asleep on the sofa bed, her head buried under a pillow. She was a deep sleeper25 and hadn't stirred. When I lit the kerosene26 lamp, I saw that Dad also had a big gash27 in his right forearm and a cut on his head so deep that I could see the white of his skull28. I got a toothpick and tweezers29 and picked the rocky grit30 out of the gash. Dad didn't wince31 when I poured rubbing alcohol on the wound. Because of all his hair, I had no way to put on a bandage, and I told Dad I should shave the area around the cut. "Hell, honey, that would ruin my image," he said. "A fellow in my position's got to look presentable."Dad studied the gash on his forearm. He tightened33 a tourniquet34 around his upper arm and told me to fetch Mom's sewing box. He fumbled35 around in it for silk thread but, unable to find any, decided36 that cotton would be fine. He threaded a needle with black thread, handed it to me, and pointed37 at the gash. "Sew it up," he said.
"Dad! I can't do that.""Oh, go ahead, honey," he said. "I'd do it myself, except I can't do diddly with my left hand." He smiled. "Don't worry about me. I'm so thoroughly38 pickled, I won't feel a thing." Dad lit a cigarette and placed his arm on the table. "Go ahead," he said.
I pressed the needle up against Dad's skin and shuddered39.
"Go ahead," he said again.
I pushed the needle and felt a slight tug40 when it pierced the skin. I wanted to close my eyes, but I needed to see. I pushed a little harder and felt the resistance of Dad's flesh. It was like sewing meat. It was sewing meat.
"I can't, Dad, I'm sorry, I just can't do it," I said.
"We'll do it together," Dad said.
Using his left hand, he guided my fingers as they pushed the needle all the way in through his skin and out the other side. A few droplets41 of blood appeared. I pulled the needle out and then gave the thread a gentle jerk to tighten32 it. I tied the two ends of the thread together, like Dad told me to, and then, to put in a second stitch, did it again. The gash was pretty big and could have used a few more stitches, but I couldn't bring myself to stick that needle in Dad's arm one more time.
We both looked at the two dark, slightly sloppy42 stitches.
"That's some fine handiwork," Dad said. "I'm mighty43 proud of you, Mountain Goat."When I left the house the next morning, Dad was still asleep. When I came home in the evening, he was gone.
DAD HAD TAKEN TO disappearing for days at a time. When I asked him where he'd been, his explanations were either so vague or so improbable that I stopped asking. Whenever he did come home, he usually brought a bag of groceries in each arm. We'd gobble deviled-ham sandwiches with thick slices of onion while he told us about the progress of his investigation44 into the UMW and his latest moneymaking schemes. People were always offering him jobs, he'd explain, but he wasn't interested in work for hire, in saluting45 and sucking up and brownnosing and taking orders. "You'll never make a fortune working for the boss man," he said. He was focused on striking it rich. There might not be gold in West Virginia, but there were plenty of other ways to make your pile. For instance, he was working on a technology to burn coal more efficiently46, so that even the lowest-grade coal could be mined and sold. There was a big market for that, he said, and it was going to make us rich beyond our dreams.
I listened to Dad's plans and tried to encourage him, hoping that what he was saying was true but also pretty certain it wasn't. Money would come in梐nd with it, food梠n the rare occasion that Dad landed an odd job or Mom received a check from the oil company leasing the drilling rights on her land in Texas. Mom was always vague about how big the land was and where exactly it was, and she refused to consider selling it. All we knew was that every couple of months, this check would show up and we'd have plenty of food for days at a time.
When the electricity was on, we ate a lot of beans. A big bag of pinto beans cost under a dollar and would feed us for days. They tasted especially good if you added a spoonful of mayonnaise. We also ate a lot of rice mixed with jack mackerel, which Mom said was excellent brain food. Jack mackerel was not as good as tuna but was better than cat food, which we ate from time to time when things got really tight. Sometimes Mom popped up a big batch47 of popcorn48 for dinner. It had lots of fiber49, she pointed out, and she had us salt it heavily because the iodine50 would keep us from getting goiters. "I don't want my kids looking like pelicans," she said.
Once, when an extra-big royalty51 check came in, Mom bought us a whole canned ham. We ate off it for days, cutting thick slices for sandwiches. Since we had no refrigerator, we left the ham on a kitchen shelf. After it had been there for about a week, I went to saw myself a slab52 at dinnertime and found it crawling with little white worms.
Mom was sitting on the sofa bed, eating the piece she'd cut. "Mom, that ham's full of maggots," I said.
"Don't be so picky," she told me. "Just slice off the maggoty parts. The inside's fine."* * *Brian and I became expert foragers. We picked crab53 apples and wild blackberries and pawpaws during the summer and fall, and we swiped ears of corn from Old Man Wilson's farm. The corn was tough桹ld Man Wilson grew it as feed for his cattle梑ut if you chewed it enough, you could get it down. Once we caught a wounded blackbird by throwing a blanket over it and figured we could make a blackbird pie, like in the nursery rhyme. But we couldn't bring ourselves to kill the bird, and anyway, it looked too scrawny to eat.
We'd heard of a dish called poke54 salad, and since a big patch of pokeweed grew behind our house, Brian and I thought we'd give it a try. If it was any good, we'd have a whole new supply of food. We first tried eating the pokeweed raw, but it was awfully55 bitter, so we boiled it梥inging. "Poke Salad Annie" in anticipation梑ut it still tasted sour and stringy, and our tongues itched56 for days afterward57.
One day, hunting for food, we climbed through the window of an abandoned house. The rooms were tiny, and it had dirt floors, but in the kitchen we found shelves lined with rows of canned food.
"Bo-nanza!" Brian cried out.
"Feast time!" I said.
The cans were coated with dust and starting to rust58, but we figured the food was still safe to eat, since the whole point of canning was to preserve. I passed a can of tomatoes to Brian, who took out his pocketknife. When he punctured59 the tin, the contents exploded in his face, covering us with a fizzy brown juice. We tried a few more, but they exploded, too, and we walked home without having eaten anything, our shirts and faces stained with rotten tomatoes.
* * *When I started sixth grade, the other kids made fun of Brian and me because we were so skinny. They called me spider legs, skeleton girl, pipe cleaner, two-by-four, bony butt60, stick woman, bean pole, and giraffe, and they said I could stay dry in the rain by standing61 under a telephone wire.
At lunchtime, when other kids unwrapped their sandwiches or bought their hot meals, Brian and I would get out books and read. Brian told everyone he had to keep his weight down because he wanted to join the wrestling team when he got to high school. I told people that I had forgotten to bring my lunch. No one believed me, so I started hiding in the bathroom during lunch hour. I'd stay in one of the stalls with the door locked and my feet propped62 up so that no one would recognize my shoes.
When other girls came in and threw away their lunch bags in the garbage pails, I'd go retrieve63 them. I couldn't get over the way kids tossed out all this perfectly64 good food: apples, hard-boiled eggs, packages of peanut-butter crackers65, sliced pickles66, half-pint cartons of milk, cheese sandwiches with just one bite taken out because the kid didn't like the pimentos in the cheese. I'd return to the stall and polish off my tasty finds.
There was, at times, more food in the wastebasket than I could eat. The first time I found extra food梐 bologna-and-cheese sandwich桰 stuffed it into my purse to take home for Brian. Back in the classroom, I started worrying about how I'd explain to Brian where it came from. I was pretty sure he was rooting through the trash, too, but we never talked about it.
As I sat there trying to come up with ways to justify67 it to Brian, I began smelling the bologna. It seemed to fill the whole room. I became terrified that the other kids could smell it, too, and that they'd turn and see my overstuffed purse, and since they all knew I never ate lunch, they'd figure out that I had pinched it from the trash. As soon as class was over, I ran to the bathroom and shoved the sandwich back in the garbage can.
Maureen always had plenty to eat, since she had made friends throughout the neighborhood and would show up at their houses around dinnertime. I had no idea what Mom and Lori were doing to fend13 for themselves. Mom, weirdly68, was getting heavier. One evening when Dad was away and we had nothing to eat and we were all sitting around the living room trying not to think of food, Mom kept disappearing under the blanket on the sofa bed. At one point Brian looked over.
"Are you chewing something?" he asked.
"My teeth hurt," Mom said, but she was getting all shifty-eyed, glancing around the room and avoiding our stares. "It's my bad gums. I'm working my jaw69 to increase the circulation."Brian yanked the covers back. Lying on the mattress next to Mom was one of those huge family-sized Hershey chocolate bars, the shiny silver wrapper pulled back and torn away. She'd already eaten half of it.
Mom started crying. "I can't help it," she sobbed70. "I'm a sugar addict19, just like your father is an alcoholic71."She told us we should forgive her the same way we always forgave Dad for his drinking. None of us said a thing. Brian snatched up the chocolate bar and divided it into four pieces. While Mom watched, we wolfed them down.
WINTER CAME HARD that year. Just after Thanksgiving, the first big snow started with fat wet flakes72 the size of butterflies. They floated down lazily but were followed by smaller, drier flakes that kept coming for days. At first I loved winter in Welch. The blanket of snow hid the soot73 and made the entire town seem clean and cozy74. Our house looked almost like all the others along Little Hobart Street.
It was so cold that the youngest, most fragile branches snapped in the frigid75 air, and very quickly, I started feeling it. I still had only my thin wool coat with the buttons missing. I felt almost as cold in the house; while we had the coal stove, we had no coal. There were forty-two coal retailers76 listed in the Welch phone book. A ton of coal, which would last most of the winter, cost about fifty dollars梚ncluding delivery梠r even as little as thirty dollars for the lower-grade stuff. Mom said she was sorry, but there was no room in our budget for coal. We'd have to devise other ways to stay warm.
Pieces of coal were always falling off the trucks when they made their deliveries, and Brian suggested that he and I get a bucket and collect some. We were walking along Little Hobart Street, picking up pieces of coal, when our neighbors the Noes drove by in their station wagon77. The Noe girls, Karen and Carol, were sitting in the backward-facing jump seat, looking out the rear window. "We're working on our rock collection!" I shouted.
The pieces we found were so small that after an hour we'd filled only half the bucket. We needed at least a bucket to keep a fire going for one evening. So while we made occasional coal-collecting expeditions, we used mostly wood. We couldn't afford wood any more than we could afford coal, and Dad wasn't around to chop and split any, which meant it was up to us kids to gather dead branches and logs from the forest.
Finding good, dry wood was a challenge. We trekked78 along the mountainside, looking for pieces that weren't waterlogged or rotten, shaking the snow off branches. But we went through the wood awfully quickly, and while a coal fire burns hot, a wood fire doesn't throw off much heat. We all huddled79 around the potbellied stove, wrapped in blankets, holding out our hands toward the weak, smoky heat. Mom said we should be thankful because we had it better than pioneers, who didn't have modern conveniences like window glass and cast-iron stoves.
One day we got a roaring fire going, but even then we could still see our breath, and there was ice on both sides of the windows. Brian and I decided we needed to make the fire even bigger and went out to collect more wood. On the way back, Brian stopped and looked at our house. "There's no snow on our roof," he said. He was right. It had completely melted. "Every other house has snow on its roof," he said. He was right about that, too.
"This house doesn't have a lick of insulation," Brian told Mom when we got back inside. "All the heat's going right through the roof.""We may not have insulation," Mom said as we all gathered around the stove. "but we have each other."It got so cold in the house that icicles hung from the kitchen ceiling, the water in the sink turned into a solid block of ice, and the dirty dishes were stuck there as if they'd been cemented in place. Even the pan of water that we kept in the living room to wash up in usually had a layer of ice on it. We walked around the house wearing our coats and wrapped in blankets. We wore our coats to bed, too. There was no stove in the bedroom, and no matter how many blankets I piled on top of myself, I still felt cold. I lay awake at night, rubbing my feet with my hands, trying to warm them.
We fought over who got to sleep with the dogs桾inkle, the Jack Russell terrier, and Pippin, a curly-haired mutt who had wandered down through the woods one day梑ecause they kept us warm. They usually ended up in a heap with Mom, because she had the bigger body, and they were cold, too. Brian had bought an iguana80 at G. C. Murphy, the five-and-dime on McDowell Street, because it reminded him of the desert. He named the lizard81 Iggy and slept with it against his chest to keep it warm, but it froze to death one night.
We had to leave the faucet82 under the house dripping or the water froze in the pipe. When it got really cold, the water froze anyway, and we'd wake up to find a big icicle hanging from the faucet. We tried to thaw83 the pipe by running a burning piece of wood along it, but it would be frozen so solid there was nothing to do but wait for the next warm spell. When the pipe froze like that, we got our water by melting snow or icicles in the tin pan on the potbellied stove.
A couple of times when there wasn't enough snow on the ground, Mom sent me next door to borrow a pail of water from Mr. Freeman, a retired84 miner, who lived in the house with his grown son and daughter, Peanut and Prissy. He never turned me down outright85, but he would look at me for a minute in silence, then shake his head and disappear into the house. When he passed out the bucket, he would give me another disgusted head-shake, even after I assured him that he could have as much water from us as he wanted come spring.
"I hate winter," I told Mom.
"All seasons have something to offer," she said. "Cold weather is good for you. It kills the germs."That seemed to be true, because none of us kids ever got sick. But even if I'd woken up one morning with a raging fever, I never would have admitted it to Mom. Being sick might have meant staying home in our freezing house instead of spending the day in a toasty classroom.
* * *Another good thing about the cold weather was that it kept odors to a minimum. By New Year's we had washed our clothes only once since that first November snowfall. In the summer, Mom had bought a wringer washing machine like the one we'd had in Phoenix86, and we kept it in the kitchen. When we had electricity, we washed the clothes and hung them on the front porch to dry. Even when the weather was warm, they'd have to stay out there for days, because it was always so damp in that hollow on the north side of the mountain. But then it got cold, and the one time we did our laundry, it froze on the porch. We brought the clothes inside梩he socks had hardened into the shape of question marks, and the pants were so stiff you could lean them against the wall梐nd we banged them against the stove, trying to soften87 them up. "At least we don't need to buy starch," Lori said.
Even with the cold, by January we were all so rank that Mom decided it was time to splurge: We would go to the Laundromat. We loaded our dirty clothes into pillowcases and lugged88 them down the hill and up Stewart Street.
Mom put the loaded bag on her head, the way women in Africa do, and tried to get us to do the same. She said it was better for our posture89 and easier on our spines90, but there was no way we kids were going to be caught dead walking through Welch with laundry bags on our heads. We followed Mom with our bags over our shoulders, rolling our eyes when we passed people to show we agreed with them: The lady with the bag on her head looked pretty peculiar91.
The Laundromat, with its windows completely steamed up, was as warm and damp as a Turkish bath. Mom let us put the coins in the washers, then we climbed up and sat on them. The heat from the rumbling92 machines warmed our behinds and spread up through our bodies. When the wash was done, we heaved the armfuls of wet clothes into the dryers93 and watched them tumbling around as if they were on some fun carnival94 ride. Once the cycle was over, we pulled out the scorching-hot clothes and buried our faces in them. We spread them on the tables and folded them carefully, lining95 up the sleeves of the shirts and the seams on the pants and balling the paired-up socks. We never folded our clothes at home, but that Laundromat was so warm and cozy, we were looking for any excuse to extend our stay.
* * *A warm spell in January seemed like good news, but then the snow started melting, and the wood in the forest became totally soaked. We couldn't get a fire to do anything but sputter96 smoke. If the wood was wet, we'd douse97 it with the kerosene that we used in the lamps. Dad was disdainful of a fire starter like kerosene. No true frontiersman would ever stoop to use it. It wasn't cheap, and since it didn't burn hot, it took a lot to make the wood catch fire. Also, it was dangerous. Dad said that if you got sloppy with kerosene, it could explode. But still, if the wood was wet and didn't want to catch and we were all freezing, we would pour a little kerosene on it.
One day Brian and I climbed the hillside to try to find some dry wood while Lori stayed in the house, stoking the fire. As Brian and I were shaking the snow off some promising98 branches, we heard a loud boom from the house. I turned and saw flames leap up inside the windows.
We dropped our wood and ran back down the hill. Lori was lurching around the living room, her eyebrows99 and bangs all singed100 off and the smell of burned hair in the air. She had used kerosene to try to get the fire going better, and it had exploded, just like Dad had said it would. Nothing in the house except Lori's hair had caught on fire, but the explosion had blown back her coat and skirt, and the flames had scorched101 her thighs102. Brian went out and got some snow, and we packed it on Lori's legs, which were dark pink. The next day she had blisters103 the length of her thighs.
"Just remember," Mom said after examining the blisters. "what doesn't kill you will make you stronger.""If that was true, I'd be Hercules by now," Lori said.
收听单词发音 |
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taunting
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| 嘲讽( taunt的现在分词 )； 嘲弄； 辱骂； 奚落 | |
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mattress
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| n.床垫，床褥 | |
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minor
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| adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修 | |
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avalanche
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| n.雪崩，大量涌来 | |
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goad
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| n.刺棒，刺痛物；激励；vt.激励，刺激 | |
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fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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proceeding
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| n.行动，进行，(pl.)会议录，学报 | |
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arsenal
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| n.兵工厂，军械库 | |
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clatter
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| v./n.(使)发出连续而清脆的撞击声 | |
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skidded
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| v.（通常指车辆） 侧滑( skid的过去式和过去分词 )；打滑；滑行；（住在）贫民区 | |
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hurling
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| n.爱尔兰式曲棍球v.猛投，用力掷( hurl的现在分词 )；大声叫骂 | |
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denting
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| v.使产生凹痕( dent的现在分词 )；损害；伤害；挫伤（信心、名誉等） | |
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fend
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| v.照料（自己），（自己）谋生，挡开，避开 | |
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whoops
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| int.呼喊声 | |
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jack
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| n.插座，千斤顶，男人；v.抬起，提醒，扛举；n.（Jake）杰克 | |
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sprouted
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| v.发芽( sprout的过去式和过去分词 )；抽芽；出现；（使）涌现出 | |
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deserted
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| adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的 | |
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moss
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| n.苔，藓，地衣 | |
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addict
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| v.使沉溺；使上瘾；n.沉溺于不良嗜好的人 | |
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addictions
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| 瘾( addiction的名词复数 )； 吸毒成瘾； 沉溺； 癖好 | |
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depot
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| n.仓库，储藏处；公共汽车站；火车站 | |
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obsessive
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| adj. 着迷的, 强迫性的, 分神的 | |
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dealing
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wrath
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| n.愤怒，愤慨，暴怒 | |
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sleeper
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| n.睡眠者，卧车，卧铺 | |
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kerosene
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| n.(kerosine)煤油，火油 | |
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gash
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| v.深切，划开；n.(深长的)切(伤)口；裂缝 | |
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skull
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| n.头骨；颅骨 | |
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tweezers
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| n.镊子 | |
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grit
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| n.沙粒，决心，勇气；v.下定决心，咬紧牙关 | |
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wince
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| n.畏缩，退避，（因痛苦，苦恼等)面部肌肉抽动；v.畏缩，退缩，退避 | |
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tighten
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| v.(使)变紧；(使)绷紧 | |
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33
tightened
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| 收紧( tighten的过去式和过去分词 )； （使）变紧； （使）绷紧； 加紧 | |
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34
tourniquet
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| n.止血器，绞压器，驱血带 | |
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35
fumbled
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| （笨拙地）摸索或处理（某事物）( fumble的过去式和过去分词 )； 乱摸，笨拙地弄； 使落下 | |
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36
decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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37
pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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38
thoroughly
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| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
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39
shuddered
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| v.战栗( shudder的过去式和过去分词 )；发抖；（机器、车辆等）突然震动；颤动 | |
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40
tug
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| v.用力拖(或拉)；苦干；n.拖；苦干；拖船 | |
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41
droplets
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| n.小滴( droplet的名词复数 ) | |
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42
sloppy
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| adj.邋遢的，不整洁的 | |
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43
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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44
investigation
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| n.调查，调查研究 | |
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45
saluting
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| v.欢迎，致敬( salute的现在分词 )；赞扬，赞颂 | |
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46
efficiently
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| adv.高效率地，有能力地 | |
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47
batch
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| n.一批(组，群)；一批生产量 | |
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48
popcorn
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| n.爆米花 | |
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49
fiber
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| n.纤维，纤维质 | |
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50
iodine
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| n.碘，碘酒 | |
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51
royalty
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| n.皇家，皇族 | |
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52
slab
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| n.平板，厚的切片；v.切成厚板，以平板盖上 | |
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53
crab
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| n.螃蟹，偏航，脾气乖戾的人，酸苹果；vi.捕蟹，偏航，发牢骚；vt.使偏航，发脾气 | |
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54
poke
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| n.刺，戳，袋；vt.拨开，刺，戳；vi.戳，刺，捅，搜索，伸出，行动散慢 | |
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awfully
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| adv.可怕地，非常地，极端地 | |
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56
itched
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| v.发痒( itch的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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afterward
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| adv.后来；以后 | |
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rust
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| n.锈；v.生锈；(脑子)衰退 | |
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punctured
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| v.在（某物）上穿孔( puncture的过去式和过去分词 )；刺穿（某物）；削弱（某人的傲气、信心等）；泄某人的气 | |
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butt
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| n.笑柄；烟蒂；枪托；臀部；v.用头撞或顶 | |
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standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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propped
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| 支撑，支持，维持( prop的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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retrieve
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| vt.重新得到，收回；挽回，补救；检索 | |
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perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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crackers
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| adj.精神错乱的，癫狂的n.爆竹( cracker的名词复数 )；薄脆饼干；（认为）十分愉快的事；迷人的姑娘 | |
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66
pickles
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| n.腌菜( pickle的名词复数 )；处于困境；遇到麻烦；菜酱 | |
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justify
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| vt.证明…正当(或有理)，为…辩护 | |
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weirdly
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| 古怪地 | |
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jaw
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| n.颚，颌，说教，流言蜚语；v.喋喋不休，教训 | |
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sobbed
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| 哭泣，啜泣( sob的过去式和过去分词 )； 哭诉，呜咽地说 | |
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alcoholic
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| adj.（含）酒精的，由酒精引起的；n.酗酒者 | |
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flakes
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| 小薄片( flake的名词复数 )； （尤指）碎片； 雪花； 古怪的人 | |
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soot
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| n.煤烟，烟尘；vt.熏以煤烟 | |
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cozy
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| adj.亲如手足的，密切的，暖和舒服的 | |
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frigid
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| adj.寒冷的，凛冽的；冷淡的；拘禁的 | |
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retailers
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| 零售商，零售店( retailer的名词复数 ) | |
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wagon
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| n.四轮马车，手推车，面包车；无盖运货列车 | |
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trekked
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| v.艰苦跋涉，徒步旅行( trek的过去式和过去分词 )；（尤指在山中）远足，徒步旅行，游山玩水 | |
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huddled
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| 挤在一起（huddle的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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80
iguana
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| n.美洲大蜥蜴，鬣鳞蜥 | |
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81
lizard
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| n.蜥蜴，壁虎 | |
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82
faucet
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| n.水龙头 | |
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83
thaw
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| v.（使）融化，（使）变得友善；n.融化，缓和 | |
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84
retired
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| adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的 | |
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85
outright
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| adv.坦率地；彻底地；立即；adj.无疑的；彻底的 | |
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86
phoenix
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| n.凤凰，长生(不死)鸟；引申为重生 | |
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87
soften
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| v.(使)变柔软；(使)变柔和 | |
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88
lugged
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| vt.用力拖拉（lug的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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posture
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| n.姿势，姿态，心态，态度；v.作出某种姿势 | |
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spines
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| n.脊柱( spine的名词复数 )；脊椎；（动植物的）刺；书脊 | |
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peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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92
rumbling
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| n. 隆隆声, 辘辘声 adj. 隆隆响的 动词rumble的现在分词 | |
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93
dryers
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| n.干燥机( dryer的名词复数 )；干燥器；干燥剂；干燥工 | |
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94
carnival
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| n.嘉年华会，狂欢，狂欢节，巡回表演 | |
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95
lining
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| n.衬里，衬料 | |
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96
sputter
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| n.喷溅声；v.喷溅 | |
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97
douse
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| v.把…浸入水中，用水泼；n.泼洒 | |
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98
promising
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| adj.有希望的，有前途的 | |
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99
eyebrows
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| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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100
singed
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| v.浅表烧焦( singe的过去式和过去分词 )；（毛发）燎，烧焦尖端[边儿] | |
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101
scorched
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| 烧焦，烤焦( scorch的过去式和过去分词 )； 使（植物）枯萎，把…晒枯； 高速行驶； 枯焦 | |
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102
thighs
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| n.股，大腿( thigh的名词复数 )；食用的鸡（等的）腿 | |
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103
blisters
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| n.水疱( blister的名词复数 )；水肿；气泡 | |
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