The Promise

I managed to catch a promise on a humid summer day, and as I watched it squirm wetly in my hand I wondered what to do with it. I’d never caught a live one myself and I knew I wanted to keep it fresh, all iridescent and scaly in the shifting sunbeams of the afternoon.

I thought first to ask my father, but he couldn’t keep a promise to save his life. He left them all over, lining bar tops and car back seats all around town. My father handed me promises that were already in pieces, sad and lifeless, and I knew he wouldn’t be any help at all.

I thought to ask my Grandpop, who had always taken great care with his promises, but then I remembered Grandpop was a Twilight Wanderer now and he couldn’t tie his shoes or go on a toilet. I felt sorry for him, but I was scared of his far-off eyes and his spittle-lips, and I couldn’t ask him anyway because if he couldn’t remember how to go in a toilet he couldn’t remember how to keep a promise.

The only other person I could think of was Mrs. Williams, but she dangled promises above us like carrots, like we were all little rabbits in a cage. Now sit, she’d say, and we’d all sit and stare at the golden promise with our wide rabbit eyes, and then she would smile to herself and wobble her fat rear back to her desk and slide the promise in the drawer. Some other time, she’d say, I’ll just keep this promise right here, and you all just listen and some day I’ll give it to you.

So I stared at the promise I caught, at its slithering body and its golden sheen. I sniffed in big and unfurled my hand, and I crouched down to the creek, and I let it go into the water, because a promise was pretty but it was useless, and I didn’t know how I could ever keep one anyhow.