"Jason, what's it mean, 'put away'?"

"You know perfectly well what 'put away' means," Jason replied, without looking away from his work. He was trying to thread a needle to fix a shirt seam. If his brothers didn't stop getting into fights every day… "It's something you aren't very good at."

"I told you not to listen to them," Josh said crossly from the other side of the room.

The thread was finally through the needle.

"You mean like put away stuff when we ain't using it? Or putting away our clothes when Miz Wisby gets 'em washed?" Jeremy ignored Josh (for a change.)

"Mm-hmm."

"Put 'em in a drawer or on hooks or in a keep-box?"Jeremy persisted.

"Mm-hmm. Ouch!"

"Tell him you ain't gonna hang him on a hook or fold him up in a drawer," Josh ordered

"Or in a box," Jeremy reminded Josh. Then he added pensively, "Unless I get dead. I guess it would be okay then."

Josh laughed and Jason frowned as he almost stabbed himself again. But maybe it was a natural thought for a child who had just buried another parent?

"Why would I do any of that?" Jason asked, becoming mildly interested in the conversation. His brothers rarely failed to amuse him. Plus he had finished the shirt repair.

"They was betting on it yesterday," Jeremy explained.

"I told you not to listen," Josh grumbled again.

"They was talking where my ears were. How was I sposta not ?"

"Whoa," Jason said. "Yesterday?"

"Yeah, at Da's party."

"It wasn't a party, dummy. It was a wake."

"Who was betting on what?"

"How long afore you put me away," Jeremy answered.

"WHAT?"

"Well, that's what they said; don't yell at me about it. I don't like them boxes. Jason, you won't put me away in a box, will you? Even if I get dead, too?"

"They couldn't even wait for us to leave? Damn this town." Jason was agitated, but his brothers weren't fazed by that, continuing their own conversation.

"Do you want us to just stick you in the ground without a coffin?" Josh asked curiously. "Just throw the dirt right in on top of you?"

"You could wrap me up in a sheet, maybe. So it don't get in my mouth."

"We could put your head in a pillowcase. Just your head."

"Yeah, and I could have seeds and nuts and stuff in my hands and pockets. Then I could be my own forest. You better bury me somewheres with lots of room to spread out," he advised Jason.

Jason's lips twitched. "I'll keep that in mind. Who did you hear talking yesterday?"

"Course, it'd be even better if you just put me in a tree. I'd like that." Jeremy characteristically followed his own train of thought, ignoring his oldest brother's questions.

"IN a tree, or ON a tree?" Josh asked. "Like stuffed in the trunk?"

Apparently Joshua wasn't going to answer his question, either, Jason thought. It wasn't like he couldn't guess, anyway. There weren't that many people in the whole town, and he knew the betters. Usually won against them, too, come to think of would be no different.

Yes, this would be no different.

He would see to that.