The rooster crowed just as the sun started rising, much like it did every morning on the farm. Rather than get started on her chores, Pearl snuck into her mother's bedroom to look for something she could play dress-up with. She opened the door to the closet and started looking through her mother's dresses, keeping her ears open in case she heard footsteps approaching. Pearl took a liking to the ruffled red one, but chose to search for something a bit more prettier than that. Finally, she found a dress she liked, a long-sleeved pink one with a red sash around the middle that was hiding in the back. Pearl removed the dress from off the hanger and took it back with her to her bedroom to try it on. Once she had it on, Pearl looked at herself in the mirror, admiring how well her mother's dress suited her, as though it had been tailored to fit her. Pearl smiled at her own reflection and blew a kiss to it before sitting down to put on a little makeup and fix up her braided hair, making sure that not one strand was out of place on her head, then tied a white lace hairbow into each braid.
When the transformation was complete, Pearl rose up from the chair and went to stand in the middle of her bedroom, imaging the lights going out one by one, leaving her in total darkness. Just then, a spotlight shined down on Pearl, as though it were a beckon of heavenly light. She kept her eyes closed as she raised her arms above her head, turning around slowly and gracefully, setting the mood so she could dance in front of the audience waiting to applaud her. She imagined herself up on a stage, hundreds of people waiting for her to sing and dance. Everything was perfect, the motion was perfect, the stage was perfect. But most importantly of all, she was perfect. That was how Pearl felt about herself, how she wanted to feel, loved by people who would one day know her name and remember her as the biggest star in the world.
But that dream would have to wait, for Pearl heard a knock at the door and opened her eyes, turning around in time to see her mother enter the room, looking her over with much disapproval.
"Where did you find that?" Pearl's mother questioned, speaking in her native German. "Did I say you could wear my old things?"
Pearl looked as scared as a small child about to receive a beating with a belt. Thankfully, her mother was not in the mood to lay a finger on her.
"Take it off", Pearl's mother demanded. "Get down to the barn and feed the animals like you promised you would." And with that, Ruth, the name of Pearl's mother, turned around and closed the door behind her.
Soon as her mother was out of her bedroom, Pearl sighed in disappointment, looking disheartened. She had hoped that her mother would say something nice to her for a change, compliment how beautiful she looked in the dress. Ever since her husband became paralyzed, Ruth had grown bitter and resentful of her life, though she never said it out loud. Pearl knew times were hard for everybody, but that was no excuse for Ruth not to show a little kindness once in a while. The least she could have done was give her a smile or a hug. Pearl turned around and walked over to pick up one of her dolls, hugging it as a replacement for her mother.
After changing out of her mother's dress and into a short-sleeved, teal-colored blouse, dark blue overalls and brown boots, Pearl stormed out of the house and walked across the yard to the barn, picking up some hay with both her hands to feed it to the cow, throwing it into his pen.
"Eat up", Pearl said to the bovine. She folded her arms on top of the gate, sighing to herself while the cow got started on his breakfast. "One day you'll never see me again", she said. "That's right, Charlie. Life may be it for you, but it sure ain't it for me. I'm special." Lowering herself down to look Charlie in the eyes, Pearl said to him with a hint of a smile on her face. "Mama's gonna feel real stupid when she finds out."
Pearl rose up and turned around to pick up some more hay, chuckling to herself as she imaged the hay in her hands to be a bouquet of flowers. It almost looked like one. Twirling around as if she were in another one of her daydreams, Pearl began to hum a little tune, continuing the task of feeding the other animals.
"One day, the whole world's gonna know my name", said Pearl, talking to the sheep this time. "Don't you agree, Mary?"
The sheep bleated, to which Pearl took a bow, pretending the animal was another female, preferably a fan of hers. "Why, thank you", said Pearl, politely. Turned around, Pearl skipped over to pick up the pitchfork near the doorway, walking back over to where the animals were and sticking the pitchfork into the ground. "I do love a good audience", she said out loud, hearing the sound of clapping hands that cheered her on. "Y'all see me for who I really am", said Pearl to the animals, imaging them as her loving, adoring fans, the people who cherished her, who swooned over her. She picked up the pitchfork and envisioned herself walking up a flight of stairs, which were really piles of haystacks. "I'm a star", Pearl declared, raising the pitchfork above her head, basking in the spotlight, drinking in the moment that belonged to her and nobody else in the world.
Suddenly, a honking noise interrupted Pearl's daydreaming, bringing the walls of her fantasy down to a crumbling halt as a web-footed creature came waddling into the born. Pearl dropped her smile as she looked forward and saw that the perpetrator was nothing more than a white-feathered goose. His insatiable honking filled her with the desire to extinguish the life of this small animal who brought her back to boring reality.
"What are you doing here, Mr. Goose?" Pearl asked, stepping down from the mountain of haystacks to approach the incompetent goose, who continued honking as if he were repeating the same sentence over and over again just to annoy the farm girl on purpose. Pearl didn't like it, having a short temper for stupid things and annoying creatures like this useless animal before her. Or so she thought. With the pitchfork in her hands, Pearl got the idea in her head to raise the three-pronged farming tool above the goose, waiting a few seconds before she decided to finally kill the bird, silencing his honking for good, thus ending his short, pathetic life.
Pearl walked out of the barn without her mother seeing her, heading down to a secluded, backwood trail that led to a swamp. Carrying the bloodied body of Mr. Goose still impaled on the end of the pitchfork, Pearl walked further out towards the swamp, standing on the edge of the dock.
"Theda!" Pearl called out, as if she were expecting a kitten or a puppy to come out of hiding. But Theda was neither a cat or even a dog, for at that moment, the large reptilian body of an alligator came swimming towards the dock, smelling the treat her mistress had brought for her. Theda hadn't eaten anything in several hours, and since it was still early in the morning, she thought it nice of her mistress to bring her some breakfast.
"Come on, girl", Pearl said to Theda, greeting her with a soft, friendly smile, offering the end of the pitchfork to the alligator to feed her a meal consisting of fresh, dead goose meat. "Take it."
With one snap of her massive jaws, Theda clamped her teeth down onto the delicious snack, filling her mouth with the taste of blood and feathers. Goose was a rare delicacy and had an acquired taste to it, but Theda loved it all the same, and she loved Pearl, the girl who raised her from an egg, for bringing it to her. As long as Pearl continued feeding her, Theda promised she wouldn't bother her mistress or come trespassing on the farm.
"You're welcome, Theda", said Pearl to the alligator, who sank down below the surface of the water with her food, disappearing from sight until her mistress came back to feed her again another day.
Once the enormous reptilian had gone, Pearl looked around to make sure she was alone. There were no neighbors around for miles, so nobody would see what she was about to do next, and since she had no friends other than the animals, Pearl decided to take a break from her chores by going for a dip in the pond. Setting the pitchfork on the ground, Pearl sat down on the dock and began to take off her boots, unlacing them and setting them aside before standing up to unbutton her overalls. Removing the straps from off her shoulders, Pearl slid the denim overalls down past her legs, letting them sit in a ring of clothing at her feet before she kicked them off to the side and lifted her blouse to pull it off over her head, stripping herself down to just her underwear. Pearl started to remove the remainder of her garments when she thought she heard a rustling noise in the trees and stopped to listen, looking around at the empty swamp. Theda had gone off to take a nap somewhere, so unless it was her, Pearl had no idea who else might have or could have been around.
"Hello?" Pearl called out. "Who's out there?" She waited until someone answered or called back to her, but nobody responded. "Mama?...Mama, is that you?"
Listening again to the sounds of the swamp, the only thing Pearl could hear other than the sound of her beating heart was the chirping of birds and insects, while a gentle breeze blew on the wind. Pearl shifted her eyes one way, then the other, shrugging in an 'Oh, well' manner before proceeding to remove her undergarments, letting them pile on top of the rest of her clothes while she stood naked on the dock for a moment, stretching her arms above her head before jumping off the edge, diving into the murky water. It wasn't long before Pearl came back up for air, taking in a breath and then wiping away the water from her eyes. She leaned back and stared up at the sky, kicking her legs and moving her arms in small circular motions to keep herself afloat.
Little did Pearl know was that a pair of eyes were watching her from afar, eying her with much interest, and not just because the person watching had just seen her naked. These eyes had watched her fed the carcass of a bloodied goose to an alligator, giving the dangerous animal something it needed to eat, something to gain its strength back, something that needed replacing due to the lack of nourishment. Whoever this peeper was, he saw much potential in the girl, not just for her body, which looked suitable for future breeding purposes, but also for her murderous intentions that could aid him in gaining what he needed, too. This girl, who lived on the farmhouse not too far away from the swamp, possessed no physical structure or internal organ he desired at the moment, but when the time was right, the creeper stalking Pearl would come out of hiding and reveal himself to this precious jewel of a girl. If she saw him for what he really was and agreed to help him, he would spare her life, but should she fear him, then he would have no use for her. He would have to kill her and harvest her organs for himself.