text: Growing up my family lived about 10 minutes away from my Aunt Patty. Aunt Patty lived in this giant old historic colonial on 300 acres with a 15 horse stable, huge barn, pond. The works. My four cousins who lived there were the “cool cousins” of our family: all older, and bigger, and constantly finding new ways to torment me. With cheap babysitting available to my parents courtesy of Amy Lynn (Second oldest “cool cousin”) I passed most of my summers darting in and out of hay bales and causing mischief in the barns of this kingdom. The cicadas’ roar provided an ambient soundtrack to the day I found myself ankle deep in the pond, trembling. Roger, the youngest cool cousin, was daring me to wade further into the pond, jeering me for my fear of the snapping turtle who presided over the pond. “Worst case is you lose a toe! Stop being a pussy!” Not an uncommon scene for those summers, all things considered. Just as I was about to make my fateful choice to risk loss of toe by turtle rather than face the wrath of Roger, a small croak snapped both of our attention away from my cowering. I splashed out of the pond before Roger could protest, though I doubt he noticed. His attention was fully focused ten a small patch in the reeds ten feet away. There sat bullfrog, a small one by pond standards, but a beastly little guy nonetheless. “Awesome!” Roger bellowed, and in one motion, using his super-human-older-cousin-strength, he scooped it up and sprinted back towards the house. Suddenly alone by the pond I faced a predicament. Happy with my full set of toes, should I retreat to the safety of the adults inside? Or should I try to earn some cool points by tagging along and seeing what the plan was for our amphibious friend. My curiosity got the best of me and I took off after Roger. I caught up to him in what he called his secret hideout -- the crawl space under the back porch. It took half a second for my eyes to adjust to the dim lighting of the claustraphobic clubhouse but when they did they registered a couple of things in succession, without immediately connecting their implications. 1. The frog was sitting extremely still on a rock in the middle of the dirt and dust ground of the hideout. 2. Roger was standing above the frog, now looking at me with a smile to which the word “devious” doesn’t begin, and never will, do justice. 3. Complementing the smile, Roger had in his right hand a rock the size of a soft ball. 4. Aforementioned hand was precariously, if not malignantly, hovering directly above the frog. “He better not drop that rock or it’ll hurt the frog,” I thought. “You better not drop that rock it’ll hurt the fro -- AHHHH” I yelped as it became too late. Roger, with all of the force of his 5'6'’ eight grader frame, drove the rock down and *through* the frog. The result was remnant of a dropped watermelon, if watermelons were filled with intestines and had heads that could have eyes dangling out of them. I shrieked, and sprinted to the safety of the adults inside, Rogers cackle resonating off of the wooden ceiling, dirt foor, and cement walls of his hideout cum torture chamber.