She’s doing it again. I’m watching from the swing set, high enough in the air that my stomach drops out at the bottom, just a little, in the way that makes me feel tingly and that Ma told me not to talk about in front of company. From up here, I can see that over in the mulch, Erin Mayburn is playing worm church.

We all know that Erin sometimes brings her mom’s bible to school, mostly because Mrs. Mayburn screamed so loud at parent pickup about theft being a mortal sin that Mrs. Sarantopoulos threatened to call See Pee Ess.

Teachers sometimes think that Erin Mayburn looks like me. I don’t think this—I’m much prettier than her. Plus, my mom lets me wear pants.

Erin doesn’t let anyone play worm church with her, but not many people ask since she doesn’t really have any friends, unless you count the worms. I tried once, because Ma told me to be nice, but Erin told me that I was Godless and a bass tard, since the teacher has to let me skip Father’s Day projects because my Daddy ran off with the lady from the Kmart, so I stomped on three of her disciples and made her cry. 

I cried too, later when I was in bed and thinking about the worms. I felt so rotten with it, that I hurt them so bad when it wasn’t even them I was mad at. I must have been the meanest girlmonster they ever knew, and their little worm brains were probably so scared. I didn’t sleep much at all that night, thinking about those worms. 

I jump off the swing, and my feet feel like TV static when I land in the mulch. I creep up real slow, sliding my jelly shoes so that Erin can’t sense my steps as I walk up behind her. I can hear her now.

“And the beast was se-eye-zed.” Erin is not a very good reader. During popcorn in class, I always skip ahead way faster than her because she’s just so slow. Her words are crunchy with it. “And with him the false pro-phet who perform-ed the signs in his presents.”

The worms don’t seem to care much about church. There are little paper bows tied to some of them on the top of their squishy heads. I don’t like bugs much, but I think these ones are alright. I feel the throw-up mouth sweats when I think about when I stepped on them. 

“By witch he de. De-ce-eye-ved those who had re, um. Re-something the mark of the beast.” Erin can’t see me, but the worms can, even though they don’t have eyes. I think they might be like the teachers. They think I look like Erin too. 

They move toward me, slither sliding on the hot blacktop that Erin has herded them all on. It must burn their wormskin. She is not a very good prophet, letting them fry like that.

“And those who worshiped his image—hey! Where are you going?” The worms aren’t listening anymore. They never were, I don’t think. Instead, they gather around my feet and my jelly shoes, and they look up at me with no eyes because I am the same, still big and scary and able to smash them, and I am different, a change from hot sidewalk scorching and big words they can’t understand.

I put my hand to the ground and let them glide over my palm.

“I’m sorry,” I tell them. “I won’t let you hurt again, I promise.”

They hug my fingers in prayer and thank me for delivering them from evil.

I’m about to pet their wormbacks, maybe remove their paperbow chains, when Erin Mayburn throws her mother’s bible at my feet. She crushes our disciples, and the resulting flood from us both crying washes their little bodies away back into the grass.