Every evening at my house that summer was the same. My sister, Shae, and I would stomp boldly out of our sliding glass door. At that time of evening the enormous orange sun would reflect off of the door and illuminate the sky. In our sloped back yard, Shae and I would reside in our fantasies, bounce on our trampoline in the quest to one-day touch the trees, and wrestle with our petite, four-legged friends. Finally, at six o’ clock, our mom would beckon us into the house to eat her not so delectable cooking. As a dark blanket would start to cover the house, trouble began.

At first, the raccoon would just gaze in through the windows. He was easily scared off by my mom. With his beady red eyes and razor sharp claws, he was thoroughly intimidating and I don’t believe he comprehended it at the time. When he did come to the realization that my mom wasn’t as intimidating as she thought she was, he started to go after the cat food. When he finally pushed the envelope and hung off of the screen on the kitchen window, enough was enough. Stare down matches and screaming were useless, so it was assuredly time for a new approach.

My grandma cooked up a plan. Actually, she baked one. She made peanut butter cookies. These weren’t ordinary baked goods, but ones made specifically for our little friend, the raccoon. These cookies contained a confidential ingredient called rat poison. The cat food was put away and was replaced by dessert. And just on time, like any other evening, the raccoon crept out of the jagged pine trees and onto the deck expecting his dinner. Well, he got something even better; a deadly dessert.

Cookie after cookie the raccoon consumed. You would have thought he weighed one hundred pounds by the time he halted his eating. It took a few days, but eventually, our friend vanished. We had no inclination of to where he could have gone. Shortly there after, we started to take into notice a wretched smell. At this point in every story, things typically start to go downhill. That is what came to pass. Our dearly, beloved, little vermin crawled under our back deck before his demise. I believe to this day that that was his way of saying, “Stupid humans! You think you’re so clever, don’t you? You can’t get rid of me that easily.” Well, that was accurate. In the heat of summer, when the sun pours down from the sky and its beams of heat penetrate you, you feel like an ant under a magnifying glass. Beads of sweat rolling down my face, I sat next to the raccoons grave under the deck, flies would swarm like a pack of hungry wolves; their buzz like a lingering alarm clock that you can’t shut off. Fly by fly, I smacked them to the ground where they hit with a gentle thud. This went on for a whole week, which seemed like an eternity in the blistering heat that felt like it was being absorbed into my body. Curse that bodacious thief.
So it goes that our deck had to be ripped up. He got his revenge, that clever thing. “That will be the last time I ever participate in the killing of raccoons”, I swore. Well, it wasn’t the last time my mom and grandmother did. That’s a whole other story though.