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Now the
switch was a silvery green sorta flat tender
limb that Julio could easily wrap around his
waist and tie in place. Having his hands free
helped him get back down through the glittering,
sparkly leaves and be able to find the handle
bars and foot pedals easier. The last 6 feet
of the tree he just slid on down to the ground.
"Great!" exclaims Granma. "This will
do fine!" But as she reached for the tender limb
around Julio’s waist, it turned into a harmless green
snake with a purple underbelly. It undid itself and
fell to the mossy floor of the path and turned back
into a branch. "My, my, what strange goings ons," says
Granma. Julio was wanting it to turn back into a snake
so he took a small stick and poked at it, but nothing
happened.
Granma, brave as she was, picked up the snake, I mean
silvery green limb, keeping it at a distance for just
a while .. Well, just in case anything .. uncanny …
or undoing like ... was gonna’ happen again … she held
it at arms length. I think she was holding her breath
too; both of them were, for soon you could hear their
big sighs of relief. She took the branch then and tied
one end to the back of Julio’s jeans through his belt
loop and she tied the other end to a loop in her overalls.
"This is a queer place Julio, some kinda magic
going on here … and we can’t take any chances. So this
way we can’t get lost from each other. K? K," explains
Granma.
So now Julio went on in front and Granma behind . .
. with the silvery green snake, I mean rope ... er
... switch, between them. The mushroom like things
were getting fatter and puffier and taller and smelled
so …. so … indescribably ... like … mushrooms! Wild
and fresh, and dirty, and damp. As the dew continued
to drip off the overhead trees, the travelers looked
up and now noticed that the trees were getting thicker
and the branches overhead were blocking out the sunlight.
Only once in a while, small rays of sunshine poked
through. Julio’s hair was getting downright wet and
it was getting sorta dark. Julio stopped short and
Granma almost bumped into him. "Gotta put my shirt
on," he says. "Good idea," says Granma.
So Julio untied the shirt at his waist. When he looked
down to undo the knot, he could feel eyes in his back
belt loop watching him. ‘The branch.’ So he moved as
slow and as gently as he could. Of course he got the
arms of his shirt all tangled up over his head and
Granma had to help him. "Wonder what time it
is?" asked Granma to herself.
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