An Irish Who Can Tolerate Snakes Chapter 34

Revealing Samantha to Bannon, she heard the little boys breathing become heavier.

He started to shake a little but remained relatively still.

When his sister had said 'Don't scream' he was certianly expecting her to show him a weapon, or maybe some candy, then when he heard the 'She won't hurt you' part he thought it must be a bee or some type of rodent.

He certianly did not expect it to be a snake!

His mother had always told him snakes were dangerous and evil creatures that were to be reviled and feared. Yet again, his little sister keeps giving him surprises his little heart just can't quite take yet.

The more Bannon thought, the more conflicted he felt within.

Right when he couldnt decide, he remembered he was the one carrying this bag around for like an hour today!

Shivers went up his spine.

What if he had gotten curious as any child might, and reached his hand inside that bag?

Ah! Was his sister on his side or against him!?

Sensing that her brothers emotions were probably swirling around in a whirlpool right now inside of him, Miriam put Samantha her shoulder.

The little snake looked scared at first but just looked up at Miriam and decided to not panic yet.

The human child had been feeding it and taking care of it for a while now, so it had gotten quite comfortable and lazy.

Miriam looked at Bannon and took Aamantha off her shoulder and gently placed her on the table next to Bannons hands.

"She shouldn't bite you only you provoke her. This is Samantha, I've had her for over a month. I want to get a proper cage for her, but I don't think father would let his precious youngest daughter have a pet snake. So, I am going to say Samantha is your pet snake. So please get used to her. She eats insects mostly." Miriam bemoaned her fate to her elder brother.

"As a older brother its your responsibility to look out for me, your younger sister. Tomorrow when we go out and about, I plan on telling father you have a pet snake harmless to humans, and that we are going to get a cage made for her." As Miriam says the last few words, she leans in next to Bannon and locks eyes with him and winks and flutters her large, limpid, sky blue eyes.

Bannon goes into a momentary daze and nods his head.

Miriam gives him a big kiss on the forehead and then, takes the lid off the water jug again.

Flipping the lid over, she proceeds to pour the remaining water out into the lid of the jar.

Picking Samantha up slowly once more, she moves her close to the lid.

As if sensing the water contained within the lid, Samantha slithers forth and props her head up on the edge of the jar lid.

A forkee tongue flipped out of her mouth and lapped at the water within the lid of the jar.

"See look how cute her little tongue is. Now while she can't really hurt people, animals are a different story. Now that I have to look after a bird, I need your help looking after her."

If Bannon knew that Miriam was refering to the fact that this snake was venomous to small animals he probably would have not said his next words.

"I guess it's not as scary as mom described them..."

"Okay, so I have a basket I can put her into for tonight but tomorrow we got to ask dad to take us to town so we can get materials for a custom made cage." Replied Miriam.

"Watch her on the table, make sure she doesn't flop off onto the ground." She commanded before shuffling over to her travel trunk at the foot of her bed and opening it and taking out a basket that was about 10 by 20 inches.

Brining the basket over to the table, she set it on the open part of the table and looked at Bannon expectantly.

"What?" Bannon asked his sister, seemingly confused.

"Put her inside. Silly. Pick her up and put her inside. When you touch a pet snake you have to gentley pick them up. So as not to startle them. Picking them up from the middle is the best strategy when used on docile snakes." Miriam said as she grasped one of Bannons hands with her own and lightly moved to the middle of Samantha's back.

Taking her other hand and grasping his last free hand, Miriam then showed Bannon how to handle a snake by showing him how to move his hands.

Eventually she finally got Bannon to put Samantha in her basket all by himself.

By this point, Samantha looked rather unnerved.

Why did they keep swinging her around? Who was this new person touching her? Oh well, time to sleep....

"Good job Bannon, your a great older brother!" Miriam announced to her big brother by giving him a big hug.

After the impromptu hug, Miriam filled the little water dish already in the basket, with the water left in the jug lid before putting the lid back on the water jug.

Going back to the trunk Miriam got out a some ink, quill, paper, and a light book before walking back over to the table Bannon was seated at.

"Alright, time for your lesson Bannon. Let's revisit what we learned last time...." Miriam started her lesson and pushed the snakes basket back to the edge of the table that bordered the wall.

After a few hours of crafting the bird flight harness and talking to and lecturing Bannon about studies, while occasionally checking up on him and correcting his spelling, Miriam finally finished the bird harness prototype.

Putting away her sewing tools carefully, she went and emptied out her bag of its contents and cleaned it with the semi-soap basin water and a towel.

She put the bags contents that were fairly clean into her travel trunk.

Looking over at Bannon, the poor kid looked like he was about to konk out for the night.

"Alright thats enough for the night Bannon. Go to bed now." Miriam said with a sigh, holding one hand to her forehead.

Being obedient from constant sisterly nagging, Bannon quickly left the room to clean up and came right back in a few minutes later very carefully as to not disturb the birds slumber.

Changing his day clothes quickly, Bannon changed into nightwear and hurridly hopped into his separate bed.

Phew, looks like he gets his own bed this time around.