Looking up from the crowded bucket, Jared croaked hoarsely. Another frog joined his croaking with its own loud croaks, prompting a third, then a fourth individual to do the same.
"Shut up! Rib-bit!" Jared croaked. He wanted Kevin's undivided attention, which the other noisy frogs made impossible. He peered upward with bulbous, protruding eyes at the oval disc that limited his field of view to only what was narrowly visible from inside the bucket just as his younger brother peered into the bucket with a silly grin across his freckled face. Looking at Kevin's moving lips, Jared realized that Kevin was counting.
"Kev, it's me! Rib-bit! Jared! Rib-bit," Jared croaked. "I'm not a frog. Rib-bit!"
Except with his green body, warts and all, with webbed toes and two strong hind legs for powerful jumping, his assertion failed from the start. As he croaked, a thin membrane of greenish-white skin over his throat pulsed.
Kevin's class had studied about France at the end of the previous school year, and he'd been fascinated by the strange inclusions in French cuisine, including squished goose livers, snails, and, of course, cuisses de grenouilles, or frog's legs. He counted eight large frogs in the bucket, which meant sixteen plump frog's legs.
Jared mistook the dollar signs in Kevin's eyes for recognition. "Yes! Rib-bit!" The older brother croaked excitedly. "Get me out of here! Rib-bit!"
Jared had often made fun of Kevin's whimsical enterprises, but the fact was that Kevin employed strategy and determination with his various projects. He'd already called the chef at a local French bistro, who responded to the tween's pitch with plans to market the freshly harvested frog's legs as locally grown.
The bucket swung wildly as the ten-year-old boy gripped the handle and lifted it from the muddy bank. Jared and the other frogs spun in the bucket, sloshing against each other. Jared cringed each time he made contact with one of the other slimy, slippery frogs held in the deep plastic bucket.
Kevin trudged several blocks to the bistro with the burden of his heavy bucket. He stopped to rest about every block. Inside the bucket, Jared continued to croak for attention. He could only wonder what his brother wanted with a bucket of frogs.
As arranged, Kevin took his bucket to the back door of the bistro, where the chef met, a large man with a dark, bushy beard, met him.
"Bonjour, monsieur," Kevin said, putting the bucket on the ground with a loud thump.
The chef, charmed by Kevin's French, greeted him identically.
"Ah, you bring the seau de grenouilles," he said. "My promised bucket of the frogs?"
"Eight of them," Kevin said.
The chef peered into the bucket and saw one large frog staring at him with its bulging eyes.
"Kev! Rib-bit!" Jared croaked. Why was his brother delivering a bucket of frogs to this man?
The chef kissed his fingers in an extravagant gesture. "La perfection," he said. "My customers will love the fresh frog's legs."
Jared's insides turned to ice. "Fuck! Rib-bit! I've got to get out of here! Rib-bit!"
At the sight of one of the frogs making a desperate escape bid but falling woefully short, the chef wielded the wooden culinary mallet in his hand and beat back the energetic amphibian.
"Owww! Rib-bit!" Jared cried as the man beaned him on the head with something that looked like a wooden hammer. He dropped back into the squirming mass of his fellow frogs.
The man took out a billfold and counted out payment. "Five dollars for each frog," he said, thumbing through four ten-dollar bills.
"Pick up your seau, your buck-et, later?" The chef asked.
"Yes," Kevin answered as he secured the bills in his pocket. "That will be fine."
His sore head told Jared this wasn't some bizarre dream. He'd really been changed into a frog by that strange amulet, and now his own brother had collected him and sold him to a man who meant to harvest and eat his legs.
The loud croaking from one persistent individual continued unabated. "Kevin! Rib-bit! Don't leave me here! Rib-bit!"
The chef carried the bucket inside the restaurant.
"Wait! Rib-bit!" Jared's croaks grew more desperate. "I'm not a frog! Rib-bit!"
The chef put the bucket inside the walk-in freezer, knowing from experience that some time in the freezer would push the frogs into an amphibious hibernation and smooth the process of harvesting their legs.