Welcome to Is(sue) 5, kinfolk! The sixth issue will go live on December 15, 2018. See Sub(missions) in the menu (for more information).
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"looking at birds' bone conceiving flight"
Charles A. Swanson, Virginia what forms fly? weak birds’ bones
stripped of flesh brittle-boiled, bleached flight defeathered bones can’t undulate detached and destroyed; nuded, subdued and yet birds fly brief feather fluffs dipping, designing, geometrics of down like a milkweed puff surprisingly sleek amazingly cheek; thought-lifters, fleet that they can wing even so bound flesh over bone bone as boundary tendon-tethered joints pivoting matchsticks skeletal framework; skeletal ballast what forms fly? above bare ground what bony metrics what feathered truths seemingly unbound bound by frail bones breakable; miracle; to power free flight "Wit's Against the Law"
(featuring Anni Wilson) Craig Kurtz, Virginia
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"a walk on the wild side" "rebirth" "over the dose"
Katherine Workman, Kentucky Corbin Fouts, Kentucky |
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"Holler Blues" "Velocity" "Texture Study"
Erin Alise Conley, Kentucky Sabne Raznik, Kentucky Avant(Stories) |
"Appalachian Trail: Sabretooth Run"
Jason Belcher, Kentucky
Jason Belcher, Kentucky
Susan awoke to a tremendous rustling sound. She sat upright and looked around, unable to see very far in the pre-dawn fog enveloping her like a gray blanket. The morning wakeup call took some getting used to. Realizing the source of the cacophony overhead, she eased back down onto her hammock and exhaled slowly. The leaves at the top of the forest canopy were turning over to face the sun, and the sound proclaimed sunrise to every living thing below like an army on the march above the trees.
She stood up and stretched, reaching her arms towards the top of the enormous tree behind her. With a diameter of sixteen feet, the giant oaks dominated the landscape like silent guardians forever standing their watch. Hundreds of their kin surrounded her, holding hands with their branches to keep the ground beneath in perpetual shade.
Checking her reversible moisture stand she found two liters of water had pooled in the small container overnight. The smart material of the fabric pulled water from the air around her like a continuous pump requiring no external power source. Oceans of moisture floated above human beings in Earth’s atmosphere, but most of the time that water lingered forever out of reach. A dehydrated human could die surrounded by water. The first thing she’d bought had been a section of smart cloth.
For breakfast she opened a plastic pack with two squares inside. Power cubes provided nutrients, up to 10,000 calories in a single unit which easily fit in the palm of her hand. After downing the water and swallowing a cube, she readied herself to get started.
Her holo-watch indicated the year 20,000 BC. She’d come to break the record for the Appalachian Trail. She knew she could do it in under a week, which meant covering almost three hundred miles a day. The wagers were 4 to 1 against, and she figured by now the betting pool exceeded ten million dollars. If she won, she’d get ten percent, enough to buy next the next gen enhancements she needed. Well, needed and wanted, she added to herself.
Winners made a good living through the quantum relay. She got to run every day, and running made her feel alive. The longer the distance, the better the sensation.
With a wave of her hand she released her microdrones, and when they reached altitude she synced her bio-lens with their video capture. The drones stayed below the canopy, but their infrared and imaging laid out the terrain clearer than broad daylight ever could. Optic connections in the brain were wired for two eyes, and the surgical enhancements enabling a wider field of vision had not been cheap. But they had been worth it.
The nano-particles began firing in her legs, pushing the muscles far past anything a standard human could achieve. Like an uncoiled spring she leapt off through the foliage. Trail running required as much mental effort as physical; uneven terrain along with roots, branches, and rocks jutting out of the ground required runners to constantly think about where their next step would be. A bad decision could result in a slip or fall, and with that came the risk of injury.
Running while seeing from a hundred feet above had required intensive training. At first the leading practitioners suggested she think of herself as a giant, so that the distance from view to foot became that of a tremendously tall figure. Bio-enhanced runners needed even more mental discipline than traditional marathoners; training the mind to choreograph greater speeds and distances took experience, and more than a few bruises.
Her feet danced across the slopes of gnarled roots and jagged rocks at a pace faster than an unenhanced Olympic marathoner from the old days. Technology gave her greater speed and access to a course thousands of years in the past. Innovation had taken her forward and backward at the same time. Did all progress inevitably lead to contradictions? She thought it probably did.
Enhancements were just tools; without the will to use them they served no purpose. Her purpose was pushing limits; all runners pushed their limits, with champions going further past their limits than any of their competitors. Pain made her angry; she used it break barriers and as fuel for achievement. With her will to win and her top of the line bio-mods, Susan covered fifteen miles an hour through rugged terrain for twenty hours at a stretch.
“Look at her pace! She’ll beat the record for sure, and you convinced me to bet against her!” Blake turned to look at Charles, who simply stared straight ahead at the viewing screen provided by his augmented reality headset. “I mean a five or ten million dollar bet is for amusement, but this is serious money, we’re talking about a hundred million now.”
“Would you relax; here, have a drink.” Charles replied, handing Blake a Diamond is Eternal, a $90,000 a glass cognac topped with a $15,000 diamond on the side.
“A hundred million is not serious money, and you know it,” Charles chided.
“Well that’s not the point,” Blake said with both mock indignation. “The center writes checks to me, I don’t write checks to them. I hate writing checks to them, makes me feel like I owe someone. I don’t owe them, they owe me!”
“My dear friend,” Charles began like an older sibling explaining the ways of the world “the center works because occasionally everybody writes at least one check to them. If not, eventually the whole thing would collapse. Do you want to go back to a world where people had to do pointless labor to earn money? Imagine the horror of daily drudgery, to no real purpose, other than the acquisition of mere things.”
“We are living the dream outlined by Buckminster Fuller.”
“Think what horrors and wasted lives he saw before his vision came to fruition. Remember how things used to be? As Fuller put it,”
“’We should do away with the absolutely specious notion that everybody has to earn a living. It is a fact today that one in ten thousand of us can make a technological breakthrough capable of supporting all the rest. The youth of today are absolutely right in recognizing this nonsense of earning a living. We keep inventing jobs because of this false idea that everybody has to be employed at some kind of drudgery because, according to Malthusian Darwinian theory he must justify his right to exist. So we have inspectors of inspectors and people making instruments for inspectors to inspect inspectors. The true business of people should be to go back to school and think about whatever it was they were thinking about before somebody came along and told them they had to earn a living.’”
“That’s what created the whole system. Once we’d automated the tasks of producing food, goods, and delivering them, we realized most human jobs were working against the economy, not for it. Our labor became an obstacle to production rather than a facilitator. So what to do?”
“The early internet generation had an inkling, as YouTubers set to work building an audience and getting paid by advertisers to play games or react to videos. The whole thing was not just an entertainment economy, it was actor/audience economy. Some people were good at performing, others good at watching. The two groups supported each other.”
“When shopping malls closed by the thousands, enterprising minds discovered they could build obstacle courses, fighting rings, and virtual reality arenas in the old structures. People without traditional jobs suddenly found they could compete against other races or fighters, and that the crowds would pay to watch them.”
“Guilds sprang up as the system began to organize itself, training new competitors and arranging ever more grand competitions. The modern gladiator economy was born. Only there were so many different arenas nobody could compete in them all, so instead the goal was to create ever more elaborate spectacles.”
“With mass classroom schools permanently shuttered, gifted minds were unchained from the mediocre masses to focus on their true purpose: innovation. Free to devote their lives to innovation, the rate of scientific breakthroughs and discoveries entered a new golden age. The quantum relay was invented by a group of the gifted, who never would have been able to construct it in the socio-economic conditions of the late twentieth or early twenty-first centuries.”
“Our wagers facilitate the system by providing the lifeblood of the center. So don’t begrudge them a drop or two every now and then. Where the economy used to be built on labor, management, and consumers, now we have participants, audiences, and gamblers. Automation grew all the food we needed, made all the necessities and things we could ever want, and transported goods globally. Human beings were freed from a life of labor to focus on their life’s work.” Charles finished.
“Besides, I don’t know about you, but I would rather watch someone else being hunted by sabretooth tigers than be hunted myself.”
Blake sighed and sipped his drink.
“It’s a good thing you have excellent taste; I wonder if I should be able to listen to your speeches without alcohol.”
Charles laughed out loud. “I would never inflict that on you.”
Charles looked out the clear glass window at other geodesic domes around him, which dotted the valleys and hillsides of Central Appalachia in much the same way log cabins had three hundred years earlier. The new pioneers came to escape the crowded living conditions of the cities, but in a way that did not require them to disconnect from the global cybo-organic network, once known as the internet.
Micro homes provided occupants with all of life’s necessities for a fraction of the cost city dwellers paid for rent in dense urban areas. Communities of tiny homes had sprung up on reclaimed mining land, where inhabitants could access natural beauty outside and modern technology inside. After two hundred years of urban growth, Central Appalachia had found a way to reverse the trend. Wealthy, educated, and talented young people began flocking to the countryside away from massive urban centers, lured by a low cost of living and freedom from high crime and violence of the cities.
America was returning to its roots, going back to a time when the majority of the people lived in small communities of homesteaders. And like all times of intense change, there was a lot of money to be made.
The whole system had been designed and built deep into the mountains. Now city dwellers came here looking for wealth.
As nightfall came Susan climbed to the top of the canopy for a peek at the stars. The moon hung above the ceiling of the forest while the stars blazed with a light the floor below could not see. Up here the air tasted purer and less stifling than in the dense undergrowth of the forest.
Leaping from treetop to treetop by moonlight, she gazed out at the endless sea of forest silhouetted against the brilliant starlit sky. To her left, which she thought to be west, lay an endless expanse of virgin wilderness, untouched by human hands. Treetop running came naturally to her; maybe she had the spirit of a panther, she thought vividly.
With a tap of her finger against her left temple she activated her electro-optics, which swung a small thin visor downward giving her a menu of options for surveying the dense wilderness. By winking her right eye she selected infrared, turning her head down to regard the forest beneath her.
She’d preprogrammed the search criteria to look for a specific body mass. Smilodin Fatalis could weigh up to six hundred pounds, making them stand out from smaller mammals even in the deep brush of primeval foliage. Birds swooped and flew above her, and down below on the forest floor the nocturnal dance of hunter and hunted, which played out as it had since the dawn of time, brought a parade of darkened shapes scurrying back and forth in the 3D image provided by her visor.
Best known for their oversized upper teeth, sabre tooth tigers were less well known for their biggest strength, front legs thicker and stronger than those of African lions. The better to hold prey in place while those massive canines carved up the meal, the forepaws of the sabre tooth were immensely powerful. Once they had prey in their grip, the fight was over.
Like their Asian and African cousins, saber tooth tigers were solitary hunters. Alone in a vast landscape with dense vegetation and plenty of hiding places for prey, sabers had to find their meals without help from other members of their kind. Unlike wolves who could use numbers to find and chase down prey, sabers were on their own.
To make up for the lack of teammates, sabre tooth tigers possessed exceptional hearing, eyesight, and smell. Their nose and ears were comparable to blood hounds, and their eyes could see almost as well as eagles. They were ambush predators, preferring to hide and wait for the perfect moment to attack their unsuspecting prey. Long teeth made it difficult for prey to extract themselves, and while they were trying those powerful forepaws finished them off. After that the large cats could dine at their leisure. And she was running through their neighborhood.
Only a year ago she’d been one of the last human workers in a vanishing profession, retail sales. Drones loaded all of the goods in the giant warehouses where orders came in from all over the world now, as the entire retail process had become automated. Orders came in electronically, robots sorted and loaded the orders onto auto-trucks, and aerial drones completed the delivery by flying the merchandise directly to the customers’ home. Aside from repair work, humans weren’t needed at all. And repair bots were on the verge of taking most of those jobs too. Seeing the end she’d quit her job to focus on running.
She’d won race after race through sheer determination, earning the chance to compete for winnings through the quantum relay. Inside every worker an athlete, artist, and warrior was waiting to be freed. She had found her calling. Running was more than physical; for her it was spiritual.
Now she was running an ultramarathon in 20,000 BC, gliding above the forest canopy in total darkness. And avoiding sabretooth tigers. Gamblers were not above fixing the odds. Sending genetically engineered, enormous predatory cats after runners was not against the rules. There were no rules. And that was why she loved it.
She stood up and stretched, reaching her arms towards the top of the enormous tree behind her. With a diameter of sixteen feet, the giant oaks dominated the landscape like silent guardians forever standing their watch. Hundreds of their kin surrounded her, holding hands with their branches to keep the ground beneath in perpetual shade.
Checking her reversible moisture stand she found two liters of water had pooled in the small container overnight. The smart material of the fabric pulled water from the air around her like a continuous pump requiring no external power source. Oceans of moisture floated above human beings in Earth’s atmosphere, but most of the time that water lingered forever out of reach. A dehydrated human could die surrounded by water. The first thing she’d bought had been a section of smart cloth.
For breakfast she opened a plastic pack with two squares inside. Power cubes provided nutrients, up to 10,000 calories in a single unit which easily fit in the palm of her hand. After downing the water and swallowing a cube, she readied herself to get started.
Her holo-watch indicated the year 20,000 BC. She’d come to break the record for the Appalachian Trail. She knew she could do it in under a week, which meant covering almost three hundred miles a day. The wagers were 4 to 1 against, and she figured by now the betting pool exceeded ten million dollars. If she won, she’d get ten percent, enough to buy next the next gen enhancements she needed. Well, needed and wanted, she added to herself.
Winners made a good living through the quantum relay. She got to run every day, and running made her feel alive. The longer the distance, the better the sensation.
With a wave of her hand she released her microdrones, and when they reached altitude she synced her bio-lens with their video capture. The drones stayed below the canopy, but their infrared and imaging laid out the terrain clearer than broad daylight ever could. Optic connections in the brain were wired for two eyes, and the surgical enhancements enabling a wider field of vision had not been cheap. But they had been worth it.
The nano-particles began firing in her legs, pushing the muscles far past anything a standard human could achieve. Like an uncoiled spring she leapt off through the foliage. Trail running required as much mental effort as physical; uneven terrain along with roots, branches, and rocks jutting out of the ground required runners to constantly think about where their next step would be. A bad decision could result in a slip or fall, and with that came the risk of injury.
Running while seeing from a hundred feet above had required intensive training. At first the leading practitioners suggested she think of herself as a giant, so that the distance from view to foot became that of a tremendously tall figure. Bio-enhanced runners needed even more mental discipline than traditional marathoners; training the mind to choreograph greater speeds and distances took experience, and more than a few bruises.
Her feet danced across the slopes of gnarled roots and jagged rocks at a pace faster than an unenhanced Olympic marathoner from the old days. Technology gave her greater speed and access to a course thousands of years in the past. Innovation had taken her forward and backward at the same time. Did all progress inevitably lead to contradictions? She thought it probably did.
Enhancements were just tools; without the will to use them they served no purpose. Her purpose was pushing limits; all runners pushed their limits, with champions going further past their limits than any of their competitors. Pain made her angry; she used it break barriers and as fuel for achievement. With her will to win and her top of the line bio-mods, Susan covered fifteen miles an hour through rugged terrain for twenty hours at a stretch.
“Look at her pace! She’ll beat the record for sure, and you convinced me to bet against her!” Blake turned to look at Charles, who simply stared straight ahead at the viewing screen provided by his augmented reality headset. “I mean a five or ten million dollar bet is for amusement, but this is serious money, we’re talking about a hundred million now.”
“Would you relax; here, have a drink.” Charles replied, handing Blake a Diamond is Eternal, a $90,000 a glass cognac topped with a $15,000 diamond on the side.
“A hundred million is not serious money, and you know it,” Charles chided.
“Well that’s not the point,” Blake said with both mock indignation. “The center writes checks to me, I don’t write checks to them. I hate writing checks to them, makes me feel like I owe someone. I don’t owe them, they owe me!”
“My dear friend,” Charles began like an older sibling explaining the ways of the world “the center works because occasionally everybody writes at least one check to them. If not, eventually the whole thing would collapse. Do you want to go back to a world where people had to do pointless labor to earn money? Imagine the horror of daily drudgery, to no real purpose, other than the acquisition of mere things.”
“We are living the dream outlined by Buckminster Fuller.”
“Think what horrors and wasted lives he saw before his vision came to fruition. Remember how things used to be? As Fuller put it,”
“’We should do away with the absolutely specious notion that everybody has to earn a living. It is a fact today that one in ten thousand of us can make a technological breakthrough capable of supporting all the rest. The youth of today are absolutely right in recognizing this nonsense of earning a living. We keep inventing jobs because of this false idea that everybody has to be employed at some kind of drudgery because, according to Malthusian Darwinian theory he must justify his right to exist. So we have inspectors of inspectors and people making instruments for inspectors to inspect inspectors. The true business of people should be to go back to school and think about whatever it was they were thinking about before somebody came along and told them they had to earn a living.’”
“That’s what created the whole system. Once we’d automated the tasks of producing food, goods, and delivering them, we realized most human jobs were working against the economy, not for it. Our labor became an obstacle to production rather than a facilitator. So what to do?”
“The early internet generation had an inkling, as YouTubers set to work building an audience and getting paid by advertisers to play games or react to videos. The whole thing was not just an entertainment economy, it was actor/audience economy. Some people were good at performing, others good at watching. The two groups supported each other.”
“When shopping malls closed by the thousands, enterprising minds discovered they could build obstacle courses, fighting rings, and virtual reality arenas in the old structures. People without traditional jobs suddenly found they could compete against other races or fighters, and that the crowds would pay to watch them.”
“Guilds sprang up as the system began to organize itself, training new competitors and arranging ever more grand competitions. The modern gladiator economy was born. Only there were so many different arenas nobody could compete in them all, so instead the goal was to create ever more elaborate spectacles.”
“With mass classroom schools permanently shuttered, gifted minds were unchained from the mediocre masses to focus on their true purpose: innovation. Free to devote their lives to innovation, the rate of scientific breakthroughs and discoveries entered a new golden age. The quantum relay was invented by a group of the gifted, who never would have been able to construct it in the socio-economic conditions of the late twentieth or early twenty-first centuries.”
“Our wagers facilitate the system by providing the lifeblood of the center. So don’t begrudge them a drop or two every now and then. Where the economy used to be built on labor, management, and consumers, now we have participants, audiences, and gamblers. Automation grew all the food we needed, made all the necessities and things we could ever want, and transported goods globally. Human beings were freed from a life of labor to focus on their life’s work.” Charles finished.
“Besides, I don’t know about you, but I would rather watch someone else being hunted by sabretooth tigers than be hunted myself.”
Blake sighed and sipped his drink.
“It’s a good thing you have excellent taste; I wonder if I should be able to listen to your speeches without alcohol.”
Charles laughed out loud. “I would never inflict that on you.”
Charles looked out the clear glass window at other geodesic domes around him, which dotted the valleys and hillsides of Central Appalachia in much the same way log cabins had three hundred years earlier. The new pioneers came to escape the crowded living conditions of the cities, but in a way that did not require them to disconnect from the global cybo-organic network, once known as the internet.
Micro homes provided occupants with all of life’s necessities for a fraction of the cost city dwellers paid for rent in dense urban areas. Communities of tiny homes had sprung up on reclaimed mining land, where inhabitants could access natural beauty outside and modern technology inside. After two hundred years of urban growth, Central Appalachia had found a way to reverse the trend. Wealthy, educated, and talented young people began flocking to the countryside away from massive urban centers, lured by a low cost of living and freedom from high crime and violence of the cities.
America was returning to its roots, going back to a time when the majority of the people lived in small communities of homesteaders. And like all times of intense change, there was a lot of money to be made.
The whole system had been designed and built deep into the mountains. Now city dwellers came here looking for wealth.
As nightfall came Susan climbed to the top of the canopy for a peek at the stars. The moon hung above the ceiling of the forest while the stars blazed with a light the floor below could not see. Up here the air tasted purer and less stifling than in the dense undergrowth of the forest.
Leaping from treetop to treetop by moonlight, she gazed out at the endless sea of forest silhouetted against the brilliant starlit sky. To her left, which she thought to be west, lay an endless expanse of virgin wilderness, untouched by human hands. Treetop running came naturally to her; maybe she had the spirit of a panther, she thought vividly.
With a tap of her finger against her left temple she activated her electro-optics, which swung a small thin visor downward giving her a menu of options for surveying the dense wilderness. By winking her right eye she selected infrared, turning her head down to regard the forest beneath her.
She’d preprogrammed the search criteria to look for a specific body mass. Smilodin Fatalis could weigh up to six hundred pounds, making them stand out from smaller mammals even in the deep brush of primeval foliage. Birds swooped and flew above her, and down below on the forest floor the nocturnal dance of hunter and hunted, which played out as it had since the dawn of time, brought a parade of darkened shapes scurrying back and forth in the 3D image provided by her visor.
Best known for their oversized upper teeth, sabre tooth tigers were less well known for their biggest strength, front legs thicker and stronger than those of African lions. The better to hold prey in place while those massive canines carved up the meal, the forepaws of the sabre tooth were immensely powerful. Once they had prey in their grip, the fight was over.
Like their Asian and African cousins, saber tooth tigers were solitary hunters. Alone in a vast landscape with dense vegetation and plenty of hiding places for prey, sabers had to find their meals without help from other members of their kind. Unlike wolves who could use numbers to find and chase down prey, sabers were on their own.
To make up for the lack of teammates, sabre tooth tigers possessed exceptional hearing, eyesight, and smell. Their nose and ears were comparable to blood hounds, and their eyes could see almost as well as eagles. They were ambush predators, preferring to hide and wait for the perfect moment to attack their unsuspecting prey. Long teeth made it difficult for prey to extract themselves, and while they were trying those powerful forepaws finished them off. After that the large cats could dine at their leisure. And she was running through their neighborhood.
Only a year ago she’d been one of the last human workers in a vanishing profession, retail sales. Drones loaded all of the goods in the giant warehouses where orders came in from all over the world now, as the entire retail process had become automated. Orders came in electronically, robots sorted and loaded the orders onto auto-trucks, and aerial drones completed the delivery by flying the merchandise directly to the customers’ home. Aside from repair work, humans weren’t needed at all. And repair bots were on the verge of taking most of those jobs too. Seeing the end she’d quit her job to focus on running.
She’d won race after race through sheer determination, earning the chance to compete for winnings through the quantum relay. Inside every worker an athlete, artist, and warrior was waiting to be freed. She had found her calling. Running was more than physical; for her it was spiritual.
Now she was running an ultramarathon in 20,000 BC, gliding above the forest canopy in total darkness. And avoiding sabretooth tigers. Gamblers were not above fixing the odds. Sending genetically engineered, enormous predatory cats after runners was not against the rules. There were no rules. And that was why she loved it.
"Cross the Bridge"
Cecile Dixon, Kentucky
Cecile Dixon, Kentucky
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The Tale of Little Mike
Little Mike wasn’t always little. He was born weighing a normal seven pounds and four ounces and twenty-one inches long. By the time he was a freshman in high school he was his full size of four foot four inches and seventy-seven pounds. Almost everybody at school taunted him for his size, except the stoners. It didn’t take Mike long to prove to them that even though he was little, he could party with the best of them. He could out-drink and out-smoke most men three times his size.
Thanks to an over sympathetic social worker, the state sent him a monthly disability check. So after two years of taunts and getting his head stuck in toilets, he quit high school and hung out at the poolroom all day. His momma bought him a mini bike with one of those checks. When he rode up in front of the poolroom each morning, he would take a dirty handkerchief from his pocket and rub the bike until it shone. As a joke Flea, one of the stoners, gave him a Harley vanity plate. He placed it on the front of the bike and polished it every day, too.
There was only one-way into town from the west side, a narrow, two-lane bridge across the wide river. Mike putt-putted across the bridge at a daring five miles an hour. Pity on you if you got stuck behind him on the long bridge. Sometimes traffic would be backed up for a mile.
Along about his twentieth year Mike met Tammy. Tammy wasn’t little like Mike; she was the opposite. She was about five foot six inches tall and weighed two hundred and fifty pounds. Tammy was several years younger than Mike. This, along with the fact that she went to the special school, probably explained why they had never met before. They loved each other from the moment they first laid eyes on each other, in the Pick and Pay parking lot. Tammy was helping her Mother load groceries into the trunk of the car. Mike was leaning against the pop machine, trying to look cool. When Mike finally caught Tammy's eye, he winked and then offered to buy her a cold drink.
Their story is not unlike most love stories. Tammy admired Mike's little bike and Mike admired the fact that Tammy admired him. It wasn’t long until Tammy was a regular passenger on the back of Mike’s bike as they crossed the bridge into town together.
On warm evenings the two could be seen at the Tastee-Freeze, Little Mike gently polishing his bike as Tammy washed down cheese Coneys with a triple thick shake.
With all her newfound happiness Tammy put on even more weight. The strain could be heard as the three and a half horsepower engine of the mini-bike whined in complaint with each pound she put on. The mini-bike speed now topped out at two or three miles an hour. Poor Tammy became so fat that her enormous backside hung down over the bike’s seat and rested on the little aluminum fender. It almost completely obliterated the tail and brake lights.
One hot summer evening as Little Mike was driving Tammy across the bridge for her evening milkshake a pickup truck driven by Bobby Hardy followed behind. Bobby was coasting along, watching Tammy’s large ass quiver inside her tight stretch pants with the vibration of the mini-bike motor. He was following close enough to the mini-bike to count the dimples in Tammy’s ass, so he failed to notice the log truck that was barreling up behind him. The log truck rear-ended the pick-up, shoving it forward onto the mini-bike, killing both Little Mike and Tammy.
Tastee-Freeze on an Average Morning
Maudie slid two eggs off the grill and placed them beside the sausage and toast waiting on the plate.
“Maudie Honey, can you warm my cup?” Wye held his coffee cup up.
"Junetta, get Wye some coffee.” Maudie’s eyes scanned the busy restaurant for the missing waitress. In the far corner Junetta was standing in front of the jukebox, giggling as she picked out songs with Dickie. Maudie watched as Dickie slid his arm around Junetta’s waist. She swallowed back a lump of jealousy and called out, “Junetta, I need some help. Wye needs some coffee and Gene’s breakfast is ready.”
Junetta mumbled, “sorry” and picked up the coffee pot, placed Gene’s breakfast in front of him and filled the coffee cups of the three men.
Everyone in the place looked up at the sound of a small mini-bike putt-putting up in front of the big plate glass windows. They watched as Tammy lumbered off first, then Mike climbed down. Tammy took her usual spot on the bench, while Mike began rubbing the road dust off the bike.
Wye turned to Sherriff Gene and said, “You aught to make him keep that thing off the road. It ain’t safe him hauling my girl around on the contraption.”
“If you don’t want Tammy on that thing, don’t let her go.” Gene answered between mouthfuls of food.
“Easy fer you to say. Ever time I open my mouth I got to go up against her and her Mama.”
“Ahh, leave em alone. They’s just kids.”
“Cept Mike’s a runt. Of all the characters that half-wit gal a mine could a picked, she took up with a midget. Could a found some hard workin’ dim wit that could at least feed her, but no she takes up with a runt. Everybody knows his own Daddy couldn’t stand the sight of him. Hightailed it out a here and never even looked back.”
“I heard that that boy weren’t none of Big Mike’s seed anyhow. Heard Elvira got him by some dwarf that come through here with the carnival.” Deputy Ben spoke up from his perch as he blew on his now too hot coffee.
Gene frowned at the two men, “You all sound like a bunch of clucking old hens. Why in the hell do you want to stir up gossip that’s been dead for nigh on twenty years?”
Gene watched the couple through the big window. Mike picked a Dandelion flower that was sprouting in a crack in the sidewalk. He handed the yellow blossom to Tammy. She sniffed the bloom and smiled a Mona Lisa smile.
“I think Tammy likes the look of Little Mike just fine.” Sherriff Gene turned all his attention back to his breakfast.
Maudie looked away from the window as a warm gust of air heralded the arrival of another customer. Flea entered the diner and walked along the counter saying a few words to each customer as he passed. When he neared the sheriff’s stool he dropped his head down and wouldn’t meet the sheriff’s eyes.
“Flea son what brings you out so early this morning?” The sheriff asked.
“Not early Sheriff, just a late night.”
“I sure hope you was at a prayer service and not out doing no good.”
“Not doing anything on the wrong side of the law, Sheriff. I’m keeping my nose clean.” Flea snickered and asked Maudie for a cup of black coffee to go.
As Flea left the restaurant the sheriff called out, “Flea, stop by and see your Mama sometime today. She worries about you.” Then he mumbled as he took a sip of coffee, “Spends her nights praying for the Lord to keep you safe.”
Flea paused and made a mock salute “Will do Dad, will do.” The bell tinkled again as he left.
Maudie turned from the grill and wiped the sweat from her brow with her apron hem. Junetta was clearing dirty dishes from a table that had just been vacated. Dickie was sitting with his back to the counter admiring Junetta’s ass, as she stretched to reach dishes on the far side of the booth. Junetta turned and caught Dickie’s eyes and smiled at him until she saw Maudie looking. She blushed then bustled the stack of dishes to the sink.
Wye stood from the counter and slid a dollar bill under his coffee cup. “See you in the morning, Gene. I got to get home and help the old woman pick beans. She’s planning on canning some today.”
“Don’t work too hard. Tell Deanie, I’ll be expecting a quart of beans come winter.” Sheriff Gene sopped the egg off his plate with a crust of toast.
Wye nodded and walked out of the diner. Outside he paused and looked at Mike and Tammy sitting on the bench, their hands twinned together.
“Morning Daddy, look at the pretty flower Mike picked for me.” Tammy held out the Dandelion bloom toward Wye.
“Ain’t no flower, just a worthless weed.” Wye muttered as he turned to get in his truck.
Now For the Story
Ma
"Chick-chick-chick-chicken” the large woman called as she scattered cracked corn onto the hard packed dirt of the chicken yard. The chickens answered her call, squawking and pecking around her feet. When the pan was empty she turned it upside down over a fencepost. Pausing for a moment she looked over the chickens before reaching down, grabbing a young white rooster and tucking him under her arm. She stepped through the gate and carefully latched it behind her.
"Ma! Ma! Where are you?" came a frantic call from the front porch of the old house.
"Right here. Mike, what ever are you hollerin about?" Her steel gray hair had worked loose from its bun and she used her free hand to shove it out of her eyes as she peered at her son. Satisfied that he was in no dire distress, she returned her attention to the rooster pinned under her left arm. With one fluid motion she grabbed him by the neck and rotated her wrist, snapping the bird's neck. She held his feet tightly as his wings beat futilely against her leg.
Ignoring the dying chicken, Mike asked, "Ma, can I have ten dollars?"
"I just give you ten dollars day afore yesterday. Don't tell me you done spent it." She frowned down at Mike.
"I guess I did, but I want to take Tammy for a ride and I ain't got enough gas."
"That thing don't hold no ten dollars worth of gas." She nodded toward the mini bike parked on the front porch.
Mike looked up at his Ma, his blue eyes pleading. If not for the scraggly whiskers on his chin he could have been an eight-year-old child. He sure acted like one most times, thought his Ma.
Reaching her free hand into the bosom of her dress she pulled a thin roll of money out. With her thumb she shuffled through the bills until she came to a five.
This she held toward Mike. "This is all you're a gettin this month. Won’t do you no good to ask for more. I got bills to pay."
Mike snatched the money from her and called, "Thanks Ma" over his shoulder as he headed toward the mini bike.
He rolled the bike out into the yard and climbed on. Just as he placed his foot on the kick-start, she asked, "Will you be home for supper?"
She nodded toward the chicken still flapping in her hand.
"Can I bring Tammy?"
"I guess you can." Then she slowly added, "If you have to."
"See you at supper." Mike grinned his little boy grin as he brought all of his seventy-seven pounds down on the starter and the bike roared alive, it's lawn mower motor noise drowning out any possibility of talk.
His Ma watched as he left a trail of dust up the gravel road. She watched until he was out of sight and then starred at the empty road for a few minutes longer before remembering the rooster dangling in her hand. He had stopped fluttering, but his mouth was working like he was trying to suck one last breath into his lungs.
Flea
The bell over the door clanked and Shorty looked up to see Flea walk into the empty poolroom.
"Man, you look like you tangled with the wrong end of a she cat." Shorty said as Flea blinked in the dim light of the room.
"Too much party and not enough sleep." Flea mumbled as his eyes adjusted. "You ain't got a little weed you could let me have? I need a little something to get rid of this pounding in my head."
I ain't got much, but I'll share." Shorty pulled a baggy out of his pocket and placed a few pinches into the sleeve of a cigarette pack. "Here see if this don't help. It's home grown, but it ain't half bad."
Flea paid Shorty for the weed and a Mountain Dew then walked out the back door to the alley. Leaning against the building he downed half the Dew then proceeded to roll a joint.
He had taken two hits when the loud sound of squealing tires and metal on metal crunch filled the air. Blunting the fire of the joint he carefully placed it back in the cellophane before making his way around the poolroom to Main Street.
On the bridge a log truck had rear ended a pick-up and shoved it into the iron railing on the bridge. Flea began running toward the bridge. About half way he had a fit of coughing and had to slow his pace to a jog. When he reached the bridge it seemed the log truck had shoved the pick-up into the bridges iron railing.
Lonnie Crabb jumped out of the log truck and ran over to the pick-up and looked into the mangled cab. Turning to Flea he screamed, "He's hurt bad. For God's sake get some fuckin help."
Flea turned and ran back across the bridge, his lungs burning and his chest heaving. As he entered the poolroom for the second time that day, he tried to tell Shorty to summon help between gasps for air. "Wreck....bridge....hurt bad.....call the law." As Shorty picked up the phone and began to dial, Flea made his way back to the bridge.
On the bridge, Lonnie Crabb, the log truck driver, was sitting on his running board, holding his head in his hands. Flea peered into the pick-up's cab. The driver was bleeding from a big gash in his forehead and his body was twisted and pinned between the bent steering and the truck door. Every few seconds he would take a gasp of air, making bloody bubbles appear at his nostrils.
Flea shook his shoulder asking, "hey man, you with us?" No answer.
Bout that time two police cars came screaming from town. As Flea moved out of their way his foot slipped on a contorted piece of metal. Bending to pick it up he glanced under the pick-up's front end. There so tangled you couldn't tell where one began and the other ended, were Little Mike, Tammy and Little Mike's bike. Flea walked slowly across the bridge toward town, carrying the crushed vanity plate.
Sheriff Gene
"Damn it, Ben, can't you get that bunch of gawkers out of here. Tell ‘em they're going to jail if they don't go home." The Sheriff yelled at his Deputy.
"I'll try, Gene." The deputy walked to the town side of the bridge, waving his arms and yelling, "Shows over, folks. Go on home before the Sheriff makes me take y'all to jail fer obstructing official business."
Sheriff Gene nodded to two men standing by a tow truck. "Boys, let's get them out of there."
Two men in greasy coveralls hooked a wench cable to the front of Bobby Hardy's pick-up. After the cable was secure one of the men adjusted controls on the side of the tow truck, while the other squatted in front of the pick-ups' mangled bumper. Suddenly, with a screech of metal and a grinding of gears, the front end of the pick-up began to slowly rise.
"Easy, boys, we don't want to tear 'em up any more than they already are." Sherriff Gene yelled at the tow truck driver. He squatted down and peered under the pick-ups front as it slowly raised, revealing two bodies twisted together with truck and mini-bike parts.
When the truck's front end was a yard off the bridge, the tow-truck man began tugging at the mini-bike. Billy Ray, the undertaker's helper, crawled under and began trying to gently disengage flesh from metal. He pulled one of Tammy's arms from the wreckage and was rotating her shoulder to try to free the rest of her body. "Gene, can you give me a hand?" He called out to the sheriff.
Sherriff Gene grunted as he heaved his large body into the tight space. Holding Tammy's arm up he bore its weight as Billy Ray worked on freeing her shoulder. Suddenly Tammy's upper half was free of the wreckage and Billy Ray began crawling backward tugging Tammy's body with him. As Tammy's body shifted, the upper half of Little Mike's body, which had been wedged between Tammy and the pick-up's fan belt housing, slid free and into Sherriff Gene's lap.
Little Mike's eyes were open and, although they had a death glaze, he seemed to be staring at the Sherriff. The sheriff shifted trying to move away from Mike’s dead eyes, but he was trapped holding Mike’s head while Billy Ray wrapped Tammy's body in a black body bag. Gene tried to look away, but he couldn't. Each time he glanced away his eyes were drawn back.
A small trickle of blood was drying in Little Mike's right ear. Gene wrapped his arm around Mike's head to keep it from sliding. The last time he'd seen Mike, was it yesterday or the day before? He'd almost hollered at him, almost told him to keep that damn little bike off the road. It weren't safe. He almost told him, but he hadn't. Mike had been so proud of that bike. Gene hadn't wanted to take that away from him. Poor little guy just wanted to be like other boys, taking his girl out.
As soon as the two bodies were loaded in the hearse, Gene climbed into his cruiser without saying anything to the few stragglers that remained. He drove straight to his office, went inside, and locked the door. Reaching way back in the bottom drawer of his file cabinet, he pulled out a pint of Yellowstone. He blew the dust off the whisky bottle and sat down at his desk. The old leather chair creaked in protest. The bottle had been in the file cabinet a long time, twenty years in fact. He'd kept it as reminder of all the reasons he couldn't drink, his job, his kids, and his wife.
In the twenty years he'd been sober he'd never wanted a drink as bad as he did right now. He wanted to get drunk, drunk enough so he'd forget the look of those dead eyes. Those dead eyes telling him he was wrong. Telling him he should have done his job. Gene cracked the seal on the bottle.
Mr. Lakes
Elvira’s eyes were so swollen from crying that she could barely see the door-handle of the funeral home. As she fumbled with the knob the door swung open and in front of her stood Tammy’s parents, Wye and Deanie.
“I, um.” Elvira mumbled as she stepped aside.
Wye stood in the doorway, his fleshy face red and angry. “You sure the last person I wanted to see right now.” His words shot toward Elvira like bullets.
“Why…”Elvira sputtered, but before she could get her words out Wye continued ranting in a loud, angry voice.
“Cause of that boy of yours we have to bury our gal. Cause of that boy of yours I got to go in debt to get her in the ground.”
“Hush Wye, you ain’t helping things.” Tears streamed down Deanie’s cheeks as she tugged at Wye’s arm. “Don’t do this, not now.”
“Cause of that boy of yours Deanie here ain’t done nothing but rock and cry and pray since we got word. He was your boy, you aught to have to pay.” Spit from Wye’s lips hit Elvira’s face.
Mr. Lakes, the funeral director, heard the commotion from his office and walked to the doorway. “Here Wye, why don’t you and me take a walk?” Mr. Lakes put his arm around Wye’s shoulder and gently steered him through the door and down the sidewalk.
Elvira watched the two men walk away and was surprised to find her hand still holding the door. Deanie moved through the doorway and sat down on a marble, smoker’s bench that was beside the entrance. She leaned forward, covered her face with both of her hands and began to sob. Soon the sobs turned to low guttural moans.
Elvira let the door close and sat down beside her, placing her arms around Deanie’s shoulders. “Lord, Lord help us. Deanie, I thought I was bearing this grief alone.” The two women clutched each other and rocked and cried together.
After a while Deanie’s moans subsided and she pulled back from Elvira’s arms and looked into her face. Her voice was raw and raspy when she spoke, “Tammy loved Mike, you know. She was always so child-like that it surprised me when I saw that she loved him like a woman loves a man. She never called him Little Mike, just Mike. He was big enough to be her whole world. Ain’t nothing little ‘bout a man that means that much to a woman.”
Jealousy. The thought ripped through Elvira’s grief and twisted her heart. From the time Big Mike left, Elvira thought it’d always be Little Mike and her. She’d never thought Little Mike would ever become a man. She’d done everything she could to keep him from being a man. There had never been anything wrong with Tammy. Elvira thought about how Tammy would always offer to help around the house, wash up after supper, or sweep the floor. Elvira had always steeled herself to Tammy’s offer of help. Couldn’t nobody do her housework right except her. Couldn’t nobody do her housework and couldn’t no other woman love her boy. Elvira hadn’t wanted Tammy to take her place, the place of the only woman in Little Mike’s life. The revelation came to her, sudden and sharp. Little Mike loved Tammy and was loved back in return. He had died with the arms of the woman he loved holding him.
“Little Mike loved Tammy too.” Elvira sobbed.
“I know honey, I know.”
The women hugged each other, their grieving hearts comforted just a little.
As they hugged, Wye and Mr. Lakes came walking back up the sidewalk. The women pulled apart and watched the men, both trying to read Wye’s face for signs of anger. There wasn’t any.
“I think Wye and I have come up with a beautiful idea. Deanie, if you and Elvira would step in my office with us, we’ll talk about it.” Mr. Lakes held the door open for the women and he and Wye followed them into the small office.
“Now before I begin let me ask, are either of you mothers opposed to having a double funeral? Now I want you all to think hard because I don’t want to push you into this while you both are vulnerable with grief. These two young people found each other against the personal odds that each faced, they come together and spent every minute they could together. And by a plan only known by the good Lord, they died together. Wye and me talked it over and we come to the conclusion that it would be fitting to bury them together. That is, if you two find it agreeable.”
Elvira looked toward Deanie. Deanie took Elvira’s hand in her own and squeezed it tightly. At the same time, the both said, “Yes” softly, as fresh tears wet their faces.
Mr. Lakes passed them a box of tissues and both women murmured, “Thank you.”
“All of you all knew Roscoe Cole.” All three nodded in agreement before Mr. Lakes continued. “Well, as you know Roscoe was a big man. When he was first diagnosed with cancer, he come in here and made his arrangements. Said he didn’t want to leave it on Sarah Jane and the kids. Good man, Roscoe was.”
“Finer man never lived.” Wye agreed.
“He had me order him a custom-made, walnut veneer, casket. Made to fit him. As you all know, once the cancer took hold the weight just rolled off him and by the time the Lord called him home, he was a skinny man. Sarah Jane didn’t want him buried in that big casket, as beautiful as it was, so I ordered her another one, a regular sized one. Now for two years that big casket has been setting back in my storeroom.”
Elvira gently rubbed Deanie’s hand.
“Truth told, that casket is plenty big enough for Little Mike and Tammy and if you agree, we could bury them together, like they died.” Mr. Lakes spoke softly and for a long moment it was quiet.
“I been dreaded having Little Mike put in the ground by himself. It would be good to know he’s resting beside Tammy, if it’s all right with you all?” Elvira looked toward Deanie.
“Yes, I know Tammy would want to be with Mike.” Deanie eyes turned upon Wye.
“Now how much is this double funeral going to set me back? You know I ain’t a rich man.” The anger had gone out of Wye’s voice.
“The casket I’ll donate and the funeral will be one, except for the cost of preparing the remains. Wye, I ain’t out to make money. I just want to help ya’ll, best I can at such a difficult time.”
Wye stood and shook Mr. Lakes’ hand and the women hugged.
Funeral arrangements for Little Mike and Tammy were made.
Maudie
Maudie flipped the switch that lit up the Tastee Freeze Open sign. Then she wet a bar towel in soapy water and walked absentmindedly to the empty counter and began wiping, moving aside the condiment containers as she cleaned. She had finished cleaning the counter and started wiping down the booths when the door opened.
Dickey Lee, her boyfriend of three years, walked through the door and slid onto one of the stools at the counter. Maudie paused to admire his lean, lanky frame and the cat-like way he moved. She remembered back to a time when she felt lucky to catch such a good-looking man, six years her junior.
"Is it all ready lunch time? Lawd, I've lost track of the day." Maudie tied an apron across her stomach to protect the black dress she was wearing. "You hungry?"
"Yeah, fix me a bowl of chili."
"I didn't make no chili this morning. I went to the funeral. It sure was pitiful. Miz Tincher is surely going to be lost without Little Mike. I can fix you a hamburger or a BLT."
"I don't know why you are so worked up about a midget and a fuckin fat assed retard dying."
"Don't be mean. They was sweet kids."
"You're too soft. They hung around here every evening, taking up space, making real customers sick to look at them. You should'a run them off."
"I don't think they ever bothered a soul."
"They bothered me. I'm glad they're gone."
"You're an asshole. I was jealous of them."
"Jealous?"
"Yeah, jealous. Jealous of the way Little Mike looked at Tammy, love pouring out of his eyes. No man ever looked at me like that."
"I always thought he was looking in amazement, wondering how many hot dogs and shakes could one cow eat. If you want a man who looks at you like that, well, you're with the wrong guy."
Maudie had started to walk to the kitchen to fix Dickey Lee's lunch but his words stopped her. She stood still breathing fast, her face flushed. Slowly she turned to face Dickey Lee. She watched as he played with the saltshaker, pouring salt onto the counter and tracing a pattern with his finger.
"I think you're right. I am with the wrong man. I deserve better." Her voice cold and hard.
Dickey Lee looked up at Maudie, surprised. She had never spoke to him in that tone. "You mean you'd rather have a midget warming your bed, well, have at it."
"I want somebody who looks at me with love, not just looking for what I can do for them. It ain't all about what goes on in the bed. They's a whole lot more to love than that. I think it's time you went upstairs to my place and pack up all your shit and find a new place to lay down your head tonight. I'm done."
"After three fucking years, this is how you act? I got news for you, woman, you ain't gonna find nobody to love you like I do or put up with your whiney ass." Spit flew between Dickey Lee's lips with each word.
"Yeah, this is how I act after three years of putting a roof over your head, feeding you, and wondering where you're at and who you're with on Saturday nights. Don't make this any worse than it has to be. Just leave."
"Fuck you." Dickey Lee slammed the door shut behind him and stomped up the stairs outside the Tastee-Freeze. Maudie listened as he clumped around above her head, yelling curses as he slammed doors and banged drawers shut. After a few minutes, he came back down the stairs and threw some bags in his car. He pulled out of the parking lot, showering the front of the building with gravel. Maudie whispered, "Good riddance” and watched as he fishtailed down the street. When he was out of sight, she sat down in a booth, lowered her head onto her arm, and sobbed.
Cheryl
"Mama, can you watch the boys, for just a little while?" Cheryl stood in the front doorway of her parent's house. Her youngest son squirmed on her hip. She stooped to lower him to the floor and he toddled after his older brother.
Cheryl's mother walked from the kitchen, wiping her sweaty face with a dishtowel. "I'm trying to get some beans canned."
"It won’t be for long, I just need to look for Bobby's billfold. It's got all his stuff, driver's license, social security card, and stuff like that. They need it to set up his disability. I think it might be in the truck and I don't want the boys running around a junkyard."
"Go on then and hurry back." She turned and walked back to her beans.
"You all behave and mind your grandma." Cheryl yelled toward the room where the boys had disappeared. "Thanks, Mama." She called over her shoulder as she got into her car.
The junkyard was ten miles on the other side of town and, as Cheryl drove over the bridge, she felt uneasy, just like she had every time she drove over it since the wreck. Bobby had laid out all night again, the night before, and when he rolled in the door, she was pissed. More than pissed, fed up. They'd fought. The mean words they'd said to each other bounced around in Cheryl's head. It wasn't much different than the fights they'd had ever since they'd been married, except this time Cheryl had thrown the hardest punch she'd ever swung, "I don't love you anymore." When Bobby stomped out the door, Cheryl had yelled, "Me and the kids won’t be here when you get home, if you even bother coming back." She'd meant every single thing she'd said. Then the wreck happened.
As Cheryl pulled off the highway and onto the junkyard parking lot, she strained to get a glimpse of the truck. Kudzu and Trumpet vines created a thick mat that covered the fence and she couldn't see anything beyond the green leaves. Cheryl pulled the key from the ignition, picked up an empty plastic grocery sack from the seat, and walked into the building that a rusty sign proclaimed, "Office."
Cool dank air and the smell of old motor oil assaulted her nose as she looked around. "Anybody here?" She called out.
"Be right there." Came a muffled reply from the shadowy recess of the repair bay. Tink walked out of the darkness wiping his greasy hands. "Hey, Cheryl, what can I do for you?"
"I think there's some of Bobby's things, tools and such in his truck. I can't find his billfold. It might have got left. I was wondering if I could get his stuff out?"
"Sure, take anything you want, ain't much of it left except the motor and transmission. I ain't looked in the cab. How's Bobby doing?"
"I guess as well as could be expected. They're moving him to Louisville next week, to a rehab center. Doctors say in time he'll be able to move himself from the bed to his chair and wheel himself around." Cheryl sighed and pushed her pale, blonde hair off her forehead. "It's sure going to take some getting used to. Bobby weren't never still for a minute in his whole life."
"I feel like hell about what happened to Bobby. Is there anything I can do to help out? You and the kids need anything?"
"No. I don't reckon there's anything anybody can do. Me and the kids are doing ok. Mama and Daddy's been helping out right smart."
Cheryl straightened the wrinkles out of the plastic bag with her fingers. "Do you have the keys to the truck?"
"I think they're still in it, but you won't need them. They cut the door off to get him out. It's parked at the back of the lot." Tink motioned with his right hand. “I parked it way back there to keep nosey people from ridding my fence down, trying to get a look. Wait a minute and I'll lock the doors and we'll walk back there."
"I'd rather go by alone, if you don't care. I really just want to see how it looks by myself." Cheryl nervously pleated the bag with her fingers.
"Just be careful back there. Watch out for sharp edges and such. Don't want you getting cut up on something."
Cheryl walked out the back office door into the junkyard. Cars were stacked three and four high in places. She was careful to walk in the middle of the overgrown gravel road. Deeper into the junkyard the road became more like a path. Weeds grew around and inside the mangled cars, and some were completely covered by Kudzu. Cheryl thought it was pretty in a scary way. Finally the road curved around an old school bus that was sprouting ragweed where its motor should have been and on the other side was Bobby’s truck.
Weeds had begun to grow up around it, but they hadn't claimed it yet. It was wadded up like a giant had squeezed it in his hand. It bore little resemblance to the truck that Bobby had sped off in the morning of the wreck. She had known it would look bad, but not this bad.
She made her way through the weeds to the place where the driver's door should have been. The steering wheel was bent and hanging down almost touching the seat. Cheryl could barely fit into the cramped space. She was glad that Bobby couldn't remember much about the wreck.
Something brown and crusty was dried on the steering wheel and seat. Cheryl picked at it with her fingernail. Slowly, she realized what it was, dried blood.
She turned and twisted herself in the seat to reach the glove box. As she did, she felt something hard under her knee, a lipstick tube. She turned the unfamiliar tube around in her hand. Straining her eyes to see in the dim light, she read the tiny label on the bottom of the tube aloud, "On Fire Red." Slowly, she removed the cap and twisted the base, a bright red finger of lipstick rose upward. With it Cheryl drew a vivid line across her forearm, the bright color made her pale skin seem even paler.
As Cheryl stared at her arm, she thought aloud, "What kind of woman leaves a crippled man?"
Lonnie Crabb
The early morning light in the jail cell was dim and the air musty. Although it was before breakfast call, the voices and noises of the many men in the confined space were already escalating to a level that was almost maddening. After seven months Lonnie knew that the noise would continue to increase all day until lights out, when it would decrease to a steady hum for a few short hours. This was the thing that was hardest for him, not having a moment of quiet. He thought back to the time before the accident, being in his truck alone, turning off the CB radio, and the quiet, just the sound of the big Cummings diesel engine and eighteen wheels turning over pavement. Freedom and quiet.
Lonnie rose from his bunk and walked the three steps to the commode. His cellmate, Jim, groaned and rolled over to face the wall. This was as private as it got. After urinating in the stainless steel commode, Lonnie smoothed the thin blanket over his bunk and bent to his knees, using the bunk as an alter for his prayers.
Lonnie had been brought up going to a Pentecostal church. As he got older, he had strayed from his church and religion. Now he found his only confidant, confessor, and comforter was God. In the church of his youth, prayer was a noisy thing, everyone praying together and trying to raise his or her voices higher than the other in order to reach God’s ear. Out of respect for his cellmate, Lonnie kept his prayers down to a low mumble.
“Lord, I thank you for your great blessings and ask your forgiveness for my many sins. Please, look over my wife and mama and my little children. Comfort the hearts of the families that my actions hurt. Please, Lord, heal Bobby Hardy’s broken back and make him whole again. Lord, I’m asking for thy will be done. If you see fit to free me so I can return home to my family. Lord, if it is your will and I am freed, I’ll try to live better and walk the Christian path that you designed for man.”
Jim snorted from his top bunk.
Hurriedly, Lonnie finished his prayer. “I pray in your name, Amen.”
“It’s funny how everybody gets religion when they come in here.” Jim’s voice was mocking.
“I guess when men hit bottom the good Lord’s the only place they got left to turn.” Lonnie stood and leaned against the bunk.
“Oh, you’re a long way from bottom. We’ll see how long your religion lasts after you been in here a year or two, after that wife of yours gets lonesome and finds a new man for your kids to call daddy.”
Before Lonnie could reply, a guard walked to the cell bars and said, “Crabb, your attorney’s here.” He yelled, “Open gate three-twenty-four.”
Lonnie followed the guard to the legal consultation room and took a seat at the table. Before long the steel door opened again and Lonnie’s lawyer entered and took a seat across from him. Lonnie’s mama and wife had hired the slick looking city lawyer, Odell Reed, from Lexington. Lonnie’s mama had put a lien on her house and his wife had sold what was left of his truck to pay this man with his fancy suit and soft hands. Lonnie didn’t like him, but he was forced out of necessity to trust him to a degree.
“Good morning, Lonnie. Sorry to show up so early, but I got what I think is good news and didn’t think you’d want to wait until I got out of court this afternoon to hear it.”
Although Lonnie’s heart started beating faster at the prospect of “good news”, he showed no outward signs of excitement. He grunted and nodded at Odell.
Odell popped open his fancy leather briefcase and pulled out a stack of legal looking papers. “You seem to have a solid reputation around Bullock, even the Prosecutor spoke well of you. That’s one strong thing we’ve had going for us, you’ve never been in trouble before.” Odell shuffled through the papers. “I met with the Judge and Prosecutor yesterday and they offered you a Plea Bargain.”
“What’s that?” Lonnie asked.
“A Plea Bargain is where you agree to plead guilty to a lesser offence and in return you get a reduced sentence.”
“I know what a Plea is. What did they offer?”
“Five years.”
“Five years?”
“I know it seems like a long time, but if you went to trial, you could get twenty. They’ll give you credit for time served, so you’ve got a good six months served. If you behave yourself and do good time, you’ll be eligible for parole in a year and a half.”
A year and a half. A year and a half in a place where a day drug on like a month. The thought bore down on Lonnie and created a weight as heavy as a mountain sitting on his chest. A year and a half away from his wife Lettie. Jim’s words pounded through Lonnie’s head, ‘after that wife of yours gets lonesome and finds a new man for your kids to call daddy.’ A year and a half or risk a jury saying twenty.
“I’ll take it.” Defeat would barely let the words escape through Lonnie’s lips.
“Good, good. I think you’re doing the best thing. I’ll file the paper work and they’ll set a court date where you will have to formally accept the plea. You understand what that means? You’ll have to stand in front of the judge and say you’re guilty of two counts of vehicular manslaughter.”
“I ain’t never denied the fact that I was driving a truck fifteen miles over the speed limit and I rear-ended a pick up and caused two peoples death.”
Odell stuck out his hand and they shook before leaving the consultation room. On the way back to the cell, Lonnie did a second thing that went against his grain, he begged the guard to let him use the phone to call Lettie.
When Lettie answered he couldn’t say it, couldn’t tell her he’d be gone for at least another year and a half, surely couldn’t tell her it might be five years before he’d be free.
He just fought back tears and said, “I just wanted to tell you that I love you. Kiss my babies. Tell mama to take her medicine like the doctor says. I’ll write you a letter as soon as I get back to my cell.” Yeah, he’d write her. It’d be easier to say in black and white on paper.
Bobby Hardy
Hank climbed out of the truck, grabbing a fifth of bootleg whiskey that rested in the seat beside him. He carried it by the neck as he walked across the packed dirt yard and onto the porch of the run-down house. Peering through the screen-door into the dark interior of the house, he called, “Bobby, you here?”
“Now, Hank, how the fuck you think I’m gonna go anywhere’s?” Came a voice from the darkness.
“I jus didn’t wanna get shot, walkin in. I brought your bottle. Toad put it on your bill, said you’d bout run your limit this month.”
“Fuck Toad.”
After Hank’s eyes adapted to the darkness of the room, he could make out Bobby lying on a cot in the far corner. The foul smell of decaying mice carcasses and urine blasted his nose as flies buzzed around his head. Stepping over the crushed mice bodies, Hank handed the bottle of whiskey to Bobby. “Why don’t you let me put out some poison to get rid of these things?”
“These vermin is the only entertainment I got. I have become the great hunter of mice. I can lay here perfectly still, which is easy since the bottom half of my body wouldn’t move if you fired a twelve-gauge shotgun up my ass. The little creatures come scurryin’ along and I wait till they’re in reach of my mighty fly swat. Then I crush 'em!” For emphasis, Bobby brought the fly swat down hard on one of the dead mice.
Hank walked into the kitchen and came back with a piece of cardboard and a broom. He began to sweep the mice onto the cardboard and toss them into the yard.
Bobby pulled his wasted legs and torso into a semi-sitting position using his arms. Taking a mouthful of whiskey from the bottle, his lips puckered, then he swished it around like mouthwash before swallowing.
“Killin’ mice and drankin’ whiskey, the only thangs I got now.” He took another longer swallow of whiskey. “Two year ago, I hunted deer and pussy. You know, I had a hard on when that log-truck hit me. The last one I’ll ever have an it was wasted, thankin’ about that fat assed Tammy.”
Big Mike
He eyed the line between the cue ball and the eight ball, making gentle feign strokes with the stick. When it felt right, he skillfully jabbed the stick forward, hitting the white ball, low and left. The cue ball made a loud cracking sound as it connected with the eight ball sending it spinning and sinking it in the side pocket. Big Mike grinned as he picked the twenty-dollar bill up from the side rail.
Several of the observers slapped Big Mike's shoulders. Mumbling, "Good game."
Big Mike's opponent grinned as he shook Mike's hand. "Hell, I left you set. You just got lucky."
Big Mike turned his can of Pabst up and drained it into his mouth. "Come on, let me buy you a beer to show you I'm a gracious winner."
"No, thanks. I'll take you up on that next time. I gotta get home. Work in the morning."
As Big Mike made his way across the crowded room toward the bar, he caught the attention of a pale man warming a bar stool and nursing a glass filled with amber liquid. The man's puzzled look became one of recognition as Big Mike neared the bar.
"Ain't you Big Mike Tincher, from up Harbuck County?" He said when Mike was within voice range.
"I might be. What's it to you?" Big Mike eyed the smaller man suspiciously.
"I'm Joe, Joe Dieters, Larry Dieters boy. From over on Peck's Branch. Shore never expected to run into anybody from home, surly didn't expect to see you."
Big Mike stuck out his hand and as the men grasped hands Big Mike said, "Larry Dieters, Larry Dieters, now that's a name from way back. We ran together when we was boys. You look like him. What brings you to New Orleans?"
"I'm working over in Houston, going home to visit the folks, and just thought I'd layover here a couple of days before I flew North. Boy, the folks'll be surprised when I tell I met you here."
"What are you drinking? " Big Mike motioned to the bartender. "Let me buy you one to sip on while we catch up on the goings on back in Harbuck."
The two men sat at the bar and talked of local politics, marriages, births, who was in jail, who had gotten rich and those that were in the poor house. Some time passed and many drinks were consumed before Big Mike worked up enough courage to ask what for news of the person he was most concerned about.
"How's Elvira doing?" He dropped his eyes, not able to look at Joe.
"Mike, she ain't doing so good, last I heard."
"What's ailing her?"
"She ain't been right since the accident."
A puzzled look came on Mike's face.
"Ahh shit, you ain't heard. Lord, I'm sorry. "
"Heard what?" Mike asked, his voice low.
"Little Mike, he got run over by a log truck."
Big Mike swallowed hard, but the quiver was apparent in his voice. "Kill him?"
"Yeah, poor little guy, dead before the law got there."
"When?"
"Let me see, it's been almost two years now, right before I got the job in Houston."
Big Mike was suddenly very quiet, unusual for him, but a knot had began forming in his stomach and was slowly working its way up his chest, making thought and conversation difficult.
"I sure hate to spring it on you like that. I didn't know nobody'd told you." Joe laid his hand on Big Mike's shoulder.
"I ain't kept in contact with folks back home. Guess nobody know'd how to reach me." Big Mike was suddenly sober, with the taste of beer souring in his mouth. "Look, Joe, it's been good talking to you, but I need to take off now. I got some things I need to think over."
"I understand."
The two men shook hands and Big Mike walked out of the bar to his truck and, without mulling over things, headed up I-10, bound for Harbuck County. As he drove, he replayed his life and guilt poured over him like sweat and left him coated in a thick layer. The guilt of leaving Elvira with a five-year-old baby; guilt of loving that baby, but not being able to accept him as he was.
He drove through the rest of the night, stopping only for fuel and coffee. When the sun came up the next morning, he drove on, the sunlight making his eyes tear until the water poured over his cheeks. Angrily, he brushed at his face and thought of the last time he’d seen Elvira, standing in the door with the too little baby on her hip. Tears had washed down her face too, but Big Mike had walked away, ignoring her tears, and bottling up his feelings. The bottle broke open now, like a bottle of pop left too long in the freezer, and years of bound up emotion spewed forth.
He drove and thought and cried through the day and in the evening he reached Harbuck County. As he turned onto the road leading to the old farmhouse he'd once shared with Elvira, he stopped the truck and shut off the motor. In the still night, he contemplated what he was going to say to Elvira. "I'm sorry,” seemed too puny and weak for all the pain she'd had to bear.
Big Mike got out of his truck and walked the last few yards to the house. When he reached the gate, he could see Elvira through the kitchen window. She was sitting at the table her head bowed over a book, the Bible. Big Mike could see her lips move as she read. He stood there watching her and remembering how happy she's been when they bought this place. She'd worked like a fiend, fixing things up, making things ready for the child she carried in her belly. His child. His son.
They'd both been so happy when the baby boy was born, looking so perfect at first, then failing to grow. They'd took him to doctors all over, all the way to Lexington and Louisville. The answer was always the same. Nothing you could do; a genetic abnormality.
For the first time in his life, Big Mike had felt shame, shame at producing a child that would always be different, a source of ridicule. It had gotten to the point that he couldn't look at Elvira. He couldn't watch her as she celebrated the boy's milestones, saying his first words, learning to walk. That's when he'd decided it was best for him to leave. He couldn't stay on and have Elvira's love for him turn to hate, as she loved the child that he could feel only pity for.
Big Mike put his hand on the latch and started through the gate to tell these things to Elvira. Before he could move any farther, Elvira raised her face up, with her eyes toward the ceiling. Big Mike saw a look of peace and serenity that seemed to glow from within Elvira.
He stopped there at the unopened gate. Elvira didn't need to hear these words from him. She was at peace. She'd done right by the boy. It was him that wanted to shed guilt by confessing to her. He knew then that if he said those things to her, he'd just add more pain to her life.
Big Mike let the gate latch fall back into place. He turned and walked quietly back down the road to his truck. Big Mike started the truck and once again drove away.
Hank
Hank watched the two little tow headed boys push trucks around in a bare spot in the worn yard. They took their play seriously. With heads bent close, they discussed the building of imaginary roads and cities. Their voices rising and falling with excitement.
Hank smiled a bittersweet smile as the boy’s play reminded him of his childhood and his best friend. Bobby and Hank were as close as these two brothers. They’d met in first grade. Hank couldn’t remember meeting Bobby, but his sense knew they’d been friends since day one. He did remember the day in first grade when old Miz Rice whipped Bobby for stealing Lemon Heads out of her desk drawer. Bobby had stood there with his chin jutted out while tears ran down his cheeks as Miz Rice whaled on his ass with a wooden paddle. He never said a word. Never told Miz Rice that Hank had been with him. That Hank had stolen Lemon Heads too. He just took the whipping for both of them while Hank stood watching, trying to not vomit the sour candies. That day set the pattern for their friendship. Bobby would think of something crazy to do, like drive fifteen miles to a bootleg joint, get drunk, and then try to outrun the law on the way home. No matter how crazy, Hank was always an agreeable partner to Bobby’s plans. When they ended up in a ditch, the law caught them and as the sheriff was handcuffing Bobby, he’d say, “Naw, Sherriff, I just picked old Hank up hitchhiking.” Bobby’d wake up in jail the next morning and Hank would wake up in his own bed, his reputation as a good boy intact.
Hank swallowed down the shame of his betrayal of that friend, shame that was as bitter as bile. The betrayal of the only man, other than his father, that Hank had ever loved.
The screen door creaked open and Cheryl walked onto the porch and sat down beside Hank on the porch swing. “Something wrong? You look sad.” She said as she rubbed Hank’s hand.
“Just thinking bout me and Bobby when we was little.”
“Lord does work in funny ways. We never would have loved each other if we both hadn’t loved Bobby first.”
Hank squeezed Cheryl’s hand and smiled at her, but the shadow of shame never left his eyes.
Lettie
When the four o’clock whistle blew, Lettie punched her timecard and walked out of the plant. She rolled the windows down in her car and sat there, waiting until most of her co-workers had left the parking lot. The muffler on her old car had a hole in it and made so much racket that everyone stared. It embarrassed Lettie, but money was so tight, getting it fixed had to be pushed off to the future.
The factory parking lot was almost empty when Lettie pulled the old car onto the road. The wind from the open windows blew her hair around her face and head and she turned the radio volume up louder than the muffler. This was Lettie’s favorite time of day. Her time was her own and she took the long way home, circling around the back roads to add as much time as possible to the drive. Killing time; delaying going home to her mother-in-law Doris’ house. Against the protestations of the worn clutch, she slipped the gear shift into fourth and pushed the gas pedal harder.
Back when she’d first started dating Lonnie, she’d loved coming to Doris’ house. Lettie’s own mama had run off with a railroad man when she was a little girl and she’d yearned for a mama. Doris had seemed like such a good, kind person back then, cooking meals for Lonnie and Lettie. Insisting that Lettie come to church with them.
When Lettie and Lonnie got married, things begin to change. The first time they’d had an argument was over the color of the paint for the newlywed’s bedroom. Lettie had wanted to paint the room a pale peach, but Doris had insisted on white paint for the whole house. She’d said that the peach would be too hard to match up if spots got damaged and needed touch up. Lonnie took his mama’s side and all the walls in the newlywed’s rental house were painted white. Lettie hated white walls.
When Lettie thought back to when Lonnie Jr. was born, she turned the radio louder and drove faster around the winding country roads. Lettie couldn’t do anything right, according to Doris. If Lettie used disposable diapers, she was lazy. If she picked him up when he cried, she was spoiling him. Doris criticism spilled over onto everything Lettie did. The meals she cooked were tasteless. Her house wasn’t clean enough. Nothing Lettie did was good enough. Finally, around the time Emily Ann was born, Lonnie couldn’t take anymore of his mama’s harping and he told her that she was welcome for dinner after church, but unless invited she should stay at home. Lettie and Lonnie felt bad, they knew Doris was lonesome, but they had to have peace.
With Lonnie as a buffer between Doris and Lettie, things went smooth for the most part. Then Lonnie had the wreck. They hadn’t had much saved up, so Lettie had to go to work and Doris had babysat the kids. Then there were the lawyer fees. Doris had mortgaged her house to get the money. For that, Lettie was thankful, but Doris couldn’t meet the payments on the little pension check that Lonnie’s daddy had left her, so Lettie and the kids moved in with Doris. It’d been Lonnie’s idea. He said, “Ain’t no use in you paying rent, when Mama has that big old house all alone. You all can be a help to each other.”
The wind from the open car windows rushed around Lettie’s face. Lettie had never known misery like she did now. Doris didn’t want Lettie or Emily Ann wearing jeans. She said that Lettie was trying to be a man and the Bible spoke against women wearing men’s garb. Doris used the Bible like a weapon, as back up for anything she didn’t want Lettie and the kids to do. She wouldn’t let the kids watch cartoons, said they were worshipping false idols. Lettie felt like she was losing her mind. Doris expected Lettie to hand her paycheck over to her. Then she would dole out a little here and there for gas or a cheap pair of shoes.
Suddenly, too soon, Lettie could see Doris' house ahead. She slowed the car and stopped it a little ways up the road. In the tiny rear view mirror, she checked her appearance. For a second, she didn’t recognize this woman staring back at her with red-rimmed hollow eyes from a gaunt face that looked as if it belonged to some hag rid creature. Lettie mumbled to herself, “six more months, six more months, and then we both will be free.”
Silas
Silas pushed the lawn mower around the entrance to the graveyard, taking care not to disturb the only other living inhabitant. The young woman had brought a little pot of daisies and placed them on old Saul Isaac’s grave. Now she seemed to be having a conversation with Saul, who'd been dead these last three months. Lots of people did that, said things to the dead that they could never say while the person was living.
Silas maneuvered the lawnmower around the tombstones, bending to move vases of flowers out of the lawnmower’s path and then when he'd finished mowing he'd replace them carefully, while hand pulling any weeds that had sprouted around the tombstone. That was the least he could do for the dead: show them respect.
Silas had been mowing the grass of the graveyard and grounds of the New Zion Baptist Church for about ten years now. The church paid him twenty-five dollars a month. It surely wasn't his best paying job, but Silas would have done it for free. His parents were laid to rest here and he wanted their graves and the graves of their neighbors well kept, so everybody'd know that someone living still cared for them.
Silas came to a grave loaded with trinkets, memorials to the dead. He carefully removed each item, toy motorcycles, flowers, stuffed animals, and plastic angels. This particular grave was covered with things. Some of the things were new and shiny and some of them had weathered here for years. Silas shut off his mower and carefully removed each item.
He’d finished mowing the grave and was replacing a rusty, bent vanity plate, when the woman walked up behind him, watching him as he moved first one item then another, arranging them so each thing was placed just right.
"By the looks of all this stuff, they must have been a well-loved people."
"Yeah, sure looks like it." Silas answered.
"Who were they?"
Silas stared at the double marker for a few seconds before he spoke. "She was a girl.” Silas paused to wipe the sweat from his brow. “And he was just a boy crossing a bridge. I guess they weren’t much different than the rest of us."
The Tale of Little Mike
Little Mike wasn’t always little. He was born weighing a normal seven pounds and four ounces and twenty-one inches long. By the time he was a freshman in high school he was his full size of four foot four inches and seventy-seven pounds. Almost everybody at school taunted him for his size, except the stoners. It didn’t take Mike long to prove to them that even though he was little, he could party with the best of them. He could out-drink and out-smoke most men three times his size.
Thanks to an over sympathetic social worker, the state sent him a monthly disability check. So after two years of taunts and getting his head stuck in toilets, he quit high school and hung out at the poolroom all day. His momma bought him a mini bike with one of those checks. When he rode up in front of the poolroom each morning, he would take a dirty handkerchief from his pocket and rub the bike until it shone. As a joke Flea, one of the stoners, gave him a Harley vanity plate. He placed it on the front of the bike and polished it every day, too.
There was only one-way into town from the west side, a narrow, two-lane bridge across the wide river. Mike putt-putted across the bridge at a daring five miles an hour. Pity on you if you got stuck behind him on the long bridge. Sometimes traffic would be backed up for a mile.
Along about his twentieth year Mike met Tammy. Tammy wasn’t little like Mike; she was the opposite. She was about five foot six inches tall and weighed two hundred and fifty pounds. Tammy was several years younger than Mike. This, along with the fact that she went to the special school, probably explained why they had never met before. They loved each other from the moment they first laid eyes on each other, in the Pick and Pay parking lot. Tammy was helping her Mother load groceries into the trunk of the car. Mike was leaning against the pop machine, trying to look cool. When Mike finally caught Tammy's eye, he winked and then offered to buy her a cold drink.
Their story is not unlike most love stories. Tammy admired Mike's little bike and Mike admired the fact that Tammy admired him. It wasn’t long until Tammy was a regular passenger on the back of Mike’s bike as they crossed the bridge into town together.
On warm evenings the two could be seen at the Tastee-Freeze, Little Mike gently polishing his bike as Tammy washed down cheese Coneys with a triple thick shake.
With all her newfound happiness Tammy put on even more weight. The strain could be heard as the three and a half horsepower engine of the mini-bike whined in complaint with each pound she put on. The mini-bike speed now topped out at two or three miles an hour. Poor Tammy became so fat that her enormous backside hung down over the bike’s seat and rested on the little aluminum fender. It almost completely obliterated the tail and brake lights.
One hot summer evening as Little Mike was driving Tammy across the bridge for her evening milkshake a pickup truck driven by Bobby Hardy followed behind. Bobby was coasting along, watching Tammy’s large ass quiver inside her tight stretch pants with the vibration of the mini-bike motor. He was following close enough to the mini-bike to count the dimples in Tammy’s ass, so he failed to notice the log truck that was barreling up behind him. The log truck rear-ended the pick-up, shoving it forward onto the mini-bike, killing both Little Mike and Tammy.
Tastee-Freeze on an Average Morning
Maudie slid two eggs off the grill and placed them beside the sausage and toast waiting on the plate.
“Maudie Honey, can you warm my cup?” Wye held his coffee cup up.
"Junetta, get Wye some coffee.” Maudie’s eyes scanned the busy restaurant for the missing waitress. In the far corner Junetta was standing in front of the jukebox, giggling as she picked out songs with Dickie. Maudie watched as Dickie slid his arm around Junetta’s waist. She swallowed back a lump of jealousy and called out, “Junetta, I need some help. Wye needs some coffee and Gene’s breakfast is ready.”
Junetta mumbled, “sorry” and picked up the coffee pot, placed Gene’s breakfast in front of him and filled the coffee cups of the three men.
Everyone in the place looked up at the sound of a small mini-bike putt-putting up in front of the big plate glass windows. They watched as Tammy lumbered off first, then Mike climbed down. Tammy took her usual spot on the bench, while Mike began rubbing the road dust off the bike.
Wye turned to Sherriff Gene and said, “You aught to make him keep that thing off the road. It ain’t safe him hauling my girl around on the contraption.”
“If you don’t want Tammy on that thing, don’t let her go.” Gene answered between mouthfuls of food.
“Easy fer you to say. Ever time I open my mouth I got to go up against her and her Mama.”
“Ahh, leave em alone. They’s just kids.”
“Cept Mike’s a runt. Of all the characters that half-wit gal a mine could a picked, she took up with a midget. Could a found some hard workin’ dim wit that could at least feed her, but no she takes up with a runt. Everybody knows his own Daddy couldn’t stand the sight of him. Hightailed it out a here and never even looked back.”
“I heard that that boy weren’t none of Big Mike’s seed anyhow. Heard Elvira got him by some dwarf that come through here with the carnival.” Deputy Ben spoke up from his perch as he blew on his now too hot coffee.
Gene frowned at the two men, “You all sound like a bunch of clucking old hens. Why in the hell do you want to stir up gossip that’s been dead for nigh on twenty years?”
Gene watched the couple through the big window. Mike picked a Dandelion flower that was sprouting in a crack in the sidewalk. He handed the yellow blossom to Tammy. She sniffed the bloom and smiled a Mona Lisa smile.
“I think Tammy likes the look of Little Mike just fine.” Sherriff Gene turned all his attention back to his breakfast.
Maudie looked away from the window as a warm gust of air heralded the arrival of another customer. Flea entered the diner and walked along the counter saying a few words to each customer as he passed. When he neared the sheriff’s stool he dropped his head down and wouldn’t meet the sheriff’s eyes.
“Flea son what brings you out so early this morning?” The sheriff asked.
“Not early Sheriff, just a late night.”
“I sure hope you was at a prayer service and not out doing no good.”
“Not doing anything on the wrong side of the law, Sheriff. I’m keeping my nose clean.” Flea snickered and asked Maudie for a cup of black coffee to go.
As Flea left the restaurant the sheriff called out, “Flea, stop by and see your Mama sometime today. She worries about you.” Then he mumbled as he took a sip of coffee, “Spends her nights praying for the Lord to keep you safe.”
Flea paused and made a mock salute “Will do Dad, will do.” The bell tinkled again as he left.
Maudie turned from the grill and wiped the sweat from her brow with her apron hem. Junetta was clearing dirty dishes from a table that had just been vacated. Dickie was sitting with his back to the counter admiring Junetta’s ass, as she stretched to reach dishes on the far side of the booth. Junetta turned and caught Dickie’s eyes and smiled at him until she saw Maudie looking. She blushed then bustled the stack of dishes to the sink.
Wye stood from the counter and slid a dollar bill under his coffee cup. “See you in the morning, Gene. I got to get home and help the old woman pick beans. She’s planning on canning some today.”
“Don’t work too hard. Tell Deanie, I’ll be expecting a quart of beans come winter.” Sheriff Gene sopped the egg off his plate with a crust of toast.
Wye nodded and walked out of the diner. Outside he paused and looked at Mike and Tammy sitting on the bench, their hands twinned together.
“Morning Daddy, look at the pretty flower Mike picked for me.” Tammy held out the Dandelion bloom toward Wye.
“Ain’t no flower, just a worthless weed.” Wye muttered as he turned to get in his truck.
Now For the Story
Ma
"Chick-chick-chick-chicken” the large woman called as she scattered cracked corn onto the hard packed dirt of the chicken yard. The chickens answered her call, squawking and pecking around her feet. When the pan was empty she turned it upside down over a fencepost. Pausing for a moment she looked over the chickens before reaching down, grabbing a young white rooster and tucking him under her arm. She stepped through the gate and carefully latched it behind her.
"Ma! Ma! Where are you?" came a frantic call from the front porch of the old house.
"Right here. Mike, what ever are you hollerin about?" Her steel gray hair had worked loose from its bun and she used her free hand to shove it out of her eyes as she peered at her son. Satisfied that he was in no dire distress, she returned her attention to the rooster pinned under her left arm. With one fluid motion she grabbed him by the neck and rotated her wrist, snapping the bird's neck. She held his feet tightly as his wings beat futilely against her leg.
Ignoring the dying chicken, Mike asked, "Ma, can I have ten dollars?"
"I just give you ten dollars day afore yesterday. Don't tell me you done spent it." She frowned down at Mike.
"I guess I did, but I want to take Tammy for a ride and I ain't got enough gas."
"That thing don't hold no ten dollars worth of gas." She nodded toward the mini bike parked on the front porch.
Mike looked up at his Ma, his blue eyes pleading. If not for the scraggly whiskers on his chin he could have been an eight-year-old child. He sure acted like one most times, thought his Ma.
Reaching her free hand into the bosom of her dress she pulled a thin roll of money out. With her thumb she shuffled through the bills until she came to a five.
This she held toward Mike. "This is all you're a gettin this month. Won’t do you no good to ask for more. I got bills to pay."
Mike snatched the money from her and called, "Thanks Ma" over his shoulder as he headed toward the mini bike.
He rolled the bike out into the yard and climbed on. Just as he placed his foot on the kick-start, she asked, "Will you be home for supper?"
She nodded toward the chicken still flapping in her hand.
"Can I bring Tammy?"
"I guess you can." Then she slowly added, "If you have to."
"See you at supper." Mike grinned his little boy grin as he brought all of his seventy-seven pounds down on the starter and the bike roared alive, it's lawn mower motor noise drowning out any possibility of talk.
His Ma watched as he left a trail of dust up the gravel road. She watched until he was out of sight and then starred at the empty road for a few minutes longer before remembering the rooster dangling in her hand. He had stopped fluttering, but his mouth was working like he was trying to suck one last breath into his lungs.
Flea
The bell over the door clanked and Shorty looked up to see Flea walk into the empty poolroom.
"Man, you look like you tangled with the wrong end of a she cat." Shorty said as Flea blinked in the dim light of the room.
"Too much party and not enough sleep." Flea mumbled as his eyes adjusted. "You ain't got a little weed you could let me have? I need a little something to get rid of this pounding in my head."
I ain't got much, but I'll share." Shorty pulled a baggy out of his pocket and placed a few pinches into the sleeve of a cigarette pack. "Here see if this don't help. It's home grown, but it ain't half bad."
Flea paid Shorty for the weed and a Mountain Dew then walked out the back door to the alley. Leaning against the building he downed half the Dew then proceeded to roll a joint.
He had taken two hits when the loud sound of squealing tires and metal on metal crunch filled the air. Blunting the fire of the joint he carefully placed it back in the cellophane before making his way around the poolroom to Main Street.
On the bridge a log truck had rear ended a pick-up and shoved it into the iron railing on the bridge. Flea began running toward the bridge. About half way he had a fit of coughing and had to slow his pace to a jog. When he reached the bridge it seemed the log truck had shoved the pick-up into the bridges iron railing.
Lonnie Crabb jumped out of the log truck and ran over to the pick-up and looked into the mangled cab. Turning to Flea he screamed, "He's hurt bad. For God's sake get some fuckin help."
Flea turned and ran back across the bridge, his lungs burning and his chest heaving. As he entered the poolroom for the second time that day, he tried to tell Shorty to summon help between gasps for air. "Wreck....bridge....hurt bad.....call the law." As Shorty picked up the phone and began to dial, Flea made his way back to the bridge.
On the bridge, Lonnie Crabb, the log truck driver, was sitting on his running board, holding his head in his hands. Flea peered into the pick-up's cab. The driver was bleeding from a big gash in his forehead and his body was twisted and pinned between the bent steering and the truck door. Every few seconds he would take a gasp of air, making bloody bubbles appear at his nostrils.
Flea shook his shoulder asking, "hey man, you with us?" No answer.
Bout that time two police cars came screaming from town. As Flea moved out of their way his foot slipped on a contorted piece of metal. Bending to pick it up he glanced under the pick-up's front end. There so tangled you couldn't tell where one began and the other ended, were Little Mike, Tammy and Little Mike's bike. Flea walked slowly across the bridge toward town, carrying the crushed vanity plate.
Sheriff Gene
"Damn it, Ben, can't you get that bunch of gawkers out of here. Tell ‘em they're going to jail if they don't go home." The Sheriff yelled at his Deputy.
"I'll try, Gene." The deputy walked to the town side of the bridge, waving his arms and yelling, "Shows over, folks. Go on home before the Sheriff makes me take y'all to jail fer obstructing official business."
Sheriff Gene nodded to two men standing by a tow truck. "Boys, let's get them out of there."
Two men in greasy coveralls hooked a wench cable to the front of Bobby Hardy's pick-up. After the cable was secure one of the men adjusted controls on the side of the tow truck, while the other squatted in front of the pick-ups' mangled bumper. Suddenly, with a screech of metal and a grinding of gears, the front end of the pick-up began to slowly rise.
"Easy, boys, we don't want to tear 'em up any more than they already are." Sherriff Gene yelled at the tow truck driver. He squatted down and peered under the pick-ups front as it slowly raised, revealing two bodies twisted together with truck and mini-bike parts.
When the truck's front end was a yard off the bridge, the tow-truck man began tugging at the mini-bike. Billy Ray, the undertaker's helper, crawled under and began trying to gently disengage flesh from metal. He pulled one of Tammy's arms from the wreckage and was rotating her shoulder to try to free the rest of her body. "Gene, can you give me a hand?" He called out to the sheriff.
Sherriff Gene grunted as he heaved his large body into the tight space. Holding Tammy's arm up he bore its weight as Billy Ray worked on freeing her shoulder. Suddenly Tammy's upper half was free of the wreckage and Billy Ray began crawling backward tugging Tammy's body with him. As Tammy's body shifted, the upper half of Little Mike's body, which had been wedged between Tammy and the pick-up's fan belt housing, slid free and into Sherriff Gene's lap.
Little Mike's eyes were open and, although they had a death glaze, he seemed to be staring at the Sherriff. The sheriff shifted trying to move away from Mike’s dead eyes, but he was trapped holding Mike’s head while Billy Ray wrapped Tammy's body in a black body bag. Gene tried to look away, but he couldn't. Each time he glanced away his eyes were drawn back.
A small trickle of blood was drying in Little Mike's right ear. Gene wrapped his arm around Mike's head to keep it from sliding. The last time he'd seen Mike, was it yesterday or the day before? He'd almost hollered at him, almost told him to keep that damn little bike off the road. It weren't safe. He almost told him, but he hadn't. Mike had been so proud of that bike. Gene hadn't wanted to take that away from him. Poor little guy just wanted to be like other boys, taking his girl out.
As soon as the two bodies were loaded in the hearse, Gene climbed into his cruiser without saying anything to the few stragglers that remained. He drove straight to his office, went inside, and locked the door. Reaching way back in the bottom drawer of his file cabinet, he pulled out a pint of Yellowstone. He blew the dust off the whisky bottle and sat down at his desk. The old leather chair creaked in protest. The bottle had been in the file cabinet a long time, twenty years in fact. He'd kept it as reminder of all the reasons he couldn't drink, his job, his kids, and his wife.
In the twenty years he'd been sober he'd never wanted a drink as bad as he did right now. He wanted to get drunk, drunk enough so he'd forget the look of those dead eyes. Those dead eyes telling him he was wrong. Telling him he should have done his job. Gene cracked the seal on the bottle.
Mr. Lakes
Elvira’s eyes were so swollen from crying that she could barely see the door-handle of the funeral home. As she fumbled with the knob the door swung open and in front of her stood Tammy’s parents, Wye and Deanie.
“I, um.” Elvira mumbled as she stepped aside.
Wye stood in the doorway, his fleshy face red and angry. “You sure the last person I wanted to see right now.” His words shot toward Elvira like bullets.
“Why…”Elvira sputtered, but before she could get her words out Wye continued ranting in a loud, angry voice.
“Cause of that boy of yours we have to bury our gal. Cause of that boy of yours I got to go in debt to get her in the ground.”
“Hush Wye, you ain’t helping things.” Tears streamed down Deanie’s cheeks as she tugged at Wye’s arm. “Don’t do this, not now.”
“Cause of that boy of yours Deanie here ain’t done nothing but rock and cry and pray since we got word. He was your boy, you aught to have to pay.” Spit from Wye’s lips hit Elvira’s face.
Mr. Lakes, the funeral director, heard the commotion from his office and walked to the doorway. “Here Wye, why don’t you and me take a walk?” Mr. Lakes put his arm around Wye’s shoulder and gently steered him through the door and down the sidewalk.
Elvira watched the two men walk away and was surprised to find her hand still holding the door. Deanie moved through the doorway and sat down on a marble, smoker’s bench that was beside the entrance. She leaned forward, covered her face with both of her hands and began to sob. Soon the sobs turned to low guttural moans.
Elvira let the door close and sat down beside her, placing her arms around Deanie’s shoulders. “Lord, Lord help us. Deanie, I thought I was bearing this grief alone.” The two women clutched each other and rocked and cried together.
After a while Deanie’s moans subsided and she pulled back from Elvira’s arms and looked into her face. Her voice was raw and raspy when she spoke, “Tammy loved Mike, you know. She was always so child-like that it surprised me when I saw that she loved him like a woman loves a man. She never called him Little Mike, just Mike. He was big enough to be her whole world. Ain’t nothing little ‘bout a man that means that much to a woman.”
Jealousy. The thought ripped through Elvira’s grief and twisted her heart. From the time Big Mike left, Elvira thought it’d always be Little Mike and her. She’d never thought Little Mike would ever become a man. She’d done everything she could to keep him from being a man. There had never been anything wrong with Tammy. Elvira thought about how Tammy would always offer to help around the house, wash up after supper, or sweep the floor. Elvira had always steeled herself to Tammy’s offer of help. Couldn’t nobody do her housework right except her. Couldn’t nobody do her housework and couldn’t no other woman love her boy. Elvira hadn’t wanted Tammy to take her place, the place of the only woman in Little Mike’s life. The revelation came to her, sudden and sharp. Little Mike loved Tammy and was loved back in return. He had died with the arms of the woman he loved holding him.
“Little Mike loved Tammy too.” Elvira sobbed.
“I know honey, I know.”
The women hugged each other, their grieving hearts comforted just a little.
As they hugged, Wye and Mr. Lakes came walking back up the sidewalk. The women pulled apart and watched the men, both trying to read Wye’s face for signs of anger. There wasn’t any.
“I think Wye and I have come up with a beautiful idea. Deanie, if you and Elvira would step in my office with us, we’ll talk about it.” Mr. Lakes held the door open for the women and he and Wye followed them into the small office.
“Now before I begin let me ask, are either of you mothers opposed to having a double funeral? Now I want you all to think hard because I don’t want to push you into this while you both are vulnerable with grief. These two young people found each other against the personal odds that each faced, they come together and spent every minute they could together. And by a plan only known by the good Lord, they died together. Wye and me talked it over and we come to the conclusion that it would be fitting to bury them together. That is, if you two find it agreeable.”
Elvira looked toward Deanie. Deanie took Elvira’s hand in her own and squeezed it tightly. At the same time, the both said, “Yes” softly, as fresh tears wet their faces.
Mr. Lakes passed them a box of tissues and both women murmured, “Thank you.”
“All of you all knew Roscoe Cole.” All three nodded in agreement before Mr. Lakes continued. “Well, as you know Roscoe was a big man. When he was first diagnosed with cancer, he come in here and made his arrangements. Said he didn’t want to leave it on Sarah Jane and the kids. Good man, Roscoe was.”
“Finer man never lived.” Wye agreed.
“He had me order him a custom-made, walnut veneer, casket. Made to fit him. As you all know, once the cancer took hold the weight just rolled off him and by the time the Lord called him home, he was a skinny man. Sarah Jane didn’t want him buried in that big casket, as beautiful as it was, so I ordered her another one, a regular sized one. Now for two years that big casket has been setting back in my storeroom.”
Elvira gently rubbed Deanie’s hand.
“Truth told, that casket is plenty big enough for Little Mike and Tammy and if you agree, we could bury them together, like they died.” Mr. Lakes spoke softly and for a long moment it was quiet.
“I been dreaded having Little Mike put in the ground by himself. It would be good to know he’s resting beside Tammy, if it’s all right with you all?” Elvira looked toward Deanie.
“Yes, I know Tammy would want to be with Mike.” Deanie eyes turned upon Wye.
“Now how much is this double funeral going to set me back? You know I ain’t a rich man.” The anger had gone out of Wye’s voice.
“The casket I’ll donate and the funeral will be one, except for the cost of preparing the remains. Wye, I ain’t out to make money. I just want to help ya’ll, best I can at such a difficult time.”
Wye stood and shook Mr. Lakes’ hand and the women hugged.
Funeral arrangements for Little Mike and Tammy were made.
Maudie
Maudie flipped the switch that lit up the Tastee Freeze Open sign. Then she wet a bar towel in soapy water and walked absentmindedly to the empty counter and began wiping, moving aside the condiment containers as she cleaned. She had finished cleaning the counter and started wiping down the booths when the door opened.
Dickey Lee, her boyfriend of three years, walked through the door and slid onto one of the stools at the counter. Maudie paused to admire his lean, lanky frame and the cat-like way he moved. She remembered back to a time when she felt lucky to catch such a good-looking man, six years her junior.
"Is it all ready lunch time? Lawd, I've lost track of the day." Maudie tied an apron across her stomach to protect the black dress she was wearing. "You hungry?"
"Yeah, fix me a bowl of chili."
"I didn't make no chili this morning. I went to the funeral. It sure was pitiful. Miz Tincher is surely going to be lost without Little Mike. I can fix you a hamburger or a BLT."
"I don't know why you are so worked up about a midget and a fuckin fat assed retard dying."
"Don't be mean. They was sweet kids."
"You're too soft. They hung around here every evening, taking up space, making real customers sick to look at them. You should'a run them off."
"I don't think they ever bothered a soul."
"They bothered me. I'm glad they're gone."
"You're an asshole. I was jealous of them."
"Jealous?"
"Yeah, jealous. Jealous of the way Little Mike looked at Tammy, love pouring out of his eyes. No man ever looked at me like that."
"I always thought he was looking in amazement, wondering how many hot dogs and shakes could one cow eat. If you want a man who looks at you like that, well, you're with the wrong guy."
Maudie had started to walk to the kitchen to fix Dickey Lee's lunch but his words stopped her. She stood still breathing fast, her face flushed. Slowly she turned to face Dickey Lee. She watched as he played with the saltshaker, pouring salt onto the counter and tracing a pattern with his finger.
"I think you're right. I am with the wrong man. I deserve better." Her voice cold and hard.
Dickey Lee looked up at Maudie, surprised. She had never spoke to him in that tone. "You mean you'd rather have a midget warming your bed, well, have at it."
"I want somebody who looks at me with love, not just looking for what I can do for them. It ain't all about what goes on in the bed. They's a whole lot more to love than that. I think it's time you went upstairs to my place and pack up all your shit and find a new place to lay down your head tonight. I'm done."
"After three fucking years, this is how you act? I got news for you, woman, you ain't gonna find nobody to love you like I do or put up with your whiney ass." Spit flew between Dickey Lee's lips with each word.
"Yeah, this is how I act after three years of putting a roof over your head, feeding you, and wondering where you're at and who you're with on Saturday nights. Don't make this any worse than it has to be. Just leave."
"Fuck you." Dickey Lee slammed the door shut behind him and stomped up the stairs outside the Tastee-Freeze. Maudie listened as he clumped around above her head, yelling curses as he slammed doors and banged drawers shut. After a few minutes, he came back down the stairs and threw some bags in his car. He pulled out of the parking lot, showering the front of the building with gravel. Maudie whispered, "Good riddance” and watched as he fishtailed down the street. When he was out of sight, she sat down in a booth, lowered her head onto her arm, and sobbed.
Cheryl
"Mama, can you watch the boys, for just a little while?" Cheryl stood in the front doorway of her parent's house. Her youngest son squirmed on her hip. She stooped to lower him to the floor and he toddled after his older brother.
Cheryl's mother walked from the kitchen, wiping her sweaty face with a dishtowel. "I'm trying to get some beans canned."
"It won’t be for long, I just need to look for Bobby's billfold. It's got all his stuff, driver's license, social security card, and stuff like that. They need it to set up his disability. I think it might be in the truck and I don't want the boys running around a junkyard."
"Go on then and hurry back." She turned and walked back to her beans.
"You all behave and mind your grandma." Cheryl yelled toward the room where the boys had disappeared. "Thanks, Mama." She called over her shoulder as she got into her car.
The junkyard was ten miles on the other side of town and, as Cheryl drove over the bridge, she felt uneasy, just like she had every time she drove over it since the wreck. Bobby had laid out all night again, the night before, and when he rolled in the door, she was pissed. More than pissed, fed up. They'd fought. The mean words they'd said to each other bounced around in Cheryl's head. It wasn't much different than the fights they'd had ever since they'd been married, except this time Cheryl had thrown the hardest punch she'd ever swung, "I don't love you anymore." When Bobby stomped out the door, Cheryl had yelled, "Me and the kids won’t be here when you get home, if you even bother coming back." She'd meant every single thing she'd said. Then the wreck happened.
As Cheryl pulled off the highway and onto the junkyard parking lot, she strained to get a glimpse of the truck. Kudzu and Trumpet vines created a thick mat that covered the fence and she couldn't see anything beyond the green leaves. Cheryl pulled the key from the ignition, picked up an empty plastic grocery sack from the seat, and walked into the building that a rusty sign proclaimed, "Office."
Cool dank air and the smell of old motor oil assaulted her nose as she looked around. "Anybody here?" She called out.
"Be right there." Came a muffled reply from the shadowy recess of the repair bay. Tink walked out of the darkness wiping his greasy hands. "Hey, Cheryl, what can I do for you?"
"I think there's some of Bobby's things, tools and such in his truck. I can't find his billfold. It might have got left. I was wondering if I could get his stuff out?"
"Sure, take anything you want, ain't much of it left except the motor and transmission. I ain't looked in the cab. How's Bobby doing?"
"I guess as well as could be expected. They're moving him to Louisville next week, to a rehab center. Doctors say in time he'll be able to move himself from the bed to his chair and wheel himself around." Cheryl sighed and pushed her pale, blonde hair off her forehead. "It's sure going to take some getting used to. Bobby weren't never still for a minute in his whole life."
"I feel like hell about what happened to Bobby. Is there anything I can do to help out? You and the kids need anything?"
"No. I don't reckon there's anything anybody can do. Me and the kids are doing ok. Mama and Daddy's been helping out right smart."
Cheryl straightened the wrinkles out of the plastic bag with her fingers. "Do you have the keys to the truck?"
"I think they're still in it, but you won't need them. They cut the door off to get him out. It's parked at the back of the lot." Tink motioned with his right hand. “I parked it way back there to keep nosey people from ridding my fence down, trying to get a look. Wait a minute and I'll lock the doors and we'll walk back there."
"I'd rather go by alone, if you don't care. I really just want to see how it looks by myself." Cheryl nervously pleated the bag with her fingers.
"Just be careful back there. Watch out for sharp edges and such. Don't want you getting cut up on something."
Cheryl walked out the back office door into the junkyard. Cars were stacked three and four high in places. She was careful to walk in the middle of the overgrown gravel road. Deeper into the junkyard the road became more like a path. Weeds grew around and inside the mangled cars, and some were completely covered by Kudzu. Cheryl thought it was pretty in a scary way. Finally the road curved around an old school bus that was sprouting ragweed where its motor should have been and on the other side was Bobby’s truck.
Weeds had begun to grow up around it, but they hadn't claimed it yet. It was wadded up like a giant had squeezed it in his hand. It bore little resemblance to the truck that Bobby had sped off in the morning of the wreck. She had known it would look bad, but not this bad.
She made her way through the weeds to the place where the driver's door should have been. The steering wheel was bent and hanging down almost touching the seat. Cheryl could barely fit into the cramped space. She was glad that Bobby couldn't remember much about the wreck.
Something brown and crusty was dried on the steering wheel and seat. Cheryl picked at it with her fingernail. Slowly, she realized what it was, dried blood.
She turned and twisted herself in the seat to reach the glove box. As she did, she felt something hard under her knee, a lipstick tube. She turned the unfamiliar tube around in her hand. Straining her eyes to see in the dim light, she read the tiny label on the bottom of the tube aloud, "On Fire Red." Slowly, she removed the cap and twisted the base, a bright red finger of lipstick rose upward. With it Cheryl drew a vivid line across her forearm, the bright color made her pale skin seem even paler.
As Cheryl stared at her arm, she thought aloud, "What kind of woman leaves a crippled man?"
Lonnie Crabb
The early morning light in the jail cell was dim and the air musty. Although it was before breakfast call, the voices and noises of the many men in the confined space were already escalating to a level that was almost maddening. After seven months Lonnie knew that the noise would continue to increase all day until lights out, when it would decrease to a steady hum for a few short hours. This was the thing that was hardest for him, not having a moment of quiet. He thought back to the time before the accident, being in his truck alone, turning off the CB radio, and the quiet, just the sound of the big Cummings diesel engine and eighteen wheels turning over pavement. Freedom and quiet.
Lonnie rose from his bunk and walked the three steps to the commode. His cellmate, Jim, groaned and rolled over to face the wall. This was as private as it got. After urinating in the stainless steel commode, Lonnie smoothed the thin blanket over his bunk and bent to his knees, using the bunk as an alter for his prayers.
Lonnie had been brought up going to a Pentecostal church. As he got older, he had strayed from his church and religion. Now he found his only confidant, confessor, and comforter was God. In the church of his youth, prayer was a noisy thing, everyone praying together and trying to raise his or her voices higher than the other in order to reach God’s ear. Out of respect for his cellmate, Lonnie kept his prayers down to a low mumble.
“Lord, I thank you for your great blessings and ask your forgiveness for my many sins. Please, look over my wife and mama and my little children. Comfort the hearts of the families that my actions hurt. Please, Lord, heal Bobby Hardy’s broken back and make him whole again. Lord, I’m asking for thy will be done. If you see fit to free me so I can return home to my family. Lord, if it is your will and I am freed, I’ll try to live better and walk the Christian path that you designed for man.”
Jim snorted from his top bunk.
Hurriedly, Lonnie finished his prayer. “I pray in your name, Amen.”
“It’s funny how everybody gets religion when they come in here.” Jim’s voice was mocking.
“I guess when men hit bottom the good Lord’s the only place they got left to turn.” Lonnie stood and leaned against the bunk.
“Oh, you’re a long way from bottom. We’ll see how long your religion lasts after you been in here a year or two, after that wife of yours gets lonesome and finds a new man for your kids to call daddy.”
Before Lonnie could reply, a guard walked to the cell bars and said, “Crabb, your attorney’s here.” He yelled, “Open gate three-twenty-four.”
Lonnie followed the guard to the legal consultation room and took a seat at the table. Before long the steel door opened again and Lonnie’s lawyer entered and took a seat across from him. Lonnie’s mama and wife had hired the slick looking city lawyer, Odell Reed, from Lexington. Lonnie’s mama had put a lien on her house and his wife had sold what was left of his truck to pay this man with his fancy suit and soft hands. Lonnie didn’t like him, but he was forced out of necessity to trust him to a degree.
“Good morning, Lonnie. Sorry to show up so early, but I got what I think is good news and didn’t think you’d want to wait until I got out of court this afternoon to hear it.”
Although Lonnie’s heart started beating faster at the prospect of “good news”, he showed no outward signs of excitement. He grunted and nodded at Odell.
Odell popped open his fancy leather briefcase and pulled out a stack of legal looking papers. “You seem to have a solid reputation around Bullock, even the Prosecutor spoke well of you. That’s one strong thing we’ve had going for us, you’ve never been in trouble before.” Odell shuffled through the papers. “I met with the Judge and Prosecutor yesterday and they offered you a Plea Bargain.”
“What’s that?” Lonnie asked.
“A Plea Bargain is where you agree to plead guilty to a lesser offence and in return you get a reduced sentence.”
“I know what a Plea is. What did they offer?”
“Five years.”
“Five years?”
“I know it seems like a long time, but if you went to trial, you could get twenty. They’ll give you credit for time served, so you’ve got a good six months served. If you behave yourself and do good time, you’ll be eligible for parole in a year and a half.”
A year and a half. A year and a half in a place where a day drug on like a month. The thought bore down on Lonnie and created a weight as heavy as a mountain sitting on his chest. A year and a half away from his wife Lettie. Jim’s words pounded through Lonnie’s head, ‘after that wife of yours gets lonesome and finds a new man for your kids to call daddy.’ A year and a half or risk a jury saying twenty.
“I’ll take it.” Defeat would barely let the words escape through Lonnie’s lips.
“Good, good. I think you’re doing the best thing. I’ll file the paper work and they’ll set a court date where you will have to formally accept the plea. You understand what that means? You’ll have to stand in front of the judge and say you’re guilty of two counts of vehicular manslaughter.”
“I ain’t never denied the fact that I was driving a truck fifteen miles over the speed limit and I rear-ended a pick up and caused two peoples death.”
Odell stuck out his hand and they shook before leaving the consultation room. On the way back to the cell, Lonnie did a second thing that went against his grain, he begged the guard to let him use the phone to call Lettie.
When Lettie answered he couldn’t say it, couldn’t tell her he’d be gone for at least another year and a half, surely couldn’t tell her it might be five years before he’d be free.
He just fought back tears and said, “I just wanted to tell you that I love you. Kiss my babies. Tell mama to take her medicine like the doctor says. I’ll write you a letter as soon as I get back to my cell.” Yeah, he’d write her. It’d be easier to say in black and white on paper.
Bobby Hardy
Hank climbed out of the truck, grabbing a fifth of bootleg whiskey that rested in the seat beside him. He carried it by the neck as he walked across the packed dirt yard and onto the porch of the run-down house. Peering through the screen-door into the dark interior of the house, he called, “Bobby, you here?”
“Now, Hank, how the fuck you think I’m gonna go anywhere’s?” Came a voice from the darkness.
“I jus didn’t wanna get shot, walkin in. I brought your bottle. Toad put it on your bill, said you’d bout run your limit this month.”
“Fuck Toad.”
After Hank’s eyes adapted to the darkness of the room, he could make out Bobby lying on a cot in the far corner. The foul smell of decaying mice carcasses and urine blasted his nose as flies buzzed around his head. Stepping over the crushed mice bodies, Hank handed the bottle of whiskey to Bobby. “Why don’t you let me put out some poison to get rid of these things?”
“These vermin is the only entertainment I got. I have become the great hunter of mice. I can lay here perfectly still, which is easy since the bottom half of my body wouldn’t move if you fired a twelve-gauge shotgun up my ass. The little creatures come scurryin’ along and I wait till they’re in reach of my mighty fly swat. Then I crush 'em!” For emphasis, Bobby brought the fly swat down hard on one of the dead mice.
Hank walked into the kitchen and came back with a piece of cardboard and a broom. He began to sweep the mice onto the cardboard and toss them into the yard.
Bobby pulled his wasted legs and torso into a semi-sitting position using his arms. Taking a mouthful of whiskey from the bottle, his lips puckered, then he swished it around like mouthwash before swallowing.
“Killin’ mice and drankin’ whiskey, the only thangs I got now.” He took another longer swallow of whiskey. “Two year ago, I hunted deer and pussy. You know, I had a hard on when that log-truck hit me. The last one I’ll ever have an it was wasted, thankin’ about that fat assed Tammy.”
Big Mike
He eyed the line between the cue ball and the eight ball, making gentle feign strokes with the stick. When it felt right, he skillfully jabbed the stick forward, hitting the white ball, low and left. The cue ball made a loud cracking sound as it connected with the eight ball sending it spinning and sinking it in the side pocket. Big Mike grinned as he picked the twenty-dollar bill up from the side rail.
Several of the observers slapped Big Mike's shoulders. Mumbling, "Good game."
Big Mike's opponent grinned as he shook Mike's hand. "Hell, I left you set. You just got lucky."
Big Mike turned his can of Pabst up and drained it into his mouth. "Come on, let me buy you a beer to show you I'm a gracious winner."
"No, thanks. I'll take you up on that next time. I gotta get home. Work in the morning."
As Big Mike made his way across the crowded room toward the bar, he caught the attention of a pale man warming a bar stool and nursing a glass filled with amber liquid. The man's puzzled look became one of recognition as Big Mike neared the bar.
"Ain't you Big Mike Tincher, from up Harbuck County?" He said when Mike was within voice range.
"I might be. What's it to you?" Big Mike eyed the smaller man suspiciously.
"I'm Joe, Joe Dieters, Larry Dieters boy. From over on Peck's Branch. Shore never expected to run into anybody from home, surly didn't expect to see you."
Big Mike stuck out his hand and as the men grasped hands Big Mike said, "Larry Dieters, Larry Dieters, now that's a name from way back. We ran together when we was boys. You look like him. What brings you to New Orleans?"
"I'm working over in Houston, going home to visit the folks, and just thought I'd layover here a couple of days before I flew North. Boy, the folks'll be surprised when I tell I met you here."
"What are you drinking? " Big Mike motioned to the bartender. "Let me buy you one to sip on while we catch up on the goings on back in Harbuck."
The two men sat at the bar and talked of local politics, marriages, births, who was in jail, who had gotten rich and those that were in the poor house. Some time passed and many drinks were consumed before Big Mike worked up enough courage to ask what for news of the person he was most concerned about.
"How's Elvira doing?" He dropped his eyes, not able to look at Joe.
"Mike, she ain't doing so good, last I heard."
"What's ailing her?"
"She ain't been right since the accident."
A puzzled look came on Mike's face.
"Ahh shit, you ain't heard. Lord, I'm sorry. "
"Heard what?" Mike asked, his voice low.
"Little Mike, he got run over by a log truck."
Big Mike swallowed hard, but the quiver was apparent in his voice. "Kill him?"
"Yeah, poor little guy, dead before the law got there."
"When?"
"Let me see, it's been almost two years now, right before I got the job in Houston."
Big Mike was suddenly very quiet, unusual for him, but a knot had began forming in his stomach and was slowly working its way up his chest, making thought and conversation difficult.
"I sure hate to spring it on you like that. I didn't know nobody'd told you." Joe laid his hand on Big Mike's shoulder.
"I ain't kept in contact with folks back home. Guess nobody know'd how to reach me." Big Mike was suddenly sober, with the taste of beer souring in his mouth. "Look, Joe, it's been good talking to you, but I need to take off now. I got some things I need to think over."
"I understand."
The two men shook hands and Big Mike walked out of the bar to his truck and, without mulling over things, headed up I-10, bound for Harbuck County. As he drove, he replayed his life and guilt poured over him like sweat and left him coated in a thick layer. The guilt of leaving Elvira with a five-year-old baby; guilt of loving that baby, but not being able to accept him as he was.
He drove through the rest of the night, stopping only for fuel and coffee. When the sun came up the next morning, he drove on, the sunlight making his eyes tear until the water poured over his cheeks. Angrily, he brushed at his face and thought of the last time he’d seen Elvira, standing in the door with the too little baby on her hip. Tears had washed down her face too, but Big Mike had walked away, ignoring her tears, and bottling up his feelings. The bottle broke open now, like a bottle of pop left too long in the freezer, and years of bound up emotion spewed forth.
He drove and thought and cried through the day and in the evening he reached Harbuck County. As he turned onto the road leading to the old farmhouse he'd once shared with Elvira, he stopped the truck and shut off the motor. In the still night, he contemplated what he was going to say to Elvira. "I'm sorry,” seemed too puny and weak for all the pain she'd had to bear.
Big Mike got out of his truck and walked the last few yards to the house. When he reached the gate, he could see Elvira through the kitchen window. She was sitting at the table her head bowed over a book, the Bible. Big Mike could see her lips move as she read. He stood there watching her and remembering how happy she's been when they bought this place. She'd worked like a fiend, fixing things up, making things ready for the child she carried in her belly. His child. His son.
They'd both been so happy when the baby boy was born, looking so perfect at first, then failing to grow. They'd took him to doctors all over, all the way to Lexington and Louisville. The answer was always the same. Nothing you could do; a genetic abnormality.
For the first time in his life, Big Mike had felt shame, shame at producing a child that would always be different, a source of ridicule. It had gotten to the point that he couldn't look at Elvira. He couldn't watch her as she celebrated the boy's milestones, saying his first words, learning to walk. That's when he'd decided it was best for him to leave. He couldn't stay on and have Elvira's love for him turn to hate, as she loved the child that he could feel only pity for.
Big Mike put his hand on the latch and started through the gate to tell these things to Elvira. Before he could move any farther, Elvira raised her face up, with her eyes toward the ceiling. Big Mike saw a look of peace and serenity that seemed to glow from within Elvira.
He stopped there at the unopened gate. Elvira didn't need to hear these words from him. She was at peace. She'd done right by the boy. It was him that wanted to shed guilt by confessing to her. He knew then that if he said those things to her, he'd just add more pain to her life.
Big Mike let the gate latch fall back into place. He turned and walked quietly back down the road to his truck. Big Mike started the truck and once again drove away.
Hank
Hank watched the two little tow headed boys push trucks around in a bare spot in the worn yard. They took their play seriously. With heads bent close, they discussed the building of imaginary roads and cities. Their voices rising and falling with excitement.
Hank smiled a bittersweet smile as the boy’s play reminded him of his childhood and his best friend. Bobby and Hank were as close as these two brothers. They’d met in first grade. Hank couldn’t remember meeting Bobby, but his sense knew they’d been friends since day one. He did remember the day in first grade when old Miz Rice whipped Bobby for stealing Lemon Heads out of her desk drawer. Bobby had stood there with his chin jutted out while tears ran down his cheeks as Miz Rice whaled on his ass with a wooden paddle. He never said a word. Never told Miz Rice that Hank had been with him. That Hank had stolen Lemon Heads too. He just took the whipping for both of them while Hank stood watching, trying to not vomit the sour candies. That day set the pattern for their friendship. Bobby would think of something crazy to do, like drive fifteen miles to a bootleg joint, get drunk, and then try to outrun the law on the way home. No matter how crazy, Hank was always an agreeable partner to Bobby’s plans. When they ended up in a ditch, the law caught them and as the sheriff was handcuffing Bobby, he’d say, “Naw, Sherriff, I just picked old Hank up hitchhiking.” Bobby’d wake up in jail the next morning and Hank would wake up in his own bed, his reputation as a good boy intact.
Hank swallowed down the shame of his betrayal of that friend, shame that was as bitter as bile. The betrayal of the only man, other than his father, that Hank had ever loved.
The screen door creaked open and Cheryl walked onto the porch and sat down beside Hank on the porch swing. “Something wrong? You look sad.” She said as she rubbed Hank’s hand.
“Just thinking bout me and Bobby when we was little.”
“Lord does work in funny ways. We never would have loved each other if we both hadn’t loved Bobby first.”
Hank squeezed Cheryl’s hand and smiled at her, but the shadow of shame never left his eyes.
Lettie
When the four o’clock whistle blew, Lettie punched her timecard and walked out of the plant. She rolled the windows down in her car and sat there, waiting until most of her co-workers had left the parking lot. The muffler on her old car had a hole in it and made so much racket that everyone stared. It embarrassed Lettie, but money was so tight, getting it fixed had to be pushed off to the future.
The factory parking lot was almost empty when Lettie pulled the old car onto the road. The wind from the open windows blew her hair around her face and head and she turned the radio volume up louder than the muffler. This was Lettie’s favorite time of day. Her time was her own and she took the long way home, circling around the back roads to add as much time as possible to the drive. Killing time; delaying going home to her mother-in-law Doris’ house. Against the protestations of the worn clutch, she slipped the gear shift into fourth and pushed the gas pedal harder.
Back when she’d first started dating Lonnie, she’d loved coming to Doris’ house. Lettie’s own mama had run off with a railroad man when she was a little girl and she’d yearned for a mama. Doris had seemed like such a good, kind person back then, cooking meals for Lonnie and Lettie. Insisting that Lettie come to church with them.
When Lettie and Lonnie got married, things begin to change. The first time they’d had an argument was over the color of the paint for the newlywed’s bedroom. Lettie had wanted to paint the room a pale peach, but Doris had insisted on white paint for the whole house. She’d said that the peach would be too hard to match up if spots got damaged and needed touch up. Lonnie took his mama’s side and all the walls in the newlywed’s rental house were painted white. Lettie hated white walls.
When Lettie thought back to when Lonnie Jr. was born, she turned the radio louder and drove faster around the winding country roads. Lettie couldn’t do anything right, according to Doris. If Lettie used disposable diapers, she was lazy. If she picked him up when he cried, she was spoiling him. Doris criticism spilled over onto everything Lettie did. The meals she cooked were tasteless. Her house wasn’t clean enough. Nothing Lettie did was good enough. Finally, around the time Emily Ann was born, Lonnie couldn’t take anymore of his mama’s harping and he told her that she was welcome for dinner after church, but unless invited she should stay at home. Lettie and Lonnie felt bad, they knew Doris was lonesome, but they had to have peace.
With Lonnie as a buffer between Doris and Lettie, things went smooth for the most part. Then Lonnie had the wreck. They hadn’t had much saved up, so Lettie had to go to work and Doris had babysat the kids. Then there were the lawyer fees. Doris had mortgaged her house to get the money. For that, Lettie was thankful, but Doris couldn’t meet the payments on the little pension check that Lonnie’s daddy had left her, so Lettie and the kids moved in with Doris. It’d been Lonnie’s idea. He said, “Ain’t no use in you paying rent, when Mama has that big old house all alone. You all can be a help to each other.”
The wind from the open car windows rushed around Lettie’s face. Lettie had never known misery like she did now. Doris didn’t want Lettie or Emily Ann wearing jeans. She said that Lettie was trying to be a man and the Bible spoke against women wearing men’s garb. Doris used the Bible like a weapon, as back up for anything she didn’t want Lettie and the kids to do. She wouldn’t let the kids watch cartoons, said they were worshipping false idols. Lettie felt like she was losing her mind. Doris expected Lettie to hand her paycheck over to her. Then she would dole out a little here and there for gas or a cheap pair of shoes.
Suddenly, too soon, Lettie could see Doris' house ahead. She slowed the car and stopped it a little ways up the road. In the tiny rear view mirror, she checked her appearance. For a second, she didn’t recognize this woman staring back at her with red-rimmed hollow eyes from a gaunt face that looked as if it belonged to some hag rid creature. Lettie mumbled to herself, “six more months, six more months, and then we both will be free.”
Silas
Silas pushed the lawn mower around the entrance to the graveyard, taking care not to disturb the only other living inhabitant. The young woman had brought a little pot of daisies and placed them on old Saul Isaac’s grave. Now she seemed to be having a conversation with Saul, who'd been dead these last three months. Lots of people did that, said things to the dead that they could never say while the person was living.
Silas maneuvered the lawnmower around the tombstones, bending to move vases of flowers out of the lawnmower’s path and then when he'd finished mowing he'd replace them carefully, while hand pulling any weeds that had sprouted around the tombstone. That was the least he could do for the dead: show them respect.
Silas had been mowing the grass of the graveyard and grounds of the New Zion Baptist Church for about ten years now. The church paid him twenty-five dollars a month. It surely wasn't his best paying job, but Silas would have done it for free. His parents were laid to rest here and he wanted their graves and the graves of their neighbors well kept, so everybody'd know that someone living still cared for them.
Silas came to a grave loaded with trinkets, memorials to the dead. He carefully removed each item, toy motorcycles, flowers, stuffed animals, and plastic angels. This particular grave was covered with things. Some of the things were new and shiny and some of them had weathered here for years. Silas shut off his mower and carefully removed each item.
He’d finished mowing the grave and was replacing a rusty, bent vanity plate, when the woman walked up behind him, watching him as he moved first one item then another, arranging them so each thing was placed just right.
"By the looks of all this stuff, they must have been a well-loved people."
"Yeah, sure looks like it." Silas answered.
"Who were they?"
Silas stared at the double marker for a few seconds before he spoke. "She was a girl.” Silas paused to wipe the sweat from his brow. “And he was just a boy crossing a bridge. I guess they weren’t much different than the rest of us."
Appal(Trad)
"The Old Mountain Home"
Philip Kent Church, Virginia
Philip Kent Church, Virginia
The old mountain home, encroaching forest reclaimed,
It’s falling down all alone, there’s nobody to be blamed,
Once it was warmed, with a hearth and the fire,
Where children swarmed, with youth’s desire;
By a Mama’s love, and all the ties that bind,
While high above, loomed the ridge’s spine.
Over there in the yard, is where the garden was tended,
Yes, the chores were hard, it was a home daily mended.
Behind the house are two posts, where a line was strung.
It looked like a troop of ghosts, when the sheets were hung.
On the old fence of split-rail, there was a gate that latched,
It opened the way to the well, where the water was fetched.
Out yonder in the field, full with purpled clover,
Is where the kids squealed, at playing Red Rover.
The old spring-house there, is where food was stored;
For vittles cooked with care, and thanks to the Lord.
The old porch, now laid low, once echoed the ringing,
Of the fiddle, and banjo, with Papaw’s sweet singing.
In these mountains wild, memories of life’s simple thrills,
Are the remembrances of a child, raised-up in these hills.
It’s falling down all alone, there’s nobody to be blamed,
Once it was warmed, with a hearth and the fire,
Where children swarmed, with youth’s desire;
By a Mama’s love, and all the ties that bind,
While high above, loomed the ridge’s spine.
Over there in the yard, is where the garden was tended,
Yes, the chores were hard, it was a home daily mended.
Behind the house are two posts, where a line was strung.
It looked like a troop of ghosts, when the sheets were hung.
On the old fence of split-rail, there was a gate that latched,
It opened the way to the well, where the water was fetched.
Out yonder in the field, full with purpled clover,
Is where the kids squealed, at playing Red Rover.
The old spring-house there, is where food was stored;
For vittles cooked with care, and thanks to the Lord.
The old porch, now laid low, once echoed the ringing,
Of the fiddle, and banjo, with Papaw’s sweet singing.
In these mountains wild, memories of life’s simple thrills,
Are the remembrances of a child, raised-up in these hills.
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