Desert Discord

by Henry D. Terrell

  Janey inhaled sharply and covered her mouth, eyes wide with fear. Then she recognized him in the dim light.

  “Andy!” she whispered. “Oh my God. You scared the shit out of me. What are you doing up?”

  “Couldn’t sleep.” He looked up at the wall clock. “It’s one o’clock. What were you doing out?” It was not an accusation. He was just mildly curious.

  Janey looked around, then popped her eyes dramatically. “I was out getting S-T-O-N-D,” she said, and stifled a giggle.

  “I thought you didn’t get high,” said Andy.

  “R-and-A think I don’t get high,” she said. “But I’ll tell you a secret. It’s a very secret secret.” She came over to Andy and put her mouth next to his ear.

  “I … am … ripped,” Janey burst out with a snort, which she quickly stifled with her hand. She took Andy’s milk cup and sniffed it.

  “What you drinkin’?”

  “Milk.”

  “I want some milk.” She got the milk carton from the refrigerator and a plastic glass from the cabinet and poured. She poured it too full, almost overflowing. “Whoops,” she said, and bent down to sip the milk without lifting the glass from the table. She slurped loudly.

  The kitchen light went on, and Ramona stood there, wan and puffy-eyed.

  “Janey, what the hell are you doing?”

  “Nothing, Mom.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Andy. “We were just having insomnia together. And milk.”

  “Fresh milk,” agreed Janey. “For our bones. Go back to bed, Mom.”

  “Andy, I know your sleep is messed up, but you shouldn’t keep my daughter up too,” said Ramona. She sounded tired. “She’s impossible to push out of bed in the morning.”

  “You’re right,” said Andy. “My fault. You need to go to bed, Janey girl.”

  “As soon as I finish my milk. Really, go back to bed, Mom. I’ll go in a second.”

  “Okay,” said Ramona. “But you’ve been staying up late and going out too much. I don’t want to lose you, too. Now, good night.”

  Ramona turned and left.

  “Thanks for not snitching on me,” said Janey. “You’re sweet.”

  “It’s okay, but I don’t want to lie for you. Your mother is nice. She’s as nice as my mom. You should ap—” He paused, searching for the word. He had learned not to push it too hard. Take your time, find a new path to the word. “Appreciate. You should appreciate her.”

  “Oh, I do, I do,” said Janey. “As long as she doesn’t ride my A-S-S.” She tilted her glass and glugged down the rest of the milk. She put the glass in the sink and walked over to Andy. To his surprise, she bent down and put her arms around him and kissed his cheek. She whispered in his ear. “Secret time again. I … love … you.”

  Andy reached his arm around her waist and gave her a squeeze.

  “I love you too, kiddo,” he said. “Now, we need to go to bed. Good night.” He got up and rinsed out his cup and then Janey’s. She went into the small bathroom. In a few moments, he heard running water and the brushing of teeth.

  Andy went to his room and closed the door. He still didn’t think he could sleep. He needed quiet music. He looked through the handful of classical albums the Piedmans had provided, then at the few he had brought from home. He wanted piano tonight. He chose Schubert’s “Sonata in A Minor,” performed by the great Lucette Descaves. It was an old recording but in fair shape. Andy removed the disk carefully from the sleeve with his left hand and put it on the little record player. He turned the volume down till the music was barely audible.

  Andy had taken off his T-shirt and was unbuckling his pants when the door opened and Janey walked in. Quite matter-of-factly, she closed the door behind her.

  “Girl, what are you doing?” he asked.

  “What do you think, silly?” she said. As he watched her, she started undressing.

  “Wait …,” said Andy, but in a few seconds she was completely naked and had draped her jeans and shirt across a chair. Apparently, she had not been wearing a bra or underwear. She was a large, big-boned girl with wide hips, and in the dim light of the bedside lamp, there was a lot of very pale skin. She shook her wavy black hair back and forth.

  “What do you think?” she asked.

  “About what?”

  “Me,” she laughed quietly.

  “You’re … really … beautiful. But Janey, I don’t think this is …”

  She swept over to Andy and embraced him, pushing her mouth against his. Andy stepped back, attempting to recover. She kept pulling him close and pushing up against him.

  “Andy, Andy, Andy.” She kissed him over and over.

  He took her firmly by the shoulders and looked her square in the face. She grinned at him, eyes wide. The whites of her eyes looked a little red, even in this light.

  “We can’t do this,” he said.

  “Sure we can,” said Janey. “You said you wanted to go to bed.” She kissed him again. This large, warm girl was not going to be denied.

  Oh my, he thought. “That’s not really what I meant,” he said. “It’s not … right. I am a guest here. What would your mother say?”

  “Who … cares?” said Janey. She sat down on the bed, grinning up at him. “Don’t you like me?”

  “I like you very much, but … we need to talk.”

  “Okay. Let’s talk in bed.”

  Janey pulled the covers aside, climbed into the double bed, and slid over. Andy hesitated, then went back to the stereo and turned up the volume slightly. He really didn’t want Ramona or anybody else walking in, even if this whole thing was not his doing. Andy took off his pants but left his boxer shorts on. He got into bed beside Janey. Immediately she snuggled up to him and put one leg on top of his.

  Oh, my, he thought. My, oh my. This is … so … nice.

  He put his left arm around her and lay still, holding her and smelling her hair, which smelled of smoke, but he still enjoyed it. But he knew this whole thing was certainly not a good idea. Am I crazy? Is this crazy? Andy found himself torn between common sense and some very real, very neglected feelings. Janey kept snuggling against him and tracing her fingers across his chest.

  This is so … very … nice, Andy thought. He basked, not in a hurry to go anywhere.

  Janey raised herself up on one elbow.

  “Have you done this before?” she asked.

  “Yes,” Andy said. “It’s been quite awhile, but definitely yes. How about you?”

  “Sure. Yesterday.”

  It was Andy’s turn to rise up on one elbow.

  “Yesterday?” He looked at Janey, who smiled at him dreamily.

  “Sure. With Roger Tannin.”

  “Who’s that? A boy in your school?”

  “No. He ditched school a long time ago. He’s a cool guy. But don’t worry, I don’t like him.”

  “You don’t like him? But you’re saying you had sex with him?”

  “It’s okay. I mean, I like him for a friend. He gave me a lid of grass for free.” She kept smiling. Andy, feeling much less special, tried to formulate a response, but fatigue and TBI had taken their toll on his verbal skills.

  “Janey … you need to have more”—he searched; he didn’t want to sound like a guidance counselor—“respect. You need more respect.”

  “I do respect you.”

  “No. You. You need to respect you. Don’t sell yourself. You are worth … more than that.”

  “I’m sorry,” Janey said. “I shouldn’t have told you. Come here. I want you to respect me.” She pulled him back down and put her head on his chest. “Let’s just stay like this for a while.” She lay still.

  Andy relaxed and kissed her forehead. “Okay. Just a little while.” He knew he should think this situation through very carefully. But in the meantime, he would let himself enjoy the touch of a girl, even one who prostituted herself for plastic bags of Mexican grass. After several minutes, with the A minor sonata playing quietly from the dresser, Janey starte
d snoring.

  Andy extracted himself gently from her grasp, whereupon she rolled over and began breathing slowly and deeply, sound asleep.

  Well, that took care of that.

  Andy pulled the covers over himself and her, then reached over and switched off the little lamp. He was going to have to make damn sure he woke up early enough to get her back to her own bed before the household awoke in the morning. He didn’t want to have to explain that it’s not what it looks like.

  Andy lay awake listening to Schubert. After the record ended, Andy composed his own song—an ode to a naked girl—in his head. He liked it. It might be worth remembering and transcribing, if he could hold on to it.

  A few feet away, crouching in a hall closet, Reggie was disappointed.

  – 32 –

  The State versus Morris Goudrault

  Ron Robbins, attorney at law, was chuckling. This bothered Morris, because his fate and future were on the line, and his lawyer was yucking it up quietly with a female court clerk. He couldn’t hear what they were saying, but he doubted the judge would approve. This was district court, Morris Goudrault had been persuaded by his lawyer to waive a jury trial and plead guilty, and now he awaited sentencing.

  “That’s the whole point, sweetheart,” Attorney Robbins was saying, and chuckled again, responding to something the clerk had said. Morris wished he knew what was so fucking funny. Robbins needed to just shut up and get serious. The Texas Department of Corrections was waiting for Morris, open-jawed like a ravenous alligator. And it was going to get him for sure. The only question was for how long.

  They both sat in court, along with the assistant district attorney and numerous onlookers and witnesses, including Morris’s mother and sister, a couple of friends, and Pastor Louis from Northside Pentecostal Holiness Church. Pastor Louis had testified to Morris’s basic Christian decency and truly penitent spirit. The other witnesses weren’t much help. Mom rambled incoherently, and with such a strong Mississippi accent nobody could understand a word she said. His sister Ruth testified that Morris was a good brother who always remembered his niece’s birthday, but that wasn’t much help. Doug Baker, Morris’s boss at the meat processing plant, was supposed to show up and tell the judge what a hard worker Morris was, but he bowed out at the last minute because “things were getting crazy at the shop.” Crazy enough to let your boy Morris go up the river for years, you disloyal ass?

  However, Pastor Louis had been great. He told in tender detail, with a slight catch in his throat, of the day Morris was saved by the grace of Jesus and washed in the blood, back when Morris was an adenoidal fifteen-year-old. The Concho River was too low for baptism that spring ten years ago, but they had used somebody’s above-ground pool to dunk the five repentant sinners, including Morris, into the cleansing water one by one, bringing them all into the bosom of the lamb. Hearing again about that holy day brought a tear to Morris’s eyes and regret to his heart.

  He was truly sorry, and a changed man. But the whole question of sentencing came down to scales—not the scales of justice, but the 1949 Toledo scales at the sheriff’s office. What quantity of illegal narcotics, exactly, did Morris possess with intent to distribute? And why did they have to weigh the dirt?

  He admitted to growing the twenty-five marijuana plants in his Aunt Birdie’s backyard. She was in the nursing home the past two years and never knew what was going on behind her house just a mile inside the Ferris county line north of Duro. She had no idea that when her nephew graciously agreed to move up there to “take care of the place and feed the cats” that he and his erstwhile friend Luke would dig up the daylilies and plant three rows of Coahuila tea. Everything went great the first summer, but the ten plants they grew that year were sparse and spindly. In the early days of winter they harvested five bags of throat-scratching horse weed that would barely get you high and contained so many seeds that two or three would always sneak into a rolled joint and explode like cigarette loads, burning tiny holes in shirt sleeves and denim jeans.

  The second year, they learned their lessons. They started with better seeds, culled out most of the males, pinched the plants to keep them bushy, and sprinkled on lots of Rapid-Gro. They were at least a month from harvest when Luke flew the coop, obviously tipped off by somebody, and the deputies descended on Aunt Birdie’s like Visigoths, pulling up the lovingly tended sativa bushes and stuffing them into garbage bags, whereupon they were weighed—buds, leaves, stems, roots, dirt, and all.

  He tried to explain dope economics to his lawyer. If everything had gone as planned, they might have managed, after curing and drying, to get a pound of product. No, it had not been worth the risk. Mexican grass was cheap, effective, and coming in by the planeload.

  It was definitely not worth it for Morris—he was headed to the penitentiary. But for how long? The deal the prosecutor offered was a stiff fine and five years in jail. Good behavior would get it reduced to two and a half. The DA said he had four pounds of narcotics. A crazy exaggeration, but there was little room for argument, said attorney Ron Robbins, and they were unlikely to get a better deal from this prosecutor. A jury might give him ten years, or even more. Take the deal, do your little time, and get your sorry life back together.

  So, Morris pled guilty. Sentencing was in the hands of the judge.

  Minutes passed, and the people in the courtroom talked quietly. There were coughs and thumps. Ron Robbins thumbed through the notes from another, presumably more important case.

  The door clacked open and a bailiff came in.

  “All rise!”

  Morris rose.

  “The court of the Hundred Forty-First Judicial Circuit, Criminal Division, is now in session, the Honorable Judge Wayne Pope presiding.”

  Morris heard the sound of his own heartbeat thumping in his inner ear.

  “Be seated.”

  Morris sat.

  The judge spoke quickly, not looking up from the papers on the bench.

  “In the case of the State of Texas versus Morris Goudrault [he pronounced it ‘go-DRALT’ instead of the correct ‘GOOD-row’], the defendant Mr. Goudrault has pleaded guilty to possession of narcotics with intent to distribute. The defendant has waived the right to a trial by a jury of his peers and has asked the court to impose sentence.”

  He held up a legal-size sheet of paper, then looked up.

  “Mr. Severin. The district attorney’s office has recommended a sentence of five years in state prison and a fine of ten thousand dollars. Is that correct?”

  “That’s correct, Judge.”

  “And this leniency is based on the possession of four pounds of narcotics with intent to sell?”

  “Yes, Judge. And on the defendant’s age and the sincerity of his remorse, and our belief he is unlikely to repeat the offense.”

  “I see.” The judge studied the paper, then looked up. “Mr. Severin, I have the sheriff’s office report in front of me. It says nothing about four pounds of narcotics. In fact, the figure given is thirty-one pounds. Can you explain the discrepancy?”

  “Yes, Judge,” said Severin. “Our office based the number on an estimate of the actual salable narcotic, excluding parts of the marijuana plants that do not contain drugs.”

  And the dirt. Tell him they weighed the dirt. Morris felt his heart rate rising.

  “There is nothing in the law that makes such a subtle distinction,” said Judge Pope. “The amount of narcotics Mr. Goudrault possessed was determined by the sheriff’s office at the time of the investigation. That is an enormous adjustment. Almost tenfold.”

  Morris looked over at his lawyer. Say something! But Ron Robbins kept his eyes on the bench.

  The judge shook his head slowly. This was not going to be good.

  “Would the defendant please rise and face the bench?”

  Morris rose. Attorney Ron Robbins rose.

  Oh no. Oh, please.

  “Mr. Goudrault, I cannot accept the recommended sentence by the district attorney’s office. Despite
Mr. Severin’s suggestion that the amount of dangerous drugs might have been smaller when you actually sold them, I still think the quantity is enormous, and the law is clear. If the law had not stepped in, who knows how many lives you would have destroyed? And I see nothing to make me believe you would have stopped producing more drugs, and harder drugs, year after year, until someone put a stop to you. I was moved by the testimony of your pastor, that you are sincerely sorry about your crime. But I believe you are mostly sorry you were caught and your criminal business was interrupted.”

  He picked up his gavel. “Before I pronounce sentence, do you have anything to add, Mr. Severin?”

  “No, Judge.”

  “Mr. Robbins?”

  “Yes, Judge. We request leniency, based on the defendant being only twenty-four years old, and on his sincere remorse, and his deep religious faith.”

  “Hm,” said Pope. “Mr. Goudrault, do you have anything to say?”

  Morris couldn’t quite collect himself enough to speak. He opened his mouth, then shut it again and swallowed hard.

  “Very well, I hereby …”

  “The dirt!” Morris blurted out. “They weighed the dirt!”

  “Thank you, Mr. Goudrault. I hereby sentence you to forty years in the state penitentiary, and impose a fine of thirty-one thousand dollars. The bailiff will remove the defendant. This court is adjourned.”

  The gavel came down. Morris’s mother sobbed.

  “All rise!”

  The judge left. Ron Robbins leaned over. “We’ll appeal. It was an inappropriate sentence. It’s a little tricky to appeal a sentence, but I’ll file one first thing Monday. Take heart.”

  “They weighed the dirt,” said Morris.

  They let him say good-bye to his mother, who wouldn’t stop crying.

  “Trust Jesus,” said Pastor Louis, and patted him on the shoulder.

  Morris was led away. Family and friends could still hear his voice as he was taken through the door and around the corner.

  “The dirt! Of course it was heavy! They weighed the dirt!”

  – 33 –

  Boredom Explains a Lot of Things