Country Hardball

by Steve Weddle

  I’m not saying anything you weren’t thinking.

  Well, just don’t say it. Not tonight.

  All right.

  A couple of the men, after enough congratulatory time had passed, came over to talk to Hank. Away from the women.

  “Great news, Hank.”

  “Great news.”

  “Yeah,” Hank said. “Not out of the woods, yet, I don’t guess. Never are, really.”

  “My wife’s brother had cancer off and on for ten years,” Eddie Pribble said. “Went to chemo. Radiation. Went to the little Chinese fellow over in El Dorado. Stuck needles all up and down his back. In his arm. Did everything they could think of. Took ’em damn near a decade, but they got his ass cancer free.”

  “What kind of cancer did he have?” one of the men asked.

  “Like I said, butthole cancer.”

  The men groaned, looked somewhere else.

  “He wasn’t gay or nothing like that,” Pribble said. “Just caught it in the a-hole, somehow.”

  They all said “damn” and shook their heads. You just never know.

  “He doing all right now?” Hank asked.

  “Naw. Lost his job. All the medical bills. Sick days. Took a shotgun to his head last Easter. Blew his jaw into a hundred pieces, clear across the kitchen. Earlene and the girl moved to Vicksburg. She works at that big Chinese buffet off the interstate. Nice place.”

  The smell of fried fish was dying off. Squeaks and chirps coming in off the water. Catfish, frogs, something flopping here and there on the water.

  “Damned shame. I think I remember something about that last year,” somebody said.

  “Yeah,” Pribble said. “It was in the paper.”

  On the way home, Hank and Ruby held hands, awkwardly, across the emergency brake between them. But neither one let go until they pulled up the drive. He pulled her hand to his, gave hers a kiss, then put the Jeep in park, took the keys out, walked across the carport to the side door, and saw through the window the mess inside.

  She walked in, said “sweet Jesus” the way you might start a prayer. Then they walked through the house, seeing what was missing. Neither of them gave any thought to whether someone else was still in the house. They called the sheriff’s office and started making a list of what was missing. Then they sat at the kitchen table, drank coffee, waited.

  “So that’s it?” Deputy Lacewell asked. “They came right for the safe?”

  “Far as we can tell,” Hank said, standing in the bedroom with the deputy. “Made a mess of the place, but didn’t take anything else. Pistol and some money from the safe.”

  “How much money you say it was?”

  “Didn’t say.”

  “Well,” Lacewell said, moving his tongue around the back of his teeth. “How much was it?”

  “You need me to say?”

  “I’m asking you.”

  “I mean, what’s the point. It’s cash. It’s gone. Not like I had the serial numbers written down. Can’t you just put ‘Stolen: Cash’?”

  “Was it a lot of cash?” Lacewell asked.

  “Enough to take, I reckon.”

  “Hank, I get the feeling you’re not being completely forthright with me.”

  He nodded. “Yeah, I’d say that’s a fair assessment.”

  “Well?” Lacewell waited.

  “What if I told you it was twenty-two thousand dollars?”

  “Jesus H. Christ, Hank,” he said, catching Ruby’s attention from the living room. “Sorry, ma’am.” He nodded her way. He lowered his voice. “Shit, Hank, that’s a fucking shitload of money. What you got that much cash for? Holy Christ.”

  “I’m just saying, what if I told you that’s how much?”

  The deputy shook his head. “I’d tell you that’s a lot of damn money to have lying around the house and I’d ask you why the hell you had that kind of cash.”

  “What if I said I’m not a fan of banks?”

  “I’d want to know why you had that kind of cash. Jesus, Hank. This is starting to sound a little questionable, if you don’t mind my saying.”

  “I mean, that’s something you’d have to put in the report, the amount of cash.”

  “Yeah, I’d sure as hell think so,” Lacewell said.

  Deputy Dennis McWilliams had come over from talking to Ruby. He’d talked to her about the doctor’s visit, heard the good news. Said they were all praying for her. In the bedroom, he asked Lacewellq”> hadck what was going on.

  Once he was caught up, he looked at Hank. Then he scratched the back of his neck. “So you had two thousand dollars?”

  “Is that what I had?” Hank asked him, then looked to Lacewell.

  “I’m not sure that’s what he said.”

  McWilliams turned to Lacewell. “Mike, how about you make sure Mrs. Dalton’s all right, okay? Been a long day for her. Maybe she’d like a glass of water.” He took Lacewell’s notebook, pulled the last page out, slid it into his pocket, and handed the notebook back.

  When Dalton and McWilliams were alone, the deputy said, “My dad wasn’t a fan of banks, either.”

  “That right?”

  “Said he didn’t need the feds breathing down his neck about how much money he made and how much he had to pay in taxes, you know?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Guess he figured the shoebox under his mattress was his Cayman Islands account.”

  “That sounds like a smart man.”

  McWilliams nodded. “It was good money. He was just kinda particular about who got a piece of it.”

  Hank nodded. “Smart man, indeed.”

  “And the combination to the lock?”

  “Yeah?” Hank asked. “What do you mean?”

  “Anniversary? Phone number? Your kids’ birthdays?” McWilliams asked, wincing after he said it.

  Hank nodded. “Birthdays and mine and Ruby’s anniversary.”

  “When’s the last time you changed it?”

  “When the guy put it in.”

  McWilliams looked around the bed. “Still a little peculiar they just came straight for the cash.”

  “And the pistol.”

  “Yeah.” McWilliams looked at the registration Hank had handed him. “A .32, huh?”

  “A Colt, right.”

  “No other guns in the house.”

  “No,” Hank said. Not since their firstborn, Billy, had died in that hunting accident over around Lewisville six years ago. The sort of day you play through with “what ifs” for the rest of your life. No. A pistol to keep the house safe was all. No rifles. No one was doing any hunting anymore.

  “And they didn’t take anything else?”

  “Not much for them to take, don’t reckon.”

  “TV? Computer? Jewelry?”

  “Old. No. And cheap. Ruby has a diamond necklace, but it’s her good luck charm. She was wearing it today. Probably still is.”

  “All right.” McWilliams held the registration between his fingers. “Might want to see about getting another pistol.”

  Hank nodded, but never got around to getting one. Not that it would have helped him sixteen days later when the man on his steps was holding a pistol on him.

  The man with Hank waited as his partner pulled the car next to the carport, got out of the car, pulled a shotgun from the backq”> hadck seat. The man with the shotgun said, “Get inside.”

  Hank came through the door first, and Ruby asked what was going on. Then she saw the two men behind him. She had taken her slippers off while he was outside, was scrolling through the channels to find something to watch.

  “Get your asses down on the ground,” the man with the shotgun said.

  Hank went to one knee, all creaks and pops. He looked over at Ruby, thinking to reassure her. Ruby didn’t move.

  The man with the shotgun stepped her way.

  “Get your ass down on the ground, bitch.”

  Hank started to say something, but Ruby stood from the couch, holding the afghan tight in her hand. “T
he hell I will.”

  The three men looked at her.

  “What?”

  “I done beat cancer,” she said, “and I swear to God I ain’t getting down on the ground for nobody.”

  The gunmen looked at each other, then back at Ruby.

  The sun painted light onto the rug in front of her feet, as flecks of dust danced in a river to the window, every speck visible, sparkling, like your first glimpse of snow. The dust, caught for a moment, before the sun goes away and the dust settles, moving by books, by afghans, by the top edge of a picture frame, from room to room in the darkness.

  When the man with the pistol moved from Hank to Ruby, Hank uncoiled, putting his shoulder into the man’s gun.

  A thin, piercing sound as a shot exploded into the wall. The man with the shotgun turned back, but the gun barrels hit the other man in the shoulder and two blasts discharged pellets into a cabinet of family photos. The Sears family photo of the Daltons in front. Hank in his funeral suit. Ruby with a fresh perm. Billy and Chet, standing as tall as they could. A decade old. A lifetime ago.

  Hank fought for the pistol, managed to put another shot into the wall. The men ran out the way they’d come, gravel spraying as they tore off. Hank and Ruby in the living room, holding each other.

  He held his left hand open for her. “Got my gun back.”

  “That’s your gun?”

  “Yeah.”

  He set it on the cabinet top, winced as he moved.

  “What’s wrong?”

  He put his left hand on his right collarbone. “Think I broke my shoulder.”

  • • •

  Hank Dalton pulled his truck into his son’s driveway, cut the engine. He squeezed the steering wheel. Let go. Squeezed again.

  He had spent the early afternoon listening to the ball game, Justin Womack getting in the game because the regular second baseman had pulled a hammy running out a grounder. Justin had gotten an RBI double in the eighth to tie the game, then scored the winning run on a wild pitch.

  “Did you hear that?” Hank asked Ruby.

  “Very nice.”

  “You weren’t paying attention?”

  “Sure,” she said, looking up from her crossword. “Sure. That was amazing.”

  “Really?”

  “Okay. I didn’t hear it,” she . h grinned. “What was it?”

  He told her, taking three times as long to tell it as it had taken to play out.

  “Justin. He’s Chet’s age, right?”

  “Year older.” The year between Chet and Billy.

  As Hank stood from his car, looking at his son’s little house, he replayed parts of the game in his head, still trying to put good thoughts on top of bad ones.

  It wasn’t much of a driveway. Enough for a car and a half, maybe. He started to close the door with his slinged arm, shoulder stinging. Sneered, used the other arm. The old house was so close to the road, when something fell off, it’d as likely flop right into the road as anywhere, he figured, walking through the side yard, heading around back. He stood at the foot of the steps, plywood on milk crates, looking around the back yard, littered with lawn mowers, metal chairs, truck tires.

  He walked through the back, caught the screen door before it could slam shut, eased it closed. He touched the bottoms of his boots to the rug, dried the dampness. Then walked through the mudroom into the kitchen, past the brown jugs on the floor, the burners on the counter, the empty drugstore boxes.

  The house was empty, except for loose CDs, ash-topped beer cans, a bong as long as a baseball bat, and the boy sleeping on the yard-sale couch. He looked at what was left of the boy, skin tight over points of bone. A sprawling, dull tattoo on his chest, never finished. Maybe it was supposed to have been a dragon. Or smoke.

  He stood over the boy, watching him sleep. There was a time he was faster than the Womack boy. Stronger than his own older brother. The promise. The absolute, complete hope.

  Once, when he was a high school sophomore, the boy had one-hopped a throw from the wall in right field, nailing what would have been the tying run from third. They’d gone to state after that, Hank and Ruby driving to every game, setting up lawn chairs early, bringing food and drinks from the store, making sure the whole team was all right. And that championship game, when even Billy had skipped class to see Chet play, everyone standing for the last three innings. Everyone storming the field after the boy’s walk-off solo shot in the eleventh. So much promise. So close to home.

  And then the hunting accident, like an earthquake. Or fire. Like a flood that sweeps over everything, soaking ruin into everything, until years later even the box of family photographs you’d thought was tucked away safe in the attic still reeks of mildew.

  Hank kicked the couch to wake the boy. Then again.

  The boy wiped his nose with his forearm. “C’mon. The hell?” He saw his father, reached for a shirt that wasn’t there. “Dad.” He blinked, shook his head. Started to cough up something, then swallowed it.

  “Afternoon,” Hank said.

  Chet looked around. “You can’t just come in my house while I’m sleeping. What are you doing here?” He slid up to sit on the couch, looking around the room, trying to see where things lay.

  Hank turned his back on the boy, walked around the room. “Came to check on you. Make sure you were safe.”

  “Safe?” Chet scratched the back of head. “Yeah. Wait. Why wouldn’t I be safe?”

  “Been a lot of breakins around here,” Hank said. “I notice here you got a nice big-screen TV now. Work going all r roan Hight?”

  “Uh, yeah. Work’s fine.”

  “Where you working?”

  “Oh, you know.”

  Hank turned to face his son. “No. I don’t know.”

  “Around.”

  “That right? And what are you doing?”

  “You know, this and that.”

  “Yeah. I know about this and that. Must pay well.”

  “I’m doing all right.”

  Hank reached for the Colt from inside his sling. He pointed the pistol at the TV. “What is that? Forty-six inches?”

  “Hey, hey. Careful, man.”

  “The TV? Forty-six inches?” Hank shook the pistol toward the TV again.

  “Forty-two I think. Hell. Be careful.”

  MIRACLES

  “I’m sorry for your loss. I’m sorry for your loss,” he whispered. Hands in his pants pockets, he slid his thumbs into his fists, squeezed until his knuckles ached. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

  The man in front of him turned around, lifted his glasses to his forehead. “What was that?”

  “Nothing. Sorry.” Rusty swallowed, felt his Adam’s apple jump, tight against his collar, against the clip of his tie.

  The man turned away as Jake slid in next to him, punched him in the shoulder. “Dude, ’sup?”

  Rusty didn’t turn. He looked at the back of the man in front of him, the white edge of the man’s shirt collar, a knife-edge standing a quarter inch above his jacket collar. Over the man’s shoulder, Rusty saw the line snaking through the hall, imagined it as it turned between the pews, to the front of the sanctuary where Staci McMahen’s family stood, squeezing hugs into cries.

  The church was quiet now, a dull murmur, after the deputies escorted F. T. Pribble out.

  “Is that …?” a woman had asked when Pribble walked in from the parking lot. Rusty had been in line long enough that a dozen people were behind him when Deputy McWilliams walked Pribble back outside.

  “I understand,” Rusty had heard him say. “I just come to pay my respects, say I was sorry for what my family done.”

  When the deputy walked back into the church, everyone in line turned forward, watching the back of the person ahead of them.

  Someone said, “Lot of nerve.”

  Jake leaned in to Rusty’s face, shaking Rusty from the whispers. “Bet they ain’t got this many people when you die.”

  “Shh,” Rusty said.

  “Hey, k
id,” said a man two or three people behind them. Rusty turned, saw a man he recognized but didn’t know. “You can’t cut. Back of the line.”

  Jake looked at the man for a few seconds. “See you after,” he said to Rusty. Then he turned, walked away.

  Rusty let him go, then stood on his toes, trying to count the people ahead of him, measure the time in handshakes, in hugs. He turned to the woman behind him, a woman his mother knew. “I’ll be right back, okay?”

  When she nodded, he walked toward the front of the line, to where it turned through the double doors, cross handles bungeed to the railing, and counted again, in clumps of ten. There’s four, then five, six. Maybe a dozen, fifteen groups of ten lined up, waiting to be sorry for their loss. Rusty wiped his forehead with the sleeve of his shirt, then pulled the handkerchief from his pocket, wiped the damp from his cheeks. People come for the show. People coming into church like they always do. Put on a tie. Act like you’re friends with everyone.

  How many of these people even knew Staci? Rusty saw Debbie. Tina. Loriella. A girl whose name he didn’t know. How many knew who she really was? Talked with her about anything real? Shared something with her. How many of these people had any right to be there at all?

  He walked back to the woman, told her again that he’d be right back, then walked outside the church.

  Rusty leaned against the brick wall, under the canopy they’d built a few years before for rainy-day drop-offs. He watched as cars pulled into the parking lot, circled through the trucks and suburbans, then pulled back onto the road and into the Methodists’ parking lot across the street. All the people who came in all the cars. Why Staci? Why not one of them? Rusty saw a man in the front row, sitting in a station wagon, head leaned back, hands on the steering wheel, patting time to a song Rusty couldn’t hear. A few spots away, F. T. Pribble sat on his tailgate, legs dangling, pants legs creeping up against bone-white legs.

  • • •

  Rusty s iaan Haw a man in a tan suit walk up the sidewalk from the back of the church. The wind was blowing a little, pine needles falling into the road as the man walked.

  “Afternoon, son,” the man said, tipping his straw hat to Rusty. “You look lost.”

  Rusty turned behind him, wondered why the man was talking to him. “No, sir. Just had to get some air or whatever.”