by Tawni O'Dell
“It’s not any worse than what you did to Crystal.”
“I never thought about that shit before I did it. She’d just say something that pissed me off, and I’d hit her.”
“You went out and bought the fucking bat.”
“It was for Johnny.”
“Don’t call him that!” I scream at him.
“That was his name!” he screams back.
I grab him by the hair.
“Get in the car.”
“Jesus!” he cries out.
“Get in the fucking car.”
He starts to cry. I grab him under the arms and drag him over.
A pair of headlights appears in the distance. I keep dragging Reese, hoping whoever it is will keep going. We’re far enough off the road they shouldn’t be able to see anything.
The car slows as it gets closer, then turns purposefully down the coal road as if this were its intended destination. I stop, still holding Reese under the arms, and watch the headlights flick off and the car come to a rolling stop. The engine dies, and a door opens and slams shut.
Jack, in full uniform with a regulation shotgun tucked under one arm, comes walking slowly toward us.
“Let him go,” he tells me.
I drop Reese. He skitters to his car and presses himself against it while Jack shines a flashlight in his face. He holds the beam steady for a couple seconds, then clicks it off.
“Hello, Reese,” he says with a tightening of his lips that almost resembles a smile.
Reese half raises a hand but doesn’t say anything.
“Deputy Zoschenko has been a little out of sorts recently,” Jack explains.
“He’s fucking nuts!” Reese shouts.
“Watch your mouth.”
He turns to me.
“What’s going on out here? Did he commit a crime of some sort?”
“He was driving under the influence.”
“Ah.” He rubs his chin. “I see.”
He flashes the light at Reese, who covers his eyes with his forearm.
“Didn’t you just get out of prison, Reese?”
“You know I did.”
“Wouldn’t a DUI be considered a parole violation?”
“Fuck you.”
He turns the light off again, and we stand in silent darkness.
“I’ll tell you what, Reese,” he says. “I’ll forget about the DUI, and you will forget about Deputy Zoschenko.”
“How the fuck am I supposed to forget about him?” he cries.
“He won’t bother you anymore unless I tell him he can. Now, get in your car and drive home and sleep it off.”
“How the hell am I supposed to sleep this off? I need a drink.”
“Go home,” he orders him.
Jack takes a step toward him. Reese tries to stand and can’t do it. We both help him up and put him in his car while he whimpers about his knees.
My own knee is killing me.
I take a seat on the rear bumper of my truck. Now that the adrenaline rush is over, I can barely move. I want to stretch out on the coal and die.
I hear one engine start and a car drive away. Then I hear a slow pair of shoes approach me.
“How’d you find me?” I ask him before he comes into view.
“You’re not the only person who can stake out a bar.”
“How’d you know what I was planning to do?”
He comes up next to me and puts a foot on the end of my bumper.
“Do you know what this job is all about?”
“The pants?”
“Reading people.”
My hands won’t stop shaking. Aside from two target practices for the job and Val’s letting me shoot his rifle, I’ve never fired a gun before.
“I got an interesting phone call from Bobbie Raynor today. You know Bobbie. She’s married to Jess. Reese’s brother.”
I look up at him. I can’t see his eyes. His entire face is hidden in the shadow cast by his hat brim.
“Yeah, I know Bobbie.”
“She seemed to be under the impression that you might have a reason to want to harm Reese. That it might drive you to do something stupid. I believe those were her exact words: ‘Jess and me don’t want him to do something stupid.’ ”
“Did she tell you why she thought I might want to hurt him?”
“No. I couldn’t get it out of her, and frankly, it doesn’t matter at the moment.”
“So what are you saying? I’m not in trouble for doing this?”
“If I thought for one minute you were actually capable of killing him, you’d be in trouble.”
“You’re not going to make me tell you the whole story?”
“Not tonight.”
“I don’t get it, Jack. You offered me a good job out of the blue that I wasn’t qualified for. You’ve helped me keep that job when a different man would have fired me. You’ve cut me a lot of breaks. Now, after what I did tonight, you’re still keeping me around. You’re doing all this for me just because you love Penn State football?”
He takes his foot off the bumper.
“Maybe I’m not doing anything for you. Maybe I’m doing this for your sister.”
He bends down and picks up Jess’s revolver from the ground where I dropped it.
“I’m going to run by Jess and Bobbie’s place,” he tells me. “Make sure everyone gets settled in okay.”
He starts to leave, then pauses.
“What was your plan? Make it look like self-defense?”
I nod at him.
He turns around and starts walking back to his truck. I hear a strange noise coming from him I’ve never heard before. At first I think he might be coughing or crying. It takes me a moment to realize it’s the sound of Jack chuckling.
———
There are no clouds tonight. The sky glints a pure onyx black, and the cold seems to ricochet off its hard surface back to earth, where it shatters and pierces like needles.
I park my truck behind Val’s and sit there with the windows open, staring at the bumper stickers on my dashboard and watching my breath leave my mouth in puffs. It’s 3:22 A.M. I can’t find a single star, but the moon is huge and bright. The strip mining beyond the house is so flooded with light it’s taken on the shadowless appearance of a lethal, dusty, white planet.
Across the road the rows of lawn mowers look new and polished, their dents and scratches and scabs of rust repaired by the glare of the moon. The snakes move in and out and through them, steadily and almost invisibly, like looping currents of brown light. The rats are bolder and scurry out into the open. I don’t see them until their eyes catch the moonlight and flash green for a second.
I get out and cross the yard. The scraps of junk and the sparse patches of grass have a dull gray glimmer to them, like they’ve been misted with iron. I drag my boot over the ground and leave a path. It’s frost.
The house is dark and silent, but there’s a wisp of smoke coming from the chimney. A flagpole has been erected since my visit yesterday. It’s flying the Stars and Stripes and my sister’s panties.
Val’s sitting on the front porch steps smoking one of the cigars I gave him.
He doesn’t seem surprised to see me.
I walk over to him without saying a word and sit down next to him on the steps.
“You gave me some hunting advice once. I don’t know if you’ll remember it. You told me it’s pretty stupid to try and kill something I don’t want to kill.”
He takes a couple puffs off the cigar and blows some smoke in the air.
“That sounds like something I’d say.”
“I thought I wanted to kill someone tonight. I tried to do it.”
“But you didn’t do it?”
“No.”
“Then you must not have wanted to kill him.”
“I have a son.” The words catch in my throat.
I was planning on saying more, but I can’t.
He hands me a cigar. I haven’t smoked one since I wor
ked for Mr. Perez.
“I wasn’t drafted,” he says simply. “I enlisted. After what happened in Gertie, I thought ’Nam would be better than working in the mines.”
He flips open his lighter and holds out the flame to me.
I watch him in amazement. I don’t know what to say.
“I was wrong,” he explains. “We all make mistakes.”
I look over at the mummified tree. In the moonlight it has the silver-gray sheen of a bone that’s been sucked on. I wonder what killed it. We’re too far away for it to be a victim of the mine fires. A disease or an insect, probably. It wasn’t very old when it died. Its brittle limbs are smooth and have kept the thin, graceful swoop of youth.
Soft padding paws sound behind me, and I turn my head expecting to see a raccoon or a cat.
It’s Jolene in bare feet and bare legs, wrapped in a blanket.
“He said my bedroom was too ruffly,” she offers as an explanation.
I glance over at Val. His expression remains expressionless. I shake my head, smiling, and go back to watching the lawn mowers.
“That was quick,” I tell her.
“Life’s short,” she replies.
She puts a hand on Val’s shoulder and shakes something at me in the dark.
“You want to stay for Jiffy Pop?”
FRIDAY
23
THE NIGHTS I SLEEP ON JOLENE’S COUCH, I’M USUALLY AWAKENED by the boys getting ready for school. It’s one of the reasons why I don’t like sleeping on her couch and one of the reasons why she does like me sleeping here. She says I deserve it.
This morning I wake up on my own, with the sun in my eyes. The curtains on her front window are open, and the sun streams through, falling across my face and onto the coffee table, where signs of Val in the form of two beer cans and a full ashtray sit.
I raise up on one elbow expecting a hangover out of habit, but my head feels relatively clear. I’m still in my clothes, but my boots are off, which is a good sign. I feel better than I expected to feel.
I reach for the phone on Jolene’s end table and dial Chastity’s office.
She’s on another line. Her secretary asks me to hold.
“Hi.”
Her voice is a more effective wake-up than a dozen cups of coffee.
“Hi,” I say back. “What are you up to?”
She laughs.
“I’m seeing patients. What are you up to?”
“Not much, so far. I thought I’d see if you were going to be free later tonight. Maybe have dinner?”
“Mm. I can’t tonight.”
“I’m sorry. I forgot. We’re going to take it slow. I’m asking too soon.”
“No, you’re not. I’m just busy tonight, that’s all.”
“How about September fifteenth?”
“What’s on September fifteenth?”
“I’ve been invited to a birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese’s.”
“Do they have one of those big ball pits?”
“I think so.”
“You’re planning on being around then?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay, it’s a date. In the meantime how about dinner Saturday night?”
“Sounds good.”
“Are you going to Gertie today?” she asks me.
“I guess so. Have you been to this memorial service before? I hear they have it every year.”
“Yes, I’ve been to it before. I think you should go.”
“I haven’t been back there since I broke my leg.”
“You should go,” she tells me again.
“Okay. Will I see you there?”
“If you don’t find me first, I’ll throw a rock at your head.”
“Great.”
After I hang up, I hear voices in the kitchen. I check the clock on Jolene’s VCR. The boys should have left for school already, and Jolene should’ve left for work. I should’ve left for work, too, but that’s never stopped me from being late before.
I walk into the kitchen and find Jolene and Randy having coffee at the table. She’s in her waitress uniform. He’s in a suit. He’s taken off the jacket and has it hanging over the back of a chair. The tail of a necktie hangs out of one pocket. He looks tired.
“Hi, Ivan.”
He practically jumps out of his chair to shake my hand. Randy has always been a little afraid of me since he got Jolene pregnant and they didn’t get married. I don’t know why. Eb was number three. I told him I was used to it.
“Hey, Randy. What are you doing here?”
“I was just about to find out,” Jolene answers.
She gets up and brings back a coffee mug for me.
“Man, I must have been tired,” I tell them. “The boys didn’t wake me this morning.”
“They’re still sleeping,” Jolene says. “They’re going to the Gertie service, and then they’ll go to school afterward.”
“You let them miss school for this thing?”
She pours me a cup of coffee.
“You’ll see,” she says.
She sits down again and smiles at Randy.
“So what’s this big news?” she asks. “You haven’t even told me why you’re in town.”
“I came down yesterday to meet with Mom’s lawyer about her will.”
“I’d imagine that was pretty cut and dried,” I comment.
“We’ve started going through her things,” Jolene explains. “She has everything labeled with a piece of masking tape. I’d imagine the only thing left to account for in her will would be money.”
“Well, there was something else she wasn’t able to put a piece of tape on: the house and the land. She left it to you, Jolene.”
“What?” Jolene gasps.
“See?” He hits the table with the flat of his hand. “I knew you didn’t know anything about it. Marcy thinks you harassed Mom into leaving it to you.”
Jolene is so stunned she doesn’t bother to insult Marcy.
“Marcy’s the one who made me come talk to the lawyer in person and see what we could do about it. She says we’ll contest the will in court if that’s what it takes.”
“On what grounds?” I ask.
He puts his head in his hands and talks into them.
“I don’t know. If the talk with the lawyer didn’t go well, Marcy wanted me to talk to Jolene and see if I could convince her to give us the house.”
“Marcy said this. Marcy wants that.” Jolene finds her voice. “What about you? Do you have any say in this?”
He pulls his hands away and looks from her to me and back to her again.
“I have to admit when I first heard about it, I was upset. We were counting on the money we’d get from selling the house. We were already making plans for some of it. When I left the lawyer’s office yesterday, I was ready to do whatever I had to do to get the house.”
He gives us a strange, sad smile.
“I was ready to do whatever I had to do to get the house so I could get rid of it,” he elaborates. “I drove out there all pissed off at Mom. Then when I got there and walked around a bit, I understood what she’d done.
“She knew I wasn’t going to come back here and live. If she left the house to me, I’d sell it. And she knew who I’d probably end up selling it to,” he adds guiltily.
“Have they contacted you?” I ask.
“The day her obituary ran.”
“Sons of bitches,” I say flatly.
“But it’s more than that,” he adds quickly. “It’s more than her wanting to keep the land away from J&P and wanting to keep the house in the family. She knew with her and the house gone, I’d probably never come back here to visit anymore.”
He drops his eyes and stares into his coffee as he talks.
“When she was alive, my mom never got on my case for the way I treated Eb. I knew she was disappointed in me, and I knew she wanted me to spend more time with him, but between the job and Marcy and our own kids and living all the way in Maryland . . . well,
it was easier to just stay away. She never got mad at me or lectured me. Now that she’s gone, she’s making sure I won’t forget I have a son here and I won’t forget where I’m from.”
We sit in silence. He keeps staring into his coffee. Jolene stares at him. I stare at Volodymyr and the history in his eyes.
Randy takes a deep breath and looks up.
“I want you to have the house, Jolene. You and Eb and the rest of your boys.”
He slides a business card across the table.
“This is Mom’s lawyer. I told him you’d give him a call. There’s some papers for you to sign. Transfer of deed. That sort of stuff. Do it quick, will you?”
She stares at the little buff-colored rectangle and nods numbly.
He gets up from his chair, slips back into his suit jacket, and plunges his hands in his pants pockets.
“I’ve decided as long as I’m down here and there’s still so much to take care of out at the house, I’m just going to spend the weekend. If it’s okay with you, I’d like to spend some time with Eb.”
“Sure, that’s fine. What’s Marcy going to say about all this?”
“That’s my problem.”
“Randy . . .” she starts to say.
“Don’t thank me,” he stops her. “I’m not doing anything great here except abiding by my mother’s last wishes.”
I stand, too.
“You’re a good son, Randy,” I tell him.
He jingles something in his pockets and rocks on his shoes.
“I don’t know about that. I think I’m more of a coward. I don’t want her haunting me.”
The phone rings, and Jolene gets up to answer it.
“For you, Ivan. Work. It’s Chuck.”
She holds out the receiver to me.
“Hey, Chuck. What’s going on?”
“We need you out at Jess Raynor’s place. There’s been a shooting.” He pauses. “A fatality.”
24
I DON’T WAIT TO HEAR ANYTHING ELSE. I TELL HIM I’LL BE THERE and hang up before he can give me any more information. I don’t want to hear a name.
Ignorance is bliss, the saying goes. I try to embrace that philosophy during the drive to Jess’s house.
It’s a beautiful day with a cloudless blue sky. It was a day like this when we buried the miners.
I remember when I woke up that day being stunned at the callousness of nature, that force I revered and lugged around with me inside a book my dad had left for me one Christmas morning while masquerading as Santa Claus. The sun shone, birds sang, grass looked greener than it had in weeks, yet the men were gone. They were never coming back. We were all in mourning, numbed by our grief and disbelief. I thought nature should mourn, too. Not just for the men but for herself. Nature had suffered, too. We had gouged holes in her and ripped gashes in her. We had stripped her and stolen from her. But she didn’t care. She didn’t hold a grudge.
