Crawlspace

by Lonni Lees

  The kitchen door opened with a crash.

  Beau, scrawny and pale, wore an ugly sneer as he entered the room. He was wiry but he was tougher than a box of nails—and she had the marks to prove it. His eyes were wild and bloodshot and darted around the room in a paranoid dance. Jolene froze in place, knowing too well what was coming. He was strung out and she was his target—the convenient dog that got kicked in it’s owner’s frustration, taking its licks in exchange for a moment of kindness.

  But that moment never came with Beau.

  The bacon sizzled on the stove, its sweet aroma mixed with the all too familiar scents of fear and rage. He’d been out back for three days, using up half the profits from the lab and twitching like a toad in hot water. Jolene held her breath, flipped the bacon strips, turned off the stove.

  “Don’t you be turning your back on me, bitch,” he said. “Show some respect.”

  Silence.

  “You hear me?”

  She turned and faced him.

  “Yes, Beau. Sorry, Beau.”

  “Don’t sound to me like you got your heart in it.” He walked up to her, grabbed her wrist, twisting it until he saw the pain in her eyes. “Got yer attention now, Sweet Pea?”

  “Yes,” she said, looking at the crazy in his eyes. “Breakfast?”

  “Not that pig slop. Sweet Jesus, Jolene, some good cooking ain’t much to ask.”

  The game had begun. Guessing what he really wanted. Afraid to guess wrong. It always started the same, him expecting her to read his scrambled mind. Scared of making a misstep. But he stacked the cards carefully before he ever started to play. She wondered what she’d ever seen in him, but he was different then. Or so she’d thought at the time. He was older by a few years and seemed so grown up and cock sure of himself. He’d charmed her ’til she didn’t know if she was on foot or horseback and he had her flat on her back quicker than a fly on molasses.

  “Stop it, Beau, please.”

  There was an edge to her voice he didn’t like. There was always something he didn’t like. A word. A look she’d give him. A question. Anything at all could set him off.

  “You’re a whole lotta mouth and no listen,” he said, then accentuated it with a strong gut punch that knocked the wind out of her.

  “Look at this,” he said, pointing around the room. “You made me a prison. I’m stuck in hell with you and that little bastard there and I don’t reckon he’s even mine. First time you did me it was like you’d been doin’ it for a living. You didn’t fool me, you whore, tricking me by getting knocked up by who knows who and then blamin’ me.”

  “You know better’n that.” He’d known damn well he was her first, but she’d put her all into it, trying to please him, trying to be romantic and passionate like in those paperbacks with the lusty cover art that she sneak-read under the covers. But the act was over practically before it started. Not like in the books at all. He was more like a pig rutting in a hollow than some knight in armor. And there were no fancy, romantic words like when he first started to pursue her. Now he was getting what he wanted and he didn’t tell her she was pretty or he loved her or none of that. About the best he’d said as he undressed her was that she was scrawny but her hips were built for birthin’ babies. And to top it all, her friends had said you can’t get pregnant the first time you do it. Well, her friends were wrong.

  “And keep your voice down afore you wake up Possum,” she said. Too firmly? Too much like an order? That was asking for it. She took two steps backward, distancing from his glare, just beyond his arm’s reach.

  “You start doing drama, we’re gonna have a “come to Jesus” meeting. You’re ready to meet Jesus, ain’t you Jolene?”

  He lunged forward. A hard fist to the jaw shut her up. Another in her stomach got her attention. His arms swung at her faster than a jackhammer on cement until she begged him to stop. “I’ve just begun,” he said. “I’m gonna put a whole lotta hurt on you until you learn. Shit, I’m gonna kill you and that soul-sucking little bastard you stuck me with and then I might just go and kill somethin’ else just for the fun of it.”

  Possum woke up to the sounds of his momma and daddy arguing. He whimpered. His whimpers escalated into high volume wails, piercing the room.

  “Shut the fuck up!” said Beau, “Shut the damn kid up or....”

  He knew how to push her buttons. She hated the “F” word, but she wasn’t going to take the bait.

  “Calm down,” she said in a whisper. “You know it’s just the meth talkin’.”

  He slapped her.

  Possum howled.

  “I said shut the fuck up.” He turned from Jolene and faced his son.

  Possum raised his arms, reaching out as Beau walked over to the high chair. Jolene lifted the cast iron frying pan from the stove, its handle hot in her hands, and before she could form a lucid thought slammed it into the back of Beau’s head. Bacon grease flew, hitting the walls and puddling on the linoleum. Beau hit the floor with a thud and lay there motionless. She whacked him five more times for good measure, each whack harder and with more determination than the last. Something inside her had snapped. It was one thing to slap the dog mess out of her, but she wasn’t going to let him start on abusing her little Possum.

  Jolene had finally found the line she couldn’t let him cross.

  She looked down at the floor. Beau didn’t move. He just lay there on the ugly green linoleum forgetting to breathe. She stood there looking down at him for a long time. Waiting for him to stir, waiting for him to rise up and take his revenge. But he didn’t move. Not one bit. There was a smile on her face, an expression of triumph. She felt better than she’d felt in a long, long time. And she didn’t feel scared any more.

  “Trapped, Beau?” she said, giving him a hard kick to the ribs. “Trapped? How do you think I feel?” A hard kick to the side of his head. “Ain’t nobody between Hooper’s Holler and hell more trapped than me—and that’s saying a lot, don’t you think?”

  Possum was laughing as Jolene lifted him from the high chair.

  “Dada go boom.”

  “Sure did, Possum.”

  “Mama kiss him whiskers, make all better?”

  Beau’s body lay motionless on the floor, silent and bloody and covered in bacon grease. It was the best he’d looked in a long time.

  “Nah, he’s just fine,” she said. As she stepped over Beau she bent down and picked up two strips of bacon from the floor, then handed them to Possum as she lifted him out of the high chair.

  * * * *

  Possum was still chewing on the bacon as she bundled him and headed out the back door, carrying him in her arms. There was a cold bite in the air and a colder one that shot through her clear down to the bone. Life was bad but she never imagined it could get this bad. Killing Beau was the last thing she’d have thought of. It just happened—she was only defending herself and her baby boy—but who’d believe her? Certainly not Beau’s own ma, but there was no place else to go. The last time she saw her own folks was when she’d told them she was in a family way. That was a bad day, followed by many more bad days. Her life had become one long string of bad days. She remembered the disappointment in her mother’s eyes, the rage in her father’s. He had her bag packed and booted her out the door faster’n a fox flying through a hen house. She’d shamed him, for sure, but not as bad as she’d shamed herself. On the up side, he had one less mouth to feed. That door was closed forever.

  Brown leaves scattered along the railroad tracks like dead frogs or dried up dog shit, crunching under foot as they headed down to Ma Crowder’s place.

  * * * *

  Jolene banged on the torn screen door with her free hand, perching Possum against her hip with the other. The radio show Voice of Redemption blared from within the house. She knocked again, harder this time. Chickens scattered from the porch, flapping their wings and clucking in alarm.

  “Hold yer horses,” came a voice from inside. “Keep yer britches on.” Ma Crowder place
d her knitting needles and yarn onto the side table and rose, with effort, from her easy chair. The chair was covered in faded floral, frayed and tired and old. The wallpaper on the living room walls was even more faded, with water marks from where the roof had leaked over the years, and edges that had long ago peeled loose, their corners folded down like some sad dog’s ears. Old family photos hung on the walls from cheap frames. Photos of young children smiling, their eyes full of hope and pictures of parents and uncles and grandmothers with empty eyes devoid of any of the optimism they may have held in their youth. Some of them had shoulders bent from the weight of life, while others held their shoulders square and proud like nothing in the world could wear them down. Needlepoint flowers were mounted in frames along side the photos, each stitch sewn painstakingly by Ma Crowder herself to add splashes of cheer to her humble home. She saw God’s flowers as happy gifts, free to even the poorest of his children, and surrounded herself with them. On the walls, on the upholstery, in vases filled with plastic roses that would never die. Even her well-ironed housecoat was scattered with a lavender and purple floral design. The room itself held the stale, musty aroma of old furniture and the faint dampness of last springs rain showers that had seeped into the walls, but the widow Crowder always kept the place clean and well dusted. She took pride in her home and always kept it presentable should there be an unexpected visitor, or just for herself when she woke up in the morning and could see the results of a job well done. Her heavy form made its way to the door and opened it, motioning Jolene inside.

  “Good Lord, child, where’s the fire? And what in mercy happened to your face?”

  “Ma,” was all that came out, raspy as a bull frog. “Ma....”

  When Possum saw Ma Crowder his eyes lit up like a K-Mart Blue Light Special. “Meemaw,” he squealed, reaching out for her. Ma Crowder took Possum from his mother and snuggled him against her chest as she crossed the room and turned off the radio. Her little grandson was the light of her life, so blonde and white and pink and innocent. He took after her side of the family and looked the spittin’ image of her Beau when he was a wee’un himself.

  “Take a sit,” she motioned to Jolene as she returned to her easy chair and eased herself down, positioning Possum on her lap. “Sit,” she repeated, pointing to the straight backed chair across the room.

  Jolene sat.

  “Your face is all bloody and bruised, child, now tell me what happened.”

  Jolene just stared at her, not knowing where to start—afraid to say what she knew she must. Instead, she pushed up the arms of her sweatshirt, exposing more cuts and bruises. Blue, purple, green and yellow, all in different stages of healing. “It never stops,” she whispered.

  The room was silent.

  “He was gonna kill me and Possum both,” she finally managed.

  “Dada go boom,” said Possum.

  “Why the hell didn’t he come with a warning sticker?” Jolene sighed. “He was so strung out on that damn meth that he was trying to kill us. It’s been bad, Ma, but it ain’t never been as bad as this.”

  “Well,” said Ma Crowder, “that’s a hard one to swallow... that’s my beau yer talkin’ about.” Then, as an afterthought, she added, “And watch your language around Possum.” But as she looked at the bruised girl her heart knew it was true. She might have closed her eyes to a lot when her son was growing, but she knew he was no angel. “The good Lord says woman must obey her husband,” she said, almost to herself. “But he also says a wife is to be honored—and there ain’t nothing honorable about knocking you into next Tuesday.” Ma Crowder let the thoughts form in her mind before she spoke again. “Child, there ain’t nothin’ in this world gets so broke you can’t somehow fix it.” She hugged Possum, who had fallen asleep in her lap.

  “My biggest mistake was not walking in the other direction first time I ever laid eyes on him. But he charmed me, Ma. He charmed me something awful. How was I to know what I was gonna be in for?”

  “Life’s full of mistakes, Jolene. Every one of us makes mistakes—that’s why God made those little erasers at the end of pencils. Ain’t nothing done can’t be fixed, one way or the other.”

  “I killed him.”

  Jolene’s words hit Ma like a sledgehammer on an egg shell. In that same instant, an engine’s roar broke the morning silence as a truck fish-tailed into the yard, stirring up clouds of dust in its wake as it sped across the gravel drive. Jolene snapped her head around and looked out the window. The pick-up came to a screeching halt just feet from the house. Beau’s truck. The engine died with a cough and a sputter. The truck door opened, and there he stood, bloody and full of madness and, unfortunately, very much alive.

  He held a gun in one hand, his other hand clenched into a fist that turned his knuckles white. The pupils in his eyes were black pinpoints, the whites were filled with flaming red rage. He focused on the front door and strode in their direction, waving the gun and growling like a wounded grizzly.

  Jolene forgot to breathe for what seemed like forever. Then she gasped.

  “He’s gonna kill us,” she said. “He’s gone bug-shit crazy. Hide Ma, please hide Possum. Don’t let him find Possum.”

  “Now, now, I can reason with my boy,” Ma Crowder said, but even as the words came out she was rising from her chair to head out of the room. She held Possum with one arm and grabbed her knitting with her free hand and headed for the bedroom. Possum stirred from his slumber as she glanced around the room, then headed for the bedroom closet.

  “Meemaw,” he said, yawning.

  “Shhh, Possum,” she said as they edged into the closet, “we’re playin’ Go Hide and Seek and we gotta be real quiet, okay?”

  “Otay.” He smiled up at her as she lay him on a pile of clothes in the corner of the closet floor, then he fell back asleep. Ma Crowder settled in next to him, trying to hold her breath as she heard the front door crash open.

  “Fucking bitch!”

  “Now, Beau—you just calm down now.”

  “You and Possum’s nothing but a curse on me.” His face was twisted with a hate stronger than she’d ever seen before. “Where the fuck is he?”

  “Gone. He’s gone. Your mama took him down to the Hooper’s General to get him some sweets. He ain’t here, Beau.”

  “You lie, that’s all you ever done is lie and lie and then lie some more.”

  “I’m truthin’ you, Beau. Honest to God I swear I am.”

  Ma Crowder listened from the closet as Beau ranted and raved. He sounded a lot like her late husband. The yelling, the threats, the hitting. Ma’s old man could pass out hurt like candy corn on Halloween. All Beau’s life she’d given her son the benefit of the doubt, but he was his father’s son after all. What else could be expected? That was pretty much all he’d seen growing up and his legacy had come home to roost. She couldn’t blame him, not really. But he, sure as God was in heaven, wasn’t going to hurt her sweet little Possum. Not knowing what else to do, she picked up her knitting and started knitting in the dark. Her knitting always eased her mind and when she was done there was always something to show for it—oven mitts, toaster cozies, little hats for Beau, fancy little coasters—her house was filled with more knit goodies than a big city thrift store.

  “He ain’t here, Beau.”

  “Get your hands off me,” he yelled. “I’m gonna find that little bastard here somewhere.”

  Then Ma Crowder heard the gun shot.

  The house was quiet except for the sounds of Beau racing through the hallway, opening and slamming doors along the way. She held her breath when she heard the door to her bedroom open. She heard his footfalls across the bare wood floor, coming nearer to their hiding place. Quietly as she could, without making noise or disturbing her sleeping grandchild, she rose to a standing position just as the closet door flew open.

  “Aha, found y’all,” Beau said with a crazy smile, aiming the gun into the shadows. Ma Crowder’s hands flew forward and Beau stumbled backwards, screaming. He
reeled, spun in circles, fell against the bed, rose again—all the while flailing his arms and grasping at the knitting needles embedded in both his eyes. His hands felt the walls until he found the doorway and stumbled toward the living room—and Jolene.

  Ma Crowder looked down and saw Possum was still asleep, so she exited the closet and cautiously followed her son into the other room.

  Jolene was lying on the floor, sweatshirt covered in blood, slowly moving towards consciousness as Beau stumbled around the room.

  “Wha’ wha...Maaa,” was all that came out of his mouth. His arm hit a lamp and the gun as well as the lamp fell to the floor with a crash. Jolene reached for the gun, grabbed it, rose shakily to a standing position and aimed it at Beau.

  Despite her shaking hands, she zeroed in on her target and pulled the trigger. The recoil knocked her legs out from under her and she fell to the floor as the reek of gun powder filled her nostrils and mixed with the stale aroma of the room.

  Beau had been harder to stop than a brakeless semi truck careening down a steep mountain road. But Beau’s own bullet in his head put him out of his misery and put Jolene out of hers as well. Beau had stopped ranting—stopped hitting—stopped breathing. Once and for all. He dropped to the floor with a hollow thud and lay there with a hot bullet in his cold brain and knitting needles jutting out of his eye sockets like straws sticking out of a Big Gulp soda from Hooper’s General Store.

  Amen.

  Ma Crowder walked across the room and knelt next to Jolene. She was still alive. Ma checked her wound. It was nothing more than a bullet hole in her shoulder, so a bit of fixin’ and stitchin’ and she’d be just fine. Ma went into the hall closet, got out her sewing kit, and went to work.

  Getting Beau’s dead body into the bed of the truck was no easy task but they got the job done. The two women had dragged his dead weight through the cinders and the dandelions and the nettles and the flapping wings of scattering chickens. And they had somehow managed to muster the strength ,after three failed attempts, to hoist him up into the bed of the beat up old truck. Jolene’s shoulder hurt like hell and Ma Crowder was panting like a hound dog in the midsummer sun.