All the Wicked Girls

by Chris Whitaker

  *

  They drove back to Grace in silence. It was late, they were tired but all three knew sleep wouldn’t come easy that night. Raine was anxious. She was thinking about what might’ve happened, what they could’ve found in Zeb’s house.

  “We gotta find her,” she said.

  Noah glanced over. The Buick bounced along Hallow Road.

  “We gotta find her now.”

  “See all those jars in the kitchen back there?” Noah said.

  Raine nodded.

  “The kind Merle sells his shine in,” Purv said.

  “Don’t mean nothin’, but if that’s the sort of guy Merle knows -–”

  “Then we should go see Merle,” Raine said.

  *

  The dark was total by Merle’s barn, not even slips from Windale made it out to them.

  They stood in a close line, shoulder to shoulder. Raine had banged the door till they were sure Merle weren’t inside.

  The barn was tall and burnt and thin trees lined each side. Noah took a couple steps back and aimed a flashlight up at the windows. They were high and square, five holes cut in the wood with plastic sheeting keeping the weather out.

  “He’s probably at the Whiskey Barrel,” Purv said. “He’s there most nights. Ain’t got money to drink so he’s into Hank Frailey for a couple hundred bucks. Hank tried calling it in a few times but Merle said he’d look at the Trans Am for him.”

  “So, what, we head back?” Noah said.

  “What about next door?” Raine said.

  Purv flinched. “You wanna call on Pastor Lumen and the Angel at this hour?”

  Raine glanced over at the Lumen house and saw a light burning downstairs. “Momma wants Pastor Lumen to get up with the White Mountain people, and the Windale churches. They still reckon he’s some kinda savior.”

  “Pastor Lumen’s back in the hospital,” Noah said. He’d seen him at Mayland the last time he’d been in for dialysis, the pastor was sitting out by the parking lot smoking a thin cigarette. Noah hated the old man, had done since the pastor told his momma Noah was being punished for past sins. He told her about righteousness and transgression and the consequence of absolution till she fled St. Luke’s in a fit of tears.

  Raine shrugged. “So we’ll ask the Angel to help.”

  They crossed the rough ground, passed Merle’s farmhouse, and walked onto Lumen land. Noah and Purv hung back a little as Raine walked along the wood porch and pressed her face to the window. She straightened up fast and took a step back.

  “What?” Noah said. “You see somethin’?”

  *

  The situation went bad real quick.

  Raine gripped the gun in two hands. Noah and Purv stood to the side and watched, both breathing hard. She held it level, eyes down the sight and pointed straight at Samson’s chest. It was a .48; from this kinda range it’d tear a messy hole in him, and from the look in Samson’s eyes he knew that too.

  Her hands weren’t shaking, which was something. The only way the gun would fire was if she meant it to. She’d pulled it from her bag the second he’d opened the door.

  The light was bad in the Lumen place, just one lamp, the glow nothing but a smudge on the gloom. The floor was oak and might’ve been polished and grand once but that was a long time back.

  Noah looked around and saw a flower pressed in a frame, and black-and-white photos of the pastor.

  “Raine,” Noah said, gentle as he could.

  She ignored him, eyes locked on Samson.

  “Where’d you get the book, Samson?”

  Samson swallowed. He had his palms up like he was being robbed. His hands shook and his pink eyes blinked fast. The skin on his cheek was mottled red like he’d been slapped or burned. His mouth was tight, blush lips pulled like he was hurtin’.

  “That’s Summer’s book you was reading. Purv, open the cover.”

  Purv picked the book up from the side table and opened the cover. His breath caught when he saw Summer Ryan scrawled across the top.

  The front door was still open. Noah could hear a chorus of crickets going on like there was something normal about the night.

  “Summer writes her name inside all her books. It’s a habit she got when we was young and we got bought two of everything. See, I’d always make a mess of my things, but she didn’t. Ain’t in her to make a mess.”

  Purv set the book down.

  “I’ll ask you one more time, Samson. Then I’ll pull the trigger. And you shouldn’t be thinkin’ I won’t, ’cause everyone knows I’m my daddy’s daughter.”

  “She gave it to me,” Samson said.

  “Why?”

  He dropped his head.

  “Why?” she said again.

  “I walked her back from school, it was raining. We were talking. She brought the book to church one day. She said I’d like it.”

  Noah glanced from Raine’s eyes to Samson.

  “Why’d she say that?”

  “I don’t . . . I can’t understand but she talked about compassion and humanity. And the title and the Lord’s Prayer.”

  “Liar,” Raine said.

  Samson blinked and tears fell. His hair was bowl cut and blinding white.

  Noah hadn’t ever seen a man cry before. It was different to a child’s cry, maybe like it came from someplace deeper.

  “Where is she?”

  Samson shook his head.

  “You’ve done somethin’ to her.”

  Samson looked at Noah, his eyes wild. “I wouldn’t hurt nobody.”

  “You’ve done somethin’ to my sister.”

  “I’m scared,” he cried.

  “Where is she?”

  “I don’t know what’s happening. I was tryin’ to read the book, but it’s tough ’cause there’s long words and then you bust in here and now I don’t know what’s happening,” Samson said, frantic. “It’s not right, none of it.”

  She cocked the hammer back.

  Samson dropped to his knees and he placed his palms on the wood and a dark patch spread on his pants.

  “Raine,” Noah said.

  “He’s done somethin’ to her.”

  “Raine,” Noah said again.

  He took a step toward her.

  Her eyes darted to Noah then back to Samson.

  Noah reached a hand out slow, inch by inch. He pushed down on Raine’s hand and she lowered the gun. He slipped it from her and passed it to Purv, who clutched it nervous, not knowing whether to aim it at the Angel or not.

  “We’ll tell Black. Right now, we’ll go tell Black that Samson’s got Summer’s book,” Noah said.

  She took a step back. “He won’t do shit. He don’t care. Summer’s a Ryan and that means she don’t count for nothin’.”

  Noah shook his head. “He’ll find out, I promise.”

  He grabbed Purv and the three headed for the Buick.

  They left the Angel on the floor, wet with piss and tears.

  *

  Black knocked a glass over when he heard the door, stood sloppy, and walked the hallway.

  Raine stood there small and tough, the low lights of a Buick shone from the end of his street.

  She pushed past him and he followed her.

  “Samson Lumen,” she said, breathless. “The Angel.”

  “How’d you hear about that?” he said, sobering but she caught the slur.

  “You know? Why ain’t you taken him in? Why ain’t you out there all night like my daddy and the other men?” she said.

  “Raine –”

  She saw the gun on the table, and the bottles and the pills. She stared at him and then she stared at the wall, at the girls and the maps and the newspaper clippings going back eighteen months.

  “You reckon he took Summer don’t you? That’s why you ain’t pressin’ nothin’, ’cause you’re such a fuckin’ mess and you can’t catch him –”

  “That’s enough, Raine.”

  “You owe me,” she said, pointing a finger at him. “You
owe me and you owe my sister.”

  He felt her anger so hot it warmed the dark room.

  “You know that’s not right, Raine. Your daddy . . . he knew what he was into.”

  “You went harder ’cause he wouldn’t cut a deal. Daddy’s got honor and you made him pay for it.”

  “That ain’t fair . . . that ain’t the way it works.”

  “Don’t matter what’s fair. You broke up Momma’s heart till there weren’t enough to go round. Is that fair, Black? Daddy said all of us is lookin’ for a way out or a way back. You gotta bring Samson in. He might know where she is.”

  “I will,” he nodded. “I’m just working –”

  “You’re scared of what they’ll say. Pastor Lumen and the church.”

  “I need to talk to Bobby and then –”

  “Bullshit. Find my sister. Get out there and find her.”

  He saw her tears but they didn’t fall.

  She held a bag and it was big; her hand trembled and it hurt him ’cause sometimes she looked small like a child.

  “You’re the only one that got close to the Bird.”

  “I didn’t. I was nearest when the call –”

  “Could be it’s Samson, could be it ain’t. But do somethin’ now. It’s been too long. Find Summer. I need her.”

  She walked for the door and then turned. “I was gonna take this to my daddy but Noah said you’d listen, that you’d help me. He goes on like you and his father was somethin’ back then . . .” Raine paused to look at him, maybe to see if he’d say something, to see if there was fight left in him.

  Black dropped his eyes to the floor.

  Raine shook her head. “I knew he was wrong.”

  15

  Summer

  I gave Samson Lumen a book once. I reckoned he might’ve liked it ’cause of the whiskey priest and the Judas mestizo and that eternal power. The church can’t be destroyed, it lies outside our dawn and our death and there’s comfort to be had in that. And Samson needed comfort maybe more than anyone I ever met.

  *

  It was fall and we were late gettin’ to class when we saw the boys clustered round. They were seniors, tall and tough-lookin’ to us.

  “Let’s see what’s goin’ on,” Raine said, tuggin’ my hand.

  We heard laughin’ and hollerin’ and Raine reckoned it was just another scuffle, but then we saw the man standing there. He had white hair but he weren’t all that old. He was tall and skinny and his skin was a shade so light.

  The boys were tossin’ a sunhat round.

  “He’s Samson. The janitor,” I said.

  They tossed it high and it landed near Samson’s foot and he stooped to pick it up, but when he did one of the boys, Jesse Cole, kicked him and he fell to the dirt. Another boy grabbed the sunhat and the game began all over.

  “I feel bad for him,” I said, and Raine turned to look at me. “He’s sweet, he’s always smilin’ at me.”

  She saw I was gettin’ upset and she walked into the middle. She ain’t got fear, never had it.

  “Give it back,” she said to Jesse.

  Samson was watchin’, his eyes squint like he couldn’t even bear the light.

  Jesse was smirkin’ till he caught a look from one of his friends. I’d seen that look before, said they knew who our daddy was and who our uncle was.

  Raine handed the sunhat to Samson and he took it and nodded but didn’t say nothin’.

  A couple days later Jesse was beat so bad his momma called Black. Black came up to the school but no one said shit and Jesse couldn’t remember nothin’ neither.

  I like the notion of karma, the causality and purity of deeds.

  *

  Sometimes I saw Bobby as a father, holdin’ his boy in strong arms. I imagined I was his and I ain’t even sure what role I wanted, the wife or the child. Wants and needs—the line that divides ain’t nearly bold enough.

  I never saw them kiss—Bobby and Savannah—they didn’t kiss or hug or touch each other the way my parents did. And it made me so sad and so glad.

  Sometimes he’d reach out and touch my shoulder and my body would burn. Sometimes I walked real slow when he was behind me ’cause once when I did that he patted me on the butt to hurry me.

  I wondered if it was love, or someplace south of love, where sin ain’t nothin’ but a threat, so empty we’d laugh at it while he anointed my body with his blessed hands.

  *

  I wore a coat ’cause there was chill, then took it off when I got to church. I sat in the back, by the carving of the two saints locked in pained surprise, like they’d just discovered mortality was a state far beneath them.

  It felt strange not wearin’ a bra.

  I saw Mary and her baby; her head to the side, a bird in the baby’s hand, its wings up like it wanted to fly.

  I watched Bobby glance, then set his papers down and start the slow walk over.

  I took a deep breath and straightened my back, pushin’ my chest out a little. I was wearin’ a shirt so sheer I might as well have screamed dark verse at him. Maybe somethin’ about vital existence and undefiled wisdom, ’cause I was grateful for his love, it wouldn’t go wasted.

  “What are you reading today?” Bobby said, smilin’ that smile he saved for me.

  “The Catcher in the Rye. Again.”

  Bobby sat down on the bench in front then turned to face me. “I used to want to be Holden Caulfield.”

  I tried to concentrate on my breathin’ when he glanced at my shirt. I tried to stop my heart chargin’ ahead of me. Nothin’ was happenin’. When you took a step back there weren’t nothin’ happenin’.

  “You don’t even know how he ended up. Could be he got married and had kids, worked in a bank all his life,” I said.

  He glanced at my chest again. I arched my back a little more. That scream; it shattered the colored glass and I saw the saints and Mary and her baby cryin’ for my lost virtue.

  “Sometimes I miss my younger self. I look back like I was somebody else,” he said.

  “Is that what I’ll do?”

  “Depends on the choices you make. Good or bad.”

  “How will I know?”

  “You won’t know what you’re gonna do until you do it.”

  I smiled.

  “Are you a good person, Bobby?”

  I ain’t sure why I asked that. Maybe if there was a spell, I was seein’ if it could be broken.

  “In my experience good isn’t always good, bad isn’t always bad. But sometimes people do things that cast such a far-reaching shadow it’s not possible to escape. Do I want to be one of those people? No. Have I done bad in my life? Yeah. Am I a bad man? I’m not sure how to answer that.”

  “Try.”

  “Only God can judge me,” he said, a half smile on his face like he suddenly realized where he was.

  “I don’t want to be judged,” I said.

  “You’re right to feel like that.”

  “What did you do that was bad?”

  He looked down, maybe to see if the stone was opening.

  “You can tell me,” I said.

  “There was a girl in Tallassee. She came to me and she was pregnant and I sent her to a clinic in Dayette.”

  “Why?”

  “She was fourteen . . . her father.”

  “Oh.”

  “It weren’t the baby’s fault. Is it murder?”

  “No.”

  “ ‘Before I formed you in the womb I knew you.’ ”

  I looked far into his eyes. “Are you okay, Bobby?”

  “What is okay?”

  “Maybe the golden mean.”

  “We crave the extremes, like some fatal flaw.”

  “I worry about you.”

  “You shouldn’t.”

  “I know.”

  He met my eye. I dropped my shoulders. He reached forward and tucked my hair behind my ear. He kept his hand there, warm against my cheek. I looked up and saw Samson by the doorway an
d he was starin’ at me with eyes so sad.

  16

  Faith

  Black came for Samson early and without fuss. No sirens, no flashing lights, no cavalry. Black thought he might’ve had to get him outta bed, but weren’t all that surprised when he saw Samson sitting on the front step. Especially seeing as what went down the night before.

  Black pulled the cruiser through the gates, followed the curved driveway halfway up, and rolled to a stop beneath tendrils of Spanish moss.

  A light burned inside, just bright enough to throw a glow over Samson.

  Samson stood. “Mornin’.”

  Black checked the sky as he walked over. It didn’t feel too much like morning, but weren’t long after six. There was a light breeze, just enough to lift the tarp on the roof. Black heard Ray Bowdoin was working on the old house, also heard he hadn’t been paid since the pastor got sick so had pulled his men from the job.

  “Still up there,” Samson said, eyeing the cloud.

  “You an early riser, Samson?” Black watched him and saw an angry burn across his cheek. He remembered when Samson was a boy, always marked.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You know I was comin’ for you?”

  “I reckoned so. I couldn’t sleep, Black. Not the whole night.”

  “What happened to your cheek?”

  Samson brought a hand up and held it to his face but didn’t say nothing.

  Black took a step forward, eyes glancing at the shuttered windows, at the rotted beams with the swing seat hanging crooked.

  Samson smiled, swallowed, and rubbed his eyes. “I’m scared, Black.”

  Black looked down and pressed his shoe into the dirt like he was stubbing out a cigarette.

  “I didn’t do nothin’ like they think, you know that.” Samson began pacing, rubbing his thumb along his fingertips over and over. His pants were high at the ankle, pale skin flashing with each step. “I want to go down to Mae’s. I want to order my biscuits and drink my coffee. I want to walk to St. Luke’s and pray. Been starting my day that way for a long time now. Reckon I can do that again, Black?”

  “Sure, Samson.”

  Samson blew out a heavy breath, then stopped still and tucked his hands into his corduroy pockets.

  “Mind if I ask you a couple questions first?”

  Samson fixed his eyes on the cloud again, then on the darkened acres that rolled out across the street. “Okay, Black.”