by Ace Atkins
“Six of our people were killed.”
Donnie upturned the Jack and reached for the cigarettes in his coat. He offered the bottle to Luz, and she refused. He looked over at her, black hair and purple T-shirt wet, and he wanted to reach for her, peel her out of those clothes, and forget about damn-near everything.
“Alejandro wanted to come for you,” she said. “I came instead.”
“He can take his crazy ass somewheres else,” Donnie said. “Ain’t me. Hey, come here. Sit down.”
He patted his seat. She shook her head.
“And don’t want a drink, neither.”
She said no.
“Say, what makes you so damn special?” Donnie said, taking another hit of Jack. “You come in here accusing me, talking down to me like I’m trash.”
“You’re a thief,” she said. “You stole guns from your own Army. How can I trust you?”
“And what makes selling drugs better than damn guns? Hell. That’s some fucked-up logic right there.”
Donnie drank some more and watched the water run down the side of the small hill and the rain beating against the glass. A hard wind shook the little Airstream. He looked to Luz and her soft brown skin and eyes.
“I’m sorry,” Luz said, her eyes downcast.
“Have I ever asked you anything about your business, just what the hell y’all are up to? I mean, shit. Y’all are a bunch of dope peddlers who want to cut the competition off at the knees. I don’t judge you. I figure you got a reason to be in the life. Just like I do. I like money. But that doesn’t make me dirty.”
“Everything is dirty and tainted,” Luz said.
“Pretty harsh, sister.” Donnie walked over to a basket of clean clothes and fished out a plain white tee to cover up his scars. He sat back down across from her and said, “I seen me a break in the system. OK? Every day that Uncle Sam forced my ass to be over in that shithole, I got more and more pissed off. I hated everything about the place. It made my dad’s stories about Vietnam seem like paradise. Least there were girls there. Who gave a shit about taking over a craphole in the desert? Some stupid-ass politicians gonna get me shot up, fucked up. When I saw the chance to get even, I did.”
Luz nodded. “I shouldn’t have said what I said. I’m sorry.”
“I got about fifty M4s supposed to be for the National Police,” Donnie said, pointing the end of his cigarette at her. “You figure those guns ain’t gonna end up pointing at some other stupid-ass American like me someday? Hell, I’d rather give it to you narcos and let y’all shoot it out over your cocaine runs. OK? So what the hell is your story? Why are you peddling dope? You have a problem with cleaning houses, washing dishes?”
Luz took a deep breath. She shook her head and stood.
“Be careful,” she said. “If you were lying, Alejandro will find out and will kill you.”
“Tell that marked-up, bald-headed fuck to bring it on,” Donnie said, pointing to himself. He singed his chest with the cigarette butt. “Son of a bitch.”
Luz made it to the door.
“Don’t go out in that, baby,” he said. “We’re both kind of fucked up and dirty. Why don’t we just be fucked up together?”
She shook her head.
“Will I see you again?” he asked.
Luz didn’t say anything. Everything was getting dark outside, and Donnie could no longer see the water eroding the dirt hill. He walked to her and pulled her in close. Her body stiffened, not fighting, but unmoving and soulless. She smelled very sweet.
“You ever want to get out of this mess?” Donnie asked. “I got some money. You say the word, and I’ll leave this craphole right now.”
“I can’t.”
“Because of your boyfriend?” Donnie said.
“No.”
“You afraid of him?’
“That’s not it.”
He held her hand as Luz stepped back. Donnie held on to her hand even though she wouldn’t meet his eyes. She took back her hand and sighed.
“You better get on, then,” Donnie said, feeling his face redden. “Git. Because you don’t make a bit of sense.”
Luz walked to him, stood on her toes, and kissed him hard on the mouth. Then he watched her big red truck disappear down the road, rain soaking his face and clean shirt. He shrugged as he slammed the door, said “Fuck it,” and fell asleep dreaming of folks screaming in a bazaar and nurses who watched him like angels.
35
“YOU WANT SOMETHING TO EAT?” LILLIE ASKED.
“I’m good,” Quinn said.
“You just gonna sit there in the dark and smoke that big cigar? Be contemplative and sort out this screwed-up world?”
“Yep.”
“You mind me sitting with you?”
“Pull up a chair.”
Lillie sat across from Quinn’s desk, lights off and a slow cold rain falling outside. They sat there for a long while in silence, welcoming it after hours spent in Union County recounting every step they took and every move they made until they found the kids. The locals photographed the dead until the rain got too bad and they took them away. They had long Spanish names coming from places in Mexico that Quinn had never heard of, some with criminal records in the States. Others would take a while to identify.
“I wish I could say I feel bad,” Lillie said, pulling the cigar from Quinn’s fingers and taking a few puffs before handing it back to him. “But I don’t feel anything for those folks I shot. I only care about those kids, glad this mess ended for them. Or maybe started. You think they’ll try and send them back to Mexico?”
“I don’t know how that all works.”
“I feel sick about that one child,” Lillie said. “You know, the one I carried for a while?”
Quinn nodded. Lillie had carried the baby in her coat until the sheriff said the little girl had to go to the hospital and get checked out. Quinn had seen her cry a bit when the child left her arms, but he’d never mention it. The kid was maybe six months old, with dark skin and downy black hair. Lillie asked the Mexican woman who’d been in the trailer the child’s name. The woman had said she didn’t know. Lillie had started to call her Rose, the name of Lillie’s mother who had died of cancer two years ago.
“That cigar isn’t too bad,” Lillie said. “It smells worse than it tastes.”
“Don’t worry about that baby,” he said. “They’ll take care of her.”
“Yeah, fuckups never happen in the foster system. They always do a bang-up job finding houses with picket fences.”
Quinn nodded.
“You think it went down the right way?”
“Sure,” he said. “Those men made their play. What choice did we have?”
“Does it bring back some bad memories for you?” Lillie asked. “Fuck your head up?”
“Kenny is always asking me shit like that,” Quinn said. “This was nothing like what I did in the Army.”
“How’s that?”
“What if I told you it felt a lot safer doing this on American soil?”
“I’d say you have a hell of a point,” Lillie said, again reaching for the cigar and taking a puff. She returned it back to his fingers. “Have to say your gal is pretty stand-up, walking into that nest of narcos. You probably know different, but it seems she sure has a big pair of brass balls.”
“She did good,” Quinn said. “You did real good. Doesn’t have shit to do with balls.”
Lillie stood up. “’Preciate that, Sheriff.”
“Good night, Lillie.”
Lillie saluted him with two fingers and headed to the door, nearly bumping into Mary Alice, who sidestepped her. Mary Alice looked to Quinn and said, “Boom Kimbrough’s been calling you.”
“You got the number for the County Barn?” he asked, leaning back, feet on the desk.
“Last time, he called from that black juke down in the Ditch,” she said. “He told me not to bother you. But I figured you’d want to know.”
“Any trouble?” Quinn asked. “
Was he drunk?”
“Nope,” said Mary Alice. “Not as far as I could tell. Just the calls.”
IT WAS NIGHT BY THE TIME he made it down to Club Disco 9000. Spam had clicked on the colored Christmas lights he kept up all year; a single lamp burned from a utility pole in the gravel lot. There was music inside and a few cars outside, Quinn seeing Boom’s dad’s truck parked at an odd angle. Here we go again, he thought. Of course he felt good that the place wasn’t burned to the ground yet. That was a start.
Spam nodded to Quinn as he walked inside. He offered him a beer and pointed him to a back table, far from the jukebox, where Boom sat alone and still. His face was a large mass of odd angles, colored by the bar neon.
Quinn was off duty and took a quart bottle of Budweiser, declining the illegal moonshine offered. He had to leave the three dollars on the bar, Spam saying he refused to take his money.
“I told Mary Alice I was fine,” Boom said. “You didn’t need to drive out here. I heard about y’all’s trouble in Union County. Holy shit.”
“Wasn’t pretty.”
“But you got those kids?”
“We did.”
“You find Janet and her man?”
“Nope.”
“Sorry to hear that,” Boom said. “People should burn for doing shit like that to children. You’ll turn ’em up quick.”
“I think they’ve gone back to Mexico,” Quinn said. “May never find them.”
“Woman like Janet would stick out in Mexico,” Boom said. “Poor country can’t afford to feed her.”
“Why’d you call, Boom?”
Boom shrugged, a couple empty glasses in front of him. Quinn drank his beer.
“Well, went like this,” he said. “’Cause I know you gonna ride my ass until you hear something that makes sense. I came down here after a pretty good day. I guess to celebrate. Did I mention I got your truck ready? Fine job, if I do say myself.”
“I want to see the truck,” Quinn said. “But tell me why you called.”
“I don’t care for some of the folks at the VA center,” Boom said. “I ain’t made of glass. I drink ’cause I like it. It don’t hurt nobody.”
“Maybe not the drink, but your fist works pretty good.”
“The other night? Yeah, I guess I got a little loose. I guess tonight I didn’t feel like getting like that. Figured I’d call. Shit, I don’t know. I didn’t want you coming down here and holding hands and saying prayers and shit. I can do that with my daddy.”
“There’s no weakness in calling a friend,” Quinn said.
“You shoot those men today?”
“Some of them.”
“Why didn’t you bring me?”
“’Cause you were fixing my truck,” Quinn said. “How many have you had?”
“Just a couple. Moonshine ain’t bad. They make it with strawberries. Mellow out that gasoline taste.”
“How do you know? You ever drank gasoline?”
“Not on purpose,” Boom said. “Man, I guess I called because I don’t like getting owned by this shit. I’m getting sick and tired of being pissed off about a situation that I didn’t make happen. I can’t go back to Iraq and find the motherfucker who did this to me. I get mad. I get so fucking mad, so mad that this was taken from me. I don’t know shit. I curse myself, blame myself. I blame God. My father said that’s some blasphemin’.”
“Probably.”
“I think the reason I like to drink is that it cools me out some,” Boom said. “VA folks call it self-medicating. I think I get fucked up because I don’t feel in control.”
“You get out of control to be in control?”
“I told you it don’t make no sense,” Boom said. “All I know is, I could maybe use a ride. That OK?”
“It’s always OK.”
“You think it makes me weak?”
“Nope.”
“I say that because I know how you feel about your sister, about how she goes carrying on and with the drugs and all. You told me she needed to get her shit together. I guess you cut me some slack ’cause you know where I live. You been to the same place.”
“I have.”
“I guess some people get to that place in their heads,” Boom said. “You don’t have to go to war and get your shit blown apart for that to happen.”
Quinn nodded. He sipped his beer. They didn’t talk for a long, steady while.
“The other day at the barn, you were telling me something about Caddy,” Boom said. “About something that happen to her. You said your Uncle Hamp was the only other person who knew about it.”
“I guess I was talking too much.”
“You said it was a drinking conversation.”
Quinn nodded.
“Well, we’re drinking, or at least you’re drinking,” Boom said. “If I have one more, you turn me in to the VA?”
“As I’ve said, it’s not my place to judge.”
Boom walked to the bar, ordered another from Spam. Spam looked to Quinn and Quinn nodded. Spam looked worried as he served Boom. Boom sat back in front of Quinn.
“So what happened when y’all were kids?”
“Let’s see that truck.”
“Now who’s the one who’s got a problem?”
Quinn took a deep breath and told him.
36
THE LADDER REACHED UP INTO THE HAYLOFT, WHERE QUINN FOLLOWED HIS sister’s cries over slatted boards that creaked and broke under his boots. He could not see into the darkness, only hear animal things that made his heart race and hands quiver on the stock of the shotgun. “Lay down, god damn you,” the man repeated. Quinn reached the end of the loft, a wide space that opened up into a ratted-out corncrib, cobs cleaned long ago by yellowed teeth and left in rotting heaps. The man was a dark shadow in the recesses, guttural rhythmic sound from him and awful whimpering noises from Caddy. Porter had torn off Caddy’s overalls and his pants, and what Quinn saw took his breath away, leaving a long, cutting stillness, everything seeming to stop. The rain drummed the roof as Quinn stepped forward, searching for a way to get to her, get Porter off, when the old board gave way under his feet, and he fell down from the loft into the rotting corncribs, tumbling onto his back, letting go of the shotgun stock, the last time a gun would ever fall lose from his hands. But, damn, if Porter didn’t quit what had brought a sheen of sweat to his balding head and unshaved neck. He crawled off Caddy and moved on Quinn, teeth clenched, a mind carried somewhere back to an animal place, walking with a purpose that left little doubt in Quinn’s mind that he would die.
The shotgun lay half covered in rotting cobs, but the blued edge of the double barrel shone bright and clear. Quinn stumbled and reached for it, Porter gripping his arm. But Quinn reached back and bit into the man’s furry hand, pulling away gristle and flesh. Porter yowled and fumbled back. Quinn turned the shotgun and saw Caddy in the corner of his eye. Time stayed like that, him knowing there was no going back for any of them. She was torn and broken and uncovered, openmouthed and vacant.
As Quinn raised the gun, he knew his sister had been taken from him.
He pulled on both triggers at once, sending fattened Porter back with a mule kick to the barn wall. His head landed with a thud against a hard floor beam.
Even in the horror, Quinn marveled at the way a shotgun could open up a human body.
Caddy stood there. Everything was silent and crisp. The blood smelled like old pennies.
Quinn pulled off his coat and covered her. He reached for her torn overalls and underthings. He gathered Porter’s clothes to cover the man’s face, frozen in a final confusion.
He pushed Caddy ahead, finding two-by-fours hammered into the wall, to get back to the loft. In the high corner of the barn, two pack rats, white and gray and as large as opossums, looked down with their red eyes and hissed at the disruption. Caddy’s teeth chattered, and her entire body shook. Quinn carried her back down the ladder and into the yawning mouth of the barn, where they could see the gray daylight and the
steady fall of rain.
Quinn found several pieces of scrap wood and old corncobs and kicked up a fire, smoke billowing up and out of the open barn.
“Caddy?”
She sat on the ground, knees reaching her chin. She was crying, although not hysterically, and rocking back and forth.
“Caddy?”
She did not answer. Quinn kissed her on the forehead.
“Are you sick?” he asked. “Did he hurt you?”
She nodded.
“Hurt you bad?”
She nodded.
Quinn found his .22 and those things that Porter had stolen from them. He discovered a half-empty bottle of whiskey among some Log Cabin pancake mix and pure maple syrup. He mixed the pancakes in a coffee mug, using rainwater to make batter, and set an iron skillet on a rock he placed dead center in the fire. The fire hissed and popped, embers glowing as night fell. Caddy had yet to speak.
Quinn cooked some cured bacon and added the batter to the grease. He set the pancakes and bacon on a tin plate and set it in front of Caddy. “We got to walk out of here tomorrow. You’ll need your strength. Come on, eat.”
She took the plate. She took a few bites.
Quinn ate three pancakes and bacon.
He watched the fire and the rain. The embers glowed hot and steady.
“You still have the compass I gave you?” he asked.
Caddy nodded.
“You follow that thing due west till you hit the interstate,” Quinn said. “You hear me? You flag down a ride or call Momma from a fillin’ station.”
Her eyes turned on Quinn.
“I can’t go back,” he said. “Not after what I done.”
“But.” Her mouth was parched and clumsy as she spoke.
“Don’t worry,” Quinn said. “Don’t cry. You hear me? I’m a bad kid, and he was a bad man, and something happened out here. But ain’t no one gonna catch me now. I’ll head out west. Maybe I’ll find Dad out in Los Angeles. Hell, I don’t know. I just know I can’t go back.”
Caddy started to cry again. She pulled her knees up even with her nose and started the rocking again.
“Aw, hell. Don’t do that. All you got to do is get safe. You promise me that? You get safe.”
