Black Water

by Bobby Norman

  “And you think ‘at stupid little bag keeps you alive?”

  “I don’t know, but I ain’t takin’ no chances. Last thing she said was th’day one of us’s t’die, we’d allll die, ‘n right now, I think I’m tired o’ talkin t’you.” She smacked him one last time and huffed away. Five steps later, she changed her mind, stomped back, grit her teeth, and slapped him in back of the head once more. “Bastard!”

  Harvey and Superman had lugged their packs and bedrolls up from their last campsite and were pushed up agin the log ‘longside the satchel. Hub was sittin’ in the dirt, opposite his captors, reminded o’ the last time—not so very long ago—three other smartasses’d been perched on that same log, eatin’ them same beans, and he wondered if another three-ringer might come rollin’ out o’ the dark to wipe them out. Maybe Pickering. Why not? The Warden’d been in on it, so Pickering’s poppin’ up wouldn’t be any big surprise. As weird as things’d been so far, the next one could be Toad! Wouldn’t that be a kick? It wouldn’t be any stranger than a compassionate, tender-hearted doctor turned heartless FBI agent, or a wife and chilluns he’d written off for thirty years. Maybe Luther Knox wantin’ to get even for losin’ his first murder trial.

  He looked hatefully at Porkyman. He wasn’t the Caped One anymore. Now he was Clark Kent. Clark was fat, too. Hub wanted to say somethin’ about his goin’ to seed since his comic book days. Maybe later. The cape—the dishtowel—all bunched up, crammed down his neck, made him look like the Hunchback of Oledeux. Now he wore his overshirt and a pair o’ lenseless glasses stuck to his face. They weren’t even the kind he wore in the comics, but the cat-eye kind Hollywood movie stars wore. Did he honestly think people believed he and Superman was two different people? Hidin’ behind a pair o’ stupid lenseless glasses? Dumb fuck. Hub was thinkin’ about askin’ him where he, Clark Kent, had been all day, but that throbbing reminder in his sternum told him maybe another time. Another maybe later. His whole life’d been one later after another, and he was gettin’ tired of it.

  He and the boys were munchin’ on beans and biscuits tender and flaky enough to crack a tooth. Raeleen’s big butt was perched on the end o’ the log, her left leg drawn up, left heel braced up on the log’s end, the other on the ground. She had her dress hiked up, damn near her belly, whittlin’ on her thick, yellowy, old-woman toenails with a jackknife. Ever time she moved her arm, the bag of fat hanging underneath it waggled.

  Ever once in a while, Hub snuck a glance at her crotch, torn in two directions by that which lurked in her underwear. On the one hand, he figured that more than likely, because of her advanced age, and as bad as she’d let herself go ever other way, it was pretty ugly, and no doubt stunk ever bit as bad as it looked. But on the other hand, pussy was pussy, and havin’ an ugly, smelly pussy to think about was better than no pussy to think about. He wished now he’d taken that last poke offered by the café woman. He spit a chunk o’ rubbery gristle sizzlin’ in the fire and looked at the mild-mannered reporter. “Possum th’best you could do? Greasiest God-damn animal ever was.”

  “Don’t eat it,” Raeleen barked, yankin’ her dress down, folding up the jackknife, and tossin’ it in her pack.

  “I didn’t catch it. Superman did,” Clark Kent threatened, “so you better keep yer mouth shut ‘r he’ll jump back here ’n beat th’Hell out o’ you.”

  “That reminds me,” Hub said. “Where is he?”

  “Who?” Clark Kent asked, grumpy.

  “Superman.”

  Raeleen and Harvey shot a look at Hub, at each other, then to Clark Kent.

  Clark Kent never batted an eye. “There was a comet gonna hit Argentina ‘n he went t’knock it out o’ th’way. He told me he’d probly be back in th’mornin’. Maybe smash th’snot outa you.”

  Possibly brought on by what Clark had just said, Harvey helt his plate off to the side, plugged up one nostril with his thumb, leaned over, and blew a stringy glob o’ snot hissin’ into the fire to keep Hub’s nicely browning slug o’ gristle company. He wiped what was left stringin’ from his lip with his shirtsleeve. “You been spoiled b’th’fine eats at th’Angola Prison Cafay.”

  “It was f’damn sure better’n this shit!” Hub griped. “They ain’t nothin’ in here but gristle ‘n grease.”

  “Gristle ‘n grease,” Clark Kent chortled.

  Raeleen looked at him like he was the most precious thing on Earth or even Krypton, her younger, adopted son’s home planet, and cooed in baby talk, “You think ‘at’s funny, huh?”

  Clark Kent nodded, picked up the bottle o’ Panther Piss from between his boots, and took a pull.

  “You gonna drink all ‘at yerself?” Hub asked, annoyed at the bad manners.

  “Uh uh, sorry,” Clark Kent replied and helt the bottle out to Raeleen. “Mama?”

  “Uh uh, no thanks, Sugar.”

  He offered it to Harvey, who rubbed off the bottle lip on the front of his shirt, took a swig, and then wiped his mouth on the shirtsleeve he’d just wiped his snotty lip with, and handed it back. Wipin’ his mouth across a snot-slicked sleeve was all right, but God forbid he’d stick his lips on a germ-laden bottle top. Clark Kent set it back on the ground without lookin’ at the glaring poor excuse of a father figure.

  “I wish you’da brought that waitress with ya,” Harvey said, shovelin’ a spoonful of beans in his mouth. Hub looked up, surprised. “I’da like t’had a little o’ that myself. I like a moaner-groaner.”

  Raeleen looked at Hub. “He just might be yers.”

  “Whada you mean might?” Hub asked, concerned.

  She let it slide.

  “Ball ‘n th’tribe was hid out so you wudn see ‘em,” Harvey continued, “ ‘n we’s hid out so’s they wudn see us, but we all heard you ‘n her agoin’ at it, ‘n I’s gettin hornier’n a three peckered Billy goat. Hell, we seen Ball ‘n th’redskins rollin’ on th’ground, laughin’.”

  “I’s kinda glad t’see’m havin’ a good time,” Raeleen admitted, “‘cause I knew we’s gonna be doin’ ’em in ‘fore long.”

  “Hey, while we’re on th’subject o’ havin’ fun,” Clark Kent said and burped, “after all ‘em years in prison, you have any trouble goin’ in from th’front?”

  Raeleen and Harvey busted up and Raeleen said, “Oh, God, Clark, you are nasty.”

  “See?” Hub said, noddin’ to Raeleen, “’At’s whatcha get usin’ sex words ‘round ’em when they’s little.”

  After Raeleen and the boys had their fill of makin’ fun of Hub, Raeleen had Harvey chain him down on his back, with the trunk of a small but sturdy tree firmly rooted in the ground between his shackled legs. Unless a lumberjack or hungry beaver come by, he was where he was gonna be when the sun popped up. Just about the only movement he had was puttin’ his shackled hands behind his head or on his chest, but even then, the wrist bands got in the way. He’d tried layin’ on his side…

  clink clink clink

  …but he had to twist his legs so uncomfortably to do it, in a couple o’ minutes, he’d…

  flip flop clink clink clink

  …over to the left. Same thing,

  flip flop clink clink clink.

  Raeleen finally settled in for the night, and the boys trundled over, got on their knees by side her, bent down, and rubbed noses, snortin’ like bugs greetin’ one another.

  “G’night, Mama,” Harvey said with a kiss to her cheek.

  “G’night, Sugar,” Raeleen said with a kiss.

  “G’night, Mama,” Clark Kent said with a kiss. (Not long after he’d discovered he was really Superman, he asked Raeleen if he could call her Mama like Harvey, his Earth brother, did. She’d cried and told him she’d like that.)

  “G’night, Clark,” Raeleen said with a kiss.

  “G’night, Raeleen,” Hub said.

  “Die in yer sleep, Asshole,” Raeleen said.

  Harvey giggled.

  “Gristle ‘n grease,” Clark Kent giggled.

  CHAPTER 35


  The sun wasn’t all the way up yet. Clark Kent was bent over a little pool about a hundred yards from the camp, washing up. He had his overshirt and caped undershirt spread out over a small bush.

  “Hello, Bud, how ya doin’?” He was talkin’ to a terrapin that was watchin’ him with a skeptical eye. He liked terrapins. ‘Specially the way his Earth mama cooked ’em up.

  Back at the campsite, Harvey was puttin’ their stuff together. Hub was sittin’ on the ground, chained up, his back to the tree his legs’d been latched around all night. It was still early enough it was a little nippy, and he was warming his hands with a speckelty tin cup o’ coffee, watchin’ Raeleen.

  With his lip curled up.

  She was sittin’ on the log, head hung low, eyes closed. She had a cup o’ coffee in her right hand, tilted, ready to spill. She had her fat elbows on her fat knees, her fat legs were spread, and he thought thank goodness she had the good sense to shove her dress down ‘tween her legs.

  She sat up and yawned like a mule, displaying her mostly missing molars. It seemed to go on forever. She finally closed her mouth, smacked her lips, and looked across the camp and caught Hub lookin’ at her. “Sleepin’ on th’hard ground ain’t fit f’human persons, is it?”

  “Try it chained t’a tree.”

  She took a last sip o’ coffee, slung the remains to the side, set the cup on the log, stood up, and stretched. “Awright, let’s get to it. We got a long way t’go.” She looked over Balls’ and the Seminoles’ gear. “I don’t know that we need much o’ their stuff. Maybe th’coffee.”

  “What ‘bout their guns?” Harvey asked.

  “Nah. We got enough. Didju see if they had any Quinine?” Harvey patted his front pants pocket. “Good man,” Raeleen said, winking. “I’ll finish packin’ up, you go findjur brother.” Harvey nodded and took off. She made sure he was gone and then asked Hub, “How’d you sleep last night?”

  “Not bad, considering. Why?” Her asking wasn’t just a little out o’ character.

  “Just wondered. I slept like a baby. First time in a long time. You dream?”

  Now that she mentioned it, “No.”

  “When’s th’last time ‘at happened?” Hub just looked at her. “What’s yer nightmares about?”

  Hub gave it a second, then, “Her scrapin’ ‘at damn hunk o’ wood over m’arm,” he said, passing on mentioning anything ‘bout all the little Rets. “What’s yern?”

  “Drowning.”

  “You think not dreamin’s good?”

  She let it hang.

  Clark Kent was scraping a rag over the rolls on the back of his neck when Harvey called out. “Clark!”

  Quickly, Clark looked to his stuff to make sure the shirt with the big S and his cape were covered by his outer shirt.

  “Step on it, we’re leavin’!”

  Clark motioned that he’d heard and Harvey headed back to camp. Clark grabbed his stuff and started off. By the time he got back to camp, Raeleen had things pretty much put together.

  Raeleen stepped to Hub and pulled out the chain key. Hub noticed Harvey kept the heel of his hand on his pistol butt while she knelt on one knee to unlock the leg irons. Finished, she stood, the chain in her left hand, impatiently snappin’ her right-hand fingers. “Hop up.” He did, and Raeleen unlocked the wrist chains.

  “You need t’think of a better way o’ keepin’ me down at night,” Hub bitched, rubbin’ his raw wrists.

  “Putchur pack on ‘n shut up.”

  Hub wriggled into his backpack.

  Raeleen waggled her fingers at Clark Kent. “Gimme th’satchel.”

  Clark Kent brought it over and Raeleen put the leg chains inside, then clamped one end o’ the other set to Hub’s right wrist, looped the other end through the satchel handles, then locked it to the same wrist and pocketed the key. “You get t’carry th’loot.”

  “Don’tcha think it’ll get a little heavy?”

  “I wudn doubt it. We’ll change sides ever once‘n a while.” She turned to the boys before he could lodge a complaint. “Ready?” They slung their rifle straps over their shoulders and mocked a salute. “Okay, let’s go.”

  She started off, and Hub snickered. “Dumb broad. Yer goin’ th’wrong way.”

  “No, I ain’t. We’re goin’ east.”

  “East’s bout a million miles o’ nothin’!”

  “Not that I hafta give you a reason,” and before he could dodge it, she glanced a knobby-knuckled fist hard off his satchel-totin’ arm, “I don’t know but what Ball ain’t got somebody awaitin’ for ‘im in Oledeux, ‘n I ain’t takin’ th’chance. So go!”

  Harvey took the lead, followed by Raeleen. Hub fell in behind her and Clark Kent brought up the rear. Now that she was in front of him, Hub rubbed the shoulder muscle her punch had knotted-up and heard a snide cackle at his back.

  “Hurt’s, don’t it.”

  They soon developed a dull, robotic cadence in their march. Harvey had the Sharps in his right hand, his backpack on his back, and Clark Kent’s pack slung over his left shoulder. Raeleen wore her backpack, her rifle strap hitched over her right shoulder and Clark’s in her left hand. Superman roared through their ranks ever so often, probly makin’ sure there weren’t any rogue asteroids or atomic-bomb-carryin’-communists lurkin’ around.

  “Harvey?” Hub asked. “Ain’t that my Sharps?”

  “Nope,” Harvey replied easily, and then back over his shoulder, “I’s wond’rin’. How come if ya had th’money, ya turned yerself in?”

  “Reason I asked,” Hub said, ignoring the question, “it looks a lot like mine.”

  “Hold up,” Raeleen said. She laid the rifles on the ground, untied the faded and frayed handkerchief she had around her neck and wiped the wet off her face. “He didn think he’d get forty years,” she said, smart-assey, wipin’ her neck. “Thought they’d go soft on ‘im ‘n if they didn let ‘im go outright, he figured he’d sit out four ‘r five years for fifty thousand dollars. Ten thousand a year ain’t bad money.”

  “I think that is my gun,” Hub pushed. “I reconize a notch in th’stock.”

  “You got fooled, though, didncha?” she added, retyin’ the rag. “Judge Parks ‘n th’jury didn feel all ‘at sorry for ya. I figured it out last night—in thirty years, it come t’barely over sixteen hunerd a year.”

  “Well, we got it now,” Hub said.

  Superman soared past with his chubby arms stuck out, banking from side to side, goin’ ssshhhew ssshhhew ssshhhew.

  “You’cn drop ‘at we shit,” Raeleen said, indicating the boys and herself. “Only we’s us we.”

  “Y’know, you ‘n me was close once. You usta let me tweezer out yer tittie hairs.”

  “I didn letcha, you made me letcha. I didn like it, it hurt. Shavin’ ’em off was good ‘nough for me, butchu liked doin’ anything ‘at had t’do with my titties.”

  “Well, if you think I’m just gonna walk away from it, yer nuts. You ain’t thinkin’ smart, Raeleen. Right now ya got me b’th’seeds. Take avantage of it, ‘n let’s work somethin’ out.”

  “I ain’t thinkin’ smart? What is it I hafta work out? I awready got th’money. I awready gotchur seeds. What more’cd a woman want?”

  Superman ssshhhew ssshhhew-ed the other way, and, more’n a little annoyed, Hub called out, “Hey! You! Superman!”

  “What’re you doin’?” Raeleen inquired, suspiciously.

  “Nothin’,” Hub replied, with mock innocence.

  “Be careful. You scuffle with him, yer scufflin’ with me ‘n Harvey, too.”

  Superman dipped his arms to port, banked hard, and ssshhhew-ed back, planting his feet in front o’ Hub with his legs spread and his arms crossed over the big S.

  “What?”

  “What? That don’t sound very friendly.”

  “It wasn’t s’posed to. I don’t like you, yer evil. Whadaya want, I’m busy.”

  “Doin’ what?”

  Superman shot his arms out to the side
and started to leave.

  “Awright awright awright,” Hub said.

  Superman refolded his pudgy arms and glared at him.

  “What makes you think I’m evil?”

  “Yer a murd’rer. You killed th’Komes Brothers in cold blood.”

  “I’m a murd’rer? ‘At’s the pot callin’ th’kettle black, ain’t it? Last night, you shot one o’ them Indians in th’side o’ th’head.” Then a nasty stroke of genius flashed in his brain. “I think you mighta been aimin’ ‘tween ‘is eyes.” Superman’s eyes hunkered down. “But I might be mistakin’.”

  “Yer confusin’ me with Clark Kent. And just so you know, Clark wouldn’t miss.”

  “Well, you fellas do look a lot alike, but it was you I seen comin’ outa th’dark, not Clark.”

  “I got there just seconds after it was over. Clark was still in th’woods, ashamed o’ what he done.” His jaw muscles danced ‘round his temples. “He shot th’Indian, yes, but he told me he was very sorry ‘bout it. He just felt awful. I don’t think I’d bring it up to ‘im.”

  “I see,” Hub said. “Well, how come you wasn’t there when it happened? You mighta saved them fellers their lives ‘n poor Clark wudn have nothin’ t’feel guilty ‘bout.”

  “It couldn’t be helped. I’s in China. A volcano was gonna ‘rupt ‘n I had t’put a boulder in it t’plug it up.”

  “Okay then, tell me this. How come I never see you ‘n Clark Kent at th’same place at th’same time?”

  Superman gave it about two seconds. “Right now he’s scoutin’ ahead….”

  “That don’t answer my question.”

  “How ‘bout it ain’t none o’ yer beeswax.”

  Hub nodded up ahead to Harvey. “How come Clark don’t carry ‘is own pack?”

  “That ain’t none o’ yer beeswax either,” and he took off before the Komes Brothers’murderer could ask any more of his stupid questions.

  “Yeah, I know,” Raeleen said. “He’s fat ‘n he looks perty silly in ‘at getup. But if push come t’shove? He’d both kill and die fer me. As fat ‘n silly as he is, he’s still twice th’man you was ‘r ever will be.”