by Larry Brown
On the deck, she sipped her coffee and unwrapped her eclair from the napkin and bit into it. It was filled with sweet white frosting. She got up and went down the steps and walked over and looked at the goldfish pond. The old Chinese guy was out in the front yard, raking out there, and he tipped his hat to her and she smiled back. The goldfish weren’t moving much and they looked like they were big enough to eat.
After she’d finished her eclair, she wiped her fingers with the napkin and balled it up and put it in her pocket. She went back to the deck and sat down. The coffee was cooling off some. She kept sipping it. Two nights with him. She wondered what his house looked like, and how big his yard was, and what kind of food he kept in his refrigerator and on his shelves. She wanted to cook for him at his house and make herself at home in his kitchen.
The door opened and he stepped out.
“Hey, baby,” he said.
She tried to smile at him because all of a sudden she wasn’t sure if this was the right thing to do. Going off for two nights with a man she really didn’t even know. Her mamaw probably wouldn’t approve of that.
“Hey,” she said, and leaned forward a little when he leaned over to kiss her. He pulled out a chair and sat down.
“How long you been out here?” he said.
“Not long,” she said. “I came down to the kitchen and got some coffee. I thought I’d come out here and look at the goldfish.”
“Oh yeah? What are they doing?”
“Nothing. Swimming around.”
He hugged his shoulders with his arms. He seemed so thin now. It was plain to see that he was cold.
“You sleep good?” he said.
And she didn’t want to tell him that she hadn’t.
“I did. I started having the best dreams.”
He seemed interested in that and he smiled at her. He opened doors for her. He left the toilet seat down for her. She hadn’t seen him pick his nose.
“Oh yeah?” he said. “What did you dream?”
She didn’t want to tell him about the dream she’d had, because she had heard all her life that if you told a dream before breakfast, it would come true. She didn’t know if an eclair and coffee counted as breakfast or not.
She’d always had dreams about her baby as he grew up, wherever he was. Even though she had never seen him again since he left her arms at the hospital, age two days, with bright eyes and a curious but happy look and really long black hair, he had aged in her dreams at the same pace she had envisioned him aging in real life. He was now fifteen somewhere, alive and in the same world she walked every day. There was no doubt. She knew he was alive in the same way she would have known if he was dead. And his name was Gabriel, after the angel who would blow his horn. But she didn’t want to tell him about all that, wasn’t ready to tell him about all that, so she just made up a bunch of bullshit about picking blackberries out in the country with her mamaw, when in reality the itching chigger bites on her private places had always driven her apeshit.
78
Dominic had pissed all over himself long before they got to where they were going. He was sick with shame and knew that a man should not be treated so. It was one of the things Doreen had done to him. Kept him tied in the basement on a bed until he had to pee on himself. When Rico opened the trunk, he just lay there since he could see nothing. But he knew it was still dark. He also knew he was going to die. And probably pretty soon.
Rico got him by the arm and pulled him up out of the trunk. He bumped his head on the lid. The lid went BONG! and it hurt.
It was cold on him where he had wet himself, and it had soaked into the bottom of his shorts, and he expected to hear laughter, but there was none.
Finally he stood on the ground. It felt like he was standing on gravel. He couldn’t tell if other people were around or not. He could hear wind and not much else. He reached up with his hands to push the blindfold off his eyes and was struck behind his right ear, a blow that caused a bright spark of fire behind his blinded eyes and glanced off his shoulder blade, something heavy, a wrench maybe. And he sank with the pain of it. And could not help it when the tears came. He couldn’t hold it back any longer. Why had his parents put him in a garbage can or had him put in a garbage can or allowed him to be placed in a garbage can? Who was that in the bag?
Something else happened to him because he was suddenly lying on his side coming to and gravel was digging into his cheek. There was a roaring in his ears like a coal train coming. He reached to touch his ear to see if there was blood flowing or if the ear was still there and Rico fetched a kick to his kidney that made him piss on himself again. And he began to beg for mercy with the word “please.” What he heard was a voice above him, crying, hollow with malice, riddled now with bitter laughter.
“Please? You stupid son of a bitch, you better tell me where my little brother is.”
“I don’t know where your asshole brother is, asshole.”
What he didn’t expect was to get his pants pulled down. The wind was cold on his already chilled skin and he felt his equipment shriveling. The blindfold was suddenly pulled off. And even in the dark he saw the steel edge of the terrible straight razor down there against the tightly drawn and wrinkled skin of his scrotum. He closed his eyes because he couldn’t bear to see it. He knew how the hogs screamed, down on the prison farm, because they’d raised and killed their own.
But Rico bent closer, to slobber softly, sniffling with his runny nose: “Okay, son of a bitch, have it your way. You don’t have to say a fuckin’ word, ’cause I know you killed my brother. You wouldn’t have his gun if you hadn’t.”
Domino lay there. He could feel the blood leaking down the side of his head. He looked around. They were at the edge of a dirt road with woods all around. The son of a bitch was crazy. And the bad thing was that he was right about everything. He should have shot him at the hospital when he had the chance. He wouldn’t have been any worse off. He might have been a hell of a lot better off. He might have been headed back to Memphis by now with his whitetail.
Rico was crying with his rage. Domino could see the tears coming down his cheeks. He’d never seen a rage quite like that before and it was a scary thing to see. His words were coming hard. But he seemed about to speak some ultimate truth. As he saw it. As he straightened and stood over him.
“And I ain’t willin’…to turn you over…to some damned. Jury. You’re gonna get your punishment from me…now…and that way…when they find my brother dead…I’ll know…in my heart…that by God, I did the right thing by him.”
It was a struggle, and every movement hurt him, but Domino pulled himself up off the ground with his hands still cuffed behind his back, and he got up on his knees. It was ridiculous. His nuts were hanging out. The gravel hurt like hell on his kneecaps.
“What if I take you where I saw him?” he said, thinking that if they ran up on some other cops, he wouldn’t be able to do this to him, whatever it was he was going to do.
Rico wasn’t going for it. He’d made some decision because he was shaking his head.
“Naw. You just tryin’ to save your ass. Now you tell me. What’s with all that bad meat?”
Why did he want to know that? He already had the weed box in the trunk and it had already thawed out maybe enough to peel the steaks and roasts back and find the package in the center of it but he didn’t know if Rico had done that or not. He didn’t know if he should tell him what was in the package or not.
“It’s for the lions.”
Rico just looked at him for a second.
“The lions?”
“Yeah.”
Rico was frozen, hanging in front of him, still bent over, still gripping the razor. He was trying to understand, too.
“Lions. Do you mean…the ones that guy keeps on Yocona River Road down close to Water Valley? That’s got three legs, some of ’em?”
Domino’s legs were trembling. He felt weak and sick to his stomach. And he could taste blood in his mouth. A pla
ce on his head was throbbing.
“Yeah. He’s got a contract for meat with my boss, in Memphis.”
The look on Rico’s face changed again, and it turned into something that was almost like a smile, only it wasn’t a nice one.
“Well why in the hell didn’t you say so?”
“You just now asked me.”
Rico stood there looking down on him, and then he folded the straight razor and slipped it back in his pocket. He motioned toward the trunk.
“I got a key to that place,” Rico said. “The sheriff insisted we have keys after that one got loose and killed that dog. Now you just get back in.”
79
Miss Muffett in her gown and robe almost broke down and cried when she saw the kitchen floor and the great-room carpet. There was mud in slick trails, and little muddy dog footprints were scattered around. She knew she didn’t have the energy to try and clean it all up tonight. She would have to get down on her hands and knee to clean it, and she just wasn’t up for it. So she went into the great room and mixed herself another drink.
She sat on the couch and wondered if maybe it was time for her to move on. She was tired of being alone with the dog but not actually with the dog. It might have been different if he would be just a little friendly and be some company for her. And she didn’t have any idea where her leg could be. She sat there and got sadder and sadder and sipped her drink. It didn’t seem fair for a dog to be able to do something like this to a person. He didn’t even know what he was doing. He didn’t have any idea what he was doing. He had it made and he didn’t even know it. He had a warm place to sleep and plenty of food to eat, and he didn’t appreciate any of it. All he knew how to do was shit on the floor and make a mess. Show somebody his teeth. Make more work for her.
That was when she heard what sounded like splashing in the tub upstairs. She raised her head and looked at the ceiling. It sounded like a five-pound bass flopping around up there. Then she remembered. She’d forgotten to pull the drain plug when she got out of it. Just one more thing she’d have to clean now. Didn’t he care? Couldn’t he see that she had only one leg?
80
Helen was in a dark room on a water bed covered with some dirty cotton sheets and she was naked below the waist. She saw shapes, shelves, things on the walls. Her shoes were off and her head was on a pillow. He was gripping the tops of her thighs with his warm hands. Her sweater was open and one of her breasts was exposed, the bra on that side pushed down under her breast. It was too hot in the room, and he was burrowing with his mouth like a mole at the junction of her thighs. But it felt too good to do anything but just lie there and take it.
She reached out a hand and touched his hair. It was too dark to see much. She licked with her tongue around her dry lips. She thought she’d been asleep. She cleared her throat.
“That’s good,” she said. “That’s…yeah.” And she trailed off in a sigh.
There was some faint music playing somewhere, so low that she couldn’t even tell what it was. More Barry Manilow probably. Some of her hair was in her face and she pushed it away. She reached to the catch in front of her bra and undid it, and pulled the two sides away, and let them lie beneath the edges of her sweater, let her breasts lie at ease. She hated to have to wear a bra. She was beginning to remember now as she looked at the ceiling.
Oh fuck. What damn time was it?
“Ken?” she said.
He didn’t answer. He just made some pleasurable sound in his throat and kept doing what he was doing. She knew she was very drunk. She knew that much. She thought she must have gone to sleep for a while.
All those drinks. They fucked you up over the long run. It was fun at first, when everything was happy and warm and there was music and people to talk to, and then, if you kept sitting there drinking long enough, you started to feel a little sad, and a little sorry for yourself, and you started to feel lonely. And if you were talking to somebody, then you might start telling things that you might not have told if you hadn’t been drinking. You began to confide, is what you began to do. You began to tell about your unhappiness if you had some. And she remembered that happening with Ken. Again. Even after she’d told herself she wasn’t going to with him again. He had listened to her, agreeing, taking her side, touching her hand. And then he had kissed her on the mouth in a room somewhere in the hotel, behind the bar, after it was already very late. He had unzipped her sweater and pulled her breasts free of the bra and had sucked on her nipples very hard, so hard she’d been afraid he was going to cause her to have some hickies, and he might have. And then he had driven her here. Back to his place. She’d have to look later. She’d have to lock the door to the bathroom, where Arthur couldn’t see, when she got home and check herself for hickies. She couldn’t let Arthur see. He’d get mad. But wasn’t she going to divorce him anyway?
She twisted her fingers through his hair and sighed deep in her chest. She held his head and moved her legs languidly, searching for the best position. It was too late now to worry anymore about Eric. Too late to worry about what time it was. Too late to think about how embarrassing it was to be taken to jail in handcuffs. Too late to think about those dead babies they’d made her look at.
“Ken,” she said. “Make me come again ’cause I’ve got to go.”
81
Anjalee was sitting on a sleek leather couch in Harv’s den and he had his stereo going at a nice listening level, not too loud. He had a really nice place and he hadn’t been wrong about the steaks. She’d never known that a T-bone could be that tender. She was full, comfortable, and a little bit sleepy. But she wasn’t quite ready to go to sleep. Not yet.
He wanted to go over to her place sometime and see her drawings and she was nervous about it. Frankie had been to her place only a time or two and never had said anything about any of them, had only turned on the television and plopped down on the couch and called for a drink. She thought of Christmas with another tinge of regret. But there wasn’t anything she could do about that. Not unless she wanted to go all the way home and have Christmas there. But she already knew what that would be like. Her mother would have some man over at her trailer. He’d be divorced or maybe even still married. Maybe he’d have a stubble of beard or bad breath or a pot gut or a human bite mark on his nose, and she again wouldn’t be able to understand why her mother had spent almost her whole life fucking a bunch of losers. She wished she could have known her daddy better, longer. He was such a dim memory. She knew he’d been a real good man. Her mother had said it enough times: Honey, your daddy was a real good man.
She was still worried about not getting in touch with Lenny before she left the hotel. She hoped he wasn’t mad, because she didn’t want to blow a possible good thing with him. What was she doing with Harv anyway? Lately could she not stick with one man for more than a few days at a time?
She heard him coming out of the bathroom. He walked into the den and took his coat off and dropped it onto a chair. Who was it he looked like? Was it Cesar Romero? Errol Flynn?
“I love your place,” she said. “Who’s that you got on the stereo?”
“Patty Griffin,” he said. “It’s her new record. Isn’t she great?”
“She’s mighty good. I can’t believe I’ve never heard of her,” she said. “But I guess you can’t keep up with everything.”
“I guess not. I can make some coffee if you want some after a while. There’s some brandy here. Or I could make you a drink.”
He ducked his head for a second to start loosening his tie and she could see that he had no bald spot. His hair looked as strong as a twenty-year-old’s, only flowing silver. She wondered what kind of shape the rest of him was in.
“I might have a drink,” she said.
“It’s right here,” he said, going over to a little cart where there were some bottles and a small tub of ice he’d brought from the kitchen earlier. He took the knot out of his tie and pulled on one end of it and slid it from his collar. “I know you like bou
rbon. I’ve got Maker’s, Crown, Wild Turkey. What would you like?”
“Maker’s on the rocks is fine.”
He folded the tie and put it on top of the stereo and started fixing her drink. It wasn’t that late, only a little after ten. She watched him pour the bourbon over the ice and then he walked over with it.
“I’m sorry I don’t have any cocktail napkins,” he said.
“Thank you,” she said. “This is fine.”
Suddenly she didn’t know what to say. He was just so fucking distinguished. He looked like he could be president of a university or something like that. Maybe a bank.
“You want to get stoned?” he said. “I’ve got some good grass.”
She took a sip and smiled at him.
“I’d love to. Mine’s back at my place.”
