by John Vigna
Earl turns the knives over in his palm. The tips are blackened. It makes him nervous to hold the knives, sharp objects in the room that Hammy can access at any time. He places the knives back in the drawer, slides it shut. “Looks like high school all over again.”
“There you go.” Hammy smiles, leaves his plate on the table, and slaps Earl on the shoulder. “You bring those pens?”
“Yeah. You’re not planning on smoking them or frying the ink or something, are you?”
“Nah. Not unless you want a homemade tattoo.”
“I’ll pass.”
Earl goes to the bedroom and rummages through his bag. He lifts the doll, her mouth a ragged line. Jesus. Bad idea. He drops it in his duffle bag, grabs a four-pack of pens. He walks back down the hallway into the living room where Hammy sits in front of the TV. “Here you go. Twice as many as you asked for. Should keep you plenty busy.”
“That’s mighty generous of you.” Hammy tears open the package, tests each pen on the back of the package and smiles. He opens his notebook and begins writing.
“Yeah, you’re welcome for dinner, too.”
IV
After Earl cleans the dishes, he watches TV with Hammy. The phone rings, startling them both. Hammy picks it up. “Hello?” He hangs up, opens the front door, and waves at the control booth. A flashlight flicks on and off, confirms he’s been seen. Hammy sits down and turns to Earl. “So, why’d you come here?”
“Jesus, little man, how about a little foreplay before you bend me over and stick it to me?”
“Foreplay’s a waste of time.”
“Not in my experience.”
“In here it is.”
Earl meets Hammy’s eyes; they flit side to side in quick succession but remain fixed on Earl.
Hammy blinks and leans forward. “I know you, Earl. You’re not here for the hell of it.”
“Maybe I am. Is there anything wrong in that?”
“Who you running from?”
“Nothing. Nobody. I’m here for you.”
“All of the sudden you’re here for me, huh?”
“Sure. Why not?”
“Because you haven’t changed a lick. You can’t take your eyes off yourself anytime you pass a mirror. Hell, you were checking out your moustache in the reflection of the toaster while doing the dishes. Christ, you look like hell.”
“Thanks.”
“You drinking again?”
Earl glares at Hammy. “Not your business.”
“I figured as much. But you’re gonna lecture me on drugs this, drugs that, let me know what a mess I’ve made of things, tell me you’ll always be there for me.”
“Who’s the one preaching? I don’t need this crap, especially coming from you.”
Hammy leans back into the couch, shakes his head. “Got it all sorted, huh?”
V
The brothers watch TV in silence until Hammy falls asleep. Earl wakes him, offers his hand to help him get up, puts an arm around his neck, and limps down the hallway with him, says goodnight, shuts the door.
“Leave it open.”
Earl sits in the living room, flicks through the channels, the sound muted. His skin feels clammy. A headache pounds at the base of his neck. He wraps himself in a blanket but still shivers, turns off the TV, and sits in the dark; the silence rumbles in his ears. He could be back home now lying on the hood of his truck with Arlene, parked at the mountainside lookout, stars glittering above them, enjoying the murmur of her voice in his ear, her palm resting on his chest.
Earl gets up, goes to his room, and closes the door. The room glows with prison lights outside; there are no curtains on the windows to block it out. He rummages through his duffle bag and takes out the doll. It sags in his fingers. He stretches the plastic to unfasten the nipple and blows air into it until it’s inflated and he can admire the full roundness of its face. It wobbles before him, eyes unblinking, mouth wide open as if in surprise. He listens to the quiet of the prison, lifts the doll in his arms, turns it around, examines it in the dark. Breasts like cantaloupes, legs all the way to the ground. It’s young and has a firmer body than anyone he’s seen or held in a long while. He turns it around so they face each other, and glides along the carpet with it. Quick-quick, slow-slow, quick-quick, slow-slow. He moves alongside the bed toward the door before spinning it around and, quick-quick, slow-slow, glides across the rug back to the other side of the room. Earl smiles, whether it’s Arlene or Flo or Bonnie or even that crazy one, Millie, that he holds in his arms. He twirls the doll one last time before propping it up in the closet, resists a bow, closes the door.
He lies down panting, the sweat cooling against his shirt, his breath wheezing in the silence, a rasp that catches on something in his throat on each inhale. He strains to breathe more evenly until he doesn’t have to keep his mouth open. His chest rises and falls, the moments between each breath long and drawn. But he can’t fall asleep. The light through the window, Hammy across the hall, the silence. He gets up, opens the closet, grabs the doll and lays it on its side, draws up the covers, and curls up behind it. The plastic skin squeaks against Earl’s as they settle in together, and all is quiet again.
VI
The phone rings for count at seven a.m., jars Earl awake. His mouth is dry and his head pounds something fierce. The doll stares back at him. He rolls out of bed and stands it up in the closet, squeezes the sides of his head with his hands to relieve his headache, stumbles to Hammy’s room. Hammy sleeps with his arms stretched over his head, bent at the elbows. In comic book sheets, Hammy looks like a child sleeping in on a Saturday morning, not someone hooked on meth and coke who robs handicapped elderly women. His fingers are smeared with black ink. After Hammy was born, their father lifted Hammy’s tiny fingers, turned them over, sniffed, and announced to their mother, “Hands like a thief.” The phone continues to ring. Earl shakes Hammy’s leg. “Little man, you gotta answer the phone.”
Hammy wakes with a stunned, guilty look, as if he’s been caught doing something unpleasant and illegal. He leaps out of bed and waves to the booth, returns to his room.
Earl makes a pot of coffee and flops down on the couch. He drops his head forward and massages his neck, guides his fingers along the tight knots at the base of his skull. When he presses hard into one of the knots, nausea floods through him. He tightens his grip, turns his head and massages the muscle until his eyes tear, notices Hammy’s notebook on the couch. Earl stops rubbing his neck, glances down the hallway before opening the journal, flips through it, dozens of pages filled with Hammy’s handwriting, tight, thin spools of ink slanted hard to the right, but precise, fitting between the lines in each page of the journal. Stories about two characters, Big and Small.
Big and Small stand in a field, a gopher at their feet, a marble smashed in its jaw. The rodent makes shrieking sounds and snaps back and forth over their sneakers. Small dont want to cry because Big would beat the shit out of him. Small says: What if Pa finds out?
Big pinched the slingshot from the hardware store. Theyd have to do some explaining.
The gopher whimpers. Red and white bubbles grow and pop from its mouth and flies buzz around it. Small starts to cry.
Big says: Quit being a baby. Shut up.
Big gives him the slingshot and picks up a big rock. Big yells: Fuck you, motherfucker fuck fuck, and smashes the rodent into the dirt.
Big stares at Small. His eyes are hard. He says: flip it.
Small cant argue with Big, wont argue when he got in one of his nasty moods. Small pushes the rock away with his foot. The gopher lays crushed in the dirt, two teeth poke through a bunch of blood in the dirt.
Big says: Dont you dare say a goddamn word.
When they get home, Big narks on Small, tells Pa that Small pinched a slingshot and killed the gopher.
Pa slides the belt off his filthy jeans, smacks Small on the ear and pushes him into one of the horse stalls, slams the gate behind him. Small sticks his hand out, like always, an
d holds his wrist with the other hand and closes his eyes and tries to dream of a place far away but cant when the belt stings his palm.
Its not the killing, understand? Pa says, lifting the belt. Its the stealing.
Small hears Big on the other side of the gate, chuckling. Prays that Pa will hit him with the leather instead of the buckle as he had done before.
Earl slaps the journal down, slams the pens on top, leans back into the couch. That little bullshit artist. It wasn’t like that. His leg trembles and his head throbs. He considers picking up the phone to call the guards and go back to his locker and have himself a little drink. Hell, he could leave. It wasn’t like that at all.
Hammy wakes at noon and wanders into the kitchen.
“Made some coffee for you.”
Hammy grunts, pours himself a cup and spits it out in the sink. “Still can’t make a decent cup, can you?”
Earl listens to him open and close the fridge door again and again as though new food will materialize each time he opens it.
“Give it a break, little man.”
“There’s no food here.”
“Like hell there isn’t. There’s a couple hundred bucks worth right in front of your nose, you—”
“You what? Finish your sentence.” Hammy comes into the living room and stands before Earl.
“You could be a little more grateful is all.”
“Christ, I’m grateful all right. You make me laugh. Lecturing me on being grateful.”
Earl looks past Hammy around the room. The walls are grimy in spots. Workers walk past the unit, shovels on their shoulders, laughing in the sunlight. The fridge door is ajar, the coffee pot empty but the machine still on. “I’m getting some air.”
“There you go. Run and hide. Nothing’s changed.”
“Shut the damn fridge and turn off the coffee machine.” Earl goes outside, punts the plastic pail, and watches it sail across the yard and crash into the fence. He kicks over the toy dump truck. The workers have gone around the corner, but another wave of them sit on the back of a pickup, legs dangling off the tailgate. He reminds himself to bring Arlene flowers when he gets home; it seems like the right thing to do. He’s not sure if she even likes flowers. He decides he’ll bring her chocolate; what woman doesn’t like chocolate?
VII
The drone of the TV fills the room as they eat dinner.
“You still dancing?” Hammy says.
“What?”
“Dancing. Two-stepping. Are you still dancing?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“What’s it matter why? I gave it up.”
“Why? No more room for all those trophies?”
Earl shakes his head.
“Then why?”
“Nothing.” He feels the sting of his admission, another failure at sticking with something, and wishes Hammy would stop.
“Don’t make sense to me, Earl. You were real good at it. Made you happy. Or at least it seemed that way.”
“Didn’t have time no more. Not like you.”
Hammy pushes his plate aside, leans his forearms on the table and laughs. “Least I’m committed. Do my time, don’t hurt no one.”
“Until you get out.”
“The good Lord’s keeping a watch on me. One day at a time, bro. I’m doing my best. That’s all I can do. You might try it.”
“The good Lord? Bad as any woman. Makes demands of you. Haunts your every move. Tells you what’s right and wrong and punishes you for either, and then turns around and does whatever the hell He wants. Will let you down time and again, and if He don’t, He’ll expect something in return, something you can never give ’cause it ain’t ever enough. Praise the Lord! Give thanks on ye, Lord! No way, little man. You hang onto Him, but the fact is, once you step outside of that fence, blinking like some dumbstruck lamb in the sunshine, standing in front of the pearly gates of heaven, you’re gonna fuck it all up. Sure as snow in January. And where’s He gonna be then?”
Hammy stops smiling. He closes his eyes and tilts his head back, his face colourless and slack, as if his jawbone has been unhinged. Earl fears his brother might start to cry. Hammy opens his eyes and stares at the light bulb on the ceiling he had taken down when they first arrived. He takes a deep breath and tips his head forward to look at Earl. His eyes are damp, but still.
“You know, Big E, the good thing about getting reacquainted with your own people is that you learn some new things about them, and you get to remember the old things you liked.”
“I was out of line.”
“There’s nothing I can do about the past. Can’t think about it, gotta move on, and live one day at a time.” He leans forward. “I try to look for the good and positive in everyone, including myself. Hell, it ain’t easy. You should give it a shot, too.”
“Sounds like your social worker’s been doing a tap dance on your head.”
“Maybe. I dunno. It’s better than the alternative.”
“Which is?”
“Anger. The bastard child of being all alone.”
VIII
Hammy scribbles in his notebook, chuckles to himself.
“What’s so funny?” Earl says.
“Huh? What? Nothing.”
“Tell me.”
Hammy lifts his head. “Yeah, everything’s about you.” He taps his pen against the page and continues writing.
Earl gets up, grabs the remote, flicks through the channels. Two men fish on a calm stretch of water. He increases the volume. Water splashes over the gunwales as one of the men whoops and shouts at a halibut that thrashes around in the boat.
The men try to grab the fish, but it’s too big and wriggles out of their hands, flops around the boat deck like something possessed. They try again, but the fish thrashes more violently. One of the men holds a blunt bat and beats on the halibut, sometimes hitting it, often hitting the deck instead. “Careful, keep back of him,” his partner says. He flogs it again, but the fish twists viciously to the side, and its tail cracks the man’s ankle, chops him to the deck. His partner reaches for the pistol on his hip, pauses for a moment, and shoots the halibut in the head.
“Damn,” Earl says. “Now that’s a fishing story.”
“Dumb asses. They got horseshit lucky. What if they missed? Then what? They’d sink like a bucket of rocks.” Hammy closes his book. “Find something worth watching.”
“It’s not like there’s a whole lot of options.”
“There’s a few.”
“None any good.”
“Ah hell, just pick something.”
IX
After Hammy goes to bed, Earl reads through his journal.
Big boxed with Stinky when they were eleven. Small hung around, wanted to watch, asking questions bout the fabric on the gloves, whats inside them, why so many laces.
Stinky was taller than Big and Small and he had grown up with two older brothers who took turns beating him. He said: Whats up with Small?
Big said, Get lost.
Stinky said: He can stay. But he cant just take tickets. Hes gotta fight.
Small felt his face grow hot. He smiled. Big locked the barn door.
Stinky shook his head and smirked. He said: Just dont go crying when I beat you to a pulp. He threw Small a pair of gloves.
Small pulled them on. Stinky circled, looking for an opening. Smalls first punch surprised Stinky, landed on his forehead.
Stinky said: Christ.
He rushed in and swung at Small but Small blocked the punches and hit Stinky hard, stopped him cold and opened a small cut above his eye. Stinky wiped it, glared at Small and bellowed: Okay, you little shit. That’s it.
Stinky charged him, screaming like a cat in heat, battering Smalls body and head.
Small tried to catch his breath but the punches kept on. He felt his face snap back and found himself on the ground twisting around in the straw, the stench of horseshit all around. He heard Big say: Hes okay.
He knew B
ig was pleased he got knocked out because he could hear it in his voice. He knew it only proved to Big that he couldnt play with him and his friend and hold his own. Small felt Stinkys hands pull him up by the armpits and when he stood, his legs felt like jello. Stinky pulled off his gloves.
Stinky said: He should lie down. We need to get him some ice.
Smalls eyes watered and the skin above his eye throbbed. It would turn into a bruise. But Pa wouldnt notice and if he did hed only call him a goddamn pussy for getting his ass kicked.
Big said: Serves him right.
Small wobbled into the house, straight to his room, up the ladder to his bunk above Bigs.
Stinky said: What if hes got a concussion or something?
Big said: Hes fine. Hes just got a little headache.
Small lay curled, holding the blankets over his head. He heard Stinkys voice: If you need anything, let us know right away, ya hear? Youre a tough lil guy. You did good.
Small heard the light click and Stinky say to Big: Its a good thing he didnt fight you. Hed have kicked your ass.
Earl’s hands shake. He sets down the journal, wipes his forehead, and sinks his fingers into the folds of the flesh on his neck to feel his pulse, faint but rapid. He takes a deep breath and exhales, closes his eyes. When he opens them, Earl clicks off the TV and goes to his room, shuts the door. The doll stands upright in the closet. Earl’s hand squeaks against the puffed-up plastic of its wrist. He leads it into the room, to the foot of the bed, whispers in its ear, “Step together, walk, walk.” He holds it in position and starts. Quick-quick, slow-slow, quick-quick, slow-slow. In the darkness, he dances with Arlene, holds the doll tight in his arms, spins it, his socks shuffle on the carpet. The doll’s smile radiates inside him and he moves in the cramped space of the room, reminded of what he loves about two-stepping, the contact between two warm bodies, how both partners move together close in the most efficient and graceful way. He opens his eyes, stops to listen, but there’s no sound. Peers out the window, the camera’s gaze directly on him. He slides deeper into the room, near the closet, hums their favourite Willie Nelson song, “Georgia on My Mind.” Earl considers what will become of them, him and Arlene, but the wondering makes his pulse accelerate, and when he opens his eyes again, he stares at the gaping mouth of the doll. Just one more night, he tells himself, plotting his drive back home. He’ll start with some Chardonnay to sweeten the palate, move on to rye and coke. Beers in the cooler behind his seat, a cold can resting between his legs to steady him until he gets back to the valley. Hammy coughs across the hallway. Earl places the doll on the bed, undresses, climbs in beside it, and pulls the covers over both of them.
