Burn Down the Ground

by Kambri Crews

  As her parents quizzed me about having deaf parents and the fine points of living on Boars Head, Maria lit up a cigarette. I was visibly thunderstruck that she would smoke in front of them. Her mother shrugged and said she knew Maria would smoke anyway. She preferred an honest smoker to a sneak. Maria blew out a puff of smoke with a smug grin.

  Maria was an only child and her parents treated her more like a comrade than a thirteen-year-old daughter. They were home every night, eating dinner and watching TV. They shared long walks and talked together about current events without bickering.

  Over the next few weeks I became a permanent fixture in the Kingfisher trailer. I cooked myself Kraft macaroni and cheese, bathed in their tub, and turned in for bed when I felt like it. As I snuggled up in my old sleeping bag on Maria’s floor, I’d call out, “G’night, Maria. G’night, Sarah. G’night, Eugene. G’night, John Boy.”

  My days of being bored were over. Each morning, Maria and I packed saddlebags with water, snacks, and cigarettes, hopped on Star, and headed anywhere we wanted. I’d stop at the trailer to check in with my parents or get supplies, but Mom and Dad never questioned me. They were happy that I finally had a girl friend that lived close to us. I was a studious nerd who preferred working on my library to going out, so I never gave my parents reason to worry.

  Some days Maria and I searched for arrowheads and other hidden treasures from Montgomery’s days as an Indian trading post. Other times we swam in the creek, explored concealed trails, and gathered wild blackberries until the brambles were picked clean.

  Star’s back was being challenged by our daily five-mile, hours-long trek between Maria’s trailer and Webb’s. He was a pony barely thirteen hands high, perfect for accommodating Maria’s pint size but not much more. We were literally breaking his back. Maria’s father put an end to it and said I should get a horse of my own.

  I approached Mom with the idea.

  I was trustworthy, made straight A’s, worked two jobs, and never had gotten anything special. David had terrible grades, never had a job, got suspended from both school and the bus, yet was still given a shotgun and a waterbed.

  After what felt like months of closed-door discussions, my parents finally decided that I could get a horse of my own. That weekend, Mom and Dad got gussied up like they were going dancing at the honky tonk. The Kingfishers and I had been going to the auction held behind Webb’s every Saturday evening, so I led my parents to the barn to see the livestock that was up for bidding. Strolling from stall to stall, Dad inspected each horse, checking out its teeth and eyes, making note of its age, sex, and size.

  We settled on a bay-colored quarter horse with jet-black mane and tail that stood fifteen hands high. The sign on his stall said he was a gelding just shy of two years old and was available at a minimum bid of two hundred dollars. When my choice finally came trotting into the auctioneer’s ring, my pulse quickened. I yanked on Dad’s arm. “That’s him!” I signed.

  Dad put his hand out and moved it up and down like he was dribbling a basketball, signaling me to take it easy. “R-E-L-A-X,” he spelled.

  “This here two-year-old gelding has an opening bid of two hundred dollars. Do we have two hundred?”

  Mom tapped Dad’s leg and he raised his paddle. “We have two hundred dollars. Do we have two twenty-five?”

  Mom was the interpreter for Dad when the bidding accelerated between Dad and other interested bidders. At last, we heard the final words: “Sold for four hundred fifty dollars to that good-looking couple in the back row.”

  I squealed and clapped before bestowing Mom and Dad with hugs and kisses.

  “Looks like that young lady just got herself a horse,” the auctioneer said.

  “Does he have a name?” I asked the seller after the auction.

  “Charlie Brown.”

  “That’s cute,” Mom said. “Let’s keep it.”

  “He’s a smart fella but he’s still green; you need to break him. He’s got spunk.”

  We didn’t have a horse trailer, so we tied Charlie Brown’s reins around the hitch of our truck and slowly drove down Honea Egypt Road toward Boars Head. True to the seller’s words, Charlie Brown fought and kicked the whole way there.

  Though he was technically my horse, Charlie Brown was a family project. Aunt Norma’s husband, Jimmie, was a blacksmith and drove down from Oklahoma to show Dad how to trim hooves. Maria’s mother gave Mom a lesson in administering vaccinations with a syringe. “Smack his ass three times then jab him. He won’t know a thing,” Sarah instructed.

  Mom was a fast learner and had Charlie Brown vaccinated on her first attempt. Feeling the sting, Charlie Brown shot a glance at his rear, then returned to chewing.

  “Hey, that was easy!” Mom grinned like a schoolgirl getting a first-prize ribbon.

  Dad was possessive of the shed, where he kept his expensive tools. He hung them on a pegboard and meticulously painted bright yellow outlines around each one in order to know right away if a tool was missing. The door was secured with a heavy chain and padlock, which only my father could open. I was surprised when he gave me my own key and showed me the space he had cleared for my saddle and tack supplies.

  Dad and David dug holes for fence posts, and then hooked up three rows of barbed wire around the entire perimeter of our property to secure it for Charlie Brown. At the end of the driveway, we put up an aluminum gate, just like the one at the Crews farm. While it was being installed, we kept Charlie Brown tied to a tree. We saddled him and stood in a circle around him as he thrashed around trying to throw it off. When the horse calmed down, David volunteered to be the first to ride him but he was bucked off twice in quick succession.

  Dad signed, “Let me try.” He only lasted a second longer than David. Charlie Brown’s saddle was like an ejector seat.

  “Kambri, he’s your horse,” Mom said. “You’re gonna have to try.”

  I didn’t weigh much more than the saddle and Charlie Brown was nearly tuckered out. I cooed in his ear, “It’s okay, boy. I’m not gonna hurt you.” I climbed on and Charlie Brown bucked and kicked, but not very hard. He settled down and Mom led us up and down the driveway the way Grandpa Crews used to lead Clipper and me. After a couple of weeks, Charlie Brown gave up fighting altogether and was broken.

  Mom bought a cast-iron bell in the shape of a longhorn at a flea market and Dad hung it on a tree outside the shed. Anytime we wanted Charlie Brown, we clanged the bell and called his name. He’d trot to us to get alfalfa or oats, or have his saddle put on. Mom said he didn’t know he was a horse; he thought he was one of us.

  Once, I heard a racket outside of my bedroom door and was startled to see Charlie Brown standing in the hallway of our trailer. He had climbed onto the porch, opened the back door somehow, and walked inside. He was stuck at the first corner, too big to make the turn.

  “Charlie Brown! What are you doing, boy?” I wrapped my arms around his neck and he nuzzled mine; his hot breath shot down the back of my shirt. “It’s a wonder your hooves didn’t crash through the floor!” I exclaimed.

  He snorted and nibbled my ears as I backed him out the way he had come in. “You just want to be with me, don’t ya?”

  One afternoon when I went to check the mail, Charlie Brown was nowhere in sight. I stood on our front porch calling his name before he came into view, sprinting along the perimeter of our land.

  “Charlie Brown?” I called, but uncharacteristically, he didn’t pay me any mind. I clapped and called louder, but he still ignored me. He was tossing his head around as if he were trying to shake off flies. His strange behavior had me worried, so I called out to Mom, who was sitting in the living room with David. They both joined me on the front porch.

  “What’s wrong?” Mom asked.

  “I don’t know. Watch him.” Just then Charlie Brown came into view. “See!”

  He ran through the trees in big, graceful laps, almost in slow motion. He shook his head from side to side before circling out of sight in the wood
s and appearing on the other side.

  “Yeah, that is strange,” Mom said.

  Suddenly David tore off running barefoot into the woods behind the shed and let out a bloodcurdling scream. He reemerged, cursing and snarling. “He ate my plants!” he screamed.

  “Your what?”

  “My pot! He ate it all!”

  “My God, Charlie Brown is stoned!” Mom laughed.

  David had been growing stalks of marijuana behind the shed and Charlie Brown chewed the top off each and every one. He was “loping under the influence,” satisfied to run in circles.

  He really did think he was one of us.

  In junior high, fashion was a life-or-death matter. I once saw a clipping taped to the wall of the school nurse’s office warning us of the dangers of wearing tight jeans. They caused circulation problems that led to blood clots that could be fatal. In spite of looming death, the fashion consensus was the snugger the jeans, the better. To make them shrink to the form of our bodies, we even wore them while soaking in tubs of ice-cold water.

  The week before eighth grade began, Maria’s mother drove us to the new Wal-Mart in Conroe. I spent my paychecks on school supplies, new clothes, and cartons of Marlboro 100’s. The year before, I had tried to fit in with my best preppy look. Now I had a new Joan Jett spiky mullet and wore dangly earrings in my left ear and studs in my right. Maria showed me how to heat up eyeliner with a lighter to get an extra soft tip for applying layers of black rings around my eyes. We tucked the cuffs of our skintight jeans inside floppy suede ankle boots and tied different-colored bandanas around our wrists.

  Oblivious to the rules of preppy-to-punk evolution, I signed up for the basketball team. My first practice was particularly hard work for a pack-a-day smoker like me, not factoring in the times I smoked pot. I found myself heaving and gasping for air, blaming Coach Carter for my shortness of breath. Afterward, my parents picked me up from a nearby shop on their way home from work, but that was three hours later. I missed Maria and her family and wondered about the fun they must be having while I sat there bored. I decided to quit sports altogether, using my parents as an excuse. My departure meant the team was left with five players, the bare minimum, but if this was irresponsible, I didn’t care.

  I stopped other activities, too. I didn’t join volleyball or track, I quit the Youth Advisory Council, and I stopped volunteering as a teacher’s aide.

  My drastic makeover and withdrawal from the extracurricular activities that had made me so happy should have warned adults who cared about me that I was heading on a bad path. Other than Coach Carter being angry with me for leaving the basketball team in the lurch, nobody seemed to notice.

  I still had my job at the yacht club, but that was in jeopardy, too. The excessive cost of gas and time outweighed the benefits.

  “You’ll have to quit,” Mom said. “But not until after the company Christmas party.” She and Dad weren’t missing a free meal and an open bar. I was excited about the party, too, since I had never been to one outside our own trailer. Dad drove us to the yacht club, and the closer we got the more nervous I became. I was wearing my nicest jeans, but fretted about whom I would talk to.

  When we arrived, my parents and I went straight to the buffet, piling on mountains of food before going back for seconds. I asked for extra slices of meat, enjoyed bananas set on fire, ordered ice cream with heaps of every topping, then went back for more.

  The instant the DJ started the music, Mom and Dad hit the dance floor. When their glasses were empty, they took turns getting refills and juggled extra drinks so the trips to the bar were less frequent.

  Miguel was the only other busboy there. We were the youngest two and gravitated to each other, partly in solidarity and partly in resigned surrender. We only talked during work, so our conversations existed in short bursts before we were called away to pepper a salad, refill water glasses, or clear a table. Now, without distractions, we quickly discovered we had common ground. We each had our own horse, smoked Marlboros, and thought Van Halen was the greatest band in all creation.

  “Hey, you want me to try to get a bottle of liquor?”

  “Sure.” I shrugged. He seemed determined to get drunk, sneaking swigs of abandoned beers and chugging the remains of half-empty glasses.

  He went to the bar to start smooth-talking the bartender, Joe. I was sure if Joe knew I was going to share the bottle, Miguel would come up empty-handed. Joe glanced over Miguel’s shoulder and made eye contact with me.

  Shit.

  I darted my eyes away and saw Mom nursing a drink while Dad was burning a hole through the dance floor. His big smile showed both rows of straight white teeth and his arms swept back and forth in wide movements, forcing other dancers to spread back.

  I glanced back to the bar, but Miguel was gone. I felt a tap on my shoulder, and I turned around to see Miguel grinning from ear to ear. He was holding up a paper bag in triumph, and pulled out a bottle of white wine just far enough for me to see the label.

  We went outside and stood behind a big pine tree. Miguel pulled a corkscrew from his pocket. He didn’t know how to use it, so I said I’d try.

  Like a basic instinct, cracking open a bottle of hooch came naturally to me. I pried out the cork and took the first big swig out of the bottle before passing it back to Miguel.

  “Hey, slow down,” he laughed. “I got us some glasses.” He held up two Waterford crystal flutes usually reserved for yacht club weddings.

  Glass or not, I still chugged so my parents wouldn’t notice I was missing from the Christmas party. Miguel discarded the empty bottle and we headed back inside.

  As I entered the double doorway, I caught Dad’s eye from the dance floor and he beckoned me to join him. Thinking we were busted, Miguel took off running back to the parking lot like a hound dog that had just spotted a rabbit.

  “Come dance with me,” Dad signed.

  I stood frozen for a second. I had no idea how to dance.

  Dad didn’t know this would be my first time and wasn’t letting up. “What’s wrong? Come on!” He signed wildly and smiled more broadly than I’d ever seen. I weaved my way through tables toward him, gripping the backs of chairs to keep me stabilized. I reached the portable parquet dance floor just as the DJ cued “Footloose,” one of my favorites.

  I joined Dad and began dancing with wild abandon. The effects of the wine and my enthusiasm for Kenny Loggins gave me newfound confidence. I bit my lower lip, snapped my fingers, and flailed my arms and legs.

  “You’re a good dancer,” Dad signed. He looked pleasantly surprised and backed up in order to take in the full picture.

  I grew self-conscious for a moment, but I quickly swelled with pride. Dad, who danced better than John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever, was complimenting me!

  I must be a natural.

  Dad and I boogied all night, improvising dance moves, dips, and twirls until the lights came on and the music stopped. I was sweaty and happy, even though my buzz from the wine had worn off.

  No wonder Mom liked going out with Dad all the time.

  Dad unwraps a fresh stick of gum and asks, “Are you still working in Rockefeller Center?”

  “No, I run my own business full-time now. I produce live theater and comedy shows and help plays and comedians get publicity.” I tell him about the parties, the different people I work with, and how I once met Tina Louise from Gilligan’s Island. He always did like redheads.

  “I’m proud of you.” Dad claps his hands to applaud me, then adds, “Please remember, don’t take any dopes and drink heavily.”

  “I know, Dad.”

  If anyone knows the consequences, he does. As if on cue, he starts to regale me with tales from the Free World, before he was Inmate #13A46B7, many of which involve weed, booze, gambling, or a combination of all three. “One night I was out partying, dancing, drinking, you know. I saw a beautiful woman watching me play pool. I wanted to show off so I acted like that movie Color of Money and twirled my po
ol cue. I didn’t hear her walk up as I swung around. The stick hit her head and her hair went flying. She was bald! I screamed and grabbed the wig and put it back on her head and said, ‘Sorry, sorry, sorry!’ I never saw her again!”

  Dad and I laugh so loud everyone around us stops and stares. I hear a nearby inmate tell his visitors, “He’s deaf. He’s a good guy. Real good guy.”

  I smile. For a brief moment I think this isn’t so bad. In fact, this is the best I could have hoped for.

  I am having fun. I am visiting my father in jail, and I am having fun. So is he. Through all the fighting and his roughened exterior, he has held on to his impish charm. The look of his smile and eyes and the way he tells me stories make it all worthwhile. Though I know he has an agenda, too.

  In the past, Dad has sent me cards that say, “Send money. Love, Daddy.” No “thank you.” No “please.” No gentilities. Now I’m overcome with satisfaction seeing him. Other prisoners admire him. His humor is intact. From now on when his notes are brief and beg for money, I will send him some. I will buy him new thermals that gleam white and new eyeglasses and smuggle in more gum and a burger. Whatever he wants.

  Suddenly a loud, angry shout breaks the hum of conversation in the prison visiting room. Startled, I jerk around but can’t tell who screamed. My adrenaline rushes and I am scared. The men surrounding me are dangerous. I am not in a comedy club. In this place, things could happen.

  “YOU!” A tall white man in beige slacks and white shirt with a tie screams again. I recognize him from the picture on the wall. The warden.