Starve the Vulture

by Jason Carney

  “Hey!” I respond, surprised by the lightning quickness of that old woman.

  Craig sticks out his tongue and grins. I swear she drew blood.

  Papaw swirls his sweet tea with vigor; his lips smack. “Now that is good cooking, Momma.” He savors the littlest things. A small Tupperware container with a red lid sits on his right. Even when tightly closed, a pungent smell seeps out. The tattoo named Trixie on Papaw’s right arm twists and dances away from the large purple onion he removes from it and grasps like an apple. Onions remind him of his days as an Arkansas sharecropper during the Great Depression. His smile grows larger as he devours the bitter fruit. Bill grew onions in their garden during the Depression to feed the kids and sell to other families. Ernest found them to be born of love, not labor like the rice fields. While Bill grew onions and greens, Ernest farmed rice on another man’s land. But he never eats rice. Superman is not as tough as Papaw.

  “You boys look like prizefighters,” he says. “Never fight amongst yourselves.”

  “You and your brothers ever fight?” Bill interjects, knowing the answer and the story already.

  “Amen, buckshot!” Uncle J.C., the second youngest of Papaw’s four brothers, sings out from the living room. A buzz of laughter rises up, as everyone knows what he means.

  “Tell the story about the snakes!” one of my cousins yells, followed by a chorus of agreement from the rest of the family. Bill blushes. I have never heard that story.

  “Jase, we lived in Brinkley, Arkansas, during the Depression when your grandma was just a girl; took whatever job we could.” Family members crowd the entry that separates the living and dining rooms. “A dollar a day: sunup, sundown.” Papaw’s eyes fall on what is left of the onion.

  “I hate onions!” J.C. injects. “Darn things kept me skinny.”

  “We got to eat most days back then because she grew that garden,” Aunt Irene gets the story back on track. “And you don’t have to eat them anymore. Let your brother talk.” She pokes at his head, so her words will make it through his receding hairline.

  “We all helped each other,” Papaw resumes. “Know what you’re fighting for, boys.” Pride overcame the scars of his poverty, sliced and burned onto his enormous hands, the kind of experience that does not come from formal education and books. Each crisp snap of his jaw against the thin layers of purple flesh holds my attention. Between each chew, I never miss his words.

  “Brinkley was hot in the spring. When we got on, the owner told us there was a house down at the creek edge we could live in as long as I worked the land. Fix her up, she was ours.”

  “Damn house was in the water,” my grandmother speaks from the kitchen entry.

  “It was a four-room shotgun house; it sat on a marsh at the side of this creek. The place needed a cleaning,” Papaw says.

  “It needed a new everything,” Mamaw mumbles through her food. “Waist-high grass; had to pull our truck loaded with all our furniture in with a tractor. My sister and I even burnt down the outhouse just to get a new one.” She cracks a wicked smile.

  “We had to get rid of all kinds of critters. Ate a lot of squirrels. But mainly it was the snakes,” he says in eerie tones. I am terrified of snakes. “My brothers and I went hunting in the yard the day we moved in. Kids propped up on the truck to watch the show.”

  “You mean the disaster,” J.C. foreshadows.

  “Well, if you had been more careful . . .” Irene shuts him down.

  “It was a sight, five grown men walking through the yard, shooting the ground. We were doing well—one snake, then three snakes, seven. Pretty quick we moved to the large side of the house connected to the back, should have had it done by lunch, we thought.” Papaw smirks. “Then one bit Virgil on the boot; we all looked down and found more moccasins than earth.” He pauses for a drink of tea. “All hell broke loose. Rifles shooting wildly as we bumped into, knocked down, and pushed each other out of the way. We used the butts of our guns to swat the slithering mess—there were millions—stomping, jumping, and crushing what we could. We sounded like a bunch of women as we fled the side of the house.” Papaw laughs and touches Craig on the arm.

  “Tell them what the brave men did next,” Irene suggests with a giggle.

  “Well, boys, we blamed each other. Then took to fighting as our wives watched,” Papaw says. “Without so much as a word, Momma grabbed her hoe and charged right toward us.” He starts to chuckle. “That is what stopped us; use to say it was the sight of determination in Bill’s face. We thought she was coming for us.”

  Everyone laughs and Mamaw rolls her eyes. “I should have.”

  “We could barely see her in the high grass,” J.C. adds.

  “We tracked her by the metal head of the hoe as she raised it overhead. She was a banshee, never heard so much vicious killing.” Papaw looks at her with a smile. She says nothing.

  “The big rowdy Morrison brothers stood there with jaws hanging; little old Bill, the butcher of Brinkley, Arkansas, saving them all from the moccasins,” Irene completes the picture.

  “Took her a half hour to kill about ninety snakes,” Papaw’s tone rises with nostalgia. “Only a few weeks to eat them all.” He pauses, shifting his gaze to Bill. “Only so many ways a man can eat a snake.”

  “Amen. Hallelujah. Amen. Fried with onions.” Uncle J.C. is acting like the deacons in the back of the church. During the sermon, they shout out praise to evoke the spirit of the Holy Ghost and wake the bored sleepers that teeter in the pews.

  From the broken laughter in the living room, you could tell Aunt Irene had poked her husband into shutting up.

  “You got to know what is important. Family and Jesus, take care of your mommas.” Papaw raises the onion in his hand at Craig and me, gives us both a smile and a look of conviction.

  “Daddy, leave those boys alone,” Craig’s mother Annie says as she goes to refill her plate.

  Papaw takes a slice of white bread and sops up the leftover gravy on his plate and the few black-eyed peas straggling at the edges. No one ever leaves food on the table. Bill is an outstanding cook who always makes the same meal on Sundays: pan-fried steaks, pan gravy, corn bread, black-eyed peas, mashed potatoes, cream-style honey corn, and Papaw’s onion. The only surprise is dessert. Nine times out of ten, it’s pie. Today it is pecan, made of nuts gathered from the front and backyards. Our family spent decades sitting around this table shelling those nuts, sharing stories, and weaving our family mythology. It is Ernest’s favorite pie and conversation.

  “Wait for the coffee, you boys,” Bill gurgles, her mouth half full of corn bread. She is wider than tall, short arms and swelled legs; she wears muumuus and house shoes except on Sundays. “Y’all settle down, let me finish or go out back and pick you one.”

  The snap of her steely green-gray eyes is serious. She peers out over the top of the bifocals always resting midnose. We know exactly what she means. The bush off the back porch provides switches, long thick stems that thin out into delicate whips. She makes everyone pick and ready his or her own switch. We hustle back to our seats and wait.

  “You learn early about Mamaw’s switches, even snakes won’t mess with her,” my mother’s sister, Barbra, chuckles to the nods of everyone else.

  “Amen,” chimes Aunt Irene. “Who’s ready for pie?” She places her arm on my shoulder as she passes by.

  The younger women gather all the supper plates and each has a specific job. Irene and my grandmother cram into the kitchen to slice the pie and pour the coffee. Bill sits at the table, empty plate in front of her, staring out the window, holding onto what yesterdays she has left. The older she becomes, the more the stories center on her. We make every effort to keep her connected to us. All the men receive coffee and pie first. Then Craig and I get ours. Every time Irene brings me my dessert, she asks the same questions.

  “You know who I am? You know my name?” Her sweet smile and gray-heavy, hair-sprayed beehive hairdo hold my dessert prisoner until I tell her.


  “Did you forget who you are?” I say with a puzzled look. “Aunt Irene.”

  “Bless your heart, adorable. Extra big piece for you,” she clamors with a pinch to the back of my arm. “Jason, you got those traveling-salesman eyes.”

  “Never mind whose daddy you look like,” Ernest whispers to me while the women’s chatter turns to gossip at the other end of the six-chair dining room table. “You will find the truth. You’re gonna be a prizefighter, boy, the reward will come when you decide to seek it.” Ernest draws truth from his own life, even though I have no idea what his words mean. “You boys belong to this family; we will be in heaven together.” I never heard a statement hold more truth within me. A sliver of pie in his left hand and tea in his right, he pushes back from the dining room and gets up to join the men at the card table for a game of Pitch.

  “We fed those kids, Momma. All day in those rice fields; we fed those kids,” Bill murmurs with a tranquil smile. Their eyes connect in a way that makes me forever jealous. Their love is the love I have sought my whole life. Time cannot contain them.

  1:11 A.M. (25:59 BEFORE GRACE)

  I PEER OVER THE BALCONY RAILING of the hotel suite with a bottle of whiskey in one hand and a cell phone in the other. Dallas spreads out eight floors beneath me.

  I fantasize about jumping, dreaming big. My torso stretches over the railing, arms extended with a gaudy fuck you flying off both my hands. The insane flaps of my appendages as I fall. I am naked.

  The ultimate belly flop.

  Although in my case, more like a devastating thud of dehydrated skin and bones. There would be an aftermath, the chill of the investigators trying to discover how the walls of this room consumed me.

  The past four days are a blur. I became conscious a half hour ago, in a pool of my own vomit, hovering above my clothes sticking out of my duffel bag.

  Four days.

  Given my present circumstances, leaping out into the darkness seems like a logical, Hollywood conclusion.

  I should put on underwear, just in case.

  The sliding glass door is open. I reject this obvious act of cowardice and step back inside.

  I dial my grandmother’s number. Cold spring morning fills the hotel room. The other line rings for the fourth, fifth, sixth time. I can’t stop shaking, pacing the room.

  She answers.

  “You awake?” I say.

  “Jason, is that you? Where are you?”

  I hesitate, the silence on the phone line crackles. My grandmother clears her throat. I know she is startled. She always saves me. Her downfall is that she loves to help other people even when they use her.

  “You doing all right?” I ask. “Hope you’ve been okay.”

  “Jason Carney, where are you calling me from?” she snaps. “Caller ID says the Embassy Suites—which one?”

  “Off I-35,” I say. “I really fucked up.”

  There is panic in my voice. I honestly want her help. Scared of my own death, I no longer have patience for my all-consuming fear. My chest hurts. My life is the constant repetition of something burning placed to my lips.

  What has happened to me?

  “We know you have, honey. All kinds of folks are looking for you. Somebody called, said you were supposed to have some shows in New York that you missed, your man from Global Talent is looking for you too.”

  “I need you to pick me up in the morning and take me to rehab.”

  “Oh Jason, how bad is it?” she says. “What time do you want me to come, Jase?”

  “Seven.”

  “I will be there. Might be late because of rush hour. You’re on the other side of the city, but I will be there.”

  “Promise?”

  “Promise,” she says. “Don’t go anywhere. Do you hear me? Don’t go anywhere.”

  “I am going to sleep. Thank you, Grandma.”

  I tell her the room number and that I love her. We hang up.

  For the first time in a month, I feel like I am turning a corner, going home. A home I no longer have, smoked away with truth. The greater truth being that I am out of dope. This addiction leads me to the truth of my own death; a death I fear. I also fear being out of crack. My blue metal pipe floats in the bottom of the toilet. Sweat rolls down my back. I tingle and pulse. I want to believe I am going to sleep. The pipe is still in there. The bowl is fresh. Only one tug before the toilet flushes. I imagine myself cleaning the tube and getting a large hit.

  I am stupid for trying to flush it.

  My cell phone beeps, C is sending me a text message: You about ready?

  I am paranoid that he and his friends are watching me. He is too accurate at knowing when I am out and in need of more.

  I should have told her that in case they come in and kidnap me.

  Now thoughts of C race through my head. I walk into the bathroom. My muscles ache. I do not want to leave. My mind spins.

  I need to get some more.

  The reality of what is happening sets in. No more high. Sobriety starts now. I look into the toilet. The edge of the crushed blue tube peeks out of the bottom of the bowl.

  One hit to calm my mind.

  The water runs from the ends as I lift the stem out of the toilet. The blue metal squashed by my heel cradles what remains of the dope melted on the chore. I press the tube into a towel. The water dances out of the end. The hair dryer on the wall comes to life in a flick of the switch. Water shoots out the end as the heat fills the tube. I rotate the ends. Each gets a turn under the heat.

  The process takes a couple of minutes. I am careful not to spend too much time glaring at my reflection. Unwashed for days, I cannot remember my last hour of true sleep. The pipe is the focus. The lighter erupts.

  The chore inside the tube sizzles with moisture. The smoke tastes foul. The effect of the dope is the same. My body eases with euphoria, even before I exhale. I sit on the toilet, my whole body unknotting.

  I need more.

  Three simple words roll across my mind and all the resolve of the phone conversation disintegrates. I no longer think of my grandmother, escaping back to life. Instead, I could be at the crack house in thirty minutes, back at the hotel in an hour.

  Could easily sit and smoke until Freeda arrives.

  I decide to go replenish my stash, smoke until morning.

  Then I will quit.

  CARNATIONS

  1978

  THE LOBBY IN BAYLOR MEDICAL CENTER smells of cleaning fluid, a scent of fear that burns in my nostrils. A sterile silence covers every surface with the feeling of impending death. All of the workers, patients, and visitors amble across the floor ignoring the hideous air, as if the stench was normal.

  My mom will not be coming back.

  I understand that I interrupted her life because single teenage mothers do not get to go to college and they have a hard time finding a man. I blame myself for my father leaving, for her headaches, and the dreamless life she finds herself living.

  I sit in one of two identical chairs across from the elevators while my grandmother waits for the doors to open. Orange vinyl sticks like plastic wrap to my leg.

  I do not want to be here.

  My grandmother turns and smiles at me with the ding of the elevator arriving. She says, “You sit over here. I’ll be right back. Then we’ll go up and you can visit with your mom. She really misses you.”

  I do not believe her.

  If she misses me so much, why have I been at Craig’s house for one month?

  Alone, I study my surroundings. A pretty woman sits at the information desk near the front, working her shiny hair more than the phone lines. A couch and two chairs, separated by a coffee table on top of a large brown abstract rug, seem out of place in the middle of the floor across from the desk and the lazy woman with a hard-working brush. The ensemble appears to be right out of a furniture store window. Even the lamps on the end table have cords dangling off the sides tied in loops, not plugged into anything.

  They just want you to think ev
erything is normal. This is not a place I want to feel comfortable.

  Beyond the far lamp is the gift shop, more of a drugstore. They sell sodas, snacks, greeting cards, medications, and flowers.

  I should buy some flowers for my mom.

  I check my pants pockets: two quarters, three pennies, and a dime. I am not buying much. I cross the floor, walking as if I belong here. I strut like John Travolta carrying two cans of paint down a crowded sidewalk in the only scene from the movie Saturday Night Fever I can recall. The music in my head bounces out of my legs, the perfect song for this place. Lost in my own world, I must look ridiculous.

  Mom loves the Bee Gees.

  The store is pristine. All the products line the shelves without empty spaces; the cleanliness suggests someone has a lot of time on their hands. The labels face the front, standing at attention. The old man behind the pharmacy counter has a crew cut; the silver stubble reveals a mole above his left ear which sticks out above his black-frame glasses.

  “You doing all right, son?” he asks with a smile.

  “No, I need some flowers for my mom, please, sir.”

  “Dorothy!” he calls out.

  An older woman emerges from behind the front counter. She wears a lavender blouse with a large silver butterfly broach clasped to a purple-speckled scarf around her neck. Her hair is stiff with hair spray. As she approaches, I smell the Aqua Net. Her smile is even more fragrant, revealing unblemished teeth between candy-apple lips. She glides over the carpet.

  “What can I do for you?” she asks.

  “I want to buy flowers for my mom,” I say, knowing I don’t have any money.