The Color of My Native Sky

by L D Bloodworth

  “Hold tight,” he said, which translated meant, do not get out of the car.

  The man emerged from the steam-cloud that issued from the truck. He moved all cowboy swagger dipped in hipster-pirate regalia and she could not avert her eyes. The small, still voice told her to look away before it was too late, but she couldn’t listen. She wouldn’t, couldn’t obey the angelic morality on the one shoulder for bowing before the red devil lust on the other.

  The young man moved toward the car, but Randall had already made to get out and met him head on. He wore a gray fedora and sunglasses, cloth and hemp bracelets on both arms, nails painted black with bulky silver rings on his fingers. She could almost hear her father’s assessment. Long hair, lazy, artist-type. A bum, a lowlife, a carouser.

  Edie wanted to get out of the car, even let her fingers slide over the handle and consider what the worst thing would be if she did. Maybe she’d have extra chores for a week, or he’d embarrass her. Her being a girl and all, he’d embarrass her in the way he embarrassed them all, about their natures. About being weak and small minded and naive, only fit to be a wife or housekeeper or secretary or to take up some other ladylike employment. To be seen and not heard. Maybe she’d have to go up to the pit on Sunday. That’s what she and her best friend Billy called it, the stairs at the bottom of the stage where the out of step sheep laid their souls bare before their shepherd, Randall, and God.

  That last one got to her, and she let her hand fall from the door.

  They waited, baking in the tin box, as Randall got to the business he was called to do. Politicking, he called it, though she was sure there was a better word for the gossip gathering and favor collecting he did so well.

  “See you got yourself some trouble,” Randall said, shielding his eyes from the sun with his hand.

  “Yeah, I guess I do,” the man said as he approached Randall.

  “Randall.” He shoved his hand out in front of him and shook the carouser’s hand, taking the young man’s elbow in his free hand. The three girls vanished behind the truck when they saw the reverend emerge from the car. “Can I assume you and your sisters are all right?”

  “Um, yeah, we’re fine. They aren’t really my…”

  “So, what’s your story? You the people moved into the old Hanson place?”

  “Yeah. I’m Skylar. Martha was my great aunt. Guess I was the only family she had left.”

  “Haven’t seen you in town before. You visit her much?”

  Insinuating. It was his specialty as he never accused, no never called you out directly. Instead, he opted to make you accuse yourself and to go even a step further and condemn yourself, sometimes when you knew you were completely innocent.

  “Actually, I didn’t even know I still had relatives here. Not until the week before last, that is.”

  Now there came a silent standoff, for the young man hadn’t cowed to the accusatory nature of her father’s words nor had he been apologetic. He adjusted his fedora, pushing dark waves back up underneath it, his shirt sleeve rolling up a slick golden bicep.

  Randall returned to the car, wiping at his brow with a white cotton handkerchief. “Truck’s overheated and I think the battery could be dead. We got a gallon of water in the back still, right, Shell?”

  “Yes, I think we do. You put it in there last month when we drove up to the lake,” her mother said, keeping her eyes on the group of people in front of her. “Isn’t that the same truck we saw those girls in earlier?” she asked.

  “I guess he’s with them,” her little sister Sara Beth quipped, cackling and proceeding to lodge her bony elbow in Edie’s side. Though Edie’s junior by a full two years, she was a tall, lanky blond that could easily pass for older. Sara Beth hadn’t met many boys she disliked or that disliked her, for that matter. Edie sometimes wondered how it’d be if she were that way, free.

  “Hush that now, Sara Beth. I reckon it’s none of our concern, anyways,” Edie snapped, her words tumbling to a halt as the tall young man long overdue for a haircut slid past her open window.

  “Dang, I’d like to make it my business,” Sara Beth whispered into Edie’s ear. “Look at that.”

  “Stop, he’ll hear.”

  “Oh, c’mon.”

  “You wanna spend the next three days scrubbing floors till your fingers bleed?”

  Sara Beth’s eyes flashed concern upon the mention of Randall’s usual punishment and closed her mouth.

  “Will you two hush? I’m trying to hear what they’re saying,” Rosemary said. Rosemary was still caught up in the charade, Edie and Sara Beth just continued ogling and shook their heads.

  Randall maneuvered the car around until at last they were bumper to bumper, and the girls watched as the men worked to unlatch the radiator cap. He smiled at the boy and made some mutually understood wisecrack.

  He was older than a boy, but saying that he was a man didn’t feel altogether accurate, either. He was at the end of the limbo through which all men pass at that age and it was not wasted on him.

  The man sauntered alongside the car, placed dirty hands on the car door, and leaned down, searching the car and looking each of them over before uttering a word. Dark waves fell over one brow and he pushed them away with his forearm, sliding the hat back to reveal stark blue eyes. Edie watched him intently, marveling at how suddenly grease and sweat had become so attractive.

  Cold fire glinted in the summer sun as he winked at her and grinned.

  “Looks like pops is stumped.”

  “Looks like.” She feigned a smile, dropping her gaze to the floorboard when she noticed her skirt had become twisted around her and was revealing a damn sight more than would be considered ladylike. She tugged, but only succeeded in drawing his attention further up her legs to her thighs. All she could do was bring her knees together and pretend he wasn’t moving his eyes over every inch of exposed skin.

  Edie was fairly certain that if her mother had not been sitting there, he might have reached a hand down and slid it between her knees.

  “I bet you’ve got a lot of work to do on that old place,” her mother interjected herself, breaking the tension. “It’s been empty for an awful long while.”

  “It’ll do for now. I still don’t know what I’m going to do with it, Mrs.?”

  “Harper. And you are?”

  “Skylar,” he responded, piercing Edie with those eyes. “What about you? What’s your name? Lemme guess. Ruth? No, Mary.”

  When he saw that she found no amusement in his acting like a child, he lost the smile and asked again. “Well? Don’t leave me hanging.”

  “Edie.”

  “Edie. Never would’ve gotten that one. Well, good to meet you. I’d better go help.”

  “Why can’t we just call the tow truck already? We’re gonna die out here.” Sara Beth was pulling wet ringlets back into a ponytail.

  They were all puddles by the time they figured out it was no use. The truck would have to be towed.

  Edie watched Skylar kick a truck tire in frustration, throwing his hat to the ground. He was wild eyed and though his hair hid his eyes, a flash of blue from beneath his hair fell on her. She felt like a bug under a microscope and squirmed like one.

  He ran his hands through his hair and smirked at her as he leaned down to retrieve the hat. Ducking behind the seat, her face flushed with heat, she knew he’d recognized the look of wonder that must have flickered from her own eyes.

  Randall approached him and eased him away from the truck, saying that he’d call a tow truck and work something out with Andy, the mechanic in town.

  “I can’t afford to do that,” Skylar now turned his focus to Randall.

  “I’ll take care of it. It’s what I do.” Randall patted him on the back.

  “I can’t pay you back.”

  “Let’s go. We’ll go on down there and send them back for the truck.”

  She had an urge to warn him off such an agreement. She hoped the young man didn’t have anything to be ashamed o
f. No secrets yet revealed. Except maybe the reason for his cowboy swagger, in which case, if it was as she suspected, she entertained the thought of him using what he had against her, slaying her innocence and leaving it bleeding on the floor, quivering.

  Edie moved to the third-row bench seat in the back of the station wagon thinking that the passengers would take her place. To her astonishment, as soon as she crawled into the back, the boy slipped in beside her along with one of his friends. The other two girls slammed the back of the seat up and plopped in alongside her younger sisters.

  Watching him from the corner of her eye, she tried not to notice the deep chocolate color of his hair or the way he smelled of patchouli and sweat. He inched closer to her, trying to make room for his friend and ultimately slipped his arm behind her, the mounds of muscles flexing around her shoulders.

  Sensing her surprise, he tried to maneuver his arm away, but then was practically on top of her and decided it was better to keep it where it was. “Sorry. This is Rix.”

  “Hello,” Edie said, her throat suddenly dry.

  He smiled a sudden and mischievous grin from under the beginnings of a mustache. A soft line of facial hair traced a strong jawline, distracting her. There was something not unlike a pirate about him and she figured he might steal more than a kiss.

  “I don’t guess this was all bad. I mean, I got to meet you, Edie.” He leaned in closer, “We’re playing this weekend at the house. Kind of a welcome us to the neighborhood kinda thing. You should come.”

  “Maybe,” she replied. Her gaze falling down the length of him, she smiled innocently.

  His eyes flicked to the front of the car and seeing Randall’s stare in the rearview mirror, he put his face in her hair so that she could feel the warmth of his breath. “Come,” he whispered.

  A scalding current ran down her neck and into her chest that made her heart race. She couldn’t help but want him to do it again.

  4

  It was the third weekend in August, which meant her mother was leaving for a scrapbooking retreat with Billy’s mother, Charlotte, and some of the other women from church. Her sisters were at school, leaving her alone in the house with Randall, who was working on a sermon in his study. The melody of a hymn oozed from the open door, slipping up her spine in waves.

  “Edie, could you come in here a minute?”

  Her heart gave way inside her chest, but like a trained dog, she reluctantly pushed the door open and entered his study, head down and tail between her legs, guilty. He sat in his leather office chair, tapping a white clicker pen on the desk.

  The desk was littered with books and papers with her mother’s handwriting, the white pens strewn between. Humming along with the song, he folded his hands in his lap. There was a raw disk with tiny streaks issuing from it on the backside of his left hand.

  “Were you flirting with that boy?”

  Difficult to say, she thought, but didn’t dare utter a word. Times when Randall was trying to make a point, you learned to keep your mouth closed. She learned to get her revenge in the best possible ways, by doing exactly what he told her not to. Only, he could never know.

  She hadn’t done anything to bring about Skylar’s asking her to the party. He just did. Edie gave the man across the desk a blank look, because right then, he was no longer her father, he was Brother Randall and Brother Randall had a short fuse.

  “It is my duty to be the lawful authority in place of God so that the sheep are not led astray by my Jezebel daughters, do you understand?” He rose from the desk and circled around the room, lifting pictures of her and her sisters when they were toddlers up to his face and then setting them back into place. “Ah, that you may stay as little lambs. Do you remember the story of the shepherd and the straying lamb?”

  She knew the story like the back of her own hand, but again, she was silent.

  “The Book tells us that the shepherd broke the lamb’s legs and then bound them so that the lamb would be completely dependent upon him. The lamb had no choice but to trust the shepherd’s authority and never stray again.” He moved behind her and placed his hands on her shoulders, squeezing. “The Lord requires obedience, Edie. He demands it.”

  Edie knew of at least seven verses that could refute what he was saying, but she shrank away from speaking them.

  “Yes, sir.” Hopefully, she had hit her queue on time.

  He pressed the tips of his fingers into the hollows of her collarbones, leaned over and whispered, “As far as you or that boy or anyone else in this town is concerned, I am God. I make it my business to know whether you come in or go out, whether you are clean or unclean, whether Miss Maggot’s fucking Esquire Joe down the street. I have the power, not you, not your little beatnik pussy.”

  Tears began to well up at the corners of her eyes as his fingers dug into her shoulders. She muttered, “Yes, sir,” just like she was supposed to.

  “Good,” he said, patting the tops of her bruised shoulders. “Now, I’m going down to Andy’s shop to help Billy Charlie with his bike. Be a good girl while I’m gone.”

  “Yes, sir,” she droned.

  Mrs. Wheeler and the rest of the fold did not understand the nature of what it was they worshiped. They only saw the marionette doll and not the puppeteer.

  There was some kind of heat that was filling up the space in her mind. Rising up from her gut and into her heart, it spread out in waves until her chest and her head felt like they were on fire. Her hands trembled.

  Having done nothing to deserve this inquest, she fought the urge to retaliate, to defend herself. No, better to rebel in her tiny secret ways than to outwardly contest his power. He would be at Andy’s all afternoon. She never understood why Billy Charlie liked spending time with Randall, but she was glad that he did, otherwise she might never have a moment to herself. The minute the car pulled out of the driveway, she set about doing whatever she damn well pleased, at least for a little while.

  She stripped down to her bra and panties. She wanted to go bare ass naked, but on the off chance that Randall came back early, she donned her underwear. He’d have a heart attack if he saw her without clothes, even in a bathing suit, which she wasn’t allowed to have.

  Looking both ways before stepping through the bedroom door, she grabbed a towel from the linen closet as she made her way to the back door. Spreading the towel out onto the stiff grass, she felt that rush coming on as she turned the radio up and laid herself out before God and everybody.

  Sometimes, it’s the little things that turn the world upside down and shake free all the buried things that seek to be unearthed. The things that try to hide.

  Half asleep with the heat and half-drunk from the dopamine high, she sank into her rebellion wholeheartedly. She didn’t notice anyone was around until the shadow passed between her and the sun. She squinted against it, unable to make out the face but recognizing the hat. He stood over her, not saying a word, possessing her field of vision.

  “Well?” she said.

  “Well, what?” he said, laughing. He knelt beside her and asked, “You lay out in your underwear all the time?”

  The way he was fighting against the smile that played at his lips, she knew he wished she had come out sans underwear.

  “You’ve met my father, what do you think?”

  “I think you need to get out of here. This really a thrill for you?”

  She raised up on her elbows and said, “I take what I can get. What are you doing here, anyway?”

  “I came to invite you to welcome me to the neighborhood. Tonight. Around nine.”

  He moved to sit beside her, and she kept thinking that she should be embarrassed or nervous to be lying out there half naked in front of a man. To her surprise, she found herself wanting him to look at her and flipped over to give him a view of the other side.

  “So, you gonna wear that or?” His half-grin hid something darker than the lighthearted conversation they were having. His eyes flicked to her, quickly taking in all that he
dared to at that moment, lingering a moment too long on the bruising flesh at her shoulders.

  “Depends. What, you don’t think this is appropriate?” she asked.

  “Depends.”

  “On?”

  “Well, I mean, if that’s what you’re wearing, I’ll cancel the party. I’m sure you could do a fine job of welcoming me to the neighborhood all by yourself.”

  “Hmmph.” She couldn’t help but laugh.

  “Ah, she laughs. Say you’ll come, then.”

  “Unfortunately, I have to work tonight. Maybe some other time.”

  “Come by when you get off. Where do you work, anyhow?”

  “I’m the custodian at the church. I usually work eight hours, three days a week, but this week I had to work an extra day.”

  “Can’t you do it tomorrow?”

  “Tomorrow’s Sunday. You know what happens on Sunday?”

  “All the sinners go to church?”

  “Exactly. What about you, what do you do besides stalk people in their backyards?”

  “Wasn’t stalking,” he feigned shock. “I do odd jobs and I’m in a band.”

  “Like the singer or are you like the roadie or something?”

  “Come find out. After you do the Lord’s work, of course.”

  “Of course.”

  She just made it into the house before Randall came home. He was going to give her a ride to the church and stay to do some office work. Sometimes, he would stay in his office the entire time she was working instead of having to drive back over to pick her up. She usually only had access to it if she asked specifically if it needed cleaning as he liked to keep it locked. It was fine by her. It took an extra hour to clean the large office that was once a reception area and an hour at the end of a long shift of wiping down pews and doors and windows, taking out garbage, and mopping floors was a long damn time.

  The money was good, though, and she didn’t mind the work. It sure beat standing in one place all day long and she didn’t have to interact with many people. Bonus for her, since she was never really that great at making friends.