Lucky Strikes

by Louis Bayard

  “Why not?” said Hiram.

  But she was too cranked up to drink a drop.

  “Daddy Hiram, what’s an appendix?”

  “It’s something that, when it gets good and ready, wants to come out.”

  “What’s the point of having one in the first place?”

  “Heck if I know.”

  Just then, Crazy Ida said, “Darwin.”

  It came dribbling out one side of her mouth. She flushed a little and swung that river of hair and, with the most apologizing eyes I ever seen, she said, “Well, Darwin.”

  “Oh, brother,” I muttered.

  “You mean Darwin had a theory about the appendix?” said Hiram.

  “Well, yes,” she said, flushing brighter. “He suggested it had a job once. To digest leaves. You know, back in the days of the primates. But now that we don’t eat leaves, we don’t need it quite so much. So we—we only miss it when it’s gone.”

  Nothing but quiet. And through the quiet, Hiram’s eyes, the good one and the bad, all shiny with wonder.

  “What’s a primate?” said Janey.

  “Who the hell is Darwin?” said Earle.

  “A great man,” said Hiram. “Beloved of Gas Station Pagans everywhere.”

  “I believe,” said Janey, “I will call my first child Darwin.”

  The next five or ten minutes is mostly lost to me now. Earle, I seem to recall, drained a strawberry phosphate in record time. Janey probably nursed her Coke. Hiram and Ida, I’m pretty sure, drank their chocolate shakes. Hiram’s hat was off and, as he spoke, he ran his finger round the sweat band.

  “Melia!”

  It was the woman at the very end of the counter. Who, upon further looking, turned out to be Mrs. Frances Bean.

  Now, I hadn’t seen her since Mama’s wake, and any other night, I might’ve asked myself what she was doing sitting alone in Shiner’s Drug with a big ol’ birch-beer vanilla ice cream float. Where in hell was Mr. Bean? But tonight, all I could think was how to keep her from seeing the spectacle at the other end of the counter.

  “What a pleasure,” I said.

  “You know, I thought it was you.”

  “And you was right.”

  “Oh, and there’s Janey! And Earle, and that dear old daddy of yours. It does a body good seeing the four of you up and about, with a little pep in your step. It’s like I always say. Just ’cause trouble knocks on your door, you don’t have to ask it in and set it in a chair.”

  “God’s truth.”

  Then she motioned me toward her.

  “I want you to know, Melia. I consider it downright sweet.”

  “What is?”

  “How quick your daddy’s gettin’ over your mama.”

  I swung my head back toward Hiram and Ida. There they was, leaning toward each other, their elbows on the counter, their chins propped in their hands. Laughs tinkling in the electric light.

  “I don’t care how far menfolk get on in life,” said Frances Bean. “They always need taking care of.” She lifted her spoon an inch or two above her saucer. “’Cept mine.”

  Chapter

  SIXTEEN

  On the drive home, Janey was still peeling that damn movie open.

  “So where did the English nurse go?” she said. “First she kisses Dr. Gable, then she goes away, then she comes back sick as a dog. What from?”

  “Dr. Gable just needed something to feel bad about,” said Hiram.

  “But he tried to save her.”

  “I’d save her,” said Earle. “I’d save her but good.”

  Hiram thought that was funny.

  “Dr. Gable’s got big ears,” said Janey.

  “Always has,” said Hiram.

  “What’s that s’posed to mean?”

  “I mean he had them the one time I met him, and that was, oh, nine or ten years ago.”

  Janey set up in her seat. “You knew Clark Gable?”

  “Well, I met him is all. When he was still trying to break into the business.”

  Earle was sitting up now. “You was out in Hollywood?”

  “For a time.”

  “Was you in pictures?” asked Janey.

  “In them, no. Once they got a load of my lazy eye—well, that’ll pass on the stage but not on the screen. So I became a scenarist.”

  “What in tarnation is that?”

  “Why, he’s the fellow that writes the thing. The dialogue and the situations and so forth.”

  “You wrote movies?”

  “For a bit.”

  “And ads, too,” I said. “And sold hats. Ain’t no limit to Daddy Hiram.”

  The truck got quiet.

  “Lord,” said Janey.

  “What climbed up your ass?” said Earle.

  Well, I didn’t say nothing right off, but soon as we got home, I told those two young ’uns they could pack it right in.

  “How come?” said Earle.

  “So I can speak with Daddy Hiram.”

  “On what subject?”

  “The subject of how I’m about to tan your hide.”

  They was still fearful slow about going. Zigging and zagging and circling. But I stared ’em down till they was inside. Hiram, he just leaned back against the truck, fishing in his pockets for a Zippo.

  “There a problem?” he said.

  “Not unless you count being shamed by Frances Bean.”

  “Shamed how?”

  “On account of you courtin’ a crazy old maid.”

  He lit himself a Lucky, took his sweet time with the first draw.

  “Miss Ida Folsom,” he said, “is one of the more balanced specimens I’ve met in my lifetime. As for being an old maid, I believe she has herself a husband somewhere.”

  “And you got a wife in the ground. Who you’re supposed to be grieving on.”

  He smoked a while longer.

  “Only I don’t have a wife in the ground. I thought we understood that. All I’m supposed to do is tell people I’m your father.”

  “Well, how are they gonna believe you if you don’t act like it?”

  “So you want me to pretend to be torn up over a woman I’ve never met? Just how am I supposed to do that?”

  “I don’t know, maybe Clark Gable can help you out.”

  He studied me. “So I’m not even allowed to have a past anymore, is that what you’re telling me? I’ve got to erase my whole history.”

  “All I’m asking is—show some respect, that’s all. A little goddamn respect. Even if you never did meet my mama. ‘Cause I’m telling you if you had…”

  My eyes was stinging, so I cut them toward the house. Earle and Janey was watching us from the front window, with their hands curved like binoculars round their eyes.

  “If you’d of ever met my mama,” I said, “you’d be torn up about her. Every hour of every day. There’d be times you couldn’t hardly breathe.”

  “Amelia,” he said, “I know what you’re going through. I lost a mother, too. But you can’t ask me or anybody on God’s green Earth to … to stop living. Just to keep your little house of cards from falling down.”

  I turned round real slow. The heat was climbing up from my chest.

  “House of cards,” I said. “That’s what you think this is.”

  “From some angles, yes.”

  Now the heat was rolling up my throat. Coming on with such force, I knew if I let it out, it would travel all the way to the moon.

  “Listen here, Mr. Hiram Watts. If that’s how you feel about this house—this family—maybe you should just hightail it on out of here. I bet there’s a coal truck comin’ along any minute.”

  He looked at me a long time. Then he dropped his cigarette on the ground, mashed it with his boot. “Is this how you’re gonna be your whole life, Amelia? Driving people off when they don’t do what you tell them?”

  “I ain’t never driven off a body who weren’t rarin’ to go.”

  “Jesus.” He flung up his arms. “There’s no winning with you, is
there? Only losing and more losing. And by the way, it’s none of your goddamned business who I talk to. Or do a goddamned thing with.”

  “Is too my business!”

  “You may have seen your share of struggles, but there’s a whole lot about life you don’t know, and I am way too far gone in years—”

  “To be acting like a lovesick chump.”

  “To have my last string pulled by a bossy-ass child. That I will not abide!”

  He started walking toward the store. Then, a few feet shy of the door, something switched in him, and he kept walking. Past the store, past the house. Moving at a tight fast clip, like he’d just recalled an appointment.

  “Hiram…”

  Can’t be sure his name even left my lips, but it hung there all the same as I watched him slip off into the darkness.

  The lights was mostly out when I come toeteetering into the house, and Janey and Earle was both lying in bed. They still had their clothes on, though, and they was most definitely not asleep.

  “Let’s call it,” I told them.

  Nothing.

  “Come on,” I said. “You only got but the two days of school left.”

  “Where’s Daddy Hiram?” said Janey.

  “He’s taking a walk.”

  Only Hiram never went for walks, I realized all of a sudden. He was about the sittingest body I’d ever known.

  “We had words,” I said, “but it’s all right.”

  Earle’s hands curled into fists. His face squeezed down.

  “That’s what family does,” I said.

  Too late. A river of tears was rolling down his face.

  “Oh, for all that’s holy,” I said. “Quit it.”

  “You made him go away.”

  “No, I did not.”

  “Yes, you did. You and your evil tongue and your nasty disposition. You drove him off, and he ain’t never coming back.”

  I looked at Janey, but she weren’t about to disagree.

  “You two are the dumbest hillbillies I ever seen,” I said. “He can’t run off without his clothes, can he? And his—his comb. His razor…” In my head, I went through his room, item by item. “His Luckys. His shaving cream…”

  And his what? Whatever cord still bound him to us got thinner and thinner the harder I looked.

  “Come on,” I said. “You think he’d bail on us without even a word of good-bye?”

  “Why not?” said Janey. “That’s what our daddy did.”

  Well, that just made Earle sob all the harder. He covered his face with his pillow to stifle the sound, but the bed shook on every side of him. I could’ve promised him two dozen Sinbad stories and a month of ginger ale, and it wouldn’t have made a lick of difference.

  “Janey,” I said, “I’m gonna sleep in Mama’s bed tonight. Make sure Earle don’t smother hisself.”

  I pulled the curtain after me.

  Amazing thing. Mama’s sheets still had her blackberry scent, and the shape of her body was still carved in the mattress, no matter how hard I laid on it. The dark folded round. Even when Earle had gone silent, my eyes was blazing and my mind circling. Like an old buzzard with nowhere to land.

  Must’ve been two when I finally nodded off. Mama come to me on the nearest dream. We’d missed the last ferry at Dickerson, and night was falling fast, and Mama was laughing and saying, “Time to get us wet.” Before I could stop her, she’d thrown herself in the Potomac and started swimming to the far side. Nothing for it but to jump in and follow her.

  In real life, you’ll learn this, I ain’t much of a swimmer, but in the dream, I was pretty damn good. Long, smooth strokes, parting the river. Water warm on my skin. I was probably fifty yards from shore when it hit me. Mama wasn’t in front.

  I jerked my head round. The river was rolling now, like an ocean, and way off in the spray and froth was Mama. Not drowning, exactly, but bobbing and dipping. Only with each dip, she dipped deeper. The last part of her to go was her hair—beautiful dark red, like fox fur. Queerest thought come over me when she finally dropped under.

  At least she give Janey her hair.

  I woke with a gulp, thinking I’d swallowed half that river. But the bed was dry.

  I sat up. Squinted at the clock. Five thirty-two.

  Quiet as I could, I stumbled over to the kitchen and dug out the Rayovac flashlight from under the sink. Crept outside.

  It gets fearful dark in Walnut Ridge when the stars ain’t out. I had to feel my way round the house, swinging the flashlight in front of me to make sure I didn’t fall headlong over something.

  The root cellar was open.

  Now, what Janey said is true. I do tend to steer clear of that place—specially at night—but I had a hunch, and the only way to know if I was right was to go in.

  Didn’t need to stay long, that was the good part. Just had to swing the light around for a minute to see what was there and what weren’t.

  I closed the door after me. Turned round. There was but the one way he could’ve gone. Up what we call the Snaky Path. Hardly even a path, really, just a kind of gap that winds through a mess of rhododendrons, climbs higher and higher till you meet the rock face and there’s no more climbing.

  The air was cold, and the grass was clammy on my bare feet. Owls had all gone to bed, but there was a whip-poor-will calling for all he was worth, and some mockingbirds. Wish I could say they made for good company, but the louder they got, the more alone I felt.

  It was slow going. What with the bushes and brambles blocking the way, I had all I could do to keep my arms free of scratches. Which is why I didn’t pay near enough notice to what was going on below and ended up flat on my side, with a sweet old knot in my shin.

  Lordy, but it hurt. And no wonder. I’d gone and tripped over the earthenware jug that held Emmett Tolliver’s moonshine.

  Well, I knew Hiram couldn’t be far off, but the dark was still so thick, I had to hear him before I knew where he was.

  Wasn’t his usual snore, neither. An angry old buzz, like a fly caught under a jar. I picked up the jug. Grunting under its weight, I carried it toward him, stood over his head, and poured. The booze rolled down his face in a cold lather.

  “Huhn…” He jerked up, hands shielding his eyes. “What the hell!”

  His legs swung under him as he made to stand, but he fell back on his hands and dragged himself clear. I set down the jug. Then I picked up the Rayovac and aimed it at him.

  “You too hungover to talk?” I asked.

  His hands made a web round his face. “Stop shining that damn thing.”

  I laid the flashlight on the ground, but I set it at an angle so I could still pick him out of the shadows.

  “Got any cigarettes?” he asked.

  “Naw.”

  “That’s too bad.”

  With his face still covered, he leaned his elbows on his knees and set to rocking.

  “Christ,” he said.

  “I’ll bet,” I said. “Must’ve tasted right awful.”

  “I’m not so used to it as I was.…”

  The whip-poor-will was quiet now, but the frogs was twanging their hearts out. First streaks of purple was stealing out of the black.

  “Listen here,” I said. “I know we didn’t put nothing down in writing, but I could swear we agreed on no drinking. If I weren’t clear on nothing else, I believe I was tolerable clear on that.”

  “I believe I was still a little drunk when I agreed.”

  “You think this is funny.”

  “No,” he said. “I don’t.”

  I looked at him.

  “Honestly, Hiram, it ain’t even me I’m thinking of, it’s Earle. He ain’t had a lot of menfolk to look up to. If you gotta know, you’re kind of it in that department, so…” I stared down at my feet. “So I guess I don’t want him ever finding you like this.”

  “I’m grateful he didn’t.”

  He stopped rocking and started in to rubbing at his face, but that just seemed to make things worse,
so he let his hands drop to his sides and rested his face on his knees.

  You won’t believe this, but in that moment, I was really wishing I could sew. Oh, I know that sounds crazy, but I’m telling you it takes the awkwardness out of things. I’ve seen more than one woman pour her terrors into a piece of calico.

  “Funny thing about that moonshine,” I said. “I always tell Janey and Earle it’s been sitting in yonder cellar since—well, since the night Emmett Tolliver brung it. Ain’t nobody’s ever touched it, that’s what I always say, but that ain’t true.”

  His face cut a little my way.

  “Toward the end there,” I said. “With Mama, I mean. Well, you know there ain’t much space ’tween her bed and ours—just a curtain to block out the sound. So when the pain come grabbing at her, I don’t know, it was like she was right there in bed with us. I couldn’t sleep through it. Neither could the kids.”

  He watched me through the slits of his eyes.

  “There was one night,” I said, “the sound got so bad, I figured I’d best do something about it. So I went down to that there root cellar and drug up Emmett Tolliver’s moonshine. Lord, it’s heavy! I don’t rightly know how you carried it as far as you did. But I managed to pour some in a milk glass, and I mixed it with some flat Dr Pepper. Mama’s mouth was already kinda swung open, so all I had to do was pour a little inside. She didn’t gag or nothing, so I poured in a little more, then a little more, and she swallowed the whole damn brew.

  “Well, sure enough, the groaning stopped, and her breathing got easy and, a few minutes later, she was down. Slept straight through till morning, too, which was a miracle. I ’member I woke in a fright, thinking something was wrong, but she was just sleeping.

  “So that’s how it took. Every night I’d give her some of Emmett Tolliver’s medicine and some Dr Pepper, and she was glad to have it. And what with the jug doing its work—well, Janey and Earle could go stretches not even pondering on things, ’cause I’d pack ’em off to school at dawn, and when they come back, I’d just load ’em down with chores, and after supper I’d send ’em out to play and only bring ’em in when Mama was dosed up but good.

  “Won’t deny I felt guilty some nights. Owing to that she’d sworn off the booze and all. But I reckoned this was a special case.”