Walking Dunes

by Sandra Scofield

  “Stu and Angie, Buddy and Ray-Jean—”

  “What?” He was half-asleep.

  “They’re all going.”

  “Going where?”

  She raised up on her elbow and glared at him with mock disappointment. “Now you’ve got what you wanted, you don’t even listen to me.” She grinned at him. He could not believe she was so confident. You always heard that girls were afraid you would dump them after you screwed them, but Glee obviously saw it exactly opposite; once you slept with her, you could not get away. There was something to it. He had necked with a few girls, but nothing very serious, before Glee. Maybe he did owe her, and he would not want to hurt her, but he knew he could not give her what she wanted most, some kind of pledge.

  Leland Piper had told him, Guys like me kill guys like you. David objected. He was lucky. He had met a girl who wasn’t hung up. Oh yeah, Leland said. Girls meet me, they become virgins again. I know just how they used to become martyrs in the old days. They simpered and turned away and said, you’ll have to kill me first.

  David ran his finger along the bare slight rise of her breasts. “I need sleep, that’s all, Glee.”

  “They’re going to go out to Red Bluff Monday to water ski. Stu’s got his daddy’s boat. I said we’d go. I mean, I said I thought we would, if you were back. Can we?”

  His scalp prickled. He could not stand for her to assume things, to make plans for them. But he had been gone. Be fair, he told himself. She always did what he wanted to do. “I guess so, sure,” he said. “Maybe.” He closed his eyes again.

  “Shirlee Ames left town yesterday. Carl Stuckey ought to have something to say about that!” she said primly. He opened his eyes and watched her smooth the sheet over her chest. He wished she would go home. He was having a difficult time staying awake. He felt wary. He would like it if she would shut up, turn around, and tuck her firm brown body into the curve of his.

  “She is going to a home in Sweetwater run by Church of God. To have it.”

  He rubbed his eyes. “Glee!”

  She grew more excited. “She’s pregnant, dumbie, and Carl wouldn’t marry her.”

  “Of course he wouldn’t marry her!” Carl Stuckey was the son of Avis Stuckey, Incorporated. His parents had half a million dollars if they had a dime. And Shirlee Ames did not.

  “Maybe Lu Anne can take her place cheerleading. She was a close runner-up last year.” Glee was delighted to have his full attention at last. She let the sheet slip down off her nipples.

  “Glee,” he said, all he could think to say.

  “He was using her.”

  He knew she was fishing. What could she possibly expect from him? “Glee, you aren’t going to get pregnant. I’m seeing to that, in case you didn’t notice.”

  She clicked her teeth together. “Well, shut my mouth!”

  “You’re not going to get pregnant, and I’m not going to marry you.”

  “I never!”

  “Come here.” He made a space for her in his arms. “I’ve got to go to sleep.” She nestled close, mewed. “I love you, Davy Puckett, you ole mean thing.” He was too tired to scold her.

  His mother stumbled into his room early the next morning. He woke to see her stuffing clothes in the washing machine. She poured in a cup of powder and started the cycle. “Mom,” he said, before he could think.

  She turned around in a kind of pirouette. She was still half-drunk, wild-eyed, her hair a mess. She had taken off her brassiere and tied the robe. Her breasts bounced under the clinging cloth as she turned. She seemed to be dripping dirty clothes, pants hanging off her arm. “I forgot you were here,” she said. She saw Glee and fixed her eyes on the girl’s buttocks. She looked back at her son. “You piece of shit,” she said. The wash cycle kicked in and made a clatter, then a roar.

  Glee rolled over, saw Marge, and shrieked. She jumped up and ran to the bathroom.

  Marge was still by the washing machine.

  “Jesus, Mother, you KNOW not to come in my room. I’ve told you a thousand times, I want PRIVACY!”

  She shook her head. “Piece of shit.”

  He got out of bed, pulling the sheet around him, dragging it on the floor as he crossed to her. “Go to bed now, Ma, really, you’re dead on your feet. Go to bed. I’ll make coffee. I’ll go to the store and come home and make breakfast. I’ll run the vacuum and do my own laundry. You’ll see. Just go and get some sleep.”

  She left.

  Glee peeked around the door of the bathroom, her eyes slyly narrowed, as though she might not be seen if she could not see. “She gone?”

  “Go home,” David said wearily. “God, this hour of the frigging morning.”

  Glee stepped out into the room and erupted into giggles.

  “Why are you laughing?”

  She put her hand up to her mouth. “I never got caught before. It’s embarrassing.” She looked, thought David, quite pleased with herself. Who would she tell about this? She was one of those girls everybody liked. Before David, she went with (slept with) Tyler Johnson, who graduated and went away to Texas A&M, and in no time she looked around and landed on David, and nobody talked about her, nobody said nasty things, like they did about a lot of other girls. “You hear?” he said. “Go home. I will call you.”

  “Oh Davy,” she whimpered. She touched his chest lightly. “I loved sleeping by you. You know you’re not mad.” She saw the look on his face and scurried to get dressed. He sat on the side of his bed. She buttoned her shorts and said, “Your mother was so—so sleepy—maybe she won’t remember, huh? See you later? Maybe this afternoon?”

  He looked up and shook his head yes, to make her leave.

  “I’m sorry if I got you in trouble.”

  “Don’t be silly.”

  He stood under the shower until the water cooled, then gave himself a blast of cold. He had just stepped out of the bathroom, a towel around his waist, when Saul burst into his room.

  “You asshole! You don’t do that to your MOTHER!”

  “Aw, Dad, it’s not so big—”

  “FIRST YOUR SISTER ELOPES WITH A FUCKING BIG MOUTH DISC JOCKEY AND NOW YOU BRING YOUR SLUT INTO THIS HOUSE. YOUR HOT LITTLE KURVA.”

  “Calm down. She’s not a slut.”

  Saul stepped up to his son and punched him in the chest with his fist. David was so surprised, and it hurt so much, he staggered, his hands to his chest.

  “You don’t bring your whores into this house. You don’t do that to your mother.”

  David gasped and sucked as hard as he could for breath. When his chest felt like this, there was always a moment when he fought terror.

  “And don’t play that asthma shit!” Saul cried. He leaned toward his son and took a long noisy breath. He banged his own chest with both fists. “You don’t tell ME about asthma, you little prick.”

  “Who’s mad about what here, Dad?” David asked coldly. “Who wishes what about pretty little Glee?”

  His father glared at him and held his fist belly high.

  “You don’t touch me again. Ever.” David kicked the towel that had dropped to the floor and walked over to his dresser. Without turning around, he dressed deliberately, as if for an occasion. He heard Saul leave the room. He went to the Stockman Cafe and ate three eggs, ham, hashbrowns, and a cinnamon roll. Then he drove to Ellis’ house to see if he could play tennis.

  7.

  David had played tennis all that summer with his doubles partner, Ellis Whittey, anytime they could juggle their obligations, but those times had been fewer this summer than in years before. Ellis was working with his dad, as a roustabout; there were seven Whitteys, and they needed his income. David had been gone more than half of each month, selling his father’s goods in church halls and basements, in parking lots, and in the old beauty parlor in Fort Stockton. Tennis was an oasis in a sea of tedium for both of them.

  David liked to play hard in the terrible heat—the concrete courts were fiery slabs, scarred with cracks and pits and buckles—and the
n sit under an elm tree and swig liquids, whatever they would have brought: water out of the tennis ball cans, jugs of tea from home, warmed in the heat, a purloined beer if he could manage it. He could feel quite content with Ellis, their skinny legs stretched out on the bristly grass; there was nothing David had to be, or say, with him. Their friendship went back to seventh grade, both of them new in McCamey School, a little lost. Ellis had had a thick East Texas drawl; he was a dirt-poor kid, friendly and pleasant. They were too small for football; it was David’s idea to play tennis. He had been whacking balls against backboards for a year or so, virtually alone. He was thin and gawky, and crazy to see his father who had written to say he was coming back. He thought, Wait till he sees this, slamming each ball with all his strength. David took Ellis to the public court, and in no time at all, when he sent a ball across the wire net, it came back. Ellis was a natural, he loved it instantly. They played the game like a giant ping pong match that lasted two years. Tennis was a wonderful secret, a two-man club they had from then until high school, where the coach was shocked by the level of skill they displayed (along with a total lack of strategy). Now they were older, taller, accomplished. They talked about taking the state title this year, which meant they had to beat Dallas and Houston teams who played real tournaments and practiced on courts at country clubs or in their own back yards. A big win would mean scholarships. David would be able to go away, instead of staying at the junior college as his parents expected him to do. Winning would mean a moment of glory. Tennis was not in the same class as football and basketball, but a win is a win. On his own, David beat balls against the backboard at the high school. At night he ran through the streets, panting and reliving his last lousy shot in the spring state doubles semifinals. He could still see the smirk on that Spring Branch player’s face when the ball hit the ground, not three inches off the line, on the wrong side.

  David pulled up in the dusty front yard. The Whitteys lived at the place where the town paving stopped. The street asphalt ceased fifty yards before their driveway. The house seemed so small, it was always hard to believe how many people lived there. Now children were trooping out of the porch, moving toward the Whittey station wagon that was older even than Saul’s. Ellis and David had made jokes about their family cars, how the junkman Chasen would be the last owner.

  There were four kids younger than Ellis, and his mother was pregnant again. Catholics.

  “Hey man,” Ellis said, bringing up the rear like a sheep-herder. They socked one another on the shoulders. Ellis’ father would be asleep in the house. Ellis and his father did not go to the wells on Sunday. Mrs. Whittey would have a Catholic fit. But Tom Whittey slept through Mass. Ellis said he heard his father tell his mother any God who paid attention would understand a roustabout staying in bed.

  Ellis was dressed in a starched and ironed white shirt and stiff twill pants. He had a fresh haircut, and a line of white skin showed between the edge of his mowed hair and his dark oilfield tan.

  “When you’re done, we’ll go smack a few, huh?” asked David.

  Ellis looked up at the glaring sun, shading his eyes with one hand. The family was going to 9:30 Mass. “It’ll be eleven before we get home. It must be ninety now. You want to die on the court?”

  His family was in the wagon, kids piled on top of one another in the back, Mrs. Whittey sitting primly in the front, waiting for Ellis to drive. She fussed with her hat, an old yellow straw with a wide green ribbon.

  David slammed his fist into his other palm. “I need to play,” he said intensely. “We need to practice.”

  Ellis slapped his partner’s arm. “We’ve got months to get back in training, old buddy. It’s August, man. Listen, I’ll meet you at the college courts at seven, how’s that? We’ll play till it’s dark if you want. But it’s too hot now, Puckett. It’s too darned hot.” He was the color of leather. Under his bright white shirtsleeves, David knew, his arms were knotty with hard muscle. He liked to say, Working is good for something besides money.

  David drove slowly through town. He followed the route they drove when they “did the strip” on Friday and Saturday nights, up the main drag past the junior college, through the Dairy Queen, up to Dewey’s Drive-In, around back of the playing fields. Nobody was out, of course. The world was at church.

  At home his father was shaved and dressed and frantic to get the car. “How’s it going to look, I have to walk to my poker game?” he asked. His pals liked to play while the women went to church. Marge went to Monahans to see her sister Cheryl on frequent Sundays. On Mondays she visited her daughter.

  David could see that Saul wanted to snarl at him. His father clenched his fists, holding his arms out away from his body half a foot, but he only gave David a dirty look, and stormed out of the house. He backed out so fast the tires squealed.

  “You could go with me, Davy,” Marge said, coming out of the bedroom. “You could do the driving,” she said, as though it were a long way and not just thirty miles. “Cheryl’s so disappointed that you never stop, all these trips right by Monahans.” She had done her hair. It was naturally curly, and sprang out when it was washed. She wore a little lipstick, and had dressed in a light green dress with pale red strawberries all over it. The dress had large buttons from the neck right to the hem of the skirt. She wore a bright red patent belt. With her figure so well-defined, David had a sudden vision of her twenty years ago. She must have been a knockout. “Their house is nice and cool,” she pointed out. Aunt Cheryl had central air conditioning, instead of fans and window coolers like they made do with here. Being cool was not enough to bribe David into his aunt’s house. The thought of her shrill nosy questions and her hysterical religious pronouncements was like the memory of fingernails down a chalkboard. And his pukey cousin Leona, sixteen and stolid as a fence post, was worse.

  “I’m going to sleep,” he said rudely.

  “Davy—”

  He could guess what was coming. He shifted his weight from foot to foot. He told himself other parents paid a lot more attention to what their kids did; other parents lectured all the time. Leland said his father had to give him a daily dose of advice, like a vitamin. Leland liked Saul, and was the only friend David had who came and went in the house comfortably. Behind his back, Saul referred to him as “Pecker Piper,” thinking he was very funny to think of it. He had no way to know how much sex was on Leland’s mind, how he was always wanting to talk about it.

  “I don’t have anything to say about what you do away from the house,” his mother began. “But that girl, in my house—”

  “Don’t start in on it. I’m sorry you came in, sorry she was there for you to see. She’s just a girl, though, a nice kid. She’s not something awful, and neither am I. And you’re no holy-roller. You know what goes on in the world.”

  “The damage is done,” his mother said flatly.

  “Shit.” David walked past her into the kitchen.

  She followed. “Assume I’m the last to know what you’ve been doing with her. Or maybe her own mother is. Other kids must know.”

  “What’s it to you?” He swung around to confront her. “What do you know about teen-agers, anyway? What have you learned, with two in the house?”

  “I know girls suffer when they get talked about.”

  “So don’t tell anyone.”

  “She loves you? That’s it, is it? She loves you, so she’ll do whatever you want?”

  “It was her idea! Crimeny, Mother, what do you think I am? Your Son the Girl-Eater? She started it! She’s the one who started me. Get it?”

  She was hurt. It wasn’t Glee she cared about. She was thinking about Joyce Ellen, who had not been in this house, had not laid eyes on her father, since she eloped with “Big Pete” Kelton, local DJ and all around jerk. Saul had called her a tramp, she insisted they had not “done it”, that they were in love and wanted to get married. Marge bawled. What a scene.

  Kelton had never met Saul.

  “Maybe Joyce Ellen can go
with you,” he suggested.

  Marge shook her head. “If Pete’s home, she has to be home too.”

  “So? What did she get married for if not?”

  “What do you know!” His mother looked like she’d like to spit at him. Instead, she stormed out of the house, too.

  Alone, David felt he could breathe for the first time that day. He switched on the cooler in the window above his bed. He smoothed out his bed and lay down with his notebook. He thought he would write about the woman who seduced the young man. He needed a name for her. The story was not about Teresa, and he needed a name, to break the connection.

  He doodled with rows of warm-ups—ovals and slashes, from his Palmer practice days—and began listing possibilities. Carolyn. Paula. Susan. Virginia. He liked the nickname, Ginny, but it was too young for his character, who would be matronly. Rosemary, that would be good.

  I can name some other character Ginny later, he thought. It sent a delicious chill down his neck. He imagined a stack of books in a bookstore with his picture on the back, and his name on the spine. David Puckett. David Stolboff. That sounded good for a writer. What would his father think then?

  The phone rang.

  “David Puckett, that you?”

  “Yes. Who’s this?”

  “Hayden Kimbrough here. I’m glad I caught you.”

  “Yes, sir,” David said.

  “You’ve been out of town, I hear.” Kimbrough made it sound like David had been on vacation.

  “On business for my father.”

  “I called to issue a little invitation. It’s late, I know, but it can’t hurt to try.”

  “What is it, Mr. Kimbrough?” David asked in a steady voice. The perspiration on his face felt icy in the gush of air from the window unit. He brushed his hair with the flat of his hand. “What can I do for you, sir?”