by Steph Post
Slim Jim smacked the table with the palm of his hand.
“It’s that crazy preacher woman, Sister Tulah, who’s been making our lives a living hell.”
Now the grumbling turned to a clamor of questions and denials. He forced himself to look at Jack O’ Lantern. His defeated posture hadn’t changed, but his eyes were seething. Slim Jim waited for Jack to contradict him, to call it a lie, but he didn’t. Legs cut through the side conversations and silenced everyone by challenging Slim Jim.
“That’s a load, Slim. We know it was the Cannons. We had one of em at The Pit. We don’t even know who this preacher is except that she lost her money and wants it back.”
Slim Jim shook his head.
“I know the Cannons went after us for a minute there, but they didn’t set the fire or the explosives. Jack’s been getting threats from Tulah this whole time. Bad threats. She sent us a live rattlesnake in a box, for Christ’s sake. It was her guys that we was supposed to be meeting out at the trailer. She did this. She’s been behind it all. And it’s time you knew about it.”
Legs turned swiftly to Jack O’ Lantern.
“Tell me he’s speaking out of his ass, Jack. Tell me he’s lying.”
Jack O’ Lantern continued to glare at Slim Jim, but shook his head slowly back and forth. From the end of the table, Ratface stood up, nearly knocking his chair over.
“You serious? That crazy holy roller is responsible for everything? For us nearly getting roasted alive? For Long John?”
Legs quickly turned on Ratface.
“Sit down, boy. You may be sitting at this table, but that don’t mean you start speaking.”
Ratface pulled his chair closer and sat down. Legs shook his head in disbelief and then turned back to Slim Jim.
“So, now we know the truth. What’d we do about it?”
Slim Jim spread his hands out on the table before him and threw his shoulders back.
“Well, that ain’t all. That ain’t even why I called you all to a meeting.”
Tiny snickered, his eyes still glazed over, but his attention more and more toward the conversation at hand.
“You mean there’s more? It just gets better and better, huh?”
Slim Jim ignored him.
“I found out today that Sister Tulah’s getting her money back after all. From the Cannons. Sherwood Cannon made a deal with her. He’s giving her back the money and she’s cutting him in on her business. They’re working together now.”
Legs brought his fist down onto the table, tipping the ashtray over and scattering ashes everywhere.
“Bullshit.”
Slim Jim looked at Jack O’ Lantern. He had expected Jack’s jaw to drop open like a cartoon. Instead, his mouth had drawn into a grim line and his eyes were blazing at Slim Jim. He turned back to Legs and the rest of the table.
“I mean it. We got screwed. We took the beating and now Sister Tulah’s taking all our money. We just got royally, royally screwed. But that ain’t why I called the meeting either.”
Legs groaned.
“Jesus, Slim, just tell us what you did call it for. Quit being all dramatic and get to the point. What do you want from us?”
Slim Jim drummed his fingers on the table.
“Sherwood’s handing off our money to Tulah tomorrow afternoon at the church up in Kentsville. And I want us to be there. I want to bleed em like they bled us. I want to make em pay.”
The table erupted again as the men began to hash it out. Ratface jumped out of his seat again and Legs and Tiny began arguing with one another across the table. Slim Jim looked at Jack O’ Lantern and raised his eyebrows. Jack clamped his jaw shut and shook his head slowly, but firmly. He had nothing to say. Slim Jim finally called the table back to order.
“All that’s left is to put it to a vote. Do we attack the church tomorrow, yay or nay? I say yay.”
Slim Jim turned to Tiny on his left. He agreed. The vote went around the table. Toadie voted against it, but Ratface and Legs were fully on board. When the vote came to Jack, there was a finality to his voice. He knew he was beaten. He knew he was a ghost.
“Nay.”
Slim Jim stood up from the table.
“Majority rules. It’s done.”
Legs, Tiny and Ratface nodded.
“Now go home. Go get laid, go see your kids. Go get patched up. Be here at noon tomorrow.”
Slim Jim didn’t wait for Jack O’ Lantern to end the meeting. He brought his fist down hard on the table.
“Church is over.”
JUDAH LOOKED up from his work at the kitchen table when the front door opened and Ramey came in from the darkness. He had been sitting in the yellow glow from the stove light for the past hour, taking swigs of Jack Daniels from the bottle and loading and unloading the clips for his .45. He followed Ramey with his eyes as she walked through the dim living room, but didn’t stop sliding the bullets into the magazine. Ramey crossed her arms and leaned on the kitchen door frame, smiling.
“Damn. This could be the cover shot for Redneck Weekly. All you need is a dog at your feet chewing on a hambone and you’d be set.”
The corners of Judah’s mouth turned down, but he gave a measured nod in agreement. Ramey crossed to the drain board and picked out a coffee cup decorated with faded pink flamingos and palm trees. She poured an inch of whiskey in the bottom of the mug and sat down across from him. Judah kept his eyes on the neat row of bullets lined up before him.
“Did you hide it?”
Ramey took a sip and nodded.
“I did.”
Judah slammed the full clip into the .45 and switched the safety on. He set the gun down next to the two full extra magazines and ran his hands along the thighs of his jeans.
“All right.”
Ramey pointed to the bottle on the table.
“How much?”
Judah shrugged.
“Enough.”
She bit her bottom lip and watched Judah’s eyes. They were focused on the .45 in the center of the table.
“You worried bout tomorrow?”
Judah didn’t answer.
“We don’t gotta go up to that church. We’ve done enough damage already just today. We don’t need to be there.”
Judah took a deep breath and ran his thumbnail along the wood grain of the table.
“Yes. We do.”
Ramey leaned back in her chair and Judah raised his head to look at her. His eyes were unyielding.
“They need to see it on my face. They need to know.”
Ramey frowned.
“Okay.”
“And Ramey, things are gonna change. Whether we want them to or not. When we leave that church tomorrow, we ain’t gonna be in the same place as when we walked in. I’m sorry it has to be that way. But it does.”
Ramey fixed Judah with an unflinching stare.
“You listen to me, Judah Cannon. In our lives, there are things we’ve done and things that’ve been done to us. And things that we have yet to do. Our lives are filled with our reactions and our regrets. We cross lines and we wade down to the depths. We fall and we pick up the pieces and carry on. If we’re sitting here right now, at this moment, then we’ve made it so far. At the end of the day, I’m hoping there’s more. But I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s less. And I’ve gotten right with that in my mind.”
It took Judah a moment to respond.
“You regret showing up at The Ace last Friday night?”
“Nope.”
A sad smile crept across Judah’s lips.
“You’ve always been mine.”
Ramey shook her head.
“No. I’ve been my own. But I think we carry a part of one another. Always have. Always will.”
Judah didn’t say anything. He stretched his hand out across the table, across the loaded .45, and touched Ramey’s fingers. He knew that what she said was true.
“You’re a very brave man, Mr. Cannon.”
Sherwood shifted uncomfortably o
n the narrow wooden bench and clasped his hands together over his belly. He certainly didn’t need Sister Tulah telling him this. When he had opened his safe a few hours before, duffle bag in hand, ready to collect the stacks of bills, he had felt a sharp pang in his chest and a sweep of panic that was usually only brought on by police sirens or Vietnam nightmares. He didn’t know who had done it. Levi? Judah? The Scorpions? Some whore he had once slept with? It could be anyone, really, and it didn’t matter. He had stared into the vacant space and known only that he was screwed.
Sister Tulah stood before him now, with one heavy, sagging arm leaning on the pulpit occupying the center of the low stage at the back of the church. The room was dim, only half of the lights along the walls were turned on and the narrow windows had been painted over to keep out the sunlight. Sherwood was unnerved by the shadows in the austere space. In the strict confines of the empty church Sister Tulah appeared to take up more room than he thought was physically possible. Sitting across from him at the Mr. Omelet, she had not seemed so imposing. Now that they were on her ground, in her territory, Sherwood could understand the hushed whispers and downcast eyes from the people he had questioned about her. Those people had harbored real fear in their hearts and Sherwood had found it ludicrous and pitiable at the time. Now he understood. Sister Tulah’s pale eyes blazed across the distance between them.
“Coming in here like this. With the audacity to open your mouth and tell me that you don’t have my money. I imagine most men in your situation would be halfway to Mexico by now. But not you.”
Sherwood managed to keep his gaze level and look Tulah right back in the eyes.
“I ain’t really the running type.”
Sister Tulah nodded and walked to the edge of the stage, the boards creaking beneath her with every labored step.
“So you show up here, empty handed, without an inkling of the difficulty you have now set before me and expect, what exactly? To be given a second chance to make it up to me? Or my sympathy for your predicament, maybe? Perhaps you thought you might be offered forgiveness.”
The closer Tulah moved toward him, the denser the atmosphere around him seemed to feel. It was as if the air was pressing against him from all sides. The heat in the church was becoming unbearable.
“I expected to encounter a woman of God.”
Sister Tulah laughed. It was terrifying, a true cackle coming from the back of her throat. Her entire body shook from the force of it and when it abruptly stopped, and Sister Tulah snapped her mouth closed, Sherwood realized that he was dealing with someone who was bordering on otherworldly. The image of a strange beast came to Sherwood’s mind, but he quickly pushed it away and tried to gain control of the situation.
“Was I wrong in believing that?”
Sister Tulah stepped down from the stage and stood a few feet away from Sherwood.
“So that’s it. You thought to yourself that all those rumors about me had to be lies. Stories made up by weak minded folk. Preacher Tulah? Why, she’s just a little old lady holed up in a church. What could she possibly be able to do to me?”
Sherwood rose to his feet.
“You think I underestimated you?”
Tulah’s colorless eyes flashed.
“I know you underestimated me. I think you believed you could walk in here, have some words with me and then walk back out of that door alive.”
Sherwood’s hand instinctively went to his side, but he didn’t un-holster the .357 underneath his T-shirt. He leered at her.
“Seriously? You think you’re gonna kill me? In cold blood? In a Goddamn church?”
Sister Tulah came a step closer.
“This is my Goddamn church.”
Sherwood laughed nervously.
“What, you got a piece stuck up under that dress somewhere? You gonna be able to pull it out for I can draw on you first?”
Tulah stretched her thin, pink lips into a grotesque grin.
“The Lord works in mysterious ways, Mr. Cannon. Best you not forget that.”
JUDAH JAMMED the extra clips for the .45 into the back pockets of his jeans and then switched on the safety before sliding the gun into the waistband of his pants. He pulled the bolt back on the M14 to make sure a round was in the chamber, then softly shut the driver’s side door behind him. He came around the back of the Bronco and stood next to Ramey. She had the 9mm gripped in both hands as she eyed the Last Steps to Deliverance Church of God across the highway. She jumped when Judah touched her shoulder, but forced herself to breathe deep and evenly. Judah kept his gaze on the church.
“You see anybody go in or out? Anybody around?”
Ramey shook her head.
“Nothing. And unless the parking lot goes back behind the church further, there’s only those two cars.”
Judah’s eyes traveled from the mud-sprayed pickup truck parked haphazardly in the middle of the lot to the gleaming black Lincoln Navigator next to the church.
“Even if Sherwood brought Levi, I doubt we’re dealing with more than four bodies inside. You cover Tulah and I’ll take care of Sherwood and anyone else if we need to. Don’t freeze up and don’t let them rattle you. I got this. And I got you, okay?”
Ramey didn’t look over at him, but gave a curt nod. Judah eyed the front door. The time for being sure had passed. He couldn’t afford what-ifs, second guesses and wavering conviction. He gripped the M14 in both hands and started across the blistering asphalt with Ramey close at his shoulder. They walked on the burnt, brittle grass along the walkway to keep their footsteps quiet and then mounted the concrete steps. Ramey rested her hand on the door handle and looked to Judah. He gritted his teeth and signaled to her. Ramey pressed down on the latch and Judah kicked in the heavy double doors. They surged forward, guns raised and met the startled faces of those inside.
Sherwood immediately went for his .357, but Judah snarled at him before he could reach the grip.
“I wouldn’t.”
Sherwood looked up to find the M14 trained at his head, and the grim face of his son behind the barrel. He slowly raised his hands out to his sides. Judah quickly looked around the dim space, the darkness within even further enhanced by the blazing white sunlight streaming through the doors behind him. The church was empty save for Sherwood and a large woman who could only have been Sister Tulah; their positions indicated to Judah that they might have been in the middle of a standoff of their own. In his peripheral vision, Judah saw that Ramey had Tulah dead in her sights. The woman hadn’t raised her hands, only clasped them in front of her as if she was casually waiting for a bus. Her doughy face was expressionless and she appeared unfazed by the two intruders who had just burst into her church, guns out, clearly full of ill intent. Judah pointed at Sherwood’s holster with the end of his rifle.
“Take it out. Put it on the floor and kick it this way.”
“Son.”
Judah jerked the rifle barrel back up so that it was level with Sherwood’s head again.
“You want me to ask again? Or did you think we came here for the potluck supper?”
Sherwood narrowed his eyes at Judah, but slowly pulled out the .357 and leaned down. The gun skidded down the aisle and Ramey stopped it with her boot. Sherwood righted himself and glared at Judah.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing, son?”
Judah’s eyes never left Sherwood’s. The hate being directed at him was reflected right back.
“Stepping up. Being a Cannon.”
“You call this being a Cannon? Pointing a gun at your own father? What kind of coward chicken shit is that?”
“I’m just evening things out. Doing what’s right. The way I see it this time.”
Judah glanced at Sister Tulah.
“And making sure that Benji ain’t forgotten.”
Sherwood clenched his thick fists at his sides and tilted his head.
“You took my money.”
Judah adjusted his grip on the rifle. Neither he nor Ramey had lowered their
guns.
“Weren’t your money in the first place.”
“What is this, Judah, your big play? You gonna try and work something out with Tulah now? That how you’re planning on screwing your old man?”
Judah looked at Sister Tulah. Now that his eyes had adjusted to the contrasting light he could see her pale eyes, burning out from her placid face. Tulah had been trading stares with Ramey, but now she directed her scrutiny fully at Judah. Her eyes gave Judah a prickly feeling running down the length of his arms and he felt a strange heat flushing upwards from his chest. He averted his gaze and turned back to Sherwood.
“It ain’t her money neither. Not anymore.”
At this, Sister Tulah raised her eyebrows and took a step forward. Ramey immediately did the same and jerked the 9mm to remind Tulah that she was still in gun sights. Sister Tulah pursed her lips and crossed her arms over her chest, but stood down. Sherwood barked out a gruff laugh.
“So that’s what you’re doing here? Come here to wave your guns around and show off how big your balls are. Riding in on your high horse, crying out for revenge for Benji? Talking about stepping up to be a Cannon. You don’t got no idea what being a true Cannon looks like.”
Judah’s mouth was pinched and his eyes were flat and dark. He raised the rifle to his shoulder and sighted down the barrel.
“It looks like this, Sherwood. It looks like this.”
Sherwood laughed.
“You ain’t gonna shoot me, son.”
Judah touched his finger to the trigger. He could feel the blood pounding in his ears and the measured breath he drew into his lungs felt like it would stay there, burning forever. He knew that what Sherwood said was true. He also knew that he could change everything, right then, right there, with just the slightest movement of his hand. Judah closed his eyes.
He heard the shots first and then the siren of bullets whizzing through the air and splintering the wooden pulpit on the stage. A line of bullets buried themselves in the back wall of the church and he heard Ramey scream beside him. He threw the full force of his body against her and they went tumbling across the floor, out of sight of the open doorway. He pressed himself against the wall, and then slid out and kicked one of the doors shut. Another stream of bullets went through the closed door, clouding the air with splinters. Judah grabbed Ramey’s wrist. Her eyes were terrified, but she nodded that she was okay. The shooting ceased for a moment and Judah heard the roar of motorcycle engines from the parking lot.
