by Bryn Roar
She slid into a pale yellow summer dress, which was most definitely out of season; her only other choice, though, had been the pleated skirt she’d worn the night before, and that didn’t seem right somehow. She stepped into her mother’s white sandals and frowned at her dated look in the mirror. She could’ve bought more things for herself, but then what would Joel have done for food and clothes? As it was, she was fortunate to be able to do even that much. She had the best babysitting gig on Moon. The Portmans’, who owned one of the nicest homes in Reva Heights, paid her a salary of a hundred dollars a week, usually for just being on call! Their twin, four-year-old girls were a handful, though, and Josie eventually earned every penny of that weekly C-note. Even so, they rarely used her services more than twice a week. Tonight was such a night. Josie hoped she could talk Bud into staying over with her. She knew Mrs. Portman wouldn’t mind.
As usual, Joel was slow to get ready. She brushed his unruly mop-top, helped him with his tie, and then hurried him out the front door. She was surprised that the Huggins’s weren’t waiting outside for them in Betty Anne’s Chevy Yukon. It sat empty behind their cabin, right beside Ham’s old Ford pick ‘em-up truck.
“Maybe they’re not going to church today,” Joel said hopefully. He tugged at the collar of his shirt.
“Well, even if they’re not, we are,” Josie said.
“You mean, walk all that way to church in these hot old clothes? Have you gone crazy?”
“Hush up. Let’s go see if they’re running late. They probably got tired of having to wait for us every Sunday.”
They climbed the brick steps, onto the wide porch, and walked up to the screen door. Ham, Betty Anne, and Rusty were all huddled around the big screen TV in the living room. Josie pushed the screen door open. “Aye? Aren’t you heathens going to church today?”
Betty Anne jumped at the sound of Josie’s voice. She checked her watch. “Lord have mercy! Look at the time, Ham! Service starts in five minutes!”
“Hey, Joe. Joel,” Rusty greeted them from the couch. Ham barely acknowledged Josie or his wife—such was his focus on the Weather Channel.
“Come on, baby,” Betty Anne said, tugging on her husband’s beefy arm. Ham reluctantly got up and turned off the TV. “That storm isn’t likely to get here before church is over. You can watch the doomsayers when we get home.”
“Storm?”
“Haven’t you heard?” Rusty asked, walking out the door. “That tropical storm is now a force four hurricane. And it looks to be headed this way!”
“Jack, they’re calling it,” Betty Anne chortled cheerfully. “Hurricane Jack the Ripper. Since it’s so close to Halloween and all. Now, isn’t that clever?”
Ham looked crossly at his wife from across the rooftop of the SUV. “Don’t know what you’re so giddy about,” he snapped. “By the time Jack gets here it could be a category five storm! Woman, do you know what a hurricane that mean would do to little old Moon?”
“God’s will,” she said, opening her car door. Rusty looked over at Josie in the back seat and rolled his eyes. It had always been one of his mother’s peculiarities to behave as if nothing was wrong, when things seemed at their darkest. A trait that often got on his father’s nerves.
*******
Tubby was sitting by himself in the back of the church when the Huggins’s, Josie, and Joel hurriedly passed him by. The first hymn had already begun.
“Pssst! Rusty!” he hissed under the cover of his hymnal. His parents were sitting up front. Tubby had begged off, hoping to sit with his friends.
Rusty turned and pulled Josie back to the last pew, where Tubby had saved them each a seat. Josie looked even better today than she had last night, which was really saying something. It was weird seeing his friends without their ubiquitous army coats. Josie’s yellow summer dress made her golden skin glow. It was all Tubby could do to wipe the lovesick look from his face.
“Hey, Joe,” he said, trying out her pet name for himself. It felt good to call a pretty girl by such a familiarality. Maybe tomorrow I’ll even call her Big Red! The idea of calling her “Tits”, like Rusty did, made Ralph feel faint. He checked his clip-on-tie to make sure it hadn’t slipped. “Rusty. Joel. What’s up, fellows?” Miss Beasly turned around in the pew in front of them and gave Tubby a withering look. He grinned sheepishly.” Sorry, ma’am.”
As Josie squeezed by she patted Ralph on his head, making him feel as if the Pope had just blessed him.
“Where am I supposed to sit?” Joel whined.
Miss Beasly turned around to glare at them again.
“Sit on me lap and hush up,” Josie said.
As the collection plates passed down their pew, Tubby leaned towards Josie. “Where’s Bud?”
“Buddy boy doesn’t go to church,” Joel said importantly. “He don’t believe in—”
“Shhhh,” said Josie, squeezing Joel’s knee. This was the last place she wanted Bud’s lack of faith publicly broadcast. It was the only major point she and Bud differed on, and one that troubled her greatly. If anyone needed God in his corner, it was that big blockhead up the street.
Tubby managed to keep quite the rest of the service, content in just being close to the woman he adored. Josie’s bare knee leaned companionably against his leg, and Tubby spent the rest of the next hour reveling in that casual touch. He realized he was still grinning when Joel looked at him from atop the perch on his sister’s lap.
Tubby crossed his eyeballs, and the two boys got the giggles. Josie shot an elbow to Tubby’s chest and pinched Joel’s leg, and that put an end to that.
Tubby enjoyed having Rusty spend the night, the two of them talking well into the wee hours. Rusty surprised him by admitting that unlike Josie and Ralph, his favorite author wasn’t Stephen King! While he enjoyed the King’s work, Rusty’s author of choice was George Pelecanos, a writer who specialized in urban crime fiction. “I just really dig his ghetto prose,” he’d said, when pressed for a reason why. “The man writes like Tarantino directs.” Even more surprising was the fact that Bud Brown’s favorite writer was Pat Conroy. A Low Country legend, who lived on another nearby island off the Beaufort coast.
Rusty said Bud had a poetic soul that fit right in with Conroy’s introspective style of writing.
“Yeah, man,” Rusty had quipped, “we might beCreeps, but we’re some well-rounded Creeps!” They discussed the things that mattered most to them, how Tubby yearned to be a writer, and how Rusty couldn’t stop thinking about the movies. Then there were the little things that didn’t matter at all. The odds and ends of their obsessions that intrigued them so. That was the best, Tubby decided, as he listened to the preacher drone on and on at the front of the church. To shoot the breeze on stupid stuff that didn’t make a lick of difference in this old world. Reminisces of Halloweens past, and what they wore those nights. Favorite episodes of The Twilight Zone and The Outer Limits. Best theme songs ever (Tubby loved the instrumental from Hawaii 5-O. Rusty grooved on that finger-snapping ditty from The Adams Family). The coolest movie monsters (their consensus: the 1931 Frankenstein, the Creature from the Black Lagoon, and the alien, from Alien). The best smells in the world outside a kitchen had also been a topic: Old comic books. Freshly cut grass. Bubblicious Watermelon gum. Real Christmas trees. Movie theater popcorn. And burning leaves in the fall.
Tubby had almost included the scent of strawberries, but wisely kept that telling-tidbit to himself.
As it was his first participation in the act of chitchatting, it had been especially hard for Tubby to stop carrying on about a whole lot of nothing. His head was full of random thoughts and opinions he wanted to express and share. Eventually, though, Rusty had fallen asleep on him, and Tubby felt compelled to try and do the same. By the time he’d drifted off, he’d learned another useless fact: it’s impossible to fall asleep with a grin on your face.
At the end of the service, they got an unexpected shock. The Reverend Milo Tipple—an industrious black minister, who live
d in Beaufort, and made a daily trip over to the island on the ferry—told the congregation that Dr. Clint Bidwell had a few words he’d like to say to them before they departed.
“This won’t take long,” Clint Bidwell said, smiling down at the citizens of Moon. Like Ham Huggins, most Mooners revered Dr. Bidwell. He was a distinguished looking man, a lean six-foot-one, with a head full of salt-and-pepper hair, which the single women (and some married one’s as well, if the rumors were true) couldn’t get enough of. When Dr. Bidwell spoke, the residents of Moon perked up and listened.
“I know you’re all ready to get to lunch, and you shrimpers anxious to get back to your Weather Channels.” At this, the wives all tittered, even if Ham and most of the other fishermen didn’t quite see the humor. “But I’m afraid we have another potential problem, which may be even more serious than Hurricane Jack. Our good neighbors at the Research Center have reported to me the presence of rabies on our fair rock.”
There was a good deal of murmuring over this news. Bidwell held up his hands in a calming nature. The whole church stilled as if Moses himself had just commanded them to do so. “Now, now…there’s no reason to panic just yet,” Bidwell clucked. His unusually long teeth gleamed wetly in the sunlight streaming through the stained glass windows. “Our friends at the Center have assured me they’ve nipped this thing in the bud. However, we can’t be too careful, now can we? I think it’s wise to consider that rabies could potentially spread fast and furious on an island this size.”
“Does this have something to do with that body they found yesterday in the Pines?” Mr. Wilky asked from the middle of the church. News of the deceased man had spread like wildfire. Rumors were varied and rampant.
“As a matter of fact, it does,” Bidwell admitted.
This completely caught Tubby and his friends off guard. More murmurs all around them, louder this time.
“Did the Center have anything to do with this virus?” asked Ham Huggins, standing up from his seat at the front. All murmurs ceased and all eyes fixed on Ham.
Josie saw that Ham's query had taken Bidwell aback. He clucked nervously. “Goodness, no! The Research Center does do some animal testing. However, I assure you, its all fairly innocuous stuff. I only meant to say—”
“How do you know all this, Clint?” Ham asked. “Are you their spokesman now?”
Rusty smiled proudly at his father’s broad back. He hadn’t told any of this stuff to his old man. It was their hope the whole matter would simply go away—yet despite his father’s folksy manner, Ham was one smart shrimper. He’d obviously put some things together on his own.
Rusty just then realized something else: he couldn’t recall ever hearing his father refer to Bidwell as Doctor Bidwell. It was as if the man hadn’t earned Ham’s respect.
Bidwell, who was well aware of the slight, scowled down at Ham before answering. “No. I am not a representative of the Center. They came to me as soon as they learned of the virus because I’m the island’s only physician. And they’ve been nothing but aboveboard ever since! They’ve offered all of their resources to help us in this matter, not to mention a vaccine. All this, Mr. Huggins, even though they are under no obligation to help us at all!”
Reverend Tipple stood up and played peacemaker. “Now I’m sure Ham wasn’t trying to impugn either yours or the Center’s motives, Doctor. And I’m sure we all appreciate the Center’s help in this matter. You can see our cause for concern, though, can’t you? I mean, that poor fellow was shot right between—”
“There was no gunshot wound,” Bidwell said, shaking his head emphatically.
Ham shot up again. “That’s not what I heard!”
“I know what you heard. That the man had been shot between the eyes.”
“That’s what Rupert Henderson told me.”
“And that’s how it appeared,” Bidwell smiled.
Tubby thought the man’s too white, too long teeth made him look like a cartoon shark.
“I performed the autopsy myself, Ham. The wound to his forehead, along with massive injuries inflicted to his face and throat, were the result of a horrific mauling…”
Bidwell realized where he was, that women and children were listening. He coughed into his fist and collected his thoughts. It was clear that Ham had rattled him. “Forgive me for being so carelessly blunt,” he smiled ingratiatingly. “It goes with my territory, I’m afraid. Now, as I was saying, the individual found in the woods yesterday was an employee of the Center.” This news didn't surprise anyone; everybody on the island already knew that. “He was out taking a walk in the Pines early Friday evening when he was attacked by a rabid dog.” Before the volume of raised voices could get too loud, Bidwell plowed on. “That animal was cornered and dispatched by employees of the Center yesterday morning.”
TheCreeps shook their heads in disgust.
Miss Beasly raised her hand.
“Yes, Miss Beasly?” Bidwell said, happy to answer questions from anybody other than Ham Huggins.
“Thank you, Doctor. Did I hear you correctly—that the Center had a vaccine for those individuals exposed to the infected animals? Animals…as in more than one?”
The doctor pointed excitedly at Beasly, as if he was a snake-oil salesman making his point with the help of one of the gathered marks. “Therein lies the rub, Ma’am. You see, we have no idea if there are any other infected mammals out there! Was this animal the only one with the virus, and did she spread it? We simply don’t know. That’s why I need your assistance.”
“Whose dog was it?” asked another voice in the congregation.
“No tags. I’d never seen it before.”
“I know every dog on Moon, and I haven’t heard of anyone missing their pet,” Ham said. “Describe it to me.”
“It was a large gray bit…excuse me, female dog,” said Bidwell, blushing at his near faux pas in the house of the Lord. “Breed was indeterminate.”
The three friends shook their heads as one. They knew perfectly well that there couldn’t have been enough of the gray bitch left from the fire to identify its sex, much less the color of its coat.
“I’d like to see it,” Ham said. Other voices in the congregation concurred.
“I’m afraid that’s not possible. In accordance with Federal and State law, the dog’s remains were incinerated after determining the presence of rabies in its brain.”
“Of course it was,” Ham drawled dryly. He stood staring at Bidwell until Betty Anne pulled him to his seat.
To Tubby’s dismay, his mom stood up and timidly raised her hand.
Dr. Bidwell smiled his shark smile at Emma Tolson. “Yes, ma’am? I believe it’s Mrs. Tolson?”
“That’s right. Emma Tolson. My family and I are new to Moon, so forgive me for speaking out of turn.”
“Not at all, Mrs. Tolson,” Bidwell practically purred. “You and your family have just as much at stake here as the rest of us. You have a thought or question?”
“Yes, thank you, Doctor. Is there anything we can do to prevent our children from getting this disease? Short of those horrible abdomen shots, that is?”
Bidwell nodded his head vigorously. Now he was getting to it. In the back, Tubby cringed. His own mother had, if unwittingly, aided and abetted their enemy.
“Excellent query, Mrs. Tolson, and yes, there is something you can do. That is, in fact, why I’m here before you today. Thankfully, those old series of painful injections you were speaking of are a thing of the past. Although I won’t lie to you and tell you the current solution is a day at the park. It’s still an unpleasant ordeal. If it does come to that, and I’m not saying it will—it probably won’t—but if it does, I can assure you that the cure nowadays is much more preferable to the disease. Rabies is nothing to fool around with, people! It’s a completely curable illness, too...
