Ferret chimed in with, “Hook your leg around the other girl’s leg, see?” He showed her. “Then give her a big push. She goes down, gives everyone time to make noise, get the teacher over. Always tell the teacher the truth. That the other girl started it, and you were going to finish it.”
Dee Dee must’ve heard that last part, because a teaspoon flew in from the kitchen table and clonked him on the forehead.
Violet laughed. “Mommy’s a bully.”
Ferret grinned. He eased onto the carpet, leaned against the wall. After Gene Handy, it had been a really hard day. His muscles hurt more every night now that the cold wind kept him tense all day beneath his jacket, except for when he was around the machinery, the trucks, or in Pancrazy’s office. He could see it in the eyes of the newer worms, and all he could tell them was, “I get it, man.”
Violet was still laughing. “Mommy’s a bitch ho!”
Dee Dee threw something else—a can of Pam? A flashlight? It missed them both by a mile. “I’ll show you who the bitch is as soon as I get off this phone.”
“My fault, baby,” Ferret said. Then to Violet, “Don’t say that again.”
“Mommy’s a bitchbitchbitchbitchbitch.”
His instinct was to reach out, grab her, scare her into stopping. And he did. She flinched. He felt sick and backed away. “Sorry, sorry.”
At a much lower volume, “Bitchbitchbitch.”
If he’d done that to his own dad at that age...it didn’t matter, it really didn’t. That sort of thing, that was gone.
“Violet, please—”
Dee Dee walked in from the kitchen, hands on her hips. “Young lady.”
“Daddy tried to hit me.”
“I did not.”
“Yes, you did, you did. I said bitchbitchbitch and you tried to hit me.”
The look on his wife’s face just then, oh, Dee Dee. A hard swallow. Back to Violet. She watched her dad with wide eyes. She scratched her fingers the way Dee Dee used to.
“I just reached for you. To tell you to stop.” To Dee Dee. “You know what I mean. I would never...”
Dee Dee spoke tightly. “Come on, Violet, you have to listen to your daddy the first time he asks you to do something.”
“We were just playing.”
She took Violet’s hand and led her back to her bedroom. “You have to know when to stop, though.”
She left him alone on the living room floor without another word, kept talking to their baby girl in that “mother knows best” tone. She was backing Ferret’s play now, but he hated the conversation he knew was coming. Jesus. He would’ve never...so why did he...no, that’s not what he was doing.
He would swear on the grave of their son, the one before Violet. The one Dee Dee was pregnant with when they got married. The one they lost when she was seven months along. He would swear, the ultimate swear, that he wasn’t going to hit their girl. Never.
But who was he kidding? He hadn’t even thought, just reacted. He was capable of giving a foul backhand across his beautiful girl’s face. If he hadn’t stopped himself.
He thought it would get easier after quitting with Pancrazy. Guess this meant there was still some unfinished business swirling around in his head, waiting to get flushed out. So fucking angry. Gene Handy, goddamn manipulator. Goddamn cheat. For the greater good, he’d told Ferret. Using guys like him for “the greater good.”
The in-laws had been talking about visiting for Thanksgiving. It was slow progress with them, still angry with Ferret for dragging their daughter and granddaughter out into the most dangerous patch of frontier since the Deadwood days. Anyway, the plans had all fallen apart. Dee Dee’s older sister and husband and newly adopted Russian toddler had invited them all—even Dee Dee, Ferret, and Violet—on a cruise. Of course, Dee Dee’s richer, more upwardly-mobile sister would be the one paying for mom and dad. Dee Dee’s family would need to pay for themselves, but then they could all be together again.
That was when Dee Dee’s mood began to turn. She realized they couldn’t afford both an Alaskan cruise and this trailer together, let alone food and gas. It would be that way for a long time. And maybe she had made a mistake. And the sides of her thumbs began to bleed again. And she was going to bed earlier and earlier each night.
Ferret closed his eyes and banged his head against the wall. He didn’t want to make it worse than it already was. Maybe they would talk. Maybe she would announce that she was really tired and needed to get to school early tomorrow. Whatever the rest of the evening would bring, Ferret was already suffering.
CHAPTER TWENTY
What the boss says is what the boss gets, but Hunter wasn’t allowed to tell Russell or Gene Handy or Ferret or anyone. He had to be careful. Especially after that fight with Ferret in the car, and Russell getting sick like that, and shit, all he’d wanted was a job. And to be with his best friend. And to get the hell out of Oklahoma for once before he ended up married—and really, what sort of choices would he end up with if he stayed? Married, kids, working himself to death. A nobody. One of those guys that shit happens to but who never makes shit happen.
Besides, he wasn’t no fag or nothing, but he didn’t get all turned up for women anyway. Not his own age, anyway. Back in high school, first blowjob, first time he fingered a pussy, those girls, what, sixteen? Seventeen? He wasn’t stupid enough to go to jail for that shit. So he was like the monks. Get out the rage by fighting, and by fucking his own fist. His memories—Taylor, Jenn, Anna Dale, that one other, Kylie, oh shit, if her parents had found out about that. That made her first on the list these days. Goddamn if his imagination didn’t turn her into the whoriest little slut every time he needed to do what he needed to.
Not to mention his teachers. He had a thing for teachers. Especially the librarian from high school. Goddamn, that woman...
What Pancrazy had him doing, it wasn’t fair. He’d tried to tell the man, look, put someone else on this. I can’t handle it right now. I’ve got enough to worry about. No, he didn’t try to tell him that. Of course not. This was the boss. Not the boss boss, but the everyday boss. The boss of the meth, anyway. How could people do that stuff? I mean, sure, Hunter had done it a little while, too, until he had to have a root canal, but that was it, man. No more. That shit hurt.
He was still itchy for it sometimes, but he would take some allergy pills to calm his ass down. Especially helped when he was out like this, waiting for Missus Ferret and Ferret’s girl to finish up at the Mastercuts so he could keep following them. He wasn’t supposed to talk to them, wasn’t supposed to be caught watching them from the car. The whole point was for him to just so happen to “be” wherever she was. Let himself be seen. Don’t necessarily be seen seeing her, but if it happened, maybe a quick grin or wave, then he was to turn away. Let her feel that he was close. Let her realize that in spite of the population surge, this was still a small town. Couldn’t help but bump into each other often.
Hunter had asked, What, I gotta scare her?
Pancrazy had shook his head.
What, I gotta weird her out?
A menthol sigh from the driller. Man, he’d gotten to look grizzled these past few months. Pancrazy slowly shook his head, and for once he didn’t look like he wanted to throttle Hunter. He explained it, like, don’t scare her, don’t weird her out, but just...be felt. Okay?
Okay. Hunter didn’t get it. Not really. But he said Okay, okay. Okay.
*
Missus Ferret was not stupid. When she stepped out of Mastercuts, her bob nice and neat again after a couple months of split ends, she did a slow pan of the lot, the street, and yes, she saw him, even though he was pretty well tucked between a couple of SUVs across the street. She must’ve known for a while. She was smart—a teacher. Didn’t stare. Didn’t make a face. Just that slight freeze, her tight lips, and laying her hand on her daughter’s shoulder, pushing her along to the car.
It wasn’t his fault that she was smart. He was doing the best he could, after all. Come on.
Following her now, well...he could always catch up later. He turned to the radio, tried to get the whining alien sound of the AM noise to calm down so he could hear more sports talk about teams he didn’t give a shit about. Colorado Rockies? Minnesota Vikings? Jesus. But it was soothing, men talking about sports as if it was the only thing in the world. Bigger than war. Bigger than love. Bigger than God. He’d heard a preacher say that on one of the late-night rambling sessions, the call-in shows where teenagers taunt the minister about demons and video games and sex, full of piss and vinegar, but the minister has heard it all and then some. He always got them in the end. In tears, repenting, always. Never a miss. Made Hunter think they had to be editing out some of the calls. The world outside was enough evidence of that.
He turned it off and decided to stop at the frozen yogurt place, almost as good as a bar. Inside, the bright green and red stripes and plastic furniture made him feel younger. Some kids hung out there after school so they didn’t have to go home to an empty trailer or apartment where, sometimes, a strange truck or RV would be parked on the curb, a man leaning against the side of it asking if he could use their shower. So there was a pile of backpacks in the corner, kids draped all over the couches and beanbags and on the floor near all the outlets plugging in phones and laptops.
There was a thick layer of grime, too, from oil workers touching the walls, the handles of the fro-yo machines, the sneeze guard over the toppings. They couldn’t help it. There was no way to ever get it off completely except to get away from it all, like an ex-smoker’s lungs going from black to pink six months after the last cig. God bless the high school kids—and occasional sad thirty-something-year-old man—who worked here, trying their best to keep the place clean, keep the machines in order, keep the line moving. But it was too crowded, too loud, too much.
It took him ten minutes to get his turn at the machines, and three of them were fucked. The chocolate one, too, damn it. So he ended up with salted caramel and “candy bar crunch”, then had to wait while one mom took her precious time letting her three kids pick their toppings, not at all worried about the twelve people behind them waiting and more coming in the door, but Hunter didn’t mind. He told the guy behind him—a huffing-puffing supervisor type, cursing under his breath—to cool it, and that was enough.
Feeling younger was worth the hassle. Back then, at fifteen, sixteen, whatever, the noise and cramped quarters were a daily way of life. You got used to it. You blocked it out. So he paid for his yogurt, now dripping with caramel and brownie pieces and topped with seven cherries, and stood at the front window, not really watching but not really not watching. Scooping yogurt, licking it out of his ’stache and beard, enjoying one spoonful at a time. He would catch up with Missus Ferret—why did he call her that when he knew damn well her name was Delilah?—tomorrow. Dee Dee, that’s what Ferret called her. Hunter wasn’t a stupid man. He played that way to get along sometimes, but he was a lot smarter than people thought he was.
Tomorrow. He would catch up with Russell, poor guy sick for so long now, and catch up with Ferret’s wife, and make some money and store up his treasures in heaven. And maybe get in a fight. Goddamn it, he sure loved to fight.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The chill hurt his bones. Literally. All the men wondered why he kept his office like a sauna. If they had asked, Pancrazio would’ve told them it was to keep the cold away. What he would not tell them is that he meant the cold of Serbia, decades ago. His homeland. When he was a younger, stronger man, he showed no signs of weakness. No shivering, no aching, no teeth-chattering. Swim in the river all winter long. Race barefoot on the ice. Stupid boys.
Jesus, how he came to hate the cold now. He didn’t have the will of God driving him anymore. His new boys were paid this time, like mercenaries, ready to move on as soon as they could. So he kept the cold away as long as he could, until his duties as driller called on him to bundle up and head onto the field to tell other people to do jobs they should already know how to do.
Like now, crouched with his hand on top of his knees, listening to a mechanic tell him how long it would take to fix this broken pump, depending on when they could get the part, and Pancrazio thought to himself, If that’s the only way it can be fixed, then why haven’t you done it already? The boys in Bosnia would not have asked permission to rape the daughters of their enemies or leave the useless male children hanging in trees, living their last moments choking and kicking. No, those boys took initiative. These Americans, always waiting for someone else to tell them what to do. Not because they didn’t know, but so they could cover their asses. “He told me to.” Pussies, the lot of them.
Except Good Russell. And, to a lesser degree, Finn the Ferret. Those two reminded him of the boys back home. Those two had potential. Even the little guy, Ferret, showed initiative. He wouldn’t take no for an answer. He wasn’t afraid to tell the boss he wanted to quit. Against all instincts, Pancrazio saw something special in the kid. Best to let him have his way for the moment. He could be lured back later.
But fucks like this fuck, this mechanic, one who stayed out of sight so much Pancrazio didn’t even have a nickname for him—until now. Now he was “This Fuck.” This Fuck was telling him things that only a mechanic could know, asking for permission to do it. This Fuck. Pancrazio was having trouble hiding his contempt. It was too cold for this shit.
“If it needs to be done, do it,” was his answer. “Understand. Nothing more, nothing less. You only need to ask me about the shit you can’t do.”
“I was just checking—”
“Some reason you didn’t ask Ferret first? Isn’t he over you?”
This Fuck was getting restless. “All he would do is ask you—”
“No, you fuck. That’s why I promoted him.” He turned and duckwalked his way back to the outside from under the pipes, climbed out of the ditch. Colder still. This Fuck. He checked his phone to see if anyone else had texted him. Any other dildos out there needing the boss to come pat them on the head? Tell them they were good boys? Two or three more. Might be able to handle them by phone, or get Gene Handy to handle it. That could save time. Then he could read up on all of the memos he had ignored for that meeting later.
He was in the wrong line of work.
He heard This Fuck behind him. “Wait a sec, do you have a minute?”
In that moment, Pancrazio wished that he hadn’t learned to tune out the constant drone and whoosh of the field. Or worn the earplugs. He turned. This Fuck looked around nervously.
“I heard...well, someone told me. I can’t tell you who, though, but he told me...I heard you might have an opening? For a different job?”
This Fuck was too close. Onion and coffee breath.
Pancrazio stared at him, hoped it made him feel silly. “You’re not really a mechanic?”
“No, I mean, yes, I mean, I am. What I mean...like, another type job. Not an oil job.” Gave Pancrazio the ol’ wide eyes. “Know what I mean?”
Well of course someone was bound to have spread the rumors. There was always a leak. But he wasn’t going to show This Fuck his surprise. He wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction.
“You have the job you applied for, don’t you? See all the men lining up, hat in hand? See them? I mean really look at their faces and remember what it felt like. You have a job. A good fucking job. A great fucking job. That’s the job we gave you, and that’s the one you can do, or you can fuck off back to whatever hick town you came from and let me find a mechanic who wants to be a mechanic.”
Palms up now. “Whoa, hey, whoa. I didn’t mean...you don’t understand. I know about the other jobs. You know what I mean? Driving to Fargo and back? Supply runs? I didn’t mean to get you riled up.”
This Fuck. Pancrazio looked around, the fog of his breath getting thicker. If this had been the homeland. If only.
Pancrazio pointed behind them. “Let’s talk back by that pump again.”
This Fuck turned and started back in
to the ditch and under the pipes to the pump, a dark little corner. Hidden. Pancrazio’s mind already reeling. All the possibilities. This place was a deathtrap. A man like this mechanic, This Fuck, could make one small mistake and lose an arm, an eye, his whole head. All Pancrazio had to do was narrow it down to the most likely, deadly accident and make sure it looked like that to anyone who came after—a careless accident by an incompetent Fuck.
Halfway back to the pump, This Fuck already talking over his shoulder about, “Didn’t mean to take you off-guard,” Pancrazio had it. Electrocution. This Fuck, he’d noticed, wasn’t wearing any gloves.
Maybe he was in the right job after all.
*
The very idea that the driller had been the one to take This Fuck off the board would never cross their minds. Not in a thousand years. Pancrazio was the first one they called once the body was found. When he didn’t answer his phone, they came looking for him at the trailer. Ferret was one of them. Banged on the door. They heard some grumbling, and then there was Pancrazio, swinging the door in, whooshing out the stored-up heat that instantly dried out Ferret’s eyes. The driller stood there, shirtless, scarred, and dripping sweat, hair slicked back, smoking one of those fucking menthols.
When Ferret told him, he stepped outside of the trailer, making everyone take a step back, and closed the door. The sweat turned to frost, and he stretched his arms wide. Yawned.
“I just talked to him. He said that pump needed a part.”
“It looks like he was trying to rig it without the part, got himself electrocuted.”
Pancrazio shook his head. “I told him to get the part. Why the hell wouldn’t he get the part?”
No one wanted to speak ill of the dead, obviously. But in this weather—the wind like the tip of a whip, and the cold making you wish Mommy was making you cocoa—fast was better than right sometimes.
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