by Lisa Howorth
Dr. Bernardo looked squinch-eyed at Teever and solemnly said, “Tecpatl.” Then he spoke to the two kids, who stepped up with mean smiles. One got behind him, resting his hands on Teever’s shoulders. The other squatted down and gripped the bad leg at the shin with both hands. He winked evilly at Teever.
“Oh, man, no way, no way, no way, no way,” Teever protested, wagging his head from side to side. He crossed his arms over his chest and knew he couldn’t rise up from the chaise even if they hadn’t had a grip on him. These wetback fools gone take my foot and I’ll be bleeding to death, he thought. Shoulda listened to L. B. Overcome with disappointment more than fear—that this was how it was all going to go down, the pitiful end he was going to come to—he continued to chant, “No way, no way, no—”
“Hiss okay,” Dr. Bernardo said, cutting him off in a soothing whisper. “Hiss hoka-y-y.” A helpless silver simper lit up the headman’s big brown face. “Hiss no good,” he said, shrugging and pointing to the awful foot. “No good. Cállate ahorita. No hagas más ruido.”
The Mexican slowly raised the knife to his face, where Teever saw that on one side a sideways smiley-face was drawn. What the fuck. His own incredulous face was reflected in the wide blade, too; and behind it, the huge gripped fist, and the flames. A tiny portrait of himself facing the devil in hell. Teever didn’t think he believed in the devil or any of that shit, but he had not expected the devil to be Mexican or any other kind of colored person. Maybe this wasn’t even about the foot; maybe they were just fixing to stob him for the hell of it.
“Man, I know that foot is gone bad but please don’t shank me, bro,” he pleaded. He looked around the fire at the other men, hoping for support. The men sat languidly, watching the scene and smiling. Dr. Bernardo swung a thick leg over the chaise and now straddled Teever. He slowly brought the knife to Teever’s neck.
Prepared for the worst, Teever closed his eyes. It couldn’t hurt much worse than jumping on the adze. He remembered that at least he was fucked up and maybe wouldn’t feel much. Why these guys had to fuck with such a good buzz was a goddamned shame, he told himself. Teever felt the cold insistence of the blade against his gullet. Oh Lord. Sarah. Grand. The rooster crowed again, three times, as the pressure of the blade slowly increased.
All of a sudden, the kids tightened their grips, and the headman shouted with Halloween-monster glee, thrusting both arms up into the air, waving the satanic, smiley-face knife. Teever hollered with shock and anticipated pain, expecting to see a gusher of his own blood before him. The men howled and hooted, slapping their legs and holding their sides. The kids backed off, laughing. Teever grabbed his throat, hoping not to feel anything warm and wet. He looked at his hands. Nothing. Dr. Bernardo babbled happily, reaching forward to give Teever’s shoulder a friendly shove. Dismounting, he moved to the end of the chaise and squatted. With the knife he began gently scraping the clay, pus, and blood from the swollen foot, sprinkling it with the awah from the jar. Teever, so happy to find his throat unslit, began laughing along with the guys around the fire who were reenacting the joke and cracking each other up. The pain in the foot began to subside.
“Hi-fucking-larious, motherfuckers,” Teever said, wiping his sweaty forehead with a sleeve. “Y’all belong on Leatherman or somebody. Stupid Mexican Tricks.” He was pissed but he couldn’t stay pissed, it had cheered the Mexicans up so much, and he himself was so lightheaded and giddy with relief. He was sheepish that he’d fallen for it. Mashed the fool button good, he thought.
“Crazy cocksuckers,” he said.
When the wound was clean, the headman produced the drinking bottle again, offering it to Teever, who swallowed mucho more. He gave it up and felt complete trust in the Mexicans. They’d had their fun. He wanted more of the shit in the bottle—it was too good—but it was making its way around the fire. Joints were being passed. The mood was cheery, almost festive. Somebody changed the music to the kind Teever liked, noisy and happy and horny. He thought the evening had become special for the men, too.
The guy who’d changed the music jerked his chin at Teever and pointed to the jam box. “Banda,” he said, giving a thumbs up.
Teever said, “Yeah, man, it’s a good banda all right.”
“Descansa un poco, compadre, hasta que esta porquería este lista,” said Dr. Bernardo. “Vuelvo en un momento.” He rose and went back into his trailer. Muhammad Ali flapped over and the door opened, taking him in.
Teever settled back in the chaise, hoping that the doctoring was over. He felt great. In fact, he felt wonderful. Beyond buzzed. He hoped he could cop at least one more swig of the pop-skull shine. Taco backwash wasn’t even going to bother him. One of the guys cut an audible fart. Or was it the fire crackling? Teever laughed, “Dude, you puckerin’ string got too much slack in it.”
Some time, minutes or hours, passed. Somebody changed the music again. For a while a man sang beautifully from the jam box. One of the men said to Teever, “Julio Elias. ‘La Voz de Dios.’”
Teever nodded solemnly. His head felt heavy, in slow motion. Did he smell gasoline? Had someone stoked the fire? The singing stopped and the sad music began again. The men sat, pretty quiet now, like they were watching TV instead of fire. Teever could see why. The flames were incredibly beautiful, like something alive, and danced to the mournful thrum of the hollow guitars. Teever had never seen a desert, but he knew this was desert music. He felt no pain now; he could feel nothing physical at all. He felt so good, he allowed himself a thought he tried not to have. Sitting around a fire like this, a bunch of dudes drinking, smoking weed, horsing around, made him think of Nam. At least the good part of it: the buddies, the feeling of belonging to something unknowable to anyone but the dudes right there with you right then. The trust. He had that feeling. He was sure that what had happened so long ago—that mess at Hill 937—had to happen, but he wasn’t sure why. Why that candy-ass white kid, just off his mama’s titty, from somewhere up north would be officer over a bunch of badass poor black and white guys from Mississippi, he didn’t know. Send ’em out to be bush bunnies. Some of those guys had had less to go home to than he did. Nothing to lose. Nothing waiting for them but crack and gangs, just like Nam. None of them cared about much besides not wanting to be shot down like doves in a cornfield because some West Point kid didn’t know shit from Shinola, wanted them to take some worthless hill, Charlie all up in it, waiting. It was a fucking shame. A fucking shame.
Teever stared down into the coals. He could see past the yellow flames and blue wisps through every glowing piece of wood. They seemed like fiery, orange cubes of ice or Jell-O, and he saw through them all the way into the heart of the fire where it was bloody red. No use thinking about that old shit now, Teever thought. At times like this, he wasn’t even sure that night had even happened, or that it had happened the way people said. He didn’t remember much. They all had been so fucked up, every night and day, and the fighting had been so crazy. They’d talked about doing it, no doubt, but exactly who’d done it, what had taken place, nobody really knew. Since he’d been back the story had become a part of who people thought he was, how people, even his family, explained him away; and he’d just given it up. Easier for everybody. He was proud that he felt good enough right now to think about bad things and feel sorry about them.
The fire popped loudly and a glittering fountain of sparks went up like a Roman candle. Instead of burning out or floating off into the trees, the golden sparks swirled together, a little golden tornado over the flames. The goldness of the sparks was unbelievable. They were a gold that mesmerized Teever, a color that was more a feeling than a color, never before seen, but also familiar. Was gold even a color? The sparks swirled together and became a mass, but not a mass. He thought of the soft, battered gold of Grand’s old ear hoops—they had teeth marks where all her babies, black and white, had chomped on them—and of the cheap, promising dazzle of Sarah’s fake fingernails and the shiny spinning rims on Fairlane’s car. He thought of the dark, bron
zy gold of the coppernose and chinquapin he and Grand had caught in the old days at the dam, scooping them up with ice chests in the spillway when it was opened, and of the evening sun going down on the water and lighting up the treetops as they sat together other days and fished from their special clay bank. He thought of the golden cat-eye flecks at the back of Sarah’s green eyes when he had kissed her, way back in the day before he gave up on kissing. He thought of the sexy, money color of the gold watch as it had slipped off the lieutenant-boy’s wrist, and he thought of the gold teeth of the beaver hound kill-dog at Parchman, of which he’d been so afraid. Longing and lust and remorse seized him for a second, but without any real sadness or nature to it; just the strong feeling that the past is dead, bad and good, no going back.
The mouth of the whirlwind dropped into the fire and flames were sucked up into it. Bigger sparks flew out, flickering on and off. Lightning bugs, Teever thought, until they bloomed into brilliant orange wings veined with black, opening and closing. Fucking butterflies! Old Mudbird would love to see this! They flitted around the glittering vortex. The thing now seemed to be stretching out, forming a tall, pulsing shape, drawing out all the colors of the fire; the goldness was shot through with reds and blues and even green—the unlikely green of that split-second flash at sunset when the sun dips below the horizon on Sardis Lake. Teever could see through the twister to a vast, barren landscape of rosy rock. Was this what guys back from Desert Storm talked about? How did they call it—a mirage? Coiling in upon itself, the spindling whorl took more shape, and the colors began to come together to define smaller shapes that began to define details: eyes, a face, a whole head appeared at one end. If my body can’t feel nothin’, why my eyes seeing and my brain workin’? Teever thought to himself. Then Teever stopped thinking at all. There was no fear or even wondering, only watching now. It was alive, a being that contorted its powerful body into massive 3-D curves and then pulled them straight, slithering in midair. Teever could see the beast from all sides, and through it, but knew for sure that it was real, as real as anything he knew. He felt himself as his baby self, smooth fat padding his limbs, the big soft spot on his head pulsing, his eyes huge with amazement. A pattern began to show on the long, tapering body. Scales? No! Feathers! Elegant, gorgeous, strong feathers, each one alive and moving on its own like fingers, but also rippling sensually together with the body’s coiling and uncoiling. The unearthly green feathers came together into shapes—wings!—while the face grew large and blood-red. The thing dipped its head into the fire and torqued around to face Teever, foreshortened so that it appeared to be only a giant mask before him. He understood that there was something for him and he was not afraid. The fiery, beaklike jaws opened and a blue forked tongue lashed out. With a sound like fifty slot machines disgorging their jackpots, out spewed a torrent of greenish-gold coins. The noise they made and their dull, lichen-colored patina made Teever feel their heaviness, and that they were very, very old. Solid. On each coin was a splash of darkest red; he felt that it was blood. The jaws closed and opened again and out came the ribbon of tongue wrapped around a new gold thing, a cylinder. Unfurling itself, the blue tongue revealed the object, whose gold was not brilliant or metallic or smooth or shiny, but bumpy and deeply, richly yellow. Fleshy. Succulent. Earthy. Corn! An ear of corn with fat, bursting kernels in rows like gold teeth. Teever reached toward it but as he did, the tongue and cob snapped back. Once more the beak opened and in a split second the tongue unscrolled again and flickered, blue and wetly glistening, lapping at Teever’s poor foot. The mask stared at him as if waiting for something. Teever could see its iridescent gator tail lashing behind it. He was overcome by an urge to speak, to communicate with the thing in some way, but he could not think of a single word. Opening his mouth, Teever felt sound—an old, familiar tune coming up from deep in his gut and exploding in a loud, Exorcist yawp:
Estaba perdido, pero ahora me he encontrado
Estaba ciego, pero ahora ya veo.
There was another loud bang from the fire and an explosion of sparks, and the thing was gone, taking its fantastic orange retinue of butterflies with it.
Stunned, Teever looked around the fire, but he knew that the corn and coins were nowhere, and that nobody else had seen what he had. There was no rosy desert, just the cold and mud of a deep, icy Mississippi winter night. The storm had cleared and the moon was out now, a minstrel grin in the blackface sky. His throat throbbed from his ecstatic song. The men sat slumped and passive, more committed to their torpor. How much time had gone by? He couldn’t tell if there were more beer cans on the ground, or if the fire was any smaller. The one thing that he was sure of was that he’d had a message or an omen—something. But what the fuck? he thought. What the fuck?
The flower concoction bubbled in the coals. It smelled like ass. Or maybe it was the baking, sour foot. Dr. Bernardo was back outside, his sidekick strutting and pecking behind him. He picked up the steaming bowl with his bare hands and dumped the contents on the foot, patting the poultice into the gash. Teever flinched, expecting pain, but then blissfully remembered he could no longer feel either of his feet at all. Or his hands or face, for that matter.
“Don’t smirch the pants, bro,” he said very slowly. The men mumbled but were over it now, smashed and settled. Reaching into the Walmart bag again, Dr. Bernardo brought out a Light Days maxi pad. On his arm, like a giant bracelet, he wore a wheel of duct tape, and he yanked out a long piece, biting it off with the silver choppers. He held the two sides of the nasty wound together and taped the maxi pad tightly over it. A kid came over and tugged a big, floppy tube sock on over the whole thing. The empty Walmart bag went on with more tape for waterproofing, and a flat flap of old tire made a sole. Stepping back, the two Mexicans grinned at Teever, who wanted to look thankful but wasn’t sure his face knew how. He put a hand up for high fives but only slapped air.
“Otra véz mañana, hokay?” Dr. Bernardo said, pointing at the foot and making a circular motion with his index finger. From the army Teever knew mañana, so he assumed that it was okay to spend the night. The gangster dude came over with a plate of meat and a new beer. He might could eat a little now, if he didn’t really think about it.
“Okay then,” he said. “Yum yum eatem up.” He thought he was smiling his most friendly, appreciative smile, but he couldn’t be sure. Looking around the fire at his new brown friends, the new niggers of this world, he thought that this might be as good as it gets. The graveyard hooch was okay, but he was glad not to have to stay there on this crazy night. He was happy his foot no longer hurt and that his fever had broken and that he was wasted and keeping some pretty good company.
“Okay then, all y’all kimosabes,” he said, “Muchas gracias. Muchas muchas gracias.”
The party seemed to have been going for some time, or it was way later than Ernest thought. Janky Jill’s living room was illuminated by a few stubs of candle. The air was sooty and smelled of pot, bourbon, burnt sugar, burnt hair, and gas space heater. A wood fire was petering out. From the ceiling hung an oil lamp that swayed and smoked like the censers in Sarajevo’s cathedral. Bessie Smith moaned from an old jam box, complaining about men. The song dragged a little as if both Bessie and the jam box batteries lacked the will to go on.
Catching a glimpse of himself in a mirror over the mantel, Ernest noticed that his mousse-stiffened golden coif glowed regally in the candlelight. He imagined himself, for a second, as the Emperor Jones. Or Kurtz. A few people were dancing, wrapped together tightly. Others had tumped over like the trees outside and lay on the floor. A man stumbled past him, going out the door—a music guy, a sort of backcountry Phil Spector who despised him. Good; no problem there. Everyone wore coats and boots. Ernest scanned the room looking for friends and opportunity. He was disappointed—sorely—not to see Byrd but he was in dreadful need of a woman. Sto was hitting on a French graduate student who reclined on some pillows in a corner. He remembered a night with her last summer. She was good-natured a
nd easy, too easy for him. She’d let him wear her yellow panties as an ascot afterward, but she had bored him to death with her graduate student babble about Derrida, deconstruction, postmodernism, all that shit. What the fuck was postmodernism anyway? Besides, he said to himself, the French? Losers. Fuck ’em.
Maybe Byrd was in the kitchen. He made his way to the back of the house where he recognized more late-night people: the vicious dude in the wheelchair who also hated him—how could he be out in the storm?—a line chef from the Bear dancing sensuously with a waitress from Ajax; a young doctor; a shaggy, smelly blues enthusiast; the girl and the two guys who played in Blue Mountain; a handful of pale, scrawny boys in dresses. Ernest thought them not to be gay, or even sexual at all, but he shied away from them anyway. Sorry bastards. Damn. No Mary Byrd. Someone had lit a small fire in the sink, and the two groupies for the Lords of Chevron, Holly Springs girls known as Hump and Pump, were toasting tiny marshmallows with roach clips. Ernest admired their skanky pulchritude. Healthy, pretty girls, they worked hard at maintaining their sickly, fluorescent pallor. Their hair was mayonnaise-colored; one was buzzed soldier-short, and the other’s hair hung lankly on one side as if it had been pressed, the other side short and oddly frizzled. Grayish straps always hung out of the few clothes they wore although tonight they were wearing what appeared to be dog-fur coats.
“Ernest!” the frizzled one said in a cheerful voice. “Want some marshmallows? We’re on a bourbon and marshmallow diet.” Her eyes glittered with reflected candlelight and god only knew what else. “That’s all we’ve eaten for two days. Unless you count the X.”
“Girls, I’ll just skip the sweets if you don’t mind,” he said, reaching behind them for a jug of black Jack. “I’m on kind of a liquid regime, myself. Anyone seen Teever?”
“It’s not, you know, totally unlike, you know, a mint julep,” the other girl said, raising a glass in which some blackened marshmallows floated. “But without the mint. Maybe we could throw in an Altoid.”
