The Many Aspects of Mobile Home Living

by Martin Clark

“Entitled?”

  “For over sixteen years—with one exception—I’ve been a faithful wife, and, for five out of every seven days, lived here like a war bride while you do as you please and come here on the weekends and screw me and watch TV and have me wash your clothes. Life is short, Evers, and a real good piece of mine’s gone, completely wasted. And think of how much money you’ve given your brother to piss away.”

  “That’s not fair. And what is it with all the numbers? You’re John Maynard Keynes now?”

  “You’ve handled this poorly, Evers. You and that simpleton policeman. I haven’t forgotten that. Even though I haven’t done anything about it yet.” Jo Miller was still calm.

  “How should you react when your wife is balling a stranger?”

  “Rationally, Evers. And, you know, you do have a bad attitude about women. A prep-school boy’s attitude. Treat us nice, get us drunk, screw us, see us next month at the mixer. Did it ever occur to you that you left me, refused to stay with me? Did you know you’ve never said you’d miss me when you leave here on Sundays? That we haven’t been on a vacation in over a year? I’m not trying to be harsh, but it’s true.”

  “I had a good opportunity, and you refused to come with me. You’re doing nothing, have no ties, no plans, and you won’t live with me. I didn’t ask you to give up anything. I begged you to come with me, and when you didn’t I bought you a farm and drove down here every weekend. If you missed me, you could’ve driven to Norton. You didn’t want to see me badly enough to drive a couple hours.”

  “And when you come here, you ignore me if there’s anything you want to watch on TV, piss all over the bathroom and leave the soap lying in the tub so it turns to paste before I get around to picking it up.”

  “Those are pretty small failings to use as a justification for adultery, Jo Miller.” Evers was watching a crow through the kitchen window.

  “You just see the world strangely, Evers. Women, people, school, everything.”

  “I think it’s strange that you are treating me so badly, that’s true.”

  “It’s just one of those tensions, Evers. I don’t feel bad about my choices, and you don’t feel bad about yours.”

  “I guess,” Evers said. “Did Falstaf tell you that I might know what was going on?”

  “He mentioned it, yes.”

  Evers didn’t want to argue. “I’ll try to think about things; we’ll see. Maybe we can work something out. I don’t have the stomach for a pitched battle over IRAs and pots and pans.” Steinem was arching and rubbing against Evers’ leg. He bent down and picked up the cat, and then headed toward the back door to put her out into the yard. The instant he stepped into the hall, she started screeching and hissing and battling with her legs and claws. Evers held her away from him, and he looked right at a large, flannel shirt hanging in the laundry room. He turned around and faced Jo Miller, dropped the cat from chest height. “Are you kidding me?”

  “What?” She stood up.

  “That’s Falstaf’s shirt in the laundry room, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. That’s no surprise, is it, Evers?”

  “Has he been here?”

  “Why do you care?”

  “Has he?” Evers’ voice caught.

  “Yes.”

  “In the house that I paid for?” He glared at her.

  “It’s my house, Evers.”

  “Is he living here, Jo Miller?”

  “That’s none of your business. Our marriage is basically over, and I shouldn’t have to answer to you.”

  Evers watched the cat flounce back toward the kitchen, and everything seemed to evaporate, to burn off into the walls and ceiling, until only the stupid cat was registering, and Evers began counting how many steps she was taking. “Three, four, five …,” he mouthed. His mind was reeling, and he thought about slugs—not snails, but slugs, the kind with gleaming brown antennae and slick, dotted bodies, the plump globs that appear on porches in the summer, and if you pour salt on them the slugs dissolve, just bubble away into moisture. Carbonated mollusks, Evers thought. Effervescent pain. He felt tears welling in his eyes, and the room and Jo Miller started to come back to him. He walked out of the kitchen and the house, angry and bewildered and cut all at the same time. “You’re just a shitty person, Jo Miller. You are.”

  She came outside, followed him out the door. “I’m not trying to be mean to you, Evers. I’m not saying you’re a bad person, or spending time with someone else so I can upset you.”

  “That’s great to know.”

  “Evers—”

  He threw up his hands. “Just do whatever you want to, Jo. It doesn’t matter to me.”

  Soon afterward, Jo Miller hired a lawyer and filed for divorce and alimony. Evers suspected he knew why. When he left Durham on Thursday afternoon, he drove to his brother’s house and drank beer and smoked dope with Henry and Rudy and Pascal. They went to a bar and played darts and video games and listened to Dwight Yoakam and ZZ Top on the jukebox. After the bar closed and during the trip back to Pascal’s trailer, the four men had detoured into Durham and, at Pascal’s suggestion, found two puny kittens eating from a Dumpster behind a fast-food restaurant. Pascal fed them both chocolate-flavored Ex-Lax, and he and Evers loosed them in Jo Miller’s car. They had walked through the woods, crept up to Jo Miller’s Lexus and tossed the kittens into the interior. Jo Miller called Evers the next day at his apartment in Norton. He hadn’t gotten there until late in the evening, after work. “I can’t believe you put those cats in my car, Evers. You did that, didn’t you?”

  “What cats, Jo Miller? What are you talking about?”

  A week afterward, Evers and Pascal drove into Winston-Salem to see Ruth Esther. The brothers were dressed in suits, and Evers had bought a new pair of shoes for Pascal. Ruth Esther had just sold five Ford vans to a school district and was in a good mood, glad to see Pascal and Evers. She hugged them both. They went out for dinner at a nice restaurant, and Ruth Esther paid the bill, even though Evers didn’t want her to. After they were finished with their meal, Evers put the bag of green and white stones on the table and told Ruth Esther that he was not going to keep them, that he wanted her to take them back.

  “That wasn’t the deal, though. You did your part. It’s not your fault that my brother stole our money. I want you to have them.”

  Evers slid the bag closer to her. “I don’t have any use for them. I feel bad about the way things turned out. In retrospect, it was a pretty good trip in its own up-and-down way; you were right about that.”

  “Why don’t you at least let me pay you back for your room and the plane tickets?” Ruth Esther asked.

  “There’s no need,” Evers said.

  “We had a good time,” Pascal added. He and Evers were both sober. They had barely finished a beer each during dinner.

  “Where’s your brother? Have you heard from him?”

  “Oh yes.” Ruth Esther sighed. “I’ve heard from him. He called from Salt Lake a few days after we got back. He was completely broke and at wits’ end. Desperate and looking for a way home. He did say that you were right, that Officer Dillon helped him get our money. It looks like he offered the officer the same fifty thousand dollars that the three of us were going to split, and Mr. Dillon accepted my brother’s deal. I had no idea—I hope you believe me about that. And, you know, I guess I should’ve paid a little more attention to what was going on. I thought Artis had told me that the cocaine was in the front seat beside him when the policeman stopped him for runnin’ the sign, and that some had spilled while he was trying to hide it. But I got to court late and thought that maybe I’d missed that part of the case or that Artis—who is not always on top of things—had told me somethin’ wrong when we first talked about what happened.”

  “So the police officer, this guy Dillon, threw the case? He screwed it up on purpose, to make sure that Artis would get off?” asked Pascal. “I mean, that’s what we figured, but now you’re certain, right?”

  “It re
ally looks that way,” Ruth Esther said.

  “Then Artis and the monkey cop split the money, and all’s right with the world until the cop double-crosses him.” Pascal whistled. “How about that? Evers and I were debating the Dillon scam in Utah, and we finally decided that Dillon had to be in on it from the outset, so I guess it’s no big shock.” Pascal whistled again. “Wow.”

  “If they made this deal, I wonder why the policeman went ahead and arrested Artis and took a chance on going to court?” Ruth Esther asked. “Do you see what I’m talking about? How come they just didn’t get on a plane and go? Why risk havin’ a court trial?”

  “We thought about that, too. I feel sure Artis didn’t make Dillon the offer until he had already arrested him and done the paperwork or gotten him to the police station. Even Artis isn’t dumb enough to offer the bribe right away. Dillon was too far into the arrest to simply cut him free.”

  “That makes sense,” Ruth Esther said.

  “Did Artis know that you’d approached me?” Evers wondered.

  “No. There was no reason to tell him and a whole bunch not to. And—to guess what you’re going to say next—it probably wouldn’t have mattered, would it? It looks like Artis had plans for my share—and yours—that pretty much left out everyone except him and his new partner. He traded my part of the money to keep from goin’ to jail.” Ruth Esther folded her arms across her chest. “Unfortunately for Artis, Dillon left him in Salt Lake City and took all the money. At least I think Dillon took all of the money; it’s possible that Artis lost his part or spent it or had it stolen by somebody else. But I’m almost certain that this Mr. Dillon took advantage of Artis, made the deal to let him get away and then took his—our—fifty thousand and Artis’ part on top of that. That’s what Artis said on the phone, for what it’s worth.”

  “Did Artis mention anything about Dillon, where he is?” Pascal asked. “I can’t imagine that he’d come back here. Evers thinks he might come back, but I don’t.”

  “It’s not like we have clean hands,” Evers pointed out. “What are we going to say or do? Why wouldn’t he come back?”

  “That’s true, I guess,” Ruth Esther agreed.

  “I’m afraid he’ll try to ice the cake and fuck me over,” Evers said. “He could very easily say that he was working on the case, followed us to Utah and recovered, say, fifteen thousand dollars of the stolen money, turn that in, turn us in and pocket the rest. We’d all look pretty guilty.”

  “I hope he’ll just leave well enough alone,” Ruth Esther offered. “Certainly he knows that you’re in no position to cause him any real problem.”

  “Let’s hope so.” Evers took out a cigarette and lit it.

  “May I have one?” Pascal asked. “And a match?”

  Evers handed his brother the pack. Pascal offered Ruth Esther a smoke, but she shook her head and refused.

  “Well, it’s good we’ve been back for a while and haven’t heard anything from Dillon or Lester Jackson,” Ruth Esther said.

  “Maybe. The one and only thing I discovered is that our friend Dillon is supposed to be on a three-week vacation in Florida. That’s what one of the other cops told one of my clerks. I wonder if he’s really there. It will be interesting to see what happens when he comes back. If he comes back.”

  “Whatever.” Pascal handed the cigarettes back to Evers.

  “I hope you left Artis’ troll ass in the desert,” Evers said.

  “I sent him a ticket and some money. I haven’t seen or heard from him since, of course.” Ruth Esther didn’t sound surprised or upset.

  “I can’t believe you’d do that for him after he fucked us over. Jesus, Ruth Esther.”

  “He’s my brother, Judge Wheeling. What did you expect me to do? I doubt that he’s so pathetic and bad by choice; no one would want to be so hopeless and simple. It’s his nature. There’s not much he can do about it. I’m sure you would do the same for Pascal.”

  “He always has.” Pascal patted Evers on the back, three quick slaps that were both heartfelt and a little comic.

  Evers looked at the plate in front of Ruth Esther. She’d ordered a salad without dressing and had eaten only a piece of cucumber and two cherry tomatoes. “Are you sure you won’t let me pay for the meal? You didn’t order more than three or four dollars’ worth.”

  “It’s my treat. I’m glad you both came to see me. I looked forward to it all day.”

  Pascal put his cigarette on the edge of his plate. “Do you have a husband or boyfriend or anything?”

  “No.” Ruth Esther smiled.

  “I just wondered.” Pascal pulled his shirtsleeve out from under the arm of his jacket. “That’s good to know.”

  “I’m flattered that you’d ask about something like that.”

  “Sure. Whatever.”

  “So how are things going with your wife and marriage, Judge Wheeling? Any improvement?” Ruth Esther’s legs were crossed, and her hands were resting on her knee.

  “Hardly. We’re going to court soon to see how big a reward she gets for her betrayal and infidelity.”

  “Well, good luck.”

  “Thanks.” He picked up his napkin and wiped the corners of his mouth. “I appreciate your asking.”

  “That reminds me. Have you talked to Pauletta since we got back?”

  “No, I haven’t. Why would I?” Evers wondered.

  “She told me you … went out while you were in Charleston, and that you had a good time. I just wondered if you’d spoken to her again.”

  “I haven’t.”

  “Maybe you should get in touch with her,” Ruth Esther suggested.

  “I might. I might give her a call.” Evers hesitated. “Did she get anything out of the trip? What was her cut?”

  “She wasn’t sharin’ any of the money that Artis and Officer Dillon took. That’s about all I can tell you.”

  “I figured as much,” Evers said. He glanced at Ruth Esther, then started pushing a piece of noodle around his plate with the tip of a butter knife. “You know—I don’t mean to be pushy or rude—but I’m going to stay on this, try to figure it out, find out what the real deal is. You don’t blame me for that, do you? It’s not going to upset you, is it?”

  “It takes right much to upset me, Judge Wheeling,” Ruth Esther said.

  Pascal turned to his brother. “I don’t know why you want to go Ahab on this, Evers. It’s pretty much been a full ride already. How much better is it going to get?”

  “There’s still a lot I want to find out.” Evers set the butter knife on top of a napkin. “I feel like I’ve been looking through a keyhole for the last month or two.”

  “Whatever.”

  In the days that preceded the hearing that would determine whether or not Jo Miller would receive spousal support, Evers spent his time talking to his lawyer and eating fast food with his brother, Rudy and Henry. Evers’ lawyer was a man named Ike White, a tall, heavy man who wore nice suits and had a deep, theatrical voice. White was polished without being glib or pompous, and he loved going to court.

  About a week before the hearing, Pascal began phoning Jo Miller at early hours to wake her and unsettle her before the day in court. There was little need for anyone to phone Evers. He couldn’t sleep and suffered from explosive diarrhea. Pascal made him drink Pepto-Bismol and eat cheese biscuits from Hardee’s. The biscuit wrappers would not lie flat—the ends were turned up at an angle—and they had all sorts of folds and crinkles and were greasy on the inside, slick to the touch. They were all over Pascal’s trailer, empty, wrinkled biscuit papers.

  The court date was on a Tuesday, and Evers didn’t sleep at all the night before. Pascal sat with him in the trailer, neither of them talking very much. Henry and Rudy had come by, both drunk, and tried to cheer up the brothers. During the night Pascal picked up a few of the food wrappers and cleaned some of his ashtrays. There was talk of thawing out the white shrine, but no one really had the heart for it. “Fuck it all,” Pascal finally said. Ever
s wanted to ask his brother some more about Jo Miller, but things were gloomy and tense enough without opening another wound. Since their conversation at the airport, a lot of their time together had seemed cramped, strange and different; simple conversations spun out webs and traps, words grew double-edged, and talk about women or sex or the Utah trip caused Evers and Pascal to glance at each other without meaning to.

  Jo Miller looked especially plain at the hearing. She wore a skirt and a blouse with buttons that were fastened all the way to her neck. Her hair was short, and she wasn’t wearing any jewelry. Her attorney, Norman Wolf, was from Raleigh, a tall man with long gray hair. Evers had heard of Wolf, and by all accounts he was a very competent lawyer. Their judge was an older man, Judge Peter Rollins. He was from Charlotte, a special designate who did not know Evers. Ike White knew Rollins and described him as “traditional,” whatever that meant.

  Jo Miller testified first. She seemed nervous and looked at her hands a lot. After several minutes, it occurred to Evers that much of her nervousness was feigned. She was more poised than that. He wondered if the judge would notice. White asked her several simple questions and then let her testify about her job and her marriage.

  “What kind of relationship did you and Mr. Wheeling have?” Wolf finally asked.

  Jo Miller looked at Evers. “Evers tried to be a good husband. I think he loves me. But, of course, I didn’t get to see him that much because of his decision to leave me and live in Norton.”

  “Did he help support you, take care of you economically?”

  “Sure. Yes. He helped. He’s provided a lot for me, a good standard of living.” Jo Miller cleared her throat. “I’m not trying to say that Evers ever did anything intentionally mean. Given his schedule and the job he had and the distance, he did what he could. He did everything he could, I guess.”

  White looked at Evers and leaned toward him. “Something’s up.”

  “She’s just telling the truth,” Evers answered.

  “Don’t be naive, Evers.”

  “What?”

  White frowned. “She’s telling the truth now. Too much so.”