Somebody Everybody Listens To

by Suzanne Supplee

  I slipped out the door and got into Goggy’s car again. I sat behind the wheel. No point in crying. I started the engine, thought about Estelle’s hug and her kind words. Keep it together, I told myself. I was on the highway when I broke down—in tears, that is. Whenever I’m upset and folks are mean, I handle my problems just fine, but when I’m upset and someone (like Estelle in this case) is too nice, I fall apart. I drove all over town and sobbed, sobbed like Mama really had died instead of just moving to Milldale. It was like there’d been a flash flood—the things I’d taken for granted, like Mama and Daddy and our life together, had been swept away suddenly. I glanced over the seat at all my worldly belongings and pulled off Highway 114. A giant truck whizzed past me and the whole car shook. I tilted the rearview mirror and stared at my splotchy reflection, rubbed my red eyes, then eased the car back onto the road.

  There was plenty of gas in the tank, enough to get me back to the Jackson Hotel. I could be there way before dark, maybe call Emerson to see what her plans were for the Fourth, stop by and say hi to Ricky Dean and Shanay. I took the turn for Route 228, pressed my foot harder on the gas, and hoped there weren’t any state troopers lurking.

  I was almost to the 40 East exit when I pulled off the road a second time. To save gas, I shut off the engine, but I didn’t look at myself in the mirror. Instead, I closed my eyes and tried to pray. I guess the thinking and crying and staying up all night with Daddy had worn me out because the next thing I knew I jolted straight up, gasping and spitting for air as if somebody’d been holding my head underwater.

  Dysphoria, Brenda called it (she was always teaching me medical terms), the awful feeling you get when you’ve drifted off to sleep and woken up suddenly—it feels like the whole world is caving in right on top of you. I wanted to jump out of the car and take off running. Run till the sweat poured off me. Run till I couldn’t think or feel anything. But I glanced down at my cowboy boots. I’d never been a runner, not even in gym class with the proper clothes and shoes, so instead of running, I just sat there.

  After a few minutes, the heaviness lifted off my chest. I imagined it floating out the window—the weight of the life I’d wanted for myself, the burden of my parents’ unhappy marriage, the dreams too heavy for one girl to carry. I could practically see it all sailing up to the sky, but I didn’t try to stop it.

  Something peaceful settled over me as I drove back to Starling. I’d clean up the house and get Daddy settled into a new routine. I’d return Goggy’s car, thank her for letting me use it, and look for a new job. The Taco Bell still had that “Team Member Wanted” sign up. Maybe in a few months, I could save up enough money for a car of my own. Start all over in Nashville when things were calmer here. Lots of people probably left their families in times of trouble, but for some reason, I didn’t have it in me to be one of them.

  gretchen wilson

  BORN: June 26, 1973; Pocahontas, Illinois

  JOB: By the age of fourteen, Wilson was working and singing at a local bar.

  BIG BREAK: Wilson moved to Nashville in 1996, and took a job bartending in Printers Alley. She also sang with the house band. After hearing Wilson perform one night, Big Kenny and John Rich (of Big & Rich fame) offered to help get her music career off the ground. Eventually, John and Gretchen wrote “Redneck Woman,” a song that reached number one on the Billboard country charts and stayed put for six weeks.

  LIFE EVENTS: In the ninth grade, Wilson left home, and since she had to work full-time to support herself, she reluctantly dropped out of high school. In 2008, at the age of thirty-four, Wilson passed her high school equivalency exam.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  redneck woman

  I’M COMING TO GET YOU,” Brenda whispered. “I just have to make my supervisor think I’m sick. She coughed noisily into the phone, just the way she used to in the nurse’s office at Starling High School when we were trying to cut classes. “And why didn’t you tell me what was going on, lame ass? I heard about your mama from one of the orderlies when I got to work this morning.”

  “You don’t have to leave the hospital on account of me. I’m fine, really,” I said, and yawned into the phone.

  “You might as well save your breath because I’m coming over.” She hacked again. “I’ll call you back as soon as I get out of here.” Brenda hung up, and I lay on the threadbare sofa and watched dust particles float through the air; I was too lazy to even reach for the remote and turn on the TV. Or go clean up the dishes piled in the sink. Or get dressed. Or brush my teeth.

  Daddy had gone to work, thankfully. At least I’d have ten hours or so before he was back and cussing a blue streak or slinging things or stomping around the house in his muddy work boots. Normally, Mama made him leave his boots on the porch, but now there was mud on the kitchen mat and all over the linoleum in the rest of the house. This morning there was even a muddy boot print in the bathtub, don’t ask me how it got there.

  Brenda called again. “Are you presentable?” she asked.

  “Well, I’m not walking around naked. Why?”

  “Shave your legs and put on a bathing suit. I’ll be there in half an hour,” she said, and hung up.

  When I looked out the window a short while later and saw Bobby McGee and Wayne Sharpton standing in my front yard, I nearly died. “Y’all wait right here. I’ll go get Retta,” I heard Brenda say. She came bounding up the steps and burst through the front door. “Retta!” she shouted, but I was standing right in front of her, still in my boxers and a T-shirt, hair a mess and no bra.

  “What are you doing?” we both said at the same time.

  “Retta, I told you to shave and get a bathing suit. You look like shit on a stick.” Before I could stop her, she reached for my calf to check the stubble factor. “When’s the last time you used a razor? Easter? Now come on.”

  “I’m not going anywhere.”

  “Oh, yes, you are,” she said, and shoved me toward the bathroom. If I didn’t follow her orders, she’d probably give me a sponge bath. Reluctantly, I complied.

  In record time, I was in my yellow bikini with a pair of shorts over the bottoms and a T-shirt on top. My legs were freshly shaved and moisturized, and my hair was pulled back in a wet ponytail. I’d stuck my head under the faucet so I would at least look like I’d showered.

  “Hey, Retta,” said Bobby. He wore navy blue swimming trunks, no shirt, and flip-flops. His skin was smooth as silk and tan from working at McClellan’s all summer. Normally, my heart would’ve gone all fluttery at such a sight, but today it didn’t even react.

  “Hey, Bobby. Hi, Wayne,” I said. Wayne gave me one of his teasing winks, and I felt my cheeks go pink. Whatever Brenda knew about me Wayne pretty much did, too—“information by association,” they called it—including the fact that I’d like-liked Bobby for as long as I could remember.

  “Wayne, you drive, sweetie, and I’ll squeeze in back with Retta,” said Brenda. “There’s not enough room back here for you, Bobby. Your legs are too long.”

  The T-tops were out, and Wayne jacked up the music. River music, we called it. Hank Jr., Gretchen Wilson, the Gatlin Brothers. Alabama’s “Tennessee River” blasted on Brenda’s brand-new sound system—an Alpine stereo with subwoofers, a graduation present from Wayne. Brenda passed the bag of Doritos then twisted open a liter of Dr Pepper. “You need caffeine in a big way,” she said, and made me drink straight from the bottle.

  We grabbed all our stuff out of the trunk—cooler, beach towels, bags of extra clothes, lunch (which Wayne’s nice mama had packed for us)—and headed toward his uncle’s Grady-White.

  “I thought we’d ski first,” said Wayne when we were out on the water.

  “I’m ready,” Bobby replied. “Unless you want to go first,” he added, and looked at me.

  Cute, and polite, too. “No, you go ahead,” I replied, and thought about those schoolbooks on the front seat of his truck that day. This boy was going places, I knew. Bobby hopped in the water, and I threw him the li
fe vest. He swam out to the rope, which Wayne had hurled about a mile away, tugged on his slalom ski, and gave the thumbs-up sign. Wayne gunned the engine, and Bobby popped right up, his skin glistening with the silvery beads of water. He was an excellent skier—ten-foot rooster tails, sharp, fast cuts across the wake, leaning so far in his shoulder practically grazed the water’s surface. Kids who grow up on the river are expected to be great skiers, and Bobby didn’t disappoint.

  After the rest of us got a turn—all except for Brenda (she has a phobia about snapping turtles)—we headed over to the man-made beach at Percy’s Landing to sunbathe and eat lunch. It was the perfect summer day—sunny but not too hot and big cottonball clouds in the sky. On the basic physical level, it was nice, but inside I was still flat. Flat. Flat. Flat.

  “You know, Brenda, it’s only on land that you got to worry about snapping turtles,” Bobby said once we were settled on the shore. Brenda’s eyes grew wide, and she glanced around as if a whole army of turtles might come crawling out of the tall grass any second. “Seriously. They can’t fit in their shells properly, so in water they don’t feel so threatened, but on land even the slightest provocation could set one off.”

  “Are you pulling my leg, Bobby McGee?”

  Wayne groaned. “What’d you have to tell her that for?”

  “No, I just meant that if she’s willing to sit here, she might as well jump in the river. It’s the same difference.”

  “Okay, that’s it!” Brenda hopped to her feet. “We’re eating lunch on the boat, Wayne. Come on.” She scooped up the Tupperware containers.

  “Brenda, no turtle’s gonna bother you,” Wayne protested.

  “That’s right. Because we’re eating on the boat. If Retta and Bobby want to sit here like turtle bait, that’s their business, but I plan to make it home with all my appendages.”

  I knew what Brenda was trying to do. Yes, she was afraid of snapping turtles, but she was also looking for a way to leave me and Bobby alone together. Normally, I would’ve been grateful for her efforts, but I didn’t want small talk today.

  When they were gone, Bobby and I sat side by side and polished off our sandwiches, neither of us saying a word. I thought about the dream I’d had back in Nashville, and glanced over at Bobby. His lips were very appealing, even with a smudge of pimiento cheese on the upper one. He looked at me, then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

  “What?” he said. “I have it all over my face, don’t I?”

  “Nope, you got it,” I replied.

  “So Brenda says you’re home for good now.”

  The comment caught me off guard. I shrugged. “Looks that way. My parents are . . . going through some stuff.”

  “Oh,” Bobby said, and finished the last crust of sandwich.

  I waited for him to say something else, give me some clue as to how much he’d heard via the Starling grapevine, but he kept quiet. “Guess it would’ve been pointless anyway, to stay in Nashville, I mean. So few people make it in the music business. Thousands of girls like me pour into that city every year, and we all want the same thing. Out of those thousands, maybe one will end up with a song on the radio.”

  “I seriously doubt they’re like you,” said Bobby. He looked at me. He had the prettiest blue eyes, and the tips of his lashes were bleached out from the sun, barely visible until you got up close. I’d never noticed this detail before.

  “Thanks,” I replied, and smiled at him, but he didn’t smile back.

  “You always seemed like the type of girl who was gonna go off and do big things with her life.”

  “I bet that’s not what my teachers thought.”

  “I bet it is,” Bobby said without missing a beat. “It’s what all of us thought.”

  “I just meant that I never got good grades. You, on the other hand, always got good grades. Was there ever a quarter when Bobby McGee’s name wasn’t on the honor roll?”

  “That doesn’t mean I’m gonna set the world on fire.”

  “Well, then that makes two of us. Nobody will need to call the volunteer firefighters on account of me.”

  “And you’re okay with that?” he asked. There was something about his tone I didn’t care for—judgment or disappointment.

  “My family needs me right now,” I replied. Bobby looked at me doubtfully. “What? They do.”

  “That’s probably true,” he said like he was challenging me.

  “It’s not probably true. It is true.”

  “I just think you’re making a mistake is all.”

  “Well, the last time I checked, I didn’t ask for your opinion.”

  “I know. You didn’t. I’m sorry if I made you mad,” Bobby said. He stood abruptly and shouted at Wayne. “Let’s get in another round of skiing. I got to be home by six so I can take my brother to ball practice.”

  Bobby gathered his things and headed toward the boat. My mood was no longer flat. In fact, I was puffed-up angry now. I jumped to my feet and shook the sand out of the beach towel. When I turned around, Bobby was standing right there.

  He said something, but Wayne cranked Kenny Chesney on stereo, so I didn’t hear him.

  “What?” I asked.

  “I’m not sorry. I apologized before, but I didn’t mean it. I’m glad I told you what I think, even if it’s not what you want to hear.”

  For the rest of the afternoon, I tried way too hard to have a good time. I made Wayne replace Kenny’s happy party music with Gretchen Wilson’s “Redneck Woman,” then insisted Brenda and I do our own rendition, complete with dance moves. Whenever Bobby said a word, I launched a sarcastic comeback at him until he finally gave up talking and went to sit in the front of the boat by himself.

  I’m a loser in so many different ways.

  Wayne wanted to ski again, so Bobby drove and Brenda shot me what-the-hell-is-the-matter-with-you looks. I ignored her and stared straight ahead. When Wayne finished and was back in the boat, Brenda announced that she was sunburned and wanted to go home. Obviously, this was a lie because Brenda looks like Miss Hawaiian Tropic twelve months out of the year, but nobody argued with her.

  The whole ride back to the marina, I thought about the day I’d run into Bobby at Smoky’s Market. He’d given me such a nice compliment: Your voice just soared right up to the rafters. I’ll never forget it. In a way, it was those few words that had changed the course of my summer. Instead of going to Bluebell’s to beg for my crappy job, as planned, I’d gone to Goggy’s a second time and ended up with her car.

  At the dock we unloaded our stuff—soggy towels, sloshy cooler, trash, and recycling—then hauled it all to Brenda’s car and stuffed it into the trunk. Everything had that fishy river smell, and I couldn’t wait to get home and shower. Fortunately, I live closer than anybody, so they dropped me off first.

  Brenda got out and walked me to the porch. “I’ll call you later, okay?” she said, and hugged me.

  “Thanks for trying,” I whispered, and held on to her a second longer. Brenda hadn’t stuck so much as one toe in the water, so she still smelled like the girl I’d known all through high school—suntan lotion and Baby Phat perfume and cigarettes.

  Wayne honked the horn as the three of them drove away, and they waved good-bye. Even Bobby.

  Daddy still wasn’t home, so I sat on the top step for a few minutes. It was that time of day when the sunlight slants through the trees and makes a lacy pattern all over our yard. The mosquitoes were awful, but considering my behavior today, I deserved a few bites. As I swatted and scratched and studied the intricate shadows on our sparse grass, I couldn’t help but wonder if this was how I’d be all the time now: permanently and pathologically pissed off at the world.

  If so, Bobby McGee could say he tried to warn me.

  The next morning I lay in bed until I heard Daddy’s truck leave, then I turned on my cell phone to find three messages from Mama:

  Message One: “Retta, I would like to see you. Maybe you could drive out here to the house, and I coul
d fix you lunch. I still didn’t get to hear all about your Nashville adventures. Call me.”

  She left the number three times and said each digit slowly.

  Message Two: “Retta, I guess you’re probably mad at me. I guess it’ll just take time for us all to adjust. I . . . guess . . . well . . . Call me, okay? Here’s my number again in case you erased it.”

  She said the number just once this time.

  Message Three: “Retta, I just want you to know that I love you, and I am your mother. You won’t ever get another one. Trust me, I know all about that. Losing your Granny Larky was just about the worst thing that ever happened to me. Anyway, I won’t bother you again. If you need to get in touch with me, you know where I am. I expect the number’s on your caller ID. Bye.”

  I tossed the phone aside and tried to go back to sleep, but that water spot on the ceiling was even bigger now, and the Sheetrock was starting to bubble. I couldn’t stop staring at it, so I got up and looked out the window. Mama’s pot of orange impatiens caught my eye. They were lush and full now, which was a miracle since she’d planted them from seed. She wouldn’t call again. Mama had done her part, and now it was up to me.

  I threw on some shorts and a T-shirt, then slid my feet into flip-flops. Hurriedly, I brushed my teeth and washed my face. Mama would just have to deal with my messy bed head, I decided, and raced out the door.

  The whole drive to Milldale, my stomach twisted in knots. Would the Dollar King be there? Would he welcome me with open arms and a 20 percent family discount? And what if he was all mushy with Mama, hugging and kissing on her? I squeezed the steering wheel so tightly my knuckles turned white, but I kept on going.

  The Wilmsteed homestead wasn’t quite so spectacular in the light of day. It was way nicer than our house, of course, but some of the fencing needed painting, and the paved driveway was cracked in places. The house itself was old, Civil War old, in fact, according to an historic marker alongside the driveway.