The Familiar Dark

by Amy Engel

  It wasn’t until the song ended and she was climbing down off the stage that I recognized her. She’d been a brunette when I’d known her, living with her older sister a mile or two down the road. We hadn’t been friends, exactly, but we’d stuck together in junior high. Not because we particularly liked each other, but because we were painfully aware that we came from the same place and there was safety in numbers. As far as I remembered, she hadn’t continued on into high school.

  “Hey, Crystal,” I said when she got within spitting distance. There was a faint slur to my words, my voice a little higher than normal. The vodka was sitting in my gut like a sparking fire. She looked at me blankly, and I wondered if I’d gotten her name wrong. Maybe it wasn’t Crystal after all, although that was a favorite in my mama’s part of the world. It could have been Diamond. That one got a lot of play, too. As if the shimmer and shine of the names themselves could make up for the sad stripper lives they were destined to precede. I guess I should’ve counted myself lucky that my mama had picked up some Bible learning along the way and had written Eve on my birth certificate instead of Sapphire or Destiny.

  “Oh, hey,” she said finally. “Eve, right? I haven’t seen you in forever.”

  “Yeah, it’s been a while.”

  Crystal leaned over the bar, and I swiveled in my chair. “Can I get a Bud Light?” she asked Sam, and he nodded, handed her an icy bottle. “God.” She sighed. “That tastes good. You wouldn’t think it, but those lights are hot as fuck.” She eyed me over her bottle. “You come in here to hang out?”

  I shrugged, pointed at my glass until Sam got the hint. “Yeah.”

  “Huh. I can think of about half a dozen better spots. Including your own living room.” She took another swig of beer. “Why in the hell would you want to spend time in this dump if you didn’t have to?”

  “It seemed like a good idea at the time.”

  That got a half smile out of her, a peek of a canine tooth and a flash of silver filling. “I hear ya. When you need a drink, you need a drink.”

  I didn’t correct her notion that drinking was a regular habit of mine. To be fair, judging from the way I was slamming down my vodkas, she had a basis for thinking I still liked the booze. And even though I didn’t enjoy the taste anymore, I was definitely enjoying the fuzziness at the edge of my vision, the blurry wall every swallow built between me and the world.

  Crystal gave a quick hoot of laughter. “Remember in eighth grade when we stole a bottle from my sister, Wild Turkey or some shit, and you ended up puking in English class? I can still see the look on Mrs. Johnson’s face when the smell hit her. How long did they suspend you for that time?”

  “Two days.” The principal had already given up on me by that point, hadn’t even bothered to give me the same old lecture about getting my shit together and thinking of my future. He’d known as well as I had that I didn’t have a future beyond my mama’s. He probably thought I’d hit rock bottom already, but it turned out there was further to go. More suspensions for drinking and fighting in high school, a looming threat of expulsion, even a ride in the back of Land’s cruiser with my hands cuffed behind my back for threatening a teacher. And then Junie came along and saved me.

  Crystal pushed away her half-empty beer bottle, straightened one of her tassels with a practiced hand. “I thought maybe you were in here looking for your brother, but I haven’t seen him lately.”

  “Wait, what?” I said, words stumbling and slow. “My brother doesn’t come in here.”

  “Sure he does,” Crystal said, going to work on her other tassel, untangling the shimmery black threads. She glanced over at me. “I mean, not to stuff dollar bills in my crotch or anything.”

  I shook my head, thinking that might clear away the alcohol cobwebs, but the room tilted and spun. “My brother?” My words were more than slightly slurred now, the syllables running together in one long exhalation. “Cal?”

  “That’s who we’re talking about,” Crystal said. “Good-looking. Cop.” She made a gun of her fingers and pulled the trigger in illustration. “Whoa, easy.” She grabbed my shoulder. “You definitely can’t hold your liquor, can you?”

  “I’m not . . .” I palmed hair off my face. “I’m not used to drinking.” I jerked away from her hand, caught myself on the edge of the bar when I almost toppled off the stool. “What was Cal doing in here?”

  Crystal didn’t touch me again, but her hand hovered nearby, ready to catch me if I pitched forward. “Well, that’s beyond my pay grade. I’m not exactly privy to what goes on in here that doesn’t involve tits and ass. But he was always huddling with that Matt guy. The asshole who got himself blown all to hell a few days ago? That’s as much as I know.”

  I would have given anything to wipe away the inability to focus that I’d been loving only a second before. Nothing that Crystal was saying made sense, and I couldn’t clear my brain enough to put any pieces together.

  “Gotta go,” she said. “You gonna be okay?”

  “Yeah, but wait,” I managed. “Stay for a second.”

  “No can do,” Crystal said, already walking away. “It’s my song.”

  I watched as she sashayed across the floor, cheap stilettos tapping, and climbed back up to the stage. A mask dropped over her face as she stood, her eyes going blank and faraway. I caught Sam’s attention by slamming my glass down on the bar, and he hurried over, his eyebrows pinching together.

  “Did you hear that?” I asked him. “What she said about my brother and Matt?”

  “No,” Sam said. “But I wouldn’t put too much stock in anything Crystal says. She’s not the most reliable person. Likes to stir up shit.” He wiped down the bar in front of me. “Can I get you a water?”

  I stared at my empty glass. Water was what I needed, but it wasn’t what I wanted. I wanted oblivion. For the first time since Junie died, the pain felt distant. Not gone, but not a raw, exposed wound, either. Hidden behind a semi-opaque wall. I could see its outlines, but not its details. So I had a fourth vodka. And maybe a fifth. I don’t remember. My last coherent memory was my forehead resting on the bar, my stomach rolling, a bead of sweat down my back, a man’s voice in my ear. And then nothing.

  * * *

  • • •

  I woke up naked, between cotton sheets. A ceiling fan whirling above my head. Popcorn ceiling with a watermark in the corner. I knew that ceiling. I knew that fan. Fuck. I turned my head, and Jimmy Ray looked back at me from the opposite pillow. I stayed still, like maybe if I didn’t move, didn’t acknowledge him, I could go back to sleep, wake up a second time and be somewhere else.

  “Hey, Eve,” he said. “You look like hell.”

  “Thanks,” I muttered. I stretched out my leg, froze when it brushed up against his.

  Jimmy Ray hooted out a laugh that pierced my skull. “You should see your face right now. You’d think this was the first time you’d ever been naked in my bed.”

  I closed my eyes, forced my aching brain to remember. I got only bits and pieces, shimmery and vague. A hand under my legs, lifting me. The slam of a car door. My arm tangled in my bra strap and my laughter, loud and crazed. Jimmy Ray’s face moving closer, my hand curled around the back of his neck.

  “I was drunk,” I said. My voice was thick and hoarse, my stomach caught somewhere in my throat.

  “Yep,” Jimmy Ray said. “Wasted.” He nudged me with his knee. “Never seen you like that before.”

  “And you never will again.” I pushed myself upright, one hand holding the sheet to my chest. I rested my forehead on my bent knees. Baby steps.

  “You were definitely looking to get wrecked.” Jimmy Ray ran a finger down my back, bumping over my spine. I hated myself for not hating his touch. “Was it about Junie?” He asked the question so quietly, so sincerely, that I looked over my shoulder to see if he was screwing with me. But his face was solemn, his eyes steady
on mine.

  “Everything’s about Junie,” I told him. Saying her name sparked something, like a lit match that sputters in your fingers, not quite sure if it’s going to take. I pressed my fingers against my temples, not sure if I was willing the memory of last night to gel into something solid or hoping it would disappear into the shadowy corridors of my mind. “I saw my mama yesterday. She spent time with Junie. Did you know that?”

  “Yeah. I saw ’em in the Bait & Tackle a time or two. They were two peas in a pod, always huddled together in the back corner.”

  “Doing what?” I’d swung toward him too fast and had to put one hand down on the bed to steady myself, bile rising. “What were they talking about?”

  “Hell, girl, I don’t know. Eavesdropping on them wasn’t top priority for me.” He paused, thinking. “I did hear Lynette telling Junie that she’d never finished junior high, that she wasn’t much for book learning. She was encouraging Junie to keep up with her studies, far as I could tell.” He shrugged. “Seemed harmless to me.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “My mama is never harmless. You know that. I can’t believe you didn’t tell me about seeing them together.”

  “We haven’t exactly been on speaking terms these past few years,” he reminded me. “Hell, if I even tried to say hello, you hit me with the stink eye before I could get a word out. And as I recall, Land gave me a pretty stern talking-to after our last fight. Told me to mind my own business where you were concerned. Besides, far as I knew, it wasn’t a secret that Junie and your mama saw each other. They were kin, weren’t they?” Jimmy Ray reached behind him with one hand, pulled his pillow up a little and settled back down. “That’s what brought you into my place last night? You wanted to ride my ass about your mama and Junie knowing each other?” He sounded dubious, at best.

  “I wasn’t looking for you, if that’s what you’re thinking,” I said, wanting to wipe the smirk right off his face. It didn’t work. Maybe because I’d still ended up in his bed, one way or the other. “I’m not sure why I was there. I wanted to forget everything for a little while, I guess.” I paused, pulling on my memories again, worrying at the threads. Knowing this road was nowhere I really wanted to go, but helpless to stop walking it. Because in the light of day, Junie loomed large again. The pain was back, full throttle, and with it the anger. Burning and boiling below the surface. “I talked to Crystal while I was there.”

  “Crystal.” Jimmy Ray snorted. “Pretty accurate name given her meth habit.”

  “She said something about Matt and Cal.” I hoped he would contradict Crystal, tell me she was full of shit. “That they were always talking. Hanging out. Or something.”

  “You’ll have to ask your brother about that,” Jimmy Ray said after a pause that went on a little too long.

  My heart plummeted, left a hollow, aching void in my chest. “You’re saying it’s true?”

  Jimmy Ray shook his head. “I’m not saying shit. I’m saying you’ll have to talk to your brother if you want answers to a question like that.”

  “Fine,” I said, “that’s what I’ll do.” I slid my legs to the edge of the bed. I took a deep breath, grabbed my underwear and jeans from the floor, and pulled them on, ignoring Jimmy Ray’s eyes on my bare ass. Nothing he hasn’t seen before, I told myself. Last night, in fact, if we’re keeping track. “By the way, weren’t you the one telling me I wasn’t asking the right questions a few days ago? ‘Follow the money, Eve,’ isn’t that what you told me? And now, suddenly, you’ve got nothing to say?”

  “Nope,” Jimmy Ray said. He sounded amused.

  “Where’s my bra?” I asked, turning to face him with one arm over my breasts.

  “Around here somewhere.” He grinned at me. “You’re crazy if you think I’m helping you find it. I’m enjoying the show too much.”

  “You’re disgusting,” I told him. Threw aside blankets and kicked through piles on the floor until I found it, then my shirt wadded into a ball next to his dresser. “Can you give me a ride back to my car?”

  “No need. It’s right out front. I had Sam drive it over last night.”

  Vintage Jimmy Ray. On the surface it seemed like a thoughtful gesture, but really it was insurance against me outstaying my welcome. I leaned over to pick up my shoes, still moving slowly to keep my stomach from sliding into my mouth, and Jimmy Ray reached out, locked his hand around my wrist. I jerked upright, shoes forgotten, tried to pull away.

  “Sit,” he said, giving my arm a tug. I pulled backward, but he tightened his grip. “Sit,” he repeated, less give in his voice this time, patting the bed next to his hip with his free hand. “For a second.”

  I sat gingerly, the edge of my butt touching the bed, my whole body wound tight and poised for flight. I didn’t think he was in a hitting mood, but with Jimmy Ray you could never tell for sure. He sighed, like I was being ridiculous, but he let go of my wrist, made himself comfortable again on his stack of pillows. “Remember Libby Lang?” he asked me.

  “Yeah,” I said. “Of course I do.” When I was growing up, people told the story of Libby Lang with a kind of predatory glee, the same way I suspected city kids told stories of girls snatched off the street by strangers or houses haunted by killer ghosts. A mythical legend meant to warn, but also to titillate. It didn’t matter if the story was true; what mattered was the lesson. Don’t be like Libby. Don’t let it happen to you. All of it always blowing back on Libby, everyone else involved somehow wiped crystal clean of any blame. The story was always a little different depending on who told it, but in the version I heard most often Libby was raised by her mama in a trailer not far from where I grew up. She was one of eight or ten kids—the number changed with the teller. All of them with different daddies—that part of the story never varied. But when Libby was about twelve or thirteen, she got a wild hair up her ass to find her real daddy. Maybe she was tired of whoever her mama had playing the role at the time, some loser with meaty fists or wandering hands. Or maybe she was one of those fanciful girls, the kind who entertain stories about how somewhere out there is a real family who will save them, cuddle them, and treat them like the princesses they were meant to be. A fool, in other words. The only link Libby had to her father was her paternal grandma, a woman she saw maybe once or twice a year. When Libby asked about her father, her grandma warned her off. Told her that he didn’t have no interest in knowing Libby, that he wasn’t a good man. Which, given the rumors about Libby’s granny, seems like advice Libby might’ve wanted to heed. If that woman—who bred fighting dogs and threw her own children out like leftover trash—thought someone was bad news, then he surely was. But Libby was stubborn, and she kept asking around. Sticking her nose in where it didn’t belong. This is the point in the story when everyone’s voice dropped, the words coming out more like a hiss. Eventually, she found out where her daddy was holed up deep in the holler (making moonshine or meth—again it depended on who told the story) and Libby took off to find him. Everyone knew it wouldn’t come to anything good, and they were proved right when she showed back up a month or so later, beaten half to death, missing a finger, and pregnant. The thing was, no one around here had any sympathy for Libby, who should have known better. There are consequences to digging too much, to trying to find people who don’t want to be found, to not taking no for an answer. To pushing past your limits. Libby was the poster child for I told you so. The wretched face next to the definition of she had it coming.

  “That story’s probably not even true,” I said. “Just some made up bullshit to keep us all in line.”

  “It’s true,” Jimmy Ray said. “I knew her. She was my age.” His voice was serious along with his face, lines etched around his mouth. “She had the baby and then she killed it. Killed herself, too. Drank a bottle of bleach. She thought she knew what she could handle, how much she could take. But she was wrong.”

  Goose bumps prickled the back of my neck, and I crossed my
arms, cupped my elbows against a sudden chill. “Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m nothing like Libby Lang. She was a kid. I’m a grown woman.”

  “Pain don’t discriminate, Eve. It doesn’t know if you’re grown. Doesn’t care, either. It hits as hard either way. Libby wanted to know who her daddy was, but she would have been better off leaving well enough alone.” Jimmy Ray leaned forward, green eyes glittering in the dark purple shadows around his still healing nose. “Sometimes the answers are worse than the questions. Sometimes it’s better not to know.”

  “I have to,” I whispered. I didn’t know how to explain it to him, this man who’d never loved anyone, not really. How Junie might not be in the world anymore, but that didn’t make her any less present. She was entwined with every part of me. Every muscle, every drop of blood in my body, every breath I took, every thought and wish and memory. I couldn’t put all that away, keep going and forget about what had been done to her. Couldn’t be such a coward that I shied away from the truth, even if it was the killing kind.

  “Okay, suit yourself,” Jimmy Ray said, wiping his hands of it, of me. He threw himself back on the pillows, watched as I stood and slipped on my shoes. “Am I gonna see you around here again?”

  “No,” I said. Whichever way this went, from here on out, Jimmy Ray and I were over. I had a feeling I’d find my self-destruction somewhere else soon enough.

  TWENTY-TWO

  I made it as far as my car, slid in behind the wheel, before I ran out of energy. My head throbbed in time with my heartbeat, and my tongue lay thick and foreign in my mouth. I closed my eyes, forcing back the sting of tears, as the first rays of daylight peeked over the horizon. I couldn’t remember ever being this tired, this down-to-the-bone exhausted, not even in those early weeks after Junie was born. Maybe Jimmy Ray was right. Maybe it was time to let things lie, stop poking around like a dumb kid messing with a nest of rattlers. Junie might even forgive me for giving up. But I knew I wouldn’t forgive myself, that I’d never have a true peaceful moment until I saw this through to the end. I opened my eyes and started the car.