Over the Fence

by Mary Monroe

  “Humph! I can’t believe Oscar had the nerve to make a fuss over some stuff he got by cheating in a card game. Some people ain’t got no shame,” I remarked.

  “I feel the same way.” Willie Frank chuckled. “You going home, or do you want me to drop you off someplace else? Sweet Sue sure gave my pecker a good workout. Oomph! You want to let her fix you up before you go home?”

  “My pussycat tab is past due again. Aunt Mattie told me I can’t have no more fun with her girls until I bring my account up to date. That greedy old bitch!”

  “Don’t worry about that. It’ll be my treat.”

  That got my attention right away. “Oh yeah? What do Sweet Sue look like?”

  “Well, she could stand to put on a few pounds, and I got more hair on my chest than she got on her head. But her tail is damn sure worth two dollars.”

  “Hmmm. Then I guess I’ll have to check her out soon. I got me a piece of tail from Tiny last week, so I’m in good shape for a few more days. So for today I’ll settle for the tail I got at home. I don’t like to spread myself too thin, like some men.”

  I immediately thought about Odell. Poking two women full-time for more than five years, he had probably wore his pecker down to a nub by now. Willie Frank was looking straight ahead, so he didn’t see the grin on my face.

  “Drop me off at that jook joint on Brewster Road,” I said. “I guess I should try my luck at a poker game while I got the urge and a few dollars.”

  It was a fifteen-minute ride to the jook joint. Since we had come up with a plan on how to deal with Oscar, we didn’t discuss him no more during the ride. I was still concerned about how this theft thing was going to play out, but I didn’t see no sense in dwelling on it. Besides, I was anxious to get in on a game. That was what I needed to focus on. By the time Willie Frank let me out, we was laughing and joking like we didn’t have nary a care in the world.

  * * *

  It was a good thing I had put a deck of marked cards in my pocket before I left home. If I hadn’t, I would have lost every dime in my pocket.

  “Milton, you sure is lucky this evening.” Talking to me was Casper “Cap” Griffin, the man who ran the jook joint I was at. He was only ten years older than me, but because he was a great big fat man who was usually jolly and easygoing, he seemed a lot older. One of the reasons I had chose to cheat at his place was that he was known to be the meek and gentle type. I’d never heard him raise his voice when people pushed his buttons. And because he didn’t seem threatening, it made more sense to me to start cheating at his place instead of one that had a history of violence.

  The other four men I had skunked had already left the kitchen, where we always played on a table with mismatched legs. Me and Cap was still sitting across from one another. He didn’t look too happy. I was feeling so good, I thought I was going to bust open from all the joy in my heart. Why hadn’t I thought about marking a deck of cards before? For all I knew, them suckers that had skunked my tail so many times had probably used marked cards! With that thought in mind, I didn’t feel the least bit guilty. I did feel a little guilty about stealing Oscar’s stuff, though. I almost wished we hadn’t done it. But if we hadn’t, I wouldn’t have had enough spare money to get in the game tonight.

  “Well, as long as I been coming over here—and losing most of the time—my luck was bound to change sooner or later, my man,” I said.

  “Luck changing a little is one thing. You won almost every game tonight, and that’s mighty suspicious.” Cap folded his arms across his barrel-shaped bosom. “Let me check out them cards you insisted on using. I don’t know why I didn’t think to do it after you won them first three games in a row.”

  “Now, wait a minute. I won fair and square. You ain’t never been a spoilsport before.” I scooped up my cards and slid them back into my pocket.

  Me and Cap had been friends since before I went to prison. This was the first time I seen a frown on his face, and the first time I heard him raise his voice. “I ain’t never lost so much money to you before! You can’t be that lucky without some kind of scheme!”

  “Now . . . now, you hold on there! I don’t like it when people drop hints about me that ain’t true. Shoot! You just hurt my feelings.” I thought a little sulking would make my case stronger.

  “If you ain’t playing with marked cards, you ain’t got nothing to worry about. But I want to see that for myself!”

  “Shame on you, Cap! I thought you was one of my best friends, and that you trust me as much as I trust you. I see I was wrong.”

  “If you want me to stay one of your best friends, you’ll let me take a look-see at them cards!”

  “I . . . I can’t take no . . . no more of this abuse,” I stuttered, with my bottom lip poked out like a second tongue. I eased up out of my chair and started backing toward the door, shaking my head. “Your behavior is unspeakable! And you just got baptized last month! I’ll come back tomorrow, when you sober. But for now, I’m going to get on down the road. Everybody with wheels done already left, and it’s a long walk to the bus stop.”

  “You know damn well them buses done stopped going to the colored part of town this time of day.”

  “Then I’ll have to walk, like I done the last time I stayed out here too late.”

  “You ain’t going no place until I check them cards!” Cap slammed his fist down so hard on the table, it almost fell over.

  I didn’t waste no more time. He weighed almost four hundred pounds, and his hands was so humongous, he could have laid me out with one tied behind his back. With him being so fat, he couldn’t stand up fast enough, let alone chase somebody as fleet footed as me. While he was struggling to wobble up out of his chair, I bolted out the back door. Before he even made it outside, I was in the wind. When I got about half a mile away, I took the money I’d won out of my pocket and hid it in my shoe. That was where I planned to hide my money until I felt safe again.

  CHAPTER 26

  MILTON

  I SPRINTED DOWN THE ROAD UNTIL MY LEGS COULDN’T TAKE IT NO more. Then I started walking. My feet was aching so bad, a minute later I slowed down even more. It was a miserable route to be on any time of day. There was trees on both sides, which anything or anybody could be hiding behind. A small flock of crows was flying above my head, cawing like crazy. When one dipped down so low its foot brushed the top of my head, I started flopping and waving my arms so they’d leave me be. Getting pecked by enough of them black devils could get me more injuries than a beating from Cap.

  “God, get me home safe and sound,” I prayed out loud. I hadn’t read my Bible in a while, but I was definitely going to read a few pages before I went to bed tonight.

  A few trucks and cars whizzed by, going both ways, but nobody paid no attention to me. But ten minutes after I’d started walking, a truck slowed down and stopped. I stopped, too, but I didn’t recognize the long-faced colored man behind the wheel. I could see the barrel of a shotgun propped up on the passenger seat.

  “Where you headed?” he asked with a friendly smile. A lot of motorists driving on country roads offered rides to strangers, so it wasn’t nothing out of the ordinary.

  “I’m going into town.”

  “You want to get in? At the rate you dragging along, it’ll be dark by the time you get there. I can take you as far as Willow Street.”

  “No, I’m all right. I don’t mind walking. I need the exercise,” I laughed, patting my potbelly.

  He shrugged and drove off. As bad as I needed to take the load off my feet, I didn’t accept a ride with this stranger, because for all I knew, he could have been one of Cap’s friends. If Cap had told him that he thought I’d cheated him and some of his friends out of their money, there was no telling what he might have done to me with that shotgun.

  I’d also refused the ride because I didn’t feel like chitchatting with nobody. The long walk would give me enough time to clear my head and figure out my next move. If somebody asked me why I took so many chances on get
ting my butt whupped by some of them mean rascals I’d conned, I couldn’t tell them. I’d been deceiving folks for so long, it seemed like second nature to me. That was one thing me and Odell had in common.

  It was at least five miles from Cap’s place to my house, but it seemed more like ten. Before I turned onto my street, I seen Uncle Sherman’s truck coming in my direction. I stopped and squatted down and made out like I was tying my shoes. I kept my head bent low enough so he couldn’t see my face. After he passed me, I stood up and watched until he turned the corner. I could see Yvonne’s kids in the bed of the truck. I was glad they was not spending the night, because I was not in the mood to deal with them after what I’d been through with Cap. A man could take only so much.

  The second I let myself in the front door, Yvonne lit into me. “Where you been all this time, Milton?”

  “Huh? Oh, well, after I got off work, I had Willie Frank pick me up and take me to Cap’s place so I could play a few games of poker. Um, I thought the kids was going to stay all night. I just seen Uncle Sherman’s old truck creeping down the street.” I brushed past Yvonne and plopped down on the couch. She stood in front of me, giving me the stink eye.

  “I thought they was going to spend the night, too. But Aunt Nadine and Uncle Sherman wanted to get them out of the house before we started entertaining this evening. I got a feeling they ain’t never going to let my kids stay with me more than a few hours as long as we bootlegging.”

  “You probably right. Well, we’ll just have to deal with it for now. We need the money if we want to stay on in this neighborhood, so we have to do our business as often as we can.” I patted the spot next to me, and Yvonne sat down. She flinched when I tried to get me some sugar.

  “I ain’t through with you!” she hollered, scooting a few inches away.

  “Baby, please do me a favor and don’t be like that. Show me some love. I been thinking about you all day.”

  “Never mind about that. What I want to know is why you was playing poker all this time. You ain’t never stayed at no game this long.”

  “I wasn’t. The game ended over a hour ago. See, I lost all my money, and nobody wanted to give me a ride home, because I couldn’t give them no money for gas. I had to walk all the way.”

  Yvonne’s voice got soft, and she gave me a pitiful look. “You walked all the way from Cap’s place? That’s at least three or four miles from here.”

  “Five.”

  “It’s dangerous walking along them backwoods roads.”

  “Baby, you worry too much. Tell me how the day went with the kids.”

  Yvonne took a deep breath, and her face looked more relaxed. “Well, it was a real nice day, Milton. Joyce treated us to lunch at Mosella’s, and then we went to MacPherson’s. Odell let the kids pick out all kinds of nice stuff.”

  “Oh?”

  “I ain’t never seen a man, colored or white, treat kids as nice as Odell treated mine today.” Now she was speaking in the kissy-poo tone she’d started using when the subject was Odell.

  “Humph! He can afford to do as much treating as he wants!” I growled. Every time she mentioned that sucker’s name these days, my chest tightened. It didn’t matter if she was praising him or bad-mouthing him.

  “The kids was all over him. Cherie even told him she wanted to marry a man just like him. It was so cute. Odell was tickled to pieces.”

  I rolled my eyes. I couldn’t stand the glassy-eyed look on Yvonne’s face now. “What you cook for supper? We’d better eat before company start coming.”

  She kept talking like she hadn’t even heard me. “On top of all the stuff Odell let the kids take, he drove us all the way home. And I don’t have to tell you how Joyce was beaming and acting like Odell really is Prince Charming. She is so lucky and love to rub it in my face. If I had a man like Odell, I would be a lot more humble than she is.”

  “Tell me this, how do you know Odell is as perfect as you think he is?”

  Yvonne gasped so hard, she hiccuped. “Hold on now! I ain’t never said he was perfect. But he is almost perfect. That’s what I said. I know the man is a braggart. But if you had as much going for you as he—”

  I had to cut Yvonne off before I lost my mind. “Baby, let’s end this conversation. I’m tired and hungry.” I gave her the most hopeless look I could manage.

  “All right, all right. I’ll go warm up everything.” She stood up and skittered into the kitchen.

  A little while ago, I had been worried about what Cap was going to do to me. Now that I’d had time to think about it, it didn’t seem like such a big deal. I was sure that I wasn’t the first person to cheat at his house. And I wasn’t too worried about Oscar coming after me, neither.

  The thing that was bothering me the most now was Yvonne and her preoccupation with Odell—that seemed to get more serious and bothersome to me by the day. I knew now that so long as he was doing his Prince Charming act, she would never let up. Well, I was tired of it! If I didn’t do something about it, she was going to drive me crazy. I had a notion to go by his office on Wednesday to collect my payment, because I knew that if he came to the house this close after being so nice to her babies, I’d have to listen to more of her giddy bullshit.

  There was just one thing I could do to make her see him in a different light: tell her about Betty Jean and them kids. The next time she made a fuss about him, I was going to do just that.

  CHAPTER 27

  MILTON

  I DIDN’T HAVE TO WAIT UNTIL WEDNESDAY TO SEE ODELL. A HOUR after I got home from Cap’s place, him and Joyce showed up. Yvonne let them in, and the first thing out of Joyce’s big mouth when she flopped down on the couch was, “Milton, did Yvonne tell you about the good time the kids had with Odell today?”

  “She told me,” I said in a dry tone. “What you want to drink tonight, Joyce?” I got up off the couch, and Yvonne flopped down on the footstool.

  “Today was sure enough hectic, so I need something a little stronger than what I usually get. How about some white lightning? And make sure it’s from a fresh batch. The last time I drank some that had been sitting for a while, it made my stomach churn after I got home.” Of all the people that came to our house, Joyce was the only one to say something so offensive. But by now, I didn’t expect no less from the Queen of Sheba. Then she jumped back on the subject of the kids. “Yvonne, it’s a shame your aunt and uncle got those sweet children believing you’re their cousin. Milton, how do you feel about that?” She suddenly stopped talking, and a wild-eyed look crossed her face. “Oops! Did I just let the cat out the bag? I didn’t mean to say that! It just slipped out!”

  “Joyce, you ain’t got to fret none. I know the whole story about Yvonne’s kids. Someday we hope to have them come live with us.”

  Joyce sighed with relief, gave me and Yvonne a sheepish look, and went on. “Oh. I think Yvonne did tell me you knew they were her children. I always have so much on my mind, sometimes I can’t remember things. Anyway, if y’all ever do get the kids, Milton, I’m sure you’ll make a good stepdaddy if you try hard enough,” she added as she scooted closer to Odell at the other end of the couch. He had been as quiet as a mouse since they walked in. “Odell is going to make a wonderful father when we have some cherubs.” She practically sung her last sentence.

  “I’m sure Odell will be a wonderful daddy.” I let them words hang in the air for a few seconds and enjoyed watching his jittery reaction. He was blinking and biting his bottom lip like a man on the way to his own execution.

  Joyce’s eyes got real big, and she started running her motormouth again. “Guess what, y’all? Daddy gave Odell a raise today.”

  “Oh? Is that a fact?” I said, with my eyebrows raised up as high as they could go. From the corner of my eye, I seen Odell scowling at Joyce like he wanted to wring her neck. I knew he didn’t want me to know about his raise.

  “Congratulations, Odell,” Yvonne piped in. “I hope it was a nice raise. I’m sure you deserve it.”

&nb
sp; “Girl, my daddy is not stingy when it comes to rewarding people for doing a good job. We don’t need the extra money—which will be fifteen percent more each month—but it’s always good to have extra in case a financial emergency comes up.” Joyce was glowing like a bonfire, while Odell was still acting like a mute. I was going to get a reaction out of him if I had to stand on my head.

  “A financial emergency always seem to come up when you least expect it, right, Odell?” I couldn’t wait to hear what he had to say to my taunt.

  “Right,” he replied, barely moving his lips.

  I could have hauled off and kissed Joyce for letting the cat out of the bag about Odell’s raise. I was going to throw it in his face the next time he made a fuss about giving me extra money.

  “Odell, you want white lightning, too? You look like you could use a good strong drink.” I gave him a sly wink, and he gave me a frown that would have scared a ghost.

  “Yeah. And make sure it’s a big one,” he added in a gruff tone.

  “Um, Odell, if you don’t mind, before I pour you a drink, can you come in the kitchen with me for a few minutes? I want to show you my hot new fishing reel.”

  “Oh . . . okay,” he mumbled.

  He wobbled up off the couch and followed me into the kitchen. I clicked on the back-porch light and beckoned him to follow me outside. Before I could even open my mouth again, he got up on me and stabbed at my chest with his finger. “Look, Milton. I didn’t appreciate that little jab you made about me being a good daddy. I hope you don’t plan on playing them silly games with me too often, especially in front of Joyce. She don’t like to be reminded that she ain’t gave me no kids yet.”

  “In case you ain’t noticed, she is the one that usually bring up that subject,” I pointed out, stabbing him back in his chest with my finger.

  “You don’t need to encourage her!” he blasted.

  I dipped my head and gave him a apologetic look. “You right. I won’t do it no more.” I tried to look and sound sorry. But I wasn’t. I had enjoyed watching him squirm. The news about his raise was too hot for me to hold off on. “So you got a big raise, huh?”