by D A Fowler
Shoulders slumped, she slid back the patio door and stepped into the warm sunshine. The pool had been drained and covered for the season; brown and yellow leaves covered the tarp. She stared at them for some time, thinking that her mother was now very much like them.
After a while she noticed the absence of rock music blaring from the clubhouse. How could a group of teenagers get together and resist a perfect opportunity to worsen their hearing loss? Jasmine had been fond of classical music, in particular Beethoven and Wagner. She would never hear them again. Total sensory shutdown. She would simply never anything.
Memories…
Jasmine young, vibrant, bustling around the kitchen preparing meals fit for a king. Cutting fresh flowers from the garden for the dining table, wearing a wide-brimmed straw hat. Singing to the birds. Kissing skinned knees.
Talking about witches in her bedroom.
Pamela shook the thoughts away. She would have to teach herself to forget the later things, the doings of the shriveled old woman Jasmine had somehow mysteriously turned into, seemingly overnight. Time would, on its own, weed those memories out, and all that would remain would be the glory of a soul who gave, without reservation, gifts of love in everything she did for her family.
Inside the clubhouse, Marla, Nancy, Nancy’s boyfriend Jay Gorman, and Jennifer Parks, a peripheral member of Marla and Nancy’s clique, were playing an unenthusiastic game of Liar’s Dice. The one-room cabin was twenty by fifteen feet, the lower walls lined with cedar storage compartments that doubled as seats, the removable cushions covered with genuine leather. Shelves on the rear wall contained a small television set and a stereo system, a few albums, a wilting Wandering Jew. Yellowing ferns hung from thick redwood beams below the slanted roof; in the northwest corner an old fishing net was spread out like a spider’s web, dipped in strategic locations by the weight of conch shells. In the northeast corner was a door that led to a bathroom equipped with sink, toilet, and shower, cabinets full of fluffy beach towels, bathing suits, and tanning products. Money couldn’t buy happiness, but it could buy the kind of misery the Mingees could live with.
They’d set up a green card table in the center of the room, and sat around it in uncomfortable wrought-iron garden chairs. Jay pushed the overturned cup under which three dice were hidden toward Jennifer and announced dryly, “Three kings and two aces.”
Jennifer, an anorexic with dark blond hair and sharp, birdlike features, studied the dice he’d left out in the open with a doubtful expression. “I know you’re lying bigger than Dallas.” After a moment’s deliberation, she swooped up the cup, challenging his claim. “I knew it!” Jay left off picking at his face, scowled, and tossed her a penny. “I’ve had enough of this stupid game. Let’s go to the park; it’s too nice to be cooped up in here.”
“We could go visit Montgomery in the hospital,” Jennifer said snidely. “Take him a get-well-soon card.”
“How about a die-real-soon card?” Jay snickered. Everyone laughed, Marla somewhat nervously, Nancy much too loudly.
“Your mom know anything about what’s going on?” Jennifer asked Nancy when the laughter died. “She volunteers up at the hospital, doesn’t she?”
“She told me it had something to do with stress,” Nancy answered, her eyes vacant, the hint of a smile on her lips. “That’s what the chart says, anyway. She asked one of the nurses.”
Jay slapped himself. “Stress! That bastard only dishes it out!”
“You think it could be something else?” Marla leveled her gaze at her best friend.
“How would I know?” Nancy shrugged, avoiding eye contact. The hint of a smile vanished. “All I know is, I’m glad it happened.”
“I wish it would happen to the coach,” Jay said half-jokingly. “I think he used to be an army drill sergeant. His workouts are pure hell.”
Nancy lifted an eyebrow. “Do you really wish that?”
“Nah.” Jay pumped his biceps proudly. “It’s been worth it.”
“What if Jay was serious?” Marla said accusingly, forcing Nancy to look her in the eye. “Is that something you could arrange?” She didn’t know why she’d said it, and was a little surprised she had, but there it was.
Nancy gazed back at her coolly. “Don’t be ridiculous, Marla. And I’d watch that mouth if I were you.”
After wandering aimlessly all over town, glowering at all the passersby he encountered—and oh, couldn’t he scare them with just a look when he wanted to; what a joy to discover—Spiro finally went home, completely unsuspecting of the assault that would greet him. His mother had found the picture he’d drawn of Lana the night before, after he’d come back from checking on Sam. He had done a particularly good job, and so hadn’t torn it up into tiny pieces as he usually did with such artwork.
A grim mistake.
She was sitting in her favorite rocking chair, rocking furiously. The picture was laid out in her lap. Her eyes were shooting sparks of outrage. “Git in here and close the door,” she said promptly, her voice a jagged blade. “You’re in mighty big trouble, boy. Mighty big trouble.”
Spiro was certainly smart enough to comprehend the circumstances quite clearly. He’d been caught drawing dirty pictures. A picture of Lana naked with her legs spread apart. By his mama. Was there anything worse?
She shoved it in his face. “Who is that? That little tramp next door, the one you gave that damn puppy to?”
She received no answer.
“Speak to me boy,” she hissed, “or it’s just going to go worse for you. Who is this a picture of? That yella-headed slut next door?”
Guilty nod.
“I knew it, I just knew it,” Bertha spat, wadding the paper into a tight ball. “Did she take her clothes off for you? Did she let you see her naked?”
“No…”
“Don’t you lie to me, boy!” She rose to slap him, paused, hand raised. “She let you see, didn’t she?”
Spiro flinched. “Just her panties, Mama.”
The open palm crashed against his cheek. “Filth! Go to your room!”
She came in with the iron a few minutes later and plugged it in. Spiro heard a hissing sound and trembled on the bed. He was sitting on the edge, clasping and unclasping his hands, subconsciously rubbing the scars. She slapped him again.
“I burned that filthy picture of yours. Now you know what’s going to happen to you.”
“Please Mama, I promise I won’t do it no more,” Spiro pleaded in vain.
Bertha tapped her toe on the dusty hardwood floor, the iron in one hand, the other settled impatiently on an oversized hip. “I know you won’t never do it again, ’cause I’m fixin’ to make sure you’ve learned your lesson.” She moistened a finger with her tongue and touched it to the iron; a light sizzle could be heard.
She smiled. “Almost ready. Give me your hand, boy. The hand you done it with.”
He closed his eyes and gave her his right hand, wetting his pants in fear, shuddering from head to toe. She held his hand open by the tips of his fingers, watching them twitch in fearful anticipation. She saw that he had peed himself and slapped the iron down.
His scream shook the walls.
Hours later Spiro stared at the swollen, fiery blisters on his right hand and fingers, which were still throbbing unmercifully, his face settled into an expression of peace. She was singing to him now from her bedroom, her voice sweet and gentle. She really did love him.
He soon closed his eyes and fell asleep.
Eight
Harry was still awake when Jane got home at eleven-ten. He didn’t have to work on Sundays, as she usually did, and would stay up so long on Saturday nights that, unable to get up and walk back to the bedroom, he would fall asleep in his easy chair and sleep until Jane left for work the following afternoon.
He was working on his fifth Coors tallboy, his stockinged feet propped up
on the weary ottoman, his mind attempting to focus on an old Philip Marlowe mystery on the black and white television screen. Jane leaned over and gave him a peck on the cheek. “Hi, hon.”
He looked up and smiled blearily. “Have a rough shift, ol’ gal? Ya look like hell.”
“Thanks a lot. By the way, you don’t exactly have room to talk.” She patted her husband’s protruding abdomen to emphasize her point, then kicked off her shoes and cleared herself a place to sit on the couch. She flopped down on it with a groan. “Jasmine Colter died today. I was with her. She thought I was her daughter.”
Harry belched. “So your job’s gonna be a li’l easier now, huh?”
“I suppose so,” Jane replied softly, the memory of preparing the shrunken, wrinkled corpse for the mortuary resurfacing, making her feel anew the revulsion she’d experienced in the performance of her wretched duty. “I wanted to talk to her,” Jane went on, needing to discuss the other thing that was haunting her. “A few weeks ago she started up with this witch thing again, I probably mentioned it—”
“About two dozen times.”
“Anyway, she added some details to her story the other night that got my curiosity up, mainly that the Obers had killed a baby in some kind of witchcraft ceremony. I mentioned it to Cora, and she told me it was true—that her mom’s aunt had kept a diary, and all that stuff was in it. She brought the diary to work with her today and let me read it. I wish I hadn’t. It’s been bugging me ever since.”
“Why? That was a long time ago. Nobody believes in that stuff nowadays,” Harry declared scornfully, sucking down the beer that had grown warm in his hand. He crumpled the can, tossed it toward an overflowing trash can four feet away, missed.
Jane squirmed on the couch. “There’s a lot of people who believe in it. Cora believes; she told me so herself. And remember that album Mother kept trying to get us to listen to? That Mike Warnke album? He’s a preacher now, but he used to be a high priest of a satanic coven in California that had over three thousand members. And I’m sure there are plenty others. You know how this town is.”
“So what? A bunch of idiots believing in something makes it true? Why’s this all the sudden buggin’ you, anyway?” Harry hoisted himself out of his chair and padded over to the refrigerator for another beer.
“I don’t know,” Jane lamented, trying desperately to find an answer. “The girl who wrote the diary accidentally tripped the Obers’ daughter, Morganna, who told her she would really be sorry. She was stricken with polio that very night.”
“Just like she’d been anyway, if that other girl hadn’t opened her mouth.”
“And the polio…she was crippled. Couldn’t walk. That seems to tie in with getting tripped…”
“Mother fuck,” Harry muttered, popping open the lid of his beer can and taking a long swig. “Before I know it, you’ll be goin’ to church meetin’s, then comin’ home preachin’ to me. I can smell it coming, with this kind of talk. I’ll tell you right now, I think it stinks.”
Jane stiffened. “I’m not getting religious on you, Harry. It’s just that too many coincidences stack up to a big question mark, and I’m having a little trouble ignoring it. I know the answer I want, and it isn’t yes. But I won’t be satisfied until I’ve proved to my own mind, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that the answer is no. And I will, I’m sure. Eventually.”
“Why the hell don’cha just forget about it?” Harry grumbled, weaving back to his chair. It was the evil that mortal men did, in his opinion, that people should be afraid of, not fairy-tale devils. “Bad things happen to people all the time—you gonna try to blame all that on the goddamn Devil, or witchcraft? Like yesterday morning, one of the teachers had this sudden attack while he was waiting to see Greer about something, got rushed off in an ambulance. Greer’s seckatary said he was fixin’ to get a couple of girls suspended. I suppose you’d think they put a hex on ’im so he couldn’t do it.”
“Why can’t we discuss this without you trying to make me look like an idiot?” Jane said, pouting. “If anything else was bothering me, you’d help me work it out. Don’t worry, I’m not going to turn into my mother on you, physically or mentally. By the way…she came over late this morning, got me out of bed. She had an urgent message for me from Brother Gibson; he says I’m headed straight for the pit. Doesn’t that put your mind at ease?”
They laughed together, the tension between them dissipating.
“I’m sorry, hon,” Harry apologized. “It’s just…you know how I feel about religion. I had it crammed down my throat same as you did, and by a bunch of no-good hypocrites. Daddy preached those fire and brimstone sermons loud enough to raise the dead without blinking an eye, but I knew what he was up to with that cute li’l church seckatary of his, Miss Paulette Pringle. I think she was screwing half the deacons too. Imagine Mama’s surprise when the saintly li’l slut turned up knocked an’ started pointin’ her finger. Out come the bottle Mama thought she’d been keepin’ such a big secret. Baptists, they’re the worst.” He said the last as if something bitter had just landed on his tongue.
His wife smiled and gave him a hug. “Yeah, that’s the kind of thing I need to be reminded of. Lord, I’m hungry. Did you eat up all the leftover meatloaf?”
Harry confessed with a look of embarrassment. “I think I pretty well wiped out all the leftovers, darlin’.”
“I guess I’ll just have a sandwich then.” Jane wearily propelled herself into the kitchen, thinking that if she had the energy tomorrow, she would clean the trailer before going to work; decaying food clinging to the piles of unwashed dishes was beginning to smell.
She opened a lower cabinet and took out a can of sandwich spread, frowning at the homed image holding a pitchfork on the red and white label. Jasmine’s final words echoed in her ears: Morganna’s comin’for me…but she does, Pammie, you never knew what I done…
What in God’s name could that have been? Jane’s mind refused to fill in the blank. She replaced the can of spread and shut the cabinet, her gut suddenly full of lead.
Lana had finally coaxed her mother into letting her take the car out for a sightseeing spin. She had driven around for almost half an hour, checking out the bedroom town she would be living in until she left next year for college. She looked forward to it for one reason only—she would no longer have to live with her toad of a brother.
Earlier that afternoon she’d gone over to Spiro’s to apologize to him for what her dippy sibling had said, but his mother had told her—in venomous language and tone—that her son was not at home, but as soon as he did show up, he was really going to get it. And whatever he was going to get it over apparently had something to do with her, but the insinuations had left Lana more confused than informed.
Before going back home, she decided to stop at the Tastee Freeze drive-in for a Coke. She pulled up next to a blue Monte Carlo and smiled shyly at the two boys sitting in the front seat. The one on the passenger side whistled softly.
“Hey babe, where did you come from? Never seen you around here before.” He had frizzy brown hair that might have last been combed several months ago, dark, hawklike eyes, flat nose, and a set of yellowed, crooked teeth in a mouth intended for a catfish.
“Never been around before,” Lana answered, now self-conscious of her accent. She looked past the frizzy-headed boy at the one sitting behind the wheel. He was strikingly handsome, and like his friend, seemed totally interested in her.
Dennis was angry that Marla hadn’t called him yet to patch up their fight, and pride prevented him from calling her. It was the standard adolescent Ego Vs. Ego impasse which could well last for a century or two. But Dennis had just seen the answer to his dilemma drive up in a gray Buick sedan. The minute he took up with a babe like that, Marla would have to relent—jealousy would leave her no other choice. She might not think she wanted him now, but she’d damn sure go to Hell before she’d let someone
else have him. A delicious plan. Perhaps there would even be additional fringe benefits…the blonde looked like she knew how to have fun.
“I just moved here Thursday,” she was saying, “from Tyler, Texas. My mom’s an adjuster for State Farm, an’ they transferred her up here. You guys go to high school, right?”
Dennis moaned inwardly; she was nothing but a dumb country bumpkin. But that wasn’t altogether bad news…he’d heard a few stories about homegrown Southern Belles. Typically they were hot to fuck.
Dennis’s friend, Wayne Forrester, laughed abrasively, and began to mock her: “Wahl, wahl, from Tahler, eh? Yeah, war hah school stewdents. When wey fail lahk it.”
Dennis poked him in the back and muttered, “Cool it, shithead.” He smiled at Lana, who looked ready to hurl cow chips at both of them. “Please excuse my ill-mannered friend here, he has neither class nor brains. He wasn’t making fun of you, really. He was just trying to be friendly. Weren’t you, asshole?”
Wayne had gotten the message. “Exactly. Why don’cha come over and join us. We’ve got all kinds of room over here.”
Lana’s anger melted quickly, and as she scooted toward the passenger side of her car to get out, the driver’s door being blocked by the menu and speaker pole, Wayne turned to Dennis and grinned.
“Hot damn. Southern Comfort.”
“She’s mine,” Dennis whispered, as if there was really a contest. “For a while, anyway. You can have her when I’m through.”
A silver-tongued manipulator like Dennis had little trouble convincing Lana to go for a ride with him, but first he had to get rid of Wayne. Half an hour later the two lit up cigarettes as they walked up Wayne’s weed-veined sidewalk, purposefully knocking into each other and laughing, Lana having been left behind in the car. Wayne’s laughter didn’t come from the heart, but he didn’t want to look like a hangdog. So he was getting dumped off early because there was only one girl and Dennis wanted her. No fucking big deal.