The Two-Bear Mambo

by Joe R. Lansdale

  “They certainly sound like a progressive bunch.”

  “The letter denied she’d been raped, said if anything she’d been cavorting with her ‘colored friends’ before she was tarred and feathered, and then there was some bullshit about women in general and how they ought to stay home and raise kids and not venture into the world of men, and so forth, and that she had gotten sewn up to suggest, symbolically, that the world didn’t need any more black babies.”

  “Sometimes you got to wonder if we’re all part of the same human race.”

  “We aren’t. Those motherfuckers are evil aliens. Got to be. Way I figure, one of those crackers came on to that gal, figured he had him a little nigger sweetie just couldn’t wait to give a big white man some pussy, and when she turned him down, it pissed him off. He and some of the boys got together, caught her off some place, and he got what he wanted. And so did his friends. Used the Assholes of the Caucasian Knights as a blind. It’s just plain old rape and brutality, justified with bullshit rhetoric.”

  “Anyone ever arrested for that?”

  The cigarette lighter had popped out long ago and cooled. Charlie pushed it back in. “Nope. No one over in Grovetown seemed to know anyone in any kind of Klan-like organization. No one had seen a thing. They got away with rape and brutality. No telling what it done to that young woman. Not just physically, but emotionally.”

  “Do you know any nicer bedtime stories than this one, Charlie?”

  “Nope. All I know is them kind. It’s all I see. It’s all I hear about. Don’t go, Hap. It ain’t for you.”

  “I guess Hanson figures we can take care of ourselves.”

  “Hell, yeah. He knows you can. You guys are dumb asses, but ain’t no one ever said you were cowards. Hell, man, Leonard, that motherfucker would wade through the fires of hell with a hand bucket half full of creek water if he thought he was doing the right thing. And you, well, I ain’t got you all figured out yet. But no one’s so tough they can beat a town. You go over there and fuck around, don’t come whining to me someone tars and feathers your ass and sews your dick to your leg. Or worse … Damn, I’m sick. My wife is gonna kill me I come in like this.”

  The lighter popped out and Charlie lit his cigarette. He turned and blew smoke through the crack in the window. He replaced the lighter and leaned back in the seat, held the cigarette tight between his knuckles.

  After a moment he said, “I’m just telling you that you ought not do this thing. Hanson doesn’t want to do it because he’s a cop. Not his jurisdiction. And him being black, it’ll look like he’s stirring trouble with all this stuff going on down there about that guy hanging himself. Then you got the bit about he don’t want Florida to know he’s sniffing her ass. Add it up, it comes out two plus two equals shit.”

  “I appreciate your concern.”

  “You feel you just got to do it, leave Leonard here. Not only is he black, in case you haven’t noticed, but he’s got a smart mouth, same as you. He can’t stand to let anyone think they’re putting one over on him. Guys in Grovetown, they can’t stand a smartass black guy. And it’s not like Leonard is quiet about being queer, neither. He ain’t bashful, you know what I mean?”

  “I know what you mean.”

  “Man, you think a black guy will work their bowels, you add queer to that, toss in you and him together doing your stooge act, it’s like throwing gasoline on a fire.”

  “Leonard wouldn’t let me go by myself, even if I wanted him to. Not since Hanson asked him to go.”

  “That’s where Hanson fucked up,” Charlie said. “He ain’t thought a clear thought in damn near two weeks. He’s really messed up. A week from now. A month. He’d know better’n to ask something stupid like that of either of you.”

  “Leonard told Hanson he’d go. Leonard says he’ll do something, he’ll do it, Charlie. You know that.”

  Charlie sighed. “I’m too drunk to argue. Let me just sum up here, Hap. You and the Smartest Nigger in the World go to Grovetown, it’s askin’ for trouble. But if you’re goin’—”

  He eased his ass up, got his wallet out, unlimbered it, and gave me two hundred and fifty dollars. “You’ll need this.”

  “I don’t want to take it, Charlie, but I got to.”

  “I know.”

  I put the money in my wallet, said, “I been sitting here wondering how I was going to afford this little trip. I hate to keep sucking off Leonard, and it’s not like he’s rich either. He sunk a lot of his inheritance into this house. Fixing it up.”

  “Well, that ain’t really enough money. You’re gonna have to dip into Leonard’s jack, but as for that two hundred and fifty, don’t worry about it.”

  “That’s good of you, Charlie.”

  “Naw it ain’t. Ain’t my money. Hanson gave that to me to give to you before we left his place.”

  *   *   *

  I dropped Charlie and his car off at his house and Leonard followed. We wished Charlie a Merry Christmas when he got through puking off the side of his porch, then I drove Leonard’s car back to his house while Leonard sat on the passenger side, looked out the window and brooded.

  “Was Raul’s stuff gone?” I asked.

  “Yeah. There was one box of his things in there, packed with an address label on it. Had a note asking me to mail it to him at his parents’. Said he’d pay me back. My Christmas present for him was on top of the box. Unopened.”

  “This your first spat?”

  “We had one every goddamn day, but I guess this is the worst. We were fighting right before I burned those assholes’ house down. I don’t even remember what me and him were arguing about. I think that’s why I beat those fucks up and burned their place down. I mean, you know, I don’t like ’em, and that’s the biggest reason, but shit, these days, I get worked up, I burn whatever house is there down. It lets off some tension.”

  “What are you gonna do until they get a new house put up?”

  “I don’t know. Squeeze a rubber ball. Jerk off.”

  “And what if the house gets put in there isn’t a crack house next time, but some old lady who just wants to putter around her flower garden?”

  “I guess I could go over there nights and pull up her roses.”

  “I can see you’ve thought this through with options.”

  Leonard tapped his temple with a finger. “Thinking all the time.” He sat for a moment, said: “That goddamn Raul. I kinda thought I was ready for him to go, but you know, I miss him.”

  “Raul seemed okay to me, but it’s not like I been around him much. Maybe him going away isn’t so bad.”

  “That some kind of comment?”

  “I haven’t seen much of you lately either, Leonard. It’s not like I know anything about y’all’s relationship. See, I sort of thought you and me being like brothers, I’d get the inside scoop on things.”

  “Hey, you got to remember, I ain’t had no loving in ages. You forget how you get when you have a woman. All you want to do is fuck.”

  “I guess that’s normal at the beginning of any relationship. I just thought maybe you’d have brought him around. You and me, compadre, we’re family. Besides, you can only screw so much, after a while, you got to maybe read a book, talk to friends.”

  “You got enough problems in your life doing crap work for a living, being mostly worthless without ambition, and being friends with me. Figured you didn’t need me and my lover dropping by.”

  “You think it’s like I got neighbors? And if I did, think they’d know just by looking at you? And if they did, think I’d give a fuck?”

  “That’s not what I mean, and you know it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “No matter how close we are, I think the whole thing jacks you around. You know, me fuckin’ a guy.”

  “It’s different is all. I’m not used to it. I see two guys hugging up, one of them my friend, guy I think of in a traditional way most of the time, well, I won’t lie to you, it makes me uncomfortable
. Not sick to my stomach or nothing, just uncomfortable. I don’t visualize what you guys are doing in the privacy of your own home, not only because it’s private, but shit, Leonard, I don’t like to think about it. I know there isn’t anything wrong with it. But I was taught one way all my life, that homos were perverts. I know now a pervert comes in hetero or homo, same as good people, but it still turns my crank backwards a little to know y’all got the same equipment to play with and you’re willing to do it with each other.”

  “How do you think it makes me feel, see you kissin’ on some old gal? That ain’t natural to me, Hap. It don’t matter what’s supposed to be natural, my biology tells me one thing, yours tells you another.”

  “All right. Let’s drop that. It’s not like we’re really in disagreement.”

  “You know what, Hap?”

  “What?”

  “I really thought this one was more than just sex. I thought me and Raul had a relationship. I thought me and him were gonna grow old together and come over to your place now and then for fried chicken and maybe borrow money, you ever got any. I really did mean to bring him around. Really. I just wanted to get stabilized. And, of course, I have. I’m by myself again.”

  “He could come back.”

  “I doubt it. I think I saw it coming for the last two weeks. We were just too different. I was confusing sex for loving ’cause I hadn’t had either in so goddamn long. You know what? He liked Gilligan’s Island. He wouldn’t miss that fucker. Had books on that shit. Photos of the stars. Has a stack of videotapes full of Gilligan’s Island. He thought Bob Denver was a good actor, and I think he had this thing for the Professor. Raul’s big goal in life was to get a copy of the reunion episode.”

  “You’re right,” I said. “Mark Raul off your list. He’s too dumb to live. Hey, one bright note. My Christmas present. I’m gonna cheer you up when I tell you what I got you. That ‘Asleep at the Wheel’ album you been wanting.”

  “The one where they get a bunch of folks together to redo Bob Wills’s stuff?”

  “Yep. Got that big-tittied singer you like on it.”

  “Dolly Parton.”

  “Yep. And it’s got Willie ‘Can’t Pay His Taxes’ Nelson too.”

  “No shit?”

  “No shit.”

  “You said album, but you meant CD, right?”

  “Yep.”

  “Great. Guess what? That was Raul’s CD player. He took it with him.”

  5

  That night I slept on Leonards fold-out couch, which had acquired an assortment of potato chips, peanuts, and pretzel crumbs. I guess watching Gilligan gives you the munchies.

  Leonard was up half the night, going to the bathroom, the kitchen, looking out windows, feeling blue over Raul. I lay there and watched him pad around, and thought about Grovetown. I’d heard about it being stuck in time before Charlie told me. Grovetown was like Vidor, Texas, another, and larger, and more infamous Klan stronghold. Vidor didn’t even have a black in its town to hang. It was all white and proud of it. Leonard knew about Grovetown. Had some idea what he was getting into, but if he was overly concerned, neither his words or actions showed it.

  I closed my eyes and remembered Florida. I could smell her hair. Feel her thigh on my finger tips. The first time we made love was in this house. In Leonard’s bedroom. My God, it hadn’t really been that long ago. I knew that hot summer night, when we lay in bed together, even before we made love, that I adored her. And just as surely, I knew she would break my heart. And she had.

  She couldn’t cope with my being white. Not having a career. Having little to no ambition. A man adrift. She said: “I like someone who gets up in the morning and has a purpose. A real purpose. I have one. I want whoever I love to have one.”

  And she was right. What I was about was day-to-day survival, and that was it. When I was young, I could look around corners. Now, I did well to see six inches beyond my nose.

  Jesus Christ, how in hell, why in hell, do all my romances go wrong?

  Next morning, not long after the sun came up and coffee had boiled, Leonard called a couple fellas he knew and asked if they could stay over at his place for a while, watch it to make sure his former neighbors didn’t drop by to return the favor to his house.

  An hour later, the fellas dropped in with two paper sacks full of clothes and accessories. I hadn’t met these guys before. They lived in the neighborhood. They were both black and huge and appeared to be in their mid-thirties. Their heads looked as if they had been boiled and all the hair scraped off. You could have put your fingers in their eye sockets and used their noggins to bowl a few sets.

  Their faces were as warm and friendly as a switchblade knife. One of them had an eye with scuz all around it, like the crusty lips of an active volcano. They looked as if on their days off they liked to sit around and wring the necks of puppies, maybe stick coat hangers up cats’ asses and toast them over a fire.

  I was put in the position of entertaining the fellas while Leonard filled a suitcase. They didn’t strike up a discussion with me concerning Melville’s flawed masterpiece Moby-Dick, nor did they have anything to say about Billy Budd.

  We mostly sat in silence, said a few things about the weather. The one with the scuzzy eye finally hit a note of interest. He said, “You know, ants come out this time of year if they want to. Our house is full of the little fuckers. Goddamn Christmas ants.”

  “No shit?” I said. “Christmas ants?”

  “Yeah, there’s ants in my underwear drawer,” said the other one.

  “It’s ’cause Clinton’s underwear ain’t clean,” said Scum Eye.

  “Yeah, well what you been doing in my underwear drawer?” said Clinton. “Sniffin’?”

  I looked around for Leonard. Still in the back room. Probably sitting on the bed having a laugh at my expense.

  “I’ll tell you though,” said Clinton. “Them ants are busy little shits. They ate my banana. I left it on the table, and next morning they was all over it.” He smiled. “I stuck it in the sink and drowned them. An ant can’t swim for shit.”

  “Leonard,” I said. “Man, we got to go.”

  Leonard came out with his suitcase, and on our way out the door he paused and gave one of the big guys some money, said, “Here’s for food. But there’s stuff in the pantry. I get back when I get back, if that’s okay with you two.”

  “We ain’t doin’ nothin’ anyway,” said Clinton. “Peckerwood we used to work for had a stroke. He can’t do nothin’ now but sit around and look wall-eyed, drip spit on his chin. His wife fired us and everyone else over at the aluminum chair plant. They say it may go out of business ’cause his family don’t want nothing to do with runnin’ it. They’re gonna sell it and whoever buys it will bring in a whole new crew of niggers. That’s if anyone wants it.”

  “It wasn’t any kind of job anyway,” said Scum Eye. “We worked there ten years or better and didn’t never get a raise. That peckerwood was so tight when he blinked his asshole turned inside out. I hope all he gets to do rest of his life is sit around in one of them lawn chairs we made, crap his pants and nest in it.”

  “They are not only without jobs,” I said to Leonard, “but they have an ant problem at their house.”

  “Christmas ants, we call them,” Clinton said. “I mean, they don’t just come Christmas, but we call them that.”

  “Well, guys,” Leonard said. “You’re gonna like it here. No ant problem. Christmas or otherwise. Watch TV, hang out, whatever, but make sure those chumps lived next door don’t drop by.”

  “You don’t want us to kill ’em, do you?” This from Scum Eye.

  “No, Leon,” Leonard said, “but I want you to discourage them. You got to kill ’em, drag ’em in the house. Law likes it that way better. Looks like breaking and entering. More clear-cut as self-defense. Frankly, I don’t think they’ll come around. My house got burned down, they’d know I knew who did it. And they wouldn’t want me to know.”

  “I hear that,
” said Clinton.

  “You guys like Gilligan’s Island?” Leonard asked.

  “Uh huh,” said Leon, better known to me as Scum Eye. “That’s a pretty funny show. I’d like to fuck that Ginger. I bet she don’t fuck black guys, though.”

  “It’s you she wouldn’t fuck,” Leonard said.

  Leon and Clinton grinned. Leon said, “Yeah, uh huh. I get it.”

  “Anyway,” Leonard said, “I got a stack of Gilligan’s Island tapes, you want to see them. They’re on the kitchen table.”

  “Raul left a treasure like that?” I said.

  “It was in the box I was supposed to mail to him. Couldn’t find the toaster this morning, so I opened his goddamn box. He loved that fucking toaster ’cause it could do four slices of bread at once. He liked shit like that. If it could have done six slices of bread, he’d have peed on himself. Anyway, no toaster. He must have took that in the car. But he had most of my spoon drawer in the box, and those tapes.”

  “That guy gone?” Leon asked.

  “Raul?” Leonard said.

  “One Clinton bounced around at the store,” Leon said. “The other queer. No offense.”

  “None taken. Yeah, he’s gone. He comes back, don’t give him a rough time, though. I ain’t mad at him. Just tell him I’ll be back, if he cares. I don’t figure he’ll be around though.”

  “Can we have girls over?” Leon asked, scratching at the scum around his eye.

  “As long as it doesn’t get out of hand,” Leonard said. “I don’t want to come home to broken furniture. And guys, use a rubber, okay? And I don’t mean share one between you. AIDS is goin’ around.”

  “Using a rubber’s like taking a shower in a raincoat,” Clinton said. “It ain’t no fun.”

  “Hey, it’s your dick,” Leonard said. “You’re too stupid to take care of it, that’s your problem. I hope the women are smarter. I’ll call you later.”