The Girl from Charnelle

by K. L. Cook

  In science last year, she’d learned about the different layers of rock and sediment, had watched as her teacher had pointed out each geologic zone—this-zoic and that-zoic—and for a while the names had stuck with her, but now they had disappeared from her mind, which was a shame. She would have liked to mention them, to show off, to have something to contribute, but then again it didn’t matter much, not today. No one really cared about that stuff. They just liked to be down on the floor of the canyon, splashing in the creek, climbing the smaller rock formations, the more ambitious clambering up to the rim. She liked searching out the less well known spots—a curve of beautiful smooth shale that created an overhang above the creek bed, the big cave that you had to crawl around back to get into, and then smaller, secret caves that Manny and Gloria and she knew well and pretended they had discovered.

  There would be lots of snacking on chips and cookies and brownies and candy—enough to sicken you if you didn’t watch out—and drinking lemonade and tea, while her father, Manny, and the men, and maybe even Mrs. Letig and Gloria and Joannie, drank the beer. Swimming in the cool stream (she wore her bathing suit under her shirt and shorts), naps beneath the trees, imagining what it was like to be here, seventy, eighty, a hundred years ago, the Comanche hiding in the rocks and caves, fighting their bloody battles with the other Plains Indians and then with the Texas Rangers, until one by one the Indians were all moved out or eradicated. That was the word her history teacher, Mr. Nelson, had used. He hated what had been done to the Indians; he had all his classes read Chief Seattle’s surrender and showed them photographs of great fields of skinned buffalo, their pelts taken, their bodies left to rot in the sun, though these things weren’t on the Texas Board of Education’s list of authorized material.

  They arrived early enough to stake out the best spot, with lots of picnic tables by the creek bed and near the big cave and Sad Monkey, a large formation that supposedly looked like a chimpanzee, though no matter how many times she stared at it, she could never quite see the resemblance.

  “You think Lyndon will catch Kennedy for the nomination, Zeeke?” Jimmy asked as he lathered up a cob of corn with some butter. “Cronkite says he’ll formally announce his candidacy tomorrow.”

  “I hope, but it doesn’t look like he can catch him. Seems a shame that he’s waited until a week before the convention to officially throw his hat in the ring.”

  Mr. Tate was standing by the picnic table, drinking a bottle of Buck’s Beer that he’d just pulled from the cool mud. John was playing horseshoes within earshot with Gene, Rich, Jack, and Willie. Manny and Joannie took Julie down by the water. Mrs. Letig, the Cransburgh brothers, Gloria, Laura, and Jerome stood and sat around the picnic table with Mr. Tate. The baby was nearby, asleep on a blanket under the shade of a cottonwood tree.

  “It would be quite a ticket if they were both on it,” Bob said. He was brushing barbecue sauce on the ribs.

  “It would give old Dick Nixon a run for his money,” Jimmy said. “That’s for sure.”

  Mrs. Letig leaned over the table and grabbed a leg of chicken. “There’s no way Johnson would be on the same ticket with Kennedy,” she offered. “At least not as vice president.”

  “That’s what they all say,” Mr. Tate scoffed. “Second fiddle ain’t all that bad.”

  Bob said, “But he’s got much more clout as Majority Leader.”

  “Trust me. Vice prez is tempting enough, even if it’s a shitty job. But don’t listen to me. Ask Gloria. She’s the political expert here. How’s Kennedy’s tan, sweetheart?”

  Gloria, wearing jeans and her bathing suit top, which barely seemed to contain her, said, “Better than Lyndon’s, that’s for damn sure.”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “Johnson’s got a good tan.”

  “But it doesn’t look as good on a rhino,” Gloria said. They all laughed.

  “You’re talking about our senator, honey.”

  “I didn’t think we were talking politics, Daddy. I thought we were talking about sexual charisma.”

  Jimmy laughed so hard that he nearly choked on his corncob. He leaned over to Jerome. Slapping him on his back, he said, “You let her get away with that, Jerry?”

  “Jerome.”

  “You let her get away with that?”

  “As long as she knows who butters her bread.”

  “You hear that, Zeeke? Your son-in-law’s talking about buttering your daughter’s bread.”

  “She’s his wife. He can butter whatever he wants.”

  “Oh, my Lord!” crooned Mrs. Letig, mocking. “When did you become such a libertine, Zeeke?”

  “What the hell is that?”

  “It’s a liberal that likes his bread buttered,” she said.

  Jimmy laughed again and began to sputter corn kernels over the table, and Mrs. Letig slapped his back a couple of times to unclog him.

  “You leave Dad alone,” Gloria said. “He’ll come around to Kennedy soon enough.”

  “Sounds like you got a crush on that Massachusetts boy,” said Bob.

  “Hell, she just says that,” Jerome said. “She’ll come around to Nixon in the end.”

  “The hell I will!”

  Her father turned to Jerome, his face a stone. Everybody was suddenly quiet. “Don’t tell me that you’re voting for Nixon.”

  Jerome took a swig from his beer and leaned back against the table. “I don’t trust Kennedy.”

  “He served in the military.”

  “The navy,” Jerome said, smiling. “That’s not the same thing.”

  Everybody laughed nervously. Bob said, “Nixon was a navy man, too, you know.”

  “And Kennedy was a hero,” Mr. Tate said, his voice rising. “A hell of a lot more of a hero than Nixon ever was.”

  “But Nixon knows the world better than Kennedy or Johnson ever will.”

  “Were you born in Texas, boy?” Bob asked, pointing the long barbecue fork at him.

  “Wichita Falls.”

  Jimmy laughed. “I thought that counted, but maybe not.”

  “Are you really voting for Nixon?” Mr. Tate asked, leaning down.

  “I’m voting for Ike’s vice president.”

  “Oh, leave him alone, Dad,” Gloria said, putting her arms around Jerome’s neck. “They’re all voting for Nixon over there. Most of them served under Eisenhower in the war. Or their fathers did.”

  “We’re not talking Ike. Ike just flipped a coin to figure out whether he was going to be a Democrat or Republican. But Nixon! Nixon’s a mean little bastard. We’re talking about the next president of the United States, you know.”

  “Sorry, Mr. Tate,” Jerome said. “She warned me not to talk politics with you. Said you were a dyed-in-the-wool New Dealer.”

  “Damn straight!”

  “It’s okay, Daddy,” Gloria said, putting her hands over Jerome’s ears. “I’m still a true believer.”

  “Hell, I was pissed off when you eloped. If I’da known he was a Republican, I would’ve chased you all the way to Europe.”

  Everybody laughed again.

  “Enough politics!” Mrs. Letig said. “Let’s go back to talking about Kennedy’s tan.” She winked at Gloria and Laura. “I’m with you, Zeeke, but no roughing up the father of your grandchildren today.”

  “Jesus, it’s Independence Day. If you can’t fight about politics on the Fourth, when can you fight about it?”

  “Well, you do whatever you want,” Mrs. Letig said. “I’m hot, and I’m going to wade in that water, close my eyes, and think of the Massachusetts senator playing football.”

  “You hear that, John?” Jimmy shouted.

  “She knows who butters her bread,” John called, and everybody at the table cackled. Laura put her head down and clenched her teeth. The baby woke, and she used that as an excuse to rise. She picked him up, but he was fussy, so she handed him to Gloria, who quickly calmed him down.

  “Nixon, for Christ’s sake!”

  Mr. Tate was hot now. Desp
ite all the joking, Laura could see him starting to seethe. He hated Nixon, would yell at the screen whenever he came on: “You idiot! Idiot!” He was sure that Nixon would get creamed in the election, especially if Lyndon Johnson was running against him. Even Ike had disowned Nixon, barely kept him on the ticket in 1956. When Ike was asked what Nixon had done as vice president, Ike had said, right there on national television, “If you give me a week, maybe I could think of something.” Her father had shouted in triumph that day, kept repeating Ike’s words to whoever would listen. But now that it looked like “the Catholic rich boy and his debutante wife” (her father’s words) would be nominated and alienate the Protestant and the southern votes, her father was edgier, more easily ignited. She felt an undercurrent of fear, watching him and Jerome square off. Hadn’t Gloria warned Jerome better? Had she forgotten how riled up their father could get about politics? She was around when Adlai Stevenson had been beaten in ’56; surely she remembered how angry and depressed he was then.

  “Did you see him the other day?” her father said. “Nixon spent thirty minutes talking about all the places he’d gone and people he’d seen, as if that grocery list was some kind of badge of honor.”

  “It does count for something,” Jerome said. “He’s been to fifty-six countries, and he did whip Khrushchev in the kitchen debate.”

  “Okay,” Gloria said, “that is enough. I’m going swimming. You two can stay here and fight all you want.” She reached up and kissed her father on the cheek and handed him Carroll. “While you’re sputtering at each other, why don’t you smash this banana up and feed him, Grandpa.”

  And just like that, the tension was defused. Bob pulled a football out from under the table and threw it to Jerome. Laura watched her father sitting there, no one to argue with, his grandson in his arms. Her father frowned at his lost audience. He seemed comical and sad, but then he raised the baby in his arms and Carroll laughed, a string of spittle landing on her father’s nose. He shook his head in surprise and then turned to Laura, and she wondered what he would do.

  “Look what I get for my troubles!” he cackled loudly, from his belly.

  She smiled, too, happy all of a sudden.

  The flies swarmed around the picnic tables. Laura swished the air with her hands while she prepared her plate: a chicken leg, a scoop of potato salad, a cob of corn, and some cherry cobbler that Mrs. Letig had made and which Laura, despite herself, had to admit was delicious. She had skipped breakfast, so she was starving, and she ate fast, guzzling down two tall glasses of sweet tea, finishing off another chicken leg and a second helping of potato salad (which she had made herself last night—extra spicy with three dashes of cayenne), before toothpicking the corn kernels from her teeth. Mrs. Letig stood nearby, nibbling at her food—watching her weight, no doubt—and Laura felt secretly pleased that she, by contrast, could eat so much and remain skinny. Good genes. After she ate, she stripped off her shirt and shorts in front of Mrs. Letig and waded into the creek with Gene, Rich, and the Letig boys.

  It had rained several times over the past two weeks, so the cool water was almost to her waist in some places. They had to keep the younger kids close to the edges, where they made mud pies and waded in only as high as their bellies.

  Mrs. Letig followed her to the water, still in her dress, so Laura could see more of her body than she’d ever seen before. Her thighs were pale and varicose-veined above her knees, a little like Aunt Velma’s, and Laura felt a secret sense of triumph. She took joy in splashing and parading in the creek in her new blue two-piece, knowing that her legs were thin and hard and tan and that her figure, though not perfect, not as voluptuous as those of the starlets she’d seen in the magazines and on the big screen, was nice-enough-looking, better-looking than Mrs. Letig’s. John had told her many times that he thought she was gorgeous, whispered compliments while they made love. She secretly watched to see if John was looking at her and his wife. She hoped he was. She knew she was parading around for his sake. She wanted him to compare. It was not nice, but she nevertheless delighted in her cruelty.

  Manny and Joannie joined them in the water. Joannie had not brought her bathing suit, only shorts and a T-shirt, but Manny had stripped off his clothes—he wore his swim trunks underneath—and carried her into the creek, despite her thrashing protests.

  Joannie would be a senior, along with Manny, and though the two had been dating since Christmas, she and Laura seldom talked. Laura liked her well enough. They would see each other in the halls every once in a while, nod and smile, and Laura had once hung out at 4-D’s with Marlene, Debbie, Joannie, and Marlene’s older sister, but Laura didn’t talk to her much then either. Joannie’s parents lived on the west side of town, and her uncle was Glenn Thomason—the same Glenn Thomason who’d caught Manny shoplifting years ago and who owned the filling station where Manny now worked. The girl was shy and sweet-natured, and she didn’t talk to anyone very much, and when she did speak, it was in a low, whispery voice, like she was embarrassed to be heard. She was pretty, though Laura thought her tight, dark curls frumpy. Laura had decided that Manny could have done worse for a girlfriend. It somehow redeemed him that he had chosen such a sweet, shy girl—or that she had chosen him.

  “Manny Tate, don’t you dare!” It was the loudest sound Laura had ever heard from her.

  But once he dropped her in the water, Joannie seemed happy enough, and they splashed each other. Manny was strong, muscular, with some baby fat still and hair scattered in uneven patches over his chest and belly and a wispy black mustache that Laura’s father sarcastically called “belligerent.” Laura thought of how he always eyed himself when he passed a mirror, spending up to half an hour in the bathroom, combing his duck’s ass, rolling up the sleeves of his shirt, sticking out his chest. Yes, Laura was vain about her body, but it was nothing, she thought, compared to her brother’s vanity.

  Gloria and Jerome waded into the water, too, and then Manny yelled, “Chicken fight!” and he dove between Joannie’s legs and lifted her up on his shoulders. She shrieked in delight. Jerome did the same with Gloria, who was up for any sort of competition. They attacked each other, splashing and wrestling, while everyone looked on, cheering.

  Gloria and Jerome had an unfair advantage because Joannie wore a T-shirt and it was easy to grab it and pull her down, which Gloria did, yelling to her husband, “Run, run, run!” as everybody shouted, Joannie toppling backward into the water, taking Manny with her. Spontaneous applause broke out.

  “The champions!” Gloria shouted, raising her clenched fists high in the air.

  “Yeah, baby!” Jerome slapped her thighs, which were clamped against his cheeks.

  “Who’s next?” Gloria challenged. “Who dares?”

  “How about you, little sister?” Jerome called. “Get yourself a partner.”

  “No,” Laura called, though she loved to chicken-fight.

  There was a short pause, and then John stepped to the edge of the water, pulling his shirt over his head.

  “We’ll take you on,” he said.

  “All right!” Jerome shouted. He bent down in the water, gulped some creek water, and spewed it as if he were a fountain.

  Gloria yodeled: her Swiss Miss.

  John still wore his jeans. He took his wallet, keys, comb, and handkerchief out of his pocket and set them on the blanket near Carroll, slipped off his boots and socks, and waded into the water toward Laura. The word “dangerous” popped into her head, but she shook it off.

  “You ready?” he said.

  “Yeah.”

  He held his breath, disappeared underwater, slipped his head between her thighs, and lifted her up. She pinned her feet behind his back, and he hooked his bare arms tightly over her thighs, just above her knees. Laura stole a secret glance at Mrs. Letig, who was smiling benignly.

  “Ready?” Gloria asked.

  “Ready!” John said.

  “How about you, Laura?”

  “Yeah.”

  Manny counted
quickly: “One, two, three!”

  They circled each other in the water. John made a dash, and Laura reached out and grabbed the back of Gloria’s bathing suit and pulled as John churned through the water, but just as Gloria was about to fall, Laura lost hold of her, and Gloria righted herself.

  “Cheater!” Gloria shouted.

  “Get her, Laura!” her father called out. “Make her pay for marrying a Republican!”

  They laughed, even Jerome. “So the election is on the line,” Jerome called. “What are you, John?”

  “My mother once kissed Lyndon Johnson,” he said.

  “Did you hear that, Dad?” Gloria shouted. “Letig’s mother and Lyndon Johnson were lovers.”

  “Is that true?” her father called.

  “Did she say anything about his ears?” Gloria asked.

  “You better watch what you say about my momma, girl,” John drawled.

  Jerome and John circled each other again, Gloria and Laura both crouched low, their arms outstretched, their fingers wiggling, ready to grab. Jerome started one way, and John shifted his weight, but then Jerome turned quickly back the other way and was behind and then suddenly in front of John and Laura. She felt off balance. Gloria grabbed her arm, and Jerome started running. Gloria didn’t have that strong a grasp, nothing that should have unseated Laura, but she could feel John relaxing his hold on her legs, and she lost her balance. Then she was sliding, sliding. Gloria pulled on Laura’s hand, and she toppled off the side of John’s shoulders, face-first into the water, John falling with her.

  Before she surfaced, Laura felt his hand slipping between her thighs, his fingers resting for a couple of seconds on her bikini bottom. Panicked, Laura knocked his hand away. As they both rose sputtering from the water, to the shouts of Jerome and Gloria doing a victory lap around them and the smiles of everybody else looking on, including Mrs. Letig, Laura knew that John had done it on purpose, had let her fall so that he could steal this moment under the water. She looked at him in surprise, but he was shaking his head, wiping water from his face, a sly grin beneath his dripping mustache.