Dry County

by Jake Hinkson

  Where does he go?

  No, don’t ask yourself that. There’s nothing for you there. He drives around, or he goes up to the church. He runs to the Walmart or he goes to Pickett’s.

  This town’s too small for him to do anything else.

  Isn’t it?

  We’ve had sex twice since Ruth was born. Do you really think he’s not having sex? This town’s not too small to keep secrets. Five minutes in any direction is nothing but trees and dirt roads.

  Besides, you know he hasn’t lost his libido entirely. You know he lied about that.

  A few months ago, I came home early from choir practice, and I heard him in our bathroom. Moans, low but unmistakable, and the soft slap of his flesh. At first, I was embarrassed, as if I’d invaded his privacy, knowing that he would have been humiliated to know that I discovered him doing something that he thought he was doing in secret.

  Then I was angry and ashamed. Angry because when he stopped touching me, he told me he’d lost his libido entirely. Ashamed, because it had been years since I’d questioned that lie. I suppose I wanted it to be true. It was easier to think he’d lost all interest in sex than to think he’d simply lost interest in me.

  Later that night, I looked on his phone and his computer for pornography. Nothing. Either he doesn’t look at it or he’s better at hiding it than I am at finding it.

  Or maybe he doesn’t need it. Maybe there’s someone else.

  Is he having an affair? Have I been a complete fool? Why would he do something so stupid and reckless?

  I can feel my face get hot. He hasn’t touched me in years. To know that he might be with someone this minute fills me with a rage that makes me dizzy.

  Someone knocks on the door.

  “What?” I say. “Come in.”

  Mary again. She pokes her head in. “Ruth says she’s been texting you. She’s ready to come home.”

  “Could you go pick her up?”

  “At Scarlett’s house?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay.”

  She closes the door.

  I yell, “Mary!”

  She opens the door. “Yeah?”

  Swinging my legs off the bed, I tell her, “Never mind, I’m going to go get her myself.”

  Before I go to Scarlett’s house to pick up Ruth, I drive down the hill, heading in the opposite direction. I drive over the bridge and go by the church.

  Brother Weatherford’s car is not there. That’s how I think of it. Brother Weatherford’s car is not at the church. I turn off the service road and swing back toward the church. I want to make sure he’s not parked around back or under the trees where I might not see his car. I want to give him the benefit of that doubt. Maybe I’m just imagining things.

  But no.

  He’s not at the church.

  “Where are you, Brother Weatherford?” I ask.

  After I pick up Ruth at Scarlett’s house, she’s chattering incessantly. She and Johnny are my youngest children, and they’re different from the older three. The older three are almost a separate family. They grew up together, with Matthew and Mary taking care of Mark. They’re closer to one another. Johnny and Ruth aren’t just younger than the other three, they’re both more desperate for attention. On a daily basis, Ruth wants to tell me every single detail of everything that happens to her.

  She’s giving me a verbatim recitation of the conversations she had with her friend this afternoon. I’m pretending to listen when something slips through.

  Ruth says, “Scarlett asked me if you’re a preacher.”

  “What?”

  “She asked me if you’re a preacher like Daddy.”

  “What’d you say?”

  “I said no.”

  I don’t respond, but something about that pisses me off.

  Ruth asks, “You’re not a preacher, right?”

  “No, but as your father’s wife I have a certain position in the church. Haven’t you noticed that?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “People respect me. I teach a Sunday school class. I lead VBS. I’m the chair of the Ladies’ Auxiliary. You know that, right?”

  Ruth stares out the window. “Yeah,” she says. She considers all that. Then she says, “I said you help Daddy run the church.”

  “Is that what you said?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s right. I help your father run the church. The same way we both run the family.”

  “But Daddy’s in charge, right?”

  I glance at my daughter, her smooth little brow furrowed as she tries to put all these pieces together to create a picture of the world she can understand.

  I take a deep breath.

  “Yes,” I say.

  My mother only respected a surface she couldn’t see through. The whole point of presenting a face to the world, after all, is to convince the world that it’s your real face.

  The hardest part of adjusting to married life, for me, was reconciling the public and the private in the man I married. Not that Richard was radically different at home than he was at church. He didn’t drink or beat me or scream at the kids. From the start, he was a good husband and father. He was a family man. He brought home a paycheck. He lived a clean life.

  And yet how can I reconcile the man everyone loves and respects with the man who makes me feel this way? When we walk into church tomorrow morning for Easter Sunday, Richard and I will be two of the most prominent citizens in this town. I’ll be hugged and kissed and prayed for tomorrow morning. I know the dress, purple and white, that I’ll wear. And I take comfort in this knowledge. It’s sure ground beneath my feet. It’s my life, the only life I know, the only life I want.

  But I haven’t loved Richard in years. I can do many things for this marriage. I can put on a good face for the world, and I can bear babies and raise children. I can choke down my pride and humble myself if that’s what it takes to maintain the face of Sister Penny Weatherford. Like my mother taught me, the whole point of presenting a face to the world is to convince the world that it’s real, because in doing so, it becomes your real face. But the one thing I can’t do—the one thing I won’t do—is love him. I’ll stay with him, but my pride won’t let me love a man who doesn’t love me back.

  EIGHTEEN BRIAN HARTEN

  I drop off Roxie’s car and split before she can run outside and chew my ass out. That’s the smart move. I don’t want to have to talk to her, and I don’t want to spend any more time in her car with the cops out looking for me. But I’m fucking beat now, and all I want to do is have a drink and go to bed.

  Still, when I get to my place, I come up through the woods to look things over before I go waltzing back into my apartment. Everything is nice and quiet. No cops. Neighbors ain’t gawking out their windows. Jack shit is going on.

  As much as I just want to go down there, though, I hold back and check things out. I’m jittery, like I’ve been shotgunning coffee all day. I give my hands a shake, stomp my feet.

  Sun’s gone down, and everything looks cold in the moonlight. A few cars in the lot. A few lights on in apartment windows. But mostly it’s just quiet. Erikson’s not outside perving on some cat’s ballbag, so that’s a plus.

  I take a breath and walk out of the woods, pine needles crunching under my feet. Across the parking lot, I rush as quietly as I can up to my door. I should have left the light on when I left. Unlock the door and slip inside. Hit the light. Lock the door behind me and wait.

  “Hello?” I say.

  Nothing.

  I walk into the kitchen to grab a beer. I’m out.

  I go to the bedroom and hit the light and my guts explode.

  I drop. Lunch spikes up to my mouth.

  “Cocksucker,” he says. “Fucking cocksucker.” Hits me in the back. Hard. Wood. A bat.

  I cover up, trying not to get hit in the head. But he doesn’t go for the head. He doesn’t want to fuck me up. Not yet. He hits me in the thighs.

  “Tommy—”


  “Shut up and stay down.”

  “Tommy, look, I—”

  “You got shit in your ears, you fucking cocksucker? You shut your fucking mouth.”

  I shut up.

  “Lean against the bed.”

  I push myself against the bed and try to look up at him, but the bulb on the ceiling fan is like a goddamn interrogation light. He dives at me like he’s going to bite my face. “Where’s my money?”

  I shake my head, but before I can even think of a lie he pulls back and whacks me in the shin. I scream, and my lunch pumps up to my mouth again. Gag, one hand over my mouth, the other on my leg.

  “This ain’t the CIA,” Tommy says. “I ain’t got all night to waterboard you. I’m just gonna beat your ass until you give me my money. And if that don’t work . . .” He pats his side, and I see that he’s wearing his Glock clipped to his belt.

  “Gonna vomit,” I manage to choke out.

  “You puke on me, I swear to Christ I’ll knock your teeth out.” He’s breathing hard, his big gut heaving and sticking out the bottom of his pink polo. Got the bat in one hand, with the other hand on his doughy hip.

  I double over, holding my leg. My shin might be broke.

  He watches. Shakes his head. “I can’t believe you did this. Are you fucking stupid, Harten? I never took you for stupid. Not this stupid. You really thought you was gonna steal from me and that was gonna be it? No consequences?”

  “Are the cops coming?” I manage to ask.

  “Yeah. They’re right behind me. Told me to go ahead and break into your house with a baseball bat and a gun.”

  I hold my shin like it’s about to fall apart.

  “Where’s my money?” he says. “And don’t tell me you spent it to get your car back, ’cause I just saw you walk out of the woods like a fucking hillbilly.”

  “I don’t have it.”

  He lifts the bat.

  “Please,” I say, and tears come to my eyes.

  “Are you crying?” he says. He raises both his eyebrows. “I wanna laugh at you, Harten, but, Christ Almighty, I think I’m more fucking offended than anything else.”

  I hate it. I hate the tears. Ever since I was a kid, I couldn’t help the tears. They just come up in moments when I’m scared or really upset. I’m not a pussy. I just can’t stop the tears.

  “I’m not crying.”

  “Looks like crying from where I’m standing.”

  “I tear up. It ain’t the same thing.”

  “Tell it to your gynecologist. Only thing I want to hear from you is where you got my money hid.”

  “I had to give it to someone.”

  “Who?”

  I don’t know why I hold back the preacher’s name. I don’t owe him anything. Certainly don’t got a reason to take a beating for him. He’s the reason I’m in trouble. He’s the reason for all my troubles.

  I hesitate for a second, though. Maybe I’m just scared. I don’t know what will happen once I say his name.

  But Tommy’s lifting the bat . . .

  “Weatherford! Richard Weatherford!”

  He makes a face like I farted. “What? Bullshit.”

  “I swear to fucking God, man.”

  “The preacher?”

  “Yes.”

  “You sure you didn’t mail it to Billy Graham?”

  “I swear to God. Why would I make that up? Why would I say I gave it to him if it wasn’t the truth?”

  “The hell does that mean?”

  “I mean, if I was gonna lie, I wouldn’t say the money was for Richard Weatherford. I’d say it was for loan sharks or something like that.”

  “He told you to rob me?”

  “No. I just had to come up with some money for him.”

  “Why?”

  I grab the edge of the bed to pull myself up. My stomach feels like a fishbowl. “I just need one second, man. One second. You fucking hammered me in the guts. I probably got internal bleeding.”

  Tommy doesn’t say anything, but he lowers the bat. “You gave the money to Richard Weatherford,” he says, turning it over in his head. “So you stole money from me to, what? Bribe him? This about the vote?”

  “It wasn’t my idea. He called me today. Said he wanted to meet to discuss the vote. I figured what the hell, so I go meet him. That’s when he tells me that he needs some cash, off the books. I don’t know why, and he won’t say why. But he needs cash.”

  Tommy leans against the wall. “And he told you that if you get him the money he needs . . .”

  “Then he’ll swing the vote my way.”

  “You believed that?”

  “Yeah . . .”

  “That’s what you get for listening to a preacher. They’re worse than politicians. No honest man talks for a living.”

  “I know, but—”

  “The preacher of the biggest Baptist church in the county told you he was going to swing the dry vote into a wet vote, and you really thought he could do that?”

  “Sure, why not?”

  “Because if he’d tried it, they’d crucify him, that’s why. What’s he gonna do next, marry a couple of fags? A preacher like Weatherford ain’t some cult leader. He can’t just make shit up out of thin air. He’s gotta tell his people the same shit their momma’s been telling them their whole life. And you know what the Baptists been telling their kids for a hundred fucking years? That alcohol comes straight out of Satan’s asshole.”

  I shrug. “I was desperate, man.”

  “Why does he need the money?”

  “Hell if I know.”

  “Maybe he got somebody pregnant and he’s got to shut her up. Or gambling? No, not gambling. But maybe he lost his ass on some business deal . . .”

  I just shrug again.

  Tommy’s tapping the bat against his leg. “When did you give him the money?”

  “Just now.”

  “Where?”

  “Up at the little car wash over on Huddo.”

  “There was about twenty grand?”

  “Nineteen and some change.”

  He just stares at me.

  “What?” I ask.

  “Shut up,” he says.

  He’s thinking. That’s fine. I just hold myself. Can’t decide which hurts worse, my guts or my shin. They both feel busted.

  “Call him,” Tommy says.

  I start to tell him that the preacher told me never to call, but I think better of it and dig my phone out of my pocket. I nearly cut my hand on the broken screen. It’s glowing, but the display is just a bunch of fucked-up white lines.

  “Goddamn it, you broke my cell, man.”

  He just stares at me.

  I stare at the smashed phone. It’s my whole business. All the numbers and info I need. Ray had the laptop. I’ve been running my life out of this thing, and now it’s all busted to shit.

  My life is busted to shit.

  Tommy shrugs. “Tough. You shouldn’t have set fire to my property. You shouldn’t have stole from me like a bitch. Get up.”

  “What? Why?”

  “Just get up.”

  “Dude, you don’t have to hit me again, okay? I get that I’m screwed. I’m cooperating. Hitting me some more is just going to make me useless to you.”

  He nods. “I know. So get up.”

  Using the bed, I pull myself up. I get to my feet with my guts churning and my leg feeling like it’s splintering.

  “Let’s go,” he says.

  “Where we going?”

  “Where do you think?” he says. “We’re gonna go get my money.”

  NINETEEN RICHARD WEATHERFORD

  The Walmart parking lot is half full, and I’ve already seen one family from our church pull up and go inside while I’ve been sitting in my minivan staring at my phone. Staring at my phone and waiting.

  Gary won’t answer my calls. I don’t want to leave a message or a text, so I don’t know what to do.

  What I want is to go home and go to bed, because I’m suddenly so exhausted
I can barely sit up straight in the seat.

  But my glove compartment is full of the evidence of a crime. It’s not much money, but it doesn’t have to be a lot. It’s enough, those few thousand dollars, that envelope full of paper, to ruin my career, my marriage, my life.

  I call Gary again. Nothing. Just a generic voicemail beep.

  I don’t leave a message. What else can I do but keep calling or go home and try to find him tomorrow?

  No, not tomorrow. This day has been enough of a disaster. Besides, on Easter Sunday it would be impossible for me to disappear for even a few minutes. That means I would have to keep this money for least another forty-eight hours, and that’s unacceptable. This has to end tonight.

  Which means that there is only one thing left to do.

  I put the car in drive and head over to Gary’s house.

  Along either side of the empty highway, the illuminated windows of simple homes shine out from the trees. I know the names of almost all the people who live in these houses, and I know many—maybe even most—of these people personally. They all know my name, my reputation.

  i knew thee in thy mother’s womb

  I shake my head, unable to think about the larger ramifications of what I’m doing. I simply don’t have the time for that right now. I’m drowning, and drowning men don’t call out for God. They gasp for air.

  Gary’s parents will probably be home. Jill and Vaughn Doane. A quiet couple. They’re members of the church, though they’re sporadic in their attendance. I expect them to make an appearance tomorrow for Easter.

  But what kind of people are they? What should I prepare for?

  Vaughn has always seemed like an affable man. He works over at the Bill Linn Chevrolet as a salesman, and I assume he’s good at that job. I know that Jill teaches high school English, but I forget where. I think she’s got a bit of a commute to somewhere north of here, a smaller town with a smaller school. I’ve always gotten the sense that she’s not terribly happy attempting to teach the classics of English literature to roomfuls of defiantly ignorant rednecks.