EMIL
Leaving his new assistant alone in the barn, Emil Hawthorne drove the rented van out to Highway-5 and up what he already thought of as the backside of the mountain – the end of the road closest to Tulsa. He drove up Mountain Falls Road and slowly past Jean MacDonnell’s house. The Jeep was in the driveway, but her minivan was not. Emil smiled. This was the time. Things were going to work out perfectly.
He had already found a clearing about twenty yards from Jean MacDonnell’s driveway, on the opposite side, if she was to be coming from Longbranch, which he figured she would be. The clearing was surrounded with trees and, having already checked during the day when both Jean and her husband were at work, he knew his van could not be seen by someone turning into their driveway, unless they craned their necks. However, from his location in the clearing, he could see her driveway perfectly.
He kept going in the direction that he was headed, down Mountain Falls Road toward Highway-5, where he turned right onto Highway-5, on to the other entrance to Mountain Falls Road and back up the mountain to his hidey-hole. He sat there in the van, shaking with anticipation. It wouldn’t be long now, he thought. Not long at all.
DALTON
Sarah directed Dalton to Riverbanks Park, on the banks of the Arkansas River that ran near the downtown area, and they parked his truck and walked along the newly renovated river’s edge, passing the floating stage and amphitheater in the middle of the river. Although the sun was shining and the sky was blue, it was still only mid-March and there was a chilly wind blowing off the river toward them, blowing an odor of rotting fish and decay. Neither mentioned it, concentrating instead on the flowers in neat borders along the walkway, brilliant colors reaching for the sky.
‘I guess I never knew Tulsa was so pretty,’ Dalton said, looking down at Sarah and wishing he had the nerve to hold her hand. That would be really nice, he thought, walking along the river’s edge, holding hands with this pretty girl.
‘The city’s been doing a lot of renovations over the years,’ Sarah said. ‘I think they’re actually getting it right.’
Making it back to the truck, they drove to Cherry Street and then walked along admiring the small shops and checking out the menus at the many restaurants.
‘Oh, look at this shop!’ Sarah said, pointing in the window of a shop that seemed to specialize in eclectic items from all over the world. ‘May we go in here?’ Sarah asked.
Dalton felt himself preening inside. He’d never been around anyone, man or woman, who said ‘may’ instead of ‘can’. He knew the difference and knew Sarah had done it right! She is so refined, he thought. And what a great teacher she must be for little kids. He couldn’t wait for her to start teaching their children the difference between ‘may’ and ‘can’.
They walked into the store, the smell of patchouli incense almost knocking Dalton over. The store was so crowded, Dalton worried about knocking stuff over because of his size. He tried slipping sideways through the aisles so he wouldn’t hit anything. There was stuff from the Middle East, stuff from the Orient and stuff from right there in Tulsa: home-made stuff. Candles and paintings and vases and sculpture and jewelry.
Sarah found a scarf, a big one, made of some silky kind of material and studded with sequins and beads and other doodads Dalton didn’t recognize. It was black at one end and faded to an aqua blue at the other.
‘Oh, I have to have this!’ Sarah said.
‘I’ll get it for you,’ Dalton said, wondering how much something like that would cost.
‘Oh, no! Never. I’ve got it.’
Realizing it was already six thirty, they found a restaurant with a tantalizing menu (at least to Sarah) and went inside for dinner. Dalton knew how to read, but he just didn’t understand anything the menu said. Not wanting to look totally stupid, he said, ‘This is your city. Why don’t you order for both of us?’ He heard that line in a movie once. It was the girl saying it, but still . . .
‘You sure?’ Sarah asked, smiling at him.
‘Absolutely,’ Dalton answered, smiling back.
And so she did. The appetizer they shared was called a ‘cauliflower latke’ when she’d ordered it, but it turned out in real life to be a potato pancake with spicy green sauce. He’d told her he liked beef so she’d ordered him a steak and mac and cheese. Except the mac and cheese had lobster in it and the carrots were spicy hot and sitting next to some green stuff that tasted like licorice, something he’d never liked. His first instinct was to spit it out, but he’d stopped doing that in high school.
‘You don’t like the braised fennel?’ Sarah asked.
‘What’s that?’
She pointed at the green stuff. Dalton shook his head apologetically, ‘Sorry. It takes like licorice,’ he said.
‘You want to try some of mine?’ she asked.
Dalton looked at her bacon-wrapped duck breast, sitting on what looked like baby food, and declined the invitation. As far as Dalton was concerned, the best part of the meal was the apple martinis Sarah kept ordering. They were, in his opinion, damn good.
When the bill came, Dalton thought he might pass out from sticker shock, but managed to put down his Visa card like he knew what he was doing. He figured it would take two months to pay off this dinner.
As they walked back to his truck, Dalton asked shyly, ‘Do you need to go home or be somewhere?’
Sarah smiled. ‘No,’ she said. ‘Nowhere without you.’
Dalton smiled back.
Sarah directed him to a club she said she’d heard about. There they switched to mojitos. It was around midnight when Sarah took Dalton’s hand in hers and said, ‘I never thought I’d find a man so understanding. So macho. So gorgeous.’
Dalton blushed. ‘Well, you’re really pretty.’
‘Thank you,’ Sarah said, smiling widely at him. Her shyness had diminished with the cocktails, Dalton noted. But then, so had his. Dalton reached forward and cupped the back of Sarah’s head, bringing her face toward him, and kissed her. Closed mouth, since it was the first kiss, and tender, but not a peck. Definitely not a peck.
When he released her, Sarah sat back in her chair and fanned her face with her hand. ‘Whew!’ she said. ‘Mama, buy me that!’
Dalton laughed.
‘You know,’ Sarah said, leaning forward and taking Dalton’s hand in hers, ‘you just don’t seem the type to be into trannies.’
‘Well,’ Dalton said, ‘I prefer working on an engine block, and even brakes, but trannies are OK.’
‘What?’ Sarah said.
Dalton had almost forgotten Sarah’s earlier mention in her emails that she was a ‘trannie’. A new word, Dalton figured, for people who liked to work on automobile transmissions. She seemed like such a girly girl, but you never could tell these days.
‘Transmissions are OK. Little detailed, you know, but maybe not as detailed as working on a brake system, or a catalytic converter, or something like that,’ Dalton said, smiling at this beautiful girl in front of him.
Sarah took her hand out of Dalton’s and fell back into her chair. ‘Transmissions?’ she said.
‘Yeah?’ Dalton wondered why she seemed so sad all of a sudden.
‘Excuse me,’ Sarah said, and left.
Dalton watched her leave, taking her oversized purse with her, and his imagination went into overdrive – just like a well-built transmission. Her hips were a little on the small side, but he thought how small his mama was, and she had three real big babies. He figured Sarah could pop ’em out with no problem. And right away. He wanted babies right away. As she disappeared down the hall toward the restrooms, Dalton turned back to his table and finished his third mojito, holding up the empty glass to the waitress to signal for another. He wouldn’t mention anything about babies right away, of course, not even about marriage. But maybe by the end of the weekend. That would be the time, he thought.
‘Put it on my tab,’ he told the waitress – the same way that Sarah had for their last round. He giggled as
the waitress walked off. ‘Put it on my tab!’ he repeated, giggling some more.
Then someone came and sat down at his table. Someone he didn’t know. ‘That seat’s saved,’ Dalton told him.
‘I know,’ the man said.
Dalton frowned as he looked down at his mojito and then inhaled half of it. There’s something familiar about this guy, he thought. But Dalton was sure he didn’t know him from Adam.
‘Dalton,’ the man said.
‘Seat’s saved . . . How’d you know my name?’
‘Dalton, you need to concentrate here,’ the man said.
‘My girlfriend’s gonna be back any minute,’ Dalton said. ‘Well, she’s not exactly my girlfriend – not yet anyway – but she’s gonna . . . Who are you?’ he asked, signaling to a waiter for another round.
The man pulled Dalton’s hand down. ‘I think you’ve had enough.’
‘Whoa now!’ Dalton said, jerking his hand out of the man’s grip. ‘Don’t you go grabbing! I want another drink!’
‘I think you’ve had enough to drink,’ the man said.
‘Who are you, the drink police? Where’s Sarah?’ Dalton asked, trying to stand from his chair but not making it all the way up.
‘I’m right here, Dalton,’ the man said, swinging Sarah’s extra-large purse up onto the table.
Dalton looked all around but couldn’t find the girl of his dreams. ‘Where is she?’ he whined, staring at Sarah’s purse. ‘What did you do with her?’
The man touched Dalton’s hand where it rested on the table. ‘I’m right here,’ he said again, pulling a strawberry-blonde wig out of the oversized purse.
Dalton jerked his hand away. ‘Huh?’
‘I thought you understood!’ the man said, tears in his eyes. ‘I thought you knew what “trannie” meant!’
‘Wha—?’ Dalton said, shaking his head. ‘Transmission? Yeah, I know what it means! Makes the car go!’
The man took a deep breath and then let it out. Finally, he said, ‘No, Dalton, it means men who like to dress up like women.’
‘Huh?’ Dalton said again.
The man sighed and held out his hand, ‘Hi, I’m Geoffrey.’
MILT
It was kinda nice having the house to myself on a Saturday, even if only for a couple of hours. More than that and it would probably get lonely. It’s funny how fast you can get used to the carryings-on of a four-year-old. I can’t believe I went almost sixty years before becoming a daddy. Something I shoulda done at least thirty years ago. Except then the mama woulda been my ex-wife LaDonna, which is a whole ’nother ball of wax.
I called Virgil Wynn down at the Exxon station, set up an appointment to get the Jeep looked at on Monday and to get a ride to the sheriff’s office, then wandered back outside to my new garage.
There was a time when this cleared section of my property had a small stable and a fenced-in area for horses, except that when I bought the place, I didn’t have any horses. Then a tornado knocked that down, and my sister and her kids were still living here and I thought maybe I’d build a pool. But before I got that notion totally clear in my head, my sister up and married and moved her and her kids to Bishop, on the other side of the county. So then when me and Jean got married, and we knew we were having a baby, she – I mean we – decided a pool wouldn’t be a good idea. That’s when I had the garage built. Not only is it a garage, it’s a workshop, too. Fits two cars and a boat, if I ever get one, and has a room all along the back set up for woodworking and general manly messing around. And it has an air conditioner. So I wandered out there and put my tools in alphabetical order.
My cell phone rang when I was on the ‘D’s – drill, drill bits, Dustbuster, drummet. I picked it up and said, ‘Hello’.
‘Did you find him?’ Clovis Pettigrew demanded.
I sighed. ‘Not yet, Ma’am. But he’ll call in soon, I swear.’
She hung up loudly in my ear. Which I felt was better than having to listen to her.
DALTON
‘Honey, what‘ja doing out here without your pants on?’ a voice said.
Dalton jerked his head up. There was a woman at the end of the alleyway. Well, at least he thought it was a woman. She had on a real short skirt with high red boots, a real low top showing what looked like real boobies and big blonde hair. The hair he figured wasn’t real ’cause her skin was the color of black coffee.
‘You a real woman?’ Dalton asked.
‘Real as heartbreak, honey.’ She moved toward him and Dalton could see that those boobies sure looked real. Still being a little on the drunk side, he reached out and touched one as she bent over him. She cupped his hand so that it squeezed her breast. ‘Now you feel that, baby? Them phony ones don’t feel soft like that now, do they, baby?’
Dalton pulled his hand away and blushed. ‘Sorry, Ma’am,’ he said, trying to get up.
‘Here, baby, let me help you,’ the woman said, pulling him to his feet. ‘How’d you get out here in your underpants?’
Dalton shook his head. ‘’Don’t know. I was in a club, talking to somebody, last I remember.’
‘Baby, you got any money?’ she asked, cradling his left arm between her breasts.
Dalton looked down at his undershorts. ‘Don’t reckon I do,’ he said.
The woman sighed. ‘That’s a real shame. I like me a big ol’ white boy ever once in a while, know what I mean?’
‘Ma’am?’ Dalton asked.
The woman laughed. ‘Come on, honey,’ she said, pulling at his arm. ‘Let’s go get you some coffee.’ She headed for the street at the end of the alley.
Dalton pulled back. ‘Oh, no, Ma’am! I can’t go out there. I don’t have my pants on!’
‘Hey, Tanjene!’ called a male voice from the other end of the alley.
The woman looked behind Dalton and made a face. ‘Yo, Luther. What‘ja doing back here? Told you no more freebies!’
‘Ah, Tanjene, honey . . .’
‘Hey, Luther, listen up. Gimme your pants and I’ll think about a BJ later tonight. How’s that sound?’
‘OK,’ the man said, taking off his pants and handing them over without question.
Tanjene held them out to Dalton. ‘Put these on, honey,’ she said.
Dalton looked at the pants. They were a black, white and orange plaid. The shirt he was wearing was a Western-cut dark blue paisley and white. ‘’Don’t know if these are gonna fit,’ he said, looking at Tanjene.
‘So they might be a little short, honey. Good enough to get you some coffee, don‘ja think?’
Dalton pulled on the pants. He couldn’t fasten them at the waist, as they were too small, so Tanjene pulled his paisley shirt down over the open fly. The cuffs stopped three inches above his ankles. His feet were still bare. Tanjene looked at Dalton’s feet and then at Luther’s, and shook her head. ‘Baby, you gonna have to go barefoot, all there is to it.’
‘Yes, Ma’am,’ Dalton said, glancing at Luther’s feet himself. Dalton wore a size-thirteen shoe; not many people even got close to that.
‘Luther, you go on home and get you some more pants. Can’t be walking around half-naked like that!’ Tanjene said over her shoulder as she walked Dalton out of the alley.
‘But you said—’ Luther started.
Tanjene cut him off. ‘I said later, Luther, now didn’t I? Is this later? I don’t think so!’ She turned back around and hugged Dalton’s arm to her breasts. ‘Come on, honey, let’s get out of this stinky old alley!’
EMIL
He had a plan. It was fairly simple and straightforward. No one would get hurt, but Dr Jean MacDonnell would suffer, of that he was certain. He just wasn’t sure how long he could make her suffer. Days? Weeks? Surely not months. There was only so much a man could take.
Sitting in his van, tucked under some trees only yards from Jean’s driveway, he watched. It was quiet up here on the mountain; very nice. Too nice. She had a good life here, he thought. But he would soon change that.
JE
AN MACDONNELL
Jean sat at the picnic table beside the only other woman she knew at the party, Mary Ellen Knight, the sister of Milt’s deputy Dalton Pettigrew. Mary Ellen’s son Eli was in the same group at day care as John. Jean attempted to carry on a polite conversation with Mary Ellen, but it was difficult because the other woman would start a sentence and then let it peter out into nothingness, never actually finishing a thought. Jean thought that the woman was obviously suffering from severe clinical depression. However, Jean tried to never make a diagnosis in a social setting, although, like now, it was often hard not to.
‘So where do you work?’ Jean asked after they’d discussed their children ad nauseam.
‘At Sinclair’s?’ Mary Ellen said, making it sound as if she was asking Jean for the truth of the fact.
Jean shook her head. ‘I’m not sure what that is.’
‘Oilfield supply?’ Mary Ellen offered.
‘Oh,’ Jean said, trying a smile. ‘What do you do there?’
Mary Ellen was quiet for a moment, as if considering, then she said, ‘I’m a credit representative.’
‘Oh,’ Jean responded, ‘that must be interesting.’
‘Not really,’ Mary Ellen said.
Silence ensued.
‘I’m a psychiatrist,’ Jean said finally, feeling like an idiot when the words came out of her mouth.
‘Yes,’ Mary Ellen nodded.
Finally, the birthday girl’s father got the piñata hanging correctly up in the tree and the children began their blindfolded attempts at whacking it. Jean felt this was the perfect opportunity to forego the conversation with Mary Ellen. She stood up on her crutches and began rooting for the next child in line.
DALTON
Tanjene had barely managed to walk Dalton through the mouth of the alley when she was jerked sideways by a man in baggy jeans, an oversized T-shirt and so much gold around his neck that it made Dalton dizzy. He looked like one of those rappers you see on TV, except that he was a white man.
‘Where you been, ho?’ the white man shouted at Tanjene, almost picking her up off her feet with his grip on her upper arm.
Rude Awakening Page 5