After our first visit to Dehart's, as we walked along the dirt road on our way home, I stopped Winston when we got to the middle of the old, rickety bridge. I wanted to see if he remembered our ritual. Kind of a test on my part to check his memory. The bridge itself was framed out of iron, but instead of asphalt or concrete, the crossover was simply railroad ties. In fact, when I walked the fifty yards across it, in a few places there were gaps between the ties where I could actually see the water flowing. The spaces weren't wide enough to slip a foot through—they were hardly big enough to slip a quarter through—but there was enough of an opening to get a glimpse of the raging world below. If a car came across, the tires would rattle the ties until I thought the whole thing might collapse beneath my legs.
Years before, during the rains and snowmelt, when the water was really running, Winston and I had stood on that bridge, looking down into the guts of the ravine. That was the first time I explained the significance of the area to him. "We're standing directly over a special spot, Winston. You know why that is?"
"No, ma'am," he'd said as he sipped his RC and stood on tiptoe to look over the railing.
"This is the Eastern Continental Divide you're standing over. Everything in Shooting Creek will one day end up in the Atlantic Ocean, where the sharks will eventually get it. But any streams that flow the other way," I'd said, pointing toward the ridge of mountains to the west, "well, all that water ends up finding the great Mississippi. Go ahead and spit over the side."
Winston had looked at me quizzically but then stretched his toes until his chin rested on the coolness of the railing. He released a thick RC-laden string of saliva and watched as it wiggled and twisted through the air like a snake falling from a tree.
"Do it again," I'd said, laughing.
So Winston spat again.
"Once more."
Winston did it again and laughed with me.
"Thanks to you," I'd said, "the sharks will someday know what RC Cola tastes like." From that day forward, it had become our ritual.
So this time when we stopped, I waited anxiously to see what would happen. He put his hands on the rusted I-beam railing and leaned his head over the side. Then he looked up at me, confused, like a puppy will do the first time it sees itself in a mirror. I didn't do anything except to give just the slightest nod of encouragement. I could tell that mind of his was working, trying to figure things out. Could almost hear those gears in his head clicking. He looked down at the water again. And then he spat. I don't think he understood exactly why he was spitting, don't think he remembered the story I'd told him, but somewhere deep in his mind there'd been a spark. And a spark was all I'd wanted.
It was right then that my heart about busted. But busted in a good way. He wasn't ever going to be the same, but I knew he was going to be okay. He might have been a little damaged, but he was still my Winston.
Robert
In a community as small as Shooting Creek, it doesn't take long for word to get around. Sometimes it seems like everybody's already heard about something before it even happens. Since most of the gossip takes place either in my store around the stove in winter, or out on the front porch the rest of the year, I generally catch wind before just about anybody. So when something big happened, like Lila Quesenberry's boy nearly getting killed by a horseshoe—well, that really got things riled up.
That particular afternoon, when Lila walked through the screen door, I wasn't exactly sure how to act. I wanted to go right up and hug her, comfort her some, but that just didn't seem appropriate. If anybody'd seen that, then the talk would have really started. Word would've gotten ahead to Ellsabeth before I even made it home for the night. Things were shaky enough between me and the wife as it was, so me hugging Lila would've only added fuel to the fire.
Winston still had some bandages on his head, and the left side of his face was bloated and swollen. It appeared soft, as if filled with jelly, and I imagined if I'd poked at it, I would've left a dent. His eye was partially closed, like he'd started to blink and the lid had forgotten to catch up, and there was bruising from his jaw to his hairline. But his other eye was that same bright blue as Lila's. The deep, piercing blue of a jay's feather. I could tell right away that he was a little off. Winston had always been as friendly a boy as I'd ever known. Come into the store, all smiles, chattering away. But this time he didn't act like he even knew I was there. Acted like he didn't have the sense to bell a cat.
Lila looked just as pretty as ever though. Her long silver hair pulled into a ponytail, trailing to the middle of her back and brushing against her blouse. She'd started going gray while we were still sweethearts, and since then, her hair had turned a bright silver. Despite that, it somehow didn't make her look old, only wise. It pained me to see her distraught, and I knew that the accident with Winston was only part of the problem. The porch talk had made it common knowledge that Dale had gone back to drinking. There'd been a few times already when I'd wanted to tell some folks to stitch up their mouths and mind their own business, but it would've gotten taken the wrong way. Next thing I would've known, Ellsabeth would've been chastising me about defending Lila's honor. Seems like a man can't win for losing in this life, no matter what he does.
Sheriff Sutphin
It was early morning when the call came in. Dispatch told me Lila Quesenberry had called and needed an officer out to her place right away. The dispatcher said Lila didn't sound overly fretted, not crying or anything, but she had spoken with urgency. I figured it most likely had something to do with that retarded boy of hers. Probably having a seizure or something. Turns out I was wrong about that.
When I pulled up, it was barely light. Right off I saw the boy over near the chicken coop, bundled up in a heavy coat and down on all fours, crawling around and chasing after some loose hens. Little puffs of cold coming from his mouth. From what I'd heard tell of, that was pretty normal behavior now.
As my patrol car crunched the gravel, Lila emerged from the door of the hay barn. That sorry barn looked to be on its last legs, leaning over to one side, the tin roofing lifted up in spots from seasons of wind. When she popped out, it looked like there was a faint fog following her from inside. She was alone, standing there and squeezing her hands together as if wringing out a dish cloth. Just kept doing it, over and over, squeezing one hand and then the other. When she saw me, she gave a wave, but it wasn't a wave of hello. More like, Come over here. The problem is this way.
It was only about a week before Christmas and bitter cold. If I'd spoken right then, my words would've come out frozen. And even though it was barely light, you could tell it was going to be gray all day. Like the whole world was trapped inside a hornet's nest.
As I approached Lila, my boots crunching the hoarfrost, I noticed she wasn't wearing no coat. Just a nightgown. Figured that's why she worked her hands the way she did, but when I got up next to her she wasn't shivering. It was more like those fidgeting hands were a nervous habit more than anything. Her hair hung down loose over her shoulders, and the silver of it shined despite the gray of the morning. And she was pretty in a foreign kind of way. Hadn't really noticed it that first time I'd been there, six months back, but she was. Crystal blue eyes and that silver hair.
"Ms. Quesenberry," I said, nodding as I pinched my hat brim.
I think she recognized me, but I saw her glance at the nametag on my coat before she said, "Sheriff Sutphin," and nodded in return.
"What seems to be the trouble?" I said. She didn't appear to be overly out of sorts, but there was something about her—maybe it was those hands—that told me something wasn't right. Or maybe it was just those blue eyes swallowing me up like deep pools of water.
"I guess you ought to see for yourself," she said, motioning toward the barn. She began walking and I followed, dropping my boots over the footprints she left in the frost, me watching the faint outline of her thin body beneath that nightgown. "It's Dale," she said, not bothering to look back as she talked. "He's dead."
Dale had been going out drinking more and more while doing less and less. Shirking his responsibilities and leaving it up to me to feed the chickens, hay the horses, even split stove wood, not to mention seeing after Winston nonstop. He'd never been able to handle his liquor. Right at first, I'd let it go, knowing he was feeling guilty, but it got to a point where I'd had enough. A person can only take so much. First Winston's accident, then Granddaddy passing a month later, then Dale crawling up inside a bottle every day.
For one thing, he couldn't hardly look at Winston anymore, let alone tend to him. It was like he was allergic. Like Winston was a vine of poison ivy. I swear I wondered sometimes if he thought Winston might be contagious.
So it had been some rough going for those past six months. If I'd been a church-type woman, I'd have probably asked the Lord for strength right about then, but I wasn't, so I didn't. Instead I confronted Dale one morning at the breakfast table. It was early, still solid black out, the windows covered in crystals around the edges. I didn't know when Dale had come in the night before, but whenever it was, it was well after I'd gone to bed. Shoot, for all I knew, he might've still been up and hadn't even gone to sleep yet. It wasn't like we'd shared a bed in months. Most nights he got liquored up, then fell asleep on the couch by the woodstove.
"It's about time you stopped feeling sorry for yourself and helped me out around here," I said as I picked at my eggs. Even though Dale sat clear across the other side, the stink of last night's whiskey leaked from his skin and churned my stomach. "What's done is done. You need to get sober again, pick yourself up, and get back to work. Christmas is only eight days off and we need to get Winston something special."
Dale kept his eyes down, staring at the table. He mumbled under his breath, almost like he didn't want me to hear but speaking just loud enough to make sure that I did. "Ain't like he's gonna appreciate anything we get him anyway. He won't know the difference."
I'd been putting up with his sorry ass—pardon my language—for as long as I could stand it. If he wanted to give up on me and stop doing work around the place, if he wanted to mope around and feel sorry for himself, well, that was one thing. But I wasn't about to let him give up and quit on Winston.
"How in the world do you know what he can and can't appreciate?" I said as I stood up from the table. "How in the world would you know if he can or can't know the difference about anything? It's not like you've been around him for more than a second since you threw a ringer around his god-blessed head. Almost like it was him you were aiming for instead of that post in the sandpit."
Dale pushed his chair away from the table, squeaking the legs across the pine slats. He got up and started for the door, his head hangdog.
"Because if you'd spent even ten minutes with him since you bashed his skull in," I said, my words trailing him out the door, "you'd know that he damn well can appreciate things. That he sure as hell would know the difference."
At that moment I was like a fiddle string tightened one turn too many. When I heard the truck start up in the barn, I figured he was taking off to somewhere. Probably down to Dehart's Grocery for a six-pack. I imagined him sitting in the parking lot, the heat on full blast as the truck idled, waiting for Robert to open up at 5:30. What a sorry sight that would've been.
Robert
Word of Dale's death came to the store shortly before noon. It was Scottie Lee Simpkins who came in while several of us was sitting around the potbelly, some sipping on coffee, some taking nips from flasks. In the dead of winter, there wasn't much else to do but huddle up and wait for spring.
Scottie was one of those sorts who always made my stomach drop. Most folks in Shooting Creek were fine and upstanding. Scottie wasn't one of them. He'd been in and out of trouble since he'd been a boy, and whenever he'd come in, my eyes would widen. Had to watch him close or he'd slip something into his pocket, smooth as butter.
He bypassed the circle of us and went straight to the cooler, grabbing a six of High Life bottles. He cracked one, dropping the cap on the floor, and took a long swallow. He reached into the pocket of his grease-smudged work shirt, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, and pulled out a crumpled pack of Camels. Dark grit was piled underneath his fingernails, his hands and wiry arms smeared with black like he'd been cleaning a chimney.
"Dale Quesenberry died this morning," he said. "Shit, I was out drinking with him last night. Over at the Pine Tavern. When they closed up, he drove me home. Dropped me off about two thirty I'd say. We got into a little bottle of busthead, and after we finished it, he left. Next thing I know, the son-of-a-bitch is dead."
Of course that caught our attention. He went through half that six-pack as he dragged out the story, making it seem like Dale was his best buddy when everybody knew Scottie only went around with him because Dale bought him drinks.
While he yammered on, my mind had already switched to Lila. She'd lost her Grandpa Davis a few months back, not to mention Winston's accident, and now this. As horrible as it was, a part of me (and I ain't exactly proud to admit this) was somehow relieved. Lila was available again. I'll probably go straight to hell, but no man can deny his true feelings. And my true feelings had always been with Lila. We'd gotten into an argument shortly after she graduated, broke things off for a little while, and next thing I knew she's marrying Dale. Not a month after we split up. I'd thought it was just temporary. Me being stubborn and not wanting to apologize. Her marrying Dale to spite me. But when she delivered Winston only eight months after they'd married, I knew it wasn't spite that made her do what she did.
By the time I snapped out of my thoughts, Scottie had already slipped out with the rest of the six-pack in tow, not having paid me one red cent.
Sheriff Sutphin
"You might want to cover your mouth," she said as I followed her to the barn.
When we got close, I smelled muffler exhaust, the air thick with it. That same gray fog still trickled from the barn, and when I entered, a haze hung inside, collecting in the chestnut rafters.
The pickup door was opened, and I could see right off that there was a man slouched in there. A snake of green garden hose went from the tail pipe, over the tailgate, across the bed, and entered the cab through the sliding part of the back window.
"When I got out here," she said, turning to me, her hand clasping the neck of her nightgown as she pulled it up to mask her face, "I opened the door and turned off the key. I didn't touch anything else, but I already knew it was too late. That's when I went back inside and called."
She told me all of that matter-of-fact. I didn't know if it was the cold, the shock, or what, but she was calm and cool. From outside near the creek, I heard the caw of a crow and the delighted sounds of the boy running around with the chickens. It was an eerie and uncomfortable scene: that retarded boy out there, a silver-haired woman in her nightgown looking at her dead husband, a cloud of exhaust hanging in the cold air, the crow cawing, and it only being a week before Christmas. I couldn't help but feel for Lila right then. The Lord don't put on us more than we can bear, but I thought He was sort of pushing it with her.
Dale sat slumped in the driver's seat, his head leaning back against the rest. The end of the hose was still stuck in his mouth like he'd been siphoning gasoline. One eye was partially open, staring at the roof. On the seat next to him was a bottle of Jim Beam, uncapped, with just a small taste remaining.
I grabbed Dale's wrist for good measure, but there was no pulse. His skin was icy, the blood already froze up.
"I'll radio for an ambulance," I said. "I sure am sorry."
"Nothing's sacred," she said and walked out.
I scratched a few notes and heard her yelling for her boy from outside the barn. "Come on, Winston," she said. "I got some sausage waiting."
I went to my cruiser and radioed in, then sat in my car to keep warm until they showed up. The morning was light now, still gray and overcast, but I could see well enough. Down in the field across from Shooting
Creek was a lone deer at the tree line, foraging before the snow set in. Which got me to thinking. I didn't understand how a man could get so low, could feel so alone, that he'd do that to himself. And not only to himself, but to his family. They were the ones had to pick up the pieces, had to continue on. What was it that made a man get to a point where he thought sucking down enough exhaust to make his son fatherless and his wife a widow was the best option?
Lila
They say death is a part of life and everything's circular. That couldn't have been more true for me. Seemed like I'd been dealing with death ever since I was born. I don't even remember my mama. She caught pneumonia before I could walk. And I was only seven when Daddy went away. Though I don't remember Mama, I do still have memories of Daddy: of times he bought me a Coca-Cola at the general store; of times I sat on his knee and he bounced me as we played Ride-em-Horsey. But then he was gone. Out drinking with his buddies when he'd been thrown from a car that took a turn too fast.
So I'd seen my fair share of death. After Daddy passed, I moved in with Granny and Grandpa Davis. Same house I've been raised up in my entire life. Same house I'm still living in now. Over the years I'd learned that death has a way of strengthening a person. Of hardening a person. I'd seen people die all around me, but that didn't mean I was going to give up and rollover like a little pill bug. I knew how to seize an opportunity when it presented itself. If a man decided he wouldn't help me out any longer, if he became worthless, well, I'd find a way to make him worth something. In Dale's case, because of an insurance policy Grandpa Davis gave us after we got married, he turned out to be worth a lot more dead than alive.
It wasn't my fault he'd drunk so much bourbon that he passed out in his truck, not even managing to pull out of the barn. When I still heard the engine grumbling fifteen minutes after he moped from the kitchen that morning, I went to check and see what in the world he was up to. And that's when the opportunity presented itself. There wasn't no planning to it. It just was what it was. Seeing that garden hose, all coiled up and resting on a couple of rusty nails tacked to the side of the barn—well, it just seemed obvious to me. I'm not proud of it, necessarily, but I'm not losing sleep over it either. The fact is, I've got a boy to raise.
THUGLIT Issue Fourteen Page 11