by John Vigna
“It’s harsh back there. The mountains aren’t all they’re built up to be.”
She touches my hand and lowers her black eyes. Then she smiles, as if she’s suddenly shy. It’s not cold in the diner, but I’m shivering.
I look down at my plate, run my finger along the edge, and offer her the most honest line I’ve spoken all night. “Want a free ride home?”
We were out on the sun-baked dirt in the squeeze chutes, flanking the calves one at a time. Harley rammed the hot iron into their sides, and the stench of burnt flesh filled my nostrils; their spindly limbs kicked up dust. Some man who hadn’t said a word all afternoon shot the calf with a dose of medicine, pulled out his Leatherman, and lopped off a chunk of ear, tossed it in the dirt where the heelers growled and scrapped each other for it. Hops kept the calf’s neck pinned with his knee, laughing as the calf trembled.
“Billy, it’s about time you gave this a try.” Harley handed me a blade. “Hops, grab the front legs and pinch ’em tight.” Harley and the silent guy tied the rear legs together, cinched the knot. To get rid of the bugs, Harley sprayed Muskoil and smeared a dark wash of iodine across the scrotum with a brush. “Now.”
The calf lay stock-still. I held the knife tight, and despite watching them do it all afternoon, I couldn’t remember where I was supposed to make the cut, top or bottom.
“C’mon, boy, don’t pussy out on me now,” Harley said. The calf jerked. “Cut it. Here.”
“Fuckin’ delinquents,” the silent guy muttered. He crushed my fingers when he grabbed the knife from me, slit the bottom third of the scrotum, and blood shot out, splashed onto my arm. The calf bawled. The guy pressed his fingers along the sack until the testicles appeared like bloodied walnuts. He snipped the tendons of each, snatched my wrist, and dumped them in my hand, where they twitched in my palm, warm and sticky. He sprinkled a rash of powder on the slit and dusted off his jeans, a look of disgust on his face. Harley and Hops released the calf. It limped off, blood trickling down its hindquarters.
Afterward, over an open flame and beneath cold starlight, Harley fried them up. He spilled a stubby of beer into the cast-iron skillet, dumped in a beaten egg, a fistful of cornmeal, flour, salt, and pepper. “Here,” he said.
I shook my head. All day I tried to keep clear of Hops, but he hovered nearby.
The hum of the quads drew closer; Harley wandered off to meet them. The heelers circled the fire, tongues hanging out, eyes glinting like embers. Hops plucked a testicle out of the skillet, shook Tabasco on it. “Not a word to anyone, motherfucker,” he said, swallowing the glob with a smirk. “I’m all you’ve got.”
Linda leaves the door to her basement suite unlocked for me on nights I work late. I take frequent breaks from my shifts and stop in to see her at the restaurant. I sit at the same table, near the service area, where I can watch her come and go, and we can share a quick smoke and talk trash about the customers. She’s got a soft laugh, and when she leans over me to pour coffee, I can look down her white dress shirt at her lace bra. The rose quartz swings near the rim of my cup. She’s got fabulous hips that sway side to side in tight black polyester pants, and when she flips her fleece sweater over her shoulder, waves goodbye to her co-workers, and reaches for my arm as we walk out into the cool mountain night, I’m part of something real, as if my presence counts in the world. She slides across the seat, places a hand on my thigh, and rests her head on my shoulder. Although I want to get to her place as fast as possible, I also want the moment to last. I take a deep breath of her hair and drive slow through the streets toward the river.
We sit on a flat, cool boulder along the riverbank, a blanket wrapped around our shoulders. I pull a beer from a six-pack hooked on a twig in a quiet back eddy and hand it to her. We clink cans and drink.
“I can’t wait to get out of here,” she says. “Make my cash, get on with seeing the real world.”
I toss my beer can behind me, reach for another, crack it open. I’ve heard this talk before from outsiders. It’s mind-numbing in its predictability. They have no idea what they’re talking about, thinking life is elsewhere. I drink fast, want the beer to wash away the disappointment. Downriver, elk bugle, their screeches rise into the starlight. “Bet you’ve never seen anything like this before.” I tip my can toward the river and trees and the outline of the mountains. “You said you wanted to get out of town and see the mountains. Well, here you are.” I finish my beer and suppress the urge to burp, crush the can before chucking it behind me, and reach to grab another beer out of the river.
“What’s that sound?” Her voice is quiet as if she knows she’s offended me.
“Elk.” I lob a rock in the river.
“Do they always cry like that?” She draws circles on my palm.
“They’re calling out, challenging one another to fight for their harem of cows.”
The screeches stop. Then grunting, muffled panting, an unsettling, primal sound, one you never get used to.
“How many cows?”
“Dunno. Lots. Twenty or so. They’d leave him in a sec if he showed any weakness. There’s no loyalty.”
She finishes her beer. The bulls wheeze and snort in the distance. Her body lays heavy and warm against me. “What about you?”
“Do I have a harem of cows?”
She kisses my chin, places her hand on my crotch, squeezes it. I feel myself harden and shift but she clutches me tight. “Are you loyal?”
I close my eyes and push up against her hand and hear her make a low sound in her throat. “I am now.”
A week after the roundup, I was back in the south country. I had pleaded with Mom that I wanted to go with her to the bar, promised I’d stay put in the truck. But she was having none of it, told me how important it was to spend time with Harley. She said he was good for me, a real man of action.
Harley had Hops and me doing make-work jobs for Vince at the Last Stop ’n’ Shop, spitting distance from the border. “I’ll be back in a bit,” Harley said, before speeding off on a quad toward the woods.
Hops and I stood behind the store, leaning against the wall. Hops sprayed some Lysol on Wonder Bread, stuffed it in his mouth, and handed a piece to me. The damp bread filled my mouth with a sharp taste like chemical apples and green jujubes. He squirted lighter fluid on the parched, knee-high grass around us. “Light it.”
My face burned, and my hands trembled with the matchbox.
“What’s the matter? No balls?”
“Quit screwing around, boys.” Vince poked his head around the corner. “Pick up the garbage and cut the weeds.” He glared at us for a long moment. “Ah, hell, get inside. I got something else for you two clowns to do.”
“Chickenshit,” Hops said. “Knew you couldn’t do it.”
In the back storeroom, Vince instructed us to sweep the floor and sort and stack old soft-drink empties in wooden crates. As soon as Vince left to attend to customers at the front of the store, Hops cracked open a bottle with his teeth and spit out the bottle cap; it rattled across the floor and disappeared under a mop and bucket. He drank the pop slow, his Adams apple bobbing as he swallowed.
“Making any progress?” Vince stood in the doorway, surveying the clutter. The shop door jingled. “It’s a buck a pop, each. There’s no handouts here. We’ll make men of you yet.” He walked to the front of the store. The door swung shut behind him.
“You got any cash?”
I shook my head. The bread was still glued to the top of my mouth. My stomach churned, and my head felt stuffed with wet cotton.
“Guess I’m just gonna have to fuck you up. Bad.” Hops grabbed my neck and squeezed. I couldn’t breathe; I knocked his arm away and massaged my throat. He held up the bottle and dropped it on the concrete floor.
“I hope that wasn’t what I thought it was,” Vince yelled from the front. “Four bucks and counting.”
Hops held up another, dangled it between his thumb and forefinger. “You a momma’s boy, ain’t you?”
“I bet he’s done time with Harley,” Hops said. “Fucking low-life mules.” He locked the door, lifted his T-shirt, hard ridges of scars twisted like knotted wood across his gut. He picked up another bottle half full of pop, held it up. “Your turn.”
I tried to speak, but my tongue was thick.
“That’ll pass,” he said. “Remember to breathe.”
I inhaled in short gasps. My head was fuzzy; the room blurred.
Hops laughed and nodded at my jeans. I shook my head but the motion made me feel nauseous. His hands reached to unzip them, the zipper a hoarse muffle that seemed to come from far away. He yanked my pants down with my briefs; they dropped like a heavy husk. The air was cold, and my skin felt bumpy and pebbled. I heard myself blurt out, “Vince,” but Hops cuffed my face and pressed his palm against my mouth.
He swung the bottle and laughed, his face twisted and misshapen, flesh like plasticine. “You’re royally messed up.” He pushed me over a crate; the bottles clinked beneath me. I shuddered uncontrollably. He slid his thumb over the bottle top, shook it, and draped an arm over me, pulled me in tight. “Your momma would be proud of you.” He jammed the bottle inside me; I cried out. He stuffed the neck in further until my stomach lurched and my insides felt as if they were pouring out of me. I was dry heaving, retching myself hoarse.
“Word is, your momma squeals like a pig,” he said. “Like a stuffed pig. Just like you.”
I tried to keep away from him as I dressed. He pointed to my shirt and laughed. It was on backward. I fumbled with my zipper, attempted to button my jeans. Vince’s voice came from somewhere in the store, but I couldn’t make out what he was saying. Hops shoved a mop in my hand and kicked a bucket toward me. “You’re still gonna pay for the soda.”
I pushed the mop hard against the floor, struggling to scrape it clean, to peel layer after layer of concrete off until I hit the clay beneath where I could tunnel furiously, dig deeper into the earth until the mud and dirt caved in over me, pulverized me into a speck.
It’s a busy night at the Northerner, and Travis sits in my regular chair, not that my name is on it or anything like that, but since I’ve met Linda I’ve been coming nightly and sitting there, which pretty much makes it mine. He holds court like a wannabe alpha dog, chuckling with Linda. She slaps his forearm, leans toward him. His eyes drift toward her shirt, and he whispers something in her ear. She pulls away, smacks him on the thigh.
“Hey buddy-boy. Haven’t see you for a few days,” he says.
“Been busy.” I grin at Linda.
“Your friend is a very naughty boy,” she says, smiling back.
“Naughty is what naughty gets,” Travis says.
He says the dumbest things. She laughs and floats toward the kitchen.
“Drink with me.” Travis pushes the pitcher toward me. “She’s something else, man. These Aussies are like minks.”
“Yeah. They are.” I regret it the moment I say it.
He looks at me. “Seriously?”
I glance around the room. Linda serves another table near the front of the bar. “Honest Injun.” I hold up my palm.
He hands me a beer. “Well?”
“Well what?”
“You got something to show me?”
“Nope.”
“No proof, no cash.” He grabs me by the neck and yanks me close. “I know you’re bullshitting me, buddy-boy. Nothing personal, but there’s no way you two hooked up.”
He licks my face and laughs. Linda smiles at us, walks toward the service area. I turn to Travis. “Sure, whatever you say.”
Afterward, I sit in my cab in front of the bar. People leave, leaning on each other. Someone kicks over a newspaper box. Another takes a leak off the curb, shouts at drivers who honk. A young couple grinds into one other against the door, laughs when the door opens, spilling them onto the sidewalk. A few nights ago, I watched a woman blow a guy in the backseat through my rear-view, her blonde hair bobbing, the cab silent except for a low growl in the man’s throat as he looked down, his jaw tight in concentration, admiring her work. I was grateful there wasn’t much of a mess to clean up, not like the ones who vomit or shit themselves. These fucking people. No respect for place. I feel a headache coming on from the beer and lean my head back against the seat.
A little ahead of my car, the Bride glides down the sidewalk. She wears a black leather jacket over her dress. The tassels on her arms flap like strands of spaghetti. She makes a sharp, graceful turn and walks toward me, knocks on the window.
I lower it. Her mascara is pale blue filled with sparkles. Her lipstick atomic black. She points to my book. “Good?”
“Same shit, different characters.”
“Story of my life.” She leans into the window. “This must be the most boring job in the world. Drive people around and sit on your ass all night. I’d go crazy.”
“It’s temporary.”
“Always is, honey.” She opens the door. “Can I get a lift?”
Harley dropped me off again at the Last Stop ’n’ Shop to chop down tall brush in the empty lot next door. Hops swore with each wild swing of the scythe. He glanced at his watch and stopped. “Ever seen a naked chick before?” He snorted. “Not counting your momma.”
“Sure.”
“Yeah?”
I nodded again.
“Yeah, right.” He dropped the scythe. “Come with me.”
“Harley will be back any minute,” I said.
“Boy, you’re none too smart, are you?”
I followed him across the open field to the edge of the bush where a ratty couch sat in a grove of aspens, their limbs bone white, flush with pale green leaves. The rich smell of topsoil and cattle drifted in from a nearby farmer’s field. An old door rested on soft-drink crates for a makeshift table; a bald tire surrounded burnt coals and tarnished beer cans. A girl stood hugging herself. She had long black hair that seemed to glow in the sunlight.
“You didn’t tell me you were bringing a friend,” she said to Hops.
I turned away. The quad droned in the distance. I glanced at her again, certain that she was the girl I saw in church a few weeks back.
She scrunched up her nose, looked at me. “Do I know you?”
The Bride’s cabin is an old garage converted into a living space, confirming what Travis had told me. I lean against the doorframe.
“Close the door. I’ve lost one cat to coyotes already.” She turns the dial and finds a reggae station. “My wallet’s somewhere around here.”
Dozens of paint jars line the kitchen counter, mostly half-empty with various shades of blue and orange and black and yellow. Brushes poke out of another jar. Portraits on the walls. Human faces blurred by cross-sections of fruit, vegetables, fish. A man papaya. A child yam. A woman octopus. Two easels stand to the side. A plank of plywood spread across two saw-horses acts as a table, cluttered with books, fragmented shards of porcelain, pimento olive jars jammed with bright beads, packages of clay.
She turns on the bedside lamp. A black cat lounges on her futon, the bedcover a dyed piece of cloth. She lights votive candles sunken in painted glass containers with religious figures on each, covers the lampshade with a piece of red sheer fabric. The cabin darkens beneath a crimson glow and candlelight-flick-ering shadows on the walls.
“Place is a mess. I don’t get many visitors. Sorry.”
Something honest in her apology makes me feel warm toward her. I compliment her paintings.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. They’re really cool. You are what you eat.”
“Here it is.” She hands me ten bucks for the fare. “I’d say keep the change, but I need it.”
I give her two dollars.
“They’re my coarse attempts at mimicking an Italian master.” She holds up a box of red table wine. “Drink? Only the very best for my guest.” She laughs and pours two juice glasses to the top.
“To a
rt.” I drain my glass while still standing against the doorframe.
“Come in.” She holds the box over my glass, presses on the nozzle, and fills it again.
When I push myself away from the door, the cat leaps off the bed and stretches itself against the concrete blocks of the night table. Its claws snag the drape of fabric, drags it over the candle, and the fabric bursts into flames. The Bride tosses the sheer on the floor, stomps it out. The cabin is hot, smoky, and she opens the window, waves a palette back and forth to clear the air. She laughs; I laugh with her and take off my jacket.
“That was a close call.” She slips the wedding dress over her shoulders, lets it fall to the ground. The elastic edges of her black bra are frayed, and she’s naked from the waist down, fanning herself, laughing. She has a thick, wiry patch of dark pubic hair that covers her crotch and creeps out from it toward her skinny thighs. Her stomach is small, but the skin is loose; she looks like a shrivelled prune, her best years well behind her. It’s the saddest thing that’s happened to me in a long time. The cat rubs itself against her legs.
I play along and drain my glass, holding it out for another drink.
She walks toward me carrying the box in front of her as if it’s a sacred urn, swaying her hips slowly to the music.
“He’s not my friend,” Hops said.
He tossed the Aqua Velva cap into the fire pit, took a long swig, handed it to the girl. She made a face, held up her palms. He shrugged, handed it to me. I leaned my scythe against the table, pretended to take a gulp, and handed it back to him. He took another long guzzle and set it down on the door. Hops tried to kiss her, but she squirmed. He tried to kiss her again. She pushed him away.
“Do you live in town?” she said.