by Carolee Dean
I stop a kid on a bicycle and ask him where to find the prison.
“Which one?” he replies.
“What do you mean, which one?”
“There’s nine prisons in and around Huntsville,” he tells me, as if this is something I should already know.
“Nine prisons.” I let what he’s saying settle over me.
“That’s the Walls right there,” he says, pointing to a towering redbrick building down the street. Something about the brick fortress sends a chill down my back in spite of the heat.
“Thanks.”
“That’s where they kill ’em,” says the boy.
“Kill who?”
“The guys on death row. Every couple o’ weeks or so they send one up. Streets fill with reporters and TV cameras. My dad says the lights around town used to flash when they used Old Sparky. Now they just put ’em to sleep quiet-like with an injection.”
“Thanks,” I say, rolling up my window, eager to end the conversation and be on my way.
I drive right up to the front of the building. Redbrick walls flanking it on either side tower thirty feet or more above me.
I remember juvie and how when the door slid shut and locked behind me, I knew I was a prisoner. I wonder if the law is looking for me now. Consider that once I walk into that building, they might not let me back out.
I get out of the truck reluctantly. See a huge old-fashioned clock right above the front door, as if to remind all who enter here of the importance of time, or maybe that they are about to lose it.
I walk up the porch steps with their shiny brass rails to a double glass door bearing the state seal of Texas. Take a deep breath and go inside. Find myself in a small foyer. There is a wood-paneled wall on the right and a counter on the left about chest high, with a sliding window opening into a room filled with weapons and restraints. I hear voices talking over a police radio inside the room and see a woman, dressed in a gray uniform.
Straight ahead from the entrance, through a window separating the two rooms, is an amazing sight—a huge cage surrounded in shining brass bars. A man dressed in white pants and a white shirt, who I assume is a janitor, looks up at me briefly, then goes back to shining the brass with a cotton rag. The whole interior of the place gleams.
I walk over to the counter on the left and find two logbooks with the word VISITORS written on them. Wonder if I should give them my real name or an alias.
“Can I help you?” the guard asks me.
“I’m here to visit Dylan Dawson,” I say. “Senior,” I add, wondering if there is any possibility the two of us will get confused and I’ll end up trapped in this place. “He’s on death row.”
“Death row is over in Livingston, forty miles east, but you can’t visit on Sundays on any account. That’s reserved for folks visiting members of the general prison population.”
“Livingston. I thought he was here in Huntsville.”
“Nope, they just bring ’em here for execution.” The casualness of the way she says it makes the perspiration beading on my skin run like a river. I feel the white shirt sticking to my body like flypaper.
“So I came all this way for nothing?”
She shrugs. “They wouldn’t have let you into the prison dressed like that anyway.”
“Like what?”
“Can’t wear anything white inside,” she tells me, pointing to my shirt. “That’s what the inmates wear. In fact, most people around these parts avoid that color altogether. You don’t want someone to think you’re an escaped convict.”
“No, ma’am,” I say, glancing over at the man in white polishing the brass bars, realizing he must be an inmate. “Anything else I should avoid?”
“No open-toed shoes. No cell phones. No paper money. I assume your name is on his visitation list.”
“I don’t know,” I say.
“They won’t let you in if you’re not on his list.”
“How do I get on the list?”
“You can write a letter to the prisoner. He tells the warden to put you on his list. Then the prisoner has to write you back to let you know it’s okay to visit.”
“But he’s my father. I haven’t seen him in eleven years, and they’re gonna kill him in nine days.”
Only then does the woman’s expression soften. “Dawson,” she says as if the name is suddenly ringing a bell. “Is your daddy D.J. Dawson?”
“Yeah, do you know him?”
“Everybody knows him. He’s been all over the papers since they announced his execution date. That’s a tough break, kid.”
“Can’t I just call him?”
“It doesn’t work that way, but if you’ve got somebody else who’s going in to see him, they could ask him to put your name on his list.”
“I could ask my grandmother,” I say, but even as the words come out of my mouth, I have my doubts. After all, Levida didn’t bother to tell me there was no visitation on Sundays. The only thing I know for sure is that I won’t be writing any letters.
“You gotta help me see my dad,” I tell Levida as she ladles black-eyed peas into soup bowls and butters up slices of cornbread to go on the side.
Levida takes a seat at the kitchen table next to Charlotte, who gets her own pan of cornbread in a huge metal bowl on the floor. “It’s the Lord’s day, so before we eat, we read from the Good Book,” she says to me and Wade and Dorie, who has joined us for dinner and sits so close to Wade she is nearly on top of him.
“Did you hear me?” I ask her. “I said—”
She silences me with a look and hands me a black leather Bible.
“I can’t,” I tell her. “I don’t have my reading glasses.”
She narrows her eyes but doesn’t say anything, just hands the book to Wade, who happily complies. “‘He was led as a sheep to slaughter; And as a Lamb before its shearer is silent, So He does not open His mouth. In humiliation His judgment was taken away; Who will relate His generation? For His life is removed from the earth.’”
“Amen,” says Dorie.
Levida gives me a sideways glance, and I can tell she’s chosen this particular selection for my benefit, though I have no earthly idea why. I get up from the table, shove in my chair, and head for the door. Levida jumps up from her chair and beats me to it, blocking my way out. “You will not disrespect the Word of the Lord in this house!” she says, shaking a finger in my face.
“Why didn’t you tell me my father is in Livingston? Why didn’t you tell me he couldn’t have visitors on Sundays? Why didn’t you say my name has to be on some stupid list before they’ll even let me in?”
“Why didn’t your mama tell you?” Levida spits back at me, venom in her eyes.
I don’t know, but there is no way I am going to try to explain my mother to Levida. “I want to talk to my father, and I need you to help me get in to see him.”
“Why should I?”
“I’m his son. Your grandson.”
“Oh, yeah.” She puts her hands on her hips as if she couldn’t care less.
I lower my voice so Wade and Dorie can’t hear me, though they are so engrossed in each other they don’t even seem to notice our conversation. “Don’t you think he might want to see me before he dies?”
“I wouldn’t know.”
“What do you mean?”
“I haven’t talked to him in eleven years.”
“Are you telling me you’ve never been to visit him?”
“Went once. Haven’t been back since.” There is a hardness in her eyes that I don’t know how to read. I can’t tell if it’s a reflection of her frosty, bitter heart or if it’s covering some pain too deep for words. The only thing I can see clearly is that she will be no help to me at all.
“I just want to know what kind of man he is,” I say. “Before it’s too late.”
She studies me with her stone eyes and rubs her chin. The icy crust around her heart seems to thaw just a little. “Come with me.” She grabs my arm and leads me to a room at the back o
f the house, takes a ring of keys out of her pocket, and unlocks a door. Turns on the light. We step into a room filled with trophies and pennants. I blink. It’s like some kind of shrine to my father. There’s a football jersey pinned up on the far wall, and to my right, a huge photograph of my father in his football uniform. His high school graduation. Some college photos.
I walk toward it. This is the face I have not been able to remember, but how could I have ever forgotten? It is the same face as mine. The same square jaw and dark hair. The same thin lips and pale blue eyes. I realize in amazement that I don’t have my mother’s eyes at all. My eyes are my father’s.
That night in the barn I stay up until four o’clock in the morning, till the batteries in the flashlight burn out, looking at the scrapbook of clippings Levida has given me.
Pictures and articles of my father’s football team winning the state championship. Stories about his college glory days. Newspaper accounts of the murder trial and conviction. Letters to the editor. Even a piece from Newsweek.
Not one of which I can decipher beyond the title and first three sentences.
I pull the paper filled with Jess’s handwriting out of my back pocket. I try to read it, but the flashlight is dead, so I just slip it under my pillow in the darkness, wondering if I’ll ever see her again.
When I finally go to sleep, I dream of clocks.
But this time it isn’t the bird that bursts through the door, it is my father.
He has come to tell me that time is running out.
WORDS
I carry a message
that I cannot read.
The words may be haunting
or tender or sweet.
Though what it says
I do not know,
I still carry it with me,
wherever I go.
24
I WOKE UP IN THE BEANBAG CHAIR AGAIN. JESS AND BABY Face were snuggled up next to each other on the futon, still set up like a couch. I imagined what it would feel like, lying next to Jess like that.
Dogs can get away with anything!
Couldn’t believe I’d spent another night in the home of a gorgeous girl without sleeping with her. But it was okay. I’d decided to do things right for once, no matter what that took. I was following her lead. Since that first kiss on the beach, she hadn’t touched me. If she was waiting for me to make a move, it wasn’t going to happen. I was too afraid of messing things up, breaking the spell, waking up from the dream.
Jess opened her eyes. Yawned. Look up at me. Smiled her crooked grin. God, she was beautiful. “I can’t believe how easy it is to sleep with you here.”
“It’s not me. It’s Yeats,” I said, pointing to the book lying on the floor, trying not to watch how the T-shirt clung to her body.
“The two of you make a good team,” she said.
* * *
I had to work, and Jess had another day of SAT cramming, so I didn’t see her again until that night. She wanted to drive down to the Redondo Pier, but she wanted to take my car. I warned her that my air conditioner was busted and the radiator was on the way out, but she insisted.
“My first car was a Mustang,” she told me, rubbing her hand against the dashboard like it was made of gold.
“Mine too.” First and only.
I remembered the day my uncle Mitch took me to the auto auction in Santa Barbara and told me to pick any car I wanted—under $4,000. The old Mustang was a classic, but nobody was bidding on it because it was a putrid shade of piss yellow. Mitch got the thing at a steal for $3,800, and I used my first paycheck to paint it midnight blue.
“What’s this?” she said, thumbing through my journal just as we pulled into a filling station for gas.
“Nothing.” I grabbed it out of her hands and tossed it onto the backseat, next to Baby Face. “Just some poems.”
“Yours?”
“Yeah, but they’re pretty lame, so don’t read ’em. Want a Coke?” I asked, trying to change the subject.
“Sure, okay,” she said.
I went into the mini-mart, and when I returned I noticed that my journal was lying on the floor of the back. I wondered if Baby Face had knocked it off the seat or if Jess had read it. I’d die of embarrassment if she saw her name above that last poem. I studied her face for signs, but she just smiled at me and thanked me for the Coke.
Later, when we got back to her house, I went into the bathroom to change for bed. At home I slept in my underwear, but I was wearing shorts and a T-shirt for her benefit.
When I came out I was surprised to see she’d already slipped into her pajamas—the tight-fitting T-shirt and cotton shorts. She was sitting on the futon, which she’d made out into a queen-size bed. My legs went weak as I sat down beside her, thinking of all the things that could happen on a bed that size. She was looking through my copy of Poetry Through the Ages , which I guessed she’d taken from my car, though I hadn’t seen her do it. “Why are some of these page numbers circled?” she asked.
“Fourteen, thirty-eight, twenty-two. They’re my mom’s favorites. She gave me the book for my birthday.” I suddenly wondered if I’d looked too eager in sitting down beside her, and I started to stand. She grabbed my arm and pulled me back down next to her. “Read me this one,” she said, handing me the book.
My instant reaction was panic. I hadn’t pretended to need glasses the previous night, so I couldn’t very well rely on that trick now. But then I looked at the page number and realized it was one of the Yeats poems my mother had circled in blue ink, thirty-eight. A poem I knew at least. “Okay,” I said.
“I saw a staring virgin stand
Where holy Dionysus died,
And tear the heart out of his side,
And lay the heart upon her hand …”
I never understood who “Dyin’ Isis” was. Mom had mentioned the god of wine, but she was drunk at the time, so I might have misunderstood. I did understand what a virgin was, though I’d never been with one. When I finished the poem, Jess looked up at me expectantly, like she had something on her mind and I was supposed to figure it out. Like she was trying to tell me something.
Then it hit me. “Are you a virgin?” I asked, but then I realized how rude that sounded and tried to cover my tracks. “A virgin who’s gonna tear out my heart?”
“Yes … no … wait.” She looked at me. “I’m not going to rip out your heart.”
“Thanks for clearing that up,” I said stupidly, my heart beating erratically.
“Is that okay with you?” she asked softly.
“Okay with me?” I didn’t know how to answer, but I could see by the look on her face that it was very important to say the right thing. Monumental. Life-changing. “No, it’s not okay at all,” I replied.
“Why not?” She looked down at her toes.
“I want you to rip out my heart.”
She smiled, pressed her hand to my chest, and said, “I could never do that.”
You already have, I thought as I took her hand in mine. “Jess, I already told you. I don’t expect anything.”
“That’s good to know.”
“All I really want is to be here with you, just like this.”
“You mean it?”
“Yes.” It was a lie, but I knew it sounded good.
She kissed me then—long and deep and hard, and I knew I’d answered her well. “Will you stay close to me tonight?” she asked.
“Of course,” I said, feeling so light and dizzy I feared I would float right off the bed.
“Thank you.” She lay down with her back to me, which wasn’t quite what I’d been hoping for. I lay down next to her, not knowing where to put my hands. She pulled my arm around her body and held it close to her heart. I had to keep it in a fist to prevent my fingers from wandering into dangerous territory. I wanted desperately to be a gentleman. It took me a while, a long while, but I finally started to breathe normally, after I realized nothing more was going to happen. Especially after I heard her snoring.
>
I have a very sedating effect on women.
The only problem left was what to do with my boner. Keep it at a safe distance, was all I could think to do. Difficult with her so close. I lay awake well into the night, unable to believe I was holding this incredible, beautiful girl in my arms. I wanted to stay there forever. Avoided the temptation to run my hands across her sleeping body. Maybe it was enough just to be close to her. I pressed my face into her hair and breathed her into me. “I love you,” I whispered. “Stay with me forever. Please.”
We lay there in the silence, but it didn’t feel like silence, because words were starting to invade my brain again. Let me love you, girl who came from the sea. Let us swim to the bottom of the ocean where we can be anything and where no one can find us. We will grow gills and breathe salt water. We will sprout fins and scales and make our home in underground caves. Or else we will drown there. But either way, I will be happy.
25
I SLEPT LATE BECAUSE IT WAS THE FOURTH AND I DIDN’T have to go to work. I reached out for Jess and found myself hugging Baby Face, who responded by licking my face.
Not exactly the greeting I was hoping for.
At least not from my dog.
I sat up, looked around. Saw Jess sitting at the bar, writing something.
“You’re awake,” she said, bouncing off the bar stool and walking toward me, paper in hand. She was fully caffeinated and already dressed, wearing a pair of cotton shorts over a one-piece bathing suit that fit her like a glove. I wondered if she had any idea the effect she had on guys like me.
“I have something I want you to read,” she said, holding out the paper.
I made no move to take it from her hand. “I don’t have my glasses.”
“Don’t be silly. Since when do you wear glasses?”