by Arlette Lees
“I don’t want you talking to Cal unless there’s someone else around,” said Robby. “It’s not like we know anything about him.”
“You’re not my Dad. You can’t tell me what to do.” The green feeling swept over me again. I leaned over the toilet and threw up the rest of the beer.
* * * *
We’d cleaned up all traces of our noontime bacchanal by the time Dad and Bell came back from Gunnar.
I threw my arms around Dad’s waist. “Are you going to be okay? What did the doctor say?”
“He’s working on it,” said Dad, as Robby and I helped him to the bedroom. “It might be hepatitis or mono. They’re running tests.”
“You kids come and sit down at the table,” called Bell. Cal sauntered in through the screen door and pulled up a chair. Bell opened the fridge. “Who’s been into the roast beef? And the milk is almost gone!”
“It was me,” I said, feeling mildly hung over and unusually fearless. I’m having a growth spurt.”
“You must have a tapeworm!” she said.
I glanced at Cal who had a big grin on his face. I started to giggle and pretty soon Robby joined in. “I don’t see what’s so funny,” said Bell, which made us laugh all the harder.
During dinner I caught Bell staring at me with eyes as hard and cold as ice cubes. I’d upped the ante of hostility, but, my beer bravado was quickly turned to dread.
* * * *
For the next couple of days I hung out by Dad’s bedside or stayed close to Robby as he did his chores. One quiet afternoon when I thought Bell was in the henhouse she caught me foraging in the forbidden pantry. She grabbed me with her talons and began shaking me like a rag doll.
“I just want some lentil soup,” I warbled, trying to keep my head from tumbling off my shoulders and rolling across the floor like a bowling ball.
“You know I make that soup for your father’s recovery,” she grated.
She was wearing another wilty cotton dress with a faded flour sack apron, her hair pulled back in an old maid’s bun, a pair of shlumpy brogues on her feet. Mom had been so gay and colorful and fun and Bell seemed to bend over backwards to look like a frump.
“I don’t know how Dad could have married such a dreary person. Mom was pretty and kind and you’re as ugly as a warthog.” Her fists started to fly but I’d already covered my head so my arms took the brunt of the blows. “You make me gag!” I shrieked.
“What’s going on in there?” called Dad from the bedroom. Bell clamped a hand over my mouth.
“Abby saw a rat in the pantry, but, it’s all taken care of.”
“I hope so,” said Dad.
“You make so much as a sounds and it’s the last you’ll ever make.” said Bell, removing her hand from my mouth.
As I fled the pantry I tripped over a jug that stuck out from beneath the shelves, something that seemed strangely out of place.
Within minutes I heard Bell calling Sheba. “Here kitty, kitty, kitty!” I smiled as I walked out into the sunshine to lick my wounds.
* * * *
Late that night Robby and I smuggled the jug of green stuff into the corn crib where we could examine the label by flashlight.
“Jesus, Abby, your arms are nothing but bruises.”
“It’s nothing,” I said. “What does the label say?”
“Antifreeze.”
My shoulders slumped. “Just that stuff that Dad puts in the truck.”
“It has another name. Ethylene glycol. It’s a deadly poison and I think Bell is putting it in Dad’s soup. Do you ever remember him being sick before Bell came along?” I shook my head.
“What are we going to do?”
“I’m not sure yet. I need time to think.”
We walked across the damp grass in our pajamas and slippers and hid the jug in the long-abandoned outhouse. “This should slow her down and give us time to come up with a plan.”
* * * *
The next morning Dad had a seizure at the breakfast table. I started to cry and Robby ran to the phone and called Dr. McBane who told us to meet him in the E.R.
Bell grabbed the phone and slammed it into the charger. “From now on stay off the telephone unless you have express permission to use it. I’m in charge here and I don’t need the interference of children.”
“I’ll help you get Dad to the car,” said Robby. “I want to have a word with Dr. McBane.”
Bell put a hand on her hip. “Are you sick?”
“I didn’t say I was sick. I simply....”
“You two stay here. You’ll only get in the way. Make yourselves useful and help Cal stack the kindling.”
Dad looked like he wanted to say something, but, no words came.
Hell with the kindling. As soon as the pickup was out of sight we thundered up the attic stairs. We needed those phony documents to make our case.
The suitcase was not where we’d left it. We scrambled around and pawed through the boxes in every corner.
“HEY, BABE, WHATCHA LOOKIN’ FOR?” I nearly jumped out of my skin. It was Robby throwing his voice like he had before Jimbo vanished.
I punched him on the shoulder. “You scared me shitless!” I yelped.
“Pretty convincing, eh? I’ve been practicing at night in my room.”
“Well, don’t practice on me.” I plopped into an old chair and a puff of dust exploded from the cushion. We spent another half hour searching the house and came up empty. “The suitcase is gone,” I said. “That means she’s on to us.”
“Maybe so, but, we’re on to her too. Let’s call the E.R.” I pressed my ear to the phone as Robby punched in a series of numbers.
“Emergency Room, Nurse Lindsay speaking. How may I help you?”
“I’d like to speak with Dr. McBane, please. This is Robby Granger and he’s our family physician.”
“One moment. The doctor is with Mr. Granger now, but, I could call Mrs. Granger to the phone.”
“No, that’s okay. I’ll talk to her later.” He quickly disconnected.
* * * *
When Dad returned home with Bell that evening our hopes for his recovery dimmed.
“Why wasn’t Dad admitted?” asked Robby. “He belongs in the hospital.”
“What, you know more than the doctors now?” Bell shot back. “He’s on antibiotics and he’s been given fluids to balance his electrolytes.” I had to admit he looked slightly better.
“What about the lab results?” I wanted to know.
“No Epstein-Barr, so mono is out. We’re waiting for more results.”
“What about a toxicology?” I pressed.
“My oh my, aren’t we using big words. Maybe since you know so much you’d like to take over his treatment,” scoffed Bell.
“Where in hell did you get those bruises?” said Dad.
“I’m going through an awkward stage, Daddy. Just ask Bell.”
“Well, be more careful. You look like a washed-up boxer.”
* * * *
After I crawled in bed I heard Bell climb the stairs and open my door. I cringed as she sat on the edge of my bed.
“Have you been talking to Pastor Blevins about your Dad’s illness?” she asked. “Or anyone else for that matter? Some things aren’t to be discussed outside the family circle.”
“No,” I said. “What’s to talk about?”
“Farms are dangerous places, Abby. Even for smart little girls who think they know it all. Kids get kicked by horses. They fall down wells. They lose their footing and tumble into empty silos. Sometimes, they simply disappear and no one finds their bones for 100 years. It would be a shame if something happened to a curious little girl like you.”
That night I dreamed that Bell shot us all as we slept and took possession of everything Dad had worked for his whole life.
The next day we woke to thunderstorms and the power went out with a spray of sparks along the wires between the highway and the house. Dad seemed well enough to sit up in bed, so Robby and I decided t
o keep him company. I sat in a chair beside his pillow while Robby went through his repertoire of voices. He did Auntie Pearl’s dry cackle, Pastor Blevin’s basso profundo, Cousin Ralphy’s adenoidal wheeze and Cal’s sexy baritone. By the time he took his final bow, the color had risen in Dad’s cheeks and a bit of the old spark had returned to his eyes.
“That was amazing,” he said. “I think Bell’s already left to pick up my prescriptions, but, why don’t you go get Cal? I’m sure he’d get a kick out of hearing your voices.”
Robby headed for the door, but, I beat him to it, dashing out into the rain and splashing through the puddles.
I was dripping when I reached the barn. I wrung as much water out of my pigtails as I could and retied the bedraggled ribbons. The barn was shadowy and smelled of sweet alfalfa and fresh straw. Cal kept everything shipshape: cows milked, stalls cleaned, garden weeded. I don’t see how we could have managed without him since Dad’s illness.
It might have been a sound beneath the clatter of the rain on the metal roof or just a funny feeling that tickled along my spine, but, I stopped before I entered the tack room. Inside, Bell and Cal were speaking in whispers. My breath caught in my chest and I hid in an empty stall where I could see them, but, they couldn’t see me. Mom had always told me that eavesdroppers deserved what they heard, but, my curiosity got the best of me.
As they talked, Cal ran his hand up Bell’s thigh and kissed her neck. I expected her to slap his face, but, she seemed to like it.
“The old goat doesn’t suspect a thing. Same with the hick doctor. It’s the girl I worry about. That little brat could queer the whole deal.”
A rumble of thunder exploded over the barn roof.
In one graceful movement Bell slipped out of her dress and let it flutter to the floor like a butterfly’s wing. Her pale, naked body rippled with shadows. Those baggy dresses had concealed long, shapely legs, a slender waist and small firm breasts. Cal’s hands and mouth were all over her body. He kicked out of his jeans and stood there naked as a jaybird. His big hands cupped her buttocks and when he lifted her she wrapped her legs around his waist. She was like a feather in his strong arms as they began moaning and moving rhythmically, hypnotically, as if they’d entered a parallel universe. He pulled the pins out of her old-fashioned bun and a waterfall of cinnamon-colored hair fell in waves to her waist. Folding downward into the hay, the muscles of his back and shoulders flexed beneath a glistening patina of sweat. Bell writhed and laughed and purred like a kitten as her fingernails ran up and down his back.
This couldn’t be the same joyless, mousy Bell who’d evicted me from the pantry. But it was. That drab exterior had been a brilliant, theatrical performance and we’d swallowed it hook, line and sinker. And Cal...this was the man who had held me on his lap and let me sip his beer and promised me...he’d promised me!
I flew into the house and ran past a startled Robby. I crawled into a corner of the attic and cried and cried. Robby came through the door and locked it behind him. I was heartbroken, shocked and confused. He sat down beside me and wiped my tears with his T-shirt.
“What the hell happened? Did Cal hurt you?”
“They were doing it,” I sniffled.
“Who? What do you mean?”
“Bell and Cal. In the tack room. All naked. They were doing IT!”
“A brother and a sister? Are you sure?”
“Go look for yourself,” I snapped miserably.
For a minute we sat together listening to the rain.
“What if they’re not really brother and sister?” said Robby.
By the time we came down from the attic we’d formulated a plan.
The rain had stopped by dinnertime and the power had been restored. Bell warmed Dad’s soup on the stove and poured it into a bowl.
“I think the soup should be tested,” I blurted out. “It could be swimming with salmonella or botulism. Maybe Dad’s allergic to lentils. Who knows?”
Suddenly, Bell stumbled and the soup went all over the kitchen floor.
“Now look what you’ve made me do!” she said. “And that was the last of it.”
I gladly volunteered to clean up the mess.
I can’t say it wasn’t weird eating meatloaf and mashed potatoes like a Leave-It-To-Beaver family knowing what I’d witnessed that afternoon. Bell had slipped effortlessly back into her drab persona and Cal sat there like she didn’t exist. Robby and I played it cool, but, the tack room antics had scrambled my ten- year-old brain. Later, I put Dad to bed with enough Benedryl in his hot chocolate to keep him under until the cock crowed.
At midnight Robby and I coasted the John Deere mower down the driveway to the highway, fired it up and drove the deserted mile to the Quick Stop. Once inside the phone booth, Robby dialed home and after a few rings Bell picked up.
“I gotta see you, baby. You were hot this afternoon,” he said, in Cal’s sexy rumble. The timber and resonance couldn’t have been more convincing. “Slip away and meet me at Mike’s Bar. And put on that red job. I’m tired of the weary, pioneer woman shit.” Robby hung up before she could respond.
“What if she checks the tack room first?”
“Then we’re screwed,” Robby said.
When we got back the pickup was gone and Dad was still out like a light. I ran to the tack room and woke Cal. Despite everything I knew, he still made my heart flutter. But, my head was on straight. Well, almost straight.
I handed him the keys to Dad’s old Ford. “Bell needs you to pick her up at Mike’s Bar. The connection was bad, but, I think she’s having trouble with the truck.”
The moment he pulled onto the highway we called Pastor Blevins. Half way through our story he was out of bed and dressed.
“I’m calling an ambulance for your Dad,” he said. “In case Bell and Cal return, I want you kids with me.”
* * * *
Both of the vehicles were parked outside when the three of us entered the bar. It was a rowdy crowd and the baseball bat at Mike’s elbow spoke volumes. Hank Williams warbled “Your Cheatin’ Heart” from a bubbling jukebox, and everyone including Mike, ignored the NO SMOKING sign above the door.
“Stand by the jukebox and don’t move,” directed Pastor Blevins.
Cal sat at the bar looking like himself in his jeans and plaid shirt, but, if I hadn’t seen the red dress and blonde wig in the attic, I wouldn’t have been able to pick Bell out of a police lineup. Her eyes were made up Egyptian-style, her lips painted sports car red. No longer the faded hausfrau, she looked the part of a high class hooker.
“Bell Jones!” boomed Pastor Blevins’ voice over the ambient roar. The room fell still as heads swiveled toward the action. Bell looked like she’d been zapped by a stun gun and Cal blanched to the pallor of chalk. Then, like a thief startled in a heist, she slid serpent-like from the stool and headed toward the door with Cal hot on her heels.
Suddenly, Bell spotted me hiding in the shadow of the jukebox and her mind snapped like a fresh carrot from Grandma’s garden.
“YOU LITTLE BITCH!!!” she screeched. “YOU’VE RUINED EVERYTHING!!!” She reached beneath her satin skirt and pulled the tiny gun from a lacy garter, swinging it in my direction.
Cal shouted, “NO!!!” and landed a solid punch to her arm. Robby jumped in front of me as the bullet whizzed by my ear and shattered the window of the jukebox.
Enraged by the betrayal, Bell whirled around and plugged Cal point blank in the chest. There was a look of bewilderment on his face as he slumped to the floor.
A cowboy in a big hat spun around on his stool and casually cracked Bell on the wrist with his beer bottle as if he dealt with crazy women every day of his life. God knows there were enough of them around the watering holes of Gunnar.
The gun flew across the room, skidded through the cigarette butts and spilled drinks on the floor, and came to rest in the darkness beneath the pool table.
In my effort to become invisible I found myself wedged between the pinball machine a
nd the wall. Bell spotted me and the rage that had simmered behind closed doors boiled over for all the world to see.
She pulled me from my hiding place by the ears and threw me to the floor, the stiletto heel of her silver shoe aimed at my heart. I rolled aside in time to see the heel crack away from the sole when it punched the concrete floor.
Out of the corner of my eye I could see Mike yelling into the phone. A frantic crowd had gathered around Cal and girls in tight jeans and cowboy boots were huddled together crying, screaming or looking on in stunned disbelief.
I dove under the pool table like an Olympic athlete. Bell grabbed my foot and my tenny came off in her hand. A trio of Jack Daniels bottles crashed to the floor when she sailed it over the bar.
Robby leaped on her back, a bronco buster on his first mustang. The blonde wig toppled off and I screamed. There was the old Bell, the cruel rictus of her mouth, the severe school-marmish bun. She bucked Robby into the wall and dragged me toward her by the cuff of my jeans. Hands around my throat, she hobbled upright on her uneven shoes, lifting me off the floor by my neck.
Pastor Blevins’ bulk appeared like an avenging angel, Mike’s bat gripped in his giant paws. He pulled back his swing, like The Babe before he lost himself in the booze. The bat pole-axed Bell behind the knees. CRUNCH! Home run. She dropped like an empty sack and I tumbled half conscious to the floor. Bell lay in a whimpering bundle, lipstick smeared grotesquely across her face, black lace stockings in shreds.
I wobbled to my feet, clutching my tortured Adam’s apple, watching the room come back into focus.
Cal!
“How long before that ambulance gets here?” yelled Pastor Blevins.
“It ain’t comin’” called Mike. “They only got one and it’s out to the Granger farm. They’ll send over Sheriff Gunderson as soon as they figure out what strip club he’s at.”
I walked over and knelt beside Cal. Someone had unbuttoned his shirt.
“Hold on, Cal. It’s only a little hole. Hardly any blood at all.”