by Brian Hodge
With a true sense of the moment, Pete watched their reactions, locking eyes with each of them as they sat in stunned silence. The summer breeze rustling through the peach tree was the only sound. Davy looked frightened, his eyes wide on his chubby face, his mouth open in an ‘o’ of amazement.
No one moved. The kind old man that they had known their whole life was gone, disappearing in the smoke of murderous memories. The old man sitting before them, his back to the peach tree, was so unlike their father that he was almost alien.
Pete continued his speech. “Now, the first thing that I want you to do is to thank your mother, for she provided your nutrients.”
Samuel, the brighter of the two brothers, was the first to catch on. He was looking at his half eaten peach with horror and revulsion.
Pete saw his enlightenment and smiled. “Yes, indeed. That woman made sure that you got all your vitamins in a way that’s pretty literal.” He knocked his wrinkled fist into the grass. “Ain’t that right, Marian?” he asked, looking down at the grave. “I shot them in my very own bed and then I dragged them up here and buried them under this here peach tree. And goddamn, if the peaches didn’t look livelier when they blossomed that year. Tastier too, said many. If you look really close within the fuzz of the peach, you can see the ghostly outline of your mama’s face, her mouth open in a silent scream. That’s entertaining stuff, I tell ya. Figures she would haunt me, the miserable bitch.”
Steve studied the peach, his breathing firing out in nervous blasts. Pete could tell by the way that his son’s face looked that he saw the ghostly visage of his mother on the peach. Years ago, when Pete had first seen the image of his dead wife on the skin of the fruit, he had damn near panicked. Fortunately, no one seemed to notice. Sometimes, he would watch her lips moving and he would just laugh with glee before pulling away the skin. One time, a peach was filled with a bloody, milky substance.
“And you know what else?” Pete continued. “You know how I take a walk every night ten o’clock sharp?” He paused while they nodded like zombies, their faces whiter than the puffy clouds above their heads. “I walk up to this here tree and I piss on it every night. I piss right on the cheatin’ bitch’s grave. Why a few times I even buried a shit or two. Another neat little twist is if you stab the tree between the midnight hour, the hour your Mama died, she will moan a little. It’s kinda cute.”
Steve stood up angrily and dropped his peaches. “You’re crazy, old man. Mom’s not really under this tree. She ran off because she couldn’t stand you.”
Pete snickered. “I notice you stopped eating the peaches real quick for an unbeliever, Stevie.”
“Dad, why are you doing this?” Samuel asked, pulling Davy away from his grandfather.
“Because all of you are good for nothing. You came from a bad seed.” He pounded the dirt to emphasize his point. “You boys ain’t never done nothing for me. You take my money and give me nothing in return. I don’t even get a birthday card. Every year you give me the same Christmas present that all of you pitch in for. Goddamn English Leather cologne. I’d rather wear skunk piss. Don’t any of you notice that I don’t even wear the shit? I wouldn’t even put it on the dog.”
“Well, it’s not like we go around smelling you, Dad,” Samuel said, trying to lighten up a situation that he felt his father had made up to make a point. “Now, this joke that you made up is funny. Ha Ha. We get your point. Now stop this nonsense. You’re scaring Davy.”
Pete got up from the ground and clenched his fists, his face red with anger. “The boy should be scared with a low-life like you for a father.”
“That’s it!” Lia screamed. “I’ve had enough! I’m not going to sit here and listen to the ramblings of a crazy old man!”
Pete stopped her with a demonstrative gesture of his hand, a sharp hatchet-like chop. “Before everybody goes running off, I got one more thing left to say. I put all my money, my entire estate, in a trust fund that goes to Davy when he’s twenty-five years old. That will goes into effect today.” He looked at his sons. “As for you two, I left you with one thing, and if you want to get me back, you can start by kicking me off your property. This acre of land, your Mama, and the peach tree are yours. Do what you will with them. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to leave you in peace. I seem to be trespassing on your property.”
As Pete walked down the hill, enjoying the smell of the fragrant flowers, he was rewarded by his good-for-nothing sons for the first time in his long life. The sounds of their whining in his ears was like sweet music. And music, he thought, is good for the soul.
Sweet Little Piggy
by Weston Ochse
“Stick men, stick men, my little stick men,” came the lispy singing from the shadowy corner of the living room.
“She ain’t violent, is she?” asked the small woman, pointing toward the figure hunched on the carpet.
“No, my dear. Sweet Little Piggy is as placid and nice as a cool spring day,” the old black woman said looking fondly on her granddaughter.
“I don’t know... ” said the woman, waffling like they all did the first time.
“Come over here and meet the nice lady, Sweet Little Piggy.”
The hunched figure stopped its soft singing and froze.
“Grandma says come here,” she repeated sternly.
Sweet Little Piggy clambered up and shambled over in a side-to-side sway. She wore a floor-length smock. Once pink, it was now covered with paint smears and pastel marks, proof of her crayon artistry. Her hands and head were the only pieces of skin visible, pure whiteness against the mosaic of childish color. In her arms, she held a large wicker basket of broken crayons, gripped lovingly, like a trophy. The young woman drew back, a hand to her mouth as she saw the figure’s face. Paper-white skin was the canvas for a pug nose, two tiny triangular eyes containing tinier red orbs and a poorly corrected cleft lip. Tight red curls topped her head like a cherry on a whipped cream desert. The woman stepped back involuntarily, causing Sweet Little Piggy to snort several times.
“Now, now. Don’t tease the nice lady. Say hello, my dear. This is Miss Rosie and her daughter, Jenny Mae.”
Close now, the woman could see the child stood nearly five feet tall and weighed almost 200 pounds.
Sweet Little Piggy stood smiling back at the woman, a look of childish pleasure on the deformed face. Rosie inhaled sharply as Piggy snorted again.
“There you go. Now, go on back and play some more,” said Grandma Fletcher, apparently satisfied at the greeting. To the woman, “My granddaughter is an albino, so she doesn’t get out in the sun very much. In fact, if it wasn’t for me watchin’ these children, she wouldn’t have anyone to play with. She may look older, but my Sweet Little Piggy is about as smart as your sweet little daughter. Poor Piggy was shaken too much as a baby.”
“But she’s so big,” said the woman, startling herself.
“Listen, honey,” said the old woman changing the subject. “The Women’s Center sent you to me. They wouldn’t have done that if there’d been any real trouble at my place. Your daughter is gonna do fine here. Granted, this isn’t one of those franchise places with fresh paint and them learnin’ toys, but there’s a lot of love in these walls. Put your trust in Grandma Fletcher.”
The old woman’s sad eyes embraced the younger in a clutch of warmth as Rosie once again studied the tenement’s main room. Faded yellow velvet wallpaper hung in tatters high above the level of inquisitive hands. Below, the wall had been stripped and scrubbed clean, revealing a smooth off-white surface. The furniture was old and worn with decades of use, but appeared sturdy enough for even Grandma Fletcher’s large frame. An oval carpet covered the greater part of the wooden floor. Once many colors, the fabric was now a washed-out gray. A pale yellow light came from the far corner, making shadows jump around the edges of its weak nimbus. The overhead light was dark, as were the windows, spray-painted black and draped with dark blue curtains. The only other light was a small table lamp with lon
g maroon tassels dangling from a small brown shade sitting by the end of the couch.
Two other children, a black boy and a white girl, both near her daughter’s age, sat semi-transfixed in front of a flickering console television that had seen its best days when disco was new. The children were quiet now, a far cry from their original clamor at Jenny Mae’s appearance, but Grandma Fletcher had warned them away, giving her daughter a bit of space to adjust. In the corner, the object of Rosie’s earlier concern, sat Sweet Little Piggy, adult sized, but child-like in her sing-song patter as she played with the large basket of broken crayons and stared longingly at the blank wall. Her legs moved frenetically beneath the smock to a private rhythm.
“And you’re real sure everything is gonna be alright?” Rosie could barely control the trembling in her voice.
Tears had already moistened her eyes and threatened to burst upon darkly bruised cheeks.
“There, there. Listen to Grandma Fletcher,” said the old woman resting a heavy arm around the young lady’s shoulders. “I deal with many women from the Center. You ladies have had enough trouble and my job is to make the getting’ back to livin’ a little easier. You go find yourself a job and before no time, you’ll be back on your feet and in charge of yourself. All this stuff that’s been happenin’... well, it’ll soon be just a bad memory.”
“I don’t know as to when I’m gonna be able to pay you.” The entreating look from the woman’s eyes begged not to be hit.
Grandma Fletcher’s face softened. “You let me worry about that. Pay me what you can, when you can. The Lord will provide.”
Within a minute, young Jenny Mae had been introduced to the two by the TV and joined them watching the adventures of a puppet and a train. Before the Rosie retreated, she left a knapsack containing a red blanket, a small battered box of crayons, some coloring books and a soiled white, stuffed kitten with a lonely glass blue eye.
Sweet Little Piggy glanced over to the couch where her grandma snored softly. The other children were likewise asleep, each curled around their own stuffed creature. All the lamps were off except the one in the far corner, making the room a comfortable gloom for her tiny, pinched eyes. On the coffee table were three plates, each had pieces of crust and smears of dark brown peanut butter left over from lunch. Sweet Little Piggy stared longingly for a moment, but remembrances of Grandma’s complaints about eating too much directed her attention away.
Carrying her basket, she waddled over to the new girl who was sleeping fitfully with small jerks and tight hugs of her one-eyed cat. Sweet Little Piggy squatted and sat the basket down at her side. Her hand reached out, long slender fingers of an artist, and touched the forehead of the sleeping girl. She hummed to herself as images of violence and pain and sex strobed through her mind, each image vivid and real.
Grandma told her it was like TV, but Piggy couldn’t watch real TV anymore. Grandma said it was the flickering that made Piggy fall down and do the trembles. But that was okay, because Sweet Little Piggy liked the new kids. They gave her a private TV that only she could watch—even if it was mostly the bad stuff.
She continued humming, greedily accepted the evil flashes from the sleeping child, cataloging them in her mind. Finally, Sweet Little Piggy stood and carried the basket of broken crayons back to the wall. She looked critically at the wallpaper-free surface, studying it like an artist would a canvas. She sunk her hand deep into the basket, came out with a broken red crayon and began to draw. As her hands moved hurriedly across the broad surface, exchanging colors at a frenzied pace, she began to sing, “Stick men, stick men, my little stick men.”
A muffled sound brought Grandma Fletcher from her nap. She glared irritably at her Sweet Little Piggy, thinking it was she who had made the noise, but found her granddaughter sleeping in her corner, an arm curled lovingly around the basket. She sighed and felt her eyes drawn to the wall, and by the multicolored markings and broad swatches of pastel hues, she could tell her granddaughter had been drawing on the walls again.
She couldn’t make out the blurry details and silently cursed her eyes, knowing blindness would come too soon. She reminded herself to get some more pine-oil at the store, tomorrow, and lay back hoping to return to her dreams of young men and better times.
The sound came again, this time more insistent. It was knocking from the front door. Grandma Fletcher levered herself up to a sitting position and took inventory of her flock. Her three wards were deep in sleepy land, but Jenny Mae was beginning to stir. The old woman’s eyes embraced the figure lovingly. With new ones, she found herself both sad and happy. It was a shame that they had to travel through Hell to get to Grandma Fletcher, but once here, it was God and her that would make everything right again.
“All Right. All Right. I’m coming,” she mumbled towards the intrusive knocking.
Grandma Fletcher, with several grunts and a long groan, brought her large frame up and into a standing position. She smoothed the rumpled front of her pale blue housecoat and stepped into her furry slippers, her bulbous knees cracking with age. She shuffled over to the door, a hand on her lower back in an effort to entreat a lifetime of pain away.
“I’m here, just a minute.” She glanced through the peephole and then began to disengage the three shiny deadbolts and the heavy chain that secured the stout oaken door. “Back already, dear?” She asked when she saw Rosie.”
“Yes, ma’am,” said the woman trying to hide an embarrassed grin.
“I thought... I thought somethin’ may have happened. No one answered, you know?”
“Happened? What could possibly happen with Grandma Fletcher around? I told you not to worry. We were just nappin’ is all. Now tell me, did you find anythin’?”
The woman’s face brightened into a beautiful smile that did much to camouflage the bruises. “Yes I did! The hotel the Center sent me too had an opening in their laundry room. They asked me if I had any experience. Ha. All I ever did was wash and iron Dicky’s clothes. What’s with doing a bunch of strangers’ clothes too?” A sparkle danced in her eyes as she finished.
Grandma Fletcher stood back, arms crossed atop huge pillow-sized bosoms, beaming a dentured smile. She enjoyed watching the transformations in her mothers when the women discovered self-esteem again. The simple knowledge that they had skills was, enough sometimes, to get them back on track. The poor woman was so happy, she didn’t even realize she had invoked her husband’s name.
“Why that’s absolutely wonderful, honey,” she was going to continue, but paradoxical tears had begun to well up in the woman’s eyes. Grandma Fletcher’s face softened and she reached out and drew the woman to her. Rosie struggled slightly, but was no match for the older woman’s maternal strength. “There, there, what else could possibly be the matter?”
Rosie greedily returned the hug. It had probably been years since she had received one with no expectations, but the small joy was short-lived. Rosie struggled for a moment, then succeeded in pushing herself away as Grandma Fletcher released her. Her face became serious.
“They wouldn’t give me any advance. I ain’t gonna be able to afford any child-care for two weeks, then maybe me and Jenny Mae can find someone.” Her eyes had moved to the floor and she chewed her lip, leaving the unasked plea between them.
“Ahhh, but that’s no problem. I’ll take care of her for a little while longer. I do it all the time.”
It was important for her to make the offer, otherwise all the good of a new job would be swept away. She had expected it, anyway. Nobody would ever give a woman like Rosie an advance. Backwoods. Bruised. They probably thought the woman had done something to deserve the abuse.
Rosie glanced up and began wiping away her tears with the backs of her hands. “God Bless You, Grandma Fletcher.”
“He already has, my dear. He already has.”
With bolstered confidence, Rosie swept into the room, her blue-flowered skirt catching air. She swung her handbag as if it was lighter somehow.
Grandma
Fletcher leaned out into the hall and checked both ways. She thought she saw someone down at the far end, but it was just another dark blur with her old vision. She was on the fifth floor and the security system had stopped working twenty years ago making the place a refuge for junkies so she shut the door hurriedly and with stiff old hands slid the locks into place.
As she turned around to hear more about the woman’s new job, she heard the first of Rosie’s ear-shattering screams. Grandma Fletcher pressed her back against the door and brought a hand up to her mouth as Rosie let loose scream after scream. The young mother had fallen to her knees facing the wall, both hands to her head, fingers pushing and pulling at her tumble of thick black hair.
The children in front of the television awoke with a start. Two of them sat hugging each other, tears and sobs beginning to rack their bodies as they relived a Mommy in pain, again. Jenny Mae stood transfixed, her thumb firmly planted between tight lips. Her eyes stared blankly towards the wall as rivulets of urine darkened the front of her pink pants and made a path down the inside of her legs.
Sweet Little Piggy struggled to her feet and waddled over to the terrified woman. She began patting Rosie on the shoulder, a kind smile, repeating, “It’s okay. It’s okay,” an eerie metronomic undertone to the high-pitched shrieks.
Grandma Fletcher followed Rosie’s eyes and saw the blurry markings on the wall she’d dismissed earlier. She stumbled forward grudgingly, the images coming into focus with each painful step until finally they were seen in all their demented clarity. A montage of apparently inter-linked vignettes assaulted her from the child-like drawings of her granddaughter, each scene framed by zigzag multicolored ovals. Two stick-like figures starred in each.