by Marsha Moyer
Connie reached over and took my hand. "You know what you need?"
"Yeah. A Mind Eraser of the permanent kind."
"No, you need to come by the house and let me do you over." I laughed. "I mean it, Lucy. A little color would do you a world of good right now." Connie was the local Mary Kay representative, known far and wide for her faith in the restorative powers of contour cream and eyeliner.
The back door burst open and Jude and Lily came running out, yelling like wild Indians. Both of them had on makeshift Porter Wagoner T-shirts, several sizes too large; Jude's hung past the knees of his cargo shorts, and Lily had belted hers with one of Dove's old scarves and was wearing tights underneath, like a go-go dancer. To complete their ensembles, Jude wore a rubber dinosaur mask and Lily had strapped on a pair of gauzy angel wings, remnants of last year's Halloween costumes.
"Look at us, Aunt Lucy! We're all dressed up for the party!"
"You look great, both of you." I pulled Jude into my arms. He wedged himself between my knees and grinned up at me from beneath the snarling snout of a T. rex. At moments like these I felt no accountability for Jude's character or his future, only an endless ocean of love, blue and deep and skimmed with little whitecaps of good fortune.
"You look beautiful, Mama!" he said, patting my face.
"That's very gallant of you, baby. See there?" I said to Connie. "Somebody likes me just the way I am."
"Gallant, what's that?" Jude wanted to know.
"It's a five-dollar word for 'nice.'"
"So, can I have five dollars?" he asked, grinning again when I laughed, then squirmed out of my arms and went racing after Lily, who'd spied her daddy and her uncle Kit playing horseshoes. I watched her wings bobble in the sun as they ran, the flash of Jude's brown legs like knife blades where only days before, it seemed, they'd been soft and white and boneless. You said it to yourself over and over again: Don't blink; they'll be grown before you know it. But still, you did it. You blinked and you missed things and would never get them back.
"How long till we eat, do you think?" Connie said.
"Here comes the cook. You can ask him yourself."
Ash sauntered up, looking exactly like somebody who knows he's the center of attention and isn't one bit worried that he might not come out smelling like a rose.
"Ladies," he said. "What's going on? Y'all about set for a feast?"
"We're erasing our minds," Connie said, lifting her glass. "I'm about halfway there, myself."
"All but Lucy," Peggy put in. "Lucy wants to keep her mind, for some reason."
"Maybe she hasn't got anything she wants to erase," Ash said.
"Ha! Don't get me started," I said.
A cloud passed over Ash's face, one that only somebody who knew him like I did would recognize. His eyes stayed crinkled, the corners of his mouth stayed turned up, but his eyes went black and flat, like the leading edge of a storm. Stop, I told myself. Did I really want to do this here, now, in front of my whole family? Didn't I owe him, if not the benefit of the doubt, then at least the dignity of not airing our dirty linen in public?
"How long till supper?" Peggy asked, filling the silence. "I'm starved."
"Maybe half an hour or so," Ash said. "We're just about to start the cool-down." The trick with crawfish was to boil them for just a few minutes, then add ice to the pot, bringing the water temperature down slowly to let the bugs soak up the seasonings. You had to taste them every so often, and depending upon who was making the final call, the process could take fifteen minutes or an hour. But there were vegetables to be cooked, too, and dip to be made. Half an hour, I'd bet, was a conservative estimate.
I stood and smoothed the front of my skirt. "I think I'll run inside and wash up."
I let myself in through the back door into the kitchen. The icebox was open and Geneva stood leaning in, rifling through the crisper, her rear end in the air.
"Where exactly did you say those lemons were?" she said, her voice muffled. " 'Cause I'm finding everything but— Oh. Hey." She saw it was me and smiled. "I thought you were somebody else."
"I wish that was true, for both our sakes."
She closed the icebox and gave me a hug, and I let myself be hugged, losing myself in the bulk and fragrance of her. In Nashville, what I'd missed even more than the smell of East Texas red dirt and pine trees was my sister-in-law's unique and heady blend of Aqua Net hair spray, Cornsilk face powder, and Coty Wild Musk perfume.
"You poor thing," she said, letting me go. "You must've had a hell of a day."
"Well, it's a good thing you're here, to remind us of the power of mascara and a good push-up bra."
She laughed and gave her neckline—if you could call it that, seeing as it was far south of her actual neck—a tug. "I just wanted to look nice for Ash's homecoming."
"And I know he really, really appreciates it."
"So what's the story? Dove said you came out and found him sleeping in his truck this morning." I nodded. "What happened to rehab? I thought he was supposed to do thirty days."
"He left—went AWOL. But he claims he's got everything under control."
"And you believe him? Or you don't."
"I don't know what to believe. I don't know what his idea of 'under control' is. Beer instead of hard liquor, maybe. That's one version I've heard. Or beer before five, the hard stuff after. That's another one."
"I guess he didn't exactly blow into town and sweep you off your feet," she said. She'd found the lemons and the cutting board, and took a knife out of the dish drainer.
"He did invite me to lunch," I said. "But I wouldn't go." Geneva looked at me over her shoulder, raising her eyebrows. "I had work to do. Anyway, I just—I couldn't, Gen. I'm not ready. The whole thing feels too weird to me. He acts so, so offhand about it all, like it's the most regular thing in the world to just drop back into our life after falling off the face of the earth for half a year. But all he seems to care about are crawfish. That and those Speakeses running off with his record collection—he cared plenty about that."
"Maybe he's looking for a way in," Geneva said, the knife blurring as she halved and quartered lemons. "I mean, maybe he's just blowing smoke until he figures out how to say what he needs to say. Did you ever think of that?"
The screen door flew open and Lily and Jude charged in, begging for Popsicles. "No Popsicles, it's almost time for supper," Geneva said. She dumped the cut lemons into a bowl and handed it to Jude. "Here, take this out to your daddy. Tell him I'm in the kitchen trying to keep his ass out of the doghouse."
"Geneva!" I laughed as the kids ran out again. "You know better than to say a thing like that. Those two soak up everything and then spit it right back out again."
"Good. The truth shall set us free. Now, where did I put my drink?" She located her plastic tumbler, swirled it a time or two, then drank down the contents in one long gulp. "Whew! Want one?" she said, reaching for the vodka bottle.
"You know, I think maybe I do," I said. "Mix me up one, okay? I'll be right back."
In Dove's guest bathroom I splashed some water on my face and washed my hands with one of the little seashell-shaped soaps in the dish. No wonder Connie thought I needed help; by the light of the naked bulb over the mirror, I looked like the "before" photo in a magazine makeover story. I was at that age, I suddenly realized, when a woman has two choices: to rally and make a stand, or to give up caring. There was nobody on earth I admired more than my aunt, who cut her own hair with the sewing scissors and had never worn a thing on her face but Noxzema. I wanted to be as carefree about my appearance as she was, but I didn't think I could do it. A little chip had been permanently embedded in my head that kept playing Ash's voice murmuring, "Juicy Lucy," over and over. I didn't think I could get rid of it without major surgery—although maybe a Mind Eraser or two would help.
Walking back through the house, I found the kitchen empty, and Geneva and Ash on the patio tending the pot full of cooling crawfish. Geneva had a tumbler in each hand,
and Ash was standing there, easy as you please, his foot propped on the ice chest, drinking a Bud tallboy. I could feel my blood pressure rising as I took a glass from Geneva. I opened my mouth, then thought better of it and decided I'd go pitch a few horseshoes.
The game had broken up, though, by the time I got there, and Bailey and Kit were lounging on the grass in the shade with their own cans of beer. I smiled at the sight of my two good-looking brothers in their jeans and steel-toed work boots and snap-front denim shirts with the hatch brothers contracting logo stitched in red on the breast pockets. Kit, big and sandy-haired, looked like he usually did, rumpled and worse for the day's wear, whereas Bailey might have just rolled out the front door fresh as a daisy, his Wranglers creased, his shirt collar crisp.
"Can I ask y'all something?" I said, tucking my skirt under me to sit beside them on the grass. "Who are all these folks? It seems like just the other day we were the only Hatches in town."
"Good question," Kit said. "Those kids over there, for instance. See the tall one, with the ring in his ear? And those two, with the little bitty T-shirts and their bellies showing, like hoochie-koochie girls? Who are they?"
Just then Lily dashed up and clambered into Bailey's lap, taking his face in her hands and pressing her palms together on either side of his mouth, their private cue for him to pucker up and give her a kiss. "My daddy!" she exclaimed, pulling back to give us all a smug look before running off again.
"Her slave, she means," I said. "Mr. Step-and-Fetch-It." Bailey just smiled and tilted his beer to his lips, his expression goofily happy, like a teenage lover's. He'd waited thirty-eight years to become a daddy, and wasn't about to apologize to anybody.
"Just wait," Kit said. "One minute they're hanging all over you, kissing you on the mouth, and the next thing you know…" He nodded toward where his brood was congregated around the boom box, the boys shoving each other, the girls acting bored and listless. Still, in spite of the hair gel and the ugly, clunky shoes, there was a homegrown sweetness to them that no amount of costuming or posing would ever cover up.
"Speaking of strangers," Bailey said, "who invited the guy on the patio?" He winked at me over his beer.
"Don't ask me," I said. "I walked out of the house this morning and there he was. Like one of those toadstools that pops up in the rain."
"Kit thinks we need to shake him down."
Kit dug his can into a little divot he'd made for it in the grass. "I just think we ought to find out what he's up to. You know, have a little come-to-Jesus. See what he's got on his mind."
"If it was up to me, we'd of tied him to a tree and horsewhipped him a long time ago," Bailey said. "Anyway, I know what he's got on his mind."
"No, you don't," I said. "If I don't, then there's no possible way you could."
"I thought he quit drinking," Kit said. I shrugged and took an exploratory sip of my own drink. It tasted like it would probably live up to its name, but the process might not be all that agreeable. "Well, hell, isn't that what you go to rehab for? To quit drinking? Looks to me like somebody needs to ask for their money back."
"I don't think you get a refund when you quit the program," I said.
"He quit?"
"Walked out. Or snuck out, broke out, something. I've not been made privy to the actual details."
"And he hijacked a truck and showed up here?"
"Don't forget, he stopped to pickup forty pounds of crawfish on the way."
Bailey and Kit looked at each other. "He can't do that, can he?" Kit asked.
"I don't see why not," Bailey said. "There's plenty of places to buy crawfish up and down the road between here and Memphis."
"Supper, everbody!" Dove called, banging a spoon against a pot lid for good measure.
Kit struggled to his knees. "I'm telling you, we need to shake him down," he said.
"Listen," I said, pouring the rest of my Mind Eraser in the grass, then stood up and brushed off the back of my skirt. "I grew up without a daddy, same as y'all did. For Jude's sake I'm not burning that bridge to the ground unless I know for sure it's the only way. Okay?" My brothers were silent, studying their beer cans like there was some secret encoded on the labels. I smiled. "I'm not sixteen, you guys."
"Maybe we oughta follow him around for a few days. Just to put a little bit of fear in him," Kit grumbled as he and Bailey got to their feet.
Ash had plenty of fear in him already, I thought as we walked across the lawn in the shadows of early evening. But I decided to keep that particular observation to myself.
The picnic table was too small for all of us, so Dove spread a tablecloth on the grass for the kids, and for a while the backyard was quiet as we laid into our feast. The crawfish, I had to admit, were perfect, succulent and spicy. Every now and then somebody would murmur in appreciation, or ask their neighbor to pass the dip.
It wasn't till we'd polished off half the bugs that we began pushing our plates away and the conversation picked up where we'd left off: gossip, discussions of work and weather, not small talk so much as the talk of folks who see each other regularly and can afford to indulge themselves in the trivial details of one another's lives.
Eventually the discussion turned, like it usually did, to Little League. Our town was too small to have separate boys' and girls' leagues, so Jude and Lily were both playing for the Hatch Brothers team that spring, Jude at third base, Lily as star pitcher. As an athlete, Jude was erratic. It wasn't that he couldn't hit or throw, but the rituals of the game, the uniforms and gear, the crowd in the bleachers, the shouts and laughter of the other players, all were so exhilarating to him that he had a hard time concentrating, and was likely to be admiring the stitching on his glove or gazing at some minor drama on the sidelines as the ball sailed past his head and into the outfield, his uncles and teammates screaming to get his attention. Lily, on the other hand, was as cold and focused as a hit man, a bona fide throwing machine; a bomb blast in the stands couldn't distract her when she was on the mound.
"As far as coaching goes, we're a little thin in the outfield," Kit was telling Ash. "Maybe if you're gonna be around awhile, you could give us a hand. Our next game's Wednesday," he added, but Ash just nodded distractedly, contemplating his beer can.
"So, how's things up in Nashville?" Bailey asked, sensing a crack and rushing in. "You must be chomping at the bit to get back onstage. It's been a good long time now, am I right?" Ash shrugged, turning his beer around and around in his hand. "Seems to me you can't afford to take too long out of the, the whatayacallit? The public eye. You stay away too long, folks might forget about you. Move on to something new."
"I guess that's true." Ash looked up. "The thing is, I don't know if I'm gonna keep on doing music. I'm not sure I've still got it in me."
There was a short, shocked pause, and then everybody was talking at once.
"What?"
"You've got to be kidding!"
"After you worked so hard! How can you just walk away?"
Ash let the protests and exclamations die down.
"Look, it's just that things are different now. The stuff I used to think was important doesn't so much seem like it anymore."
"Well, that's the silliest thing I've ever heard in my life," Geneva said. "You're a musician. It's what you are! You can't just decide not to be anymore, like a, a Baptist, or a Republican."
"Nashville's been your dream your whole life, Ash," Peggy said. "You finally got yourself a toehold. Why would you let go now?"
"And what would you do instead?" Kit asked.
Ash gave a small, selt-conscious laugh. Are the Hatch Brothers hiring? I used to be a pretty good carpenter."
Kit and Bailey looked at each other, then at me. I shook my head. I had no idea where any of this was coming from, if it was dead serious or part of a long, crazy joke, one that had started with a white pickup and forty pounds of crawfish.
"Look," Ash said, spreading his hands on the tabletop, "I'm just hanging out this evening, all right? Just
kicking back like the rest of y'all, sucking on crawfish heads, having a good time, enjoying the company. I don't want to have to think about Nashville, or work, or any of the rest of it. There's plenty of time for that later. And I promise, when I make up my mind, y'all will be the first to know."
Kit cleared his throat, and Connie picked up the tea pitcher and started pouring refills. "Who wants more slaw?" Dove asked. But the only person who had any appetite left was Ash.
chapter five
"Good old Ash," Geneva said. "You can always count on him to be full of surprises." We were on the patio, scraping plates into a drawstring Hefty bag.
"Trouble is, you can't tell what's for real and what's for show. He never makes a move without thinking about his audience."
"Well, maybe that's why he wants to step aside. Stop performing awhile and just live a little, like the rest of us."
"No," I said. "Ash hasn't got it in him to live a little. He's got to live bigger than everybody else, louder, just plain more, than everybody else. It would kill him to be like the rest of us."
The bag was full; I drew it shut and tied the strings in a quick, tight knot. Lily and Jude were wrestling in the grass, the big kids had gone inside to watch TV, and the women still sat clustered around the picnic table, sipping tea and talking. There was just enough light left in the sky and from the little electric lanterns strung from the tree limbs to make out Ash and Kit and Bailey near the back fence, flinging horseshoes, the spike nearly invisible in the dusk, worn across the yard came grunts and curses and laughter and the occasional clang of metal on metal. It occurred to me that if my brothers really did want to put the fear in Ash, one stray horseshoe would probably take care of it.
"You know, Lucy, it's no secret I had a crush on Ash back in the day, when he used to sing at the Round-Up. But after y'all got together, I never envied you. I always knew the idea of him and the reality were two totally separate animals."