Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter

by Tom Franklin

  “Get up and walk the halls,” Milton said.

  “I didn’t know I was allowed.”

  “You are,” the doctor said. “You are allowed.” He was frowning. “I want to say congratulations to you, but that’s not right. Not for what’s happened to you. Yours is a unique situation, Mr. Ott, and I can’t imagine what it must have been like. But I’m glad it seems to be over now.”

  “When can I go home?”

  The doctor turned in the door. “Couple more days? I just want to keep an eye on that gunshot.”

  Dr. Milton gone, Larry buzzed the nurses’ station and the one who’d been so cold to him came in.

  “He said I can go for a walk.”

  She nodded, lowering his rail. His catheter had been removed a couple of days ago, and she set his empty bedpan on the table. She helped him to his feet and took his elbow as he eased off the bed.

  “Thank you,” he said.

  “You’re welcome. You need me to go with you?”

  He told her he thought he could make it.

  He walked the halls in his hospital robe, wondering was the doctor right. If it was really over. When he came to the elevator he rode down. He stepped out and stood for a moment in the lobby, the glass doors across the room filled with news vans and people in suits standing in groups. Waiting for him. None were looking now, none saw him. Women and men both, several with cameras. Silas would’ve already talked to them, given his story, so now they were waiting for him, for Larry. The elevator door began to close and he stepped back in.

  THAT NIGHT AT ten, most of the nurses on their break, he slipped out of bed. Winded from dressing, he left his room and walked to the elevator and waited for the doors to open, wondering was this a crime. He didn’t have his keys, wallet, or phone, sorry now he’d not asked French for them.

  His pants felt big and he tightened his belt. He came out of the elevator in a warm darkness, an EXIT sign glowing in the distance. He heard someone cough in the dark gift shop and lowered his head and walked as fast as he could past the volunteer at the information desk, the old man putting on his glasses. Then, just as quickly, Larry was outside, over the sidewalk, not looking up, approaching two orderlies lighting cigarettes. He nodded and they nodded and averted their eyes, stepping off the sidewalk, out of his way.

  The news vans had shut down, the reporters and cameramen probably at the motel. He put his hands in his pockets and walked as fast as he could across the parking lot, leaves scratching over the cracks and snagging on sprigs of grass. The night wind was cool, him alone with his shadow crazed by the overhead lights, each with its orbit of bugs.

  Wishing Silas had brought him a cap, Larry stepped onto the sidewalk that went alongside the highway south toward the center of Fulsom. But that was a good two miles away, past fields and woods, past neighborhood after neighborhood with old-timey gas-burning streetlamps and flower boxes, kids standing in the yards to watch him pass, dogs barking on their leashes. There were no taxi services in Fulsom. Were their rental car places? But how would he pay? If he could just get to his shop he’d be okay. That was beyond the town center, two and a half more miles.

  Long walk.

  He was out of the flooded light and passing a grove of pine trees, lamps ahead but dark now. He wondered again was it really over. Scary Larry. If anything would really change. Earlier that evening, before he’d busted out, he watched the news where the local anchor announced that Wallace’s death had been ruled a suicide, that Silas “32” Jones was recovering at home, and that local business owner Larry Ott had been cleared of Tina Rutherford’s murder. Wallace Stringfellow was now believed guilty of killing the girl and, possibly, Morton Morrisette, whose body Constable Jones had discovered two weeks before.

  Larry limped over the uneven sidewalk in the dark breadth of trees, his legs stiff, holding his hand over his heart. He felt in each beat a labor he couldn’t remember and wondered what that meant. Sweat covered his face and drenched his back. His breathing was harder and he was beginning to feel pricks of pain in his chest.

  He went on.

  SILAS WAS HOLDING a bottle of pain pills, trying not to take one, when his cell phone buzzed on the counter across the room, its light reflected in Angie’s fish tank. Currently on night shift, she’d been unable to get someone to trade with her and had left him alone for twelve hours. She’d been doting over him so much it reminded him of his mother, which he’d found himself not minding.

  Now he heaved off the sofa, muting the television and setting the remote alongside the phone.

  “Yeah?”

  “Constable Jones?”

  “Hey, Jon with no h.”

  “How you feeling?”

  “I’m not too bad. What can I do for you?”

  “Well, I’m looking at my computer here, and it don’t say nothing about his being discharged, but there he went. Just walked out the door. And they make you ride a wheelchair, too. Every time.”

  “Wait, Jon. What you talking about?”

  “Larry Ott. I think he just checked himself out.”

  TEN MINUTES LATER, Silas came down the steps of Angie’s apartment snugging his hat then adjusting his sling, his jacket arm hanging loose. He had a bottle of water in one pocket and a plastic bag in the other. It was awkward opening the Jeep door with his right hand and more awkward getting in. When he turned the key the starter ground a few moments longer than healthy and he smelled gas. He waited a moment and tried again and the engine sputtered to life. He’d discovered he could keep it between the ditches by working the pedals with his right foot, steering with his left knee and shifting with his right hand, a rhythm, like anything else. Soon the Mississippi night hummed by outside his windows, bug, bird, frog, the wind on his face. His elbow hurt but otherwise he felt alert, clearheaded. He passed the hospital going east and slowed, Larry would’ve come this way, heading home.

  And there he was, limping along, his shadow tethered to his feet and elongated by the streetlights.

  Silas slowed and leaned across the seat and cranked down the window. Larry’s face was pale and covered in sweat.

  “Need a ride?” He opened the door.

  Without an answer, Larry climbed in, nearly panting. He leaned back and closed his eyes.

  “You want to go to the hospital?”

  Larry shook his head. “Home?” he whispered.

  “That might not be exactly legal,” Silas said, “but home it is.”

  They rode awhile, Larry’s breath slowing. Silas offered the water bottle and Larry took it. After a while he opened it and drank most of it.

  They passed through the quiet Fulsom town square, the hardware store now a tanning salon slash manicure-pedicure joint. The drugstore a video rental place with a going-out-of-business sign in the window. Two closed barbershops, their poles plastered with stickers and graffiti. A block east, centered in a streetlight, a bent dog was eating something in the middle of the road and backed up as they passed. A box of chicken.

  Then they were passing strip mall after strip mall. Larry seemed content to ride, his eyes shut, as the buildings fell behind and the night closed them in, though both knew that outside the windows were acre after acre of loblolly pine, fenced off and waiting for the saws.

  After a while Larry’s breathing had slowed. He opened his eyes, finished his water, then looked around the Jeep. “What model’s this? Seventy-five?”

  “Six.”

  “Four cylinder.”

  “Yeah.”

  Silas had been driving slowly, he realized, like he used to with Cindy, not wanting to let her go, say good night. On those nights he’d wanted to hold on to her forever.

  “Your carburetor,” Larry said, cocking his head. “Sounds like it needs rebuilding.”

  “So I been told.”

  After a few more minutes, Silas signaled and turned and bumped by Larry’s mailbox where the familiar gravel ground beneath them and the familiar trees slid from the gloom of the headlights into passing night
. A deer flashed across the road in front of them, gone so quickly Silas had barely raised his foot from the pedal. He slowed anyway. One meant two or three and yep, here came the second, bouncing over the gravel.

  They passed the old Walker place a moment later, the overgrown driveway. You couldn’t see it, but if you could all you’d see was privet and kudzu. The land had a way of covering the wrongs of people.

  “You reckon,” Silas said, “if I was to bring this old Jeep in, you might look at that carburetor for me?”

  Larry took a moment to answer. “I don’t know how long it’ll be fore I open,” he said. “They told me I need to take it easy awhile.”

  “I reckon that’s true.”

  Silas stopped in front of Larry’s house, the old Ford truck waiting where Larry had left it. Larry opened the door and climbed out with his water bottle and stood a moment, the only light the light from the headlights. “I thank you for the ride.”

  “You welcome,” Silas said. “But wait. I near bout forgot.” He handed Larry the plastic bag, his wallet, keys, cell phone.

  “Thanks, Silas.” Larry closed the door.

  Silas waited as he made his way slowly up the walk. Halfway to the house, he turned over his shoulder. “Silas? I suppose you could bring the Jeep by here tomorrow. I got tools in my truck yonder.”

  “I’ll do that,” Silas said.

  They looked at each other for another moment, and then Larry turned and went on, laboring up the steps, opening the bag, letting himself in, flicking on the light. Through the pane, Silas watched his back stiffen in surprise, seeing before him his house made ready, washed of blood and smelling like Angie. Silas thought of the lilies she had left on the table, the gift basket filled with fruit. The cinnamon candles. Larry didn’t know it yet but his refrigerator was stocked (a couple of the beers gone, replaced by Marla’s hot dogs). He didn’t know that Silas had had satellite television installed. He didn’t know Silas had taught himself to drive the tractor in a one-armed way, and that he’d been pulling the chickens to fresh grass and that there were two dozen eggs waiting.

  Silas put the Jeep into first and eased off the clutch and began to roll. It was country dark, as Alice Jones had called these nights, the absence of any light but what you brought to the table. He sped up, his eyes focused on what was before him, and drove toward home.

  And not too long after the Jeep’s lights had faded and the night grown darker yet, after a dog had barked somewhere far away and another answered, Larry rose from his chair on the porch and went in and walked down the hall and stood staring at the rifle. Shaking his head. Then, one by one, he passed through the rooms of his house and clicked off the lights, the last lamp the one by his bed. What he thought before falling asleep was that he needed to call Silas in the morning, tell him to stop at the auto parts house, get a carburetor kit for the Jeep. He, Silas, knew the model.

  Acknowledgments

  THANKS TO BETH ANN, Nat, Judith, Dream Team of readers: Judith, patient voice of reason, best heard in your living room, holding a cat; Nat, blessed uncle, cut man of all cut men, I’m so thankful you’re in my corner; and B.A., first reader, immaculate editor, best friend: we’ve got to stop kissing in public. Thanks to David Highfill, who asked good questions from the start; to Michael Morrison, who still calls; to Gabe Robinson, who is owed many beers; and to Sharyn Rosenblum, my dear friend and publicist. Michael Knight and Jack Pendarvis read this book early; Joey Lauren Adams, Audrey Petty, and David Wright read it later; Lucky Tucker read it all along: thanks, all of you, for your criticism, insight, ideas, and time. Thanks to Ron Baggette, chief investigator for the Clarke County, Alabama, Sheriff’s Department, who was generous with his time, patient in his explaining, full of great stories. If this man ever runs for sheriff, we should all take up residence in his county. Thanks to Robert Israel, M.D., who helped with medical details. This man keeps my father healthy, and for that I owe him thanks as well. Thanks to my oldest writing friends, Barbara Spafford, Tammy Thompson, Winston Williams, Wayne Coates, and Gary Cunningham for your early support and friendship. Thanks to Dennis Lehane, for always sending the elevator back down. Thanks to my father, Gerald Franklin, who read this manuscript many times, and to my uncle, D Bradford: I watched these two mechanics work hour after hour in my childhood, hearing their stories and handing them wrenches. And finally, a last good-bye to family and friends taken much too early: Monica Bradford, Barry Hannah, Harold Norman “Skip” Holliday Jr., Jim Larrimore, Graham Lewis, Jay Prefontaine, and Julie Fennelly Trudo.

  Tom Franklin

  ***

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