Delicious Foods: A Novel

by James Hannaham

  A woman name Jequita went, What about my debt? I owe $942.22.

  The debt was bogus, everybody, Darlene announced. Forget the debt. Today we start with a clean slate. From now on, we’re going to pay you what we owe you. We’re going to keep careful records. Real ones. You can keep staying in the barracks if you like—we’re going to clean them up, too, and move the chickens somewhere else—but you can live wherever you want.

  Darlene had em take that wheezing dog and his nasty-ass friend out the yard right then to make a show. Most everybody clapped. A couple folks done broke down weeping. But still ain’t nobody runned off. Most people standing there with they mouth open, couldn’t believe that shit. And why the fuck would they?

  For real? said a man they called Taurus.

  Another dude who went by the name Ripley went, Is this some kind of a trap?

  For real, Darlene told em. Not a trap.

  By sundown though, ’bout half them workers had packed up they shit and got on the road by they lonelies, braving that long walk to the next place in life, or back to they old haunts, without no kinda moneys. Another half be talking ’bout they didn’t know where they might could go next but they gonna figure it out the next few days, and then you know that turnt into weeks. Me, I wasn’t going nowheres, and the folks who stuck around on account a Scotty done figured that shit out but quick.

  Darlene remembered her childhood experience on the farm outside Lafayette. She put that together with her business knowledge from the Mount Hope Grocery, and she start keeping good records of what folks done picked and what they was paid, which still ain’t been much but it meant the world to a lotta them motherfuckers. They would come up and praise her ass like she Nelson Mandela or some shit. But Darlene ain’t really had her heart set on turning Delicious around. She ain’t want to make the goddamn place profitable, she just want to make it a honest day’s work, to pay motherfuckers for what they done, to push that joint a hair closer to the thing Jackie had told her ’bout in the first place. If the farm goes broke, she thought, so be it.

  When we walked into that courtroom, though, it felt like we had got to a wedding late—a bad wedding where the families be hating each other. We had the bad luck to walk in during a lull in the action, so a bunch of heads turnt 180 degrees to look at Darlene. The Fusiliers up front on the left, with they lawyer. Sextus turnt around and gave Darlene that helpless look of his, but she averted her eyes from that shit real fast. Behind them, toward the front, Hammer waving her over. He had quit the company right after Eddie done broke out and got hooked up with a different farm ’bout fifty miles away. Darlene ain’t want to sit on the Delicious side. As she raising her hand to greet Hammer and beg off sitting with him at the same time, she seen what she thought could’ve been a ghost. A woman sitting toward back right, staring and leaning forward, probably tryna absorb every word of that damn trial. She wearing a suit and her hair parted in the middle with a pigtail on either side, a style Darlene recognized immediately. Darlene slid herself into the one empty bench right behind the woman but she had to get her bearings ’cause she ain’t know for sure if I was fucking with her.

  Michelle, she whispered, real loud.

  My girl musta startled Michelle, ’cause she jump-turnt and put her left hand on the back of the bench. Darlene realized at the same moment that this well-dressed woman was Michelle for sure and that her right sleeve ain’t had no arm in it; she had pinned the sleeve in half and let it flop around like a damn flag announcing the no-arm.

  Amazement filled up her voice. You made it, Darlene said.

  Just barely. Could you believe this trial? Can you believe it took three years to nail these sons of bitches?

  No, I can’t. I mean, I can, but it’s not easy. I’m so glad to see you made it out.

  Darlene had the impulse to lean over and hug her but ain’t do it ’cause maybe it gonna offend a one-arm lady to hug? She had a ton of questions ’bout how Michelle had got free and had lost her arm, but the lost arm distracted her ’cause it reminded her ’bout Eddie, and she start searching the room with her eyes instead of asking. Finally she spot him up front right, sitting next to some proper-looking woman she ain’t recognized, and a child she couldn’t see too well, but from the way he touch the woman shoulder and sat the boy up next to him she got mad ’cause she figured they was a daughter-in-law and a grandchild she ain’t never seen or heard of before in her life. It staggered her ass to imagine that she coulda got so separated from Eddie that he ain’t never told her about no woman, no wedding, and no baby. I got mad myself. What the goddamn shit!

  Darlene covered her eyes with the palm of her hand and get to thinking ’bout everything she ain’t never wanna be thinking ’bout. She gripping her face like she gonna pull it off to show somebody else face be under there, maybe the real face she felt she been hiding. Then she took her hand down and looked at me—I guess you could say she looked inside herself at me—and I done recognized a expression I dread more than anything. Them big wet eyes said I’m sorry, them drooping eyelids said I’m tired, and that flat mouth said I’m determined. She blaming me for everything that happened and deciding she gonna break up with me. Naturally, I heard this a thousand times before, but that meant I could tell when a motherfucker really mean it.

  I freaked the fuck out. Honey, I said—bluffing—give it some time. Like fifteen minutes. You gonna be crawling back on your stomach to get a hit. Slithering for my forgiveness. Let’s watch this damn trial, okay? I ain’t really wanna watch, but anything be better than a breakup in a courthouse.

  Now it did seem real odd to me that them accusations against Delicious ain’t had nothing to do with some shit the judge called Certain Irregularities Concerning the Recruitment, Treatment, and Compensation of Laborers, but that go to show how tough it was to take them Delicious motherfuckers down. The prosecution had went on a roundabout strategy instead.

  So the lawyer—some motherfucker with saggy cheeks and old-school nerd glasses who be looking like a failed vice president—ain’t said nothing ’bout tricking nobody into working for no company, or no jacked-up prices at no store, or no beating the bejeezus outta TT. He talking some shit ’bout how the bad sanitation up at Delicious done polluted the water supply with human waste, saying that Sextus and Jackie and How had lied to the IRS about the company income, and, of course, blaming em for having a interesting relationship with Yours Truly—the kind where they was sometime using me to compensate they workers. Which they still was doing some of. At that point I wanted to get up and leave—behind all the corrupt shit they was perpetrating up in that joint, I’m gonna get the blame again? And my best girlfriend gonna cut me dead? No, no, Joe! Motherfuckers was about to see a illegal drug go apeshit and burst into tears.

  Otherwise, I don’t remember much about the trial, I turnt off to it. Once all the rigmarole and legalese got said by the lawyers and the judges and whoever, like a lion saying grace before it eat your ass, and the prosecution side made their dumb remarks, Darlene zoned out thinking ’bout Eddie and changing her life, and I ain’t want to face her new state of mind or the character assassination happening on me up at the bench. Judging folks ain’t my bag—I guess I could understand why y’all does it, since y’all got bodies people could rape and kill, and possessions motherfuckers could jack, you got to figure out the histories and smack people with the it’s-your-faults, but I get tired of that shit real quick. Who cares what happened in the past—for real! Y’all human beings has got enslaved to time, and that’s why y’all need me, because just like Darlene y’all need time to stop rushing into the future or chaining your ass to the past. That’s why this whole legal-system thing people got going hate me, call me a controlled substance and keep me from making friends with everybody, ’cause I know how to make time go away.

  Eventually after all that blah-blah-blah up at the wooden desk, they gave our ass a lunch break. So I said, Darlene, honey, this whole deal so crazy-making, let’s go to the ladies’ room and kick i
t for a while. Maybe let’s not even come back. Everybody waiting for Sirius to testify on account a he be a Texas celebrity now with his social rhymes, but he had came with a li’l entourage and split early. He wave to Darlene cross the room at one point and she waving back, and he mouthed some shit that look to her like I’m sorry but she couldn’t tell. She mouthed back Love your music but she really only heard one song. Tuck snuck out the courtroom right on Sirius heels, probably desperate to beg him for a gig as a backup singer or some shit.

  The top thing on Darlene mind was getting a opportunity to talk to Eddie. She had waved to Sirius, but she ain’t feel like talking to him on account a he brought the whole trial on. It’s all ’bout Eddie. So she start edging her way to the front, but a mad rush of people come out either side into the middle aisle, and my girl couldn’t push through till they got done. She turnt around to go the long way, but two fat white ladies she ain’t recognized, dressed in purple and pink, was sitting at the far end, fanning theyself and gossiping, and it ain’t look like they gonna go nowheres without a airlift. When Eddie come down through the crowd, he on the far side from her, the woman and child walking closer, and right up next to Darlene be some tall white lawyer guys with big guts and watch chains keeping Eddie from seeing her and her from reaching across and grabbing his arm or even getting his attention. She called out his name and his neck done twisted round, but them lawyers still blocking his view. He kept moving like he ain’t heard nothing but a echo from somewheres, but then he stop looking, and she ain’t wanna shout, so she ain’t said his name again.

  Once the crowd thin enough for Darlene to get in the aisle, Eddie almost out the courtroom door. Next thing she know, somebody loud-ass voice up in her face yelling, Oh Lord have mercy, is that Darlene Hardison? And TT bear-hugged her like they was all good friends in the Delicious days, and he ain’t ratted her out on the TV. Motherfucker wearing a pinstripe suit that ain’t look bad considering all the ways she had seened him look before, but everybody from back then looked like new people to each other ’cause they had a bath, a haircut, and a decent set of threads. Some of em even had new damn teeth, and that made Darlene a li’l jealous.

  Darlene told TT how good he look and he goes, It’s like the Delicious Cotillion up in here—and he wouldn’t let go her forearm until she had to turn around and excuse herself, saying that she ain’t talked to Eddie yet and they ain’t seened each other in a quite a while. TT put on a face that said Why you hasn’t seen your son? but she ain’t want to explain nothing, so she told him that there be more time to catch up later and she pushed past a couple people to get out the courtroom.

  In the hallway I start getting tired of Miss D and I wanted to mess with her, dance her brain around a little, do a little mental foxtrot and shit. It’s darker in that hallway than inside the courtroom and her eyes gone screwy and she couldn’t tell who was who. She turnt in circles a couple time to get set, but she couldn’t see her son nowheres. Then she spot a lady looked like the woman she seen with Eddie, but she ain’t see Eddie or the kid they was with, and the woman had her back to Darlene. Darlene grabbed the lady by her upper arm and she spun around; you could tell she made a judgment on Darlene and her missing teeth on account a her face got tight and her shoulders squinched together.

  At first Darlene ain’t notice that the lady kinda flipped out, ’cause she still on a mission to find Eddie, so she grip on the woman arm even more, probably too tight, and goes, Are you the woman?

  The woman yank her whole torso away from Darlene hand and go, What woman? I’m a woman, but I don’t know if I’m the woman. Are you searching for a particular woman?

  Darlene did not get to answer ’cause then she saw Eddie coming to em, leading the wobbly boy by the hand with his claw, and her attention gone over there immediately. Eddie looked up from the child face at Darlene and handed him off to the woman, who he called Ruth. The child climbed up on her and she balanced him on her hip.

  Ma, Eddie said.

  Darlene extended her arms for a hug—she feeling ready to forgive his betrayal and all that hardheadedness, ’cause she recognize how much he like her in a way. But he ain’t extended his arms. Then she seen his claws and was like, Maybe that’s why he won’t hug me? She thinking ’bout not hugging, but changed her mind and hugged his non-hug so that at least one motherfucker be hugging somebody.

  I thought you might come, he said. You didn’t have to.

  Oh my chicken-fried goodness, Ruth gasped. Mrs. Hardison! Ruth’s attitude went poof and she got all sweet. I am so sorry! she said.

  You look a lot different, Ma, Eddie said.

  I told Darlene I thought he pretending not to say worse.

  You mean better or worse? she asked, hoping to laugh off his comment.

  Ruth broke up that weird moment by saying, Mrs. Hardison, I’m sorry, I did not recognize you.

  Why would you, since we’ve never met? Darlene shot back while she still staring at Eddie so there wouldn’t be no doubt she blaming his ass for keeping his life a secret from her. I only just heard your name for the first time. Did he even tell you he had a mother?

  So Ruth introduce herself as Eddie wife, and Darlene start giving Eddie a bunch of outraged grimaces behind all the shit she never heard from him ’bout Ruth and ’bout they life together. Every new piece of information be dropping like a brick on Darlene big toe. They ain’t even get to the boy for a while, and it seem like Eddie start to guess that Darlene ain’t gonna have a good reaction to meeting him, so he kinda stepped between Darlene and Ruth, who still got the child in her arms to hide him. But the kid so outgoing and everything that he lean around Eddie arm at one point and goes, I’m Nathaniel! Totally innocent of course ’bout what that name gonna mean to this lady he ain’t even know be his grandma.

  Soon as Darlene heard that name she grab Eddie by the arm of his suit so hard that it done made a li’l ripping noise and some strings done popped out the shoulder. Her face be quivering, she trying so hard to stomp down the agony she experienced when Nat said Nathaniel. She screamed, Eddie, you—how could you name—! And not tell me! She grabbing his suit jacket anywhere to shake him back and forth.

  Eddie said, Ma, I didn’t want you to know. The butt-naked honesty of that shit made Darlene close her mouth and flop her hands to her sides.

  Ruth put Nat down and changed her stance like she gon have to escort Darlene out the building in a hot minute.

  But then Darlene looked at me again, and she caught herself and stepped back from the three of em. She wiped her teary, mucusy face with a sleeve and covered her mouth with her fingers on either side, almost like she praying. Suddenly they was a trinity to her, some sacred folks who had managed to turn they rotten life into something got value, and she blamed herself for failing to do that shit in her own life. And when she understood that they was prepared never to let her into they life, she took a gaspy breath like she ’bout to drown.

  It ain’t too often that the mother look at the child and get schooled, and that brung on a whole nother tornado of shame to Darlene. She seen how spiderwebby and delicate that connection be between any two people, even when they blood, and how bad she had fucked with it far as Eddie concerned, like it ain’t meant nothing to her. For one second she could truly see his side of things, and it be like everything inside her turnt to mud and slid from her head to her foot and she become a monster to her own self. She seen the fear and disgust and judgment in the eyes of her unknown family, this woman and child and the son she ain’t really knowed no more, and them feelings done filled up the hole where love and respect and trust oughta gone. By that point, li’l Nat don’t understand what the hell he done wrong and he start wailing.

  Scotty, Darlene said to me, it’s over.

  And I knowed her ass wasn’t kidding, neither. But I am a badass drug with a reputation for keeping the loyalty of my friends and lovers in a very tight grip, so I laughed at her—a long, nasty, spiteful, smoky laugh—praying that all my ridicule gonna keep h
er from knowing that without her, I would lose all my strength. She was in my head, too, though, and this time couldn’t nobody fool her no more, not even me.

  28.

  Almost Home

  I was experiencing hellacious withdrawal symptoms—after so long, I couldn’t function without Scotty, and I used a few more times before I could honestly say I quit. I had no health insurance and I knew I needed to find a free clinic in order to truly detox and finally tear myself free of the drug. It turned out that the nearest place was in Shreveport. When I let Elmunda know that I had decided to get off drugs and move there, she said, Shreveport! as if she had opened her purse and a palmetto bug jumped out. Didn’t even congratulate me for kicking my habit. I chose not to argue with her about the merits of Shreveport, since it still meant a lot to me.

  At the end of the trial, Sextus had received a fifteen-year sentence for selling drugs and polluting the water supply, and a fine of five thousand dollars for financial restructuring. The court banned him and his family from the agriculture business for life, and the high legal fees required the Fusiliers to sell a large portion of the farm’s acreage. I stayed out of the brouhaha to the extent that I could, because I’d finally admitted to myself that my desire for Sextus depended mostly on my perception of his power as well as my need for Scotty. The Fusiliers went through a great deal of infighting and agony as Sextus steeled himself to do hard time and Elmunda and Jed prepared to move to a smaller house with Elmunda’s great-aunt in Baton Rouge, closer to where Sextus would be incarcerated. They put the majority of their belongings in storage and cleaned up Summerton, hoping to rent it out for weddings and family reunions. Elmunda wore herself out trying to contact somebody who could make what she kept calling a computer page for the home and its grounds.

  Though I felt no obligation to assist her, and she put up a confusing amount of resistance to my efforts, I found her a new caretaker before her move to Baton Rouge. When she said that she would miss me, I doubted her sincerity to the point where I had to stifle a laugh. On the other hand, I believed Jed when he said the same thing, and when he wept over his father’s upcoming departure, I wept as well, but maybe not for the same reasons. The withdrawal was racking my body with seizures and sweating, I was constantly anxious and paranoid—at one point I had myself convinced that I would actually die within the hour without a hit. Just about anything could make me weep.