by James Wade
The boy bent down and picked up the can and it was full of foam and the rim was covered in dirt. He held it from the top between his thumb and forefinger and watched the beer drip down the side.
“Even holds it like a pussy,” Micah said.
Jonah looked up at the girls, and they whispered and giggled and shook their heads.
The boy turned and began to walk away as Patrick and Micah continued to howl with laughter.
“Hey, man.” Trevor ran to catch up with him. “They were just joking with you. It’s okay.”
Jonah spun and faced the other boy.
“Did you know what would happen?” he asked.
“What? Like did I know the beer was about to fucking explode? Yeah, man, of course. I can’t believe you didn’t.”
Jonah’s face was red and flushed and his fists were balled.
Fuck you. Fuck you. Fuck you. Fuck you. He screamed inside his head.
He turned without saying anything and Trevor shrugged and rejoined the group and the boy imagined them all laughing at him and talking about the weird kid from the river and how he’d never had a beer or a girlfriend or a mother. He hated them. He hated them all, and he hated his father, and he hated himself, most of all.
Dwayne Hargrove sat in the well-worn recliner, sculpted into the growing indentation of his own making, and watched the light from the evening sun as it sieved through the broken blinds and fell across his lap, painting the leg of his jeans in disjointed stripe and shadow.
He drank Pabst Blue Ribbon beer because that’s what his father drank, and he thought about his life and his father’s life and how the old man had died young, never having to deal with the changing times.
He thought about his ex-wife, who was still legally his wife, and he wondered whether there was such a thing as common-law divorce. He thought of her often, and rarely were his thoughts pleasant. She was weak, and he saw her weakness in everyone, in all the world except himself. He saw it most in their son, standing in front of him as if he expected something. Everyone always expected something. It was, in Dwayne’s estimation, the downfall of society.
“It was a shit two weeks, so I need some time to myself. I don’t want you bothering me with questions. You understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Goddamn foreman thinks the sun shines out his ass. I been working this job since that little prick was your age. Thinks he can tell me how to go about it.”
Dwayne took a pull from his beer and sat it empty on the ground next to him.
“Another fallen soldier,” he mumbled to himself, then looked up at his son. “Go get me another can out of the ice box, boy.”
Jonah nodded.
“Better make it two,” his father called after him.
The boy opened the refrigerator and saw milk, a case each of PBR and RC Cola, a jar of pickles, a carton of eggs, and a block of cheese.
“You didn’t bring any more groceries?” the boy asked.
“You know what the problem is? Nobody’s got any common sense anymore,” the man said, ignoring him. “They read all these books about this and that, but that don’t prepare you for what it’s really like. Your momma was like that. She was book smart. But what does that get you? Not a goddamn thing. And now half the hands out there are Mexicans who don’t speak a word of English. Gonna get somebody killed is what they’re gonna do.”
The man’s eyes were glossed and narrow. He pulled a small Bic lighter and a soft pack of Marlboros from his shirt pocket and flicked his wrist so that one cigarette rose halfway from the pack. He leaned forward and clasped the filter between his lips and lit the end opposite. He rocked back in the recliner and inhaled.
“How was school?” he asked, as if the thought had just come to him. He kept the cigarette in his mouth and it bobbed up and down with each word.
“It’s summer break.”
“Oh. Well. Good.”
The man looked on either side of the chair for an ashtray. Seeing none, he leaned over and tried to ash his cigarette into one of the empty beer cans, but most of it missed and disappeared into the carpet.
“Anybody come to the trailer a’huntin’ me?” the man asked.
The boy shook his head.
“Good.” The man nodded. “That’s real good.”
“You expecting somebody?”
“There was just some ole boy I’m partnered up with, and I thought he might’ve come by to see if I was here.”
“Partnered up?”
“Yea, an investment thing down in Livingston. He loaned me—” The man stopped himself. “You know what? Mind your business.”
The boy looked around, hesitant.
“Your air conditioner broke, but I think I fixed it,” he said.
His father stared at him and smoked and said nothing.
The boy’s heart raced.
“You went in my bedroom?” the man asked, finally.
“Yessir, but just to look and see if I could fix it. It’s working again, now.”
“Goddamnit, boy. You know the rule.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Hell, it ain’t like I ask hardly anything of you. Most kids would love to be in your position.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Why can’t you do what you’re told?”
“I just wanted to make sure it worked when you got home.”
“Are you talking back?”
“No, sir.”
“Did I ask you why you broke the rule?”
“No, sir.”
“Go to your room. And don’t come out until I say so.”
The boy went to his room and shut the door and listened to the droning of the television and counted the times his father got up to go to the refrigerator and the times he got up to piss. The boy worked it out in his head and figured his father pissed once every three beers. The man had gone into the bathroom five times before he passed it and opened the door to Jonah’s room.
He stood in the frame. The boy sat on the edge of the bare mattress.
The man nodded.
“Alright, then, let’s get on with it.”
“Please,” the boy said, moving toward his father. “I just wanted to fix it for you.”
The man slapped him and the boy staggered backward and steadied himself on the bed.
“Don’t talk back,” the man said, as he slid his belt out from the loops of his jeans.
The boy shut his eyes and gripped the mattress with both hands.
Don’t cry. Don’t let him see you cry.
6
The room was bright white, then fading. Pulsating. Two of them, Dustin and Ryan, sat with crossed legs and rocked back and forth in front of an unplugged stereo.
“No, you can’t, you can’t just do that,” Dustin said, his skin tingled, his breath cold. “You know? You can’t just do it like that. They get angry. They get so angry. And Cade. Man, you just, you just can’t.”
“Yeah, alright. But. ’Cause this has gotta be fixed, though. This is . . . I mean. It’s gotta be fixed. Okay?”
“No, listen, you’re not listening, and you have to listen, they’ll get angry. Fucking pissed.”
“Let’s fix this shit, man. Let’s just fix it.”
“Where’s Lonnie? Wasn’t Lonnie here?” Dustin asked. He started grinning, then laughing. “I’m sorry, man, I’m pretty out there, right now.”
Ryan joined in the laughing.
“Those cartel boys sure know how to cook up some roosk.”
They laughed harder.
“Powerthirst,” Dustin said, his voice full of faux intensity.
“Geeter.”
“Gak.”
“Cracker crack.”
They fell backward onto the floor and held their stomachs as they laughed.
“We n
eed music,” Dustin said.
“That’s what I’m trying to say,” Ryan insisted. “This stereo is broke as shit, man. Let’s fix it. We can fix it right now. I want to hear some music.”
“I don’t think we should. I don’t know. Where’s Lonnie?”
“He’s digging, man. He’s digging in the earth.”
“What? He’s digging in the—hey, hey, we should ask the girl. Where’s the girl?”
“She’s, I don’t know. I think . . . I think she’s in the bathroom. Hey, are you in the bathroom? Fuck it, man, let’s just take it apart man. We’ll fix it, we’ll put it back together. She don’t care.”
“It’s not her, dude, it’s Cade. Cade will kill your ass. He’s crazy. He’s crazy, but you gotta ask the girl. She’s his girl. If she says yeah, then it’s on, okay? It’s on.”
The girl heard them beating on the bathroom door. She couldn’t think. Everything was different now, and they wanted something from her and she couldn’t think. Yes, she thought, give them whatever they want. Make them go away. I just need to think.
“Yeah,” she called. “Do it. Fix it.”
“Yeah?”
“Fucking yes. I don’t care.”
She didn’t care. She couldn’t care. Everything was different, now. She hadn’t thought it would be. She told herself it wouldn’t matter, but it did. She hadn’t believed it before, but she believed it now, and now it mattered.
I’m so high. I can’t do this.
The bathroom had red bulbs over the sink and the wood panels glowing like they were on fire, and the girl wondered if this was Hell, if this is where she would go.
I can’t breathe.
She tugged at the slipknot of the black cord she wore around her neck.
The faucet knobs were marked hot and cold, but it was summer and the water ran hot no matter which one was turned. The girl turned them both. She cupped her hands and let the water fill and watched as it ran over and into the sink. The drain was filled with beard trimmings, black mold, and all manner of waste. She bent over the basin as it began to fill, and she splashed water onto her face and let it run down her neck.
She stared through the caked grime at the face in the mirror above the sink. Her cheeks were sunken, her eyes hollow. Her bleached, matted hair fell past her shoulders, uneven streaks of purple dye reflecting near black in the dark red light. She could see the bones in her shoulders, the veins in her neck. She could feel each droplet of water as it slid along her body.
She shivered.
She pulled her phone from the pocket of her jean shorts. The battery was at 2 percent and there was no service, and even if there had been, she didn’t know who she’d call. She stared at the cracked screen and the background of a white sand beach with impossibly blue water. She cried.
She slunk down along the wall and cried for a good while, and when she was finished she stood and wiped away the tears and wiped away a swath of dirt from the mirror and looked again at herself.
She thought of her mother and her mother’s frailty. Of the victimhood in which she weltered.
No.
Not me.
She gripped the edge of the sink with both hands, her jaw clenched. She nodded at her reflection. Tense and flexed and nodding, she was a long time in deciding her next move.
She walked barefoot, her feet shuffling over the short, loop-pile carpet like voltaic emery boards. The stereo was in pieces as she passed by. The two boys didn’t look up.
“Y’all know when Cade gets back?” she asked.
“No.”
“Nope.”
“You gotta phone charger?” she asked them.
“Uh-uh.”
“I don’t got a phone. That’s how they track you.”
“Did Cade ride with John Curtis?”
“Naw, big man took his truck.”
“Shit,” she said. “Y’all know where John Curtis keep his keys?”
At last they both looked up from the floor.
“Why?”
“Nothing. Forget it.”
She walked barefoot out onto the porch and squinted at the figures in the darkness.
“Hey, girl. You come to watch Lonnie dig his way to China?” Scooter called.
She crossed her arms over her chest and shook her head. She stumbled back inside. I should drink water or eat something. I should take vitamins. I’m so fucking high.
She went into the kitchen and opened the fridge and stood staring for a while and there was nothing she wanted. She closed it, then forgot what she was doing and opened it again. Still nothing. She felt the panic creeping. There was a backpack on the counter. She unzipped it.
It was more crystal than she’d ever seen in one place. Maybe more than all the crystal she’d ever seen in her life added up. She zipped the backpack up and stood there at length. Again she was a long time deciding. She picked up the bag and put the straps backward over her shoulders, holding the bag in front of her as if it were a small child, and walked out of the cabin without putting on her shoes.
She moved slowly along the side of the structure, trying to avoid the reach of the flood lights. She started across the yard and toward the treeline. She could hear Lonnie cussing from down in his hole.
“Where you headed with that satchel?” Frank called to her.
She froze. The men were just silhouettes. Shadows. She was crying, again. She’d been crying, but she didn’t know how long.
“Hey, come here,” Frank said and started toward her.
She was twenty yards away from him, another twenty to the trees.
Lord protect me.
She ran.
Dustin wasn’t much count at fixing stereos. But running? That he could do. He’d been all-district in centerfield, and only a sophomore. Before meth, running had been as close to free as he’d ever felt. He’d stolen twenty-six bases that year, and tracked down dozens of fly balls that should have been hits. His coach thought he could play college ball at Neches Community, maybe even somewhere bigger. That was another life though, and he worked hard not to think about it. As if the memories didn’t belong to him.
He was the youngest in John Curtis’s crew, and he relished the chance to prove himself to the older, harder men around him. He pulled ahead of the others. He could hear them shouting, see their lights dancing off trees, but they weren’t fast enough to keep up with him. He was so spun he’d half-forgotten what it was he was chasing. Then he saw her, clawing at the underbrush, panting and crying.
“Hey! Stop,” he called.
She turned in a crouch and looked at him with animal eyes. A creature swallowed up by terror and confusion.
“Get away from me!” she screamed.
“Whoa, it’s me. It’s Dustin. It’s okay.”
He’d always liked the girl. Felt sorry for her. She was the closest to his own age, and she’d already been through more than any one person should.
He shined his flashlight on his own face.
“See? Just me.”
“Let me go,” she said, a begging whisper.
He frowned.
“What’s going on?”
“Please. Just let me go.”
“I can’t help you if you don’t talk to me. And I can’t let you go. Not with that backpack.”
She clutched it tighter to her chest.
“You have to. Please.”
“Why? What’s wrong?”
She told him.
A few minutes later the others caught up to him near a clearing. He was waving his light back and forth across the topgrass.
“Where is she?” Frank asked.
“Couldn’t catch her,” Dustin said.
“Goddamnit.”
He put his hands on his hips. The others followed suit.
Dustin avoided their eyes.
Frank continued to stare at him.
The night was filled with insect songs and the heavy breathing of men.
7
Cade stood alongside one of the marble pillars meant to separate the dining area from the grand living room. He’d never been in a house, or any other building, with such refinements. The grandeur was unsettling; the space too open, too vulnerable.
The men at the table played their game of postures. Cade ignored them. He wasn’t there to negotiate. John Curtis brought him in case things went wrong. In case the masks of civilization were pulled back and the true nature of men unveiled. Fancy talk, he called it. When in the end it was still the soldiers who won the war. It always comes to blood, sooner or later.
He was growing impatient. They still had a long drive back from the city, and Cade hated driving in the dark to begin with. Too many things hidden in the shadows.
On the far wall, framed in gold styling and hanging above a stone fireplace, was an enormous canvas whereon some great battle played out in oil paints and varnish. Cade stared at the scene.
“You know this painting?” a man whispered.
Cade glanced at the man and then back to the far wall. He shook his head.
“The Battle of Ciudad Juarez,” the man said.
“Juarez,” Cade repeated.
“The great Mexican Revolution,” the man said. He scoffed. “And yet, what did it bring us? Death and division, and what else? Brothers killing brothers.”
“We had one like that,” Cade said.
“Yes. The war of the slaves.”
“Wasn’t about slaves.”
The man looked confused.
“The Civil War, no?” he asked.
“It was about the rights of the states, the rights of the people.”
“The rights to own slaves?”
“What was you all fighting over?” Cade asked, ignoring his question.
“The soul of our country.”
“Who won?”
“Death.”
“Well.”
The two men stood one next to the other and looked at the painting. From the table came an exaggerated fit of laughter from John Curtis.
“Your boss is a funny man,” the Mexican said.