by Sable Hunter
He could see every little thing from that day in his mind. The way Glory had bit her lip as he’d stretched her tight little pussy when he slid in. She’d been wearing the short Mardi Gras purple jacket he’d bought her at the Rougaroux Festival and he could still see the little heron embroidered on the shoulder as he’d tried to get her out of it that day in the backseat. But the jacket had been tight on Glory and instead of her arms slipping out of it, they’d caught, becoming a straightjacket of sorts, trapping her and forcing T to reach around with both hands, to grip Glory’s little ass and move her back and forth on his lap until they both exploded.
T sat in his idling truck for a little bit longer. Indulging himself in the pleasant memory was just too painful. They’d both been adamant that their time together was only temporary, but this wasn’t how T wanted it to end. He looked at himself in the cracked glass of the rearview mirror and the loathing seeped back in. He hated himself and he knew he wasn’t worth a damn thing.
Looking up from his thoughts, T spotted a neon sign not too far up ahead. A smiling green alligator in a colorful Hawaiian shirt waved at him from down the road.
“The Happy Gator,” T said under his breath. “Been a long time.” The bar had been the sight of his lowest point, the place he’d gone to get drunk the night he’d rammed into Lauren and Teagan Middleton. He’d been sober for years, but tonight…maybe tonight he needed to fall off the wagon for a brief spell.
*
T stood in front of his idling truck, staring at the front of a Rite-Aid pharmacy – conveniently located right across the street from the local tavern. God, he needed a drink. He also needed to get some things to tend to his wound. But going into the store to buy some bandages and antiseptic didn’t appeal. He didn’t want people staring at him and wondering how he’d damaged his hand. T didn’t know why he was self-conscious about it. He almost felt guilty, as if he’d been in a fight or something. Turning his hand to look at it better in the light of the security lamp, he winced. Damn, the gash had gone deep, he was probably going to need stitches. A trip to the hospital might be just what he needed. Even a little cut like this one would probably have him waiting for hours to see a doctor and that’s precisely what he needed right now. A distraction. A reason to just sit somewhere and calm himself for a while.
Across the street, the waving gator taunted him. ‘Come sit for a bit, old pal,’ it seemed to say in a singsong voice. ‘First drink is on me. I’ll let you bend my ear for a while. Tell me all your troubles, T. You know I’m here for you.’
T shouldn’t have even let the thought of having a drink into his brain, because now it was all he could think about.
Why shouldn’t he have a drink?
His entire world was falling down around him. The one thing he’d always wanted and never wanted, was happening. The woman he loved was pregnant and it was tearing him apart.
T slid in behind the wheel. He could just leave. Drive back home and tell Glory that he loved her, that he loved their unborn child and that no matter what, they would be together.
“You aren’t that man, you’ll never be that man,” he told himself, staring at the cut on his hand. Hell, he’d been so distraught over the situation that he’d lashed out and thrown a punch.
Lauren Middleton had come along, as if sent from God himself to save T, but now he could see it had all been a smokescreen, a cruel joke played on him to make T-Rex think he was a normal person. He could never be normal. The temper was still there. Rex Senior lived on inside of him and he might as well just accept that and go back to the way things had been before the crash.
If his old man did live inside him, Big Rex was thirsty.
Giving in to temptation was one of the easiest things he’d ever done.
Once inside, The Happy Gator looked just the same as he remembered it and the place was hopping tonight. A cute little waitress in a very revealing outfit walked by and offered him a wink. “Hey, hot stuff. Grab a seat and I’ll be right with ya.”
T’s eyes followed her cute ass as she walked off to a table full of rowdies. The waitress was a little honey for sure, there was no debating that, but she didn’t do a damn thing for him, not the way Glory did. Turning away with disinterest, T made his way over to the bar.
The stool he settled down on felt familiar, like meeting an old friend you hadn’t seen in a long time, one you’d missed and couldn’t wait to catch-up with.
“What’ll it be?” the bartender asked as he slid a coaster in front of T.
“Triple Jim Beam and soda. And make sure you forget the soda.”
The bartender gave T a knowing smile and slid a wet glass in front of his new customer. T watched with wide eyes as the dark liquid filled the squat rocks glass.
T wanted this drink. Oh boy, did he ever want it, but he hesitated a moment, just staring down into the glass. “This is who you are,” he whispered to himself and lifted the glass from the bar, tossing it back in one giant gulp. “Again!”
The bartender turned from the register at the sound of T’s big booming voice. “Big fella is thirsty, huh?”
The smoky concoction burned on its way down, leaving its mark all the way from T’s lips to his stomach, which was now on fire. The second glass full of bourbon was in front of T for about two seconds before he made it disappear down his throat.
“Another one,” T barked. The alcohol hadn’t yet hit him, but that old friendly warmth in his gut had his blood pumping and he forgot his manners like the old T was prone to do.
The bartender filled T’s glass again apprehensively. “Why don’t you make this one last a little while, fella?”
T scooped the glass up and took a small sip. “I just might do that, partner.”
That snappy, happy feeling slowly returned to T as he sat at the counter. The alcohol had finally come on him and he basked in the warm glow for a while before getting up to stroll around the bar.
Not much had changed since he’d last been there. The big blue marlin still hung on the wall. Of course, the long pointy nose was missing. T had torn it off one night and brandished it as a weapon when he’d gotten into an altercation with a group of truckers. He’d been off his ass drunk that night, as he was most nights back then and the owner of the bar had banned him for a full month for the fight.
In fact, T had been thrown out of the Happy Gator so many times, he was surprised he’d been allowed to come back in tonight. One could have rightly assumed his picture was up at many bars as a patron on the ‘Not Welcome’ list.
It wasn’t long before the exhilaration of drinking again and being at a familiar place wore off and T found himself seated at the end of the bar, messing with a touch screen game he’d wasted many hours playing.
“Mind if I join you?”
The voice was feminine, with a slow drawl. T would’ve guessed the owner came from Texas and when he turned to look, the girl standing at his side had trouble written all over her.
“I’m kinda in the middle of a game here,” T told the young girl, hoping she’d just go away and leave him alone.
She ignored him completely and took the seat at his side.
The girl mumbled her name during an introduction, but T didn’t bother to learn it. She was petite with long blonde hair, very short shorts and extremely transparent with what she wanted.
T begrudgingly let her join him in the next game, but he kept the talk minimal. It didn’t take her long to get comfortable and start pawing at him, touching T’s arm at every chance and making obvious advances. While checking out the bar earlier, T had seen her with a group of guys who looked like they were from out of town. They all had on some sort of camouflage, but their camo was far too neat and clean for them to be hunters. They looked like a bunch of wannabe gator trappers in town for spring break and a few of them had already given T the stink eye upon arrival.
“This is fun,” the girl said after T had done his best to ignore her for the better part of twenty minutes. “Let’s play again.” Sh
e fished around in her purse, searching for some change to plop into the machine.
T placed a hand on top of hers. He was more than three sheets to the wind and he just wanted to be left alone with his misery. “Listen, Amber. Or Tiffany or whatever your name is. It’s been fun, but I’d kinda like to be left alone to play my game if you don’t mind.”
The smile left the face of Amber, or Tiffany or whatever her name was. T hadn’t responded to her in the way she’d hoped. He’d ignored her blatant advances and it was clear she didn’t appreciate the rejection.
“You don’t own the game,” she said in a vile tone. “Why don’t you get your country ass the hell out of the way so I can play?”
Oh yeah, she was from out of town for sure.
T could already feel it, the group the girl was with started to surround him. “Oh, fuck.” He glanced back over his shoulder and saw three young guys standing behind him, chests puffed out, faces snarling. “No harm, no foul fellas. I’m just sitting here trying to enjoy my evening. Why don’t you take your girl here and run back along to your little table?”
He probably shouldn’t have spoken to them in such a condescending way, the little cabal was clearly looking for trouble and T knew he’d just made things worse by dismissing them.
“Fuck you, hick,” one of the young fellas said. “Let’s take this outside.”
When T didn’t respond, the guy tapped him on the shoulder.
“Do that again and you’ll be pulling back a stump brother,” T warned, getting up off his stool so his opponents could see what they were getting themselves into. “I’ve put down guys bigger than all three of you runts combined. So why don’t you take your little white-trash girl and mosey along?” He pointed towards the door.
Shit, he really was making this hard on himself.
T had been in this situation more times than he cared to remember. He’d shown his size to the group and they’d shrank under it. He knew all he’d have to do is drop one of them and the rest would run off. But that old feeling hadn’t returned. Back in the day, even the sniff of a fight was enough to get T’s blood boiling, to get his heart pounding, and give him a smile.
But today there was nothing.
“Listen, fellas. I apologize. I’ve had a rough day and a few too many. Let me have a pitcher of beer sent over to your table and we’ll chalk this one up to me being a fool.”
The young men looked at each other in disbelief. A moment ago, even though none of them would have admitted it, they’d feared for their lives, now this mountain in front of them was offering his apology and even offering to buy them beer. None of them knew what was going on, but they were quick to accept their good fortune and scurry back to their table, despite the protests of Amber, or Tiffany, or whatever her name was.
T ordered the pitcher and another glass of bourbon for himself and took a seat at a table as far away from the young group as he could. He had no idea how he was going to get home, he wouldn’t have been able to even get his keys into the trucks ignition right now, let alone pilot it anywhere. The room was starting to spin and T laid his head down on the table to try to regain his equilibrium.
When he lifted his head, there was a man sitting across the table from him, but T’s world was out of focus and he couldn’t see the man.
“Drinkin’ to celebrate, or forget?”
“Do I know you, fella?”
The figure leaned closer and T could see that it was his AA sponsor, Danny. “The owner’s son is an old friend of mine and he’s in the program. When T-Rex Beaumont comes walking into a bar in these parts and starts getting snockered after years of sobriety, it doesn’t go unnoticed. He gave me a call and told me I’d better get down here. What’s goin’ on, T?”
“She’s pregnant, Danny.”
“Who is? Glory?”
T nodded his head clumsily and lifted the bourbon to his mouth.
Danny intercepted the glass and took it from his friend. “Let’s just put that down for a minute. I thought you were fixed, T. How the hell did you get her pregnant?”
“I thought I was too. Apparently, I’ve got some super sperm. But she told me she couldn’t get pregnant either, because all the women in her family are infertile since a witch put a hex on her great-great-great-great grandfather. Or was it because she was part alien? I can’t remember.”
“Well either way, this is good news. You’re gonna be a father.”
“You know I can’t be a father, Danny,” T snapped and made a reach for his drink.
But his reflexes were slow and Danny moved it away before T had a chance to grasp it. “I’m familiar with your past. I’m sure Glory is over the moon about this. Why don’t I take you home to her?” He stood from his chair and took T by the arm.
T yanked away from his friend’s grasp. “No! I can’t go back there.”
“Why?”
“Because Glory is there and I said awful things to her.” T’s handsome face was a mask of remorse.
“I’m sure she’ll forgive you.”
“I don’t deserve her. I don’t deserve to be with her. She can do better than me, Danny.”
“That’s the disease talking, T. You’re a good man. You deserve good things.”
T looked away, tears welling up in his eyes. “I’m a monster. I always have been and I always will be. You don’t know the things I said.”
Danny knew there wasn’t any point trying to convince his friend otherwise, he’d been down the same road, he knew the guilt, the shame, and the feeling of hopelessness T was feeling right now. “We can talk about this in the morning.”
T was emotionally drained and drunk as a skunk. He laid his head back down on the table. “Just leave me here.”
“I don’t think the bar is gonna let you sleep this one off here, buddy.” He motioned for the bartender to help him and a moment later, the two men struggled to carry the substantial frame of T-Rex Beaumont out the door to Danny’s waiting car.
T’s boots dragged on the gravel parking lot as they went. “Where are we going?” He could barely keep his eyes open.
“I’m taking you home,” Danny told him as they finagled T into the backseat.
T sat up for a brief second and did his best to open his eyes. “Please don’t take me home.” His words came out slow and garbled. “I can’t go there now. Please.”
Danny closed the door and thanked the bartender for the help. He stood at his car, hands on the roof. “Now what am I gonna do with him?”
*
Glory never knew old people rose before the sun. When the screen door creaked, announcing Ethel’s arrival, she barely had time to grab her backpack and dive off the porch. She wiped her eyes, used the bushes, and took off on the nine-mile trek to New Iberia.
Like yesterday, she had to stop frequently. Twice, she refilled her water bottles, choosing houses where she saw a woman or a child hanging about. Once, someone recognized her and asked about T-Rex. Again, she said only good things, agreeing with the Wilmott’s about his value as a good neighbor. Highway 86 hugged Bayou Teche, so Glory chose to walk near the water instead of right down the edge of the highway. She didn’t hitchhike anymore. After one bad experience, she’d learned that two-legged beasts were more dangerous than four-legged ones. So, she took her chance with the alligators, seeing several, but none did anything more than slip into the water when she walked by.
Walking gave her plenty of time to think. She missed T so much. The old saying that ‘love hurts’ was correct. Did he miss her? Did he even notice she was gone? Probably not. For weeks after her mother and stepfather left, Glory remained near their old house, visiting the neighborhood – just in case they changed their mind and returned to find her. They hadn’t. This time, she didn’t even entertain the hope T would look for her. Although…if he took a notion, she supposed she was leaving breadcrumbs – if he was a mind to look for them.
Glory wasn’t holding her breath. Ha! She didn’t have any oxygen to spare.
Be
cause she needed to stop so frequently, Glory didn’t average much more than a mile and a half an hour. Each time a vehicle approached from behind her, she ducked into the tree line She kept imagining that one of those vehicles would be T, coming to look for her.
But none of them ever were.
Glory hooked her hands in the shoulder straps of her backpack, humming as she hiked. A canopy of trees shaded the way. She passed two plantations, the historical markers outside the fences proclaimed they’d been built with sugar money. At the second, she ventured up to sit on the wide verandah. The first house had been open for visitors, but this one appeared to be abandoned. The name on the marker had been Melancholy, a very strange name for a house, Glory thought. She admired the massive columns and tall stately windows, venturing near enough to peer inside to see the furniture all covered with white drop cloths. A chill crept over Glory’s skin. She turned away and returned to her seat, sipping on water, and munching on cheese crackers. Soon she’d need to get a hamburger, her baby needed real food. Maybe she could exchange a meal for a few hours washing dishes or waiting tables.
Glory was studying an ant scurrying along the ground at her feet, determined to carry off a crumb bigger than he was…when she heard it. A giggle. Jerking her head up, she tried to see who might be near her. Was someone living here and she’d trespassed? Grabbing the strap of her backpack, she slid to the ground, her eyes scanning the overgrown gardens of the plantation. Another giggle drew her attention and she turned her head quick enough to see a female figure in a light yellow gown hurrying between two magnolia trees a few yards away. “Hello?”
Curious beyond measure, Glory threw down her backpack and took off after the girl. Was there a reenactment going on? Some type of pilgrimage? “Hello? Come back! I just stopped to rest. I’m not bothering anything.”