Welcome to Fat Chance, Texas

by Celia Bonaduce

  Thud stood at the gate to the petting zoo in his bolero tie. Polly had no better luck with the dog’s acceptance of a hat than she had the goats, although Pappy said Jerry Lee was wearing his. Professor Johnson, dressed as a honky-tonk piano man, met her at the pen, a worried expression on his face.

  “I was just looking at the bowling lane Powderkeg laid down for the twins’ exhibit,” he said. “I don’t think it’s regulation.”

  “Oh?” Dymphna said.

  “I suppose I shouldn’t mention it,” he said.

  “I wouldn’t.” Why are men so damned competitive? Dymphna thought.

  “Unless you think I should mention it.”

  “No, I don’t think so.” Is this still about the dry ice?

  “You might be right,” Professor Johnson said. “He’s very touchy about being proven wrong.”

  Oh my God, it is about the dry ice!

  “I think it will be OK,” Dymphna said.

  “Well, all right then.” Professor Johnson turned to head back to the Boozehound. “I’ll see you at rehearsal.”

  Thud stood up and followed the professor. Dymphna watched them go. She could feel her eyes brimming with hot tears. She pressed her fingers to her lower lids to stop them, as Polly had taught her. In a few days, Professor Johnson would go back to his real life and she would go back to hers. She didn’t even know where she would end up. She had to find a place for the goats, the chickens, and the rabbits. But she did know one thing—she was going to miss that man.

  And that damn dog.

  CHAPTER 40

  Old Bertha stared at her reflection in the mirror in her second story bedroom and sighed. Whoever said you could make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear was full of malarkey. If you were your basic sow’s ear, the best thing you could hope for was to distract folks with a good pair of earrings. Luckily, thanks to Pappy, she had those. She held them up to her ears and sighed again. They didn’t really go with her suede gaucho pants and fringed jacket. She heard someone coming up the path to the Creakside Inn and looked out the window to the walkway below. It was Pappy, dressed as a sheriff with a tin badge, cattleman’s coat, holster at his hip, and a broad-brimmed hat. Pappy had trimmed his beard but kept his mustache, which was now waxed into an arching handlebar. Bertha hurriedly tucked her earrings into a pocket and went down the rickety steps.

  “I don’t have a lot of time,” she said, meeting Pappy at the door. “Cleo runs a tight ship.”

  “Oh, don’t I know it,” he said, lumbering up the stairs to the porch. “But I thought you might have time for this . . .”

  He produced two root beers from inside his jacket. “I stole ’em from Wally’s coolers in the creek.”

  “Is that any way for a lawman to act?” Bertha admonished, but she took the root beer as she sat down on the porch swing.

  Pappy sat down next to her, casually throwing his arm over the back of the swing, inches away from having it around her shoulder. Bertha stiffened for a moment, but relaxed into the back of the swing as she drank the cold root beer.

  “Crazy that this is all almost at an end,” Pappy said.

  “It is,” Old Bertha said.

  “Gonna be quiet when you all head out.”

  “You don’t have to stay here, you know. It doesn’t matter where you are, whatever you’re hiding from, it’s going to come up one day, like that snake—Big John—and bite you.”

  Pappy drained his can of soda pop and crushed the can in his fist. He stood up and headed down the steps. He turned and looked at her.

  “You don’t know the first thing about snakes,” he said.

  Old Bertha put her fingertips to her lower eyelids.

  CHAPTER 41

  Polly stood in the middle of her store, critically eyeing the outlaws that were in full costume in front of her. Four men in hats, worthy of the Country Music Awards, took every inch of space in the tiny shop. But Polly had no complaints—they were all gorgeous. Rodney and Rock had chosen the most conservative costumes and most elaborate hats. Every detail, jeans strapped into buckskin chaps, the leather vests over bare chests, the sequined bandanas knotted at their necks, all worked perfectly with their copper-colored skin.

  Titan had opted for the chaps/thong combo and matching hat.

  “Could you add a few more feathers to the hatband?” Titan asked. “I saw a show where one of the cowboys had feathers going all the way from his hat to past his tailbone.”

  “You’d never get to sit down,” Rock said.

  “I’ll suffer to be beautiful,” Titan said.

  Polly tried hard not to stare at Wally. While smaller than the other three half-naked men in her store, Wally could hold his own. Taut, wiry, ripped, Wally’s body was a revelation. It was the kind of body she used to read about in those steamy text-romances by Mimi Millicent, before she dropped off the planet. While Polly was very happy with her choice in Rodney, the most stable of the young men in Fat Chance, there was no denying the chemistry she and Wally shared. She had a history of getting involved with anyone who interested her, and hoped the time in Fat Chance would help her curb that instinct. The impromptu haircut months ago in the middle of the street certainly got her attention—and she thought about it more than she should. But she knew herself. If she wanted to make things work with Rodney, she’d probably have to let her hair grow for the rest of her life!

  CHAPTER 42

  Pappy was muttering about Old Bertha as he headed toward the other end of town. He saw smoke coming out of the smithy. Looking at his watch, he knew that Titan was going to be needed for the parade rehearsal in less than an hour, so what was he doing working in the forge? Pappy had never met Titan’s friend, but from the sound of things, Maurice would never forgive Titan if he scorched one of his costumes.

  It took a minute for Pappy’s eyes to adjust to the low light in the forge. Titan’s hat was laid neatly at the entrance. He had his glittering bandana tied around his forehead like a sweatband. He’d pulled a long coat with the arms cut off over his thong and chaps. Pappy wasn’t sure if it was for modesty or protection from the embers. Fancy, on her perch, peered at Pappy with her one eye. Pappy took a step back—Fancy at eye-level was an intimidating sight.

  Titan, drenched in sweat and pounding on the anvil, looked up.

  “What’re you doing, Titan?” Pappy said. “Cleo will skin you alive if you run out on the dress rehearsal.”

  “Oh, I’ll be there. I’ve just been working on this cage and I’m afraid I won’t get it done in time.”

  “What cage?” Pappy asked. “In time for what?”

  “A cage for Fancy.” Titan wiped sweat from his brow. “I have to take her with me when we leave Fat Chance.”

  Titan lifted the hammer to strike the hot metal on the anvil, but Pappy stopped him mid-blow.

  Titan looked at him in surprise. “What?”

  “Titan, you can’t . . .” Pappy faltered, looking at Fancy, who cocked her head at him. “You can’t take Fancy out of Fat Chance.”

  “Why not?”

  “She belongs here,” Pappy said.

  “You mean, she’s yours?” Titan said, confused.

  “No no,” Pappy said. “She’s yours. There’s no denying, Fancy is your buzzard. You two are a team.”

  “Then why can’t I take her?”

  “Because, son,” Pappy said, putting his hand on Titan’s arm, “she won’t make it out there. She’ll die.”

  Titan put the hammer down and stared at the ground.

  “You know I’m talkin’ true, Titan,” Pappy said gently.

  Titan continued to look at the ground, but he nodded his head in acknowledgment.

  Pappy patted the big man’s shoulder. “I’ll leave you alone for a few minutes. Then you pull yourself together and come on out for the parade, you hear?”

  “Yes, sir,” Titan said softly.

  Pappy turned from the doorway. Titan hadn’t moved.

  “I’m proud of you, Ray,” Pappy said. “You grew
up to be a fine man.”

  “Thank you, Pappy,” Titan whispered.

  By the time Titan looked up, Pappy was gone. Titan put his fingertips to his lower eyelids, but it did no good. The tears came hot and fast.

  CHAPTER 43

  After endless rehearsals, Fandango-Up in Fat Chance was ready to roll.

  The sky was perfect—a brilliant blue with clouds that looked as if they’d been blown in by a benevolent god who’d attended art school. The town itself was swept and polished. Powderkeg had completed the Herculean task of making stands for all the handmade inventory the people of Fat Chance had worked so hard to create.

  The twins, on their ATVs, were parked at Dymphna’s farm so they could see all of Main Street. The ATVs had gone through a renovation. Instead of sitting on seats, Polly and Wally would now stand on pegs behind the drivers, making a more theatrical presentation as they rode into town, whooping their signal that an attack was imminent. Titan stood beside them, the feathers attached to the back of his hat flowing almost to his waist. Titan insisted that Fancy be part of the festivities, so Polly had added beading to his leather wristband. It coordinated with the rest of Titan’s costume. Polly only beaded around the edges, so Fancy wouldn’t have to deal with a lumpy perch as she tried to stay on Titan’s wrist while he attacked Fat Chance on cue. Polly thought the bird was looking longingly at the forge with her one good eye. Since Titan was on foot, he was going to get a head start on the ATVs before the raid.

  While Powderkeg had done what he could to camouflage the attackers, if anyone in the audience were to look up to the farm, it was pretty obvious that something was going on. Their Vegas costumes shot off sparks in the sun.

  If the guys looked like something out of a romantic rendition of early frontier history, Polly could have stepped out of a men’s magazine’s salute to a New Age Annie Oakley. She wore a buckskin dress, slashed to her thigh. The dress laced up the front and sides, giving her more cleavage than she sported in real life.

  In town, Dymphna was busy trying to keep her goats calm. The goats had not remained orderly during the parade rehearsals. Powderkeg floated the idea that instead of containing the Angoras, why not let the goats run through the streets—a Texas version of the running of the bulls in Pamplona. Pappy had nixed that. He said Texans would laugh them out of town.

  “It’s our town,” Powderkeg argued.

  “Doesn’t matter in Texas,” Rock said.

  It was decided Dymphna would lead Catterlee on a leash in the parade. The rest of the goats would just be available for petting. They appeared to have had an informal goat meeting and agreed that they would cooperate with this plan, since Dymphna had had no trouble with them for the last few days.

  Even dressed as a saloon girl, Cleo’s steely determination showed through. She pulled an antique stopwatch out of the pocket of her ruffled skirt and frowned at it, then snapped it shut.

  “Elwood is ten minutes late,” she said. “The parade is already too small; we can’t start without him.”

  “What difference does it make?” Powderkeg asked, sitting on the stoop in front of the bank. “Nobody’s here.”

  “They’ll be here,” Old Bertha said. “Dodge said he was still hearing from people yesterday.”

  “I need a drink,” Pappy said as he straightened Jerry Lee’s hat.

  “It’s ten o’clock in the morning,” Old Bertha said to Pappy.

  “I’ll see what’s holding up the professor,” Dymphna said, closing the pen’s gate behind her.

  Maybe a few minutes without human intervention would calm the goats. Who knew what might calm Cleo.

  Dymphna walked into the Boozehound. She patted Thud, who was sitting just inside the doorway. Professor Johnson was sitting at one of the glass display cases Powderkeg had made for some of his historical pieces, staring at a ledger, so deep in concentration he didn’t hear Dymphna come in.

  “Professor,” she said. “Your aunt is waiting for you. I’m not sure if she’s more upset that you’re not on time or that nobody has arrived yet, but—”

  “Come look at this,” he said urgently.

  Dymphna came over and looked at the book on the counter. The writing was old and faded. “What am I looking at?”

  The professor stabbed at a passage in the middle of the page. “This. I found out what happened to Fat Chance between 1950 and when Cutthroat bought the town.”

  Dymphna read quickly. Her throat felt like someone was cutting off her air. She hadn’t realized how closely she was standing to the professor, but when she looked up, she was staring into his troubled eyes. “I’m not sure I understand exactly what this means.”

  “Neither do I,” Professor Johnson said. “But it doesn’t look good.”

  A rap on the window made them both jump. It was Old Bertha, waving them outside. Dymphna took a deep breath. She was aware of a motor, first as a faint hum, now getting louder and louder. She knew it couldn’t be a car, because none could navigate the trail, so it must be a group of ATVs coming on the off-road trails from Spoonerville. As she and Professor Johnson came outside, they saw Old Bertha, Pappy and Jerry Lee, Powderkeg and Cleo, standing at the edge of the boardwalk in front of the café, watching a single ATV making its way toward them. Dymphna reached for Professor Johnson’s hand. He took it.

  They stood just inside the doorway, watching as Dodge drove through town, kicking up dust behind him. Pappy stepped forward as Dodge fishtailed in front of them, causing even more dirt to fly.

  “Oh, great,” Cleo said to Powderkeg. “It will take twenty minutes for that dust to settle.”

  “What’s happening, Dodge?” Pappy said.

  “Not much, by the look of things,” Dodge said, looking around.

  “Where are . . .” Cleo’s voice sounded strained. She took a deep breath, put on her calm Beverly Hills Voice and began again. She beamed a charming smile. “Where are the multitudes?”

  “Oh! You mean all those people who are supposed to show up for your pathetic little shindig?” Dodge asked casually. “They aren’t coming. Nobody is coming.”

  Dymphna took a step out the door, but Professor Johnson pulled her back. He put his fingers to his lips. Thud stood up. He was headed out the door, but Dymphna grabbed his collar and he sat at her feet.

  “What . . . what do you mean they aren’t coming?” Old Bertha asked. “You said everything was right on schedule.”

  “Everything is right on schedule,” Dodge said. “Right on schedule for me.”

  “Let’s cut the crap,” Powderkeg said. “What’s going on?”

  “Let’s just say, it seemed like it was in my best interest not to help y’all out,” Dodge said.

  Old Bertha lost her balance as the weight of Dodge’s words hit her. She, better than anyone else, knew that they were now heavily indebted to this man, who had obviously set a trap for them. How could she not have seen it? This was the first time she’d let a man dupe her since Cutthroat Clarence all those years ago.

  Pappy caught her before she hit the boardwalk. He helped her sit on the edge of the boardwalk, then they both returned their full attention to Dodge.

  “I don’t understand,” Cleo said.

  “You don’t have to,” Dodge said. “I was going to just call you and let you know, but I couldn’t be sure one of you fools would be standing in the middle of the street looking for reception. Besides, I kind of wanted to see your reaction for myself. It’s been a long time coming.”

  “What has?” Cleo asked. She looked at Powderkeg and Pappy, hoping that neither had listened to her and had brought their guns after all, but it was clear there was no weapon on Main Street other than the Colt holstered on Dodge’s hip.

  “Retribution, Ms. Johnson,” Dodge said.

  “Ms. Johnson-Primb,” she corrected, although she realized this was a stupid time to be standing on ceremony.

  “Retribution for what?” Powderkeg asked. “What did any of us ever do to you?”

  “Any of yo
u?” Dodge laughed. “What could any of you do to me? Although I should thank you. Without your half-assed attempt at rehabbing this godforsaken town, I might not have gotten my bowling team back together. So thanks for that.”

  “Let’s back up,” Pappy said. “Come on, Dodge. You and I go way back and we’ve had our disagreements. What’s the point of all this?”

  “I don’t think you’re in any position to ask questions, Pappy.” Dodge gloated. “And I’m just not in the mindset to answer just now.”

  “You don’t have to,” Professor Johnson said, coming out of the Boozehound. “I have the answers.”

  Everyone turned to the professor, who signaled Dymphna to stay put. As Thud prepared to follow Professor Johnson, Dymphna grabbed his collar to keep him with her. She wasn’t sure if it was for his safety or her own reassurance, but she wasn’t about to let the dog go.

  “Do you, now?” Dodge asked. “Well, go on. Tell us what you think you know.”

  “I know the Durham family . . . your family . . . worked this land, starting around 1900. I’ll forgo the history lesson, but farming—especially tenant farming—was a tough road.”

  “Tenant farming is nothing to be ashamed of,” Dodge said hotly.

  “Then why are you ashamed of it?” Professor Johnson asked.

  Dodge sat up taller in his seat. Dymphna felt a growl start low in Thud’s chest, but she soothed him. Professor Johnson seemed to have a handle on things. She hoped she was right. Brilliant judgment calls—on any of their parts—were not the order of the day.

  “Go on,” Dodge said, settling back.

  “Those were the big days of the American Dream. If Cutthroat had been a little older, he would have had a field day out here! Anyway, when hard times hit, when the twister of 1908 came through, the town was destroyed. But your grandfather saw an opportunity to buy the land cheap. It was a gamble, but he made it. He prospered. Built up the town and had his own tenant farmers.”