by Diane Munier
“It was. Not on the up. Not—legal.”
“Okay,” she said.
“Your father, his own kind of Moses. Do what I say… but not what I do.”
“My father. I was supposed to go to church with him this Sunday. I didn’t even leave a note!”
Jules had leaned forward, and now he sat back with a sigh. “He’ll get over it.”
“He won’t know where I am.”
“Good,” Jules said, and he meant it.
“All of you arrested? You too, Jerry?”
Jerry looked back at her. “Yeah.”
“Did you fight too?” Then a quick look at Jules like he was corrupting the baby.
“He’s a big boy,” Jules said. “And no, he didn’t fight.” But cub was already defending himself. Heaven forbid he should share Jules’s little section of sinner’s hell.
They got through that conversation without calling Blaise a crook, but it took a while, as each of the girls had questions and opinions—oh God, the opinions. That was the trouble with dating girls who liked to read and think and shit. They had so much to say about everything.
He had a theory. There were three kinds of men. One was a guy with a body and a dick. That was a whole man. Two was a dick with no body. That was Isbe’s father. His own as well. Just dicks with no humanity. Third was a body with no dick. That was what she was trying to turn him into right now.
He’d seen that happen to married guys or guys with some girlfriend who wasn’t ever gonna be happy. So when a guy gave up his dick, it was never gonna work cause later, she’d want the dick, and guess what, he already gave it to her, every time he said, “Yes dear, I’m a no-good piss-drinker.” Every time, and pretty soon, no pecker left. Not an inch. Then guess what, she hated his guts because he couldn’t put it to her.
Now go figure dat.
He loved this girl like sunshine. But she wasn’t getting his dick without his body. She wasn’t getting his body without his dick. She had a hell of a lot to learn about him.
Chapter 32
A lack of sleep took its toll. Yes, there were four drivers, but they’d had the fight, exhausting in itself, then spent the night in jail. None of the four of them had slept but Baboon.
They were used to it, pushing through, but not with a warm girl on the side. Jules knew he’d become one lazy bastard. She ever gave in, they were going to make love straight for a year.
So Jerry, bird-dogging on his truck anyway, ended up driving deep into the night, all the way to Hot Springs. He only awoke Jules when he wasn’t sure about the way. They may have passed Seth in the darkness; there was no way of knowing. But they hoped to be ready and waiting when he reached town.
Jules shifted, sitting up straight. Even still, it was comforting knowing she was near. He was hurting, but that would pass. The loneliness he felt when she wasn’t around wouldn’t.
It was the oddest thing. Before he met her, he was fine. Pretty much a lost cause, but fine. Now that he’d met her, he was lonely when she wasn’t there.
He saw her open her eyes. For a split second, she was asking herself where the hell she was, and that made him grin. She was quick to smile in return. Whatever that thing she’d felt between them had been, it was gone now, in the soft light of morning, in this different world, Arkansas. He poked Isbe to motion she should look at Baboon and Dorie. Baboon was sprawled out, head in the corner, but Dorie had slept on top of him, on his lap. “That ape ain’t gonna be able to move,” Jules laughed.
“I learned something,” Isbe whispered to Jules.
“What’s dat?” he said, miserable in the corner, the door handle having been in his back for hours and him just now realizing.
“It’s better if I stay.”
He didn’t know what in the hell she was talking about.
“If I don’t run away and stay. I don’t even have to talk; just staying near you…I get over it.”
“Well good,” he said, smiling at her. Cramped as he’d been, holding her had provided much consolation. “Get over what?”
“It’s like…I’m mad…and I don’t know why. I just love you like crazy, and it gets me mad. I think I’m scared. I don’t know,” she said.
“Nothin’ to be scared of. You got me,” he said, his arms tightening in case she was in doubt. “I make you mad?”
She lifted her head and looked at him. “You make me happy. So darn happy.”
He kissed her then, a long, soft kiss. Glad to know his girl was alive and kicking in there. Another place, waking up to her in a real bed, he could give it a go then, take her slow, love her up and down, in and out. But here—Blake’s eyes flicking to that mirror. Dorie’s feet practically in Isbe’s lap. Gorilla snoring as his head bobbed against the window, Blondie’s head on his shoulder—he didn’t think so.
An hour later they pulled up to this big hotel, the Park Hotel, the tall brass doors just catching the morning sun. Real swanky looking place. Hot Springs, hot damn. And they were loaded. They didn’t see Jerry’s truck anywhere around here, but Jules had told Orangutan to pull in here, and he and Bobby went into the lobby and paid for three rooms. Him and Baboon in one, Audie and Orangutan in the other. He got the girls a nice suite for themselves.
Back outside, a bellhop, even at this insane hour, was loading their bags onto a cart. Jules took his bag. The money was in the bottom. Each guy carried his own shit. Jerry didn’t have so much as a toothbrush.
The girls were quiet all the way to the third floor. They each went to their room, but soon as they did, Baboon and Jules were back in the hall going to the girls’ room. Their door was still open as the guy emptied their cart and Jules tipped him. Baboon grabbed Dorie and took her to the single bed in its own cubbyhole. She squealed a little, and they settled down right there like they were going to stay tangled up for a million years.
“He’s not staying in here!” sleepy (and bitchy) Francis declared, falling to the bed and kicking off her high heels.
“Quiet!” Dorie yelled, not opening her eyes, not moving a toe, twined up with Baboon and looking ready to hibernate. Little Bird was getting bitchy herself, and the big bitch flopped back on the bed, arms spread, moaned over how soft the mattress was, and didn’t fight back.
Jules grabbed Isbe’s hand. She reached for her bag as she passed the pile, and she followed him as he swiftly pulled her down the hall.
He pulled her into the room he shared with Bobby and closed the door. He took her case, threw it on a chair, and toed off his shoes, and she did the same. He tore off his shirt and undid his belt, pulled it out of his pants. She stood there while he peeled off his socks and tossed them; then he tore into that bed, ripped back the covers—oh man, some sleep.
“Get in here,” he told her, but she ran into the bathroom, and he waited for her to get in, but he already had his eyes closed. When he felt the bed move lightly, he’d already been out. He got up quick then, saw she’d changed her clothes. He used the john, then came out and she was on her side in her nightgown, her back toward him, that behind of hers like “come and get me,” but yeah not quite.
He took off his pants and even laid them over a chair. He went to the door, flipped the “Do Not Disturb” sign outside, closed it, locked Baboon out, and got back in bed beside her quick as he could.
Oh, God—he pulled her into his arms, thank God, at last; he took his hand and smoothed her belly, and she complied and moved against him. He spooned her like that, his eyes about rolling back into his head with satisfaction. He was tired as a chimp could get, but not so tired.
His hand moved up to her breasts, and there they were, just waiting in a nice soft stack, and he moved his hand over them with just enough pressure she would know how much he wanted her. Oh God, how he wanted her. He breathed out, and she breathed in. “You afraid of this?” he said in her ear.
“No,” she said softly.
“Afraid of me?”
“No,” she said.
“Don’t ever be,” he said raggedly
, but he had to admit, he could say about anything right now.
“I knew I couldn’t resist you,” she said.
“You mad?”
“Not anymore.”
He moved his hand to the center then, between her smooth white thighs. He cupped her there, and he felt it, a sense of claiming her. This was it. This was home.
“Oh Isbe,” he said in her ear.
“Jules,” she sighed.
Such relief. For them both.
“You want to save yourself for your husband?”
“Yeah, Jules. I…do.”
“You have.”
She turned in his arms, and his hand moved over her rump. He was stroking her there.
“Jules…”
“Yeah, I mean it. I ain’t askin’…not yet…but…prepare yourself.”
The easy thing would be to kiss her, right now, before she had a chance to think. But he didn’t. He told her to roll over, and he moved them back the way they’d been. He sighed then, happy as a clam, big smile on his lips.
He went to sleep holding her.
Chapter 33
It was a broken sleep. Frequently they would wake up touching and kissing. He’d been so alone. To share a bed with her…he wanted this, sacred and undefiled. This bed they’d make…and love…and home…and babies…and life…and death…him in her arms…her in his…he was ready to sign, meet the terms. He was ready to march.
She stood up and undressed for him, down to her underwear, keeping the Holy Grail covered. They hadn’t pulled the drapes, and there was enough of a moon, he could see her exquisitely like that, washed in the blue light of a southern night, the way she was meant to be seen, like a dream, like the thing he’d been missing, all his life, this other side of himself axed off in some pre-human existence when they were both ideas or fireflies riding one another’s wings, floating around in some outer-space silence, wisps of themselves waiting to be born, waiting to be found…in the flesh… by the other.
He looked at her, the sound of his breathing denoting his eager discovery. Life had surprised him, so many times, but nothing, nothing compared to the pleasure, the purity of Isbe Blaise like this.
He waited until she was ready to climb back in beside him.
She had curve and flair and skin like cream and butter. He knew all this, but here they were in this fancy room, fancier than either of them had back home, especially him. Well, he had no home, just here and there, this and that, but he found himself…with her. And he knew what to do, who to protect, worship, and serve. He was a soldier again, with a new cause, something more intimate than a country. His woman. His wife. He wanted to be tied, bound in every way.
He knew what she needed. Him. She wanted him. Her trust—he grew huge inside.
“You know how much I love you?” he said, and he wasn’t shy or ashamed.
“I…” She didn’t know. She swallowed then, her own need, the brash hopelessness she’d felt when he made her wait for it. The denial she had tolerated. He’d made her crazy. Love did. She had no guard against him; he saw that. He was so far in, all the way inside, in her heart; he saw that. When he took her body, it would be the seal on the deal they’d already made…back in space, back in time. He was already in there.
“That night we spent…in your room…your bed. On the way home, I knew. But I knew before. That night I saw you…that first night.”
“Love at first sight…Jules?” she whispered. This was all in whispers, lovers’ talk, the words sliding in, wet with their desire, everything a penetration…the knowing…the speaking…the breathing…everything a penetration.
“Yeah.” Enough talking. But some things had to be said. “I love you” had to be said. He understood that.
She pulled him to her, and she kissed him with love and relief. He wanted her to know it would be all right. He wouldn’t hold back anymore, starting with his chest against her breast, his arm around her. He had weight and strength, solid muscle, and he wanted her to feel it. He was real, and he took up space, and he was here, and he was hers. He was surrendering.
“We’re getting married tomorrow,” he told her. He’d told her to be ready.
He was giving it to her, the hard pump of his heart. She didn’t speak, as he heard the answering flutter of her own, her breathing shallow, her mouth open. She was receiving, she was taking—and he was waiting.
Chapter 34
That morning, he was aware of the light, soft and sharp at the same time. A light he’d seen before—at a school picnic. He was young, he’d been beaten right before—his father, just that morning.
He walked in a line, two by two, pants to his knees, last day of school, as the teacher led them in a parade through the grounds so they could see the picnic as it was set up, as it came to life. Hole in his shoe, gravel burning through; he didn’t care. He was watching. He was listening.
The most glorious sight: orange drink, so deeply hued, from the rainbow, or the liquid off the pot of gold, being poured into a washtub, and the light warming that deep color, setting it off more orange—pure orange. And the woman who poured, the mother, when he’d dragged his black eyes upward and saw her, the light behind her head. He could just make out her smile.
He could never figure it out, the joy that gave him, the memory even now. And the joy over that bubble and splash, the excitement of that world of games and laughter…and families that would come…
Not him…not his…that’s what the beating was for…for asking…
But he felt her then—his mother, and he knew that the glimpse of that orange splash, he knew it was enough…promise and hope. His mother had died…but not love. He only had to find it. Find love.
It was weird, didn’t make sense, but he thought on that drink so many times, that drink he would never taste…only want…and he wasn’t sorry for himself… no…it had made him hope.
And that time in Belgium, sun coming up over that field, the hay shattered…and scattered…but other places…where the bombs hadn’t hit…parted into golden windrows, like a mother parts her child’s hair…and he walked there, the clean and cared for among the angry dark holes…and it didn’t surprise him…cause he knew about the mix…already knew that life gave you both…terrors and smiles.
And the light as he beheld Isbe lying on his arm, her mouth open just a little, and her lips so red and sweet, and her lashes full on her cheeks, and the freckles like a constellation against the pale beauty of her face. And the light in this room…alive on their skin, like grace, there…but not…if you didn’t look…if you didn’t want to see something more.
And he wondered then, about his mother…about hers…and if they’d had a say…in the light, the right-now light…that felt like a blessing. Had they?
He wondered.
And later, Isbe had brought the blue dress, her special dress, folded and creased. He would buy her another…and another…a lifetime, a clothesline of dresses…
But they both knew the blue dress needed to witness their I dos. I ams. I wills. Just like the clover had stayed through the fight—then had fallen to pieces—the clover he’d thrown on the floor in his old room and ground under his boot. He’d had something better in mind, and his next piece of jewelry would last, just like the promise behind it. He didn’t believe in luck.
But he did believe in this light, a blue dress…this girl. He did believe in what they were about to do and the promises they’d make. He believed they would create something new and good. He had a lot to make up for—the sins of the fathers, sins of his own. With Isbe…he would.
“Watch me,” he whispered to himself…to Isbe. To the mothers and their orange drink and neat rows of parted hair. To the fathers, the black holes riveting all the calm. Those were his vows…made in the light…before God…and the witnesses. Watch me.
“We’re getting married; get up, get the heck up,” he’d said to Audie, but it wasn’t Audie alone in the double bed now; it was Audie and Francis. Jerry wasn’t there—gone to look for
his truck? And Bobby slept in the girls’ room, with Dorie—apparently. “Oh!” Jules shouted, turning away from Francis’s eyes opening in confusion, her hair tousled on the pillow, her shoulders naked above the covers. “Excuse me.”
He made it to the hall, quick, went one way then another. He hoped he hadn’t embarrassed Francis. Wait a minute…
Audie was coming out, undershirt, pants being zipped. “What the hell, Jules—you don’t knock?” Audie said.
“I—” He started to laugh. “I’m getting married.”
A pause, a stare, a gaping mouth and then the boom: “To who?”
“Who you think, duffer?”
“Isbe?”
Jules refused to answer that, but the smile lighting his friend’s face—Jules couldn’t stay mad.
“This how you’re gonna do it? Ram it up Clark’s ass?”
“What?” Here he’d been ready to hug this ape.
“Oh shit,” Audie said, laughing. “Oh shit, brother. You know, you damn chimpanzee. You know what this will do.”
“Don’t even…don’t say dat. Isbe hears…don’t you even say it.”
“You tell her? About the ear? We threw her old man’s ear out the window, brother. You think she might—have a problem? I mean—around Christmas time, old Clark Blaise at the fireplace reading the story—and that damn ear like a raisin there, and your little tyke—Daddy, what happened to Paw-Paw’s ear?”
He went into hysterics then. That gleeful, evil laugh of Gorilla’s that made you want to…
Jules hit him hard on the arm.
“Oh, you—” Audie said, grabbing the spot. It hurt, and Jules meant it to.
“Shut your mouth,” he said. “Least I’ll make her an honest woman.”
Bingo. Gorilla’s smile got wiped away like Grandma took Bon Ami to it.
“Honest woman? You’ll be pulling her into your damn crooked life, you mean.” When Audie was mean, it was like a baby spouting off—no limits. Problem was, he had a man’s worth of bastard behind it and Francis was in his bed, his corruption, probably swimming around in there about now. “That’s right. Don’t act surprised. I may not be marrying Francis right out of the gate, but I don’t pass myself off as ‘hero.’” He mimicked a lovesick girl on that word. “If I ever get ready, Francis will know the deal.”