Thieves I've Known

by Tom Kealey

  “Okay,” I said.

  She kissed me then. She turned her head to the side and ran her fingers at the back of my scalp. “Close your eyes, dummy,” she said.

  So I closed my eyes, and she kissed me some more. She pinched one of my ears with a fingernail and pushed my head back against the chair. I could feel her weight against my knees. I listened to the music and felt her sway with and, it seemed to me, within it. She pulled my lip with her teeth, and her kiss was warm and it made me warm. I leaned forward in the chair. We were done before I wanted us to be. She sat back and took up Albert’s hair again.

  “Don’t say anything,” she said.

  “Okay.”

  “Some day you’ll figure what to say after, but it’s got to be the right thing. If you don’t know, then keep quiet. Got it?”

  I closed my eyes. “This is complicated.”

  “No it’s not,” she said. “Can I ask you something?”

  “Sure.”

  “Did you see that picture in my room?”

  I opened my eyes again. “I think you put it out there for me to see.”

  She nodded. “Well bully for you. I did. I was scared of you coming here tonight.”

  “Why?”

  “That’s my brother in the picture. He and I were close once. That’s a picture I had that’d fit the frame.”

  “He’s older than that now,” I said.

  “He died when he was eighteen,” she said. “He was working a ferry in the Pamlico. He tried to jump from the dock in a storm. He hit his head and went straight down. I miss him a lot. He and I were as close as you and Albert.”

  I didn’t say anything to that.

  “You remind me of him,” she said.

  “I do?”

  “Well, I suppose if you had three eyes you’d still remind me of him.”

  “What do you mean?”

  She didn’t say anything.

  I thought about something. I thought it through twice before I said it.

  “Did you teach him how to kiss?”

  “My brother?” she said.

  “Yes.”

  She laughed a little at that. She didn’t take her eyes from the stitching. “No,” she said. “But I guess you won’t believe me.”

  “I believe you,” I said.

  “You want to know his name?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  She studied me for a moment. I couldn’t read her face in the candlelight. She set the hair aside. Then she leaned over to my ear and whispered his name.

  We went out back, the three of us. A big stretch of clouds had moved in, and the stars were all gone. There was lightning in the distance, and the clouds would flash up every minute or so, dull and sudden. A warm breeze from the north pushed across the lake. We took Albert down to the water’s edge. He was wide-awake now, though he was yawning. He couldn’t seem to stop. His eyes were all wet, and it was like I couldn’t recognize him with all that hair gone. He looked like something young had come over him. There were frogs making all kinds of sounds—low then high—along the shore. “Peepers,” Merrill said to us, nodding out into the dark. We got Albert down there, then we pushed his chair a ways into the water. Not too far. It sent a couple ducks flying out from the reeds, honking and complaining. We watched them skim across the water and then disappear into a mist in the center of the lake.

  We got Albert a beer and a donut. “This water’s cold,” he said. But it wasn’t all that cold. Me and Merrill stripped down to our underwear, and we waded out into the water, the scum and rocks against our feet.

  “There’s brambles in here,” she said. “Watch where you go.”

  I went under and I couldn’t see anything, but as I settled I could hear the blood in my head, bouncing through the water it seemed. I was warm down there. I came up and wiped my eyes. I let my sight adjust. I looked back toward Albert. I was about twenty yards out into the water, and he pointed over and past me with his beer.

  “What’s that out there?” he said.

  I turned where he was looking, and I saw the school bus. I waited for the next flash of lightning.

  “That’s been there for years,” said Merrill.

  “How’d it get there?”

  “Somebody was very drunk, I suppose.”

  When the lightning came I could see that all the windows were smashed out. Cattails were growing all around it, and it rested low against the bank. Somebody had popped the tires a long time ago.

  “How come no one’s pulled it out?” I said.

  “It’s junk,” said Merrill. “I know what you’re thinking. There’s no kids in there.”

  “How do you know?”

  “You’re spooking again,” said Albert.

  And I was. I didn’t like that bus in there. There were all sorts of things floating around my legs. I’d swallowed some water.

  “I want to get out there with you,” said Albert.

  I looked at him. “Out in the water?”

  “Hell yeah, out in the water. I never get to do anything fun.”

  He dropped his bottle in the water and took off his shirt again. We swam up to him. I got him under an arm and Merrill got him under the other arm, and we eased him out of the chair and turned him. He settled back with us, and he tensed a bit as he went into the water. His face was pointing up at the clouds. The darkness of the water was bobbing at his neck. “That’s good,” he said. I had my arm across his chest, my ribs at his back. Merrill took him from the other side.

  “Don’t let go now,” said Albert.

  “No,” we said.

  “I’ll drop for sure.”

  “We won’t,” we said.

  “Then go out some.”

  We pushed past the reeds, and out a little ways from shore, out where the water was colder. We moved away from the bus, and I was glad of that. And then I got to thinking about Merrill’s brother and how he’d drowned. We went out a ways more, till I couldn’t feel the mud at my feet. We paddled out farther. I looked over at her.

  “You all right with this?” I said. I couldn’t see much of her face in the dark. Our chins were dipping under, and we could hear thunder off in the distance.

  “She’s all right,” said Albert.

  “I can take the weight,” said Merrill.

  We went out toward the mist, and the water became very cold. I set my hip against Albert to keep him up. It took me and Merrill awhile to keep our legs from tangling, but we got the trick of it.

  The air smelled flat and green, and we could hear the night bugs and the peepers chirping all along the shore. I looked out toward the mist. It was not much farther out now. I thought we might could make it there and then turn back. I was feeling all right. I felt like I could take my brother across the ocean if it needed doing. And I was glad to have Merrill there with us. It seemed to me like we were the only three people left in the world. Like all but near us was empty space. I looked at the two of them in the flash of lightning.

  “Daniel,” said Albert. He had his eyes closed. He was just a face and two shoulders in the water. “Do you remember a scarecrow?”

  I kicked under the water. “No.”

  “Ma’s,” he said.

  “No.”

  “I told you about it though.”

  “No,” I said. “I don’t know anything about that.”

  There was another flash of lightning, close, I thought, and I said so. We listened to the thunder after.

  “It ain’t that close,” said Albert. Then he looked over at Merrill. “Did I tell you?”

  “What?”

  “The scarecrow.”

  “I don’t think so,” she said.

  “I’m drunk,” he said. “It was somebody close to me, but I can’t remember now.”

  “Who?” I said.

  “The person I told.”

  “Well tell us.”

  “There’s nothing to tell,” he said.

  “We’re going to dunk you under.”

  He laughed
at that, clutched onto my arm. “Don’t.”

  “Tell it,” I said. “Then we’ll turn around.”

  We were into the mist now, and the air was warmer, though I could hear a breeze moving up along the shore and through the fields. I took a tighter grip across my brother’s chest.

  “It had a face of corn,” he said. “She had this box for a head. The scarecrow I mean. It was just a couple sticks and some old clothes, and the box for a head, and Ma spent all night at the table, gluing this corn to the box. She made the eyes and a mouth. I don’t know. She just put the corn all over the head. Different shades of corn. She stayed up like she would. No sleep. Just gluing this face on the box. A kernel at a time.”

  “Why’d she do that?” said Merrill.

  “Cause she’s crazier than hell,” said Albert.

  I laughed. “She’s crazier than all get out.”

  But Albert wasn’t laughing. “You know what happened.”

  “What happened?” I said.

  He reached up and swatted at the mist. “I can’t see the sky through all this,” he said. “We could be under the water for all I knew. The birds came and ate all the corn off. It was gone by the afternoon. There was so many of them, they ripped the box right off the sticks. You could see them out there fighting over the head.”

  I thought it might be good to turn back now. I started to turn us, but they wouldn’t come.

  “My mom had a garden just like that,” said Merrill.

  “We’re not talking about your mom,” said Albert.

  “What are we talking about then?”

  “I didn’t say anything about any fucking garden. Why don’t you listen?”

  “You’re drunk,” I said.

  “So?”

  “So, you’re being rude.”

  “I’m trying to tell a fucking story, but I’ve lost it now.”

  “Sorry,” said Merrill.

  “Drop me if you want,” he said.

  “No one said anything about dropping you,” she said.

  “I can get drunk if I want. I’ve been through enough.”

  “Nobody said you haven’t,” she said.

  “I haven’t been through shit,” he said.

  He laughed, and I had this feeling he was going to try to slip from us then. I thought about how crazy a drowning person can get.

  “Let’s go back,” I said.

  “You hear that wind?” he said.

  We listened, and it was thunder we heard, from the west, not the north. When it faded I listened to the trees, and sure enough there was a wind coming down on us. I could feel my legs starting to cramp up.

  “Why’d y’all bring me out in the water?” said Albert. “It’s lightning out.”

  I looked around, and the mist was spinning in every direction with the wind. I held tight to Albert, and I turned us around. I pulled hard. We could see the rain off in the distance. A gray it seemed against the blue.

  “Y’all are stupid,” said Albert.

  “You’re stupid,” Merrill said.

  “What was in your garden?”

  “There wasn’t anything in there,” she said.

  “Did y’all have corn?” he said. “Snap at me,” she said.

  The shore seemed like a long ways off. I was thinking of pulling Merrill’s hand away. I thought I’d take hold of my brother and make some time.

  “Man, did y’all have corn or not?” he said.

  “Yes,” said Merrill.

  “What kind?”

  “Why you asking?”

  “It’s important to me,” he said.

  “Well, I don’t remember.”

  He settled back then. He’d been all tight. There was a lightning flash, and I could see that school bus then. I was glad to see it now. I made for that end of shore.

  “It don’t matter I guess,” he said. He closed his eyes and set his head back in the water. “Can y’all hear that wind?”

  We said we could. We could hardly hear anything else by then.

  “I once had a friend blown right off the road.”

  “By the wind?” said Merrill.

  “No,” he said.

  I drove on the way back. It was just the two of us. I wasn’t going to let him behind the wheel. We had no top for the jeep. The rain was coming down not straight but sideways with the wind, and I was soaking wet and had to wipe the water from my eyes. We listened to it fall, slap against the pavement, and tin-tap against the jeep. The wiper I’d busted on the passenger side didn’t work, and we went slow down into the dark. I was feeling sober and feeling bad. The rain and the swim had sobered me up. I was getting a feeling then, but I couldn’t place it. Albert sat next to me holding his hair in his hand, running his fingers through it.

  “I wanted you to have this,” he said.

  “I didn’t ask for it.”

  “I know,” he said. “I was hoping you’d clip it on and feel it behind you.”

  I didn’t say anything to that.

  “It’s all wet now.”

  “That’s all right,” I said. “I’m going to grow mine out. We got the same length now. We’ll have us a race with it. Down to our butts.”

  “First one gets this jeep,” he said.

  I looked at him. “This is yours.”

  “That’s the deal,” he said. “Can’t have a race without a bet.”

  “All right,” I said.

  Albert looked down at his chest. “Your butt’s closer to your head than mine is.”

  “I guess.”

  “I’m getting screwed.”

  We drove on for a while, and I kept watch at what the headlights would show. We listened to the thunder, and the lightning turned the road like day in front of us. We passed those horses behind the fence, and they were all worked up with the storm. Milling about the field, some were shaking their heads. They kind of looked like they were ready to break loose. I wiped the rain from my eyes.

  “Why’re you shaking?” he said.

  “It’s cold out.”

  “It’s not that cold,” he said. “You’ve been shaking all night.” He looked in the back seat. “Where’s the quilt?”

  “We left it at Merrill’s,” I said. “You were the one that wanted to go.”

  He looked out into the dark. His clothes were all soaked through.

  “Why you climbing on hoods and shit?” he said. “That was damn stupid.”

  “I couldn’t help it,” I said.

  “That’s bullshit. That’s something Ma would say. I got no one to rely on but you. Understand? Look at me. I’m all fucked up.”

  “You’re not all fucked up,” I said.

  He held up his hair, studying it. It seemed like it was the first time he’d seen it.

  “You’re not like you used to be,” he said.

  He kept looking at the hair in his hand. He played for a while with the clip that Merrill had sewn on. We were moving past the farmhouses now, and he looked out at them, out at the rain. Then he reached back and tossed his hair out into the dark.

  I pulled on the brake switch and pulled the jeep over to the shoulder. I had to take it slow because of the rain. When we came to a stop I put the switch into Park. We sat there in the rain for a while.

  “Go get it,” I said.

  “I can’t fucking walk. You go get it.”

  “It’s your hair,” I said.

  “It’s your hair,” he said. “Leave it there if you want.”

  I took the key out of the ignition and got out. “Don’t go anywhere.”

  “Where am I to go?” he said.

  I left the headlights on and went back on the road. I couldn’t hardly see anything in the rain. There were some shapes: the fence line down below the hill, a long stretch of tree line that we’d passed. I tried to figure how far we’d gone. I searched all down the shoulder of the road, waiting for the lightning to see anything. There were some old tire treads, an old shirt. Some bottles and a ball of aluminum foil. I walked along for a while, a
nd then I walked some more. A car came up toward me, and I looked back to the jeep. I could barely make out the red lights in all that rain, and the car went on by. I walked a ways past where Albert had thrown the hair. I’d thought all night that I was moving into crazy. I thought the shivers might be a sign of it. Part of me wanted it to come on. I was hoping to trade it for lonely.

  There was a farmhouse off in the fields, and I recognized it I thought. I thought maybe we’d just passed it before he threw his hair out. They all looked alike. I headed back. I looked along in the mud and peered down the slope. If it’d gone that far, I wouldn’t find it tonight. Another car was rushing down the road, and I waited for the headlights. I looked down at my feet, holding my hand up to shield my eyes from the rain. I reached down and took hold. It was then I heard the gunshot. I thought at first it was thunder, but it had come from the jeep. The car went rushing by.

  I looked up, and I couldn’t see much in the rain, just that car trailing off toward the jeep. I took off running. I was a long ways it seemed. The car passed my brother’s jeep and kept going. I ran past all the trash I’d seen, all the farmhouses. A flash of lightning lit up the road, and I kept running. I ran as fast as I ever did. When I closed the distance some I could see him up there, his head leaned back in the seat. I ran through the rain.

  When I got up to him, the pistol was in his lap. He was looking up into the rain.

  “Sorry,” he said.

  “Are you hit?”

  He looked down at his body. “I guess not,” he said.

  I took up the pistol and threw it out into the fields. It disappeared into the dark and the rain.

  “That was my best pistol,” he said.

  “Tough shit.”

  “I brought that back with me. It belonged to my friend.”

  I looked at him. I kicked the side of the jeep. “I don’t want to hear about your fucking friend.”

  I walked around for a while, on the shoulder of the road. Up then back, and I wouldn’t look at my brother. The rain came down on me. There was a farmhouse across the field, and I could see a man standing there. On the porch, standing in shadow. He had his hands in his pockets and was looking out across the way.

  It was necessary to hold on to what I still had. This is what I would’ve told that man. I wouldn’t have meant Albert or Ma, though I wanted to hold on to them. I’d have meant my head. The insides. I wanted to hold on to my insides. I wondered if there was any hope in it. I walked around in the headlights so maybe the man or Albert could take a good look at me.