Eye of the Beholder

by Jackie Weger

  “My backside?” Her light-colored brows shot up. “I thought you liked women that run to fat.”

  Gage sat there, staring at her, eyes glinty, face pinched. “I can’t stand much more of this. Or you.”

  “I was makin’ a joke.” She turned slightly, giving him the view and opportunity to change his opinion about her nose.

  “You’re witty all right,” he said, still watching her, noting her soft smile had transformed her clever face. It highlighted a fine-boned slenderness. “I’m laughing so hard my ribs hurt.”

  He blew on his coffee and took a tentative sip.

  “Liquor sure turns you into a sour man of a mornin’. Makes you blind, too.” Hints aside, that was one truth in the open between them. And because she wanted another, she had to ask, “Did you get yourself a woman last night?”

  Gage choked. Phoebe pounded him on his back. Pounded and measured the width of it. Heat seemed to radiate through her skin. “You all right, now?” The backs of his ears were turning pink as newborn flesh.

  “Oh, I’m just fine.” Abruptly he moved away from her, heading out the back door.

  “Say! Don’t you want breakfast…? Guess you don’t,” she muttered as he disappeared behind the pile of old tires.

  She stirred grits into boiling water and wondered about his ears going pink. Some men were shy about women, being all talk and no actual “do.” Gage must be that way. With a man like that, she thought, a woman had a lot of leeway. An exhilaration charged through her.

  — • —

  “You look nice and spritely,” she said to Dorie when the child took her place at the table.

  “Maydean helped me get the tangles out. You sure my mother can see me all the way from heaven?”

  “Like as not she can. Won’t know for sure until I get there myself.” Phoebe put a platter of eggs and buttered grits on the table.

  “You aiming to go real soon?” Maydean commented snidely.

  “You know the trouble with you, Maydean? You’re all mouth. Shut up and use it to eat.”

  Willie-Boy was at the table, too, feeling better but popping out all over in blisters. “What am I gonna do all day while you’re at work, Phoebe?”

  “Watch TV and color. You be nice and Dorie might give you a page outta her colorin’ book.”

  “I’ll give him two pages if he doesn’t try to follow me and Maydean around like he did yesterday.”

  “Follow you around where? Besides crabbin’.”

  “Around the junkyard. We tried to play teenagers and he kept butting in.”

  Phoebe slanted a look at Dorie. “How do you play teenagers?”

  “I get to be sixteen and Maydean plays eighteen. When somebody comes to buy something from Daddy, we put our hands on our hips and look like this.” Dorie fluttered her lashes and thrust out her lower lip.

  Phoebe glanced hard at Maydean. “Is that right?”

  Maydean shrugged. “It’s just a game.”

  “Well, today, you just better play dead, ’cause that’s what you’re gonna be if I hear tell of this game again.”

  “It was fun,” said Dorie. “We pretended we put on makeup and everything.”

  “Maydean can’t play teenager today. She has to iron.”

  “I hate ironin’. It’s too hot.”

  Phoebe gave her sister a warning glance. “You iron up our Sunday clothes. A dress for Dorie, too. In case she wants to go with us come Sunday. That’s my final word.”

  “I don’t know where I can find an iron and ironin’ board.”

  “I’ll show you,” offered Dorie. “I like going to Sunday school. My daddy used to take me.”

  “Used to? He don’t anymore?”

  “After mother died, he said God did him in. He won’t go anymore.”

  God did him in! For shame, Phoebe thought. It was Velma Morgan who did all the doing, but she couldn’t say that to the dead woman’s daughter. Another cross to bear.

  On the other hand, it was nice to know that Gage had a Christian streak in him. Looking at him, she never would’ve guessed it. Looking at him… She recalled him standing on the threshold of his bedroom. She felt an enchanting quickening of her pulse. It made her feel good all over.

  As the sun’s morning warmth fingered the junkyard, Phoebe gave out last-minute instructions to Maydean before she left for the crab house, mostly dire warnings and threats. But she satisfied herself that Maydean would keep a close eye on Willie-Boy and Dorie. “If y’all need a snack afore I get home, finish off that gumbo.”

  Once she was outside, Phoebe walked backward a few steps, keeping the house, the ragtag fence, and unkempt yard in view. Her heart swelled. Lor, but it was wonderful to have a place to call her own—almost.

  “Watch out!”

  A hand reached out to grab her arm before she tumbled backward over an old piece of iron bedstead. Then the hand released her as if it’d touched fire.

  “I thought you went to the weldin’ shed,” Phoebe accused.

  “I did. But I had to open the gate. Damn! Why am I explaining to you?”

  “Maybe you like explainin’,” she threw at him with a puritanical glare. “Maybe you ought to go finish your coffee. Maybe your mind is still muddled from liquor. Maybe you ought to clear out this front area afore a body comes along and breaks a leg and sues the pants off you.” She rubbed her arm where he’d grasped her.

  He stiffened. “That’s how your mind works, eh? Always hinting about suing decent folks. Maybe you ought to watch where you’re going. Maybe you ought to just go, period.”

  “Aim to,” Phoebe said before she pushed him beyond redemption. She scurried out the gate to work, leaving him standing like an unbending board.

  The hairs on her neck prickled. He was watching her no doubt. There was no sense attempting the hip swaying. The mood he was in would leave the attempt wasted. She was going to have to do something about his attitude. Gage Morgan was getting less friendly by the hour.

  At the crab house, she slipped into her chair and nodded to Essie. Stout piled crabs in front of her and Phoebe began picking. The crabs got smaller and smaller, harder to pick. It took longer to get up a pound. When Stout brought another batch of crabs, even smaller, Phoebe complained.

  “Hey. I want some of them big ones. I can’t make no money tryin’ to pull meat outta these bitty things.”

  “Last hired gets the littlest. Ain’t fair to the other pickers to give you the best.”

  “How long does a body have to work here afore she gets the big ones?”

  “Years,” smirked Stout.

  This is my last day of crab picking, Phoebe thought.

  At one o’clock all the crabs had been picked. Phoebe collected ten dollars and eleven cents. While Hank was counting out the money she asked, “Who all do you buy crabs from?”

  “Anybody who wants to sell ’em, as long as I get the entire catch. I don’t hold with a crabber skimming off the number one shippers and trying to pawn off seconds on me.”

  “If I was to bring you a batch of crabs, you’d buy ’em?”

  “You going into the crab business regular?”

  “Plannin’ on it.”

  “Well, ice ’em down and truck ’em to the back door. I don’t pick up at the docks.”

  “I’ll truck ’em,” said Phoebe. She returned Essie’s tools. “Thank you for the loanin’. If I stayed about I’m liable to use these on Stout.”

  Essie grinned. “Been many a day the rest of us had the same notion. Your boy got okay then?”

  “He’s better,” Phoebe acknowledged.

  “You planning on staying in Bayou La Batre?”

  “For the rest of my life,” Phoebe said with feeling, waving and turning away.

  “Then I’m sure to see you around,” Essie called. “Maybe at church.”

  Phoebe stopped. “You go to a good one?”

  “We like it. And there’s good programs for the kids winter and summer. Ain’t a big church though, workin’ f
olks, if you know what I mean. We got a hand clappin’, fiddlin’ gospel choir, but ain’t got a single member what wears a fur.” She gave Phoebe directions to the church.

  Phoebe strolled back to the junkyard stepping lively and high of spirit.

  She’d made a new friend and had been invited to church. The gospel singing intrigued her. Maydean had a good voice. If she could get the twelve-year-old interested in music, mayhap it’d take her mind off boys.

  She’d decided to go into business for herself and had a buyer for her crabs—that is, once she learned how to catch the things. Like as not by the time Ma and Pa and Erlene got here she’d be well established in business for herself.

  The only thing out of whack was that Ma would certainly look askance at her Phoebe being under the same roof as a man without there being an understanding between them.

  Phoebe shook her head. Achieving an understanding with a man who had misunderstanding seeping from his pores at every word or gesture was as worrisome as trying to make a living. She knew what it would take: out and out seduction. Lor! What she knew for certain about seducing a man would fit on the head of a pin with room to spare. But she knew a woman had to use her body. Maybe even get naked.

  Phoebe pictured herself naked, saw her ribs, her knees.

  Better to think about the crab business, she decided. Still, all the way back to the junkyard, she practiced a hip-swaying walk.

  — • —

  The ironing board was standing foursquare in the middle of the kitchen with Sunday clothes piled atop it unironed. There was no sign of Maydean, Dorie, or Willie-Boy. Phoebe washed her face and hands at the sink then went to hunt them up. Maydean and Dorie were in the rusted-out shell of a car, Dorie behind the wheel, Maydean lurking at the mirror. Naturally, Phoebe thought. Her exasperation peaked.

  “Where’s Willie-Boy and why ain’t you got the clothes sprinkled down?”

  Maydean jerked. “How come you’re home so early?”

  “Because I can’t trust you to do as you’re told around a corner, that’s why. Where’s your brother?”

  Maydean sniffed. “In the welding shed with Gage. He—”

  “Oh, Lor!”

  Phoebe entered the welding shed with a stone-quiet face of resignation certain she marched to disaster. She discovered nothing so cataclysmic as Gage grousing and running roughshod over Willie-Boy, for Willie-Boy was sitting on a stool and Gage was explaining the workings of a propeller. In her first start of surprise she didn’t speak.

  Willie-Boy caught sight of her and began talking rapidly. “I’m learning, Phoebe. Mr. Gage is teachin’ me all about propellers. When I grow up I’ll have a trade. Pa said I was to have a trade and—”

  “That’s nice,” she replied warily. “But you’re not supposed to be in here pestering Gage. He don’t like to be bothered while he’s working.”

  “I’m not pestering, I’m—”

  “The boy’s okay,” Gage said, acknowledging Phoebe’s presence, but only just. After slanting a glance at her, he turned back to polishing the machine.

  All through her body Phoebe had a sense of good things, a feeling that life was pleasant and easy. Mayhap she wouldn’t have to get naked to do her seducing. Gage’s attitude seemed to have improved all by itself. Outside of threatening her with eviction, indulging in drink and being only somewhat God fearing, he seemed to have a good streak in him.

  “I told Maydean to watch Willie-Boy. She should’ve.”

  “She was pickin’ on me. Mr. Gage said I could set a spell with him. He said if I was to get out in the sun, you’d start up naggin’ at him again, but I told him you wasn’t mostly a nag, are you, Phoebe? It was only ’cause you’re worried ’cause Ma told you to find us a place ’cause Aunt Vinnie is so mean to us. Ain’t that right?”

  Phoebe’s heart began to pound mightily. Lor! If Gage got it in his mind that there were more Hawleys yet to come she would have to do naked seduction. She couldn’t think of anything else that’d undo all the damage Willie-Boy had done in his five-year-old innocence. Gage’s profile was clear in her view. One whole side of his face was a smirk. Well, she could undo that without seduction. She reached into her change purse and withdrew three one dollar bills.

  “I told you I’d triple what I paid you yesterday. Here it is.” She thrust the cash toward him, satisfied when the smirk diminished. He accepted the money. One thing about Gage Morgan, Phoebe thought, he didn’t sneer at money. Still, there was enough snideness left in his expression that she felt obliged to add, “Hope you don’t go wastin’ that on drink. I worked hard to get it.”

  His jaw worked. “I spend my money the way I want. Though I suspect any man who hangs around you long enough is bound to end up a drunkard.”

  Phoebe’s jaw began to inch up.

  “I got to go to the bathroom,” said Willie-Boy, slipping from the stool and hurrying out.

  “I suspect you had a weakness for whiskey long before we met, Gage Morgan. Don’t go blamin’ it on me.”

  “I suspect you could make a living nagging the fur off a cat.”

  “Oh, I’m going to make a livin’ all right. At crabbin’. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.”

  Gage smoked it. His mouth shaped a derisive grin. “Got fired at the crab house? Told Hank how to run his business, did you?”

  Phoebe could see in his eyes, in his expression how he was making himself believe she’d had a comeuppance. She lifted her head with regal forbearance. “I resigned. I’m goin’ into business for myself. Come Monday, I’ll triple again what I paid you today.”

  Gage scoffed. “Going into business for yourself? Well, good. That’ll improve my chances of collecting the debt you owe me. The way you’re paying now, it’ll be into the next century.”

  Phoebe’s chin kept inching outward. “I got your number, mister. You think I don’t have brains to see it, but I do. You’ve been savin’ up your grousin’ since your wife died. Savin’ it up and just waitin’ for somebody you could bully. You picked the wrong body. I can give as good as I get.”

  “No man in his right mind would pick your body. Hah!”

  Phoebe stepped into his space. It was filled with the man-smell of shop oil, sweat, and soap. She had to get Gage off the track of flesh and get him on the track to his purse strings. “You got that wrong. This body works. Every single part. A man in his right mind would appreciate that. He wouldn’t be worried about what sticks out and has to be covered up. A right-thinking man appreciates plumbing that works, figurin’ a healthy woman costs less. I got energy. I got enthusiasm. I got health. The man that gets me ain’t never gonna have to pay for medicine and doctors. And I ain’t got a cavity, not one. See.”

  What he saw were her dark velvety eyes with little lights behind them. Surprisingly dark eyes for one so fair. “Get out of my face.” His voice held a slight huskiness.

  Phoebe tossed her wealth of curls like a bright-crested bird preening feathers.

  “Bloodshot and blind of eye. That’s you, Gage Morgan. So you can just quit makin’ vile references to my body parts. You’re just tryin’ to make yourself out better’n other folks. Well, you ain’t. All you are is a man livin’ smack in the middle of junk. You ain’t even got the price of pride enough to keep up your yard. It ain’t been mowed or swept since who knows when.

  “A smart man, which you ain’t, would sure keep his property tidy so as to increase its value.

  “A smart man, which you ain’t, would keep his eye on Phoebe Hawley, ’cause I’m goin’ to be somebody. I’m goin’ to be a woman in business for herself. With a fat purse.” It sounded like boasting, but Phoebe didn’t care. Nor did she care that her chin was so unflattering, so outthrust, it would serve as saucer to a cup.

  Her breathless run-on speech had given Gage time to regain some composure. “‘You could have a fatted calf and you wouldn’t appeal to me.”

  Phoebe clenched her teeth. He was still harping on body parts. He was paying her back for what he considere
d an insult, but she couldn’t just let it pass. “You can’t hurt my feelings. You know why? You’re scared of me. I can tell.”

  Gage’s jaw dropped.

  “I used to think you had kissin’ lips. Now I don’t. Now I think you got flycatchers.”

  Gage closed his mouth, sputtering. “Get… get out of my shop. Stay away from me.”

  Phoebe gave another toss of her head. “I’m more than happy to oblige you.”

  She sashayed toward the door, arms swinging and hips swaying.

  “You can twitch your fanny all you want,” he called in loud hectoring sarcasm. “It won’t change my mind about you.”

  Phoebe was at once fettered by excitement and stopped dead in her tracks. Practicing hip swaying had paid off! Warm with delight, she spun about, her face alight with a high-voltage glow. “I ain’t aimin’ to change your mind on any account. I’m allowin’ for your opinion.” She put one hand on her waist and cocked a hip forward like she’d seen Vanna White do on Wheel of Fortune. “Supper’ll be late,” she sang out loftily. “I got to set out crab lines.”

  “Wrap one around your neck and use it for bait, why don’t you?”

  Phoebe laughed. “Why, ain’t you the witty one.” She lifted a hand. “See you at supper.”

  Willie-Boy popped from around a stack of weathering lumber and joined Phoebe on the path. “You mad at me?”

  “I should be, but I ain’t. I feel too good. But listen, Willie-Boy, you don’t carry tales about Vinnie or Ma or Pa or Erlene to outsiders. Family stuff stays family.”

  “Ain’t Gage family?” he asked, slipping his hand into hers.

  “No.” Not yet.

  “But you said we was cousins. You said the Bible—”

  “I can feel myself gettin’ mad at you Willie-Boy.”

  He jerked his hand loose and ran ahead. “You’re gettin’ just like Ma! Always undoin’ what you say and mixin’ me up. Next time Mr. Gage says you’re a nag, I ain’t takin’ up for you.”

  “Willie-Boy, wait! Don’t run like that.”

  “I don’t care if I get sick. I don’t care if I die!” He scooted off into some weeds where a boat was stored upside down on wooden supports.