by Billie Letts
“Jesus Christ,” he said as he surveyed the mess he was sitting in. Plastic snowflakes and holly drifted across his belly, the Charmin settled to the bottom of the tub and dirt from the cactus pot turned the bathwater brown.
“Jesus Christ,” he repeated, then shook his head in disgust.
He couldn’t decide whether to drain the tub and start all over or just skip the whole thing. But he knew for certain that with or without a bath, he needed a smoke and it wouldn’t come from the soggy package floating between his ankles.
He wrapped his hands around the rubber grips on the sides of the tub, took a ragged breath and began to lift himself out of the water.
Great knots of muscle hardened like gristle as he started to rise. Veins swelled into dark ridges, and thick ropes of tendons corded and bulged as he raised pound after pound of resisting bone, flesh, body.
Beads of sweat popped into rivulets that streamed in his eyes, and his skin purpled as the veins in his neck gorged to bursting. And with his jaw clamped and lips stretched into a grimace, he made some sound of pain deep in his throat.
He quivered as he reached the last of it, as he strained to gain the final few inches. Then it was over.
With his arms fully extended, his weight in perfect balance, he hung in midair… back straight, head up, muscles rigid. And for a moment, for just one sweet moment, he was one of Louis L’Amour’s cowboys, gloved hands gripping the rails of a loading chute as he settled himself onto the back of a lean stallion. Flawless… except for his legs hanging heavy and still beneath him.
Then, with a practiced twist, Caney shifted his weight, slid his hips onto the side of the tub and reached for his wheelchair.
Chapter Three
THE ONLY LIGHT in the cafe came from a neon beer sign in the front window. But Caney liked the faint red glow that veiled the stains on the ceiling and smoothed the cracks in the linoleum.
He rolled to a stop behind the counter and slid a pack of Camels out of the cigarette rack. With a book of matches he found in the windowsill, he lit his first smoke of the day as he watched the sky beginning to lighten in the east.
The wind was picking up, sudden gusts sailing paper cups and beer cans across the parking lot, lashing at the branches of a pine tree that towered over the cafe. When something heavy banged against the roof, Caney ducked his head, waiting for the sky to fall.
But it was the sound of the wind that got to him, the sound that raised goosebumps up the back of his neck.
When he was little, the sound of a howling wind would shake him from sleep and send him racing to the bed of his ancient great-aunt who believed nothing good came of bad weather.
“Night creatures ride on the wind, boy,” she would whisper as she settled him against her brittle hip and covered him with quilts that smelled of lavender talc.
But all that had changed. And so had Caney Paxton. He could no longer recall the scent of lavender… his legs had forgotten the magic of running… and he hadn’t been welcomed into a woman’s bed for a very long time.
When the wind started to whine around the door and through the heating vents, Caney decided to crank up the jukebox. If anyone could outwhine an Oklahoma windstorm, it was Merle Haggard singing about low-down women and low-life men.
Caney popped open the cash register and dug out a handful of quarters, then wheeled from behind the counter, heading for the jukebox, when the front door flew open.
A blast of wind howled as it swooped and swirled into the Honk, giving new life to the dark fears of Caney’s childhood, new voice to an aunt long dead… a voice that whispered against the rushing air.
Night creatures ride on the wind, boy.
Dizzy with dread, Caney whirled, his pulse pounding in his ears, his voice stunned to silence by the banshee that loomed in the doorway, her long dark cloak billowing around her. With her hair whipping at her face, her lips stretched into a B-movie grimace, the shrillness of her scream echoed inside the dim light of the Honk.
“MollyO, what the hell are you yelling about?”
“Caney Paxton!” MollyO clutched at her heart while she worked to regain her breath. “I think you’ve gave me a thrombosis.”
“Well, if your heart stops before you close that door, then I’m pretty sure my pecker’s gonna freeze off.”
“Oh,” she said, noticing for the first time that Caney was naked. “Honey, you ought to have something on your feet.”
“My feet? It’s not my feet I’m worried about.”
“What in the world are you doing out here without any clothes on? You know what time it is?”
“No, but if you’ll shut that door…”
“Caney, are you okay?” she asked, her voice registering concern. “That kidney infection’s come back, hasn’t it? I knew I should’ve refilled your prescription soon as—”
“My kidneys are fine! My feet are fine!” Then Caney glanced down at his lap. “But this little baby here is about to ice over.”
“Well, I don’t wonder. It’s freezing in here.” MollyO slammed the door, snapped on the lights, then fiddled with the thermostat until the heater kicked on.
“You started coffee yet?” she asked as she peeled off her coat.
“Nope.”
“Good.” She hung her coat on a rack in the corner, then bent to a cracked mirror propped on a low, narrow shelf. “I can’t abide a naked man in the kitchen.” She smoothed her hair, then wiped at a smudge of rouge on one cheek. “Dewey O’Keefe, God rest his soul, thought he couldn’t cook a lick unless he was naked.” MollyO ran her tongue over her teeth once, checking for lipstick.
“By the way,” Caney said, “what are you doing here so early?”
“Couldn’t sleep.”
“Those dreams again?”
“No. Everything’s fine.” MollyO shot him her top-of-the-morning smile, but not even Merle Norman could help her pull it off. Lips shiny with Wild Poppy, cheeks flushed with Woodland Rose, skin dusted with Perfectly Porcelain… none of it could hide the lines that webbed her brow or the dark half-moons beneath her eyes or the tightness that pulled at her mouth.
“Feeling all right?”
“Great,” she said as she slipped into her cheerful Christmas apron, the skirt too tight across her hips, the bodice too narrow to cover her Maidenform double D’s. But this morning, the apron fit her better than the Christmas cheer.
“Insomnia?” The question Caney intended sounded more like an accusation.
“Too excited about Christmas, I guess.” She tried to put some sparkle into it. “Still got so much to do.”
“Well, I hope to God you’re all finished decorating.”
“Yeah, at least I’m done with that. But I haven’t wrapped not one gift and I’ve still got to—”
“Look, you want to take the day off, that’s fine with me. I mean, it’s not like we’re overrun with business here. Nothing I can’t handle.”
“Oh no!” she said too fast. “I’ll get it all done. Always do. Matter of fact, I been thinking about helping you out this weekend. No sense in having Wanda Sue come in.”
“This weekend? Christmas?”
“Well, yeah. But you know what you can expect from Wanda Sue. Sitting on her butt, drinking coffee. And you know for sure Henry Brister’s gonna show up for Christmas dinner. Can’t get a fork of mashed potatoes in his mouth, let alone the rest of it. You think Wanda Sue’s gonna cut up Henry’s turkey? You think she’s gonna do that?”
“What about Brenda? Thought you were going to Nashville. Thought you two were going to spend Christmas together.”
“That’s not going to work out the way we planned.”
“You mean—”
“See, Brenda’s got some auditions coming up….”
“On Christmas?”
“And she’s having new head shots made. Same photographer who shoots Tanya Tucker’s pictures.”
“But why can’t you go on to Nashville? I can’t figure out why you—”
“You don’t know nothing about show business, Caney. Nothing at all.”
Caney knew MollyO wasn’t telling him the whole story, not by a long shot. But when she stepped behind the counter and began to spoon coffee into a filter, he knew the conversation had come to a close.
“Now,” MollyO said, “we gonna get this place opened up or what?”
Chapter Four
MOLLYO HAD long ago given up trying to help Caney get dressed each morning, so she stood by and watched as he rocked back on the bed, then wrestled his way into a pair of Wranglers by rolling first onto one hip and then the other.
About the most she could do was make sure he had matched socks, clean jeans and a fresh denim shirt every morning. If she didn’t, he’d simply slide into whatever he’d worn the day before and the one before that. Clothes held no more interest for Caney than food or the weather or the time of day.
When someone began to bang on the front door of the Honk, Caney shook his head in disgust.
“Why the hell can’t he wait till we’re open?”
“Guess he’s hungry,” MollyO said as she peeled plastic off a shirt just back from the cleaners. “Life don’t like to wait long for his breakfast.”
Life Halstead, the most regular of the regulars, was always the first customer of the day and nearly always the last.
“He’s hungry, all right,” Caney said. “But it’s not food he’s after.”
“Then why does he show up here for breakfast, dinner and supper, seven days a week?”
“No mystery there.” Caney popped his head through the neck of an undershirt, then worked his arms into the sleeves which strained against his biceps. “You know he comes to see you.”
MollyO took a few seconds to consider Caney’s remark, then she pitched his shirt at him. “You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Caney. Why, Reba’s not been in the ground more’n six months.”
“Well, I doubt Life’s spending much time checking the calendar.”
“He’s just lonesome, that’s all. Sold off most of his land and some of his cattle, so he doesn’t have much to keep him busy. That’s why he comes here… to eat, have a little company, read the morning paper.”
“Life doesn’t read the paper. He just props it in front of him so you won’t know he’s watching you.”
“You’re beginning to sound like Wanda Sue. Biggest gossip in town.”
“Not gossip. Fact.”
“Caney, you know how old Life is?”
“What’s that got to do with it?”
MollyO stepped closer to the bed and lowered her voice, though there was little danger Life could hear her above the racket he was making out front.
“The man is old enough to die,” she said.
“Hell, we’re all old enough to die.”
“Yeah, but some’s older than others.”
“Looks to me like Life’s still got some kick left in him.”
“I doubt it. He’s had two heart attacks. Gallbladder’s gone bad. And he’s about half-deaf.”
“Too many damaged parts, huh?” Caney hauled one leg onto the bed, then stuffed his lifeless foot into a stretched gray sock. “Well, that’ll damned sure take a man out of the game, won’t it?”
The question hung between them long enough to fill the room with silence. Even the banging out front had stopped.
“Honey, I—”
“You’d better go open the door or we’re gonna lose our first customer of the day,” Caney said as he reached for his other sock. “And we can’t afford to let Life get away from us, can we?”
By the time Caney had finished dressing and rolled into the cafe, Life Halstead was hunkered over his second cup of coffee and a greasy plate streaked with cold egg yolk. Though his face was half-hidden behind the morning paper, his eyes were firmly fixed on MollyO’s bottom as she bent to swipe at crumbs on a tabletop.
“Morning, Life,” Caney said.
“Yes, it is.” Life cut his eyes back to the paper, but he was clearly not as engrossed by the print as he was by the way MollyO’s skirt stretched across her hips. “A fine morning.”
But Caney could see little evidence of a fine morning. A steady rain had started to fall, and the wind, straight out of the north, scattered scraps of yesterday’s garbage across the parking lot.
“Raccoons got into the trash again last night,” Caney said. “We got crap blowing from here to Texas.”
“I wouldn’t worry about it,” Life said. “A little more crap in Texas ain’t gonna make much difference.” Obviously pleased with this contribution of humor, Life smiled.
When Caney heard the old Plymouth pull up and park, he didn’t even have to turn to know who was coming in.
Soldier Starr and Quinton Roach were always the first of the coffee drinkers to arrive, settling in at their regular table just before seven, the same table they had occupied every morning since the day the Honk opened. The third member of their group, Hooks Red Eagle, usually showed up at seven-thirty, the galvanized tub in the bed of his pickup teeming with catfish. Hooks, always on the lake before dawn to run his trotline, sold fish to Caney from time to time and gave the rest to his neighbors, having no taste for fish himself.
All three men were Cherokees, all in their late sixties… friends from boyhood, and all veterans of World War II, the one subject they never discussed, their conversations centering instead on tribal politics, weather and women. Though they had long suspected the three topics were connected in some mysterious way, they had yet to discover it.
“Hey, Caney,” Soldier said, “I figured we were going to have to go down to the Dairy Queen to find a cup of coffee this morning.”
Caney looked puzzled. “Dairy Queen’s not open yet.”
“Looks like you’re not either.”
“What?”
“You forgot to turn on the sign.”
“Oh.” Caney stirred a spoon of sugar into his coffee, then reached over the cash register and flipped a switch on the wall.
The sign out front, once the biggest and brightest in the county, tilted and trembled against the wind. Pelted by too many BBs and battered by too many storms, it attracted no more attention now than a dozen others along this stretch of highway. Now, even the brilliance of the neon had faded.
But twelve years earlier—when the awnings were bright, when the stainless-steel kitchen gleamed, when the countertop and tile glistened—Caney hadn’t had to be reminded about the sign. Then, when even “Opening Soon” had been a fresh joke, Caney’s fingers would tingle with excitement as he reached for the switch that would turn it on. And when the first bright neon blazed in the morning sky, he would stare wide-eyed with the wonder of a boy watching his first Roman candle explode in the air.
The day the sign had been delivered and installed, Caney turned twenty, still young enough to laugh about mistakes. But after eighteen months in a VA hospital, he was not as familiar with laughter as he had once been.
Caney had designed the building with the help of Wink Webster, an amputee in the ward who had done some drafting in high school. And from the day the foundation was poured, MollyO made sure they got to “watch” the building going up by sending them snapshots she took of the construction site each week.
Then, the morning before Caney’s discharge, he called Leon’s Neon in Tulsa where he had the sign made. He told Leon exactly what he wanted: THE HONK AND HOLLER in ten-inch letters, red neon against a white background. After all the details were settled, Caney wrote a check for the deposit and put it in the mail.
That might have been the end of it if the guys in the ward hadn’t smuggled in some beer and bourbon that afternoon to give Caney a “getting-the-hell-out-of-here” party. And the sign might have been perfect if Caney hadn’t drunk half a case of Coors and if he hadn’t listened to Wink, who drank the other half.
“Hell, Caney,” Wink said, “if you’re going to put that sign up now, you ought to add ‘Opening Soon’ to it. Then everyone who drives by will know someth
ing big is going to happen.”
“You think so?”
“Sure. They’ll figure there’s going to be some kind of grand opening. Prizes, free food. That sort of thing.”
“That’s not a bad idea.”
“Maybe a band. Have a dance out there on the parking lot.”
“Yeah. I like that,” Caney said, his entrepreneurial spirit fueled by a dozen cans of beer.
“You’ll draw a big crowd, too, if you’ll tell those carhops you hire to wear short skirts.”
“Real short!”
“And halter tops.”
“Those stretchy kind.”
“Go call that guy….”
“Leon?”
“Yeah. Call him before it’s too late.”
“Well…”
“Look. Just tell him you’ve decided on a little change in design. Tell him you want to add ‘Opening Soon.’ Now how he does it is up to him, of course, but if it was me, I’d hand-letter a sign to hook on the bottom of the neon. Then, once you’re open, just unhook it, toss it in the trash and you’re in business.”
“Okay! Soon’s I finish this beer, I’m gonna call Leon.”
Three weeks later, Leon delivered and installed the sign. THE HONK AND HOLLER OPENING SOON. Mounted on steel, anchored in concrete. Six hundred dollars of red neon. Nonrefundable.
At first, living with the sign was easy. While Caney was doing the hiring, ordering stock, having menus printed, “Opening Soon” made sense. And the grand opening was grand—free hotdogs, a rock band and carhops in halter tops.
But as soon as the hoopla ended and the Honk and Holler was in business, “Opening Soon” gave the locals something to laugh about.
Caney didn’t mind, though, not in the beginning. Not when old pickups and new Firebirds and jacked-up Camaros circled the lot, waiting for a parking spot. Not when knots of teens in tight jeans fed handfuls of quarters into the jukebox. Not when long-legged carhops juggled trays of chili cheeseburgers and frosted mugs of cherry-pickle-lemon-lime-orange until two o’clock every morning.