Edward Lee: Selected Stories

by Edward Lee

  “But all that changes tonight,” you’re told. “Says in the Bible ‘vengeance is mine,’ and that’s what’s gonna happen. And when Floyd is finally punished proper for the awful things he done, then all that pain we both’re feelin’? It goes away forever!”

  Would it, though? Would it really?

  You feel numb, and a strange drone sounds in your head when Miss Dory knocks and then the squeaky wooden door swings open. Candles flicker within, and before the sedate light, a bulky figure moves. “Well, howdy, Dory Ann,” greets a deep, husky, but otherwise congenial voice. The figure shows you inside, and at once you’re struck by the coziness of the backwoods abode. Clean wood floors, simple furniture, hand-embroidered curtains. It does not look like the kind of house where evil men have been put to death.

  Miss Dory introduces you to the large, overalled figure: Wynchel Conner. Heavily browed, barrel-bellied, broad-shouldered. He looks around fifty, and has a hat on like a train conductor would wear. A big, callused hand shakes yours with enthusiasm. “Well, hey there, Marla. Now, I’se heard ’bout’cha—knew yer Daddy way on back—but sorry I ain’t never met ya before. Me’n my kin? We’s stick mainly ta this side’a the lake. At any rate, ya both’re welcome in my home anytime,” and he pronounces “time” as tam.

  You expect other men to be here—that’s how you understand it, at least. When someone throws a header on a person who’s committed a terrible crime, other men from the area show up to…participate. This house, however, feels empty, and it couldn’t be more silent. The narrowed look on Miss Dory’s face tells you that she’s confused as well, to the extent that she speaks up, “Um, Wynchel? Where’s…ever-one else?”

  The big man makes a casual shrug, and bids them both to sit down on the ancient couch topped by cushions filled with straw. “Like ta ’splain that to ya, Dory Ann. See, tonight what we’s gonna do is a bit diffurnt from like what happens most times—oh, give me sec whiles I fetch yawl some raspberry cider.”

  Amazed, you watch the man depart to a back room. You expect the mood here to be dark, somber, but instead, He’s gettin’ us CIDER? When you look to Miss Dory, you sense her bewilderment too.

  Wynchel returns, giving you each a filled mug. His big down-home smile couldn’t feel more out of place. “’S’my daughter Rhonda made it, and I’ll tell ya, that gal can make some cider. She ain’t here now, a’course. I don’t want her ta be seein’…”

  His words dissolve. You barely taste the sip you consume, while Miss Dory sips hers with eyes narrowed to slits. “Wynchel, I say, what is goin’ on? You invite us ta come here for…well, you know.”

  “Fer a header,” the man finally acknowledges. “Yeah, but—”

  Your heart flutters in disappointment like dread. Something happened! Floyd must’a got away’re somethin’! and Miss Dory gives voice to something close to your exact thoughts: “Wynchel, youse mean ya didn’t really catch Floyd? I thought—”

  “Oh, I got him, all right”—he shoots a thumb behind him. “Got the varmint tied’n gagged shore as can be in the back. Gandered the dag bastard sittin’ by the lake just this mornin’, trappin’ fer crawdaddies. Couldn’t’a been no easier—just cracked him one in the noggin with my jack, hault his ass inta the truck, and brung him here.” He laughs. “Relax, gals!”

  Relax? That’s impossible. In the back of your mind, in a way you can’t control, all the times Floyd raped you replay like someone flitting cards. The look on his face is always there, to the point that your head feels full of pressure and will soon break open. Wynchel jabbers on about various neighbors and gossip while Miss Dory pretends to listen. But you can’t listen—all you can do is sit there, seeing all those images flash through your mind.

  “All right, gals. Nuff small talk, I reckon.” He slaps his knees and rises. “Foller me.”

  Dead-eyed, you follow Miss Dory and Wynchel, first into the kitchen, whose ancient woodstove dominates the entire wood-walled room. It should be hot here, but the cross breeze from several open windows make the place quite comfortable. You can smell the forest, but then it occurs to you that there’s a particularly strong forest-like scent all around. That’s when you notice a single pot on the stove.

  “What’s that smell, Mr. Conner?” you blurt. “Smells nice, like the woods.”

  “Oh, I’ll show ya in a minute, but what’cha really wanna see is just on in here,” and then he disappears through a smaller door. With reserved steps, you and Miss Dory follow.

  Here a single incandescent bulb burns overhead—Wynchel is one of only a few locals who has electricity—but suddenly this light burns darker, as if your own thoughts have dampened some of its energy. The room smells…odd, nothing like the rich, piney scent from the kitchen but something dense, old, and vaguely repugnant. There are no windows, and dead center is a heavy wooden table on which your brother Floyd has been tied down and gagged. He’s fully clothed yet his jeans have been pulled down; you blanch at the sight of his bunched, withered genitals.

  “There he is,” Wynchel’s voice gutters. “Piece’a trash has been lyin’ here all day. Thought I’d give him plennie’a time ta think on things,” and then the big man grabs a handful of Floyd’s greasy black hair and gives it a twist. “Huh, Floyd? You been thinkin’ on things? Hope so, cos ya ain’t gonna be thinkin’ much longer. But look who come ta visit’cha”—Wynchel jerks Floyd’s face and staring eyes toward the door. “Why, if’n it ain’t Dory Ann Slate, you know, the sister’a the poor inner-cint gal you fucked’n kilt. And that li’l baby you pissed all over’n left for the possums was Dory’s nephew. And a’course you know the other gal well—Marla, yer own sister. I don’t gotta remind ya of the awful shit ya done ta her.”

  Floyd’s bugged eyes over the gag find yours and freeze. You freeze as well, from head to toe. He mewls something behind the gag but it’s undecipherable.

  Wynchel rubs his hands together. “See, ladies, I already done tolt Floyd that we’d be killin’ his sick, sorry ass by throwin’ a header—that’s what I wanted him ta be thinkin’ ’bout all day. But, see, there’s some fellas who do things so terrible that dyin’ by a header just ain’t enough, ya know? It’s kind’a lettin’ him off easy on account he up’n die fairly quick. But fer such folk, we got other ideas.” Wynchel lumbers to the center of the big table, and it’s Miss Dory who catches a breath in her chest when the big man flicks open a pocket knife. Now Floyd’s face is pinkening, his neck canted as he stares shuddering at the blade. “This part, Floyd, ain’t gonna hurt a whole lot…”

  Miss Dory hugs you as you both watch Wynchel go to work. He daintily punctures the center of Floyd’s scrotum with the blade, then makes an inch-long slit in the wrinkled flesh. Floyd mewls once and bucks his hips. “This here’s what we call a ‘raw-ballin’.’ We slit the nut sack’n then pop both balls out so’s they’s hangin’ raw outside,” and as his stubby fingers work, both of Floyd’s testicles are pushed through the slit, glistening pinkly and still connected by delicate cords.

  “What-what…what’cha gonna do?” Miss Dory asks in a hot whisper.

  Wynchel winks—“Be right back”—then leaves the room.

  Meanwhile, you continue to stare. You want so much to say so many things to Floyd but you can’t. Your throat is locked up, and your brain is in turmoil from all those images still swirling round and round. It seems like they’ll never stop, but you know that if they don’t stop soon, you’ll kill yourself. It’s the only release.

  Wynchel thunks back into the room, holding the pot you’d seen on the woodstove. When he lifts the lid, the rich piney scent that struck you so pleasantly in the kitchen increases tenfold. You hear a faint bubbling sound.

  “Like I said, ladies, scum like this un here cain’t be let off easy, no sir. So’s what I got fillin’ this pot is a fair helpin’ of pine sap that I up’n tapped myself just outside—tapped several pine trees, I did, then I heat it all up on the stove till it’s a-bubblin’. Cut it with a li’l turpentine so’s ta not
get too thick.”

  Floyd’s eyes are bulging so intensely now they seem ready to eject from their sockets. Wynchel continues, “See, in the old days when we was layin’ a raw-ballin’ on someone, we’d always use boilin’ water, but then one time someone—Charlie Fuchson, I’se think it ’twas—he scratch his head’n say in that sky-high voice’a his, ‘Hey, fellas, ain’t there sumpthin’ better’n water we can use? Cos, see, it seem ta me that boilin’ water’ll lose most’a its heat pretty fast after ya up’n dump it,’ and dang if we didn’t all agree with him. I believe that was the day we find some rummie from Waynesville millin’ ’round here, then someone—Tater Kline, it might’a been—actually caught the low-down rube lookin’ in one’a the winders over at Jory Cray’s. The sick scum were peepin’ in on Jory’s li’l ten-year-old daughter Joanie, he was, and beatin’ hisself off, so it were Tater who brung him in. Now, we didn’t throw no header on the trash on account he didn’t kill no one, but we shore as shit needed ta teach him a lesson, and”—Wynchel rolls his eyes and chuckles—“we up’n taught him one in spades that day. Tapped some pine trees we did, fill up a pot’n bring it to a boil while ole Charlie raw-balled the fucker. I tell ya, ladies, when we dumped that boilin’ pine sap on that rummie’s nuts, he made noises like I’d never thunk a human bein’ could make. See, pine sap’ll hold its heat lots longer’n water.” Then Wynchel suddenly points at both of you. “But’cha know what? Never again did that rummie ever look in no little girls’ winders, no sir!” and he trumpets hoarse laughter.

  Floyd is jerking against his bonds on the table, such that the legs come an inch off the floor. Wynchel comes back around with the steaming pot and says, “Now, Floyd, member howsI told ya the first part wouldn’t hurt all that much? Well, this part I reckon’ll hurt a holy ever-livin’ SHITLOAD more,” and then he tips the pot just enough to let some of the hellishly hot sap come over the rim and land directly on Floyd’s exposed testicles—

  There’s a crackling sizzle, then a muffled roar from your brother’s throat that sounds like something a massive animal might make when gored. Floyd jerks so hard against the rope that all four of the table legs jump up at the same time.

  “Theeeeeeeeere ya go! How’d that feel? That feel as good as the nut you had all them times ya raped yer sister, hmm? That feel as good as when you was fuckin’ Lucie Slate after ya cut her throat just so’s she couldn’t sue ya fer child support? In fact, I’lls bet that felt so good, you’ll want some more—”

  Floyd’s throat expands he’s screaming so hard against the gag, and then—

  Sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss…

  —Wynchel pours more piping hot sap on the bubbling testicles. “Ooo-doggie, yes sir! I’ll bet that put some kick in yer day, huh, Floyd? Well, shit, ever-one can use a little kick, so, hail! Have some more!”

  Now the noises produced by Floyd’s throat sound like some geared machine grinding away with bad sprockets as Wynchel makes another liberal deposit of the insanely hot sap. The sap itself pours thick as honey and is clear save for the faintest amber tint. Now that pleasant pine scent hangs heavy in the room but is laced with something akin to pork sausage breakfast patties, which you assume must be the smell of Floyd’s testicles cooking. Floyd rocks on the table, every muscle corded like cables, eyes lidless in agony.

  “Well, looks like we up’n mussed his nuts more’n a tad, huh, ladies? What say we treat the dick itself to a little’a the same,” and after more beast-like roaring from Floyd’s gagged mouth, Wynchel dribbles still more sap on your brother’s horror-shriveled penis. You and Miss Dory watch, enraptured, as the little twist of meat crackles, twitching in a manner that can only be thought of as unearthly.

  “Ain’t that fascinatin’?”—Wynchel pours some more sap—“Watch how the dick tries ta git away from that heat by shrinkin’ inta his body,” and, yes, he’s right, the pathetic twist of flesh that so many times debased you and God knows how many other women is now retracting itself, as if attempting escape.

  Floyd is positively convulsing now; his face is maroon. Wynchel chuckles, “’S’right, Floyd, you can relax now. See, I’se all out’a sap. But I think that’s a fair ta midland punishment fer all the devilish crimes ya committed, huh?”

  Floyd is still conscious, and his body loses some of its tension when Wynchel informs him that the sap is all gone. But then—

  “Ho boy! Well, how you like that? Seems I was mistaken, son! This pot—I say—this pot’s still half full!” and then—

  Sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss…

  —he dumps the rest on Floyd’s shivering groin, an amount that must be at least ten ounces. Steam and presumably smoke waft up from the bubbling insult, and what remains of your brother’s genitals cannot be effectively described.

  “All right, looks like we’s done with the fun’n games,” Wynchel announces. Floyd lay motionless now on the table, his face still maroon. When Wynchel pushes open an eyelid, you see that the white of Floyd’s eye is marbled crimson, from hemorrhaging. Your question issues as the tiniest peep: “Is he…dead, Mr. Wynchel?”

  “Naw, he just up’n passed out on acount’a the pain is all. And don’t’cha worry, we ain’t done with him just yet.”

  You and Miss Dory are clinging to one another, and you notice only now that Miss Dory’s left hand is cupping your breast. You look over and see that her own breasts seem enlarged, nipples poking like bolt-ends through the sheer fabric of her top. That’s when you realize that your own nipples jut similarly. Miss Dory seems to speak in a wanton hiss: “Now, right, Wynchel? Youse gonna do the header now?”

  “Well, that’s what I’se wanna talk ta ya about but why’s don’t I first git’cha both some more cider?”

  Even in the distraction of her anger, Miss Dory does not remove her hand from your breast, and you admit to yourself that you like the way it feels. But she rails, “We don’t want no more fuckin’ cider, Wynchel! Why you jerkin’ us ’round so? You promised youse was gonna throw a header! So do it! Ya cut a blammed hole in that rat bastard’s head’n then you FUCK! HIS! HEAD!”

  Wynchel just smiles, and rambles on, “Now, you know ole Marm Lewis, right?”

  “A’course, I do, Wynchel!” Miss Dory yells. “She been lettin’ my sister Lucie live in her house since she gots put in that nursin’ home—”

  “Um-hmm,” Wynchel nods. “Ole Marm, she been ’round a long time’n—she’s what city folks I think call a matriarch—and, see, since she wind up in that home, I been stoppin’ by to see her once a week, an’ a’course, when Lucie was found kilt in Marm’s house, I tolt Marm cos, well, I’se felt she had a right to know—”

  Miss Dory’s face goes pink in her rage. “We don’t wanna hear ’bout Marm Lewis, Wynchel! We wanna see you fuck that man in the head!”

  “Yeah, yeah, shore ya do’n I’se can do that if’n ya want, but hear me out full’n right first,” Wynchel keeps up. “What Marm Lewis say ta me that day is she say ‘Wynchel, if’n ya ever catch the evil devil-lovin’ scoundrel that murder Lucie’n her baby in my house, there ain’t but one thang ya can do ta git proper revenge, and youse know what that is, don’t’cha, son?’ an’ a’course, I say, ‘Yes, ma’am, Marm Lewis, we’s’ll shore as hail throw a header on the varmint.’ But then she closes her eyes’n gits ta thinkin’…”

  “Thinkin’…’bout what?” you have to ask.

  “Well, she says that since Lucie were Dory Ann’s sister, there might be a better kind’a header ta throw, somethin’…more ’pro-pree-at—”

  Spittle flies off Miss Dory’s lips: “What in tarnations is you talkin’ ’bout!”

  Wynchel keeps rubbing his big rough hands together; he seems gleeful. “Somethin’ she done herself a few times long ago, when dag sick bastards like this here Floyd Cotes do awful stuff ta her kin.”

  “A better kind’a header?” Miss Dory keeps yelling. “That don’t make no sense!”

  Wynchel mulls something over in his mind. “Ya know, on account M
arla here’s so young, I’se think it’d be best if’n I whisper it to ya,” and then the big man approaches Miss Dory, leans over, and whispers something in her ear. When he’s done, the older woman’s eyes slowly go wide and she smiles like an egg-suck dog. “Oh lordie, Wynchel. That sounds dang nice…”

  A big husky laugh. “Thought ya’d git a fixin’ fer the idea, ’specially on account both’a youse are gals. So, what’cha think? Ya wanna try?”

  “Yes!” Miss Dory blurts, but you don’t understand a thing. You’re so confused, so dizzy, and Miss Dory hugging you like that and playing with your breasts has you getting swampy between your legs. You can scarcely imagine what Wynchel just whispered.

  “Lemme show ya.” From a cabinet on the back wall, he picks up a power drill with a hole-saw bit in the chuck. “This here’s what we normally use fer a header”—and he revs it a few times, each rev sending you on your tiptoes and strangely bringing a throb to your privates. “Ya both probably been tolt through the grapevine how it’s done—simple, really. Ya just cut a hole in the top’a his head, pop out the circle’a bone, cut a slit fer yer pecker’n, well…ya slip yer willy in and start a-humpin’. Ya fuck the booger-eater’s brain till ya git’cher nut.”

  The crude explanation makes your nipples tingle, then you actually bring your hand between your legs and begin to rub. Miss Dory is rubbing herself too.

  “But fer this kind’a header, well…I reckon we’s need a diffurnt kind’a saw.” Wynchel turns back to the cabinet to rummage. “Reckon a plain ole hack-saw’d be fine but, shee-it, that’d take a coon’s age… Lemme see—ah, yeah, this un here should do the trick,” and now he withdraws another saw, like a circular saw only smaller. It says DE WALT on it. “This here saw’s got a adjuster-bull depth settin’ so’s the blade only cuts so deep. It also got a finishin’ blade with a high tooth-count.”

  You stare at the saw. He plugs it in and squeezes the trigger.