River Mourn

by Bill Hopkins

Chapter 14

  Last Wednesday Night into Thursday Morning

  Rosswell drove to The Four Bee, chewing on Jasmine's information about seeing a file. And thinking about Ollie abandoning him. One of the special channels this month on satellite radio was The Beatles. John Lennon's album Imagine started. Good thinking music. Rosswell started talking to himself.

  "Ollie's quit and now it's up to me to solve this alone. What could be in that file? If that's what it was. A list of dealers? A list of suppliers? A list of customers? It had to be valuable if Turk paid Charlie for it. Or maybe Turk gave Charlie postage money. Who the hell knows? Maybe it means absolutely nothing."

  Rosswell's gut lurched when I Don't Want To Be A Soldier cued up. After the riff by Joey Molland on his acoustic guitar, Rosswell recalled that he sure as hell didn't want to be a soldier either. Too late for that. He'd volunteered. And he'd volunteered because he believed Aristotle who wrote, "We make war that we may live in peace."

  Switching to the local AM station, Rosswell caught the news.

  "?corn futures plummeted after predictions the drought affecting area farmers would last until?"

  "?after a poor showing, the Cardinals lost again, making this string of defeats the longest since?"

  "?funeral mass scheduled tomorrow for the beloved father of six young children, killed at the quarry when?"

  "?strong winds out of the south followed by a powerful front of moist, unstable Gulf of Mexico air, then a dry front from Canada?"

  "?again reminded residents of the red flag warning?"

  "?County Commission issued a strict no-burn order with criminal penalties?"

  Rosswell punched the OFF button, wondering why the news was nothing but downers.

  When he arrived at The Four Bee, he slammed on the brakes. Something thumped. The sound came from behind the seat. He looked over his right shoulder, trying to determine the source of the noise.

  Now what? He was already upset because fracking Ollie jumped ship and then all that weirdo talk from Jasmine about a file, and now his truck was thumping. He knew something was going out on it. Something was falling off his rattletrap and he wouldn't have anything to drive till Vicky was repaired.

  Cursing, he rummaged around behind the seat. Hand saw. Hammer. Plastic rope. Chisel. WD-40. Screwdriver. Dust bunnies. Another screwdriver. Duct tape. Gloves.

  And a bottle.

  A fifth of 18-year-old single malt Scotch, nectar of the gods of oblivion, still in a plain brown paper bag.

  When had he stashed that behind the seat of his truck? Must've been during one of his drinking binges, long forgotten. He'd been sober five years. Maybe closer to six.

  Setting the bottle on the seat beside him, he withdrew the letter Tina had written him before she disappeared. He kept it folded in his billfold. The creases were already tearing the page from so much handling. He unfolded it carefully.

  Dear Rosswell, I love you so much. When I wake up in the morning, you're the first thing I think of. When I go to sleep at night, you're the last thing I think of. You're on my mind every hour of every day. I want to know you and love you the rest of our lives. I've got something really important to tell you. I'm so happy to tell you. And I want you to be happy, too.

  I'm pregnant.

  When you finish reading this letter, come to me and hold me and never let me go.

  I love you always,

  Tina

  Rosswell re-folded the letter, kissed it, and stuffed it back in his billfold. Tears welled, then ran down his cheeks, as they always did whenever he read her beautiful note. But this time excessive fatigue caused the emotional burst to be a big one. He hadn't cried this much since Tina had disappeared.

  For a few moments, he watched the river before he dusted off the bottle, broke the seal and opened it, breathing in the fragrance of smoky peat. Glorious. The golden liquid shined when he held the bottle up to a street lamp, casting oddly tinted rainbows from the orange glow of a sodium bulb. Even more glorious. He screwed the lid on and cradled the booze in his arms. More streetlights came on now that full dark had swallowed the day. He left his truck, crossing the road into P?re Marquette Park.

  He sat for a while on top of a picnic table in the glow of the street lamps, watching a black dog root through an overturned garbage can smelling of rotten bananas, a stench that brought Rosswell to the edge of vomiting. The dog cocked its floppy ears-one of them marred by a triangle sliced out, perhaps from a fight-and then stopped for a moment before growling, wheeling its head toward Rosswell, fixing its yellow eyes on him.

  When a young mother carrying a little girl arrived and began pushing the child on a swing, Rosswell's stomach shot acid into the back of his mouth, stabbing his throat with hot forks the whole way up. The mother, a dark-complexioned woman not more than twenty-five, reminded him of Feliciana, Rosswell's first true love, killed as she drove him home while he snored, passed out in the passenger seat. She never noticed the grain truck that plowed into her side of the car.

  Now, the woman in the park laughed. She talked and sang to the child, a dead ringer for the girl in the Middle East. The child, Rosswell estimated, had made no more than three or maybe four birthdays. Hideous memories of the girl he'd shot ate at his brain, crunching on the defenses he'd erected, trying to escape.

  The dog, its muzzle enshrouded with dirty foam, lost interest in Rosswell, slinking instead for the little girl. A low growl escaped the animal's mouth. The girl waved to Rosswell. "Hey, Daddy." The woman followed the girl's gaze. "Rosswell," she said.

  Rosswell touched the star of the necklace Maman Fribeau had given him and blinked.

  When the dog leaped, Rosswell screamed and the dog, the mother, and the child disappeared.