Stinger

by Robert R. McCammon

  Cody was a second late in answering. “Ain’t that right?” Curt repeated.

  “Yes sir.” Cody started for his room but his father’s voice stopped him again.

  “Whoa! I didn’t say you could go nowhere. I’m talkin’ to you, boy.” He took another long pull from the cigarette. “You goin’ to work today?”

  Cody nodded.

  “Good. I need me some smokes. Think that old wetback’ll give you a carton?”

  “Mr. Mendoza’s okay,” Cody told him. “He’s not like the other ones.”

  Curt was silent. He drew the cigarette from his mouth and stared at the burning end. “They’re all the same,” he said quietly. “All of ’em. If you think different, Mendoza’s got you foxed, boy.”

  “Mr. Mendoza’s always been—”

  “What’s this Mister Mendoza bullshit?” Curt glared across the room at his son. Damn the boy! he thought. He’s got rocks for brains! “I say they’re all alike, and that finishes it. Are you gonna get me the smokes or not?”

  Cody shrugged, his head lowered. But he could feel his father watching him, and he had to say, “I will.”

  “All right, then. We’re settled.” He returned the cigarette to the corner of his mouth, and the ash glowed red as he inhaled. “What’s that thing?”

  “What thing?”

  “That thing. Right there.” Curt jabbed a finger at him. “Under your arm. What’s that?”

  “Nothin’.”

  “I ain’t gone blind yet, boy! I asked you what it was!”

  Cody slowly took the tie rack from under his arm. His palms were wet. Sweat trickled down his neck, and he longed for a breath of fresh air. He had trouble looking at his father, as if his eyes couldn’t bear the sight; and whenever he was close to the old man, something inside him felt dead, heavy, ready to be buried. But whatever that dead thing was, it sometimes gave a surprising kick, and the gravediggers would not come to dispose of it. “Just a tie rack,” he explained. “I made it at school.”

  “Lordy Mercy.” Curt whistled, stood up, and came toward Cody, who retreated a pace before he caught himself. “Hold that up so I can see it.” Curt reached out, and Cody let him touch it. His father’s nicotine-stained fingers caressed the smooth rosewood and the simulated mother-of-pearl squares. “You made this? Who helped you?”

  “Nobody.”

  “I swear, that’s a fine piece of work! Them edges are smoother ’n free pussy! How long it take you to do this?”

  Cody wasn’t used to being praised by the old man, and it made him even more jittery. “I don’t know. Awhile, I guess.”

  “A tie rack.” Curt grunted and shook his head. “That beats all. I never knew you had it in you to do somethin’ like this, boy. Who taught you?”

  “I just learned. Kind of hit-and-miss.”

  “Pretty thing. I swear it is. I like those little silver squares. Makes it fancy, don’t it?”

  Cody nodded. And bolstered by his father’s interest, he dared to step over the line that they had drawn between them a long time ago, over nights of shouting, cold silence, drunken brawls, and curses. Cody’s heart was pounding. “Do you really like it?”

  “Sure do.”

  Cody held it toward his father. His hands were trembling. “I made it for you,” he said.

  Curt Lockett stared at him, his face slack. His haggard eyes moved to the tie rack, to his son’s face, and back again. Slowly, he reached out with both hands and took the tie rack, and Cody let him have it. “Lordy Mercy.” Curt’s voice was soft and respectful as he drew the tie rack to his chest. “Lordy Mercy. This is better than you could buy at a store, ain’t it?”

  “Yes sir.” The dead thing deep inside Cody suddenly twitched.

  Curt’s fingers played over the wood. He had the scarred, rough hands of a man who had dug ditches, laid pipes, and mortared bricks since he was thirteen years old. He cradled the tie rack like a child, and he went back to the sofa and sat down. “This is mighty fine,” Curt whispered. “Mighty fine.” Cobwebs of smoke from the burning cigarette drifted past his face.

  “I used to do carpentry,” he said, his eyes focused on nothing. “Long time back. Took the jobs that came along. Your mama used to pack a lunch for me, and she’d say, ‘Curt, you do me proud today,’ and I’d answer, ‘I will, Treasure.’ That’s what I called your mama: Treasure. Oh, she was a pretty thing. You could look at her and believe in miracles. She was so pretty…so pretty. Treasure. That’s what I called your mama.” His eyes glistened, and he bowed his head with both hands curled around the tie rack.

  Cody heard his father make a choking sound, and the thing inside him kicked at his heart. He’d seen his old man cry drunk tears before, but this was different. These tears smelled of hurt instead of whiskey. He didn’t know if he could handle the sight or not. He wavered, and then he took a step toward the old man. The second step came easier, and the third was easier still. He lifted his hand to touch the old man’s shoulder.

  Curt’s body shook. He wheezed like he was having a choking fit; and then he suddenly lifted his head, and Cody saw that even though his father’s eyes were wet, the old man was laughing. His laughter got harder and harsher, until it boomed from his throat like the snarl of a wild beast.

  “You’re the damnedest fool!” Curt managed to say, snorting with laughter. “The damnedest fool! You know I ain’t got no ties!”

  Cody’s outstretched hand clenched into a fist. He drew it back against his side.

  “Not a one!” Curt hollered, and his head rocked back as the choked laughter spilled out. Tears ran through the cracks around his eyes. “Lordy Mercy, what a fool I’ve raised!”

  Cody stood very still. A pulse beat at his temple. His lips were tight, and they hid his gritted teeth.

  “Why the hell didn’t you make me a footstool, boy? I coulda used a footstool! How the hell am I gonna use a tie rack when I don’t own no ties!”

  The boy let his father’s laughter go on for another thirty seconds or so. And finally Cody said, clearly and firmly, “You didn’t go to the bakery today, did you?”

  The laughter gurgled to a halt like a clogged drain backing up. Curt coughed a few times, his eyes still watery, and crushed his cigarette out on the burn-scarred tabletop. “Naw. What the fuck is it to you?”

  “I’ll tell you what it is to me,” Cody answered. His spine was rigid, and his eyes looked like scorched holes. “I’m tired of takin’ up your slack. I’m tired of workin’ at the gas station and watchin’ you piss the money down the toi—”

  “You watch your mouth!” Curt stood up, one hand gripping the tie rack and the other cocked into a fist.

  Cody flinched but did not retreat. His guts were full of fire and fury, and he had to get it all out. “You heard me! I’m not coverin’ for you anymore! I’m not callin’ that freakin’ bakery and tell ’em you’re too sick to work! Hell, they know you’re a drunk! Everybody knows you’re not worth a piss-ant’s damn!”

  Curt bellowed and swung at his son, but Cody was faster by far. The man’s fist plowed through empty air.

  “Yeah, try to hit me!” Cody backpedaled out of range. “Come on, you old bastard! Just try to hit me!”

  Curt lurched forward, tripped, and stumbled over the table. Hollering with rage, he went down onto the floor in a flurry of playing cards and ashes.

  “Come on! Come on!” Cody urged wildly, and he started running to the windows and flinging the shutters open. Searing white sunlight flooded the room, exposing the dirty rug, the cracked walls, the beat-up secondhand furniture. The sunlight fell upon the man who was trying to stagger to his feet at the center of the room, and he threw his hand over his eyes and screamed, “Get out! Get out of my house, you little fuck!” He flung the tie rack in Cody’s direction. It whacked against the wall and fell to the floor.

  Cody didn’t look at it. “I’ll go,” he said, his chest heaving but his voice cold now, his eyes as muddy as his father’s as he watched the old man shield his fa
ce from the sun. “Sure, I’ll go. But I’m not coverin’ for you anymore. If you lose the job, it’s your ass.”

  “I’m a man!” Curt shouted. “You can’t talk to me like that! I’m a man!”

  Now it was Cody’s turn to laugh—a bitter, wounded sound. Inside him the weight of the dead thing had gotten heavier. “You just remember.” He turned toward the door to get out.

  “Boy!” Curt’s voice boomed. Cody paused. “You’d better be glad your mama’s dead, boy,” Curt seethed. ‘“Cause if she was still alive, she’d hate you as much as I do.”

  Cody was instantly out the door; it slammed shut like a trap at his back. He sprinted down the steps to his motorcycle and drew the desert air into his lungs to clear his head, because for a second there he’d felt like his brain was being squeezed inside a small box and one more ounce of pressure would’ve made it blow. “You people crazy over there?” Stan Frazier called from his own porch, his gut hanging over the belt of his trousers. “What’s all the hollerin’ about?”

  “Kiss my ass!” Cody flipped the man a bird as he got onto the Honda and kickstarted it. Frazier’s face turned crimson; he wobbled down the steps after Cody, but the boy accelerated so rapidly that the motorcycle’s front wheel reared up and the rear tire shot sand into the air. Cody tore across the yard and swerved onto Brazos Street, spinning the red Honda around in a skidding turn that left its signature on the pavement.

  Inside the house, Curt stood up and squinted. He stumbled forward, hurriedly closed the shutters again. He felt better when the light was sealed away; he remembered that his father had died with the brown blotches of skin cancer all over his face and arms while the deeper, darker cancer ate his insides away, and that memory was never far from his nightmares. “Damn kid,” he muttered. Shouted it: “Damn kid!” If he’d talked to his old man the way that kid spoke to him, he’d be six feet under; as it was, his back and legs still carried a few scarred welts, some of his old man’s best swings with a shaving strop.

  He walked to the screen door, could smell the exhaust of Cody’s motorcycle lingering in the air. “Lockett!” It was Frazier’s voice. “Hey, Lockett! I wanna talk to you!” Curt closed the inner door and turned the latch. Now the only light came through cracks in the shutters, and the heat settled. He liked to sweat; it cleared the poisons out of a man’s system.

  There was enough light for Curt to see the tie rack on the floor. He picked it up. One end of the little wooden dowel had split and come loose and one of the perfectly carved edges was a splintered ruin, but other than that it was okay. Curt had never known the boy could do such work. It reminded him of what his own hands used to do, back when he was young and tough and he had Treasure at his side.

  That was long before Curt had been sitting in a hospital waiting room, and a doctor with a Mexican name had come to tell him that he had a son. But—and Curt could still feel the pressure of the Mexican doctor’s hand on his shoulder—would he please come back to the office? There was something else, something very important, that needed to be talked about.

  It was because Treasure had been so frail. Because her body was giving everything to the baby. Odds were ten thousand to one, the Mexican doctor had said. Sometimes a woman’s body was so tired and worn out that the shock of childbirth was too much. Complications set in—but, señor, your wife has blessed you with a healthy little boy. Under the circumstances, they both might have died, and for this baby’s life you can give thanks to God.

  There had been forms to sign. Curt couldn’t read very well; Treasure had done all the reading. So he just pretended, and scrawled where his name was supposed to be.

  Curt’s hand clenched the tie rack, and he almost smashed it against the wall again. It was just like Cody, he realized. What damned good was a kid without a mother? And what damned good was a tie rack without a tie? But he didn’t smash it, because it was a pretty thing. He took it with him into his bedroom, where the bed was rumpled and the clothes were dirty and four empty bottles of Kentucky Gent were lined up atop the chest of drawers.

  Curt switched on the overhead light and sat down on his bed. He retrieved the half bottle of Kentucky Gent with its trademark happy colonel on the label from the floor and unscrewed the cap. His elbow bent, his mouth accepted, and the taste of life shocked his throat.

  But he felt so much better with whiskey inside him. Already stronger. His mind already clearer. He could reason things out again, and after a few more swallows he decided he wasn’t going to let Cody get away with talking uppity. Hell, no! He was a man, by God! And it was high time he cut that damn kid down a few pegs.

  His gaze wandered to the framed photograph on the little table next to the bed. The picture was sun-faded, many-times-creased, stained with either whiskey or coffee, he couldn’t remember. It showed a seventeen-year-old girl in a blue-striped dress, her blond hair boiling in thick curls around her shoulders and aglow with sunlight. She was smiling and making an okay sign for Curt, who’d snapped the photo with an Instamatic four days before they were married. Even then the kid had been growing inside her, Curt thought. Less than nine months later, she would be dead. Why he’d kept the kid he didn’t know, but his sister had helped him out before she got married for the third time and moved to Arizona. The kid was part of Treasure, and maybe that was why he’d decided to raise Cody himself. That was the name they’d already decided on if the kid was a boy.

  He ran a finger over the sunlit hair. “It’s not right,” he said softly. “It’s not right that I got old.”

  Swig by swig, the half bottle died. The burn pulsed in his gut, like the center of a volcano that demanded more sacrifices. When he realized the bottle was gone, he remembered that there was another up on the closet’s shelf. He got up, stumbled to the closet—howdy there, legs!—and reached up for it, groping amid old shirts, socks, and a couple of cowboy hats to where he’d stashed the juice. He didn’t trust the damn kid not to pour the stuff down the drain when his back was turned.

  He had to stretch way up to the dusty rear of the shelf before his fingers found the familiar shape. “There y’are! Gotcha, didn’t I?” He pulled it free, dislodging a leather belt, a ragged blue shirt, and something else that fell to the floor at his feet.

  Curt’s cocked grin fractured.

  It was a necktie, white with red-and-blue circles all over it.

  “Lordy Mercy,” Curt whispered.

  At first he couldn’t place the thing. But then he thought he recalled buying it to wear when the federal safety boys had toured the copper mine and he was an assistant foreman on the railroad loading dock. Long time back, before a Mexican took his job away from him. Curt leaned over to get it, staggered, lost his balance, and fell to the floor on his side. He realized he still had the tie rack gripped in his other hand, and he carefully set the Kentucky Gent aside, righted himself, and picked up the necktie. From it wafted a stale hint of Vitalis.

  He had to concentrate to steady his hand; he looped the tie around the tie rack’s dowel. It looked real pretty against the smooth wood and the silver squares. A thrill coursed through him, and he wanted Cody to see this. The boy was in the other room; Curt had heard him come in just a minute ago, when the screen door’s hinges squealed. “Cody!” he shouted, trying to get up. He finally got his legs under himself and was able to stand. He stumbled to the bedroom door. “Cody, looky here! Looky what I—”

  He almost fell through the door into the front room. But Cody was not there, and the only noise was the fan’s sluggish stuttering. “Cody?” he asked, the tie trailing from the tie rack in his hand. There was no answer, and Curt rubbed the side of his head with numb fingers. He remembered having a fight with Cody. That was yesterday, wasn’t it? Oh, Lord! he thought, speared by panic. I’d better get to the bakery or Mr. Nolan’ll skin me! But he was very tired, and his legs were unsteady; he thought he might be coming down with the flu. Missing one day at the bakery wouldn’t hurt anything; those cakes, pies, and rolls would get baked whether he was
there or not and, anyway, there wasn’t much business.

  Cody’ll cover for me, Curt decided. Always has before. He’s a good ol’ kid.

  Mighty thirsty, he thought. Mighty, mighty thirsty! And cradling the tie rack with its single ugly tie against his chest, he staggered back into the bedroom, where time folded and refolded and the happy colonel held dominion.

  14

  Daufin’s Desire

  “WHAT DO YOU MEAN, she’s changed?” Tom blinked, his senses whirling. He looked at Jessie, who was leaning against the doorframe with her arms crossed and hands cupping her elbows. She stared at a place on the floor, her eyes dark and distant, her attention turned inward. “Jessie, what’s he talking about?”

  “I don’t mean your daughter’s changed physically.” Matt Rhodes was trying to speak in a calm and comforting voice, but he didn’t know how successful he was being since his own insides seemed to be tangled into twitching knots. He’d pulled a chair up so that he was only a few feet from where Tom Hammond sat on the sofa, directly facing the man. Ray, just as shocked as his father at coming home and finding two air-force officers, was sitting in a chair to the left. White stripes of sunlight painted the living-room walls. “Physically, she’s the same,” Rhodes emphasized. “It’s just…well, there’s been a mental change.”