EDEN

In her eyes he could see the hope spring eternal.For it was in her eyes that he saw at once the vibrant dance of all life and the sad sorrowful portrait of the human condition. In her smile he felt the warmth that fed the impoverished and nourished the spirit. It was an unforgettable smile, pure, alive, and undeniably familiar.For it breached the million years of his soul’s existence and traversed the desert days of laborious drudgery that he had sold his mind and body to.He could now understand as he gazed thickly into the vast and immense sea, as he strode boldly into the dense cocoon fragility of the lush and pungent forest.It was in her that he now found reasons to live. He was in love. He could only know from the sheer force of emotion what now was transformed in him. For this he had never experienced. He had known the desperation of longing and the sharp pains of unrequited desire and he had felt the endless agitation of his youthful lust, but never before had he cherished another soul.He wanted now only to be near her, to admire her, to hear the soft timbre of her voice as the words flowed from her gentle lips.He cared neither to possess her, nor did he lust for her. For she did not belong to him, but to that vast and undefinable  immensity that lay beyond. It was enough for him to know that she existed. An opulent flower in the meadow of God’s grandeur.

in valle lacrimarum

It was rust. It was rust and it was rot and it spat soot and the soot beget a graphite that crawled into all of its many orifices and filmed all about it with its color and that color was filth.It was seventy and seven cylindrical arteries and seething tanks of poison pus.It was rust and from its snout it shot fire and belched smoke and the smoke was white from the venom that flowed through its being.It’s sirens whistled in high screaming shrills and flashes of lighting shot from its many molten corridors and from its bowels rolled hideous monsters that crept through the night, piercing the silence with their gruesome growl and scream. They heaved maniacally and screeched across the concrete with their fierce black claws.It was steel and it was hard and around its skin grew razors. It’s capillaries were twisted into a multitude of harrowing metallic serpents.It blew its acid breath into the trees and its horrid stench burned the nostrils of the animal and wilted the leaves of the suffocating trees and plants that were bound to its vicinity.It took from them their breath and it cancered their bodies, rotting them from the inside. From the harvest of its malignant furnaces they fed their children. They prayed that it not be slain. They fought for its life and it fed on their skin and their blood and their sweat and their fear.It was life and it was death and its subjects congregated in masses to pay it homage and bow before its enervating grip. They subsisted in the shadow of its ghastly presence, for it was their alpha and their omega.It left its ugly scar upon their Eden.They were forsaken.

He cleaned the soot from the window for sight and saw dark clouds of usurped ash color the sky. He crept into the room and bore witness to their twisted entanglement. She encouraged him with her harlot feigning ecstasy. He was puzzled and he was enraptured and he was hypnotized. When the man screamed at him he ran to the window. He heard the harrowing echo of her mirth. On another day she encouraged him and another man screamed at him and he ran to the window. On the third day that she encouraged him and a third man screamed at him he ran once more to the window and asked of the dark monster for the power of vindication. The monster did not forsake him. For this they came for him and they took him away. When he returned to her he was bigger and stronger. He beat her, for she had encouraged him. She fled from him and he was left alone to play about the edges of the great monster, and he found his demon strength in its dark shadows. When they found him he was sixteen years. They commanded him to steal for them and he obeyed. They commanded him to bludgeon their enemies and he obeyed them as before, crying yes, master. And when they beat him black and bloodied him red he stood before them, drinking of his own blood and begged them to kill him for he swore to murder them. They did not. They clasp a hand into his bloody one and they made him of them. They made him a lord of the dark. He, they called Rusty.

I

Hoop Delaney laughed like a baboon. It was an utterly stupid, hyperventilating, gargling, gurgle. His stained and disfigured teeth would float about in his huge mouth, a mouth that resembled a slice of watermelon or perhaps it was more closely assimilated to the cut out mouth of a jack-o-lantern. Wick had, more then once, referred to Hoop as; Pumpkin head. He was laughing that stupid laugh on one sweltering July afternoon, yet it could hardly be heard over the rumbling racket of Burgy’s sixty seven muffler less Chrysler. It could almost go without being said, that when Rainbow Campbell leaned, too far, out the car window to annihilate the Doyle’s mailbox with a baseball bat, that the crashing thud echoing from that act were barely audible. And that fact bore true for the four occupants of the New Yorker. It did not for the resident owner of the battered box. Harp Doyle heard it, you’re damned tootin he did. And he knew just as soon as he heard it, just exactly what it was and the grip he held on his chain saw tightened, turning his normally hairy, red, hand white. It would be the third box he’d have to replace that summer and it was only July. One of these days he’d get um and when he did, there would be hell to pay. And as fate would have it, this turned out to be Harp’s lucky day. You see, it would appear that Rainbow had extended himself so far out the car window to reach Harp’s box that he couldn’t get himself back in and plummeted, head first, into a ditch less then a quarter of a mile from the blasting point of his dastardly deed. Harp rushed out to check the damage to his box just in time to see the blur of Rainbow’s jug head whirling from the car window like an half empty Thunderbird bottle. Harp started like a cat spotting a wounded bird. And although his assailant lay helpless before him, (a small piece up the road was all) his mind began to race with a crazed exhalation, so much so, that he had forgotten to put down his chain saw, or had he? I mean, maybe it was one of those Freudian things. After all, a man never knew when a good power tool would come in handy and this was a good one. It was the model 610 Scruffy Clear Cut Roughneck. Wilma had gotten it for him last Christmas. Harp had been like a twelve year old receiving his first shot gun. Yes sir, a man just never knew. As he thought this last thought a grim smirk appeared on his sweaty, red, face. Perhaps he’d take a foot, he mused. He could pin it to his dilapidated mailbox. Or better still, he could tack it up out back the ol shed. It would make a good conversation piece when he and some of the boys got together on Saturday night to drink sour mash. It was on this turn of deliberations that Harp strode forth, his gait ever quickening, until it was more like a trot. Once he had crested the embankment, he paused to take a breath, and then smugly considered his vantage point as he stood hovering over his, soon to be, victim. Well now, observed Harp, if it ain’t one of them damned Campbell’s. Harp knew um, they all looked alike, coming in pint, quart, and gallon size. He recollected whippin a couple of them Campbell boys back in high school. Hell, there musta been fifty of them damned Campbell’s strung across Lofton Hill.Rainbow, trapped and cornered, would like to have found a hole to craw into, but there were none.Not even one big enough to fit a weasel like himself. He absently thought about Bird dog’s advise not to do that last dumb thing that he did that got him here, but then he often absently thought about good advice, usually after doing the dumb thing that such advice was suggesting that he not. Harp paced back and forth like a wolf, thumb flipping at the pull cord. Rainbow, from the corner of his eye, spotted the coveted baseball bat and with one mad jerk snatched for the grip, before considering that this might also be a dumb act, compounding the previous one. His fingers wrapped around the bat at the same time that Harps’ construction boot stomped down on ol Rainbow’s wrist, forcing him to relinquish his grip. Harp then slowly wrapped his thick fingers around the barrel of the bat, twirled it around in the air, and then paused a second to contemplate his—- vantage point. Observing this instrument used in the demise of his box, he decided to spare the Scruffy and allow the punishment to fit the crime. This being decided, Harp Doyle fixed his grip solidly and with one swift swoosh, landed a whack, special delivery, across the left cheek of Rainbow’s ass. One that he felt quite sincerely down to his tail pipe. Rainbow, no stranger to an ass whoopin, clung fiercely to an old tree root with one hand and came up with a fist full of dirt in the other when the second whack smashed his rib cage, cracking two and bruising a third. After this second swing, ol Harp felt a bit like a drunk after a morning double, the satisfied monkey clawing gently and nibbling softly. It was in this state that he offered up one final kick in the back side, hurled the bat across the road into ol man Fitch’s field, picked up the Scruffy and headed back toward the house. Rainbow lay there, a muddled puddle of whimpering puppy, mumbling sounds that resembled mom and God. When he finally realized his attacker had retreated and he himself still not at the gates of hell, the next thought that flooded poor Rainbow’s pea brain was this—–where the hell’s Burgy? Well it seems that Bird Dog (That’s Burgy. Friends called him Burgy, but good buddies called him Bird Dog. ) had been too damned preoccupied to notice that Rainbow had fallen out the window. In fact, he never did notice. It had been Wicky, the forth boy in the back seat, straddling the case of pissy warm Pabst, that had noticed. But Wick was too damned inebriated to respond for good half a mile. Meanwhile, Hoop sat over in the corner mumbling unintelligibly, attempting to piece together the situation like a cave man gazing at first upon the wheel. Finally ol Wick turned over the whiskey bottle he had been communing with and shouted up at Burgy. “Hell Bird Dog, Goddamned Rainbow done jumped out the winder mile back.” Burgy looked across the seat, took a sip of beer, and began to compute the fact that Rainbow, who in fact had been riding shotgun, was now, in fact, gone. This process took some thirty seconds. After which, Bird dog, from sixty miles per hour, locked up the brakes, skidded ten yards, did a U turn in the middle of the highway, and headed back in the direction which they had just driven. The boys returning to the aforementioned spectacle offered little consolation for Rainbow. The dye of his fate having been cast. Burgy wheeled the Chrysler slowly and cautiously toward the scene, keeping a safe distance, without really knowing why. The sight of this brute like giant wielding a chain saw one second and a club the next seemed a matter to step back and consider. He figured it might be a safe bet to observe rather then act. After all this wasn’t the first time Rainbow started some shit he couldn’t finish. Maybe he needed this lesson. Hoop thought it an interesting debacle to watch through a drunken blur. Through intermittent baboon snorts he would ask in his quip and very dumb voice; “Think he’ll kill him Wick?” Wick, with a mouth full of Blue Ribbon, burst out laughing, spraying beer all over the car. This of course was too much for the other two and they began snickering and snorting uncontrollably. After that they all sort of sat in a quite stupor watching, just watching, mostly out of fear and amusement. Wick figured twenty four cans of beer divided by three was better then twenty four divided by four. He had gotten that far in school. Besides, he always seemed to be a little bit smarter when it came to calculating money and booze or dope. Especially when it was somebody else’s money, booze, or dope. Hoop, on the other hand, was a simpler guy. He just liked to watch a good, old fashioned, ass whoopin, even if it was a friend. Rainbow would snap back together like Wiley coyote, reckoned Wick. So what the hell. Burgy however, although smirking and grinning along with the other two stooges, didn’t assess the situation as good humored. Something would have to be done. He didn’t know what, but something, yet at this very moment he felt paralyzed and mesmerized. As it came to pass, Harp Doyle picking up his chain saw and walking down the road meant that whatever would be done, would have to wait. For now he would have to go scoop up the dog shit remains of ol Rainbow. Burgy, without averting his fixed stare on the image of the man and the chain saw, spasmodically jerked the Chrysler into gear and wheeled up to the spot where Rainbow laid quivering like a sick cow. Glaring down at the pathetic sight of Rainbow, Burgy simply said “Get in the car, puss.” Wick jumped out like a paramedic, then stumbled over to the bush to take a leak. Rainbow slowly crawled into the car, each step and movement requiring an agonized effort. Wick hurriedly shook off and ran to catch the already moving vehicle. Everybody, except Burgy, started talking at the same time, recounting the incident as they saw it. Rainbow complained about the pain in his leg, his head, his ass, and so on and so on until ol Bird dog couldn’t take it any more. Fed up with all the whining, Burgy locked up the brakes and brought the car to a screeching halt. He then turned to Rainbow and said ” LISTEN, you sniveling little pussy, everybody gets an ass whoopin now and then so why don’t you just take it like a man instead of a fuckin little girl? I ain’t taken ya to no hospital and I ain’t havin no pissy ass little girls ridin around in my car. So drink a beer and shut up”. Rainbow straightened himself up and did what Burgy said. He knew ol Bird dog was right. Hell, he learned that lesson a long time ago when his ol man used to come home drunk, slappin the ol lady around and knockin kids across the room. So, with beer and a grimace, he swallowed his pain, got to work on getting drunk, felt less pain, and held his head up with pride, consoling himself in the knowledge that he was a member of the Lofton Hill gang. It was all he had and it would have to be enough.

II

Ol Bird dog was getting tired of drivin around wasting gas and decided to park it out at Crow’s Creek Road for about an hour or so before they headed over to Mabels’. His decision was not debated or explained. He simply decided and without any conversation off they went. Crow’s Creek winded and stretched and hooked and then winded some more until it came upon a large corn field that bordered a stretch of broken blacktop about a mile long. The corn stalks towered pertly on each side of the road. They must have been six feet tall already. It would be a banner year for corn. Burgy made a right hand turn on to a dirt road that sliced down the middle of the cornfield, a road that looked to be more accommodating to a tractor then a car. “Hot damn Bird dog, wanta slow her down?” winced Hoop. Burgy never responded and kept right on going at a good forty MPH over bumps and ditches and cow shit and God knows what else. He sometimes fancied himself as the commando of a tank unit boldly headed off to battle the japs, nazis, or who ever else was givin um shit. When he finally stopped he yanked it into reverse. Then he threw his right arm over the back of his seat and looking past an annoyed Hoop, backed the Chrysler up into and over corn stalks until it was completely camouflaged. Wick and Hoop jumped out. Hoop to take a piss and Wick to shake off the dust. God damned cloud of dust just hovered over them. Ol Wick had dust in his hair, his nose, his eyes, and even in his beer. What the hell’s the matter with that damned psycho case Burgy, driving like a fuckin maniac, thought Wick. Made him spill his beer on himself. He looked like he pissed himself now. He was wearing his lucky pants too. Last time he wore these ones he got a piece of ass out at Mabel’s. Now he just looked pissy, God damned pissy. Fuckin Burgy. Poor Rainbow looked and felt like a guy who had just been tied to the bumper and dragged. That was about the effect the ride had on him. He wasn’t about to say anything though because Bird dog was in a strange way, a scary way. Ol Rainbow knew Burgy well. They had grown up together. He knew how dark and mean Bird dog got at times and this looked like one of those times. He didn’t like the dark cloud forming over Burgy’s head. It meant trouble and he had had his share of that today, but he wasn’t gonna say nothing. He just sat there and sucked in the pain, winced, and with quick, not so inconspicuous glances, watched Bird dog fester and smolder. Burgy retrieved a camel from behind his ear, tapped it on the dash, and then propped it into the corner of his mouth. He then snarled a look in Rainbow’s direction, as if he were crazy. Rainbow anxiously fished a lighter from his pocket and lit Burgy’s cigarette. Burgy took the longest drag from a cigarette Rainbow ever saw. Burgy often did. Then after it seemed he had swallowed and forgotten the smoke he would exhale. Then he looked out the window a long, intense moment, dropped his eyes Rainbow’s way and said, ” We ain’t gonna take this shit. . . Not like this. Not like dogs lying down.” “Wh-wh-what we gonna do Bird dog?”, Burgy took a few seconds to digest and compute this question, made a pursing motion with his lips, which was a very Burgyish thing, pulled at the tip of his thin, developing mustache, then snapped back as if he had just returned– “I don’t know. . . Yet“, said Burgy. “I’m thinkin about it.” He was and he had been. In fact the whole reason for coming out to the cornfield was to think, but who can think with a God damned baboon jabbering. “You wanna shut up a minute”, snapped Burgy in Hoop’s direction, Hoop continued to laugh but turned it down a few decibels. Burgy accepted this as adequate respect and went back to thinkin. It wasn’t so much that he felt sorry for Rainbow. Hell, he deserved an ass whoopin for being such a jackass, fallen out the window and all, but that wasn’t no reason for that hulking basturd to beat on him the way he did. A wave of sorrow swept over ol Bird Dog for his childhood friend who was just now looking pretty pathetic. Burgy had told him just two minutes before not to start that stupid shit with the baseball bat. That really wasn’t it either though, but something else. Burgy couldn’t quite put his finger on it. He often felt agitated by things without really knowing why. Yet, there seemed something personal here. Somehow, by virtue of being Rainbow’s friend, he had been insulted, violated, as it were, and he couldn’t let that happen. Rainbow felt helpless and frightened. There were shooting spasms of pain around his chest. So much so that he was beginning to feel delirious. Burgy’s eyes were giving off a glazed and haunted glint. The sparkling, soft grayness, now appearing furiously stark. Rainbow didn’t like it. Burgy seemed to thrive on the idea of having some grudge to bear. It offered him a sordid, venomous, and vindictive reason for living. Being self deceived, Burgy often knew not the true enemy and in his deceptions was subject to lash out at any provocateur, simply to vent the smoldering furnace within. The idea of taking another life wasn’t an obsession of his, but he did feel a kind of power in the idea of being someone angry enough to kill. Although the urge or desire, or at least the thought of it might be common in even rational and balanced men, it didn’t repel or repulse Burgy. Rainbow was one of a very few who suspected or perhaps knew that Burgy harbored such phantoms. When it came to revenge, Burgy had stopped drawing boundary lines. Incarceration was only a minimal deterrent. Hell, he’d spent a couple of years in a reform school already and had found it to be a somewhat agreeable lifestyle. It was a simple and basic life with clear cut rules and boundaries. He never felt confused in there. The people in there were people like him. Boys that had been fucked in life and learned to stop caring. To stop giving a damn about their P’s and Q’s, people that had been pushed to the edge, treading a thin line for so long that it didn’t matter any longer which side they ended up on. Nobody gave a damn where you came from or how much money you’re parents made. Not in there. Besides, he was only seventeen, at least for a couple more months, although he could produce false identification that showed he was nineteen. This was used for the purchase of alcohol–the magic potion he had become depended upon to function normally. He wouldn’t go to the pen. Probably Hutchensville or that boy’s camp over at Black Water Falls. He had already heard that those places weren’t that bad. He was beginning to develop an ache at the base of his skull from all this thinking and warm beer, dust, and heat. With a quick, impulsive movement he slung the car door open, belched, crunched his beer can, and walked to the rear of the car. He stood there for a few seconds, silent, sucking one last draw from his camel before flicking it into the cornfield. He then reached behind his back and unsnapped the sheath holding his Buck knife. Then, with one flick of the wrist, he snapped the blade open. The razor sharp edge flashed a cold glare like a magic wand. It clicked in the instant of a frame of film and the evening sun began to drop behind a hill. All the glistening sunlight seemed to vanish in a twinkling, giving way to a very vivid dusk. The cornfield took on a spooky, confined, and surrounded mode. Burgy then took a couple of steps toward Hoop and Wick, who had been leaning against the car drinking and babbling. He then spoke these words, while staring at the blade of his knife; “I don’t know Hoop. I been thinkin. . . Feller can’t always tell just what’s gonna go down. Y’all know what I mean don’t cha. . . Wick? ” Wick could have sworn that the knife blade reflected a glow that turned Burgy’s eyes into two fiery pools of evilness. Then ol Bird dog clinched his jaw, and hissing through his teeth, uttered these words. “I believe we’ll head over to Maxine’s tonight. Yes sir, I believe that’s just what we’ll do”. Then he laughed a sinister Snidley Whiplash laugh and Hoop was sure that Bird dog’s teeth never moved when he spoke or when he laughed.

III

Unlike Mabel’s, Maxine’s was a respectable business establishment. Maxine’s was a bar and grill, not a booze dive like Mabel’s. A person could get themselves a hamburg, hot dog, or fish sandwich at Maxine’s. At Mabel’s they didn’t even put beer nuts on the bar. The whole family could enjoy themselves at Maxine’s. A man and his wife could have themselves a beer, while the kids drank pop and ate potato chips. They even had one of those games where you throw the weighted disc down to hit the bowling pins. Except it really ran over some little metal pegs that came up from the bottom and never touched the pins. Trouble makers generally steered clear of Maxine’s. Patronage was basically comprised of working men. Lumberjacks, miners, and the sort were common at Maxine’s. Mel Tillis, Johnny Cash, Conway Twitty, and the likes provided the entertainment by way of their forty five’s spinning on the old Wurlitzer juke box. The pool table was occasionally a source of minor disputes, but of course gambling was against the rules. You could get your beer in a long neck bottle, a fish bowl, or a mug. Every Tuesday and Thursday from six to eight was happy hour. Beers by the mug were fifty cents, or you could get a fishbowl and a fish sandwich for one dollar. That was Maxine’s seafarer special. The interior design had changed very little over the last ten years. The last change took place about five years ago. That was when Stub, Maxine’s husband, put two booths in with the help of his long time friend Harp Doyle. Harp and Stubby went back some twenty years. They had met in the late fifties while they were both employed by the railroad. Stubby had been a brakeman until he lost a foot in a switch mishap in 1960. It was then that Charles Harvey Thomas was christened “Stubby”. Stubby had received a settlement from the railroad company in compensation for his misfortune. That, in addition to some personal savings, was enough for he and Maxine to purchase the old building on Gatlin Street, a couple of coolers, a grill, various other odds and ends, and reopen the old Step Right Inn under the new name of Maxine’s Bar and Grill. There had been some small dispute over the name. Stub’s Place had been suggested by Stub, but Maxine had her way this time. In fact, Maxine had her way most of the time. Stub didn’t care much to argue with his willful wife. He didn’t rightly give a damn what it was called, just as long as he got to sit and drink cold beer in his own bar whenever he felt like it and he felt like it a lot. Heck, the way he figured, any good ol boy would give up a foot to live that kind of luxury. So he was happy to turn the reins over to Maxine. He’d let everyone know how she was the boss and everything. He got himself out of a lot of work that way. It was an arrangement Maxine liked. After all, Stub just got in the way whenever she was tryin to pickle some eggs or arrange some chips on the rack. He argued about everything too. So she was just as well to have his ass sittin on the other side of the bar or off fishin or whatever else, so long as he was out of her hair. Maxine liked to run things and Stub liked to let her. I suppose it could be accurately stated that they were compatible. It stands to reason since they had been married for thirty four years. Getting a little work out of Stub was a plus. He was more likely to spend afternoons watching baseball games or sittin on barstool mountain chewin the fat with one of his buddies. On this particular afternoon it had been Harp Doyle. Harp had blown in out of the heat all sweaty and thirsty from his labors in the hot sun. Stubby had turned slowly at the jingling of the door to notice his pal, grinned softly, and went back to the baseball game he had been watching. Harp shuffled in, swiped his wrist across his brow, and sat quietly on the stool next to Stub. A bit too quietly, Stub thought. This lack of hearty congeniality on Harp’s part caught Stubby’s attention. He knew Harp well enough to know that something was amiss. “Well who the hell stole your ice cream cone son?” Quipped Stub. Harp flashed a snickery grin Maxine’s way, and then slapped a paw across Stubby’s shoulder and back. “Ain’t no problem in the world a cold beer can’t make better” said Stub. Slowly turning to focus in on Harp. Stubby needed to strain slightly these days to focus in. “Hot one out there today, peg leg.” “That’s just one of the reasons I’m in here” responded Stub. Maxine appeared and set an icy mug of beer in front of Harp. He fished for his money but was quickly rebuffed by Maxine. “Oh no ya don’t sailor” ,snipped Maxine, with her finger wagging. “Son I done tol ya your money ain’t no good in here” chimed in Stub. Harp smiled, picked up his mug and gulped a fair portion, enjoying the crackling feeling of the foam on his unshaven upper lip. “Who’s winnin?” “Atlanter. . .Reds shoot themselves in the foot ever chance they git. Can’t hit the side of a barn painted red in broad day light “. Stub’s metaphorical red barn came to him from a childhood memory. It was a standard ol Mail Pouch barn perched atop the hill just above the old farmhouse he grew up in. Once every few years it would be freshly painted and cast off a glistening reflection that could be seen for miles. An old pump that drew cool water, dirty feet, dry throat. It all seemed a part of some portrait imprinted upon his personal archive. He nostalgically, dimly, recollected how long ago that it all happened in a second that seemed like minutes. He was old now. He had aches in his joints. His bones creaked and when it got cold he could never seem to keep warm. There had been mornings lately when he really didn’t want to get out of bed. It would be nice just to lay there and quietly drift off somewhere without aches and pains, and troubles. Somewhere over the rainbow. But he had conceded some years back that such a place didn’t really exist. He gathered himself, took a long draw from his beer, and while staring blankly at the television, asked Harp. “What’s a eatin at ya?” Harp shuffled, groaned, and slowly began. . . “Had a little situation over my place safternoon. Couple of punks knocked over my mailbox. Got my hands on one of um.” As he said these last words he looked down at his hands, turning them over contemplatively and inspecting the culprits. Harp’s hands were large, even for a man of his mass. They were made for outdoor work– lumberjacking, tilling, plowing. He had been careful all his life not to lay them on another human being for the purpose of causing harm. But happenstances such as the aforementioned seemed to sneak up every now and then. They were usually spontaneous reactions to some unexpected provocation. Nonetheless, with all his justifications and alibis he still felt ill at ease as a result of his actions. He hoped he hadn’t hurt the kid too much. He really just wanted to teach him a lesson. Oh well, he thought, and attempted to dismiss his guilt with a chug of beer. “Well it’s about time somebody jerked a kink in one of um.” Chimed in Stub. Those little bustards been a nuisance up and down that road all summer. Let me guess-gotta be one of those Lofton Hill punks.” “Yeah, responded Harp,” I reckon it was one of them Campbell boys. So damned many of um. Anyway, what’s done is done.” “Sounds like the boy made his own bed.” “I reckon you’re right about that”, said Harp, snatching his mug off the bar and finishing it with a stretch. He then slapped ol Stub across the back with his right hand, fished into his pocket and popped a dollar bill on the bar with his left, and started for a quick exit. Walking across the floor he dismissed the objectionable protestations with a wave of his big paw and seconds later found himself squinting in the late afternoon glare. Adjusting to the light and feeling a bit cooled down from the beer, he strolled down Gatlin Street in the direction of Dodd’s Hardware. Gatlin Street was fairly quite this afternoon. Harp glanced at his watch. It was four thirty five. He hadn’t much time. Ed closed at five and sometimes left early on Saturday. Harp stumbled on a curb of broken pavement and mused to himself–its gettin bad when I can’t handle one beer. He noticed the cragged weeds growing through the cracks. The fresh summer air spiced his nostrils with its mint thickness. As he strolled lazily down Gaitlin he began to reflect on the sites of this small town he grew up in. On his side of the street he drifted past the First National Bank of Trust and gave a friendly nod to Hal Wheeler. Funny how trust was so often associated with money, he thought. Every money grubbing slickster talks trust when he’s about to mark ya. Halbert Wheeler sat whittling away the hours on the front steps. Good ol Wheels. They say he was there when they built the damned place. Probably carved his initials in the support beams. Gaitlin and all of Woodburne, West Virginia seemed to shrink as Harp had gotten older. Stone and Thomas’s department store used to seem like the fashion Mecca of the Eastern seaboard. Biggest thing since Sears and Roebuck. Now the place just looked old and faded, weather battered. The store front window display which used to make for such big gossip amongst wispy old bitties about its risqué fashion mannequins now hadn’t been changed for years. Old man Rossenblatt just didn’t seem to have the energy to do much anymore. Besides, he seemed to have gotten depleted of his spunk and enthusiasm some years back fighting for his right to be a Jew in this redneck burg. Even after all his years of residency he never did quite fit in. But that’s the way things go. You can’t change who you are, unless you become a spineless ass. Rossenblatt wasn’t a spineless ass. He was just some poor shmuck miscast in this Twilight Zone Mayberry. Harp had now come upon the corner of Gaitlin and Main and could now see and smell Keye’s filling station. Couple of grease monkeys were grabassin with the water hose, trying to beat the heat. Harp recognized one of them as Mark Wise, Ted’s boy. He was a wispy little kid that never seemed to comb his hair and was always poppin off at the mouth. One got the idea upon meeting him that all the bolts weren’t fastened down, but he was gifted with an innate sense about engines. If ol Ralph Keys could straighten him out he’d make a crackerjack mechanic some day. Ralph had his work cut out for him. Ed Dodd had just stepped out on the sidewalk. Harp noticed Ed before Ed noticed Harp. At least it appeared that way. But things were often not as they appeared where Ed Dodd was concerned. Ed poking out of his hole like that reminded Harp of a rat venturing out. Ed Dodd had a rat like face, no chin, and all the rest of his features seemed scrunched together in the lower part of his face. His teeth were brown and he had an over bite that affected his speech, giving it a nasal quality. The faded gray smock he wore helped to create this rat like personification. “Howdy Harp” sparked the apparently startled Ed. Harp nodded suspiciously. There was something contrived about Ed Dodd. Harp had known this odd man all his life and could never quite put a finger on him. Dodd was smarter then just about everybody around and Harp was one of few smart enough to know it. For one thing Dodd played chess, apparently quite well because he had received several awards for it. Also, he was the best trivia player around and if anyone were ever stumped by a question on the daily chronicle’s jigsaw puzzle ol’ Ed was a good source to turn to. That was all well and good but there was some other mysterious quality about Dodd, he seemed to know things. Things he shouldn’t know. “Smells like rubber” said Ed, pushing his nose into the air. “Well Ed, they got a filling station across the street there, ya know” “Well now, it’s a fact they do” said Ed, dismissing the subject and graciously opening the store door for Harp. “What can I do for you today, Mr. Doyle” “Need some wood screws and Wilda needs a fly swatter” “All out of them, said Ed. Then he appeared to drift off into some preoccupation. Seconds later, when he returned, he finished the sentence. “Fly swatters that is. I got tire gauges if you need one.” As he asked this odd question, he was looking directly into the eyes, or possibly even the mind of his customer. Harp was perplexed and even somewhat annoyed with Ed’s apparent sales pitch. Then Ed stumbled as if he had lost his balance. Harp reached out to help him and felt the constricted muscles of Ed’s arm. “Are you feelin alright today Ed”? Ed breathed heavily, then reached out for the counter to support himself. He looked directly into Harp’s eyes in a very penetrating way, as if he were looking through him. Harp was frightened. He had not seen a man have a heart attack, but that was his impression of what Ed Dodd was experiencing. “I’m fine Harp. Just felt a bit dizzy, but I think I’m OK.” Harp didn’t really believe him, but decided to dismiss the matter after it appeared that Ed had regained himself. “I got a fresh new line of knives in and—what was that you wanted, I remember now: tire gauges.” What the hell do I need a tire gauge for, thought Harp. “No thanks Ed, just the screws”. “Yes sir, how many will you be requiring” “I don’t know, a handful, just throw um in a bag” “Will do” said Ed, as he hustled about in nervous, jerking movements. It puzzled Harp to watch the man, who only seconds earlier had seemed to be on the brink of collapse to now be skipping about sprite as a spring colt. Just after the bell on the register sounded, a loud popping pierced the air, muffled by the store-front glass. “Them there motorcycle boys drive up and down this street like bats outta hell “. Said ED. But Harp only stared into space. He snatched his screws and headed for the door, followed by Ed. Outside Harp saw only the back of the rider, his red pony tail whipping around the corner like a slinking fox. Harp looked at Ed, smiled and said “I smell rubber” “Do you now” said Ed, grinning uneasily. Then he went back inside his store. Harp paused momentarily, shook his head and started to walk back toward Maxine’s where he had parked his truck. He had seen that rider before. He knew the pony tail. He had driven past his place before, maybe after his daughter. It was always troubling to think of her, to think that in some way he had lost her and that in some way it had been his fault, yet it was a fault that he was unable to assess or understand. Just an awkward weight that bore him down somehow. A gnawing aberration crept into him, seemingly beckoning him, calling to him to rectify the matter while there was still time, but the feeling passed through him as such feelings often did without being dealt with. There would be other days, perhaps thousands of them, but then as quick as a snap he remembered that days were numbered.

IV

Ol Bird Dog, through a film of smoke, gazed heavily at the shimmering asphalt. The sun was just about to set behind a mountain of spruce that towered like an ominous sentinel over the western edge of Woodburne. Woodburne was bordered on the South by a drooping portion of this same mountain, known to residents as Lofton Hill. The terrain in and around the hill was steep and treacherous. The forest, a thick concentration of blue spruce and white pine at the higher elevations, giving way to the sugar maple, oak and birch at the lower levels. The soil was a dense clay that was stubborn and unyielding to proper drainage. A land unfit for farming primarily for those reasons as well as the fact that the tree density was such that little sunlight was permitted. Builders avoided the area. Most houses and cabins on the hill were built by the owners themselves and often couldn’t be found on the county tax ledgers. Land sold cheap and much of the area remained un surveyed. Squatters had set up camp and build cabins without interference from county officials for years. A brash young tax assessor once attempted to change all this in the early sixties when it was discovered that the county could not produce documents to support its tax drive. The assessor sent crews of land surveyors into the area. The men complained of equipment being stolen and marking posts disappearing. His project was suspended shortly after it had become apparent that the mounting costs of appraisal were a greater burden on the county tax coffers then what officials might collect from the dead beat land owners. The Eastern sector of Tyler county was richer and more fertile. It was comprised mostly of farmland and rolling meadows. Corn was the staple of the farming crop, followed by tomatoes (of many varieties), turnips, potatoes, and beans, also of many varieties. The hills and upper regions were thick with game and hunted with a high frequency, both legally and illegally. Most county folk were avid hunters as much for food as sport. Deer were thick in the hills and meadows, as were groundhog, possum, and raccoon. An occasional bear could be spotted along the upper edge of the hill around late summer, when the berries were ripe. Burgy squeezed a final frantic draw from his cigarette, flipped the butt viciously out the window, and returned his concentration once more to driving, like a fiend hunched over a pinball machine. The loud popping of the exhaust was quaking spasms shooting through ol Rainbow. He could barely hear Burgys’ one 8-track tape of Black Sabbath belting out War Pigs, but the back beat’s chilling cadence sent shivers down his spine. He glanced nervously in Burgy’s direction and thought how damned precarious life was. Wrong how he never decided things, they just sort of happened to him. He always seemed to be thrust to the edge without the knowledge of how or why. Hoop and Wick seemed oblivious of everything except the joint they were bogarting. Wick’s eyes squinted as the smoke rolled up his face. A seed popped and he spasmodically jerked back, slowly passing the joint over to Hoop. Hoop, trancelike, accepted the bone, looked out the window and thought how pretty it was, then he begin to laugh stupendously, like the village idiot. The speedometer needle was creeping past the 90 mark. Rainbow attempted to inconspicuously get a peek at it but Bird Dog shot him a stern glare. When the Woodburne Corporation sign flashed by, Burgy slowed to 65. The sun was now well behind Lofton Hill and Bird Dog flipped on the headlights, one of which actually worked. He made a quick right down Meadow Lane, slowed to a crawl, and turned up the stereo. “Where the hell we goin, Bird Dog” shouted Wick, over the rising volume of the music. Burgy turned the stereo down. Wick repeated the question, this time holding his breath, his lungs full of smoke. “I heard you the first time, damn-it” hissed Burgy, through teeth, barely moving his lips. But in fact he hadn’t quite heard the question, he suffered from a slight hearing problem since the time he was a toddler. This impediment could be attributed to his old man’s practice of flipping him in the back of the ear as hard as he could accompanied with a “can’t you hear boy?” Burgy wasn’t sure if his old man caused the problem or was the first to recognize it. He had adopted the habit of pretending not to listen when in fact he couldn’t hear. School teachers hadn’t appreciated this contemptuous attitude and so Patrick fell further and further behind. It reached a point where it became impossible for him to catch up. But nobody really gave a damn. His parents certainly were not anything close to the type that went to PTA meetings, or took part in their child’s educational process. School officials sent home notes that Burgy threw away, followed by phone calls that yielded unpleasant results. Virgil Burgess was the kind of parent that loved to tell school teachers, or anyone else he was not obligated to be subservient to, just where to stick-it. He often did this, isolating his meek wife and troubled children from any civic civility. They sat quietly for a few seconds, until the track switched over to Iron Man. Patrick reached over and slowly cranked the volume several decibels. He than shook a Camel from its pack, slowly raising a brow while arranging the cigarette between his plump lips. Rainbow dug his lighter out quickly and lit Burgy’s cigarette as Burgy wrapped his hand around his wrist, steadying the flame. He then stared blankly out the windshield at the twilight night. Bird Dog was preparing the troops for battle, a bivouac, he though, that’s what this was. He wasn’t quite sure of the meaning of this word, bivouac, but he liked it. He had seen it plastered throughout a novel he once unsuccessfully attempted to read. This novel suggestion had come from one of Patrick’s high school English teachers who had tried to go the extra yard for this troubled youth. Mr. Leeson, like Sidney Portier, had tried to give his students reading material of subject matter within their range of interest. It was a strategy that worked for many, even Patrick Burgess, although it would take years to yield results. As much as Patrick appreciated war drama, the” Naked and the Dead “included too much other bullshit filler material to hold his interest. At least that was what he told Leeson. The fact was the damn book was too big and thick and Burgy felt very intimidated by it. It seemed to give rise to those voices within that told him he wasn’t good enough or smart enough. He was a Burgess and Burgess’s didn’t read books or give a damn about school, with the exception of his too perfect brother, Tommy. There had been one winter evening when he sat on the sofa attempting to concentrate. He was somewhat absorbed, his finger sliding down the page, when the old man crashed into the room and started barking at him——Get your lazy ass outside right now and bring in some wood. Patrick looked up and smiled mockingly at the old codger. The frail old man then grumbled some other unintelligible mumblings as he left. Patrick, frustrated because he could no longer focus, flung the book across the room. He would later explain the damage to the book with an extemporaneous lie that he was certain Leeson didn’t believe. He hated to get caught in these memories. They were constant reminders of a past he would like to forget, an embarrassment that followed him every where. The song ended and Burgy abruptly switched off the stereo. He then rolled his head to the right “gimme that there bottle, Wick” he hissed. Wick obeyed, casting a big, now we gonna party smile, Hoops way. “Everybody just shut-up for awhile, I’m thinking up a plan” said Burgy. He then unscrewed the cap and took a deep slug of whiskey, licked his lips, took another and waited. Waited for all those voices inside to stop screaming to him, and all those memories to fade to black velvet.

V

Patrick Herman Burgess was the forth son of Virgil and Helens. His birth was greeted with the same excitement and tender loving expectation as was that of his three brothers before him, which wasn’t much from his awkward and apprehensive mother and significantly less from his wayward drunken old man. Virge would cock his head sideways and count with his fingers when asked how many kids he had. “Hey Virge, didn’t your wife just have a baby?” Ralph Keyes asked. “N’other mouth to feed, that’s all” spouted Virge “Don’t make no never mind to me one way t’other.” He snarled. Ralph had given him a job at the filling station after Virge had pulled a hitch in the Pen. But if the truth be known, ‘ol Virge hadn’t been feedin many mouths with the money he was earning at Keyes, nor with the money he was stealing. His wife Helen was lucky to get a pound of bacon and a gallon of warm milk when Virge appeared in the doorway on payday but you could bet your bottom dollar he had cold beer and cigarettes. She would have to manage with the welfare checks and what meager coins she could steal out of his pants pockets after he passed out. Patrick’s home life could best be described as squalor. The house, or shack that he spent his early years in was a worn farmhouse perched atop a rocky knoll. The exterior of structure was covered with tar shingles, peeling and torn in places where they were not all together missing. A tin roof, splotched with rust, attempted to support a haphazardly cemented block chimney that jutted cumbersomely from one end of the house. Warped wooden doors creaked eerily and never fully shut, often allowing winters icy air to seep underneath and through cracks on the sides. The floor boards on the interior of the house were notched and indented pine. They were almost always too dirty for kids to go without shoes, although they often did. The cracks in the floor were big enough for rats to crawl through, and they often did. In the few places where wallpaper had been hung it was peeling or altogether detached. Grease and smoke had colored the remainder of the walls. The plaster on the ceiling was crumbling and cracking and the place stunk of dog piss and shit, dirty dishes, diapers, and old smoke from the wood furnace that Virge would sometimes burn trash in. Time and time again the heat or power would be shut off because the bills didn’t get paid. There was always a shortage of dried or canned goods on the shelves in the rickety cabinets and the GE icebox was usually, no not usually, always sparse if not entirely empty with the exception of a few beers, outdated condiments and water. Indoor plumbing would come along later thanks to state aid. Patrick could still remember having to fetch water from a well out back of the house and of course there was the outhouse. He hated to have to take a shit in the winter. It was an unpleasant experience to have to sit his warm skinny ass on that cold stoop and shiver while the icy air swept up from underneath and through the cracks in the walls. If school were good for nothing else it at least provided a warm bowel movement. Dogs and cats were all over the place, both indoors and out. Bedding, curtains and furniture were always unkempt, unlaundered and covered with dirt, dust and animal hair if not feces and piss. Chickens sprinkled the yard, which was mostly dirt and weeds. When it rained red clay mud could claim a good 3 or 4 inches of your clod-hopper. This was one of many points of embarrassment for Patrick once he started school. The Burgess mansion being up a dirt gully of a road that the bus route didn’t include meant that the boys were required to walk a goodly piece, about a quarter of a mile, down to catch the school bus. By the time Patrick had reached school age he was one of only three siblings. He had lost one of his older brothers. Virgil junior (little Virge) had been shot in the woods by a hunter, mistaken for a deer. Patrick had remembered very little about this tragic incident that happened sometime when he was about four years old. Little Virge just wasn’t on his side of the bed anymore. An old coon dog named Bean was there in his place. Bean had been little Virge’s dog and laid there waitin for him for what seemed like years. Bean would howl at nights for weeks and dart to the window anticipatively whenever anybody approached the house. After awhile ‘ol Bean just laid about on Virge’s side of the bed and moped until he died. Other than Bean and his mothers crying Patrick’s memory of little Virge faded rapidly. Patrick’s two other brothers were distantly older. Tommy the eldest was nine years Patrick’s senior and Trisk only two years younger than Tommy. Tommy Burgess was to his irascible father the proverbial spit in the eye. This worrisome antithesis of a bulk would prove to Virge that roosters, not hens would come back to roost. A godsend to his mother and an assiduous foe to his father, Tommy Burgess would grow both in stature and virtue to become a mountain of a man. This strapping pillar of justice and strength would reverse the Burgess family fortunes in one swift act while Patrick, six years old at the time, stood in fascinated awe. The incident unfolded on one late November night in ’65. Thomas, 15 at the time, and already six feet tall, had shot a prize turkey, plucked it and cleaned it in preparation for the following days Thanksgiving feast. Virgil had been instructed to simply pick up a few essential odds and ends on his way home to complete the menu. All waited in thrilled anticipation for Virge’s return. They waited and waited but there was no Virgil. Sometime after midnight a pair of headlights topped the hill illuminating the Burgess house. Tommy was awake. Virge killed the engine, slammed the door of his truck, and noisily made his way towards the front door. He then kicked, pried, and pushed, shouting obscenities, until the door opened. A light flickered on in the kitchen at about the same time shattering, noisy, collapsing sounds were heard. Virgil had made his way into the kitchen and found the light switch, but not before he had tripped over the table, knocking it over and breaking the porcelain platter that Helen had planned to serve the turkey on. Helen appeared in the doorway in a state of disgusted contempt. “You’re drunk” the words being evoked stale and rhetorically. It wasn’t a surprise. This errant behavior wasn’t anything abnormal for Virge. It just seemed to push her over the line tonight. Her eldest son’s good deeds and grand plans for the holiday were somehow making this insolent and sinister binge all the more criminal and cruel. “I don’t reckon there’s any point asking if you picked those things up from the store you were supposed to have gotten” Virgil swayed unsteadily until he could get one hand on the counter. He then started to shake the forefinger of his other hand in the general direction of his wife and bellowed through a heavy slur– “Now what business is it to you– ain’t no business to you where I been, what I do is my business.” The ss in business were prolonged with tongue lisping difficulty. He than hesitated as if he were trying to remember what he was talking about and this was exactly what he was trying to do. After which he proceeded with his tirade, through a drunken maniacal stare from a swimming head. “You, you don’t give me no sass about nothin.” HEAR? This last word was shouted, addressing everyone, perhaps even many beyond the small room he stood in. All three boys, now awake, stood behind their mother. Helen crossed her arms and stood silent, half afraid, and half angry. Tommy then stepped forward, his heart pounding, his hands, as Patrick recalled, slightly shaking. He began to address his father. “Mom asked you a question” he stated sternly. This bold inquiry at once startled Virge. He grasped at the air as if to catch the source of it, much in the way a blind man might. Realizing that it had come from his eldest son he began to focus his attention, or lack of, in that direction. He smiled slyly and began to chuckle. “Well now” he begun” whata we got here? Smart ass young punk of a piss ant done got too big for his britches.” Virge’s smile was devilish as he stumbled toward Tommy. Patrick and Trisk backed off several feet and Helen jumped in front of her eldest son. Virge threw up a hand and knocked his frail wife out of the way to get to Tommy. Then it happened. Tommy Burgess grabbed his father by the ass and the scruff of the neck and opened the front door with the old man’s head. He then threw ol Virge off the front porch, stepped down himself, and proceeded, in the mud and snow of a chilly November night, to give his father an ass whoppin he would not soon forget. When the grunting, scuffling, smacking, and yelling stopped, Tommy jumped back up on the porch, breathing heavily, but other wise unscathed. Virge lay spittin blood, hacking, and groaning. He had been sworn never to lay another hand on Tommy Burgess’s mother and he never did. At least not as long as Tommy was alive. Patrick watched his older brother’s majestic, figure, against the cold night sky. He stood triumphantly at the end of the porch, wearily looking down, as if from the edge of a cliff. He appeared stoic and expressionless. The warm puffs of breath coming forth in exhausted clouds of cold steam. To Patrick he was the new king, a hero, a knight, perhaps a savior. Thomas stood motionless for one moment, then cast an eye into the night sky, perhaps appealing to the stars. Then he gazed down at his shoe laces. His mother tightly wrapped her warm arms around him from behind. Then he did something Patrick didn’t quite understand at the time. He started to cry. He sobbed uncontrollably as Helen walked him back into the house. Patrick and Trisk followed. The broken old man struggled in the cold yard with his soul. Dogs barked and chickens rustled in their roost and the stars shined brightly.

VI

The fallout of this volcanic incident produced an initial estrangement between the triad of father, son, and mother. Its resultant consequences, however, were both necessary and positive. Helen began to take more pride and care of their humble home; cleaning and scrubbing and washing. She worked ceaselessly through endless hours of the day. In those rare moments, when she would sit resting at the kitchen table before a cup of coffee, she would contemplate her situation. Although she felt distain and pity for her alcoholic husband, at times bordering on disgust, she would never leave him. She was a woman of small decisions not large ones, after all where would she go? She was an uneducated country girl with three kids and no money. She took solace in her belief in a God that she sometimes didn’t understand, yet had learned to trust blindly. Her renewed faith had led her back to the church and this had given her the strength to bear her cross in life. It had also provided her an opportunity to make a couple of friends to whom she found comfort and support. One of which was a kindly fellow parishioner by the name of Ed Dodd. Ed had introduced her to Hyett Grant, the manager of the IGA market. Hyett had agreed to accept eggs at a very agreeable price, providing some well needed extra income for the family coffers. While this kindly act had not been solicited it had been appreciated. Helen’s regular attendance at church had been warmly and quietly applauded by the members of the congregation. Many of who were well aware of the difficult living conditions that she and her children endured. Her husband’s notorious reputation was no secret in this small town. Tommy’s role in the family now became more active and decisive, while Virge slowly turned over the reins of the family’s fortunes and future to his wife and son. Tommy’s next act of virtue and magnanimity was to seek employment, no small feat in itself for a fifteen year old boy in a small town. But Thomas was determined and confident. His persistence finally paid off when Ed Dodd agreed to give him four hours a day, four days a week after school, stocking and inventorying merchandise at Dodd’s Hardware. Ed was getting older and needed the help as well as the company. Loneliness and aging seemed to go hand in hand with Ed Dodd. Tommy Burgess was a breath of youthful fresh air for this childless old man and as it turned out—one hell of a worker. Tommy would finish, in a few hours, projects that would have taken Ed an entire week to complete. Ed was a crafty and shrewd man, but he was also fair minded and Christian. He believed that every man should get what he deserved and that the trials of his labors should be rewarded accordingly and so it was necessary for Ed to raise Tommy’s salary after only a few short weeks of employment. After all, business was picking up as a result of all the young ladies in town dragging their resistant fathers in to Dodd’s to view his new line of hardware. The fathers of these young ladies were often amused, at least in the beginning, to observe their daughters conversing flirtatiously with this handsome and courteous young stock boy. Their view on the matter would soon change when they would learn of his name and make the connection to the boy’s father. Some would return to Dodd’s later only to have their fears dispelled. They would discover that this young man’s polite and respectful manner was genuine and authentic. They would be further dissuaded from their initial reluctance once Tommy Burgess began to show his athletic prowess on the gridiron. Tyler County residents went to baseball games and they supported the basketball team, but make no mistake about it—football was king. They revered, even worshiped the football field every Friday, come fall, and Tommy Burgess was about to become one it’s most beloved and endearing Gods. Coach F. C. Walker hadn’t noticed Tommy Burgess freshmen year. This wasn’t unusual since most boys in town that were eligible to make the team showed up at try outs. Coach was not accustomed to looking outside that realm of prospects. If they weren’t there they simply didn’t exist. It was late one summer afternoon that he first noticed the boy. F.C. had been sitting in his truck getting gas when he happened to gaze across the street in the direction of Dodd’s Hardware. Fifteen year old Tommy Burgess was arraigning a display of farming equipment in front of the store. F. C. watched a couple seconds and then began to shift nervously in his seat as if he had just spotted the biggest bass in the pond. Ralph? He snapped. Ralph Keyes was filling up F. C.’s tank at the moment and responded with a grunt. “Ralph does that boy go to school here”? Inquired F. C. motioning in the direction of the hardware store. Uh huh. Responded Ralph, already noticing F. C. s mouth watering. “Now why the hell ain’t I seen him before?” “You have“, said Ralph. F. C. jerked his head as if he didn’t understand. “That theres Virgle Burgess’s oldest boy, Tom”. Responded Ralph. “Why didn’t he try out for my football team?” Asked F. C. studying and measuring the kid from a distance the way a boy scout might estimate the height of a tree. “I don’t know coach, why don’t ya go over there and ask him”. “I believe I will “, said F. C. smiling. “I do believe that’s just what I’ll do. I’ll be right back”. Coach Walker abruptly jumped from his truck and started to walk across the street. Ralph started to say something about the gas but it was too late. F.C. broke into a jog, one that Ralph recognized from Friday night games at Red Raider Field as he would bring out the pride of Tyler County to do battle. Tommy had just walked back into the store to ask Ed a question concerning the display out front, when the door jingled open. F.C. looked up and down the aisles until he spotted Tommy. He looked him over from close range and was even more impressed then he had been from his view across the street, knowing that distance can sometimes be deceiving, making objects appear larger then what they actually are. Tommy squirmed uneasily under the scrutiny of this stranger’s eyes. He was embarrassed without reason. A feeling he had experienced time and again in the presence of his persecuting drunken father. Ed stepped into the picture and greeted F.C. heartily. “Good afternoon, coach”. “Howdy Ed“, sparked F.C. hardly noticing Dodd standing behind the counter. Ed cleared his throat. “Something I can help you with, coach?” Said Ed. F.C. removed his ball cap and ran his fingers across his mouth, tilted his head sideways, and, while looking over Tommy, began to address Ed. “Ed, does this young man here work for you?” “Yes he does, what’s the trouble?” said Ed defensively. “No trouble”, said F.C. “ I just wonder why he ain’t tried out for my football team”. “I don’t know coach“, stated Ed, then slyly—”you might want to ask him that question yourself ”. F.C. took a couple steps forward and asked Tommy directly. “You ever play football son?” Tommy looked to Ed for permission to respond. Ed nodded. “Yes sir“, said Tommy, “a little bit and sometimes I watch on TV with my dad”. F.C. sucked a tooth. “You gonna be a senior this year son?”, F.C. asked bewilderedly, pondering to himself, how could I have not noticed this kid. Tommy looked embarrassed. “No sir, just a sophomore. “HOLLY COW” exclaimed F.C. removing his cap once again and slapping it against a sack of lawn mulch. “How old are you, boy?” “Fifteen sir”, stated Tommy apologetically. F.C. whistled a whistle that sounded like a bomb before it hit the ground “Son, how would you like to try out for the Tyler County Red Raiders varsity football team next week?” F.C. Walker knew this kid was a cinch, but he wanted to be careful not to overplay his hand. :“I don’t know, sir I’m awfully busy working here for Mr. Dodd and I don‘t have a way to get back and forth from town, that is, without Mr. Dodd giving me a ride. I thank ya very much for askin me but I don’t think its possible”. Ed stood proud. He was often impressed with the simple, honest, and unassuming nature of this young man and he could see that Coach Walker was also. “Well I see what ya mean, began F.C. a man’s got priorities and responsibilities. That’s admirable son, yes sir it is. But what if“, continued F.C. with the persuasive tone of a salesman with an offer he knows you can’t refuse, “what if, Mr. Dodd here was willing“, F.C. slipped Ed a wink, “to arrange you’re work schedule around practice in the fall, and I personally, saw to it that you got a ride home every evening? That is if, Mr. Dodd here, was agreeable and if, BIG IF, you made the team.” F.C. knew that every boy that choose to be on the football team was on the rooster. There simply wasn’t enough boys at this country school to turn anyone down unless of course they were academically ineligible. And that was a matter that allowed for some degree of latitude, depending on how important a player was to the team Now rather or not they actually played in any games was a different question. “Would you then be willing to consider the idea?” Ed was trying, unsuccessfully, to hide the ear to ear grin that was plastered on his face and Tommy was now beginning to get the picture. “Not only that“, declared F.C. triumphantly,” I’ll throw in free tickets for him, indicating Ed, and you’re whole family every home game. What would you say to that?” Tommy looked to Ed for the answer. “Tommy I’d be so proud to see you playing for the Red Raiders. Besides, it ain’t that busy in the fall“. Tommy nodded affirmatively. “I’ll try sir. I mean, I don’t know if I’ll be any good at it and if its alright with Mr. Dodd. I’m also gonna have to check with my mom”. “You do that son. You do that. Try outs are a week from tomorrow at ten thirty sharp. You be there and I’ll see to it that you get a ride home. You can take that to the bank with ya. Good day gentleman”. F.C. tipped his cap, turned, and headed back across the street. Tommy Burgess thought over the matter for a few seconds, them smiled to himself. His work had an extra step in it that afternoon.

VII

The boys shuck off the damp, thorny, weeds and chiggers, and emerged from the wooded ravine, strutting cavaliers. Bird Dog confidently leading his band of apprehensive compadres along Gaitlin Street. The warm summer breeze tugged at his shirt tails, as he wiped the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand. The humid air blew through his dampened hair. He felt sticky and clammy. A nervous energy made his brain feel fuzzy and his heart raced. He could feel the palpitations in his chest and the clammy, cool oozing film on the palms of his hands. Violent encounters or at least the anticipation of them, held a tantalized and seductive sensation. He had at times confused this sensation with sexual desire. Each seemed to create the same excitement, while the results were both calming and tranquilizing. The whiskey had warmed his insides and perpetrated the electrodes that swirled within that convoluted mass encompassed by his skull. He couldn’t quite understand that state of drunken, bungling, idiocy that seemed to curse so many who lifted the bottle to their lips. Alcohol didn’t affect him that way. It was almost the reverse. He seemed to sharpen mentally, to become more active. He seemed to become more alert, more courageous, and stronger with each drink. So many of those indefinable inhibitions appeared to vanish. When he was sober it was as if his wiring didn’t connect. His heightened senses absorbed the night’s charge. His decision to park the car several blocks away had been argued, unsuccessfully by the others. Bird Dog had his reasons. He felt no obligation to explain or disclose them to the others. He was the thinker and the leader, they were the followers. He was the sergeant and they were his platoon. The reasoning first and foremost was that if it became necessary to make a quick getaway from what ever was about to unfold, it would be safer not to have a vehicle around to be identified by. Secondly, He didn’t want his enemy to see him coming–ambush, that’s what he had in mind. He wasn’t certain if the guy that beat up Rainbow saw the car or not, but he suspected that he had. Anyway, Bird Dog wasn’t taken any chances. Rainbow had started to complain about the pain in his ribs when they got out of the car. Ol Birddog was about to light into him when Wick suggested that Rainbow stay with the car, so he didn’t slow them down. Birddog thought about that proposal for a second and agreed. It also fell in line with the ambush tactics that he was beginning to visualize. “Hey Birddog, I know who that ol boy is now. Doyle, that’s his name, caused I used at see him over at Bickel’s Diner when I was busin tables thear,” Wick’s voice popped out of the night’s tranquility. Burgy stopped and thought to himself–why do I have to spell every thing out. “I know who he is Wick, this here is where he hangs. He’s friends with that one leg hop along old cuss“. A soft glow was contained within the window of an otherwise dark building, tucked in among several other dark structures. Intermingled with the yellow glow were soft blues and reds and as the boys drew nearer the motion of human figures could be made out. Maxine’s was a subdued tavern. It was sparely patronized at just about any hour of the day and this was that time of day when working men were headed home to be responsible husbands and fathers. Of course, that didn’t include everybody and there were always a couple of barflies in and about at any hour. Burgy twisted about to do a head count, suspecting that something was amiss. His suspicions were confirmed when he discovered that Wick had stopped some ten feet back. “What ya waitin for?” Snapped Burgy. “I ain’t goin in” responded Wick. “I know this here Doyle, I’ll tell ya right now and I ain’t agonna mess with him. I don’t think you ought a either Birddog, I‘ll tell ya that right now”. Burgy knew how to get Wick to come along but didn’t really want to get into it with him. He might have to whip his ass again and he didn’t feel like it. He had other priorities. “Go on then puss, we don’t need ya”. At this he turned his back on Wick and headed for the door, Hoop followed. Hoop would of followed ol Birddog into the gates of hell if necessary. Hoop wasn’t smart enough to think for himself. He needed Burgy. Wick stood and watched them for a second and then bolted into the night. Rainbow sat frailly in the front seat of the Chrysler. His movements were constricted and ginger. He felt weak, meek, and small. He tasted blood in his mouth and whirled it around with his tongue before spiting it out. The beer was warm and he felt sick to his stomach. He wished Woodburne had a hospital, he’d head straight for it. He decided to leave before Burgy and the boys returned. He was eternally grateful to Wick for getting him excused from this dreadful excursion. He slowly opened the car door and with painful movements maneuvered himself out onto the sidewalk. His broken body moved in hunched jerks and shuffles. He struggled along for about half a block, feeling weaker with each agonized step. The streetlights shone dimly and the moon was beginning to assert itself through the dewy evening mist. Without any conscious thought to do so, he collapsed deliriously on to a posh lawn. He lay there in a semi conscious state, losing contact with time and place. The pain was so acute that he could hardly stay awake. Some time later, and he couldn’t have guessed how long, he was startled by bright lights, followed by the static sound of a police radio. His first instinct was to jump and run, but that was out of the question. More brilliant and immediate lights now flickered and then voices. “Hey boy, are you alright?” “I don’t think so”, replied Rainbow lamely. He could hear the muffled sound of the radio and the voices of the cops, but was unable to make out what was being said, until the voices grew louder and more directed. “How bad are you hurt son”? Rainbow attempted to turn in the direction of the light. “Are you able to tell us what happened to you”? Rainbow needed a quick response. “I was jumped by a couple of guys. . . Coupla blocks back”. The officers glanced at each other. “Have you been drinkin tonight son?” Rainbow could hear a siren coming from a distance. “Yeah” he confessed flatly, knowing it would be useless to lie. “Well you just take it easy, helps on the way“. Voices–I suppose they’ll take him over Sistersville. Hell let them get the information our shift’s bout over”. Seconds later Rainbow was being strapped to a gurney and slid into the back of an ambulance. He felt safe and he thanked God.

VIII

Stub was trying to listen to the news but someone kept sticking quarters into the God damned jukebox. He swore that one day he’d take that damned contraction out and burn it. Oh well, he thought, God damned news casters was just a bunch of smart alacky hippie sons of bitches any how, with their big ass ties and fancy sports coats. They didn’t even cut their hair any more. Whole damned country was a going to hell in a hand bag. Maxine”s was easing into the night slowly. Two boys that worked on the bridge were shooting pool and drinking Strose. Grubby looking fellows with jeans, steel toed boots and unshaven faces. Maxine guessed them to be from somewhere down the river. She got the feeling that they were gambling but she didn’t care. Men gambled at the pool table all the time. She didn’t care as long as they kept laughing and scratching and buying beer, of course. A Miller high life man sat down the other end of the bar. He was fairly a regular. He had told Maxine once that he sold insurance. She thought he was a bit strange, but he was quite and never give any body any trouble. He minded his own business and that spelled a good customer. A younger couple sat at one of the booths drinking drafts and the fellow had a fish sandwich. She knew that business would pick up in the next hour or so, it always did. No sooner had she thought this then the front door swung open and in came a couple more customers. She sidestepped in Stub’s direction and noticed him surveying the newcomers in the mirror behind the bar. The pair looked down and out—-beat nik and destitute types. God damned hippies, was S first thought. He was gonna keep an eye on them. Maxine was inspecting them carefully. She had to, it was her job. They could be minors. The first one was a blond, greasy haired kid of medium height. She figured him at probably five ten. He was handsome, but sort of dirty looking. He wore a sky blue oxford shirt with the tails out, jeans with stove pipe bottoms and what looked like riders boots. His companion was a big greasy looking brown haired kid with patchy facial hair splotched about his jaw line, chin, and upper lip. They both looked to be of age, but not by much. She decided not to ask them for ID’s. Thin layers of blue smoke hung flatly in the air and the hazy soft lighting of the bar’s interior reflected off colored bottles, mirrors, and ceiling. An imitation green and floral Tiffany dome lamp hung from above illuminated the pool table with its brilliantly colored balls gliding across the soft green felt. Teal, Pink, and yellow neon’s flashed a glass encased box containing vinyl entertainment to the tune of Waylon Jennings “Only Daddy that Walk the Line”. Burgy and Hoop slithered in out of the humid night air, Hoop boopin to the beat of the jukebox. Burgy securely adjusted the pint of whiskey that he had smuggled in his hip pocket. He scanned the bar’s interior, searching for the john and then decided to slip in for a snort without inviting Hoop. Hoop sat in a booth and lit a cigarette. Minutes later Birddog emerged from the restroom still slicking back his hair with a comb. He loved bars with their smoky rank smells of stale beer and liquor, cigarette butts and interspersed perfumes almost as much as the scintillating tart scents that women exuded from their spicy mysterious crevices. Birddog dug a crispy twenty dollar note from his billfold, carefully concealing it from Hoop, raised two fingers to the lady behind the bar and said—– Blue Ribbons. Maxine once again considered asking for identification, but quickly changed her mind when she heard his husky voice and looked into the hardened face behind it. Burgy slid into the booth with Hoop, took a long draw from his beer and prepared a camel. Over the next several hours Maxine’s filled up with a joyful and gregarious crowd of partiers and then began to trickle out to a sparse sprinkling of lonely and perhaps troubled hard drinking men. One female remained. A platinum blond had parked herself on to a bar stool beside the insurance man and the two of them were finalizing the provisions of a contract that they would discuss in further detail later in a highway motel room. Merle Haggard sang a song about swingin doors, jukebox, and a barstool for the third time that evening, compliments of the colorful box, with special thanks to Capitol records, and most of the remaining patrons could identify. The smoky haze had become gray stale and bottles and glasses littered the tables and bar among wet ringlets and over filled ash treys. Burgy and Hoop had consumed a half dozen beers apiece and ol Birddog, had secretly nipped away at the whiskey right down to the very last droplet. Hoop had enjoyed the evening for the most part. Checking out the chicks, taking in the tunes, and soaking up the suds. And although he felt like something of an outsider in this uptown watering hole, he had appreciated a change in their normal drinking routine at Mabel’s. It had been something like a vacation getaway. He leaned across the table and ask Birddog how much longer he wanted to stay. Birddog swayed unsteadily and his head floated in space. He appeared to Hoop to be despondent, and Hoop was about to repeat the question when ol Birddog growled, as if he were from Pluto “let’s fuckin go”. That was the end for Patrick Burgess. He would remember nothing of the events that would follow when he and his partner would venture once more into the night. A black curtain had fallen in front of his consciousness as he slipped into that mysterious dimension of existence that alcoholics experience, commonly referred to as an alcoholic blackout. The temperature outside had dropped only slightly, but the wind had picked up to a crisp wisp. Gray white clouds had now rolled in and pushed the summer moon behind their shroud of pillow light. The boys staggered adjacent to a set of headlights and looked toward them annoyingly. When the lights flicked off a man stepped out of a pick up truck and shut the door behind him. The man hadn’t planned this stop but the truck was running unsteadily and he wanted to check the air pressure in his front left tire, then he decided since he had stopped, that it wouldn’t be a bad idea to duck into Maxine’s and say goodnight to his friend Stub, and see if they were still on for fishing the next day. An unsuccessful shuffling through the glove compartment produced no tire gauge, and then he remembered Ed with a smile. The man started a course towards the front door of the bar when Hoop, without taking thought blurted out to Burgy; “That’s him Birddog, that there’s Doyle”. Burgy swirled about uneasily into the general direction of the man and yelled. “Hey you”. The man turned. Burgy continued through slurred words and tightened mouth and jaw—–”Yeah you, you fuckin asshole” Harp Doyle couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing and though not an easily frightened man he sensed a strong urge to go back to his truck and leave. His retreat only encouraged and emboldened his pursuers. They moved on him rapidly and soon had him pinned near his truck. His hand was on the door handle when the figure in the night insulted him again. “Where ya goin Pussy?” spouted Burgy. Harp had been had. His arms dropped from the door handle. An amber of anger began to smolder inside him. He grinned and thought to himself, this looks like it’s gonna be a long day. “I don’t know you boys and I don’t want no trouble, so why don’t yall just let it go and move along. Ya look like ya had a bit too much to drink”. “Yeah, let’s go Birddog” said Hoop uneasily. Birddog swam in space like some obsessed alien, looked for a split second as if he would pass out, then reached behind his back, unsheathed his knife and clicked the blade into the night air. “Birddog—- NO”, snapped Hoop. It was too late. Burgy moved in on Doyle and Harp saw his escape opportunity vanish as quickly as the clouds had separated the stars from the earth. Burgy’s clumsy, drunken lunge was countered successfully by Harp, who managed to knock the knife from Burgy’s hand. It dangled to the asphalt with a clang and a sharp reflecting laser light shot from its steel. The men grappled and Harp quickly was gaining an advantage when he felt a sharp, warm, slippery sensation in his middle. He stiffened and jerked toward the hot penetrating affliction. He gasped and reached to his stomach only to discover blood coloring his hand and soaking his shirt. He dropped to the ground in a wounded tangle as the other body separated itself. He heard their slapping footsteps as they appeared to flee the scene. He struggled fiercly to get to his feet, but his efforts seem to intensify the bleeding. He pushed harder at the wound in an unsuccessful attempt to stop the flow. When he removed his hand it seemed to release a flood gate of sticky, and warm ooze. When he lifted his eye from the pavement, he saw an awful boot. They had returned to finish him off. A sharp blade dug into him and he felt its wicked twist penetrate something inside. A horrid laugh followed, or was it his imagination. He quickly realized that he might bleed to death, without even realizing what the hell had just happened. A strong force was attempting to pull him. It was perhaps the same force that he had felt earlier that had attempted to dissuade him. Life or God had in some way now taken over the steerage of his vessel. His thoughts flew to his wife and daughter. He would be letting them down. He now, for perhaps the first time ever, saw them thorough some prism, some pristine, perfect lens. They were more beauteous and glorious then he had known them before. He pleaded his case to the judge, some judge that appeared or seems to. He wanted to hold life for them. He was indebted to them. How ironic it would be for his adopted daughter to once again become fatherless. It wasn’t fair. The puzzle of life was a sham. He thought of fighting a fish that was larger then he and attempting to drag him into a dark river. He reached out for some object that he might pull himself up by, maybe a handle. Yes, there had been a handle, a door handle but he had missed it. He saw it floating down the ugly river. Blood was an annoying mess, and it never would wash out. He attempted a chuckle. War hero spilling his blood cheaply in a dark vacant parking lot in a motionless dead town. He attempted a rebuttal—–sorry folks, just can’t seem to stop the ol geyser. His imagination swept to the image of a balloon that had been punctured by a tiny pin and was now deflating slowly, slowly losing the air of its life as he was losing the blood that was his air. He pushed at the slippery warm, gooey area and blood engulfed his fingers. Is you’re underwear clean; it was his mother’s voice now appearing on the image screen. But how could that be, why she was dead. The joker from a card deck responded to him menacingly—–startin to get the picture partner, we’re dealin you out. The light that was Maxine’s was now barely visible through the ever thickening fog. In one last ditch effort to move, he slipped and blood spurted. If I just stay quite and don’t move maybe it won’t flow anymore, he reasoned. He laughed at this foolish concession and was embarrassed for dying here. Yes, he was dying in this tinny winny little dead town. Dead man, dead town. He was too weak to scream, like a nightmare that was so horrid, it rendered one speechless with terror. He was losing. He set his head down on the warm pavement and began a prayer. He suddenly felt light and adrift. He guessed that he had lost so much blood that he was now lighter, so much lighter that he could hardly stay on the ground. He was afloat and a body lay beneath him. Was he a spectator to this event? He wasn’t bleeding or dying why, it was someone else. Me thinks its another unfortunate lad Mr. Doyle. It would appear that you dodged the reaper you did! He could see the victim below. Resembles you just a tad me lad, but me thinks not! He felt relieved. The joker roared with laughter. The image monitor now moved with increased rapidity, years like seconds. He saw a multitude of door handles appear just out of reach. Strange how a simple object like that could mean life or death. Suddenly all memories were packaged within one neatly sealed envelope. He sat tightly aboard an ethereal jetliner. An innocent cowboy joyously burst into the passenger’s coach of the liner and announced, in an exceedingly hospitable voice. “Hang on to you’re hats and glasses ladies and gentleman, cause this here’s the wildest ride in the wilderness”. His words evoked a soft laughter from all the passengers. The pain began to subside and all earthly memories were now a tender and glorious essence. No longer was any thing specific, only a blissful, general, serenity. He had never experienced such peace and glory.

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