Something Bad (5 page)

He was halfway through his eggs when the door of the Edge slammed open, then shut, jingling the entry bell on each pass. He swung around on the stool and smiled. Even though her name tag said “Deena Lee,” he couldn’t bring himself to call her anything but Miz Murtry.

Deena Lee sauntered to the bar with exaggerated strides. When she rounded the counter, Gabe noticed her pursed smile—her raspberry lipstick had already run into the creases around her mouth.

Deena Lee grabbed her apron and tied it around her waist. “Better get this thing on while it still fits,” she said, looking in Teddy’s direction.

Teddy chuckled as beads of sweat formed on his forehead and threatened to add their own unique flavor to the biscuits.

Deena Lee kept the smile as she slid to the far end of the counter where Horace still stared at his mug.

“How you doing this morning, Daddy?” Her smile widened, allowing her crooked teeth to peek through.

Horace grunted, as if she had interrupted an ongoing conversation between stimulant and patron.

Gabe stared, expecting a revelation.

Deena Lee pouted a little, leaned over the counter, and craned her neck to put her face between Horace and his coffee.

“Do you love me, Horace?”

Horace rolled his eyes and sighed. “What the hell’s this about, Deena Lee? Did you back your car up into the pole at the gas station again? Jesus Christ, woman, if I said it once, I—”

Deena Lee placed her hand up to Horace’s mouth and shook her head.

“Darling, you’re going to be a daddy.”

Horace’s mouth dropped open. His eyes followed Deena Lee as she turned to face the two other patrons in the Edge.

“That’s right, folks. Me and Horace are going to be parents.”

Gabe did a double take. He wasn’t as shocked by the news as he was by the smile on Deena Lee’s face. It was a genuine smile—happy, excited. He hoped it would be more devious, portending a plot to keep a troubled marriage alive. He knew a baby was seldom a cure for a sick relationship. But her smile didn’t tell that story. She was giddy, beaming. He slumped on his stool. His head throbbed.

Horace stood over his stool and gave a half-smile to Deena Lee. “I best go tell all the boys at work.” He grabbed his jacket and keys with one sweep of his left hand and hurried out the door.

Gabe turned on his stool and watched Horace disappear through the door and into the dense fog. He wondered when the fog had rolled in. It pressed the light down by about half, and yet he hadn’t noticed it until now. Through the gray mist he heard tires throw loose gravel and then bite pavement with a screech. He spun around toward Deena Lee. She was facing away from the counter, washing glasses that were already clean. He didn’t know what to say.

After a long fifteen seconds, Gabe pushed himself up from the stool and placed a couple of bills under his plate, which still held half of the eggs. He turned. You have to congratulate her, he thought. She’s not the one you hate. Don’t take it out on her. He turned back to the counter.

“Congratulations, Miz Murtry.”

Deena Lee kept washing the glasses. “Thank you, Gabe. You get enough to eat?”

“Yes, ma’am. Not very hungry this morning.”

“Me either.”

Gabe closed the door to the Edge and squinted at the bright morning sun. He stopped and scanned the horizon. There was no sign of the fog that had enveloped the diner minutes earlier. Despite the warm light, he shivered. Something in his distant memory told him to beware of the fog. Two words kept coming to him—they invaded his vocabulary whenever he felt a twinge of danger. And they carried a warning from his past, although he couldn’t zero in on the associated memories. It was like the words were trying to pry open the lid to his missing years—the years that didn’t exist for him. He resented the feeling. He wanted to open the past, but every time he tried to get in, his mind locked up. It allowed only small snippets of recognition. Like with the fog.

“Something bad,” he said. And shivered.

Halfway home, Gabe’s mind was on Miz Murtry. He didn’t know much about her, except that she had come to the Tri-counties a year ago. He knew she spent her cigarette breaks reading romance novels about daring damsels with flowing hair being rescued by strapping young men with names like Dmitri and Lance. He didn’t know her age, but her face didn’t have the luster of the teen years. Maybe months of standing over deep fryers and the steam off newly reheated country fried steaks were prematurely pushing her toward middle age.

The pickup engine lugged so Gabe downshifted and brought it back up to speed. He often thought about his attraction to Miz Murtry. There was something about her that initially escaped explanation—it was impossible to dismiss her with a quick look. The gaze was typically extended into a full-out stare, mostly due to a prolonged puzzlement as to just what feature made her seem so appealing. Gabe liked to watch the other male patrons look at Miz Murtry that way. He imagined them looking for the one outstanding feature that made them turn their heads when she walked across the floor. It was the focus on individual features that made most people miss her full appeal, and left them wondering why they felt the strange sense of attraction when she was around. Now, Gabe saw her through a special window—one that counted up more than individual external characters. One that went beyond the usual checklist of scanning points most men used to size up a woman from a distance. He wondered what Horace saw when he looked at her.

Gabe slammed on the brakes, hard. The tires slid on the gravel and he turned the steering wheel to the right to counteract the slight fishtail of the truck. A dust cloud surrounded the truck and gave him a blink of fright. But only a blink. When the truck slid to a stop, he put it in neutral and let off the clutch. He looked down at the dashboard gauges and spoke to the truck.

“Horace said he had to go tell the boys at work.” Gabe let go of the steering wheel. “But Horace lost his job five months ago. Fired was more like it. Probably the last place he’d want to go.”

He double-clutched, shifted into first, and re-gripped the wheel. The clutch slipped a little as he let it out but the truck rolled on the gravel.

Gabe smiled. “Got a chance.”

As
SOON AS
Gabe came in the back door, he heard the television. He walked through the kitchen to the front room, up to the couch, but Wanna didn’t move. She appeared mesmerized, maybe even hypnotized by the program.

Gabe watched a few seconds and grabbed the remote. He changed channels.

“Hey. I was watching that.” Wanna spun on the couch and made a wild swipe for the device.

Gabe pulled it away. “I told you not to watch any more doctor shows.”

“Damn it, Gabe. They were just getting to the symptoms. Put it back on.” Wanna jumped to her feet and balled her right fist.

“You know what happens when you watch doctor shows. I know how you get. You watched one on prostate problems and had trouble peeing for two days before you found out the prostate gland is a man part.”

“Oh, yeah. Well … mind your own business.”

Gabe grinned. “Nice comeback.”

“I’m not the one who can’t leave the Tri-counties.”

Gabe stiffened. Whenever she brought up his problem, he resorted to his best defense. Silence. Besides, she seemed like she wanted to argue. Wanna loved to argue.

A smile swept Gabe’s face. Whenever an argument was at stake, she swam in past the drop-off every time. The prospect of going down for the third time never derailed her enthusiasm. To her, the destination wasn’t the destination. Gabe had two ways to deal with Wanna’s itch. If it was a subject of interest, he would push her to the edge of her reason as fast as possible and then weather her reliance on emotion. A much more effective tack was to go silent. He knew she hated it when he wouldn’t give her an argument.

Wanna stomped her foot and walked toward the kitchen. “What do you want for lunch?”

“I’m not hungry.”

“You still hung over from the card game?” “I swear, you get worse every time you go. You talk about me. You’re the only one I know who has a hangover for three days at a time. Let me come to the card games and I’ll keep an eye on you.”

“For the last time, no. You can’t come to the games.”

“Why not? You afraid I’ll hear some man jokes and get offended?”

Gabe laughed. “No. Just the opposite. Your jokes would probably offend the men. Some of them are downright gross. And you don’t know when to stop with them.”

“What a bunch of sissies.” Wanna walked to the refrigerator. “How about some corn dogs?”

“I told you, I’m not hungry.”

Wanna slammed the refrigerator door and walked over to Gabe. “You need a little cuddling, sissy boy?” She put her arms around him and gave a tight hug.

Gabe felt the strength of arms on his back. She was a stocky woman of average height, but her large bosom gave her an hourglass figure, although of quite buxom proportions. In contrast to the sensation from his back, he felt her softness push into the front of his body. It wasn’t a three-pat hug—the kind reserved for relatives. Her body forced into him, sealing the space between them. He felt her pelvis push forward into his.

He shoved her away. “We can’t do this.” He took a step back.

“Why not? We’re adults.” Wanna put her arms out and moved forward. Her smile looked devious.

Gabe stepped back again. “We can’t. No one knows the situation. No one understands.”

“As far as anyone knows, we’re not doing anything right now.” She moved forward again.

Gabe moved to his left. “People have a way of finding out. You think they’d believe us if we told them the truth about our family? If we did anything, they’d see a brother and sister doing this and they’d turn their backs on us in an instant. Just look at the Wilcoxes. They sit in the back of the church now. You know why?”

“They diddle their relatives?” She laughed loud.

“No. A few years back, their son was caught stealing women’s underwear from their neighbors’ clotheslines. Before that, they sat up front, third row.”

Wanna put her hands on her hips. “What’s that got to do with anything?”

“They moved to the back. They needed to show everyone that their son’s behavior wasn’t due to poor parenting. Their son was probably running with the wrong crowd or something beyond their control. So they moved to the back, with the newcomers and visitors.”

Wanna put her arms out and moved toward Gabe again. “Let’s sit in the back of the church.”

Gabe deflected her arms and moved to the sink. “Maybe you don’t care what happens here, but our family has been working this farm for four generations. People expect certain things of me. Of us. Besides, why are you getting like this all of a sudden?”

Wanna stopped, then smiled again. “Maybe I’ve always felt something for you. Maybe not. Maybe I just feel sorry for you. As far as I can tell, you haven’t been laid in ages.”

Movement from the window over the sink caught Gabe’s eye. “What the hell? When did the fogs start coming this far from the swamp?” Gabe put both hands on the sink rim and leaned, putting his head next to the window.

The fog bank receded from the house like it was drawn by a vacuum and Gabe pushed himself from the sink. He felt like he should run, but he didn’t know why. A tug in his belly made two more words come to his tongue, but he didn’t let them out.

Wanna was back on the couch cycling through the television channels. “Damn. It’s over. Gabe, could you put three corn dogs in the microwave for me.”

Gabe stared out the kitchen window. Something vague was taking form in his mind, and it went back to the very edge of his memory. Twenty-five years back. It was a bicycle. He was pedaling a bicycle. Through fog.

J
OHN
J
OHNSON SCANNED
Main Street and turned to Billy and Press, who were seated on the bench outside the general store. He nodded to Billy, who was trying to pick the permanent grease from his fingernails. “Go get Mac.”

Billy threw open the wooden screen door of the general store and let it slam shut behind him. A minute later he walked out, followed by Mac McKenna. Both squeezed onto the bench with Press.

John paced on the porch and stopped, facing the men. The sky opened up with a soft rain and he took a deep breath to savor the smell of the freshly wet asphalt.

“Okay. So far we know his name is A. Jackson Thibideaux. He’s from New Orleans. Billy found out he’s renting the rectory and I found out that the electricity isn’t hooked up. No water either.” John looked at the wooden floor and paced in front of the bench again. He stopped and turned to face the three.

“Anyone have anything good on him? Anyone been able to find out what he’s up to?” He turned to Mac and frowned. “Mac, what you got?”