Stories (2011) (6 page)

"I don't know that I've got an old sheet. And there
ain't a house close enough for trick-or-treatin' at."

"I could take her around in my car. That would be fun,
I think. I'd like to see her have fun, wouldn't you? She'd be real scary too
under that sheet, big as she is and liking to run stooped down with her
knuckles dragging.

To make his point, lie bent forward, humped his back, let
his hands dangle and made a face he thought was an imitation of Cinderella.

"She would be scary, I admit that," Widow Case said.
"Though that sheet over her head would take some away from it. Sometimes
she scares me when I don't got my mind on her, you know? Like if I'm napping in
there on the bed, and I sorta open my eyes, and there she is, looking at me
like she looks at them ants. I declare, she looks like she'd like to take a
stick and whirl it around on me."

"You need a sheet, a white one, for a ghost-snit."

"Now maybe it would be nice for Cindereller to go out
and have some fun." She finished making the sandwiches and stood up.
"I'll see what I can find."

"Good, good," Preacher Judd said rubbing his hands
together. "You can let me make the outfit. I'm real good at it."

While Widow Case went to look for a sheet, Preacher Judd ate
one of the sandwiches, took one and handed it down to Cinderella. Cinderella
promptly took the bread off of it, ate the meat, and laid the mustard sides
down on her knees.

When the meat was chewed, she took to the mustard bread,
cramming it into her mouth and smacking her lips loudly.

"Is that good, sugar?" Preacher Judd asked.

Cinderella smiled some mustard bread at him, and he couldn't
help but think the mustard looked a lot like baby shit, and he had to turn his
head away.

"This do?" Widow Case said, coming into the room
with a slightly yellowed sheet and a pair of scissors.

"That's the thing," Preacher Judd said, taking a
swig from his ice tea. He set the tea down and called to Cinderella."

"Come on, sugar, let's you and me go in the bedroom
there and get you fixed up and surprise your mama."

It took a hit of coaxing, but he finally got her up and took
her into the bedroom with the sheet and scissors. He half-closed the bedroom
door and called out to the widow, "You're going to like this."

After a moment, Widow Case heard the scissors snipping away
and Cinderella grunting like a hog to trough. When the scissor sound stopped,
she heard Preacher Judd talking in a low voice, trying to coach Cinderella on
something, but as she wanted it to be a surprise, she quit trying to hear. She
went over to the couch and fiddled with a sandwich, but she didn't eat it. As
soon as she'd gotten out of eyesight of Preacher Judd, she'd upended the last
of his root beer and it was as bad as he said. It sort of made her stomach sick
and didn't encourage her to add any food to it.

Suddenly the bedroom door was knocked back, and Cinderella,
having a big time of it, charged into the room with her arms held out in front
of her yelling,

"Woooo, woooo, goats."

Widow Case let out a laugh. Cinderella ran around the room
yelling, "Woooo, woooo, goats," until she tripped over the coffee
table and sent the sandwich makings and herself flying.

Preacher Judd, who'd followed her in after a second, went
over and helped her up. The Widow Case, who had curled up on the couch in
natural defense against the flying food and retarded girl, now uncurled when
she saw something dangling on Preacher Judd's arm. She knew what it was, but
she asked anyway. "What's that?"

"One of yer piller cases. For a trick-or-treat
sack."

"Oh." Widow Case said stiffly, and she went to
straightening up the coffee table and picking the ham and makings off the
floor.

* * *

Preacher Judd saw that the sun was no longer visible. He
walked over to a window and looked out. The tumble bug of night was even more
blue-black now and the moon was out, big as a dinner plate, and looking like it
had gravy stains on it.

"I think we've got to go now," he said.
"We'll be back in a few hours, just long enough to run the houses around
here."

"Whoa, whoa," Widow Case said.
"Trick-or-treatin' I can go for, but I can't let my daughter go off with
n6 strange man."

"I ain't strange. I'm a preacher."

"You strike me as an all right fella that wants to do
things right, but I still can't let you take my daughter off without me going.
People would talk."

Preacher Judd started to sweat. "I'll pay you some
money to let me take her on."

Widow Case stared at him. She had moved up close now and he
could smell root beer on her breath. Right then he knew what she'd done and he
didn't like it any. It wasn't that he'd wanted it, but somehow it seemed
dishonest to him that she swigged it without asking him. He thought she was
going to pour it out. He started to say as much when she spoke up.

"I don't like the sound of that none, you offering me
money.

"I just want her for the night," he said, pulling
Cinderella close to him.

"She'd have fun."

"I don't like the sound of that no better. Maybe you
ain't as right thinking as I thought."

Widow Case took a step back and reached the butcher knife
off the table and pushed it at him. "I reckon you better just let go of
her and run on out to that car of yours and take your own self
trick-or-treatin'. And without my piller case.

"No ma'm, can't do that. I've come for Cindy and that's
the thing God expects of me, and I'm going to do it. I got to do it. I didn't
do my sister right and she's burning in hell. I'm doing Cindy right. She said
some of a prayer and she's baptized. Anything happened to her, wouldn't be on
my conscience.

Widow Case trembled a bit. Cinderella lifted up her
ghost-suit with her free hand to look at herself, and Widow Case saw that she
was naked as a jay-bird underneath.

"You let go of her arm right now, you pervert. And drop
that piller case . . .

Toss it on the couch would be better. It's clean."

He didn't do either.

Widow Case's teeth went together like a bear trap and made
about as much noise, and she slashed at him with the knife.

He stepped back out of the way and let go of Cinderella, who
suddenly let out a screech, broke and ran, started around the room yelling,
"Wooooo, wooooo, goats."

Preacher Judd hadn't moved quick enough, and the knife had
cut through the pillow case, his coat and shirt sleeve, but hadn't broke the
skin.

When Widow Case saw the slashed pillow case fall to the
floor, a fire went through her. The same fire that went through Preacher Judd
when he realize his J.C. Penney's suit coat which had cost him, with the pants,
$39.95 on sale, was ruined.

They started circling one another, arms outstretched like
wrestlers ready for the runtogether, and Widow Case had the advantage on
account of having the knife.

But she fell for Preacher Judd holding up his left hand and
wiggling two fingers like mule ears, and while she was looking at that, he hit
her with a right cross and floored her. Her head hit the coffee table and the
ham and fixings flew up again.

Preacher Judd jumped on top of her and held her knife hand
down with one of his, while he picked up the ham with the other and hit her in
the face with it, but the ham was so greasy it kept sliding off and he couldn't
get a good blow in.

Finally he tossed the ham down and started wrestling the
knife away from her with both hands while she chewed on one of his forearms
until he screamed.

Cinderella was still running about, going "Wooooo,
wooooo, goats," and when she ran by the Sylvania, her arm hit the
foil-wrapped rabbit ears and sent them flying.

Preacher Judd finally got the knife away from Widow Case,
cutting his hand slightly in the process, and that made him mad. He stabbed her
in the back as she rolled out from under him and tried to run off on all fours.
He got on top of her again, knocking her flat, and he tried to pull the knife
out. He pulled and tugged, but it wouldn't come free. She was as strong as a
cow and was crawling across the floor and pulling him along as he hung tight to
the thick, wooden butcher knife handle. Blood was boiling all over the place.

Out of the corner of his eye, Preacher Judd saw that his
retard was going wild, flapping around in her ghost-suit like a fat dove,
bouncing off walls and tumbling over furniture. She wasn't making the ghost
sounds now. She knew something was up and she didn't like it.

"Now, now," he called to her as Widow Case dragged
him across the floor, yelling all the while, "Bloody murder, I'm being
kilt, bloody murder, bloody murder!"

"Shut up, goddamnit!" he yelled. Then, reflecting
on his words, he turned his face heavenward. "Forgive me my language,
God." Then he said sweetly to Cinderella, who was in complete bouncing
distress, "Take it easy, honey. Ain't nothing wrong, not a thing."

"Oh Lordy mercy, I'm being kilt!" Widow Case
yelled.

"Die, you stupid old cow."

But she didn't die. He couldn't believe it, but she was
starting to stand. The knife he was clinging to pulled him to his feet, and
when she was up, she whipped an elbow around, whacked him in the ribs and sent
him flying.

About that time, Cinderella broke through a window, tumbled
onto the porch, over the edge and into the empty flower bed.

Preacher Judd got up and ran at Widow Case, hitting her just
above the knees and knocking her down, cracking her head a loud one on the
Sylvania, but it still didn't send her out. She was strong enough to grab him
by the throat with both hands and throttle him.

As she did, he turned his head slightly away from her
digging fingers, and through the broken window he could see his retarded ghost.
She was doing a kind Elf two step, first to the left, then to the right, going,
"Unhhh, unhhh," and it reminded Preacher Judd of one of them dances
sinners do in them places with lots of blinking lights and girls up on
pedestals doing lashes with their hips.

He made a fist and hit the widow a couple of times, and she
let go of him and rolled away. She got up, staggered a second, then started
running toward the kitchen, the knife still in her back, only deeper from
having fallen on it.

He ran after her and she staggered into the hall, her hands
hitting out and knocking one of the big iron frying pans off its peg and down
on her head. It made a loud BONG, and Widow Case went down.

Preacher Judd let out a sigh. He was glad for that. He was
tired. He grabbed up the pan and whammed her a few times, then, still carrying
the pan, he found his hat in the living room and went out on the porch to look
for Cinderella.

She wasn't in sight.

He ran out in the front yard calling her, and saw her making
the rear corner of the house, running wildly, hands close to the ground, her
butt flashing in the moonlight every time the sheet popped up. She was heading
for the woods out back.

He ran after her, but she made the woods well ahead of him.
He followed in, but didn't see her. "Cindy," he called. "It's
me. Ole Preacher Judd. I come to read you some Bible verses. You'd like that
wouldn't you? Then he commenced to coo like he was talking to a baby, but still
Cinderella did not appear.

*  *  *

He trucked around through the woods with his frying pan for
half an hour, but didn't see a sign of her. For a half-wit, she was a good
hider.

Preacher Judd was covered in sweat and the night was growing
slightly cool and the old Halloween moon was climbing to the stars. He felt
like just giving up.

He sat down on the ground and started to cry.

Nothing ever seemed to work out right. That night he'd taken
his sister out hadn't gone fully right. They'd gotten the candy and he'd
brought her home, but later, when he tried to get her in bed with him for a
little bit of the thing animals do without sin, she wouldn't go for it, and she
always had before. Now she was uppity over having a ghost-suit and going
trick-or-treating. Worse yet, her wearing that sheet with nothing under it did
something for him. He didn't know what it was, but the idea of it made him kind
of crazy.

But he couldn't talk or bribe her into a thing. She ran out
back and he ran after her and tackled her, and when he started doing to her
what he wanted to do, out beneath the Halloween moon, underneath the apple
tree, she started screaming. She could scream real loud, and he'd had to choke
her some and beat her in the head with a rock. After that, he felt he should
make like some kind of theft was at the bottom of it all, so he took all her
Halloween candy.

He was sick thinking back on that night. Her dying without
no God-training made him feel lousy. And he couldn't get those Tootsie Rolls
out of his mind. There must have been three dozen of them. Later he got so sick
from eating them all in one sitting that to this day he couldn't stand the
smell of chocolate.

He was thinking on these misfortunes when he saw through the
limbs and brush a white sheet go by.

Preacher Judd poked his head up and saw Cinderella running
down a little path going, "Wooooo, wooooo, goats."

She had already forgotten about him and had the ghost thing
on her mind.

He got up and crept after her with his frying pan. Pretty
soon she disappeared over a dip in the trail and he followed her down.

She was sitting at the bottom of the trail between two
pines, and ahead of her was a clear lake with the moon shining its face in the
water. Across the water the trees thinned, and he could see the glow of light
from a house. She was looking at those lights and the big moon in the water and
was saying over and over, "Oh, priddy, priddy."