Family Thang (37 page)

“‘Mrs. Avery, I don’t have time for this! I got work to do.’

“‘Listen, Shirley, you’ll learn something.’

“‘The man is out of touch, thinks black folks still saying ‘right on, right on’ and ‘jive honky.’

“‘Y’a
ll don’t say that anymore?’

“‘Not since the seventies. Bo Snerdley should update him.’

“‘Shirley, you know he’s trying to take our future and country away from us.’

“‘Is he? He must’ve relapsed on OxyContin.’

“‘Not him! Your president.’

“‘How is he trying to do all that?’

“She never answered that one.

“‘Shirley, look what he’s done to your people.’

“‘
My
people, Mrs. Avery? The Harris tribe? What did he do to
my
people?’

“‘Nothing! He’s done nothing for your people! African American unemployment has skyrocketed a whopping two percent since he’s been in office.’

“Now she and I both know if President Obama so much as declared Popsicle Day for African Americans, she and a buncha other like-minded people would take to the streets, pulling their hair out and stomping their feet in one mass hysterical hissy conniption. The back-in-the-day bunch will be in the mix, too, crying it ain’t enough and looking for a shitty-assed mule. I know the history, but I feel sorry for anyone who desires to own a mule.

“Last year Mrs. Avery’s husband died and she found out her youngest boy had blown all their millions on cocaine and leveraged funds. Now she lives in a ratty duplex on Mallory Street and walks seven miles each day back and forth to work at McDonalds. Poor, just like me and a lotta other folks. Each week faced with tough decisions. Rent or fill the prescription?
Food or the light bill? Not enough money to do both. Kid’s clothes or the gas bill?

“You either got it or you don’t. If you ain’t got it, you need to figure a way to get it or learn to live without it.
Doesn’t matter what you used to have, what you used to do, what you gonna do when you get it again. All anyone cares about is do you have it now. Everywhere you go--bank, hospital, courthouse, wherever--the second someone sees you don’t have it now, you might as well sit down because you fixin’ to wait a long time. ‘You ain’t got no money, what’s your rush?’ The more money involved, the longer the wait.

“I know Mrs. Avery is having a helluva hard time adjusting to now and she can’t afford to send me two hundred dollars. She can barely feed herself. She thinks I’m in far worse shape than she. So each check I put in another envelope and mail it back to her with a note. Thank You, Mrs. Avery, But There Are Some Things I Cannot Do. This Is One Of Them.

“Ruth Ann, someone could have a put a gun to my head and I would not have done what you did to me. Never! Hungry, dead broke, living on the street, there are some things you should never do.”

“Shirley, you’re not going to beat me down?”

“You didn’t hear a damn thing I said, did you? Not one word. It doesn’t matter. You’re no longer my sister. You’re bad news. Somebody ask you who I am, tell em you don’t know. Tell em I’m an acquaintance, someone you used to know. Don’t tell em I’m you
r
sister because you’re no longer related to me in any way.”

Ruth Ann laid the gun on the couch and stood up. “I do love you, Shirley.”

“Don’t you dare! You hear me? Don’t ever say that shit to me again!”

Ruth Ann swallowed. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”

“Do I look like I’m bullshitting? I’m not! Sit down and let me finish what I have to say. Where’s Shane?”

“Out hunting. Shirley, how long we supposed to act like we’re not sisters?”

“Forever! Shut up and listen! I want a life, a real life, not this nightmare I’m currently living. I aim to have it, one way or the other. I also want Eric. He’s a dog, a dirty dog, but he’s my dog. I picked him and I’m keeping him. I’m not giving him up to you or no one else. We’re still getting married. No, before you ask, you’re not welcome at the wedding. Don’t even send a card. I’ve thought about this long and hard, and there’s no reason to change my plans because my former sister doesn’t give a fuck about nobody but herself.

“I want a computer for my son. A car for Mrs. Avery so she can at least drive to work. I want a home of my own. You know how I’m going to get all this? The money Daddy left for us, is how. Once I get it, Eric, Paul and me, we’re getting the hell out of Dawson. You feel me, Ruth Ann?”

Ruth Ann nodded.

“Good. Then you’ll have no problem helping me out, will you?”

“Uh, what do you want me to do?”

“Help me catch whoever killed Daddy.”

Ruth Ann eyed Shirley toe to head, from her well-worn sandals to her extra-large gray sweat suit to her hair, a tangled mess. She forced herself to look in Shirley’s steely brown eyes. “How do you propose to do that?”

Shirley smiled at her.

“Why do I have a bad feeling about this? An hour ago a humongous tick with an hourglass on its back bit me. Its head is still in my neck. I may not have long to live.”

“My sympathies lay with the tick.”

“What exactly do you want me to do?”

“Nothing, really. Stay here for a couple days.”

“That’s it? I guess I can do that.”

“When the killer comes here, I’ll nab him or her.”

Ruth Ann cleared her throat. “What makes you think the killer will come here?”

Shirley smiled again. “I sent out invitations.”

“Invitations? Shirley, honey, don’t take this the wrong way. Killers rarely answer invitations. They view those the same as going to the police and confessing.”

“I’m not your honey. I told everyone Daddy left all his money to you. My friend Darlene designed a fake will on her computer and I showed it to em as proof.”

“So everybody thinks I’m getting all the money?”

“Yes.”

“You think whoever killed Daddy will now come looking for me?”

“Amazing! Morally deficient with a degree of intelligence.”

“If the killer takes the bait and comes up here to kill me, you’re going to nab him with an empty pellet gun?”

“Yes.”

“Shirley, why didn’t you just get a real gun and shoot me? Same results.”

“I couldn’t get hold of a real gun. I was lucky to get this one. No one knows it’s a pellet gun. It’ll work.”

“I know! What if the killer comes with a real gun, then what? Huh? What you gonna do? The killer firing real bullets while you’re shooting blanks. No, you can’t even do that. You don’t have any pellets.”

“No doubt in my mind you’re the scariest-assed woman ever snapped on a bra. Listen, this killer is cunning, organized, methodical. He’s not coming in with guns blazing.”

“Organized? Methodical? You finally got cable, didn’t you? Shirley, I really think we should let Sheriff Bledsoe handle the investigation.”

“Sheriff Bledsoe? Ha! He couldn’t find smut on the Internet. I’ll be too old to enjoy the money by the time he figures out who did it.”

“Maybe so, but I don’t think it’s a good idea. I’ll do anything but that. When Shane comes back I’m outta here.”

Shirley raised her chin and looked down at Ruth Ann. “You owe me and you are going to pay me! One way or the other.”

“Couldn’t you take a check?” Beseechingly: “I don’t like this, Shirley! I really don’t. Somebody could get hurt. Me!”

Chapter 33

Various birds chirped discordantly, hamsters and gerbils rattled exercise wheels, water-purifying machines percolated in aquariums. The entire pet shop, including the assistants, smelled of feces.

Robert Earl, a beatific expression on his face, stood in front of a large aquarium that housed an inert albino boa constrictor, the same color as Albert, orange-and-white. But by comparison, this snake made Albert look like a worm. Robert Earl judged it to be about twelve-feet long and as thick as a man’s arm.

He wanted it, desperately. He just knew this snake was much smarter than Albert. This snake could be taught a bunch  of tricks. This snake wouldn’t belly-up under a little pressure around its neck. People would pay good money to see this snake.

“May I help you?” an assistant asked.

Robert Earl, eyes never leaving the object of his affection, said, “How much does he cost?”

“Three hundred and seventy-five dollars.”

Robert Earl looked at the young woman wearing a blue apron with the store’s name stitched on the pocket. “That’s not much,” he said, though he’d almost said, “Are you outta your mind?”

“I’m just looking,” he told her.

“If you need anything, give me a nod,” the woman said before moving on.

Robert Earl gave the snake another longing look before walking out.

Getting into his truck, he said, “Fuck!” He only had ten dollars and some change. All the snakes he’d owned someone had given him or he’d caught himself; he had no idea a snake could cost so much. Plus he’d driven all the way out here, Greenville, Mississippi. Fifty miles!

The gas hand was almost on E. “Fuck!”

He hadn’t tossed the F-bomb since his tour in the Marine Corps. “Fuck!” It felt good to say it. He started the truck and drove off. “Fuck!”

A rusty Ford pickup pulling a lone cow in a cattle trailer slowed him on the narrow two-lane bridge over the Mississippi River.

The Ford slowed to walking speed, and Robert Earl could see the driver looking right to left, admiring the picturesque view of gulls and pigeons gliding below an azure sky and above a collage of painted fields dotted with grazing cows and rusty tin buildings halved by a band of muddy-brown water.

Robert Earl blew the horn. The wind shifted and the stench of cow manure hit him full face. Blew the horn again. The driver, an elderly white man--
who else?
--stuck his hand out the window and waved, as if he were in a parade.

“Fuck!” Robert Earl shouted. “Get out the damn way, you coot!”

The Ford inched along even slower. For the next fifteen minutes it took to cross the half-mile long bridge, Robert Earl cursed and screamed, veins pulsing in his forehead, cow manure assaulting his nostrils, and the old fart up ahead waving and strolling along as if he were lead float in the Rose Parade.

At the foot of the bridge, just past the sign that said Arkansas, The Land of Opportunity, Robert Earl jerked his truck in the opposite lane, an eighteen-wheeler approaching less than a quarter mile away, and drove alongside the Ford. “Get out the damn way, grandpa!”

The eighteen-wheeler less than a block away now, air horn blaring, Robert Earl jerked his truck in front of the Ford, narrowly missing the bumper.

Maybe I should have let that big rig hit me, he thought.
End my misery. Rotten rascal had a million dollars and couldn’t leave me a rusty dime
. He should’ve been able to walk in the pet store and buy four or five snakes.