The White Widow: A Novel (9 page)

“I’m fine, I’m fine.” Jack put his tickets in little stacks by towns. “Let’s see, three to Corpus, two for Woodsboro, one to Odem …”

“Hey, you’re shaking,” said Paul. “You have a problem with a passenger?”

“No problem. No problem at all.”

Jack knew that Paul Madison knew better but he did not press it. “Hasta la vista, boys and girls, one and all,” Paul said to Jack and to Johnny Merriweather behind the counter. And he was gone.

In a few seconds Jack heard the smooth revving of the Buick engine in Paul’s Flxible Clipper, then the release of its air brakes.

“I have a question, Johnny,” Jack said. He could not help himself.

“Sure, Jack.”

“There’s a woman I just put on. She rode last Friday, too. She looks familiar. Should she? Did she used to work around here or something?”

“You mean the looker?”

Jack felt some warmth in his face. “Yeah, that’s the one.”

“I wish I was familiar with her. But I ain’t. She looks to me like she’s got money or something, though. She looks like a White Widow to me.”

Money or something. Now Jack hadn’t even gotten that far in thinking about her. Money or something.

“Give me a last call,” he said to Johnny and turned to go back out to his bus and to her.

Right behind him at the counter stood Mr. Abernathy with his suitcase.

“I’m ready and this time I am really going,” he said. Jack had never seen him so direct and happy.

“Get yourself a ticket and let’s hightail it,” Jack said. “Hey, hey, Mr. Abernathy.”

“No, no, I’m not going with you,” said Mr. Abernathy, still smiling. “I’m on my way to Mount Rushmore through San Antonio with Mr. Paul Madison and then on west and up.”

“Paul just pulled out. That was him leaving as you were coming into the waiting room.”

“Oh, my,” said Mr. Abernathy. “I will just have to come back.”

And again he walked away with his suitcase.

“I feel sorry for him,” said Johnny Merriweather. “He’s crazy as a red hornet.”

“Right,” Jack said, never really having heard of red hornets, crazy or otherwise. “Only a crazy person would miss the bus to Mount Rushmore, wherever that is.”

“What are you saying, Jack?”

“I don’t know what I’m saying,” he said. And he really didn’t know. “Like I said, give me a last call.”

She took a different seat. She was on the aisle, on the right, four rows back. He had found her quickly when he made his announcement to the passengers, which he did without losing his lunch or control over his left leg. As Paul would have said, that’s progress, you see.

Now he could see her clearly in his rearview mirror. There was a young boy in a clean white T-shirt with
SAN
ANTONIO
YMCA
CAMP
emblazoned in dark blue on it sitting by her in the window seat. He was a Dollar. Probably in high school. They were talking.

She was a looker all right. Oh my, yes, she was a looker.

She’s got money or something. Johnny was probably right about that, too. And she had gone to college. No question she had gone to college. Probably to U.T. at Austin, or that women’s college up at Denton. Jack had always rooted for Texas A&M, the Aggies, over U.T., the Longhorns, but if Ava was a U.T. grad he would change his loyalty for her. He would change anything for her. Anything at all.

Jack, as he turned his bus onto Moody Street, suddenly wished for the first time that he could go back and change his life so he had gone on and finished college, even just junior college. For Ava. He wished he had done so for Ava.

But, but, but. If he had done that, then he would probably
have gone on to be something fancier than a bus driver. That would be terrible! He could not even imagine himself as something else. Not since he gave up seeing himself flying fighter planes or scoring touchdowns. He could not imagine a life now anywhere except behind the wheel of an ACF-Brill on the open road.

On the open road at full speed. Again, again, after each stop in each town, it happened to him day after day, run after run.

There were two passengers, an elderly Tamale couple, to let off at Vidauri. There was no bus station there, only a flag stop at a Flying Red Horse Mobil station. He pulled the bus to a stop and helped the couple off.

He smelled something. Something was running hot. It wasn’t the radiator. He went around to the side where the air conditioning motor was. Some smoke was coming out of it.

Back inside, back in his seat, he switched off the air conditioning and then stood to address the passengers.

Here I am again, Ava! Look up here at me, please.

“Our air conditioning is not working properly,” he said, trying his best to avoid speaking only to her, to Ava. “I have switched it off. This means opening the windows. There are releases and handles there on each. Feel free to open them. If there is a problem, please let me know. It’s only about a hundred and ninety-seven degrees outside so it should not be too bad.”

There were some laughs. She smiled. Ava smiled. His White Widow smiled at him.

And he was back in his seat, in gear and on down the highway and into his thoughts.

Jack and Ava were in a booth in a nice restaurant, a seafood restaurant along Padre Island Drive that served baked potatoes with sour cream and tiny green chives as well
as butter. She was in her light-colored blouse, he was in full uniform.

I cannot go away with you if you stay a bus driver, she said.

I am a bus driver now and forever more, he said, leaning across the table and taking her right elbow in both of his hands. What else could I be?

Start your own shoe store or be a radio announcer? she asked.

I cannot do either, he replied. I have to be out there on the open road, again and again, day after day, where I belong.

Then this must be good-bye, dear Jack.

I cannot live without you, Ava dearest.

You have no choice, Jack dear.

Why can you not love a bus driver?

Because I was brought up to love better than that.

Then it is true you have money or something like that?

It is true.

Adele Lyman and four passengers were not the only ones waiting for Jack and his bus in Refugio. So was Slick Carlton, the regular Texas highway patrolman for the area.

“Two wetbacks shook loose from some immigration cops up at Goliad,” Slick said to Jack once the bus was stopped. He had his tan uniform Stetson on his head, but Jack could still smell the tonic underneath. Jack also got a whiff of leather from his wide brown belt and holster, from which protruded a very large .38 magnum pistol. “Any candidates aboard your bus?”

Jack was embarrassed to have to say “I don’t think so, Slick. But be my guest.”

He stepped back up inside his bus with Slick, who had played linebacker for Lamar College in Beaumont and looked it.

Jack, through good habit and practice, normally looked over every passenger he had on his bus. A question like “Any candidates aboard your bus?” would draw an informed answer. But since she, Ava, got on in Victoria, he had been distracted.

Jack watched from the front of the bus as Slick walked down the aisle, silently peering into the faces of the twenty-seven people who were sitting silently watching him do it.

Jack’s eyes were on Ava. Hers finally found his.

All in an exciting day’s work for a bus driver, he tried to say with his look. It’s responsible, difficult, respectable work for a man. Sometimes they turn up wetbacks but sometimes in the process they flush out bank robbers and murderers and rapists.

Rapists?

There was no criminal of any kind on board.

“Somebody told me you were about to get the big gold badge,” Slick said.

“You got it right.”

“
You
got it right, you mean. I’m ready for something like that.”

“When are you due to make corporal?”

“In about a year if one of those damned Indianolas doesn’t get me first.”

“Indianola” was what a lot of people along this part of the Gulf called hurricanes and most really bad storms. The name came from the town of Indianola, which was right on the water due south of Victoria and Port Lavaca and had been on its way to rivaling Galveston as a major port and railroad center in the late 1800s. But then it was wiped almost off the face of the earth by two killer hurricanes that hit in two Septembers eleven years apart. Hundreds of people were killed and the few big houses that survived were dismantled and
moved away to Cuero and other towns farther inland. Cuero, which also called itself the turkey capital of the world, was Progress Paul’s hometown. He grew up with the descendants of some of the Indianola survivors.

“Well, I don’t have to tell you, we’re right into the Indianola season,” Jack said to Slick.

“I know, I know, and I can hardly wait to start pulling people out of floating shacks and stranded pickups,” Slick said.

They shook hands and in a few minutes Jack was back on his way to Corpus Christi. A good thing about Slick’s check was that Jack did not have to say more than a quick “Hi” and “Bye” to Adele.

But he was late. Seven minutes by the time he got to Woodsboro.

And the bus was hot inside. September was mostly as hot as August in South Texas. Jack saw sweat on Ava’s face. Sweat on her beautiful face. He so much wanted to help her.

Here now, let me wipe that awfulness from you.

Oh, please, Jack. That would be wonderful, Jack. Thank you oh so much, Jack.

He was sure her sweat did not smell like everyone else’s did. He could not imagine anything about her that would smell bad. Nothing, literally nothing at all. Nothing at all.

Your hand feels so good there, Ava said.

It feels so good being there, my dear, Jack said.

Johnny Ray was singing “Little White Cloud That Cried” in the background. They were in bed, the lights were out, their clothes were off.

He kissed her gently on the mouth and then around her mouth and on her neck and chest and below.

Oh, my God, Jack, your lips feel so good on me, Ava said.

They feel so good being on you, dearest, Jack said.

He took his time, lingering for full pleasure over each move, each caress, each kiss.

And when it was over, when both had screamed their pleasure to the heavens, they fell back from each other.

“What are they feeding you bus drivers out on the road these days?” Loretta said.

“The same old roast beef, ranch fries and brown gravy,” Jack said.

“I think maybe they’re spiking it with something,” Loretta said. “I have never seen anything like you. Are you ready now for dinner?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I’ll go get it on the table. I hope the meat loaf hasn’t burned.”

“I’ll be right behind you.”

She leaned over and kissed him on his naked stomach, turned on the lamp on the table by the side of the bed and got up.

“You called out something besides me just now, Jack,” she said. “When you were coming.”

“Like what?” he said.

“I couldn’t make it out. Ada, Alma, Ava. Something like that. Something with an
A
, or maybe an
R.
”