Helton and Dumar, both wearing smiles of contentment and holiday joy, got back in the big truck.
“Well, Paw. I cain’t say this were the best Christmas we ever had but it’s dang shore the most interestin’.”
“That it is, son. And now that Maw’s moved on, we can up’n move right into her house. Ever-thang she left—the house, the money, the land—it all go ta me.”
“God bless her.”
Both men ignored the decapitated body of Menduez, which still sat tied up in the fold-down metal chair, while the head itself—abused perhaps more than any head in history—lay face down in a cardboard box. In the rear of the truck, however, something overlooked seized the attentions of Helton and Dumar…
Veronica.
She sat limp in the corner, staring at nothing.
Helton scratched his head. “Dang. We’se plumb fergot all about her.”
“Shit, Paw. What we gonna do? Cain’t just kick her out, not after all she done fer us.”
Helton snapped his big fingers before her blank face. “Veronnerka? Hon?”
Very slowly she looked up at him.
“Well this here is more fucked up than a tube’a crickets, son. Veronerka still ain’t got her senses back after the shock’a all that gone on.”
“But, Paw,” Dumar said, “why’n’t we do what’cha suggestered before? Maybe somethin’ familiar’ll snap her out of it.”
“Right. That big store she work at, and her car.” Helton climbed behind the wheel and roared off.
After the fact, it should be recounted that during the previous “quadruple-header,” Veronica had indeed been present, silently staring at this veritable jubilee of psycho-sexual revenge. (And, yes, she’d orally “tweaked” all participants without so much as a flinch.) But several questions remained: had her current and hopefully temporary vegetative mental state prevented her eyes from registering the macabre scene? Would she ever be normal again? And would the searing sounds of hole-saws, power drills, and wet schlucking cranial coitus haunt her dreams for the rest of her life?
Hmmm…
Christmas lights twinkled up ahead. Once the clattering truck emerged from the dark residential streets, Helton spotted, of all people, Kasha, the Russian, walking away from the Hess station, evidently having just been relieved of her shift. She was frowning, so Helton rolled down his window, waved, shouted, “Hey, there, missy!” cleared his throat quite noisily, and—
Kurrrrrr-HOCK!
—expectorated in grand backwoods style. The dense, kiwi-sized wad of phlegm traveled straight as an arrow and caught the girl right over the mouth.
SPLAT!
“There’s some Christmas custard fer ya, hon! Merry Christmas!”
Shortly thereafter, the truck rumbled around the Best Buy and turned into the rear parking lot.
“Here we is, Veronnerka,” Dumar said loudly. He gave Veronica several gentle nudges.
“Hon?” Helton nudged her as well after he lumbered into the back. “Why don’t’cha git up now so’s you can go home? We cain’t thank ya enough fer helpin’ us like ya did. You’s’re a little shook up now but I reckon you’ll come out’a it a’fore long. Here”—he helped her get up, but as he did so, she could only stare blankly outward, her mouth hanging open.
“You’ll be fit as a fiddle in a jiffy, I’se just know it,” he tried to sound hopeful. He paused, leaned over, and pulled a band of cash from his ruck sack. “And take this, hon. I’se promised I’d pay ya fer the time ya missed at work, so’s I want ya ta go git yerself somethin’ nice, okay?”
Veronica nodded.
Both men helped her down to the pavement and approached her car.
“This here’s yer car, Veronnerka. Ya remember it?”
Veronica only continued to stare.
“Shit, Paw. She’s just standin’ there like she don’t know nothin’, like she don’t even know who she is…”
Helton shook his head. “Ain’t nothin’ we can do, son, but pray that God see fit ta give Veronnerka back her senses.”
“Yeah.”
“‘Bye, Veronnerka! Merry Christmas!”
Veronica’s only response was a mute glance.
Helton and Dumar, whispering prayers, mind you, got back into the truck and drove away. Dumar cracked open a soda for himself and his father; however, Helton had paused at the exit, idling. Had something that slipped his mind suddenly occurred to him?
“Dang, much as I’d like ta git us back wheres we belong, we still got one more stop ta make.”
Dumar looked up, chin pointing. “Oh, yeah—” but before further discourse could take place, a rapid snapping sound approached.
In the dim headlights, a figure seemed to be trotting toward them.
“Who’s this here?” Dumar asked. “Looks like a gal.”
“Yeah, son, shore is…”
“Ya reckon she helps some help?”
It was a woman, yes, oddly dressed. Out of breath she stopped just below Helton’s window. In spite of the cool night, her legs were bare from mid-thigh down, and she wore flip-flops. She also wore a tacky overcoat riddled with buttons of some sort. Off-blond hair rose in a trace breeze.
Helton sipped his soda, then lowered his window. “Well, hey there, missy. Are you’s in any kind’a distress?”
Wrinkles lined the woman’s face such that her age was impossible to discern, but in a raspy yet high-timbered voice, she replied, “Man, you guys got the trick-time boo-ya all goin’ on! I ain’t never peel-eyed killin’, spillin’, and thrillin’ like that. Fuck, man, I hated those creeps—I was lookin’ for a way to flunk ’em but now I don’t have to! Bunch of poo-putt loser smack-slingers, small-time actin’ big-time.” She winced, deepening her facial wrinkles. “They treated me like shit, man, and I’m talkin’ disrespezzy like you never dreamed.”
Helton made a face of utter incomprehension. “Uh, what’s that, hon?”
A prodigious cleavage became momentarily visible at her neckline when she leaned forward to continue. “I saw it all, man! I was watchin’ through the windows the trunk-poppin’ you and the Wops pulled on the NSG-3! Man, that shit was top as a crown! I didn’t like the Wops, either, but you guys? You guys are Ace Players!”
Helton stalled. “Uh, what’s that, hon?”
Dumar leaned over. “What’cha mean by… trick-time boo-ya?”
“And…lemme see,” Helton reflected. “Peel-eyed?”
“Aw, shit, I guess you guys aren’t phat to street jaw,” the girl assumed, vibrant in some undisclosed excitement. “I see shit like that happenin’ to scumbags? Fuck, man, my pwizzle gets to drizzle, ya know? Makes my cunt beat like my heart!”
Well, at least Helton and Dumar knew what cunt meant, but that was about it. “Missy, we up’n had a dang differ-kult couple’a days, so’s now we’se just hankerin’ ta git on back ta our homestead and have Christmas proper. But, see, we, we, we—”
“We don’t know what the hail yer talkin’ ’bout,” Dumar accentuated.
“Lemme be in your gang!” she pleaded and hopped up and down.
“Gang?” Helton said. “We don’t know no gang.”
“Make me hip to your crib!” Her bloodshot eyes beamed. “You won’t regret it. I wanna be your gal!”
Helton traded a cruxed glance with his son.
“I think she wanna go home with us, Paw.”
“Yeah, I reckon.” Helton’s bushy brows jiggled. He lowered his voice. “But don’t she look kind’a old?”