“I can read,” I said jokingly. “Even made it through college.”
“So I heard.”
“From whom?” I asked.
“I have my little spies. At least one of your relatives felt some compassion for me. I even have your graduation pictures from high school and college and copies of the ceremony programs.”
“Who gave them to you?” I kept prodding.
“I’ll never tell. In case you disappear again, I need to know how to keep up with your life.”
I touched him on the arm. “I won’t disappear again, Daddy. I promise.”
I spotted a tear forming in his left eye but he swiped it away before it could land on his cheek.
We didn’t say anything else; I just went into the house to find Flower.
She was in her room watching a rerun of Sister, Sister on the Disney channel on a thirteen-inch television. She had on a black Barbie nightgown and a pair of pink slippers. I pulled the slippers off her feet and tucked her into bed.
“You don’t mind if I put you to bed, do you?” I asked.
She shook her head. “Nope. Can you read me a book?”
I giggled. “Ha, how did I know you would say that?”
She wasn’t a stupid child. “Because Daddy told you I would say it.”
“Okay, you got me. I looked around her room, which was the only room in the house that looked like a woman had something to do with it. There were pink sheer curtains, posters of teddy bears in ballerina outfits hanging on the walls, and a few stuffed animals strewn about. “Where do you keep your books?”
Flower pointed to a toy box by the window. I got up and walked over to it.
“Any particular one you want me to read to you?”
“Hmm, how about Isra the Butterfly Gets Caught for Show and Tell?”
I went through the toy box and located the book by Christine Young-Robinson. After turning off Flower’s television, I sat down beside her on the bed and started reading the book. She was asleep within minutes. I sat there for a while and just stared at her. I thought about my childhood and how confusing it was. My blackouts, all the accusations, all the teasing and bullying.
I started crying and looked up at the ceiling. “Dear God, please guard this child and don’t let her go through the things I went through.”
I pulled myself together and I was about to go back out on the porch to check on Daddy. But, when I passed his room, I heard snoring. I peeked in on him and he was fast asleep. It had truly been a long day and the serious discussion I needed to have with him could wait.
24
jude
I couldn’t believe she actually went through with it; going to see Henry fuckin’ Pierce. And trying to actually bond with the motherfucker at that. I thought about doing something really foul like climbing into the bed with him buck-ass naked to make the two of them think they had actually fucked each other the next morning. Only one thing saved Jon and the bastard. Flower was in the house. She was a cute little something.
Nevertheless, I needed to seriously blow off some steam, so after Henry and Flower were fast asleep, I located the keys to his Ford Ranger, the only vehicle he had except for his tow truck.
I headed into town, what there was of it, hunting for some action. I stopped by a twenty-four-hour convenience store and there were some lowlifes hanging out front drinking forties of beer. I asked them about the local night life and they all started laughing.
One of them finally told me about a “juke joint” called The Crystal Palace. His friends all looked at him like he was tripping. I should have suspected he was up to no good. The Crystal Palace was down a dark dirt road and I knew something was wrong when I pulled up beside a pickup truck that had Redneck’s Toy fancily painted across the back of the bed.
I sat there and surveyed the place for a few minutes. It was fifteen minutes after one and the parking lot was packed with nothing but pickup trucks and hot rods. I had never seen so many Novas and Chargers in my life. Nor had I seen so many Confederate flags hanging or stickered in windows. Those black men at the store were trying to set my ass up.
Two white boys pulled up on four-wheelers and parked beside a pickup that had a dead deer lying on the back. I had stumbled into Deliverance; it was like something right out of the movie.
I didn’t leave, though. The thought of walking into a place full of “good ole boys” enticed me. Whether they wanted to acknowledge it or not, all of them had probably fantasized about fucking a sister at least once.
An inebriated couple stumbled out the front door and started making out in the middle of the parking lot. My voyeuristic side surfaced and I watched them get more and more into it. My eyes followed them as they made their way over to an older model Pontiac on the side of the building. I could still see them from my vantage point.
The girl went down on him with the speed of a bullet and he came just as fast.
“Amateurs,” I said aloud. “This town sucks.”
I waited for them to get into their car and drive off before I got out of Henry’s truck, put on my fuck-with-me-and-I’ll-fuck-youup face, and stormed toward the entrance.
“Something Like That” by Tim McGraw was playing when I went in. The place was off the fucking chain. People were on the dance floor line dancing and a couple of scrawny white girls were on the bar swinging tits and ass they didn’t even possess.
It wasn’t long before all eyes were on me. No big surprise. I knew there wouldn’t be any other black people in the place before I went in. No one else was bold as shit like me to walk into a club full of rednecks. If I had been male, a brotha, an instant ass-kicking would have been in order, but since I was female, they didn’t know what to do except stare.
I went over to the bar and waved the bartender over. She acted like she didn’t want to be bothered with the likes of me, but I smacked my lips and she came over taking her little sweet time. I asked for a blow job but her dumb ass didn’t know what it was, so I asked her, “Are you sharp enough to make a rum and Coke? That means you put some ice, rum, and Coke in a glass. Got it?”
She rolled her eyes and then skulked away to get my drink. I watched her like a hawk to make sure she didn’t try any shady shit, like spitting in my glass or being skimpy with the rum.
After she came back with it and told me it was four-fifty, I slammed a five on the bar and told her to keep the change.
The music suddenly stopped and I thought, Aw hell, they’re about to lynch me up in here, female or not.
I was wrong. Some drunken bastard got up on their little makeshift stage and broadcasted that is was time for the karaoke contest. Now I was really laughing at their country asses. I searched the place for some bingo tables but found none. I was convinced there was a bingo hall in Trinity someplace, though.
The first bitch that took the stage was ghastly. She couldn’t hold a tune if her life depended on it. I was amazed someone didn’t swing a beer bottle at her head. If Dolly Parton had been in the house, she would’ve been justified in doing it since it was her song that was murdered. Someone needed to tell that whore to sit down, so I did. I yelled out, “Sit down, whore! Sit down, whore!” just like the people on Jerry Springer.
Everyone swung around to look at me. One fat motherfucker at the bar, whose head was bigger than a watermelon, leered at me and said, “Why don’t you shut up? That girl can sing.”
I poked his arm, which was thicker than a country ham, and replied, “If that whore can sing, I’m Halle Berry.”