Authors: James Henderson
“He looked great. Just great.”
“He wasn’t hungry, was he?”
“No, Mother.”
“Maybe you should take him more food. A growing boy needs to keep his weight up. I’ll cook something that’ll keep for a long time. You can take it to him.” She let him digest that before adding: “If you don’t mind?”
“No, Mother, I don’t mind at all.” He hoped she wouldn’t go through too much trouble because whatever she cooked was going into the first trash can he saw. He was not going in the woods again.
“Your dinner is in the microwave. A pumpkin pie in the refrigerator.”
“Pumpkin pie,” already tasting it. “Mother, you shouldn’t have.”
“Save a piece for Shane, okay?” Ida said, leaving the kitchen.
Leonard washed his hands in the sink, took a paper towel-wrapped plate out of the microwave and put it on the table. This was his reward for fearlessly confronting jungle boy. And in the process, he thought, I’ve lost the love of my life.
He’d gone to the Greyhound bus stop in town, the regional airport in Lake Village, and then back to the motel. No sign of Victor.
He’s gone forever!
He shook the thought.
After blessing the food, he removed the paper towel and froze, staring at green beans, mashed potatoes, two dinner rolls and a steaming heap of boiled neck bones. Leonard swallowed hard.
Had he angered his mother? If he did he couldn’t remember doing so. Even if he’d done something to upset her, it couldn’t have been egregious enough for her to spike the neck bones.
Could it?
He picked up a neck bone with a fork. This is silly, he chided himself. His mother wouldn’t poison him.
He sniffed the neck bone. Arsenic, he remembered reading, didn’t have a smell or taste. If Kenny G were afoot, he would have him…He remembered Kenny G whining and howling as his owner was wheeled into the ambulance. He’d thought the poor dog was expressing grief, but then Kenny G threw up and keeled over, his little legs sticking straight up.
The phone on the wall rang. Leonard ignored it, got up, dumped the food and the plate into the trash
can and covered it with newspaper. He was headed for the pumpkin pie when he heard a scream. He ran and almost collided with Ida, also running, in the hallway.
“What’s the matter, Mother?”
“Come on, Leonard, we gotta go! Ruth Ann had a heart attack!”
* * * * *
Shirley, Lester, Eric, and Robert Earl and Estafay were all sitting in the emergency waiting room when Leonard and Ida arrived at the hospital.
“How is she?” Ida asked no one in particular.
“We don’t know yet,” Shirley said. “The doctor hasn’t come out and told us anything. I’m going to give them a few minutes, then I’m going back there to see what’s going on.”
Robert Earl and his wife, her face hidden behind a large Bible, were sitting apart from everyone else. Robert Earl, wearing his usual blue jean overalls, slumped in his chair, clamped hands resting on his large stomach, one finger tapping a knuckle, as if he were waiting for his car in the shop.
One look at Eric and Leonard thought he might be high on drugs. His legs were shaking and he didn’t seem to know where to put his hands as he swiveled his head back and forth from Shirley to the double doors leading into the emergency room. Shirley appeared on the verge of a nervous breakdown, red eyes, uncombed hair poking up like weeds.
Lester, sitting to Shirley’s left, rested his head between his knees.
“What happened, Lester?” Leonard asked.
Lester raised his head a bit. “I’m not sure…I think she had a heart attack.”
Leonard patted his back. “She’ll be all right, Lester. Ruth Ann’s a fighter.”
Shirley said, “Ruth Ann, Eric and me, we’re at the police station and Ruth Ann just standing there, looking the picture of health. All a sudden--Kabookie!” Clapped her hands. “Ruth Ann let out a hoot and holler, and I looked up and she was lying on a desk. I swear, it scared the living daylights out of me. I checked her heart, didn’t hear anything, so I started emergency CPR. Almost lost her right then and there.”
“Why were y’all at the police station?”
Shirley rolled her eyes at Eric. “Somebody got arrested.”
“Why was Ruth Ann there?”
Eric abruptly stood up. “Where’s the john around here?”
Robert Earl pointed to an exit. “Through there and to the left. You better get your own tissue--they out.” Eric hurried out the door.
“Butthead got himself arrested again,” Shirley said. “Ruth Ann gave me a ride.”
“Mercy!” Ida exclaimed and plopped down in the chair beside Lester. “This is all my fault, all my fault!”
“It’s not your fault, Mother,” Leonard said. “Ruth Ann’s going to be all right.”
“Lester,” Robert Earl shouted across the room, “you and Ruth Ann have insurance, don’t you?”
Lester gave Robert Earl a bewildered look.
“Robert Earl,” Shirley said, “that’s a helluva thing to ask at a time like this. Who called you, anyway?”
“Nobody. I heard it on my police scanner. I know things before the police do. Lester, I sure hope you have burial insurance. Burials are pretty expensive nowadays. Ruth Ann might make it, she might not. Either way you gotta be prepared. Estafay and I are strapped right now so we won’t be able to contribute to nothing. Speaking of strapped, Momma, what’s going on with the money? You oughta see if the man will give us a little bit.”
Ida covered her face with a hand and shook her head.
“Shut the hell up, Robert Earl!” Shirley said.
“We’ve got insurance,” Lester said. “I just…want my wife back…alive.” He buried his head between his knees and bawled.
“Contain yourself, man,” Robert Earl said. “Ain’t nobody said she dead yet. She might make it. I hope she didn’t go too long without getting oxygen to her head. If she did she’ll be a veggie. I wouldn’t blame you not wanting a veggie rotting up the house, attracting a bunch of flies with them big diapers.”
Lester’s sobs increased in pitch and volume.
Leonard said, “Somebody oughta cut the oxygen off to your head.”
“A good idea,” Shirley said. “He keeps talking crazy, Leonard, you and I take him outside, see how long he can hold his breath.”
“Momma,” Robert Earl said, “you hear em, don’t you? They talking about choking me again.”
“Shut up, already!” Shirley shouted at him.
Sheriff Bledsoe and an Asian man wearing surgery scrubs came through the double doors.
“How is she?” Shirley and Lester asked at once.
“She’s fine, just fine,” the man said. “Too much stress. Stress not good, causes anxiety attacks. Tomorrow she go home, back to old self, live happily ever after.”
“Could you explain it in English?” Robert Earl said.
The man laughed. “You comedienne in the family? You very funny. Very funny, indeed.” He left the room.
Eric came back.
“She’s all right,” Sheriff Bledsoe said. “A case of nerves, I suspect.”
“Thank you, Jesus!” Ida said.
“Can I go see her?” Lester said.
“I guess,” Sheriff Bledsoe said. Lester started for the doors. “Say, Lester…”
Lester stopped. “What?”
“Never mind. It can wait.”
“What about me, Sheriff?” Eric asked.
“What about you?”
“Can I go now?”
Shirley said, “C’mon, Sheriff. This family has suffered enough. Let him go home tonight. It’s Friday. You’ll have to spend the weekend at the jail watching him. Let him go and I promise you he’ll be there bright and early Monday morning.”
Sheriff Bledsoe inhaled loudly through his nose. “Okay, Eric, you can go. Now everybody listen up. Here’s what I’m gonna do.”
He paused and gave them each a hard look. “Since this investigation has turned into a circus, I’m requesting each and every one of you come in this weekend, Saturday or Sunday, and submit a polygraph test. If you don’t I’ll come looking for you. One of you tell Lester and Ruth Ann when she starts feeling better, which should be in a few minutes.” He scanned their faces. “Does everybody understand?”
“Can I go first?” Robert Earl asked.
“It doesn’t matter who’s first. Just show up.”
“I’ll be there,” Shirley said.
“Me, too,” Leonard said.
“I’ll go after Shirley goes,” Eric said.
“I already told you I did it,” Ida said.
“Yes, you did,” Sheriff Bledsoe said, and walked away.
“What’s eating him?” Leonard asked.
“He’s either hungry or he’s gassy,” Robert Earl said. “Didn’t you hear his stomach? Sound like a diesel engine low on oil. He better put something in or let something out before he blows a rod.”
“Robert Earl,” Shirley said, “where’s your teeth?”
Robert Earl covered his mouth with both hands.
“They’re in the shop,” Estafay said from behind the Bible.
“The pawnshop,” Shirley said, laughing. Eric laughed, too.
“Leave my son alone,” Ida said, a chuckle in her voice.
Leonard didn’t crack a smile, staring at Estafay, head to toe dressed in white. White scarf wrapped tightly around her head. White short-sleeve dress, frayed at the edges. White stockings, a long run along her right calf. White nurse’s shoes, the rubber instep missing on the left. Her long, pallid fingers held the Bible in a death grip.
She wasn’t reading, she was hiding. Perhaps she was uncomfortably shy amongst her husband’s family; they were prone to crude jokes. Or she…Estafay hadn’t uttered a word when Sheriff Bledsoe requested everyone come in for a polygraph test.
The Bible slid down and Estafay’s eyes met his. She’d sensed him staring at her. Leonard shuddered. Something…something cold… in her eyes, which looked out of alignment, one higher than the other. She held his stare for a moment more and then slid the Bible back up. Leonard exhaled, not aware he’d been holding his breath.
Chapter 20
Ruth Ann lay in her own bed with her favorite bed partner at her side, Teddy. Despite looking into the eyes of death not fifteen hours ago, she’d never felt better. Now she knew how Lazarus must have felt after awakening and not finding himself hosting earthworms: exhilarated.
Not only was she alive and kicking, she didn’t have a bruise on her body. Not even a scratch. No small miracle, considering the possibilities.
She remembered her promise to The Man Upstairs.
It can wait.
After all, she didn’t say when she would start living a righteous life; she’d said she would, which, of course, meant sometime in the near distant future.