Tag Archives: 1928

Campout over

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It was dark, like now. Miss Helen had laid out the sleeping bags. Mama had set the sandwiches and cookies she’d made in the center of a picnic cloth.

After Mama and Miss Helen had gone inside the house, Scoot and me were fine for a while. We settled in to the hum and thump of the distillery until I realized the machine was so loud, I wouldn’t be able to hear danger if it came sneaking up on us. Maybe if Choppers had been there. But he was still recovering and getting used to his missing leg.

All that day, Scoot had been excited about camping out. That’s why I didn’t tell him I was spooked. I looked up through the gaps in the trees and watched the clouds as they moved across the half moon like Blankets trying to cover a small bed. Then it got darker. The owl hooted. When we both saw its eyes, yellow and mean, Scooter said it first. “Campout over.” Then he got up and walked inside with the sleeping bag over his head.

I’m not afraid of the dark anymore. I’m not afraid of untold secrets, either. “I’m afraid for Scooter,” I tell Frank.

Excerpt from The Moonshine Thicket set in 1928

 

Shining Bosoms

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Mama liked Miss Helen’s moonshine, but only when she drank with Beauty. Once, when the summer was too hot for anything else, Mama, Scooter and me, took Beauty to the swimming hole. Mama spread out a red blanket and plopped a picnic basket on top. Scoot and me ate cheese and tomato sandwiches and crunched apples while Mama and Beauty drank Miss Helen’s hooch out of paper cups. Beauty got so ossified, she stripped naked and jumped in the creek. It Jolted me a bit, but Scooter didn’t care on iota.

“Betty Bedford, get out of the creek before you drown,” Mama said, laughing.

Then Beauty stood up in water only waist deep, her bosoms shining with moisture. She’d laughed and said, “Hard to do unless something pulls me under.”

No matter where we went, Mama and Beauty always had fun together. Except when everything went wrong.

Excerpt from The Moonshine Thicket

 

 

Learning with challenges

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Scoots’ hand in mine, we walk home from school. His other hand blows a new harmonica, one of many Miss Helen bought at Johnson’s Variety.

He’s getting better at playing “Has Anybody Seen My Gal.” He misses notes sometimes, but now I can almost sing along without hour-long Pauses between the words.

“You like playing, Scoot?”

He takes the harp from his mouth and wipes it on his sleeve like a real musician. “Like DeFord Bailey.”

“Who’s Difford Bailey?”

“DeFord Bailey. Best ever. That’s gonna be you someday, Scooter,” he says in a Frankish-enough voice I have to laugh. “DeFord had polio. Polio. Like me.”

“You never had polio, Scooter.”

“DeFord learned anyway,” he says, straight in my eyes.

And then I know. Scooter understands that, unlike most folks in Holly Gap, Frank believes in his abilities to learn.

Scoot drops my other hand and uses both to play us home.

Excerpt from The Moonshine Thicket

 

 

Dog food Sandwich

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Scooter grabs my hand when we head home from school. “Angry, angry,” he says.

“You’re angry Scooter? How come?”

“Farter’s angry.”

I’m about to ask him how he knows when the Great Stupid Gatsby Franken-Farter rushes up behind us.

He shoves my shoulder and breaks my hold on Scooter.

“You’re a real scam, aren’t you, Enema?”

I brush his germs from my arm. “What’s eating you?”

“You thought it was funny, didn’t you?”

He’d finally done it. He ate the dog food sandwich.

Scooter backs away and starts mumbling. I reach in my satchel and hand him my yo-yo to take his mind off things. I’ll untangle the string Later.

Excerpt from the Moonshine Thicket

 

BLOW like a hurricane

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The hundred yards might feel like a thousand. It doesn’t matter. If someone needs to save Mama from the wolves, it might as well be me.

I gather courage like the Mayor gathers con-stitch-you-wants, and make my way to Scooter’s house. He sees me first and runs toward me, his arms wide. “Emmy! Emmy!” I hug him back and glance at Frank who raises his hand a few inches.

“Frank’s my tutor!”

“That’s good, Scoot,” I say, as we get closer to the porch. “Are you learning anything?”

“Tons and tons and tons. Blow the harmonica. Blow like a hurricane.”

I’ve crossed the chancy line into risky Territory.

 

 

Fairy kisses

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“Ready?” Daddy says, looking at me.

And then I remember something. “Brandon? You said Rachael liked Scooter’s get- well letter the best. How come?”

“He drew her a heart. It was Purple with a big smiling face and red pokey hair. Had freckles, too.”

“Kissed by fairies many times,” Scooter says. “More than you, Emma June.”

I hug Scooter. I want to bounce him up and down like he does me. I can’t. Scooter’s been growing, not like a weed, but like a beautiful wildflower.

Then the three of us, a Choppers-legged dog family, say our goodbyes and are about halfway home when Daddy says, “Doodle Snip? Think we can tell you about everything tomorrow? It’s been and long day and we’re—”

“It can wait,” I say. “Besides, it doesn’t matter now.” Then I’m sandwiched between two pieces of Wonder Bread.

Excerpt from The Moonshine Thicket

 

Don’t let the coppers stop us!

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The goods are hidden under a canvas in the backseat. I pinch my nose. The smell’s giving me a headache.

“Lux,” Frank says as we putter down the road.

I remember the advertisement. Lux soap, rich in fragrance.

“Every box has a layer of soap on top. Not Ivory. Miss Helen says it’s not strong enough.”

“But you can’t smell sealed moonshine anyway,” I say.

“No. But she says if I’m stopped, I’m supposed to say I’m delivering soap to Common’s Variety in Houston.”

“And if we are stopped, say I’m your little sister. It would look daffy otherwise.”

“Deal.”

We settle in for the drive, Miss Helen’s directions between us.

“You know what she told me before I left?” Frank says.

Before I’ve counted to three, Frank says, “Get there as fast as Holly Gap gossip.”

I backhand his shoulder and laugh. “Then we should already be there,” I say, and settle into Nervous Town where a daddy finds out his daughter lied.

 

Excerpt from The Moonshine Thicket by CD-W

 

 

 

 

Character Descriptions

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For me, writing Specific descriptions of characters, can be a challenge. I kinda like this one, though. The visual makes me giggle.

(Voice of eleven-year-old Emma June)

If anyone is two crackers shy of a box, it’s Miss Helen. She takes trips to the big city so she can get her hair colored orange that she thinks is red. It’s cut stylishly short but pokes out on the ends like soggy cactus needles. Each time she drives Moonbeam, the name she gave her brand new 1928 Ford Roadster, she wears the same red tam pulled down tight over her head, and the same flowered-y silk scarf draped around her neck. Her big bosoms poke the steering wheel that she clutches so tight, her elbows stick way out on both sides. Then she peers through the windshield wearing aviator goggles like she’s about to take Amelia Earhart for a plane ride.

 

 

If Only…

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Eleven-year-old Emma June just wants to Flee away from the bully and go to the flea circus . But she doesn’t listen to her instincts. And that’s when everything went wrong.

“Not over there, Carla. That boy gives me the creeps.” <Emma June>

“It’s only Rachael’s brother, for crying out loud.”

I remember the time I stayed overnight ay Rachael’s. Brandon kept peeking through her bedroom window trying to scare us by pretending to be an axe murderer.

“He’s a sixteen-yea- old bully,” I say.

“He’s not that bad. I’ve seen his good sides.”

“I’d rather go to the flea circus. They’re trained, you know. They can turn a miniature carousel two thousand times their size.”

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“And they’re itchy.” Carla grabs my hand and leads me toward the Knock-Down-The-Milk-Bottle tent where Brandon stands motioning us forward with a bona-fide moonshine jug in his hand.

(excerpt from The Moonshine Thicket)