Tag Archives: family struggles

Nervous Sweat

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Frank’s nervous, too. The way he strangles the steering wheel reminds me of the time Daddy taught Mama to drive. Mama had Jiggled nervous sweat. Daddy stayed calm and quiet like he was reading the death notices in the Galveston Post. I sat in the back giggling my socks off.

Mama kept turning to see if I was still alive. “You okay, baby? You okay?”

“Bernice, sugar. You have to keep your eyes on the road.”

Daddy and me didn’t have much to worry about. She never went more than five miles an hour.

Daddy had tilted toward me and winked, “Hope you’re not too hungry, Little Tulip. This might take a while.”

When we got home, Mama had to change out of her sweaty clothes. Daddy gave her a big hug and said, “Bernice, you make me proud.”

But that was then.

Excerpt from The Moonshine Thicket

 

From Arid to a full belly

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1940: Fresh Air and Dusted Britches — Last weekend Mr. Green asked Delma and me if we wanted to spend a night with him and his wife. I think maybe he’d heard a few things about what was going on at my house, about how Dad was treating me. Either way, it sure was good to get away for a night.

Mrs. Green made us corn on the cob with fried chicken and I ate every bit of mine. Then we played checkers, and even taught Delma how to play. It was like a vacation from the desert with no water into a place with fresh air and cold iced tea. It was a full belly.

The next morning before we were about to leave, Mrs. Green hugged Delma, turned to me and said, “Now Cono, you keep sittin’ on the shiny side’a that star.”

It sounded like a real nice thing to say, but I’m still trying to figure out what in tarnation she was talking about.

Excerpt from No Hill for a Stepper

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Arid

“Boys that age get a little carried away”

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I muster up Miss Brave. “Daddy? Can an almost twelve-year-old have a friend that’s almost fourteen?”

“Of course, Sugar Pea.”

“Even if it’s a boy?”

Daddy sighs and creases his forehead. He places both hands on my shoulders. The pressure feels like serious is coming. “Emma June. Boys that age get a little, a little, carried away sometimes and don’t always think with their heads. Do you know what I mean?” His eyes beg me to understand.

I think of Frank who got carried away with his need for moonshine money and blackmailed me to get it. I think of the man behind the flea circus tent who told his girl, “We’ve been friends a long time now. Time for something more.” Then Carla and me Heard a loud smack across his face and the man yell, “bitch”.

“Boys want more than a girl might wanna give,” I say.

“That’s right. And a boy hasn’t got any right to take it if a girl says no.”

“But what do I have to take?” I never let Frank take my dollar. And I didn’t let Brandon dance with me at the carnival.

Daddy sighs again. “Maybe, since your Mama is away and all, this is something you should ask Miss Helen. In the meantime, don’t let any boy touch you.”

I don’t tell Daddy, but he’d be proud knowing I didn’t shake Frank’s spitty hand.

Excerpt from The Moonshine Thicket

 

Stupid pinwheel, stupid me

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I had motioned Mama away. I was stupid because I had to save my pinwheel. Stupid that I let Brandon pour so much rotgut down my throat that I was too sick to leave with Mama.

What if I had given up the pinwheel? Never let Brandon pour that hooch down my gullet? I know the answer. If I’d been well, I would have made Mama stay. In a red chili second, I would have forced Mama and Daddy together to finish talking, to work out their problems.

I lift my head and see the note Miss Delores read to me. It’s three-quarters folded and right then I know something’s funny. Miss Delores didn’t write down Mama’s words from a telephone conversation. I’d Recognize Mama’s writing a mile away.

Excerpt from The Moonshine Thicket

Bonnie and Clyde and Amelia Earhart?

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            I don’t know why, but it makes me kinda proud that Clyde’s best weapon came from the town where I was born. Bonnie and Clyde entered my life several times one way or the other  before the Texas Rangers finally gunned them down.

          In February 1934, right after we moved to Rotan, Bonnie and Clyde robbed the National Guard Armory in Ranger. The armory was where Clyde got his favorite weapon, an Automatic rifle. He cut off part of the barrel, got three ammo clips and welded them together so it would shoot fifty-six times without reloading. That’s why Clyde called it his scatter-gun.

         Amelia Earhart was another celebrity who came through Ranger. She landed her Autogyro at the Ranger airfield in 1931. It’s a shame that she went missing just six years later and that we still can’t find her.

            But for me, the real celebrities from Ranger are Ma and Pa.

         I close my eyes again but it’s no use. My seat companion says, “You ain’t done yet, Cono.” Again, I give in to the nudge and open up that old cigar box of things I don’t care to see. I picture that tiny little girl sock, the one that used to be in the box of specials, the one that belonged to my kidnapped little sister.

Excerpt from No Hill for a Stepper, a story about my father

Franken-Farter

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I set down my lunch sack, take off my Mary Janes, and step over a railroad tie that borders the sandbox. “Hey, Scoot,” I say.

“Emmy!” he says without looking up from the hole he’s already made. “Dig for gold?”

“How deep’s it buried?” I ask.

“To the island,” he says, loud enough for others to look over.

If Miss Primrose is in sight, the bullies shut their traps and don’t make fun of him for the way he talks, or the way he likes his blond hair cut into a burr but makes his Mama leave the three red patches an inch longer. “Strawberries patches,” he calls them.

Seven-year-old Janie clambers over and says, “I want to find an island.”

Me too. I want to find an island. Anywhere but here in the Hilltop school yard. Stupid name, Hilltop. We no more sit on a hill than Mama’s home cooking chicken and dumplings.

Janie and Scooter start chattering, so I dig my toes further into the sand and imagine pulling Mama out between my toes. That’s all the treasure I need.

A shadow hovers over me, but I don’t turn when it says, “Playing with retards?”

Scooter pays no mind to the comment and keeps digging for gold.

I look behind me. Frank’s hands are in his pockets. He’s pushing himself up and down by his toes.

“Don’t know how tall you are?” I say.

Frank looks at me like I have an ostrich head. “Huh?”

“You keep bouncing on your toes. You wanna be a ballerina Someday?”

“You gonna play in a sandbox all your life? Even when you’re all grown up?”

“You’re not grown either, in case you haven’t noticed.”

“I’m older than you. So, you’re that girl whose Ma disappeared.” He’s not nice when he says it. “And your daddy’s missing.”

I look toward the seesaw for help. The top hairs of Rachael’s red bob take turns bouncing up and down with Carla’s blond ones. They don’t pay me any mind.

“You’re stupider than you look,” I say. “Daddy’s at work.”

Scooter stops digging and looks up into Frank’s face. “Can’t disappear. Houdini died!”

I love how Scooter accents the words that are important to him. It’s his way of saying something important without having to string a bunch of words together to make a proper sentence. Scooter’s world is filled with magic, and not just because he loved Houdini.

Frank shakes his head and looks at me. “This dimwit your friend?”

“At least you got one part right.”

He puzzle-faces.

“Who’s stupid now?”

“Keep playing in the sandbox, Enema,” he says.

I go back to digging trying my best not to stand up and claw out his eyes. I hear him spit and stomp off.

I want to speed through time so Miss Primrose can ring the dismissal bell. Nothing’s the same, and now it’s worse since Frank-furter entered my life. I think I’ll call him that. No, even better. I’ll call him Franken-Farter. I smile and yell the name inside my head and reach for my lunch sack. It’s gone.

Excerpt from The Moonshine Thicket

Featured image photo credit

 

Waitin’ for the Gunshot

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Instead of Uncle “No-Account” Red taking young Cono to buy a donkey, he takes him to a bar in Sweetwater. Cono doesn’t know it yet but he will soon return with his pistol-toting Aunt Nolie. (1930’s)

No-Account gives Sunshine a pinch on her round butt and she lets out a sound somewhere between a squeal and a giggle sound. It sounded stupid.

Sitting there by myself doesn’t stop me from staring, disgusted-like at their carrying ons. She whispers in his ear, he gives her a little smooch, he whispers in her ear, she lets out another harebrained giggle. I get so fed up my belly starts to twist around and I think I might just puke. Standing up I say, “I’m gonna wait in the truck.” And that’s what I do.

I look around the truck, but it’s not there. Not one rope. That sorry son of a bitch never intended to buy me a donkey.

I watch people go in and come out and think about the loser I’m with, the jackass full of bullcorn. My hard-earned-honest-days-work-seed-selling money had gone straight towards something to do with that blonde haired giggly eye winker named “Sunshine.”

No-Account finally gets back in the truck and starts jawing again about more things that don’t make no sense. The difference is, this time he’s swerving around the road like a drunk man, which he is.

He seems to have forgotten about buying me that donkey since we’ve driven past the donkey field for the second time. I look over at him. He’s got a shit eating grin on his face that tells me his mind is sitting on something else. Wink, wink.

That grin flipped over real quick when we got home.

“Where ye been so long and where’s that donkey?” screams Aunt Nolie.

“Couldn’t get one today,” he says.

Aunt Nolie looks at the mad on my face and yells, “What the hell were ye doin’ then?”

No-Account whistles himself into the other room and ignores her.

“Cono, where ya’ll been?” she asks, her tone a little softer now.

“We went to Sweetwater to the Lucky Start beer joint.”

“Why didn’t ye get a donkey?”

“He wouldn’t stop fer one,” I tell her. Then I add more of the honest truth. “Red had some beers and started kissin’ on Sunshine.”

“He was, was he?”

“Yep.”

“Com’on, Cono. I’m gonna get my pistol and I’m gonna drive right back over there and shoot that no-good hussy.”

“Ye know who she is?”

“Everybody in Sweetwater knows that slut.”

I decide right then and there that another ride to Sweetwater to shoot Sunshine didn’t make no never-mind to me. I don’t have a donkey and nothing to strum but and idea.

After Aunt Nolie gets her gun, we’re back in the truck. She puts on some kinda girly scarf and ties it under her chin. Then she takes out her lipstick, looks in the rearview mirror and smears it on her lips. Aunt Nolie must want to look good when she shoots No-Account’s girlfriend.

Here I go again, on the way back to Sweetwater. Not to get a donkey but to shoot Sunshine, My Only Sunshine.

Driving down the highway, Aunt Nolie doesn’t talk much, at least not with her mouth. She clutches that steering wheel like she’s about to squeeze all the Texas sand and grit out of it and that’s a whole conversation in itself.

We finally get to Sweetwater and park in front of the Lucky Star Bar.

“Cono, ye wait right here.”

“OK,” I say, since I’ve already met the woman, who’s about to be shot anyway.

I sit in the car, again. I watch the people come and go, again, except this time, the ones that had been going were coming and the ones that had been coming were now going. I wait for the sound of a gunshot, the sound I’ve become familiar with when I hunt with my dad. I wait alright ‘cause there’s nothing else for me to do.

Excerpt from No Hill for a Stepper

Mornin’ After the Beatin’

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Ike on left, grown Cono on right. (my great grandfather and my dad)

After Cono’s dad beats the tar out him the night before, Cono’s grandpa Ike (who witnessed the beating) shows up the next morning with an extra horse and a bit of wisdom. (Cono is ten at this point) No Hill for a Stepper– based on a true story.

 

  We keep riding until we get close to the stock pond. Ike mashes on one side of his nose and snorts out snot from the other.

            “Damn,” Ike says. “Those dandelion feathers Float up my nose ev’ry time this year. He nods his head toward the water. “That pond o’re yonder?” 

            “Yeah.”

            “That there’s yer Great Grandpa Dennis’ favorite spot. Used ta ride up on him sometimes, saw him sittin’ there starin’ at the water like he was waitin’ for it ta talk to him.”

            “Did it?” I ask.

            “Prob’ly. Guess that’s why he kept goin’ back to it.”

            “Maybe I should sit there sometime.”

            “Wouldn’t do no harm. A little piece’n quiet kin go a long way for a man.”

             I liked that he said that; like he can see the man in me.

            “Kin I ask ye somethin,’ Ike?”

            “Uh huh.”

            “That time P.V. Hail beat the tar outta ye on Main Street? Did ye wanna kill ‘em?”

            “P.V.? Nah. He was jes’t doin’ his job’s all.”

            “But it wadn’t right. He shouldn’t ‘a done that.”

            “Nah, wadn’t right. But some folks feel a little too big fer their own britches.”

            Ike pauses and says, “Besides, it shor’ wouldn’t ‘a been right fer me to kill him. That’s a whole nuther thing. He’s jes’t a piss ant’s all. Kinda like this here horse I’m ridin’.” He reaches down and gives P.A. a couple of pats on his neck.

            “Did ye feel sorry fer yerself?”

            “Fer what?”

            “That you’d been done wrong.”

            “Why a’course not. That’s called pity. Hell, pityin’ yerself don’t do no good. Nobody ever got anywhere by pityin’ themselves.”

            “That a fact?”

            “Which part?”

            “The part that ye really didn’t wanna kill him.”

            “Cono, if I tell ye a rooster wears a pistol…”

            “Jes’t look under its wing,” we finish together.

            “That’s right,” he says.

            “Yer a straight shooter, ain’t ye Ike?”

            “Only way to be.”

           I stare up in the cool and clear Texas sky and picture that rooster standing up on our fence post, his wing back like he’s ready to draw. “Cock-a-doodle doo, you sons ‘a bitches. Now get up!” Then I laugh.

            “What so funny?” says Ike.

            I tell him about the picture I’d put in my head and he says, “He’s prob’ly one’a P.V.s deputies.” And when he lets out his “hee hee hee” laugh, I laugh even harder.

            “Ike,” I say. “I believe what ye say, that a rooster’s under yer wing, when ye tell me he does.” Not only that, I’m thinking that rooster’s got a six-shooter under there ready to unload.

            “Let me tell ye a little somethin’ and I want ya ta listen up.” He pauses, clicking the left side of his cheek like he’s finding the right words and I wait. I can wait all day if need be just to hear what Ike has to say. “When it comes right down to it, yer your own best friend. Most the time, ye can’t trust anybody but yer own self.”

            I think I’ve done figured that out on my own. But I say what I mean. “I trust you though.”

            “Uh huh, but trustin’ yer own self’s even better.”

 

 

Renewal or Regret?

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Cono, age eighteen, travels back home to confront his father.

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Getting on the train, I’m thankful it’s not crowded. Too many people too close to me is something I’ll never get used to. I find a seat toward the back like I always do. A back up against the wall is a back protected. I need to see what’s going on around me at all times. And like always, when I hop on a train, I hope that my head is still attached when I get to where I’m going; not like our friend, Wort Reynolds who hopped on that train to Clyde Texas, the train that grabbed his head and kept right on going.

         “Ticket please.”

            I turn my eyes from the curved tracks outside my window to the ticket taker. Handing it over, I watch him punch the hole without even looking into my eyes. How many years has he done this, I wonder, and does he like the shoes he’s wearing?

         Home, a place that’s sometimes as hard as cement that you can’t pull your shoes out of. Nevertheless, that’s where I’m heading.

            My ears focus on the sound of the train’s idling, but eager-to-go engines. Where the hell would I be today if I didn’t have those railroad memories chugging along with me, some good and some anything but?

         Just as I’m feeling comfortable that I won’t be crowded, I feel something settling into that worn seat next to me, making itself comfortable but making me anything but. It nudges me. I ignore it and then tell it to go away. It doesn’t listen. The memories want me to pay them a little attention. I know this train is about to pull out. I know this train is taking me to Temple. But my mind and my uninvited seat companion start to take me somewhere else, somewhere I’ve already been before, somewhere I don’t care to go back to. It starts speeding me down the track a lot faster than this train is accustomed and a whole lot faster than I can put a stop to.

         The first memory is safe. It makes me wish, “If only it could have all been this easy.”    

         But past wishes were reserved for the other folks with good seats.    

         Not for me.

 

Renewal – Excerpt from No Hill for a Stepper

The Shape of Cono’s Being.

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In a previous post titled, The Shape of our Being, I mentioned how experiences shape our humanness. Here’s another example of the “shape” of Carolyn’s Being that shows up in my novels.

Disclaimer: I’m betting on my ‘underdog-ness’ again–that part of me who feels uncomfortable with self-promotion. But try, we must. Right?

NOTE: No Hill for a Stepper, is about Cono, my father (and a huge piece of my heart) who died in 2009 before its publication. Don’t worry, he read and loved the first draft.

In 1942, victimized his entire life by his own father,  fourteen-year-old Cono must stand  up against him an protect his mother and little sister.

Excerpt:

I hear Mother scream. I snap back into the present, out of my daydream. Maybe she’s woken up, has seen blood on her sheets reflected in moonlight, seen the blood on Dad’s face. I start to get up, but the quiet has taken over; but only for a moment.

I hear a voice I know is Dad’s but different somehow, guttural like a wolf’s growl. I hear Mother say, “Stop it Wayne!”

My feet touch the floor before the rest of me knows what it’s doing. I open my door. Mother is backing towards me, but away from the bloodied-face man holding a butcher knife, glistening from moonlight, shiny like a raccoon’s mirror. He’s stumbling towards her. My mind freezes. It’s a scene from a scary picture show. No, Cono, I tell myself, this is real. Real life, real time.

Dad’s stopped walking. He’s swaying back and forth like an old porch swing. No, more like the swing of a hanged man’s noose. His eyes are glazed like a film of anger is laying on top that he can’t wipe away. He glances once over to the couch where Pooch is sleeping.

“Mother, keep backing up towards me,” I tell her.

She stares at my father but listens to my words. Dad stops at the kitchen table, he puts his empty palm on the table for balance, the butcher knife in the other hand swaying by his side.

“C’mon, Mother, keep coming to me,” I say softly, feeling a surge of calm and determination at the same time.

Mother has backed all the way up me. I pull her behind my door into the bedroom where Delma is still sleeping. Mother is shaking. My hands are doing the same now. I see our .22 sitting on the open shelf just a few feet away. It’s so close I can almost feel it. It’s like the .22 Hoover found, the one I felt in my hands, the cold steel of it. Now, I want to feel the warm safety of it.

A fear invades my body like a sickness. I’m drowning, but not in water. I’m drowning in the fear of what to do next, what I need to do to protect my family from a madman.

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Here’s Cono, my dad. My sister had the novel photoshopped into his hands and gave me this awesome framed photo.