Tag Archives: novels

Cleaning a bigot’s plow

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“Now what are you talking about? I know what’s right and wrong. And you hanging out with a colored is not right. What would your parents th …”

Kent’s words hang in the air, his sentence unfinished. He knows what my parents do. He knows we’ve had Mr. Overton, our new Local president of the NAACP, over for dinner. Kent saw him when he dropped by that evening last spring.

I point a finger to his chest and feel like Olvie. “It’s time for you to leave, Kent. You’ll never understand.” I turn to go inside.

He grabs my arm. “You’re full of shit, Grace. All this time I thought you were smart enough to—”

My eyes burn coal. “Let go of me.”

“Problem, Chicken Coop?” The familiar voice sounds protective.

Isaac saunters up the walkway and up to the front porch. He’s about the same height as Kent, but thinner. Yet his presence towers over Kent a hundred times over. When he looks at Kent, his eyes don’t shift, don’t blink.

“What are you looking at, colored boy?” Kent says, but his wobbly voice betrays him.

“Not much,” Isaac says.

Kent pulls back a fist then launches it toward Isaac’s face. Isaac catches it somewhere in mid air. Kent opens his mouth, then closes it.

“You see, Massa,” Isaac says. “I ain’t s’posed to fight with white folk. So, my Daddy and my Mammy both taughts me to be quick on these here feet. Ya know, to’s protect m’self from de harms dat be.”

“You stupid, nigg—”

“Nigerian, you were about to say.” Isaac says losing his accent. “Right, Kent? Because when a white person says that other word, it means they are ignorant about walking in the footsteps of humanity. I highly suggest you leave Mrs. Monroe’s porch and bike it to that theater. You show good movies there.”

Kent’s mouth opens. His chin drops. He can’t quite manage the puffing out of his chest. His posture deflates until he reaches the curb. Kent straddles his bike and points to Isaac. “Your plow needs cleaning, boy.”

As he rides off, Isaac yells, “Ain’t got one no mo’. Done sold it to my Massa.”

I turn to Isaac. “I didn’t know you were such a tough guy.”

Excerpt from WIP, Bare Bones of Justice (working title), set in 1963

Daily word prompt: Local

Not Invited

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Madam Fannie Porter

There he stood, the man whose cleft chin always reminded me of a bare ass. “Well, well, well, Mayor Marshall Hicks. What can I do for you?”

“May I come in?”

I hesitated, my eyes scouring him from head to toe. “What do you need Mayor? I’ve paid my dues.”

“It’s about Sadie.”

“What about her? She’s upstairs sleeping.”

A thunderbolt cracked. The puffed rooster Cringed. “Can I come in?”

“For a minute. I have things to do.”

I opened the door wide enough for him to squeeze through. Too wide would seem like an invitation and asking him to sit a spell was out of the question.

He removed his hat and hung his rain jacket on the hook by the door. Now inside, he took an uninvited seat in the parlor—the same chair William Pinkerton sat on when asking about the Wild Bunch. Not a good omen.

Excerpt from The Last Bordello

Daily word prompt: Cringe

What poverty looks like

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All I hear is the rotting porch creaking from the wind.

“It’s the right thing to do,” I say over and over while pulling open the screen door that has more holes than a liar’s tale.

The house is crowded with litter. I step over a broken radio with its back unscrewed, a screwdriver next to it. The one chair in the tiny sitting room lies on its side, wood glue next to its broken leg. Papers torn from a Big Chief tablet, marked with music notes, are scattered across the floor. A tattered pillow sits on a mattress in the corner. Beside it, Frank’s harmonica. I picture Frank sleeping here. My eyes get watery.

The kitchen smells like the sandwich I made Frank – moldy and spoiled. Plates and bowls are caked and crusted with old food.

I walk the few steps to her bedroom. The door is open. I concentrate on the body beneath the covers and see the slight rise and fall of the life underneath.

Excerpt from The Moonshine Thicket

Daily Word Prompt: Paper

Why shear a pig?

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I look out at the monster contraption in the moonshine thicket. A coiled snake-looking tube sits on top of a barrel and is attached to a copper boiler pot.

Two of me could fit inside the barrel that I tap. “What all’s in here, Miss Helen? Besides prunes and yeast.”

“Corn, rye, and a few other secrets.”

“It smells stronger? How come?”

She stands straight and proud and looks me in the eye. “Fermentation.” She smiles. “And ready to be poured.”

“I bet you wish prohibition was over so you didn’t have to work so hard at moonshining,” I say.

She lifts one eyebrow and glares at me. “Why shear a pig? I like seeing Ulysses S. Grant smile at me on his Crisp bills.”

I look at the scars on the insides of her arms. “Even if you burn yourself?”

“Those are nothing but hard work kisses. What’s important is temperature, filtration and whether or not the beading’s right.” She sets down a box of Mason jars. “Besides, what would the Mayor give his constituents if I didn’t do my job?”

Excerpt from The Moonshine Thicket

Daily prompt: Crisp

That rare gift of laughter

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One Thanksgiving when we lived in the Tourist Court, we had enough food for Mother to make a real meal, but it was Pooch who landed on Plymouth Rock. We didn’t have money to buy a turkey, but somehow Mother got hold of an old hen to cook. She baked it for most of the morning, even making cornbread dressing to go with it, which, for her, was like pulling a cart full of lead. She set the food on the kitchen table to let it cool while we went to the drug store to get Dad his medicine. Seeing as how it was Thanksgiving, the drug store was closed and Dad had to rely on his refrigerated liquid medicine to make it through the day.

When we got back home, Dad opened the door and what we saw made my mother want to spit cactus needles. There on our kitchen table laid scattered bones where our chicken used to be and only half of what used to be a whole pan of dressing.

We looked around the corner into the bedroom. Lying on Mother and Dad’s bed, head on a pillow and wearing a smile that stretched from Rotan to Sweetwater, was Pooch. We were the three bears coming home to find out that our porridge had been eaten, but this time, not by a little blonde-haired girl but a Curbstone Setter with an eyepatch.

Pooch’s smile disappeared when he caught sight of Mother spitting fire from her eyeballs, and coming at him with a big broom in her hand. Once those straw bristles touched his butt, he was out the door lickety split.

We ate the leftover dressing and the pinto beans, which had been safe from the theiveing on top of the stove. Mother’s teeth were so clenched with madness, I’m still not sure how she got anything into her mouth. Dad, on the other hand, was trying not to laugh, and he looked like he was enjoying every bite of the scant Portions.

“Ain’t it surprisin’ how full we can get without eatin’ meat?” Dad says stuffing more beans into his mouth, his eyes pushed into a squint by his smiling cheeks.

“It ain’t funny, Wayne,” Mother says.

We all stayed quiet for a bit so Dad could concentrate on keeping his food in and his laugh from coming out. Then he mumbled out loud, “Guess we’re not saving any leftovers for Pooch.”

I couldn’t help it. I had to stick my head under the table and hold my breath to try to keep my own laugh from spewing across the table.

Dad leaned back in his chair, pushed his plate away, patted his belly, and said, “I ate so much I think I got a little pooch.” That’s all it took. My sides started to split right along with Dad’s. Delma giggled, and Mother, although she tried to hide it, was starting a grin all her own.

Pooch didn’t show up until later that night, when everything was calm again and the chicken and dressing had settled nicely in his belly.

Even though we had beans, cornbread, and dressing for Thanksgiving, it was Pooch who really celebrated the feast of the pilgrims. And, I think because of that, Pooch had given us a rare gift around the supper table: laughter.

Excerpt from No Hill for a Stepper (for those who have enjoyed these excerpts, remember you can order the novel on Amazon. 

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Daily word prompt:Portion

Madam Fannie defends her bordello

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The real Madam Fannie Porter made famous by harboring Butch Cassidy and his Wild Bunch

John opened the paper and tapped a small ad on page three. A glance down at the headlines, my smile faded.

The mayor already hated me. Now, he had new artillery.

Mayor Marshall Hicks, the blue-skin Presbyterian, and member of the Knights of Pythias who had taken an oath to abstain from vices. My bordello sat a mere block outside the district; a fact Dick-Hicks pointed out on a regular basis in his crock of shit. The mandate had been established only a year ago, six years after I opened the bordello.

“What is it, Sheriff?” Reba fiddled with the ties of her apron and remained a vigilant guard by the sink.

“San Antonio Women’s Club have asked the Women’s Christian Temperance Union to speak at a public forum,” he said.

“I believe in Lawd Jesus too, but them Thumpers from their Christ Union are full’a horse pucky and needs to mind their own business.”

The WCTU pledged to protect women by banning alcohol, as well as prostitution. Obviously, they’d never known a woman who could have Survived without my profession, me included.

At Madam Fannie’s Boarding House, my girls earned a good living and treated fairly. A client who forgot that rule or broke any others got a hard stare down the barrel of Reba’s Ratchet. Over the years, that shotgun proved well worth every cent we coughed up to buy it. When trouble knocked at our door, Ratchet made its point with one threatening crack.

Excerpt from The Last Bordello

Daily word prompt: Survive

 

 

Drinking to Dead Relatives

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Great Gatsby Franken-Farter stares at the creek. “I saw my aunt die.”

“I saw my grandpa die, too.” I remember Mama crying when she pulled the bed sheet over him and Daddy hugging her for a long time after. When they buried him, Scooter kept going back to the cemetery to see if Grandpa was sprouting from the dirt.

“Your grandpa. Was he run over by a get-away gangster, too? Like Aunt Sissy was? She didn’t Survive like your dog,” he says.

It sounds too horrible for truth. “Phonus balonus.”

“Suit yourself. You’re next?”

“Okay,” I say. But I won’t mention Miss Helen. I think for a while then decide to tell him another truth. “I’ve been Cooter Browned before,” I say, and almost taste the vomit-varnish from that night.

“Who?”

He’s not so smart after all.

“You know, I’ve been blotto before.”

His eyes crinkle when he laughs. “Let’s drink to that. Plenty of mornings I’ve had to chew my water. Tomorrow might be one of them.” He hands me the Mason jar.

I take it thinking it’s his way of making peace. I pretend to drink then hand it back.

“Where were you when you got drunk?” he says.

“At the carnival. Last weekend. The night Mama left.” I didn’t mean to say the last part. “I gotta go.”

Excerpt from The Moonshine Thicket

 

Fighting for rights

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A man, close to the front, pumped his fist. “My wife don’t have time for more learning. We got six kids needing supper on the table.”

A melee of querulous male voices erupted from the crowd.

“Why do women prostitute themselves to the abnormal passion of man?” Miss Fisher continued. “Because they are poverty-stricken, destitute above temptation and driven by necessity. They sell themselves, in marriage or out, for bread and shelter, for the necessities of life. How can we blame them? They have no other recourse but to live in a society that dictates what they, we, can and cannot do. To solve this problem, we demand that women be allowed to exercise their inherent, personal, citizen’s right to be a voice in the government, municipal, state, and national. Then, women will have the power to protect themselves.”

“We men protect our women just fine,” a voice shouted. Other men shouted their agreement.

Mayor Hicks stepped to the podium, his lips pursed. “Enough of your heckling. Save your disagreements for editorials in the newspapers. She has a right to free speech.”

“So do we,” someone boomed back.

The mayor banged a fist on the podium. “These women are invited guests. By God, we will show them our southern Hospitality.”

The raw egg came from nowhere. It narrowly missed the Mayor’s head before landing on the bandstand floor. He squinted, searching the crowd.

Poor Mrs. Fenwick held a shaky hand over her mouth.

Miss Fisher reached below the dais and pulled out a speaking trumpet. “The true relation of the sexes can never be attained until women are free and equal with man,” she continued, her determination thundering above the chaos.

The second egg hit the podium dead center.

Excerpt from The Last Bordello

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A bullet past an ear

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Cono and his grandfather, Ike

Further up on the right is another house. It looks kinda like an old Wayne Dennis house, falling down on one side. Car parts litter the front yard.

“Who lives there?” I say.

“Oh, some damn white man,” says Ike.

“Still like that Cherokee part ’a ye, huh Ike?”

“Damn straight.”

We get to the bar and meet Andres, Ike’s friend. “This here’s my grandson, Cono,” Ike says.

“Pleasure,” I say, shaking his hand.

The three of us sit down at a table for four and a short little old lady in a Pink uniform comes over to take our order.

“Bring us three Pearl beers,” says Ike.

“No beer fer me,” I say.

“Still not a drinker, Cono?”

“Still not,” I say.

“Sody Pop then?”

I turn to the waitress and say, “Ye got Nehi Grape?”

She nods and says, “Be right back.”

For eleven o’clock in the morning the place is busy. The early lunch crowd has come in. Andres starts to talk while Ike listens. And I’ll be damned, Ike’s twirling his index finger around his thumb. They say an apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. This is one habit Dad’s pulled down from his father, but as far as I can see, and unfortunately, the only one.

Ike starts to talk but Andres keeps saying, “What are you saying? I can’t hear.”

Finally, after gulping down his beer, Andres says, “Hell, let’s go someplace quiet where we can talk.” I pull out my wallet to pay but Ike says, “Put that away, Cono. You need ta save yer money.” I do as I’m told, grateful of the man beside me who appreciates my hard work.

Ike and me gulp down our drinks and head down the street to a little dive of a bar, a place that doesn’t sell food.

“This is better,” says Andres. We all sit down at a table and order another round from the bartender, the only person working here.

In the middle of cow talk, a man with a black mustache that matches the color of his eyes opens the door, pulls out a pistol, and shoots a bullet right past Ike’s ears and into the mirror behind the bar. The bartender pulls out his shotgun, aims it at the shooter and says, “Jose, you drop that gun right now. This ain’t no way to settle a bar tab.” The man backs down and yells something I don’t understand, and then he leaves.

As cool as a cucumber, Ike clicks the left side of his cheek, turns to Andres and says, “Ye got another quiet place ye wanna go?”

Excerpt from No Hill for a Stepper

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Trying to keep a straight spine

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In the glow of the kitchen lantern, I spotted the lone tear in Reba’s eye. “So, what’s now?” she asked.

“It’s only Temporary, Rebie. She’ll be back before we know it. I just hope the plan works. We’ll find out in the morning.”

“Fannie, notice how this catawampus started when the Wild Bunch come here?”

“How do you see that?”

Reba folded her hand. “Etta leaving with Sundance. That’s when Sadie’s trigger got pulled. Pushed her over that ledge.”

I shook my head. “It was before that.”

She glanced up at the ceiling. “Yes’m, suppose so. Plopped out in a cabbage patch with nobody around to comfort her ’cept for devil mother.”

“Rebie, we’ve all had our sorrows. Some just can’t seem to recover from them.”

“You dids, though. Came outta that orphanage with a straight spine.”

“It didn’t feel so straight at the time.”

“Mmm. Never does.”

Excerpt from:

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